Deborah Bloomfield

Currently, the best way to search for alien life in other star systems is by looking for biosignatures: the presence of particular molecules in the atmospheres of distant worlds. Many substances are being considered for such a role – oxygen is a prime candidate, and methane too. Work on phosphine as a possible biosignature has led […]

The fossilized brain of a 500-million-year-old worm has been discovered by researchers, opening up new insights into how brains evolved and patching up holes in the fossil records of ancient scalidophorans.   The ring-shaped structure, which the researchers interpret as the worm brain, marks the first fossilized nervous system of such a creature, made possible […]

Notable levels of cocaine, ketamine, Valium, Xanax, tramadol, and other potent pharmaceuticals have been found in the bodies of freshwater shrimp and their habitat in rural England. In yet another unexpected twist, the researchers also found traces of numerous pesticides that are now banned by the EU. Reporting in the journal Environment International back in […]

You’ve been on the VPN (virtual private network) market for awhile, and you’ve yet to add one to your cart. Well, that works out just fine because we’ve got one that will not only fit all of your VPN needs, it comes at a price that you simply cannot refuse.  Thanks to Deal Days you […]

Therapy dogs are a tool being used to help people with a variety of conditions, but why is it that some quality time with a heckin’ good boy is enough to make some of us feel better? Neuroscience research has uncovered one possible explanation as it found that petting a dog activates an area of […]

So, you want to learn to code. Smart move, really. The growing demand for programmers is causing quite the stir. There simply aren’t enough coders to fulfill the growing demand. And if truth be told, there’s no better career out there that offers the same amount of stability and lucrative pay. There’s one catch. You […]

Science is truly amazing, so amazing that even stuff we believe to be stone-cold scientific facts can occasionally turn out to be incorrect. Case in point, researchers are puzzled over how a woman born missing her left temporal lobe — the brain region believed to regulate language processing — could actually speak two different languages.  […]

Following months of drama and legal jostling, it looks like Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter will go ahead after all. In a series of tweets posted after the news broke, Musk suggested that he’s buying the social media platform as part of a bigger plan to build “X, the everything app”. “Buying Twitter is […]

Tsunamis that followed the Chicxulub impact 66 million years ago were probably not the main reason for the dinosaurs’ demise, with soot from fires having more effect. Nevertheless, they were powerful enough to leave marks on the bottom of the deep ocean half a world away that we can still see today. University of Michigan […]

Have you ever had that weird feeling that you’ve experienced the same exact situation before, even though that’s impossible? Sometimes it can even seem like you’re reliving something that already happened. This phenomenon, known as déjà vu, has puzzled philosophers, neurologists and writers for a very long time. Starting in the late 1800s, many theories […]

In the last few years, researchers have developed a paint so white that it reflects most of the sunlight it receives. Things painted with this ultra-white paint are several degrees colder than ambient temperature, and it could be used as an electricity-free way to cool down buildings. Not just buildings now, thanks to new innovations. […]

Researchers looking into a 30-year-old mystery surrounding a rare antigen have discovered a new blood group system called Er.  Your blood type is determined by the presence or absence of specific antigens, with the main type people know being A, B, O, and AB (positives and negatives). However, blood groups are slightly different.  Advertisement “The term ‘blood […]

It’s a question as old as time (probably) or certainly middle school: when you smell poop or a fart, is that because some of the poop molecules have entered your nose? You won’t be surprised to learn that proving this one way or the other hasn’t been an absolute scientific priority. However, one Australian doctor […]

When we talk about human evolution, we’re often discussing our ancient ancestors but as a species, we continue to change in modern times. Now, research has discovered a new route through which human evolution can occur in the way that genetic material from our mitochondria can enter the genome. As well as representing a mechanism […]

US-based startup SpinLaunch has teamed up with NASA and a number of other partners to see whether slingshotting objects into the sky could be a viable alternative to chemical-powered rocket launches.  Last week, SpinLaunch completed its tenth successful fling using their Suborbital Accelerator in the New Mexico desert. Their latest launch – which you check out […]

Most of the universe’s stars exist in pairs, sometimes after the more massive one completed its life cycle and became a white dwarf. This evolution changes the dance between the two, at least if they were fairly close to start off, as the dwarf’s powerful gravitational field draws the outer layers of the main sequence […]

Creating new molecules underpins so much chemical research, plus many industrial fields from drug manufacturing to new materials. Improving these approaches has huge consequences – and the Nobel Prize committee recognized three people, among the many, that did just that. The winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry are Carolyn Bertozzi, Morten Meldal, and […]

It’s time to put your money where the bears of Katmai National Park and Preserve’s mouths are: Fat Bear Week is back for 2022. The annual competition celebrates the seasonal fattening of Alaska’s brown bears (Ursus arctos) as they prepare for their big winter sleep. The Alaska Peninsula is home to more bears than people, […]

Researchers have discovered that the drool of wax worms is capable of breaking down one of the world’s most common types of plastic. Although it might take some work to scale up, these wriggling larvae could offer a novel way to combat the planet’s plastic pollution problem. In a new study, scientists from the Spanish […]