Deborah Bloomfield

One minute you’re gently drifting off to sleep, and then the next, you’re suddenly jolted awake. No, you’ve not been betrayed by your cat leaping onto the bed or a particularly loud snore from your partner, but your own body. This is known as a hypnic jerk – but what exactly is it and why […]

In news your 8-year-old kid probably knew about weeks ago somehow, a new Minecraft rip-off is available to play online. In a surprising twist on the genre, every frame in this one is entirely generated by artificial intelligence (AI). The game, Oasis, lets players explore a 3D world filled with square blocks, mine resources, and […]

Across the globe great animal gatherings are taking place that make the footfall at a Taylor Swift concert look like a kid’s party. The motivations driving these mass gatherings can be the need to flee, feed, or… reproduce, and while the gatherings can be crucial for the survival of a species, there are some examples […]

The nēnē, or Hawaiian goose, is the world’s rarest goose, and can only be found living in the wild in one part of the planet: the Hawaiian Islands. There, the species was once on the brink of extinction – but it’s been making one hell of a comeback. The rarest goose Perhaps best known as […]

Yellowstone’s Isa Lake is a fairly unremarkable pond except for one unique quality: it’s the only lake in the world known to drain into both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Located in the Yellowstone National Park between the Old Faithful and West Thumb geyser basins, Isa Lake sits directly on the Continental Divide of North […]

The world’s largest coral colony has been discovered in the Solomon Islands, measuring a whopping 34 by 32 meters (112 by 105 feet). This thing is so huge it’s even visible from space, and yet it’s been hiding away from human eyes for around 300 years. The coral sits at a depth of 12 meters […]

To ask if a beam of light can make a shadow sounds like a sort of Zen paradox, but physicists have demonstrated the possibility. They used a laser beam to block another laser beam, albeit with some crystalline assistance. They say the work has the potential to allow one laser to control another, but if […]

Right now, space travel is limited to trained astronauts and cosmonauts, and the super-wealthy. This means there is little opportunity for having a little zero-g intercourse unless you don’t mind doing it in very close proximity to Jeff Bezos and Captain Kirk. However, that might not be the case forever. Assuming humanity survives for long […]

Should scientists have a role to play in public policy, and do you trust them to make decisions that are in the public’s interest? These are some of the questions at the heart of a new report by the Pew Research Center, which found that the majority of Americans have confidence in scientists, which has […]

Incredible footage shows the meeting of lava and snow as molten rock from an Icelandic volcano creeps across the snowy terrain.  The video was captured by Jeroen Van Nieuwenhove during the eruption of the Sundhnúkagígar Volcano in February 2024. The flurry of volcanic activity was associated with the larger Sundhnúkur eruptions of 2023–2024, which destroyed buildings […]

A bunch of startling and wild allegations were made in the latest US congressional committee on unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP), or UFOs as they’re more commonly known. While the public hearing suggests that attitudes on the subject are starting to change in the US government, evidence for some of the bolder claims was lacking.  The […]

Seven years ago, the world was both horrified and enthralled by the announcement of a giant “fatberg” in the London sewers composed of human waste, cooking fat, sanitary products and items that carry specific instructions not to be flushed. That case drew attention to a growing problem worldwide, but two chemical engineers think they have […]

Mesmerizing footage of a weedy seadragon carrying his eggs was recorded recently by a diver in Australia. Jules Casey, who regularly documents the incredible creatures she finds on her journeys around Australia’s coast, was diving at Flinders Pier on the Mornington Peninsula, south of Melbourne. Casey spotted two weedy seadragons (Phyllopteryx taeniolatus) and quickly realized […]

We do not know if there is life elsewhere in the universe. It is likely, given that we are here, that there are other beings out there too. We also do not know if the characteristics of our planet are the best there can be to make life – some might be better. However, a […]

Back in 2018, the world was briefly fascinated by the remains of a particular victim of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. Victims of the eruption suffered some of the most awful deaths imaginable – with such horrible deaths taking place, it’s hard for a single one to stand out as “unlucky”. But […]

Parts of the “Treasure of Villena” found in the Iberian Peninsula appear to have originated from space, new research has revealed. First discovered in 1963, the Treasure of Villena is a haul of 66 items largely made of gold and silver. The treasure – including bracelets, bowls, bottles, and other ornaments – was a significant […]

China has unveiled the design for its new reusable space shuttle, set to ferry cargo between Earth and the country’s Tiangong Space Station. While we hear a lot about the International Space Station (ISS), it’s not the only science laboratory orbiting our planet. China operates the smaller Tiangong Space Station, which launched its core module […]

A team of astronomers believe they have found a black hole in the early universe gobbling down matter at a rate of 40 times greater than the Eddington limit. The team, led by International Gemini Observatory and NSF NOIRLab astronomer Hyewon Suh, took a look at a sample of galaxies from the Chandra X-ray Observatory’s […]

The deep sea is home to a lot of weird creatures. Some are brand new species living in the midnight zone, while others are recorded visiting the depths of the ocean in something of a surprising move. The deep sea gives rise to all sorts of adaptations and in the case of this recently recorded […]

In 1903, the Wright brothers made the first sustained human flight, flying the first plane above Kitty Hawk, North Carolina for a then-impressive 12 seconds. Before that, on November 21, 1783, in Paris, France, the first hot air balloon ride took place.  But there were other attempts at flight that came before that – and […]