Deborah Bloomfield

In an effort to get in before the damage starts, 25 experts from many fields have released proposed guidelines on ethical research in space by commercial operators. They note that with private flights to space expected to rise almost as fast as the rockets themselves, not everyone going into space will be a tourist. If […]

Home to some of the planet’s oddest animals, not to mention 11 percent of the global population, islands are among the most diverse and exciting places on Earth. Here, you can find a rundown of the largest islands by landmass.  Before arguments break out in the comments, we’re not counting continental landmasses, so that excludes […]

Even if you are a gigantic fan of Pokémon, there’s an episode of the cartoon it’s unlikely you’ve seen. On December 16, 1997, Dennō Senshi Porygon aired in Japan for its first and final showing. The episode – which roughly translates as “Computer Warrior Porygon” – sees Pikachu, Ash, et al. deal with a faulty […]

The most massive stars in the universe end their lives in supernovae, explosions that tear them apart. But for stars that aren’t quite so big, they end their lives not with a bang, but a whimper. Stars like our Sun will eventually turn into extremely hot white dwarfs, shedding most of their mass and then […]

Möbius strips are fun geometrical shapes that only have one side. Take a strip of paper – it’s got a front and a back. Now twist it and glue the two short edges together. Suddenly there is no front or back. You could draw a line across its whole surface without having to lift the […]

The tobacco mosaic virus was the first virus to be discovered by science. Viruses have been around for billions of years, but they were only scientifically described towards the end of the 19th century. Even then, it took decades of work to fully get to grips with these baffling “invisible” agents.  The first step in […]

Planet Earth is back for a third series as David Attenborough and the BBC Natural History Unit combine to tell the stories of some of Earth’s most intriguing species, spectacular landscapes, and the curious science behind it all. Filmed over the course of five years, Planet Earth III employed the help of drones, highspeed cameras, […]

Thousands of DNA cutters, akin to the bacterial enzymes used in the gene-editing system CRISPR, have been discovered in a diverse host of species, including snails, algae, and amoeba. The finding proves that the proteins, called Fanzors, are widespread in eukaryotes – the group of organisms that comprises fungi, plants, and animals – and have […]

Despite the phase-out of leaded gasoline, exposure to lead is still having a massive impact on the hearts and minds of the world’s population. As per new research, the current impact of lead poisoning is far greater than previously thought, accounting for 5.5 million cardiovascular disease deaths and 765 million lost IQ points in 2019. […]

In the heart of the Sahara, an area that is now in southwestern Libya, a great empire built a city and towns. These represent the oldest known example of a large permanent human population living without access to a river or lake. Their success, now being explained, is a testimony to human ingenuity – and […]

Lying beneath Africa and the Pacific in the lowermost part of the Earth’s mantle, surrounding the Earth’s core, there are two gigantic blobs that occupy around 3 to 9 percent of the volume of the Earth. There are of course no direct ways of seeing the Earth’s core, at least without being burned to a […]

Meet Barnard 68, which – if the Internet is to be believed (which it’s not) – is “an empty void in space so big that if you traveled across it you wouldn’t bump into anything for 752,536,988 years”. While it’s smart not to specify a speed (hey, it’s technically true that if you traveled at […]

Centenarians, once considered rare, have become commonplace. Indeed, they are the fastest-growing demographic group of the world’s population, with numbers roughly doubling every ten years since the 1970s. How long humans can live, and what determines a long and healthy life, have been of interest for as long as we know. Plato and Aristotle discussed […]

Every now and then on the Internet, people discover something about food that they thought everyone already knew. Hey, we’re all learning, right? Recently it was the turn of paprika and all spice, but now it’s our old friend Parmesan cheese under the spotlight. Parmesan is traditionally made from cow’s milk, aged for at least 12 months in […]

It turns out the buff-tailed bumblebee is buff by name *and* nature, with researchers discovering that it has a surprisingly effective method for fighting off Asian hornets. In the blue corner Asian hornets are the menaces of the natural world, having invaded three continents and reaching a record level of sightings across the UK and […]

Just outside of Edinburgh, Scotland are the slopes of Arthur’s Seat, a small mountain once created by a now-extinct volcano. Rumored to have once been the site for King Arthur’s Camelot, the location is steeped in historical lore and mystery.  In 1836, a group of young boys were out on a rabbit hunt in the misty […]

We might think that the rules of DNA are set in stone, but the genetic code of a microscopic organism found in a park pond in Oxford, UK, has once again proven that science is always changing. The discovery was quite unexpected – Dr Jamie McGowan and a team of researchers from the Earlham Institute […]

Neanderthals were just as intelligent as Homo sapiens – that’s the conclusion of research that, based on more than 20 years worth of excavations, demonstrates our ancient cousins knew how to control fire and used it to cook food. It’s perhaps not that surprising given what we already know about the extinct hominins. In the last […]

Breast cancer is often thought of as a “female” disease – but that’s not the case. Moobs, a new organization launched in the UK, aims to challenge these preconceptions, raising awareness of male breast cancer and providing support to those diagnosed. Breast cancer can affect anyone Although males might not have “boobs” in the typical […]