Deborah Bloomfield

Despite its name, the mammoth was not the largest Pleistocene land animal. That status goes to its relative, the straight-tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus), which weighed up to 13 tonnes and lived across Asia and Europe until around 100,000 years ago. Anthropologists have sought evidence that Neanderthals hunted Palaeoloxodon, maybe even to extinction, but evidence has […]

People who have been sexually assaulted or raped can accurately recall details of the attack after drinking, new research suggests. When alcohol is involved, people are often considered unreliable witnesses of their own assault, but the new study challenges that assumption by demonstrating that women could remember details of a hypothetical assault – including whether […]

The Atlit Yam sits submerged 10 meters (33 feet) beneath the sea off the coast of Atlit village in Haifa, Israel. An enormous Neolithic coastal settlement, these complex remains tell a story of a once-thriving community that existed almost 9,000 years ago – and this one really did exist. During the beginning of the Holocene, […]

We’re currently experiencing a pandemic of fungal fascination, as each week millions of people are tuning into The Last Of Us, the TV adaptation of a game of the same name. In it, the world falls to a fungal pathogen that creates zombies capable of biting other humans and spreading the disease, and it was […]

The discovery of an Ancient Egyptian mummification workshop in Saqqara has enabled researchers to reveal the secret recipes that embalmers used to preserve different body parts almost three millennia ago. Astonishingly, many of the ointments involved in the process contained ingredients from far-flung parts of the world, suggesting that the Egyptians’ passion for mummification helped […]

In Bethlehem, there is a church known as the Milk Grotto, which is claimed to have hosted the Virgin Mary while she was still breastfeeding Jesus Christ. According to the tale, Mary hid in the church to escape King Herod’s order to kill all male infants under the age of two. While she was there, […]

This article first appeared in Issue 4 of our free digital magazine CURIOUS.   Without the Sun, life on Earth would have had no hope of getting off the ground. A star to warm our little rocky planet helped create conditions that meant life could unfold in this tiny corner of the cosmos. Yet somehow, some humans […]

Authorities in Western Australia say that they have found the radioactive capsule which had been lost last week somewhere near Perth. Finding the capsule was described by Fire and Emergency Services Commissioner Darren Klemm as finding the “needle in the haystack”.  Advertisement “When you consider the challenge of finding an object smaller than a 10-cent […]

The de-extinction of long lost species is a firm favourite in science fiction, but in recent years companies in the real world have been setting their sights on bringing groups of animals from beyond the grave. Most recently, Colossal Laboratories & Biosciences have caused a buzz over their plans to bring back Earth’s lost bottom-heavy […]

From January 17 to February 5, 1947, Yukon, northwest Canada went through a cold spell, hitting the lowest temperature of -64°C (-84°F) on February 3. Weather observer Gordon Toole measured the lowest temperature at Snag’s tiny airport. The thermometer he used didn’t go below -62.2°C (-80°F), meaning he had to record it by marking an […]

Look up! The green comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) is almost at its closest point to Earth. Tomorrow, February 1, the comet will be only about 42 million kilometers (26 million miles) from our planet. Many around the world have already spotted the object as it passes across the northern sky. Since last week, when it […]

The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has accused Russia of using inflatable tanks in the ongoing invasion of Ukraine. According to a Facebook post on Thursday, some of the “rubber” tanks have since deflated. “While our partners agree to supply tanks to Ukraine, the occupation army is also increasing the presence of […]

A Californian man has found himself in serious trouble after driving over the historic Ponte Vecchio medieval bridge in Florence, Italy, which is exclusively reserved for pedestrians and protected to preserve the important monument. The man ended up on the bridge after trying to find parking in a rental Fiat, but somehow turned onto the […]

Police appear to be investigating the so-called “Tylenol murders“, an as-yet unsolved case that saw seven people killed after taking Tylenol capsules that had been laced with cyanide, 40 years on.  On September 29, 1982, a young girl in the suburbs named Mary Kellerman woke up with a sore throat and a runny nose and […]

Looking at an earthworm that’s been dumped on the street by a bird, you might not think much of the annelids, but the reality is these animals are one of the largest and most successful phyla of animals alive today. They’ve dominated both terrestrial and marine ecosystems, and now the analysis of some remarkably old […]

As if there were not already enough reasons to save coral reefs, scientists studying the Red Sea have discovered another one: they can be major sinks for carbon dioxide. Coral reefs grow from two major chemical reactions: photosynthesis and calcification. Reef photosynthesis stores carbon, just as forests do on land, but calcification takes hydrogen carbonate […]

An epic dig along the UK’s Jurassic Coast has uncovered a remarkable find: an ancient crocodile-like creature that would’ve looked a little like the modern gharial. It’s the most complete specimen of its kind, consisting of a partial skull, backbone and a few limbs, meaning scientists were able to name it – something that’s not […]

Back in Medieval England, life was hard. Even if you lucked into the best possible circumstances, your life was doomed to be both short and violent – and god forbid you got sick, because you were more likely to be prescribed salty owl meat or puppy fat than a simple ibuprofen for your aches and […]

Scientists have published the most accurate map of the distribution of matter in the Universe. This incredible achievement gives insights into the evolution of the cosmos as a whole and it suggests that the Standard Model of Cosmology is missing some ingredients to explain what we are seeing today. The matter that makes stars, planets, […]