Deborah Bloomfield

Scientists in China have begun digging a 10,000-meter (32,808 feet) hole into the Earth, the deepest ever attempted in the country. Digging down through 10 layers of rock, the team hopes to reach rocks from the Cretaceous Period, the layer known as the Cretaceous System, which dates back up to 145 million years. The project, […]

The term “sundowning” is sometimes used to describe a tendency for people living with dementia to become more confused in the late afternoon and into the night. At the outset, I should emphasise the term “sundowning” is overly simplistic, as it’s a shorthand term that can encompass a vast number of behaviours in many different […]

On February 5, 1971, Apollo 14 touched down on the Moon. As well as equipment for attempting to determine the internal structure of our satellite, and to measure the composition of the lunar atmosphere, the astronauts took with them a six-iron golf club head and some golf balls. The head had been attached to the […]

A few years ago, a man named Jack Garman passed away. You might not have heard of him, but he had a pivotal role to play in the Apollo 11 lunar landing. And it culminated in a single word that meant the landing could go ahead. Back in 1969, John “Jack” Garman was working at […]

A recently resurfaced video by a college math instructor has introduced people to an easier way of adding and subtracting large numbers. Howie Hua shared the trick with his followers on Twitter, explaining that it is sometimes easier to add and subtract by going left to right, rather than right to left as taught in […]

Doctors have claimed yet another person with HIV appears to be in long-term remission, meaning they are effectively “cured” of the dreadful virus. Known as the “Geneva Patient,” the man is the sixth person with HIV to be declared in long-term remission.  The news of the sixth patient was announced by the Hôpitaux Universitaires de […]

A new venomous whip snake just dropped, although really it is an old one that no one noticed before, mistaking it for familiar species. The desert whip snake (Demansia cyanochasma) has been scientifically distinguished from other whip snakes for the first time. If you’re thinking this is another reason to never visit Australia, or at least […]

A space rock found in Somalia has been found to contain at least two minerals not found before in nature and only previously known to have been produced artificially. It’s not quite the asteroid that gave Wakanda its vibranium, but for geologists, it might be even better. Since these discoveries were made using a single […]

It’s 2023 and high time you knew that you can hear bees ejaculate. The “pop” of bee copulation is caused by the explosive way in which they transfer sperm, and if it makes you uncomfortable you should know that the male drone is left feeling a lot worse. Drones, which are male bees, come into […]

Carbon-rich dust grains have been detected in the first billion years of the cosmos for the first time. The discovery is another important insight into what the universe was like during its infancy, although it is currently not clear what kind of molecule the researchers are looking at. In the recent universe, up to roughly […]

Sabertooth cats were prowling around much of the world around 6-7 million years ago during the Pliocene, with fossils of many different species found across Africa, China, Europe, and North America. Now, scientists have examined one of the world’s largest collections of Pliocene fossils and found two new species.  The fossil collection has come from […]

One cosmologist has claimed the universe is almost twice as old as conventional estimates, and his claims have attracted plenty of attention. The proposition would upend not just the timing of everything, but a great deal of what we think we know about the universe’s development. However, he’s not even close to convincing his peers. […]

Have you ever phubbed your marital partner? It’s ok, this is a safe space. You can tell us. If so, you might want to think about quitting, because a new study has found that regular phubbing is bad news for a happy marriage. If you’ve no idea what we’re talking about, read on and all […]

Space junk is a growing issue. From large chunks of rockets to specks of paint, the orbits around Earth are filled with garbage – garbage that moves faster than a bullet and poses a risk to astronauts and other satellites. The number of satellites is growing massively, year on year. Just five years ago, there […]

An untouched archaeological discovery has been unearthed (literally) in Siberia. Thought to be the skeleton of a charioteer due to a metal object found with the remains, this raises the question about whether horse-drawn chariots had been used in the region.  The remains, thought to be around 3,000 years old, were found together with a […]

The ocean’s apex predators have been getting a bad rap recently – first, they were exposed for attacking boats in Europe and then an unflattering story about salmon hats came out. Now, in a further reminder they are not to be messed with, it’s been revealed that post-menopausal orca moms protect their sons from fights […]

On July 13, an asteroid passed the Earth at a distance of 100,000 kilometers (60,000 miles). Not only was humanity entirely unaware it was coming, no one even noticed until two days later.  If this had been something too small to do damage – like the famous “half-a-giraffe” that may have slashed down off Iceland […]

Depending on who you listen to, coffee is either a superfood (well, superdrink) or a health hazard, yet a remarkable new study demonstrates that store-bought Java beans can be used to disrupt the formation of protein plaques that contribute to the development of Alzheimer’s disease. And while the experiments were conducted in a petri dish, […]

This summer, Indiana “Indy” Jones returns to the silver screen in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, the final installment of this decades-long cinematic saga. Since his first outing in Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indy’s whip-cracking adventures have been a source of entertainment and inspiration for many people – there are few who cannot […]

Think you know why people cheat, how they feel about it, or the impact it might have on their relationship? You might want to think again if a recent study, which casts doubt on common cheating assumptions, is anything to go by.  “Findings from this study challenge widely held notions about infidelity experiences,” its authors […]