Deborah Bloomfield

IFLScience was recently at the Open Day of the European Space Research and Technology Centre, which is seen as the technical heart of the European Space Agency (ESA). There, we had the opportunity to interview ESA astronaut Rosemary Coogan, who is part of the recently graduated Hopper class of astronauts. The name refers to their […]

The Big Bang and the age of the universe have plenty of evidence behind them, from the temperature of the cosmic microwave background to the measured expansion of the universe. Through a lot of work over the last century, we now believe the universe to be around 13.8 billion years old. But it would not […]

One too many bottles of red wine will leave most humans with a throbbing skull the following morning. However, a few unfortunate souls will develop a nasty headache after just consuming a small tipple of red wine, while other alcoholic beverages leave them feeling fine (if not pleasantly numbed).  There are a few ideas as […]

It’s been a bumper year for the manta ray with a brand new species added to the roster, and they’ve even been seen being used as scratching posts by Galapagos sharks. But the fun does not stop there, as new research has revealed that they are diving deeper than anyone thought. To learn more about […]

English physicist and science communicator Brian Cox has given some of his thoughts on comet 3I/ATLAS, the interstellar visitor currently hurtling its way through the Solar System. On July 1, 2025, astronomers at the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) spotted an object moving through the Solar System. That’s no surprise, given the name. What […]

How do you spot pregnant individuals in the archaeological record? With great difficulty, it turns out. But that could be about to change, as a test capable of identifying hormones in skeletons breaks new ground in our understanding of ancient pregnancy. For the first time, estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone have been detected in multiple human […]

While snooping around one of the world’s most remarkable archaeological sites, researchers peeled away layers of dusty earth to reveal a large, stony human face staring back at them. With further digging, archaeologists realized they had uncovered the first human face carved onto a T-shaped obelisk ever found at this magnificent site. The rest of […]

Adult women with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) receive their diagnosis on average five years later than men do, even when their symptoms arose at the same age and despite the fact that women’s symptoms tend to have a more negative impact on their wellbeing. New research looked at a sample of 900 adults with ADHD receiving […]

Bigfoot, Yeti, the Loch Ness Monster, Mothman, the list of cryptids goes on. But what exactly is cryptozoology, and how is it related to the “monsters” that we can’t explain? What is cryptozoology? Cryptozoology is the study of hidden or unknown animals, often referred to as cryptids. The field takes into account evidence from witnesses […]

A new study has looked into the so-called “red sky paradox” and the puzzling observation that intelligent life has sprung up on Earth so early in the Stelliferous Era of the universe. Analyzing the problems using Bayesian statistics, the suggested solutions are not pretty. The only intelligent life we have observed lives around a G-type […]

Uranus and Neptune are the two furthest planets in the Solar System and have been visited only once by human spacecraft – by Voyager 2 over 30 years ago – so there is a lot about them that we do not know. One thing we thought we knew, however, was what type of planet they […]

The effects of a COVID-19 infection can sometimes persist for months or years after the initial symptoms have gone, but could some of the impact even be transferred to the next generation? Scientists studying male mice infected with SARS-CoV-2 discovered that it could alter their sperm, leading to behavioral changes in their offspring. It remains […]

Usually, it’s the number of legs and that strange scuttling motion that sets off arachnophobes. But with all eight legs motionless when you find an unfortunate deceased spider behind the sofa, we ask the question: why do their legs curl up when they die?  The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign […]

If you only ever saw the leaves or flowers of the Decaisnea fargesii shrub, you might not be tempted to give it a second glance – they look a lot like plenty of other leaves and flowers do. But come the fall, something happens to this plant that you’d be hard-pressed to miss. It grows […]

The Earth’s magnetic field has a giant weak spot roughly aligned with the south Atlantic, and 11 years of observations show it has grown dramatically in that time. The cause of the South Atlantic Anomaly (SAA) is still debated, but the changes show it is dynamic on a relatively short timescale, considering evidence it has […]

In 1965, the US Air Force and the Lincoln Laboratory at MIT launched two Lincoln Experimental Satellites (LES) into orbit around the Earth: LES-1 and LES-2. These were the first super-high-frequency satellites, using the X-band of the electromagnetic spectrum. “Lincoln Laboratory’s space communications program after Project West Ford began in 1963 with a charter to […]

Declared extinct in the wild decades ago, a newborn Spix’s macaw hatchling at a European zoo is offering the species fresh hope. The Spix’s macaw (Cyanopsitta spixii) is a brilliantly blue parrot once native to the dry tropical forests of northeastern Brazil. With its vivid cerulean plumage and paler gray-blue head, this striking bird is […]

Interstellar object 3I/ATLAS is a comet and an extremely interesting one at that. Despite the overwhelming amount of evidence of its cometary nature, however, erroneous claims that it could be an alien spacecraft and even that the aliens have nefarious intentions* are getting a lot of media coverage. We thought, hey, if they are rolling […]

Every now and then, somebody with a lot more self-belief than is warranted will set out to the “end” of the Earth in order to “prove” we are living not on an oblate sphere, but a pancake. They have traveled to Antarctica for a “final experiment” and attempted to sail to the edge, always ending […]

Earth has reached its first climate tipping point, according to an official new update, marking a “new reality” for our natural world. The tipping point concerns the world’s warm-water coral reefs, which have recently been facing repeated, unprecedented die-offs due to relentlessly rising ocean temperatures. With global temperatures already about 1.4°C (2.52°F) above pre-industrial levels, […]