Deborah Bloomfield

Trilobites are among the most common fossils, some of which include the earliest-known sexual weaponry, and yet for all the specimens we have to work from, nobody’s found any direct evidence of what they had for dinner. Now, a first-of-its-kind fossil has been described that contains preserved stomach contents dating back 465 million years! It’s […]

Quiet quitting is an increasingly popular term for employees who “check out” and no longer put in additional effort at work, usually in favor of a healthier work-life balance. Now, new research has identified a curious link between the use of psilocybin, from magic mushrooms, and a reduction in working overtime among employees. The results […]

Although cleansing is a major part of many people’s skincare, it often leaves our skin feeling uncomfortably tight. A new study has revealed the mechanisms behind this odd sensation, and it could help cosmetics companies improve the cleansing experience. The tightness you get after cleansing is easily the worst part of the nighttime routine – […]

It’s surprisingly easy to learn to operate an extra limb, a new study has found, despite the fact humans haven’t had to do it for millions of years, since some ancestral species lost their tails. Admittedly, the study demonstrated the capacity to repurpose leg muscles, rather than operate a true additional limb, but it could […]

This article first appeared in Issue 12 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS. Geology and biology collide at Fly Ranch Geyser in Nevada, USA, where a human-made well provides a window into Earth’s hottest watery environments and the curious life they support. Few animals would be lining up to take up residence in a place that […]

An eel-like parasite with no jaw, no bones, and a thirst for blood has been wriggling its way through Earth’s waterways since before even the dinosaurs walked the Earth. It’s older than trees, even, and yet has endured to the modern day where it’s become the subject of many scientific studies and killed off the […]

Researchers have been wondering how antimatter, the mirrored version of the matter that makes us, would behave under gravity. Antiparticles have the same mass as their respective particles but the opposite charge. Would they fall down in a gravitational field? After laborious efforts, scientists from the ALPHA collaboration at CERN with the support of many […]

Astronomers found an incredible cosmic object in the data from JWST, and they stumbled upon it without a particularly systematic search. In the exquisite observations from the space telescope, there was this beautiful image of galaxy JWST-ER1. And it truly is a beauty. The object is a gravitational lens. This means that the galaxy’s mass […]

More ancient treasures have been recovered from the sunken city of Thonis-Heracleion off the coast of Egypt. Among the underwater ruins of a fallen temple, the team uncovered a collection of valuable items, including gold relics, ornate jewelry, ceramics, perfume decanters, and gifts to the gods. The artifacts were discovered at the site of an […]

This article first appeared in Issue 12 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS. The devil’s tooth fungus (Hydnellum peckii) appears to “bleed” as it grows, releasing a type of sap. It gives the beige, pink, and sometimes blue mushroom its other nickname “bleeding tooth fungus,” but it isn’t blood.  Advertisement It’s the result of a […]

How much of your high school French do you remember? Maybe enough to order a drink or ask where the library is? For most people, studying a language at school doesn’t allow them to achieve true fluency, so it’s probably not surprising that you’d start to lose those skills if you don’t practice them. But […]

Twenty-one years of observations from the Chandra X-ray Observatory have been put together to make a film of Eta Carinae. The movie traces the after-effects of an explosion so large we lack adjectives to convey its scale. For 18 years in the mid-19th century, the leaderboard of brightest stars was upended when the previously faint […]

Researchers in Israel have uncovered the cremated remains of what was probably a high-class Greek escort from the period of Alexander the Great. Discovered by the side of a road in Jerusalem, the young woman’s leftovers were found alongside a series of bent iron nails and a remarkably well-preserved and rare bronze box mirror, providing […]

A new study shows that early Homo sapiens in Europe coexisted with Neanderthals in specific locations where there were sufficient herbivores to support both populations. The results add texture to the growing image we have of the interactions between these two species. Herbivore carrying capacity In ecology, there’s an idea called the “competitive exclusion principle” […]

Unusually powerful disturbances in the Earth’s magnetic field have sparked some stunning red auroras this week, with the rare scarlet glow visible from locations across Europe and North America. Typically, the famous Northern Lights are made up of predominantly green hues, and while flashes or streaks of crimson are sometimes seen, sustained red skies are […]

Recent years have seen newly budding flowers spring up across parts of Antarctica, much to the concern of some scientists. The increasing spread of plant life in the South Pole appears to be a consequence of human-driven climate change and may even indicate that the ice-capped continent is reaching its “tipping point.” Due to its […]

The Neanderthals made a glue out of birch bark tar to stick tools together; new studies confirm this required skills anthropologists have not been sure our extinct relatives had. If there was any doubt that the use of the term “Neanderthal” to insult someone’s intelligence was wrong, this should put it to rest. When we […]

A new study has revealed that Caenorhabditis elegans, a roundworm commonly used in scientific research, could possibly possess primitive “emotions”. Although humans have anthropomorphized animal emotions for a long time, the reality is that studying their emotions is quite a challenging feat. However, changes in an animal’s behavior, in response to a trigger, might be […]

According to a new study, the Gulf Stream has slowed by 4 percent over the past four decades. More worryingly, the researchers are 99 percent certain that the weakening of this important ocean current is more than random chance. The Gulf Stream plays a significant role in maintaining the climate of the US East Coast […]

If you haven’t heard of the Fermi Paradox, it goes something like this: Given the vastness of the universe and the probability that implies of life evolving elsewhere, how come no alien civilization has ever gotten in touch? We have found many exoplanets in the brief time we’ve been looking. Surely there must be someone […]