Deborah Bloomfield

Periodically throughout the year terms like equinox and solstice get banded around, with some people even going so far as to celebrate the summer solstice, or wish you a happy solstice in much the same way as other more well-known celebrations. But what actually is a solstice and an equinox and how are they different […]

With excitement for next month’s total solar eclipse building, many authorities across the path of totality are preparing for an influx of visitors, putting out warnings to residents to expect disruption. One of the latest comes from a Texas judge, who has urged pet owners to make sure that they’re stocked up on supplies for […]

Seven states are trying to broker a deal on how to divide up the dwindling waters of the Colorado River. However, different factions of squabbling states have their own visions on how to make the plan work – and no one wants to pull the short straw.  The Colorado River Basin covers around 673,396 square […]

Scientists with the IceCube collaboration have finally been able to detect a special type of neutrino coming from the universe. The tau neutrino was only discovered in the year 2000 and it has never been seen from an astrophysical source. Now, researchers report the detection of seven possible candidate events. There are three types of […]

A strange video that appears to show an eel shedding off a rather nice striped sweater has been doing the rounds on TikTok, and the video’s twist ending has got a lot of people thoroughly confused, concerned, and disgusted. The video, which is filmed beside a rocky coral bank on the seabed, shows what looks […]

A distressing story has resurfaced on various news outlets over the last few days, concerning a man who was swallowed up by a sinkhole in Florida on March 1, 2013.  Jeff Bush, 37, was asleep when a sinkhole opened up beneath his home in Seffner, Florida. The hole – about 6 meters (20 feet) across […]

Archaeologists have used the Iliad, an Ancient Greek epic poem written in 800 BCE set towards the end of the legendary Trojan War, as a guide to locate shipwrecks off the coast of Greece. Researchers from Greece’s National Research Foundation and the Ministry of Culture used various historical sources to locate 10 shipwrecks that sunk […]

This coming weekend the Moon will experience an eclipse, and in less than three weeks the Sun will be eclipsed by the Moon. The best views for both will be in the Americas, but you might be wondering what the view would look like if you were not on Earth but on the Moon. The […]

The seemingly inevitable has been confirmed: 2023 was the hottest year on record by a massive margin. Oh, but that’s not all – last year also witnessed record-breaking levels of greenhouse gas concentrations, sea level rise, ocean heat and acidification, Antarctic sea ice cover, surface temperatures, and glacier retreat. The findings come from the latest […]

In a statement released on Monday, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it had finalized a ban on the last remaining form of asbestos – a group of cancer-causing minerals – used in the United States. Though the use of asbestos in the US has been in decline for decades, previous attempts to ban […]

Packaged meats aren’t particularly appealing, often bearing witness marks of the journey they’ve been on from farm to fridge in the form of gloopy residue. Tempting as it is to clean it off, should you wash chicken before cooking it?  The science says you could be making things worse. Advertisement Why is raw chicken dangerous? […]

After 71 years, Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks has reached magnitude 5, the traditional point where an object is considered to be visible without binoculars or telescopes. You’ll still need particularly fortunate conditions to spot it with eyes alone, however, although even small instruments will shift the odds very much in your favor. Pons-Brooks is a member of […]

A perplexing illness that began striking US overseas diplomats in 2016 did not leave any lasting traces of brain damage, according to the findings of two new brain-imaging studies. Popularly known as Havana syndrome, the strange condition typically involves dizziness, headaches, and blurred vision among other neurocognitive symptoms, yet the cause of the illness remains […]

Schools in a Texas district will close for the 2024 eclipse, following warnings from local emergency management officials. The last total solar eclipse over the US was pretty spectacular, as anyone who saw it will attest. Looking at the photos, it’s hard to imagine how the sight could have been improved upon in the eclipse […]

Scientists in Brazil have engineered a cow to produce human insulin in its milk, making history as the world’s first transgenic cow capable of such a feat. Though still a long way off, the researchers hope that this bovine breakthrough could open doors for sustainable insulin production and help tackle the world’s insulin supply problems. […]

Efforts to save endangered species often call for an army of volunteers – but one zoo’s conservation program is showing how an air force can be just as useful. A range of innovative applications of drone technology could be the difference between survival and extinction (at least in the wild) for many species. Australia has […]

Elon Musk’s space company SpaceX is working on a classified project for the US Government, according to a new report from Reuters.  The firm, responsible for internet-providing satellite network Starlink, signed a $1.8 billion classified contract with an unknown government agency in 2021, as reported by the Wall Street Journal.  Advertisement Musk confirmed in 2023 […]

A new simulation challenges the way we picture one of the most famous stars in the night sky. Betelgeuse is among the top 20 brightest stars (although occasionally it is not) and is a red supergiant, the final stage of stellar evolution leading into a supernova. We usually picture stars as big plasma balls – […]

Sometimes it pays off to have a second look at something even over 100 years later. The fossil remains of a marine reptile that lived 247 million years ago have been re-examined 106 years after it was first described. The researchers have concluded that this means Trachelosaurus fischeri is the world’s oldest long-necked marine reptile.  Trachelosaurus […]

Rinsing out your sinuses can be part of ritual ablution, and might also be useful when you have a blocked nose. However, a new study has illustrated the importance of using sterile liquids to do so, as people using unsterilized tap water can become ill with a rare type of amoeba infection. Amoeba species like […]