Deborah Bloomfield

Just a few weeks ago, the United States grew in size by 1 million square kilometers (more than 386,000 square miles) – that’s almost twice the area of Spain. The unexpected growth spurt was not the result of strange geological forces, nor the invasion of a foreign land, but the States attempting to lay claim […]

The final hurdle to retrieving the full sample of asteroid Bennu collected by OSIRIS-REx – the first asteroid return sample in US history – has at last been overcome. NASA technicians have been able to successfully remove the two fasteners from the sampler head that have been preventing them from opening the canister fully since […]

A long-lost species of orchid had scientists scrambling over the summit of Mount Nok on Waigeo – a remote island in West Papua, Indonesia – in the hopes of tracking it down. The successful expedition not only rediscovered the blue beauty Dendrobium azureum, but also stumbled upon a new-to-science species that was bright red. The […]

Life on our planet has been going on for several billion years. Young stars have had a privileged position in our search for life elsewhere. After all, it’s easier to compare past and present than to speculate about the future. However, research has shown that we shouldn’t discard older stars as hosts of life-bearing planets, […]

When we think of galaxies, we often think of bright spiral galaxies full of stars and gas – but some galaxies have very few stars and look quite different. These are known as low-surface-brightness galaxies. They tend to have a lot more dark matter than regular galaxies like our own, and the normal matter they […]

Their roots might be buried in soil or sand, but as for the rest of a tree, we generally think of it as sticking out quite a lot. However, in the remote and nutrient-poor Kalahari sands of Angola, life works pretty differently: research in the region has uncovered two new tree species that are nearly […]

For the curious (something we always encourage here at IFLScience), there are few places better to look for interesting stories than the Case Reports section of a medical journal. Whether it’s the tale of an 8-centimeter (3.1-inch) live worm being pulled from a woman’s brain, or a whole new reason to be frightened of sneezing, […]

China’s Zhurong rover was the first Chinese mission to land on Mars, exploring one of the Red Planet’s largest impact basins: Utopia Planitia. This area was first visited by Viking 2 in 1976 and thanks to decades of technological advancement, Zhurong has delivered new insights into the planet’s make-up. It turns out, the rover found […]

A mere 200 million years ago, the supercontinent of Pangea split apart and created the continents we see on Earth today, separated by vast oceans. It’s easy to think these mighty landmasses are here to stay, but it’s likely that another supercontinent will grace our planet in the future.  It’s very hard to predict what […]

A “broken heart” is something we all understand as a figure of speech – a poetic way to describe the almost physical sensation of grief that comes with losing a loved one. But new research out of Shanghai suggests that having a sibling die in childhood or young adulthood really can have adverse effects on […]

The ocean is full of some of the most weird and wonderful creatures Earth has to offer, from the cutie patootie that is the dumbo octopus to the horrifying deep-sea football of your nightmares. While whales might be busy creating Fibonnaci spirals, one diver was lucky enough to see a larval form of a tripod […]

“I checked it very thoroughly,” said the computer, “and that quite definitely is the answer. I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you’ve never actually known what the question is.” “But it was the Great Question! The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything,” howled Loonquawl. Advertisement “Yes,” said […]

This article first appeared in Issue 15 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS.  Boxing and cheerleading collide in the case of the pom-pom crab (Lybia edmondsoni). Also known as the boxer crab, it has evolved to use the stinging power of anemones to its advantage by holding the venomous species Triactis producta in each claw. Advertisement […]

Papua New Guinea might account for less than 1 percent of Earth’s land area, but what it lacks in size, it more than makes up for in biodiversity. The latest discovery to be made in its remote forests comes in the form of nine new species of land snail with a small size but a […]

Two teams of astronomers have found direct evidence that when a star goes supernova, it leaves behind a neutron star or a black hole. These are compact objects of extreme density; a teaspoon of neutron star material has the weight of a mountain, and nothing can escape a black hole. Their formation has long been […]

By meshing together real heart tissue and sophisticated soft robotic technology, scientists have created a biorobotic heart that beats like a living organ. The model captures the complexity of a human heart in a way that has not been possible until now, and could be a game-changer when it comes to trying out new treatments […]

A new gland-like strand has been discovered in the curious jaws of saber-toothed frogs. These anurans are nicknamed for the bony protrusions that sit on their lower jaws, and new research suggests they may be packing a surprising form of chemical communication that gets under the frogs’ skin. There are five species of saber-toothed frogs […]

Standing over 3 meters (nearly 10 feet) tall, Gigantopithecus blacki was the largest species of primate to ever walk the Earth (at least that we know of). This elusive beast stomped around modern-day China until it fell into extinction between 295,000 and 215,000 years ago under mysterious circumstances. In a new study, scientists investigate why […]

WASP-69b is an exoplanet that has just 30 percent of Jupiter’s mass, but is 10 percent larger. This world is dramatically puffed-up because it orbits very close to its star, completing an orbit in just 3.9 days. And its inflated layers are not staying put – the stellar wind is eroding them, creating a comet-like […]

If you’ve ever watched Hayao Miyazaki’s Ponyo, you will have seen the pop pop boat in action. The children’s toy uses the heat from a candle to power an engine that propels the boat forward. They’re pretty neat as children’s toys, but what is far cooler, of course, is creating pop pop boat so large […]