Deborah Bloomfield

New data from England and Wales has identified an increase in women seeking abortions after using “natural” birth control methods – things like menstrual cycle tracking, and systems that use body temperature fluctuations to predict fertility. These methods are known to be less effective than other options like hormonal contraceptives and condoms, so there was […]

At the center of almost every galaxy, there is a supermassive black hole. Well, astronomers think it’s every galaxy, but it is a difficult claim to confirm. Not because there might be many exceptions – the difficulty lies in the fact that many black holes are so well hidden that we wouldn’t know they are […]

Australia might be home to a large proportion of the world’s deadliest animals but it’s about to have three more. The iconic Sydney funnel-web spider, with one of the world’s deadliest bites, has been discovered to be three species instead of one, each with a separate geography to match. Considered the spider with the most […]

Scientists working at a crustacean laboratory in Singapore have discovered a new-to-science species of “supergiant” isopod, and it’s an absolute wedge. Known as bọ biển or “sea bugs” in Vietnam, its angular noggin has inspired an out-of-this-world species name: Bathynomus vaderi, after everyone’s favorite absent father figure, Darth Vader. B. vaderi is part of the […]

In 2008, a team of researchers studying deer and cattle found something a little unexpected. Both animals, when grazing or resting, appear to align their bodies in the north-south direction. Advertisement “Farmers and attentive nature and countryside observers know that most cattle and sheep, when grazing, face the same way,” the team explained in their […]

The Amazon river is the largest drainage system in the world in terms of water volume and its drainage basin. The 6,400 kilometer (4,000 mile) river flows from the Andes Mountains of Peru, crossing South America before emptying into the Atlantic Ocean. However, according to a surprising find in 2006 and subsequent geological studies, that […]

Researcher are forever finding and naming new-to-science species of dinosaurs, but it feels like we don’t speak as much about where new dinosaurs came from in the most literal sense. That is, when two dinosaurs wanted to make baby dinosaurs, how did they do it? Advertisement Dinosaur sex is something that science writer and palaeontologist […]

Gold, while deemed valuable by humans, isn’t that exciting as an element, being fairly unreactive with most of the other elements available to play around with. Advertisement Humans love the rare metal anyway, partly due to its rarity and unreactive nature making it an ideal element to use as currency, and its unique shiny color […]

Life is full of big decisions, and making a choice between seemingly endless options can be – well, paralyzingly hard. Should you buy this apartment, or that one? Share with this housemate, or someone else? Settle for Mr Pretty-Damn-Great, or hold out to see if Mr Perfect comes along? Advertisement It’s enough to make you […]

Welcome to 2025! A lovely year, filled with excellent things. Obviously, we’re not talking about the state of the planet – that’s pretty terrible, all things considered. But the math? That is delectable. Advertisement The geometry of 2025 Let’s start with arguably the simplest fact about this new year: 2025 is a perfect square. It’s […]

Animals and their offspring can either look like copy and paste versions, or have radically different appearances from each other. While clearing up some debris on the seafloor, NOAA got more than they bargained for with an adorable king crab baby hitchhiker.  Advertisement While working in the Gulf of Mexico during the summer in 2024, […]

The recent rise in popularity of the True Crime entertainment genre has demonstrated that some of us go giddy for gore and get a thrill out of scaring ourselves silly, which raises the question: why are so many of us drawn to the darker side? New research may have found an answer. Advertisement Content about […]

Dementia is a huge public health challenge, and the situation is expected to get even worse in the coming decades. New research predicts that by 2060, around a million US adults will develop dementia every year. In 2020, the figure was 514,000, highlighting the growing need for preventative measures and care strategies to protect this […]

The Mississippi River Delta is under siege – a multi-pronged attack of sediment erosion, rising sea levels, and flooding is putting immense strain on the wetlands between the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico, threatening the wildlife and millions of humans that call the region home. Advertisement The disappearance of Louisiana’s coastal wetlands is […]

It’s 2025 and high time you learned that just 3 percent of birds have penises. Perhaps a shocking statistic for we member-wielding mammals, but nowhere near as shocking as the genital ingenuity seen among the 3 percent of birds that do boast a penis. So gather round folks, and let’s go on exploration of avian […]

Delicately detailed tattoos have been discovered etched onto the bodies of 1,200-year-old mummies uncovered in Peru. Although the passing of centuries has faded these once-living artworks, new research is uncovering the remarkable skill and complexity with which they were created. Advertisement The body art is found on the mummified remains of individuals from the Chancay […]

As the Palisades, Eaton, and Hurst fires continue to burn through large areas of Los Angeles, millions of people are likely to be affected by the smoke generated by these urban blazes. Yet while the dangers of forest fire emissions are well documented, the composition of metropolitan wildfire smoke is something that scientists are just […]

The brains of people with aphantasia may have unusual wiring, according to new research. The study suggests that in people with the condition – which involves having no “mind’s eye”, or an inability to conjure up mental images – the brain’s visual cortex is still active and producing visual information. The only trouble is, these […]

Step inside London’s Grant Museum of Zoology and among the many things in jars you may spot a grass snake unlike any you’ve ever seen alive. Its flesh has turned see-through revealing a vibrant pink skeleton underneath, rib bones jutting out into tissue that has been transformed, how? Why, it’s the art of diaphonization. Advertisement […]

More than a hundred volcanoes lie beneath the Antarctic ice, and the release of some of the weight upon them could spur them into life. According to a new study, the danger of this depends on the rate at which their icy burden lightens. Advertisement Human-induced hotter temperatures are making a variety of natural disasters […]