A monkey was recently seen carrying the body of her dead baby for some time after it died. However, she later ate the corpse in a case of primate cannibalism. As unpleasant as this sounds, this unusual behavior may have evolutionary benefits that impact the mother’s chances of reproducing in the future. The monkey in […]
Time Ran Five Times Slower In The Early Universe, Quasars Reveal
Variations in the brightness of quasars from the early universe have been used to measure time dilation back to only a billion years after the Big Bang. The findings reveal an era when clocks moved five times slower than they do today – or would have, if there had been anyone to make clocks. It […]
Arsenic-Based Antibiotic Is Bad News For Resistant Bacteria – And Malaria
A team of scientists thought they had struck gold when they discovered the only known natural antibiotic that contains arsenic and showed its ability to treat tough bacterial infections. But its potential did not end there. Now, new research has found that it could be a game-changing treatment for another serious infectious disease: malaria. Antibiotic […]
NASA Visualization Shows How El Niño Has Sprung In The Pacific
This red hot stripe across the Pacific shows that El Niño has arrived. Satellites have suggested that sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean are significantly higher than average, signaling that the triple-dip La Niña is over and El Niño has returned. The data was gathered by two NASA satellites, Sentinel-6 […]
What Type Of Language Did Neanderthals Speak?
Modern humans and Neanderthals obviously got along well enough to mate with one another, although the level of conversation that preceded these inter-hominid romances remains a matter of great uncertainty. Given that fossils are unable to talk and Neanderthals disappeared long before the invention of recording equipment, archaeologists have no way of knowing whether our […]
“Shooting Stars” Discovered In The Sun’s Corona For First Time
An international team of astronomers has discovered a never-seen-before feature in the solar corona: “shooting stars” falling down on the Sun. Using the European Space Agency’s Solar Orbiter (SolO), they discovered that the phenomenon of coronal rain was hiding these meteor-like fireballs, which can get as big as 250 kilometers (155 miles) wide. Don’t let […]
Watch Thousands Of Lightning Strikes Flash Across Europe And Africa
The first images and videos of the European Space Agency’s (ESA) new Lightning Imager have been released and you can watch thousands of lightning strikes flash across the globe. This is the first ever satellite instrument capable of continuously detecting lightning across Europe and Africa. ESA, along with the European Organisation for the Exploitation of […]
Live Pill Bugs And Mollusks Are Being Used As Hands In Biohybrid Robot Arms
The rolling power of pill bugs and grip strength of chitons have landed them an unexpected role in robotics, as scientists working on biohybrid technologies have invented a robot arm with living grippers. The creators say that the method doesn’t harm the animals and that once they’ve done their grabbing, they can simply scuttle back […]
How Do You Decide When To Throw Away Milk?
Do you sniff it, read the label, or wait to see bits floating in your coffee or tea? There are many ways to check when milk has gone off, but new research has shown that up to half of consumers decide to throw away milk based only on a brief glance at the date on […]
Dead Bodies Can Reveal Details Of Their Death Through Microscopic Diatoms
Forensics can be vital in supporting police and juries to reach accurate conclusions in complex cases where the facts are elusive. The potential of results to swing convictions or eliminate suspects means their correct application is paramount, which is why the field is now populated by experts who can search for clues in places most […]
Search Begins For Bones Of Legendary 19th-Century Circus Elephant
Archeologists are looking for the skeleton of an elephant – not in the savannahs of Africa or the jungles of Asia, but in the green English countryside. In Victorian Britain, traveling menageries would scale up and down the country to show off the exotic animals looted from the empire’s distant lands, including lions, tigers, bears, […]
We May Know What’s Causing The Huge Gravity Anomaly Beneath The Indian Ocean
In the Indian Ocean, there is an anomaly. The gravity there is lower (compared to what we’d expect) than anywhere else on the planet, and now, a team of researchers may have figured out why. According to Newton’s law of universal gravitation, objects attract other objects with a force determined by their masses and the […]
Does Everyone Have An Imagination?
This article first appeared in Issue 9 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS. In 2003, in Exeter, UK, a 65-year-old man, now memorialized in scientific literature as patient “MX”, decided to visit his neurologist. He had a very peculiar problem: after a minor heart surgery, he had awoken to find that he had completely lost his […]
Is There Really No Sound In Space?
This article first appeared in Issue 9 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS. To quote Edwin Hubble, “Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science.” Of course, we enhance our senses as much as we can with technology, but it is here we often start. How would the […]
Why Our Voices Change As We Get Older
Sir Elton John set a record at this year’s Glastonbury, becoming the most-watched headliner in the festival’s history, with more than 7 million people tuning in live to the BBC to watch his last ever UK performance. The 76-year-old singer certainly delivered all his characteristic showmanship. But many who have followed his music over the […]
How To Capture Monday’s Supermoon With A Smartphone
You’ve got to give it to the Moon. It is not one to be photographed on the fly. Smartphone images of our natural satellite turn out like smudgy, flare-y blobs (unless you are using some AI trickery). But it doesn’t have to be that way. It is possible to get a good picture of the […]
Victoria Has Rediscovered A Dragon – How Do We Secure Its Future?
The Victorian grassland earless dragon (Tympanocryptis pinguicolla), not seen since 1969, has been found in grasslands west of Melbourne. No need to fear this dragon, though; these lizards are just 15cm long fully grown. The dragon is Australia’s most imperilled scaled reptile. This is an extraordinary second chance. The rediscovery of a species thought to […]
This Single Factor Determines Whether Your Partner Is More Likely To Cheat On You
All relationships are different, and people can change and improve their own behavior. However, a piece of research has found evidence that backs up the old “once a cheater, always a cheater” rule when it comes to staying faithful in relationships. Researchers from the University of Denver wanted to look at whether infidelity in a […]
Over Half Of Adults Can’t Name A Single Symptom Of Blood Cancer
A survey by the charity Blood Cancer UK found that over half of UK adults cannot name a single symptom of blood cancer, despite it being the third-biggest cause of cancer deaths in the country. The charity asked participants to list what they believed were common signs of blood cancer. As well as 55 percent […]
Few Fungi Can Infect Humans, But One Of Them Is Expanding
The Last Of Us wasn’t too far off reality when it suggested that climate change could make fungi a bigger threat to humanity, and a perfect example of this is currently spreading in parts of the US. Coccidioides is one of a small number of fungi known to infect humans, and its range is expanding […]