Deborah Bloomfield

Hidden inside a secure vault in Australia, there is a letter written by the late Queen Elizabeth II that cannot be opened for another 62 years. The letter is addressed to the Mayor of Sydney, specifically, and has instructions that it can only be opened in 2085 and not a moment sooner. The contents of […]

If movies are to be believed, sex is something to be enjoyed only between two extremely attractive people, both of whom are under the age of about 35. Sorry, grandma, the message seems to be – gettin’ lucky is a young gal’s game. In reality, nearly seven out of every eight men and three in […]

The animal kingdom is full of all kinds of predator-prey relationships, from head-popping hunting techniques to carefully evolved camouflage. Avoiding predators is a tricky job for many of the world’s animal species. Playing dead might be thought of as a fun trick to teach your pet but researchers in Australia have discovered that whole colonies […]

Palaeontologists from the University of Portsmouth have discovered the fossil of a new species of prehistoric marine reptile that could have been twice the size of a killer whale. The new findings suggest these animals could be much larger than previously thought, adding to a debate that has divided experts for some time.  The remains […]

Would you care to bathe in the blood-red pools of Japan’s Beppu city? At around 78°C (172.4°F), we wouldn’t recommend it. Beppu’s famous cluster of natural hot springs bubble away in an array of curious hues and temperatures, but perhaps the most arresting and dangerous is Chinoike Jigoku, whose name translates to “blood hell pond”. […]

Saturn’s rings are so quintessential to how we visualize the planet that it seems almost wrong to picture the gas giant without them. But it seems likely that the planet was not born with them. Astronomers have presented the most solid evidence yet that the rings are not ancient at all. They formed no more […]

The stratosphere is the second layer of Earth’s atmosphere, extending up to 50 kilometers (30 miles). It is relatively calm – but through it, it is possible to hear faint sounds coming from the troposphere, the part we inhabit. But not all the sounds detected have a clear origin. Scientists have used microbarometers, attached to […]

May 14, 2023, marks the 50th anniversary of the launch of Skylab, a crucial mission in NASA’s crewed space exploration of space. Skylab was the first American space station, an orbiting workshop, and over the six months it was occupied, it vastly expanded humanity’s understanding of space exploration, from the effects of space on the […]

Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story recently began streaming on Netflix and tells a fictional tale based on a real person who some believe may have been the first Black Queen of England. There is much debate around the queen’s ancestry, with some theories stating she was a direct descendent of a Black branch of the […]

Make your way through the Actun Tunichil Muknal cave in Belize and you might be lucky enough to meet the Crystal Maiden. This ancient Maya archaeological site is the home of a number of skeletons, including one that has been caked in calcite, giving the effect it’s bejeweled in glistening crystals. The remains are known […]

On June 4, 1629, the Dutch East India Company’s flagship Batavia was lost off the coast of Western Australia. What unfolded was a tragic tale of mutiny and murder that has captured the imaginations of historians and archaeologists. Now, the findings of a five-year project have shed new light on what became of the Batavia and […]

Have you ever left the house on a warm summer’s day or a particularly cold dry winter afternoon and thought you can smell rain? Apparently, not everyone is able to nasally detect approaching bad weather – so is there any science to back it up, or is it just another myth? The claim that it […]

The Wallace Line has shaped species diversity across Asia and Australia but, the thing is, it doesn’t actually exist. It’s completely imaginary, and yet its influence on species evolution is very much real. Animals – and plants too, although less obviously – look very different on either side of the line, which might make sense […]

One of the most famous and important surviving artifacts from the Aztec Empire reveals how they expected the apocalypse to go down – but also the rather sneaky way they figured out to avoid it. If there’s only one thing you know about classical Mesoamerican apocalypse myths, it’s probably this: that the world ended in […]

Landscapers are truly impressive professionals. There are so many nuances to taking care of a piece of land, which is why many of us average homeowners trying to save on expenses struggle to keep up on our own. It can be quite fascinating when you learn about the different variables that influence the health and […]

A study of massive and very bright stars close to the center of our galaxy has found something unexpected: these stars are much less likely to be parts of binary or triple systems than those in Earth’s vicinity. Being close to many others of your kind might seem to maximize hook-up chances, but if you […]

The Apocalypse Bingo card for 2023 has so far featured a lot of monstrous blobs. First, the stinking sargassum blob came for Florida and now an invasive (and whiffy) weed is engulfing the Sonoran Desert in Arizona. The odorous carpet is made up of the aptly named “stinknet”, and it’s bad news for humans, plants, […]

Fake news is mostly shared by people with right-wing political leanings and without knowing it is false, according to a new study. The findings suggest that the issue of misinformation may not be due to malintent, but rather a failure to fully understand the shared information, highlighting that education may be the best route to […]

Jezero Crater was chosen as the target for NASA’s Perseverance for its impressive river delta. Seen from orbit, it already told a story of water flowing on the surface of ancient Mars. In the initial months of work from the rover, the picture is expanding: The river was deeper and faster moving than it was […]

Twitter CEO Elon Musk says he has found a new boss for the social media platform and that she will be starting in around six weeks. He kept quiet about who this mystery woman may be, but there’s already been some informed speculation. Musk tweeted the announcement on Thursday, May 11, saying: “Excited to announce […]