As an ACT newbie, I'm a little nervous about the Science section. Do I need to study the scientific material that's on the test before I take it?
You only need to know very basic science for the ACT Science section (the type of science you probably learned in elementary school or from common sense). It's mostly about interpreting data logically and understanding scientific arguments. Reading skills are more important than Science skills on this section.
Rather than studying scientific information, you should take practice tests so that you get used to the way the Science section tests your reasoning abilities. This section often includes a lot of extraneous information that you don't need to fully understand in order to answer the questions. It's good to practice filtering out unnecessary clutter.