Last December, for the first time, researchers had a controlled nuclear fusion reaction that put out more energy than needed to be started. It has been reported that the National Ignition Facility (NIF) team did it again in a second test on July 30, where they achieved an even higher energy output. The second experiment […]
Now That Everyone’s Heard About Phubbing, It’s Time To Put It To Bed
It’s the topic of the moment. Whether you thought it meant something NSFW (naughty naughty) or whether you just find it maddening, there’s no escaping it: “phubbing” is a definite candidate for Word of the Year (according to the very unofficial IFLScience rankings). But, in case you’ve missed out, let’s take one last voyage of […]
Ridiculously Bright “Kaiju” Star Named Mothra Could Be Clue To Explain Dark Matter
Astronomers have observed a giant star system, probably composed of a pair of stars, that is far too bright for the distance over which we see it. According to a yet-to-be-published paper, the star is being gravitationally lensed by something massive between us and it. However, with no suitably placed galaxies to do the job, […]
Solar Storms Are On The Increase, What Does That Mean For Us?
The Sun goes through a cycle of activity of about 11 years, from being quiet during the solar minimum to a bustling period full of flares, plasma releases, and sunspots during the solar maximum. You might have noticed that there has been an uptick in news stories about solar storms and northern lights over the […]
Megalodon Vs Mosasaurus: Who Would Win In A Fight?
Megalodon vs Mosasaurus, it’s a tough call. This hypothetical conflict takes place below the waves, where the currents of time merge to pit two of nature’s ancient aquatic titans against one another. While these giant prehistoric monstrosities both ruled different epochs in Earth’s history, the question of who would emerge victorious in a fight has […]
Man Develops Never-Before-Seen Bacterial Infection After Feral Cat Bite
As much as we may love them, cats are major reservoirs of zoonotic infections, and their bites and scratches can pose a serious threat to our health. It’s a sad truth that one UK-based man found out the hard way after he was bitten by a stray cat and contracted an extensive soft tissue infection caused […]
The World’s Heaviest Fruit Is Something You Might Not Expect
The confusing world of fruits and vegetables is full of some surprising, and frankly delicious, specimens, from strawberries and tomatoes to asparagus. But which of these fruits could be classed as the world’s biggest? We take a look at some whoppers of the fruit world. A new entrant To start us off, a new whopper […]
“City Killers” And Half-Giraffes: How Many Scary Asteroids Really Go Past Earth Every Year?
Asteroids are chunks of rock left over from the formation of our Solar System. Approximately half a billion asteroids with sizes greater than four metres in diameter orbit the Sun, travelling through our Solar System at speeds up to about 30 kilometres per second – about the same speed as Earth. Asteroids are certainly good […]
X Marks The Unknown In Algebra – But X’s Origins Are A Math Mystery
Even though x is one of the least-used letters in the English alphabet, it appears throughout American culture – from Stan Lee’s X-Men superheroes to “The X-Files” TV series. The letter x often symbolizes something unknown, with an air of mystery that can be appealing – just look at Elon Musk with SpaceX, Tesla’s Model […]
India’s Moon Rover Chandrayaan-3 Has Entered Lunar Orbit
India has crossed a major milestone in the quest to become the fourth nation to make a soft landing on the Moon. Having launched on July 14, the Chandrayaan-3 mission entered lunar orbit on August 5. Touchdown is scheduled to take place on August 23 or 24. The United States, the Soviet Union, and China […]
Revealed By Thaw: The Ancient “Mummies” Of The Mongol Empire
The permafrost of east Eurasian mountains is slowly melting away, helping to reveal the buried bodies of the much-feared Mongol Empire – as well as their unquenchable thirst for yak milk. Research has studied the remains of a cemetery at the so-called Khorig site, located high in the Khovsgol mountains. Dating suggests that the cemetery […]
Would We Still See Ourselves As ‘Human’ If Other Hominin Species Hadn’t Gone Extinct?
READER QUESTION: We now know from evolutionary science that humanity has existed in some form or another for around 2 million years or more. Homo sapiens are comparatively new on the block. There were also many other human species, some which we interbred with. The question is then inevitable – when can we claim personhood […]
We’re Back: Communication With Voyager 2 Re-Established
Well, that didn’t take long. Having picked up what they called Voyager 2’ “Heartbeat” on Wednesday, by Friday NASA had restored communications. It seems you can’t keep a good spacecraft down, and Voyager 2 is undoubtedly one of the best. After visiting Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune and returning arguably the richest treasure trove of scientific […]
Video Game Study Reveals What People Do When The World Ends
There are few things more difficult than studying the end of the world, and how humanity would react before it. If you try when the world isn’t ending, then you probably won’t get an accurate impression, given that the world isn’t really ending. If you try while the world is actually ending, people won’t be that […]
Why It’s Bad To Always Suck Your Stomach In
Our abdominal muscles are among the hardest-working muscles in the body. They are involved in nearly every move we make, keeping the body stable and balanced, protecting our spine and even ensuring our internal organs stay where they’re supposed to. But certain health conditions and even unnecessarily tensing the muscles during your daily life can […]
Why Do Geologists Lick Rocks?
This article first appeared in Issue 10 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS. If you’re ever out walking and stumble across a geologist with a rock stuck to their tongue, fear not. They’ve not succumbed to the midday heat and started trying to eat their environment, they’ve simply struck fossilized bone. Advertisement In the pursuit of […]
Is “Twin Telepathy” Real?
This article first appeared in Issue 10 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS. Speak to anyone with siblings and they’ll likely have a rich backlog of dumbassery they’ve witnessed in the company of their brothers or sisters. The quirks of genetics mean that sharing the same parents isn’t enough to guarantee any morphological consistency among siblings, […]
Antarctica Is Missing A Chunk Of Sea Ice Bigger Than Greenland – What’s Going On?
Deadly heatwaves, raging wildfires, and record global temperatures are upon us. But far from the flames, at the southernmost tip of the planet, something just as shocking is unfolding. It’s Antarctic winter, a time when the area of floating sea ice around the continent should be rapidly expanding. This year though, the freeze-up has been […]
Beautifully Complete 150-Million-Year-Old Turtle Fossil Discovered In Germany
An incredibly well-preserved fossil of an ancient Jurassic sea turtle has been uncovered in Germany, the first to have a complete skull, shell, and all four limbs. The marine turtle had a massive head and would have swum through the shallows of a tropical sea that once covered Europe 150 million years ago. Across the […]
How Hidden Details In Ancient Egyptian Tomb Paintings Are Revealed By Chemical Imaging
The walls of ancient Egyptian tombs can teach us much about the lives of the pharaohs and their entourages. Tomb paintings showed the deceased and their immediate family members involved in religious activities, the burial itself, or feasting at banquets and hunting in the Nile marshes. But many such tombs were looted in antiquity and […]
