Deborah Bloomfield

Observations of the gravitational lensing of galaxies have thrown up a new mystery for our best understanding of cosmology; how galaxies are held together with dark matter. Advertisement In 1933, Swiss astronomer Fritz Zwicky studied the Coma Cluster – a large galaxy cluster more than 20 million light-years in diameter, containing thousands of galaxies – […]

A new study that left data to interact in a digital “primordial soup” has found that self-replicating patterns emerge. Advertisement In 1970, British mathematician John Horton Conway created a zero-player videogame, dubbed Conway’s Game of Life. The game takes place on a grid of squares, and the only input a user can have is setting […]

The internet is full of hacks and tips on how to best pack your suitcase for a vacation, but what about those of us who crave chaos? Is there a way to rationally and systematically fill a space in the worst way possible? The answer is yes – and thanks to a recent proof, we’re […]

When Elon Musk took over X (then known by the much more recognizable name of Twitter), he made a big deal out of getting rid of the bots. But nearly two years down the line, according to analysis by the Queensland University of Technology, bots are still very much active on the platform. X users […]

The animal kingdom is full of spectacularly colored creatures. From bright blue tarantulas to the stripes and spots on a tiger cat,  just about every kind of pattern and hue can be found somewhere. Problems arise, however, when those who admire these bright colors want a closer look. Research has revealed that a bat species […]

A new planet has been discovered that has the most elongated orbit of any of the 5,600 we have found. On top of that, it’s going the wrong way. Strange as this is, it could provide the missing link between planetary formation, and the category that made up most of our initial discoveries of planets […]

Springtime in Canada. Its large lakes have spent many many months completely frozen, but they are finally starting to thaw. From the shore it may not look like much, but a little prodding reveals that the ice is made up of tightly-packed, vertically floating candle-shaped ice sticks. Not something you see every day. Advertisement Candle […]

AI images are now omnipresent online. While some are absolutely ridiculous, dubbed by Gen Z and Gen Alpha as “Boomer Art”, others can fool even people paying close attention. This is particularly important when it comes to deep fakes, the made-up images of real people. Advertisement Counteracting the spread of these images is extremely important […]

The chopped-up carcass of a giant armadillo shows that humans were in South America much earlier than previously realized. Dating to around 21,000 years old, the butchered remains also show some of the earliest archaeological evidence of people in the southern stretches of the continent. The fossilized bones were discovered along the banks of the […]

A microcontinent has been discovered in the Davis Strait between Canada’s southeastern Baffin Island and southwestern Greenland. In a new study, researchers from the UK and Sweden mapped the microcontinent using gravity data, and seismic reflection data to create a plate tectonic reconstruction of the region. Advertisement Though the geology of the region has been […]

You’d think it’d be hard to lose something as large and with as many legs as a giant millipede – but lo and behold, scientists managed to do so with one species for 126 years. Luckily, it’s been found again in Madagascar’s Makira Forest, joined by 20 other lost species ranging from ant-like flower beetles […]

A start-up is literally making butter out of thin air. Using a host of biochemical wizardry, the company is developing ways to make fats out of carbon dioxide taken from the air and hydrogen from water, all without the need for animals, plants, or farmland. Advertisement The brains behind the initiative are called Savor, a […]

Astronomers have made new discoveries in the atmosphere of Venus, adding to the compelling complexity and debate over recent discoveries of the molecule phosphine there, and what it means. The unexpected presence of phosphine continues to perplex scientists, but the idea of life in the clouds of Venus continues to be a tantalizing possibility. Advertisement […]

The new trailer for Gladiator II is an absolute riot of glistening flesh and spilled bodily fluids, and while the movie itself may be historically dubious, it’s certainly true that the combatants of the Colosseum would have spent much of their lives coated in blood and sweat. Exactly what the ancient Romans did with all […]

Analysis of brain scan data from 4,757 children has revealed new insights into how sex and gender influence the human brain. The study team concluded that when it comes to how the brain is wired, sex and gender are two distinct things. In the past, there’s been too much of a focus on sex, they […]

NASA has stepped in to explain after reports of a “daylight fireball” flying over the Statue of Liberty in New York, USA. Advertisement On Tuesday, residents of New York reported a large fireball and an associated loud boom between 11:16 and 11:30 am. “As I was driving down on Rte 100, I suddenly saw this […]

Binge-watching TV shows, doom-scrolling on social media, excessive gaming. All these behaviors have been associated with being caught in a “dopamine trap”. But what does this mean and what is dopamine’s role in our compulsive behaviors? What is dopamine? Dopamine is one of the main signaling molecules in the brain. It is often sensationalized as […]

From the sandstone cliffs of continental Europe to the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, something has been leaving its dazzlingly geometric mark since the dawn of complex life. Despite finding thousands of these perfect honeycomb-shaped fossils, however, scientists are completely baffled as to what type of creature could possibly have been producing the patterns for […]

Traveling faster than the speed of light in a vacuum is impossible, according to Einstein’s theory of special relativity. Advertisement Particles without mass must travel at the speed of light, while any other object cursed with mass finds that it cannot approach 299,792,458 meters per second (983,571,056 feet per second) without expending infinite amounts of […]

It’s just as well a mission to Saturn’s moon Titan was confirmed this year, because the observations we have reveal the most Earth-like world we know still contains many mysteries. Just a month after evidence that waves on Titan are eroding the shorelines of its biggest lakes, a new study reports that even on its […]