Researchers have developed a quantum watch: a quantum system that has a unique way to measure time. It doesn’t need a reference time or a repeating pattern to provide a measurement of the elapsed time – and they weren’t even looking to demonstrate such a timepiece. The easiest analogy to understand how it works would […]
Elon Musk’s First Hyperloop Tunnel Is Gone; Now A Parking Lot
The Controversial Decisions of Elon Musk have been taking up so much of the news cycle over the past week or so that it’s easy to forget how, only a matter of months ago, he was most famous as the guy who once bought a car company and wants to install serfdom on Mars. At […]
Same-Sex Couples Deal With Stress Better Than Different-Sex Couples
Same-sex married couples often cope with stress in a healthier and more collaborative way than different-sex couples, according to a new study. The researchers argue that this is perhaps because homosexual couples face unique problems, including stigma, and may receive less support from wider family and traditional institutions compared to heterosexual couples. To reach these […]
Men In Makeup? Yes Please, Says New Research
In a discovery that will surprise pretty much nobody who knows the purpose of makeup, researchers have found that men are considered more attractive when wearing a smattering of the old powder and rouge than when barefaced. The albeit small study asked 200 participants, recruited via Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, to rate the attractiveness of 40 […]
Black Holes Can Apparently Have Two Different Masses At Once
A team modeling the behavior of black holes has come to the conclusion the masses of the universe’s densest objects are quantized, similar to the way electrons orbiting atoms can only have specific energies. Moreover, just as particles can simultaneously be in multiple places at once, known as superposition, the authors of a new paper […]
Man Sick With COVID For 411 Days Cured Using Super-Targeted Treatment
A patient in the UK who had COVID-19 for a staggering 411 days was finally cleared of the infection after doctors sequenced the virus genome and targeted it with a personalized arsenal of drugs. The incredible new case was the work of Dr Luke Blagdon Snell and colleagues from King’s College London and Guy’s and […]
This Could Be One Of The Last Images Ever Taken By NASA’s InSight
NASA’s InSight has revolutionized our understanding of what goes on inside of Mars. From detecting marsquakes to pinpointing new meteorite collisions on the Red Planet, the mission has gone far beyond expectation. Its planned duration was 709 sols (martian days) and it has now almost doubled that. However, for the last several months, the lander […]
A Fascinating Array Of Fish Has Been Found By A Deep-Sea Expedition
An expedition to survey the hidden depths around Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands has returned with some amazing finds. A team, led by Museums Victoria Research Institute, Australia, set out from Darwin on September 30 for a 35-day voyage on the research vessel (RV) Investigator, operated by the Australian national science agency CSIRO. […]
Record-Breaking Closest Black Hole To Earth Discovered
An international group of astronomers has determined the closest black hole to Earth. And, it is orbited by a star similar to our Sun, the first time such a binary system has been discovered in our galaxy. The object, known as Gaia BH1, is located 1,600 light-years away, and it has a mass about 10 […]
TWIS: An Adult Female Lion Has Mysteriously Sprouted A Mane, Mario Kart Teaches NASCAR Driver Some Nifty Tricks, And Much More This Week
This week, we see Zuri the female lion who has suddenly grown the mane of a male, new research warns of the dangers of vaping and why it is an unsafe alternative to smoking, and 100 years on from his tomb’s discovery, we learn about the fascinating tale of Tutankhamun. Zuri The 18-Year-Old Female Lion […]
Tonga Volcano Breaks Record For The Highest Plume Ever Recorded
The Hunga Tonga-Hunga Haʻapai volcanic eruption which happened on January 15 2022, has broken another record, knocking the previous record holder, Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines, off the top spot for highest plume ever recorded. Hunga Tonga-Hunga Haʻapai reached heights of 57 kilometers (34 miles), more than 17 kilometers (11 miles) clear of the previous […]
Mars Appears To Have A Bad Case Of Acne
In the grand scheme of things, cosmos-wise, Mars is relatively young (a mere 4.6 billion years old to the universe’s 13.7 billion), which means it could still be in its pimply phase, as it appears in new NASA images. However, what may look like a spot of acne or a hormonal breakout on the Red […]
Mass Migration From Twitter Is Likely To Be An Uphill Battle – Just Ask Ex-Tumblr Users
Elon Musk announced that “the bird is freed” when his US$44 billion acquisition of Twitter officially closed on Oct. 27, 2022. Some users on the microblogging platform saw this as a reason to fly away. Over the course of the next 48 hours, I saw countless announcements on my Twitter feed from people either leaving […]
Woman Gets 12 Tumors By Age 30 Due To One-Of-A-Kind Genetic Mutation
An extremely rare genetic condition that has never been seen before caused a Spanish woman to developed 12 different types of tumor before the age of 30, say the authors of a new study. Now aged 36, the patient has been disease-free since 2014, when a tumor was surgically removed from her colon. Born in […]
Five Things You May Not Know About King Tutankhamun 100 Years After His Discovery
One hundred years ago on this day, November 4, the tomb of pharaoh Tutankhamun was discovered. Egyptian workers (and possibly a single boy working away from the main area) found the steps to this extremely well-concealed tomb. This archaeological dig was led by British Egyptologist Howard Carter with the patronage of George Herbert, 5th Earl […]
Are Bananas Really “Radioactive”? Clearing Up Common Misunderstandings About Radiation
The simple mention of the word “radiation” often evokes fear in people. For others, it’s fun to think a little exposure to radiation could turn you into the next superhero, just like the Hulk. But is it true basically everything around us is radioactive, even the food we eat? You may have heard bananas are […]
What Is Shadowbanning? How Do I Know If It Has Happened To Me, And What Can I Do About It?
Tech platforms use recommender algorithms to control society’s key resource: attention. With these algorithms they can quietly demote or hide certain content instead of just blocking or deleting it. This opaque practice is called “shadowbanning”. While platforms will often deny they engage in shadowbanning, there’s plenty of evidence it’s well and truly present. And it’s […]
A Helicopter Is Going To Try And Catch A Plummeting Rocket Mid-Air Today
Space startup Rocket Lab is all set to pull off its latest feat today: using a helicopter to catch a rocket booster in mid-air as it plummets back to Earth. The launch window for the “Catch Me If You Can” mission opens today, November 4, between 5:15-6:30 pm UTC (1:15-2:30 pm EST). Best of all, […]
What Are “Indigo Children”? Or, To Be More Accurate, Do They Really Exist?
As a kid, were you more empathetic and aware of your emotions than others? Did you like music and art – even if your potential in those areas was never fully reached? Were you a free and independent thinker, an outsider, sometimes feeling hemmed in by external authority? If so, some may have labeled you […]
Hackers Take One Of World’s Largest Telescopes Offline With Mysterious Motive
One of the world’s most advanced telescopes has been hacked and taken offline, with all astronomical observations suspended, but the motive of the intruders – and when it will be back up and running – remains unclear. On Wednesday, the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) Observatory in Chile announced they had been hit by a cyberattack […]
