Tomorrow’s the day if you want to have the best possible chance of gazing upon the green spectacle of Comet Nishimura. You’ll need to be prepared for an early start, but this comet takes 437 years to do a lap of the Solar System, so we really are talking about a once in a lifetime […]
Ethiopia’s Controversial Megadam Threatens A Water War With Egypt
Ethiopia has completed the final phase of filling a reservoir for its highly controversial hydroelectric dam on the Blue Nile River, much to the annoyance of Egypt who fear it could sever them from the Nile’s precious waters. Fueled by climate change and ongoing geopolitical tension, it’s often been said that the problem of water […]
Blood Rain: Brits Wake Up To Weird Layer Of Dust Covering Their Cars
Over the weekend, a lot of people living in the UK woke up and found their cars were dirtier than they would usually be. Brits found a layer of dust covering their vehicles or windows. The dust, of course, did not target cars but cars are especially good at showing up the dirt. Advertisement ⓘ IFLScience […]
Perseverance Produces Enough Oxygen To Keep Small Dog Alive For 10 Hours On Mars
NASA’s Perseverance rover has now produced enough oxygen to keep a small dog alive on Mars for 10 hours, NASA has announced, despite no plans to weird a dog out shortly before its demise. When Perseverance landed on Mars in February 2021, it took with it the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE) aimed […]
Movement Detected On The Moon Appears To Be Coming From The Apollo 17 Lander
In the 1970s, astronauts placed three seismometers on the lunar surface, to collect data between October 1976 and May 1977. A new study has looked at this seismograph data, discovering that some of the repeating tremors appear to be coming from the Apollo 17 lander. When earthquakes occur on Earth, waves of energy are sent […]
World’s Largest Lithium Trove Found Under Ancient Volcano In US
The planet’s largest-known lithium deposit may have been found hiding beneath an ancient supervolcano along the Nevada–Oregon border in the US. Given the skyrocketing demand for lithium, this deposit could be a treasure trove – although obtaining it could come with a bunch of challenges and dangers. An estimated 20 to 40 million metric tons […]
Unprecedented 24,000-Year-Old Paleolithic Art Sanctuary Found In Spain
The largest collection of prehistoric cave art in Eastern Iberia has been discovered in a cavern in Spain’s Valencia region. Consisting of over 100 images, the extensive array of engravings and paintings features at least 19 different animals and has been dated to over 24,000 years old. Found in a cave known as Cova Dones, […]
The Closest Black Holes To Earth Could Be Inside Famous Hyades Star Cluster
Evidence has been found of black holes a tenth of the distance of the previous closest observation to Earth. Moreover, unlike previous discoveries, this is one where anyone with access to moderately dark skies can stick out their finger and say, “They’re there.” The Hyades Star Cluster is overshadowed in the public mind by the […]
Ever Wonder How Your Body Turns Food Into Fuel? We Tracked Atoms To Find Out
Inside our bodies at every moment, our cells are orchestrating a complex dance of atoms and molecules that uses energy to create, distribute and deploy the substances on which our lives depend. And it’s not just in our bodies: all animals carry out this dance of metabolism, and it turns out none of them do […]
India’s Aditya-L1 Probe Takes Its First Image Of Earth And The Moon On The Way To The Sun
After lifting off last Saturday, India’s solar probe has now sent back some remarkable images of the Earth and Moon, as well as a cheeky selfie. Advertisement The two images were taken on September 4 by a camera mounted on Aditya-L1, with the most striking picture showing the Moon as a tiny speck beside the […]
Discover The Bizarre Life In Movile Cave: A World Sealed Off For 5 Million Years
Cut off from the rest of the world 5.5 million years ago, the Movile Cave has developed a unique and bizarre ecosystem like no other place on Earth. Sitting a few miles from the Black Sea coast in Romania, the cave is one of the most isolated places on the planet, having been sealed off […]
Earth’s Core Appears To Be Encased By An Ancient Mysterious Structure
Through the science of seismic imaging, researchers have revealed that an ancient ocean floor may be wrapped around the Earth’s core. The layer in question sits at the core-mantle boundary (CMB), the region inside the Earth at which the molten outer core meets the silicate rock mantle, around 2,900 kilometers (1,800 miles) below the surface. […]
We Could Soon Be Getting Energy From Solar Power Harvested In Space
The idea of space-based solar power (SBSP) – using satellites to collect energy from the sun and “beam” it to collection points on Earth – has been around since at least the late 1960s. Despite its huge potential, the concept has not gained sufficient traction due to cost and technological hurdles. Can some of these […]
Devastating Earthquake Hits Morocco Killing Over 600, Damage Reported In Historic Regions
At least 632 people have died following a powerful earthquake that struck Morocco’s High Atlas mountains late on Friday night. The earthquake hit just after 23:00 local time and measured 7.2 on the Richter scale according to Morocco’s geophysical center, categorizing it as a major earthquake event. Approximately 10 to 20 such major earthquakes occur […]
Where Are All The Supermassive Black Holes?
Supermassive black holes are found at the center of almost every galaxy, and when they get enough material around them they enter a feeding frenzy phase we call an active galactic nucleus, or AGN. There was an expectation that when the universe was more active in the past, with enhanced star formation and galaxy mergers, […]
Is Your Relationship “Enmeshed”? New Questionnaire Measures Individuality In Relationships
Romantic relationships are known to have many benefits, but they can sometimes also threaten a person’s sense of independence, individuality, and autonomy. Now, researchers have developed a quick questionnaire to measure levels of individuality in your relationship, which can help develop healthier dynamics. What is individuality in a relationship? Most adults will experience at least […]
We’re In A “Golden Age” Of Near-Future Space Exploration But It’s Not Star Trek – Yet
September 8 is Star Trek Day, the 57th anniversary of the first broadcast of the groundbreaking original television series. IFLScience recently attended Destination Trek in the UK to speak with Chris Lee, the first Chief Scientist at the UK Space Agency. The challenge we put to him is how he envisions the near future of […]
The First Bamboo Bloom In 120 Years Could Spell Disaster, A New Language Is Forming In Miami, And Much More This Week
This week India’s Chandrayaan-3 lander seems to be detecting movement from beneath the Moon’s surface, a few simple hacks could improve the Wi-Fi connection in your home, and an “Earth-sized planet” may be hiding in the solar system. Finally, we investigate why Neil Armstrong’s Moon poop is so important. Subscribe to the IFLScience newsletter for […]
Crows Hold “Funerals” For Their Dead, But The Service Can Get Weird
Crows have a peculiar response to death. Folklore states they hold court to decide an individual bird’s capital fate, likely spurred on by observations of groups of crows – that come with the goth collective noun of “a murder of crows” – standing around a dead bird. This does happen but not in the way […]
Can Ancient Ice Help Us Predict The Future?
Sometimes, in order to predict what might happen in the future, you need to be familiar with what came before. Predicting how our planet responds to the climate changes brought forward by humans is a difficult job – but so very important. One approach that researchers are taking is studying the climate of ages past, […]
