Have you ever wondered how woodpeckers pound away without breaking their neck? We’ve got the answer—plus, why this flu season has broken a record, how AI is learning to predict disease from your sleep, and what CES 2026 showed about the biggest tech trends, including “physical AI” in the form of robots and other devices.

Recommended Reading:

This Year’s Flu Season Just Surpassed a Grim New Record

Harsh Flu Season May Be Driven by New Variant K

How Woodpeckers Turn Their Entire Bodies into Pecking Machines

At CES 2026, AI Leaves the Screen and Enters the Real World

Stevie Wonder’s Rule for AI at CES: ‘Make Life Better for the Living’

E-mail us at sciencequickly@sciam.com if you have any questions, comments or ideas for stories we should cover!

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Science Quickly is produced by Kendra Pierre-Louis, Fonda Mwangi, Sushmita Pathak and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura, with fact-checking by Jennifer Hackett, Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith.

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Woodpeckers Rock the Lab, AI Steps Out of the Chat Box, and Flu Hits Hard