News

Is there other life out there? “Pray that there’s intelligent life somewhere out in space ‘Cause it’s bugger all down here on Earth,” sang Monty Python. We do not know if there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, and we do not know if there is any other life beyond Earth. However, this last […]

December 23 marked a fiery anniversary for Kīlauea, as the volcano officially reached a whole year since its current eruption began – and it’s spat out some pretty spectacular lava fountains to celebrate. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content. Kīlauea is a […]

There are some seriously beautiful spiders in the world, but the species we currently have a crush on is Eresus rubrocephalus, a kind of ladybird spider. It’s not just any ladybird spider, however, with unique traits scientists have never seen in its genus. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in […]

During comet 3I/ATLAS’s closest approach to Earth, the Breakthrough Listen project attempted to search the interstellar visitor for signs of technosignatures, or signs of alien beings sending communications. Meanwhile, another team has taken a look at the non-gravitational acceleration of the object – or the acceleration of the comet that is not due to gravitational […]

Werribee Open Range Zoo is celebrating their rhinoceros calf’s crossing of the 1 tonne threshold earlier this month. For a calf born underweight with big doubts over his survival, the milestone would be an achievement under any circumstances. The fact that Jabulani has done it with a mother expected to need plenty of assistance represents […]

This time of year many of us will be sitting down with family and friends to enjoy a seasonal feast, the centerpiece of which might be roast goose, turkey, or chicken – but would you consider swapping your poultry for something a little more plant-based? The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please […]

In a striking example of rapid adaptation, the physical form of urban rodents has changed to better suit the hustle and bustle of urban life. Earlier this year, scientists at the Field Museum in Chicago went through their collection and measured the skull shapes of eastern chipmunks (Tamias striatus) and eastern meadow voles (Microtus pennsylvanicus). […]

Every day is a learning day, and we shouldn’t really mock people for learning something new. But a 39-year-old has recently told the Internet about his very recent discovery about what raisins are, and his family’s reaction to it. “Today, aged 39, I found out that raisins are in fact dried grapes,” Reddit user p00shp00shbebi1234 […]

Hundreds of old leather shoes have mysteriously washed up on a beach in the UK. Could a 19th-century Italian shipwreck be responsible for these lost soles? Around 200 black leather shoes were discovered on December 18 by the non-profit group Beach Academy during a rockpool restoration project along the shores of Ogmore-By-Sea in the Vale […]

On July 8, 2000, Dave Shealy captured a creature on camera he had been tracking for decades: the Florida skunk ape. Few believed the state’s answer to Bigfoot existed, but here it was out walking in the swamp. Shealy first saw the skunk ape when he was just 10 years old. “It looked like a […]

The largest planet-forming disk ever observed, nicknamed Dracula’s Chivito after a Uruguayan sandwich, has been revealed to be exceptionally chaotic. This turbulence may have propelled whisps of material visible far beyond the main disk, creating a butterfly-like appearance. Early last year, astronomers discovered a very strange-looking disk around a young star, officially titled IRAS 23077+6707. […]

Scientists have long puzzled over the origins of eukaryotes, the domain of life defined by cells with a membrane-bound nucleus, which includes all animals, plants, fungi, and insects. If they unravel this, perhaps they could understand how complex life came to be. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or […]

Mummification can happen in all sorts of ways. It can be slow and steady, or as rapid as a matter of days. It can result in pleasantly scented mummies, bound mummies, potentially hazardous mummies and, in very rare cases: green mummies. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe […]

Ask someone to name a maritime disaster and chances are they’ll say Titanic, but compared to the Vasa, it did quite well. It took a several-ton iceberg to end the doomed Atlantic crossing, but for the Vasa, all it took was a bit of wind. Thought to be the most expensive ship of its time, […]

It’s the holiday season, and houses across the world have been festooned with seasonal décor – including plants. But if you have pets in the house, it’s important to know about festive plants that might pose a health risk to them, so you can hopefully avoid interrupting your turkey dinner with a trip to the […]

In math, more than any other discipline, reputation is irrelevant. It’s not that it counts for nothing – but with vanishingly few exceptions, if you don’t have a valid proof, your proposition isn’t going to be accepted just on the strength of your name alone. Nobody believed in that tenet more than Richard Dedekind, a […]

Alaska is perhaps better known for snow and ice than it is fire. But new research shows the Last Frontier has been hit by more wildfires over the last century than at any other time since the rule of Ramses the Great. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or […]

As we all learned in 2020, it does not take long for a disease outbreak to turn into a full-blown pandemic. Zoonotic diseases – such as COVID-19 or bird flu – are prime contenders for a future “Disease X” that could spark a global epidemic.  The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please […]

You would be forgiven for thinking this is a mushroom. It wears a cap, it lives in the undergrowth and it lacks chlorophyll, the pigment responsible for photosynthesis and for plants being green. The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content. But despite appearances, […]

On September 12, 1940, a dog in France made one of the most exciting archaeological discoveries of the 20th century. Marcel Ravidat, an 18-year-old student, was exploring the woods in Montignac in Dordogne, southern France, when his dog named Robot began investigating a small hole next to an uprooted tree. According to some retellings of […]