Deborah Bloomfield

Full circle rainbows can be seen in nature, but you’ve got to be in the right place at the right time to spot one. The fact is that actually, all rainbows are circular, but we’re always viewing them from the ground. This means the lower half is blocked from view, but if you get to […]

There is a community – largely on Reddit and occupied by men – dedicated to not masturbating, and helping others to not masturbate. While people in the “NoFap” community make (sketchy) claims about improvements to health, a new study has found that engagement with the community and a belief that NoFap forums helped the user […]

There are many challenges around the return of astronauts to the Moon. But there are also challenges when we actually get the astronauts there, and a big one comes from something small: moon dust. It has the consistency of ground fiberglass, it clings to spacesuits and crafts, and you do not want to breathe it in. […]

If you live at high latitudes or spent any time on social media, you’ve probably noticed that we’ve been having some great auroras recently. Astronaut Josh Cassada took advantage of an angle available only to a few to take the incredible photo above. It’s beautiful enough on its own but prompted a flood of responses […]

Astronomers have confirmed the existence of a star with one of the shortest life expectancies imaginable, having formed dangerously close to the supermassive black hole known as Sagittarius A*. It accompanies the announcement of a mysterious object being destroyed by the same giant black hole, published in the same edition of The Astrophysical Journal. If […]

A peculiar hummingbird that was thought to have been a new species has been found to actually be a rare hybrid never-before-reported in science. The bird stood out to researchers because it has a gold throat, a trait that became particularly peculiar when DNA revealed that both of its parents had pink throats. The bizarre […]

Flying a kite: it’s an age-old family tradition, so quintessential there’s even a Disney song about it. Many people will have happy memories of kite-flying on a sunny afternoon; but, did you know that this most innocent of hobbies could actually be a hotbed of law-breaking? There are more regulations around kite safety than you […]

We know that weather events on Earth can be terrifying and even deadly. But elsewhere in the Solar System, the weather can get even more extreme, with phenomena that only marginally resemble Earth’s own. Winds that would easily kill you, rains that would melt or crush you, unique lightning, and aurorae that would give you […]

So, the third annual Mental State of the World Report has dropped, and once again we’re all depressed and nobody likes us. Okay, that may not strictly be true: there’s a smattering of good news in among the concerning findings. But overall, the world is in a similar situation to the past two years – […]

The idea of the “Dark Triad” as a collection of malevolent behavioral traits has become popular in recent years and has been the subject of many studies into unpleasant attitudes and behaviors with civilian groups. But research has investigated these traits in relation to military personnel to see if there is a way to predict […]

Dicks! Big ones, small ones, absolutely colossal ones – it seems humanity just can’t get enough of these funny little dangly bits. As a species, we’re obsessed: why isn’t it hard? Why isn’t it floppy? Oh god, is it even summer ready? But for some people, it’s more than just a fascination. It’s a problem. […]

A new moai statue has been found buried in a dry lake bed on Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island. The team who discovered the stone head believes that there could be even more in the lake bed waiting to be revealed after climate change led to it drying up. The statue was found […]

Venus is only a bit smaller than Earth, but the similarities stop there. Earth’s “evil twin” is a hellish world of crushing pressure, lead-melting heat, and acid rain. Now, a long-standing mystery about how the interior of Venus loses heat may have been solved. Astronomers think a feature on its thin and squishy crust helps. […]

Giant, majestic, hairy, and looking quite a bit like a guinea pig, the capybara is most definitely a fish, according to the Vatican.  Capybaras are the world’s largest rodents and are native to South America. Though you might not think it because of their shape, capybaras are excellent swimmers and appear to enjoy time in […]

For as long as humans have lived in close proximity to animals, there has been the ever-present risk of infectious agents making the jump from them to us. This process is known as spillover: when a pathogen, like a virus, crosses a species barrier to infect a new host. It’s not a rare phenomenon; some […]

As the days get longer and the Northern Hemisphere begins to see the first signs of spring, daffodils begin to appear in our gardens, parks, and even in a vase on the kitchen table. However cut daffodils and bulbs sold in shops bear a striking resemblance to members of the onion family, and some worrying […]

Painting a simple stripy pattern on wind turbines could prevent the majority of bird deaths from collisions with the blades, according to new research. The work, which builds on previous studies showing a that small lick of paint could save endangered bird species, proposed that increasing the contrast of wind turbines against the sky will […]

The length of an Earth day is built deep into our sense of time, so much so that minuscule variations in the Earth’s rotation can create considerable problems. How then are we to operate on other worlds, where the length of a day is completely different? The European Space Agency (ESA) doesn’t have the answer, but thinks […]

Let’s admit it: being “face blind” sounds less like a real condition, and more like a hastily-slapped-together excuse for why you failed to say hi to Bill from IT for the third time this week. But to those who suffer from the phenomenon – which is more properly known as prosopagnosia – it can be […]

Take a look at any “great man” of 16th-century European history and there’s a chance your eyes will be drawn southwards to his nether regions, where you’ll see a bulbous mound. Known as a codpiece, this item was a must-have for any serious Renaissance king looking to promote and protect his virality.  The accessory is […]