Deborah Bloomfield

Here are a few problems which probably won’t affect you unless you work at NASA: hydrogen burns with a very pale blue flame that is almost invisible in daylight, hydrogen is highly flammable, and hydrogen tends to leak through the tiniest of cracks. “That makes it a hazard, as the element is highly flammable, to […]

An advert for mobile phones recorded in the 1940s has recently been unearthed by Open Culture. It shows a working mobile phone, long before the iPhone or the 80s Wall Street guy brick. The advert begins by attempting to explain the benefits of being able to communicate while on the move. Advertisement “Here comes a […]

This article first appeared in Issue 2 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS.  There are few simple questions out there that can shake the foundations of science like “when does a theory become a fact?” A scientist like Stephen Hawking will tell you that it never does, that all scientific theories are just observations of […]

There’s no reasonable way to say this without sounding like a conspiracy theorist, but if you turn over a lot of bollards in London, UK, you will find that a surprising number of them are cannons. Granted, any number of cannons above zero is a surprising number of cannons to find embedded in the sidewalk, […]

Scientists respond to handwringing about our failure to find evidence for life beyond the Solar System by pointing out how limited our searches so far have been. Even if our instruments have picked up a signal, however, we may have overlooked it using decades-old algorithms to comb the data. That idea has become more plausible […]

Shark fans, look away: it seems some of us may have been unknowingly eating some of the oceans’ most remarkable and endangered apex predators. A new study used DNA barcoding to analyze the contents of “flake” –  an umbrella term used for fish fillets – sold across South Australia, and found that much of the […]

On Halloween day 1941, the 14-year long effort to carve 18-meter (60-foot) tall faces into the side of Mount Rushmore was finally completed. Forming the iconic Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota, the structure displays the profiles of US presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. But did you know behind […]

Near Laguna, Brazil, bottlenose dolphins have formed a rare alliance thought to have lasted 140 years with humans using hand-thrown fishnets. A study confirms that the collaboration benefits both mammal partners, but outside forces are destroying the conditions that make it possible. Large schools of mullet (Mugil liza) migrate along the east coast of South […]

In sad news for fans of urban folklore, Bigfoot could actually be several hundred black bears, a new analysis suggests. It seems people across North America may have been mistaking the American black bear (Ursus americanus) for everyone’s favorite giant hairy ape-like creature all these years. The analysis, poetically titled “If it’s there, could it […]

A new study has highlighted just how much people may not know their own IQ, finding the largest disparities in young men and older women. Looking at both intelligence quotient (IQ) and emotional quotient (EQ), the results showed that younger males think their scores are significantly higher than they actually are; but, as we age, […]

Everybody loves a harebrained get-rich-quick scheme, but if there’s one that has to top the “Absolutely Not” charts it’s surely necropants. The pants, also known in legend as nábrækur or nábrók, were rumored to bring the wearer of a pair of human-leg-skin trousers riches, but only if you followed a strict set of instructions. The […]

People are exposed to numerous chemicals throughout their lifetimes. These chemicals can be from the air, foods, personal care items, household products and medications. Unfortunately, exposure to certain chemicals can cause harmful health effects, including cancer. Substances that cause cancer are called carcinogens. Familiar examples include tobacco smoke, radon, asbestos and diesel engine exhaust. To […]

In 1897, mining engineer and archaeologist Jacques de Morgan made a map of several catacombs at Anubis, North Saqqara, Egypt. On this map was the first modern reference to a Tomb de Chiens, or tomb of the dogs. The name was somewhat of an understatement, for when the catacombs were investigated later in 2015, it […]

The sclera isn’t something you tend to think of when imagining animals, but looking at a photo of a chimpanzee with white eyes you might get the feeling that something’s slightly off. This is because most primates have a dark sclera, which in human eyes is the white that surrounds the iris and pupil.  The […]

Artificial intelligence (AI)-generated imagery has moved on impressively in the last decade, from 2014 when the most cutting-edge technology could produce a picture that looked like it was taken on a Game Boy Color. Now it can even win state fair art competitions.  However, there are still a few things that all the main leaders […]

A study has contradicted a prevalent belief that people on the autism spectrum are “indifferent to pain”, by finding that these individuals may actually experience pain more intensely than neurotypical people. The research team hopes that the results will lead to better pain treatment for autistic people. It is very common for autistic people to […]

Ancient history is full of people doing weird stuff, which is good news for archaeologists on the hunt for interesting artifacts or the leftovers of strange archaic rituals. Every now and then, though, researchers dig something up that leaves them utterly bamboozled, as appears to be the case for a team of scientists in England. […]

The latest issue of IFLScience’s free digital magazine CURIOUS is out now, bringing you science highlights for the month plus deep dives into intriguing topics, interviews, exclusives, diary dates, and explanations for some of Earth’s most perplexing natural phenomena and landscapes. Join us as we put curious questions to top experts, share excerpts from the […]

The 12,000-year-old prehistoric site of Göbekli Tepe has become showered with attention in recent years – and rightly so – but it’s lesser known that southern Turkey is also home to a very similar “sister site” known as Karahan Tepe. Located just over 45 kilometers (27 miles) east of Göbekli Tepe, Karahan Tepe was first […]

Every two to seven years, the equatorial Pacific Ocean gets up to 3°C warmer (what we know as an El Niño event) or colder (La Niña) than usual, triggering a cascade of effects felt around the world. This cycle is called the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) because every El Niño is naturally followed by […]