Deborah Bloomfield

Along the east coast of America, an unusual and sad phenomenon has been happening since 2016: Humpback whales have been washing up dead and stranded on the beaches of the east coast, causing concern among researchers as to the cause of these deaths. From Maine through to Florida, coastal US states are reporting higher than […]

Were you to lay eyes on the bizarre worm blobs of Colorado’s sulfur caves, you’d have just a few breaths in you before the deadly gases brought your sightseeing tour to an untimely end. Fortunately, being tucked deep within a spring it’s not a place you’re likely to end up in by accident, but it […]

Researchers have spotted three Roman military camps in Jordan that may provide evidence for a previously unknown campaign to conquer a desert kingdom in the second century CE. Identified using Google Earth, the temporary bases rewrite history and suggest that the Roman army marched across Arabia to annex the Nabataean Kingdom, which had its capital […]

From wild cheetahs and cougars to the tiniest little fuzzball, just about all cats can purr – and, just like the wag of a dog’s tail, it’s an unmistakable signal that everything in that kitty’s life is A-OK right now. Or is it?  As it turns out, this most ubiquitous of feline noises is way […]

Chaka the fairy penguin was happily living life at Weymouth Sea Life Adventure Park when his keepers noticed he was looking a little wobbly on his flippers. To find out what was going on, the care team took him to Cave Veterinary Specialists for an MRI scan, representing a world first for this species. Fairy […]

Sitting completely undisturbed until as recently as 2009, Hang Son Doong cave in Vietnam dates back to the Pliocene or late Miocene some 2 to 5 million years ago. The 5-kilometer (3-mile) long cave system boasts 200-meter (656-foot) high ceilings, making it by far the largest cave ever discovered on Earth. The cave is so […]

Chronic enteropathy (CE), the name for gastrointestinal disorders lasting three weeks or longer, is a common problem in older dogs. Investigating potential causes and factors, a team has found that diet at a younger age may play a role in these problems in later life. “Diet has a key role in the homeostasis of the […]

OpenAI have announced a new “incognito” mode that will stop your chats from being used in the AI training sets. They claim this will improve user privacy and allow users to choose which conversations will be saved, potentially opening their tools up to companies that deal with sensitive data.   Since their eruption into the […]

Among the most enigmatic of ancient cultures, the Picts are known to have established the earliest kingdoms in eastern Scotland yet left behind agonizingly little evidence relating to their culture or origins. However, after analyzing the genomes of ancient Pictish skeletons, researchers have finally revealed where these mysterious people came from while also demonstrating that […]

A new study that has looked at how far signals from NASA probes have reached into the galaxy has found that the earliest we could expect a reply is 2029. The team looked a number of probes sent out by the US space agency, including Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, and […]

More than 200 years ago, mysterious stone balls began to be unearthed in the UK. These oddly geometric stones date back to the Neolithic period, approximately 5,000 years ago. With the majority appearing in Aberdeen, Scotland, the now 500-strong collection has been found in Ireland, England, and even Norway. Made from various types of stone […]

A while back we brought you the absolute worst ways to die according to science, including a notorious diving bell accident and people’s heads shattering after the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Well since then we’ve found a lot more terrible ways to die, so that you might try to avoid them. Enjoy. Advertisement Hisashi Ouchi […]

Deep in a protected ancient forest in southern Chile sits an enormous tree that has existed for thousands of years. Now the “Great Grandfather” tree could soon be recognized as the world’s oldest tree. The Great Grandfather (Gran Abuelo), or Alerce Milenario, is a remarkable specimen. It is an alerce tree, a Patagonian Cypress tree […]

Summer is on its way, and as those with annual hay fever across the land reach for their antihistamines and tissue supplies, parts of the world may also experience “pollen bombs” that make their symptoms even worse. But there is also a lesser-known form of allergy that may add to some people’s frustrations. Pollen food […]

When the first repeating Fast Radio Burst (FRB) was discovered in 2016, astronomers thought it might be a coincidence or an anomaly. A further 24 had been reported prior to this week, ruling both those scenarios out. Now, a single paper has doubled the total to 50 thanks to the efforts of the Canadian Hydrogen […]

Harriet Cole’s body was taken to the Hahnemann Medical School’s anatomy department in 1888, where it’s believed that Rubus B Weaver then carried out a delicate and lengthy procedure to create a complete dissection of the human cerebro-spinal nervous system. It was celebrated within the academic community as an achievement for the insights it yielded […]

Standing at 1,675 m (5,495 ft) tall, Mount Thor’s height is not particularly impressive for Canada’s mountains, but how it reaches that height is what makes Mount Thor so imposing – it has the world’s largest vertical drop. At 1,250 m (4,100 ft), its cliff face in Auyuittuq National Park plummets straight downwards, a sheer […]

What would you do if you encountered a shimmering white ghost on a moonlit night? Would you instantly run, or would the shock of such a scene freeze you to the spot as you struggled to make sense of such a thing? Well, if your answer is the second response then you have something in […]

More pandemics are coming, and the UK is woefully underprepared: that’s the stark warning from top scientists as the world continues to feel the impact of COVID-19. We’ve always known that it was not a one-off event, but there is a fear that lessons are not being learned and that the next pandemic could be […]

The question of why some galaxies have quasars at their core, and most do not, has finally been largely answered. The explanation indicates that in the far distant future, the Milky Way may host a quasar, with big implications for its development. The discovery of immensely bright objects in the distant universe caused great consternation […]