News

Ever put your foot in it by presuming that someone’s date was actually their sibling? It’s surprisingly easy to do, and a pretty unfortunate way of kicking off a social interaction. If you were looking for a handy guide to help prevent you making these kinds of faux pas, we’re sorry that we’ll have to […]

Rare gene variants passed down from our Neanderthal relatives have been linked to the development of autism in a new study.  Advertisement Scientists at Clemson University and Loyola University New Orleans found that rare Neanderthal variants are significantly more common in autistic people compared to non-autistic people at a population-wide level.  Advertisement These rare variants […]

There are a lot of surprisingly long-lived species out there, from the Greenland shark that can live to around 400 years old, to a clam that could have survived much longer than its 507 years if it wasn’t accidentally killed. Now, scientists have discovered the world’s oldest known marine plant, and it’s a whopping 1,400 years […]

Given that humans have a fair few body parts, it’s understandable that anatomists had to get a bit creative when it came to naming them. That being said, some of those names are downright odd – so where did they come from? Coccyx Better known as the tailbone, the coccyx is the final segment of […]

There’s something rotten in the kingdom of Great Britain. One of the smelliest plants on Earth is about to bloom in London. Not in the street, but in the tropical rainforest glasshouse of Kew Gardens, which hosts the “largest and most diverse botanical and mycological collections in the world”. Among the gems of this collection […]

Bill Gates has helped “break ground” on the development of a new next-generation nuclear reactor. The project, which is run between TerraPower and the Department of Energy, plans to build a new sodium test reactor at a site in Kemmerer, Wyoming by 2030. Advertisement The nuclear industry has been in decline in the USA for […]

“Damnatio ad bestias” were probably the three most feared Latin words in Roman times, and signaled a truly horrifying fate for those unlucky enough to be sentenced with this awful phrase. Literally meaning “condemnation to beasts”, this cruel and unusual punishment saw criminals ripped apart by wild animals for the entertainment of the general public. […]

Here are two facts about math that often go unadvertised: firstly, there are some problems that are simply unsolvable. It’s not that you personally aren’t smart enough, or that you’re using the wrong method to figure it out; the question, or conjecture, or concept will simply never be solved by anyone, ever. And secondly, inspiration […]

The storage capacity of amber was showcased in Jurassic Park when a prehistoric mosquito was mined for information, namely the “dino DNA” stored within its last blood meal. Now, scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have taken than idea and run with it to create an amber-like polymer that could store anything from genomes […]

This week on Break It Down, elephants have names, the ISS just scared the bejesus out of everybody, how to Benjamin Button yourself in space, grolar bears remain extremely rare, “alien signal” from Mars finally gets decoded, and why London’s Kew Gardens are about to reek of corpses. Available on all your favorite podcast apps: Apple […]

As you read these words, do you have a voice that is essentially saying them in your head? If so, then this is what is referred to as subvocalization, or silent speech. It’s a common reading habit that many people have and is often useful for comprehension, but some claim you can suppress or even […]

At the heart of the galaxy OJ 287 is a supermassive black hole, like almost every other galaxy, but this one is unusual. Around it orbits a smaller black hole, but one still far bigger than the one in our own galaxy. Astronomers have suspected for decades the flares from this galaxy were a product […]

As the Moon orbits the Earth, the Earth orbits the Sun, and the Sun orbits the center of the Milky Way, oscillating up and down relative to the galactic plane as it does so.  Advertisement A new study has suggested that this motion of our star through the galaxy potentially takes us through regions of […]

The landscape in South Africa is pockmarked by beautiful smatterings of wild flowers. They grow in this particular way because they prefer setting up camp on termite mounds which are richer in nutrients than the surrounding soil, and also happen to be the oldest termite mounds in the world. Advertisement The termite mounds are known […]

At the end of the day, humans are just another kind of ape – sharing DNA, anatomy, and apparently, even basic thought patterns. At least, that’s according to a new study out of the University of St Andrews in Scotland, which finds that, while chimps may not have the language capabilities that humans do, they’re […]

The Internet was briefly sent into a panic yesterday, after a NASA audio feed from the International SpacStation (ISS) was accidentally “misrouted” to a public feed. Advertisement The ISS broadcasts its view live, including footage from cameras inside and outside the station. At time of writing, you can even watch astronauts conducting a live space […]

Amongst the super-rich, it’s almost a requirement at this point to try some wacky way of halting the irrepressible march of time. Anti-aging strategies range from the positively vanilla – drink lots of water and wear sunscreen – to the still-quite-tame cosmetic surgery options, to the extremely expensive and bizarre (penis rejuvenation, anyone?). But what […]

In Greek mythology, the island of Crete provides the setting for a legendary battle between the heroic Theseus and the half-human, half-bull monstrosity known as the Minotaur, which is said to have lived inside a maddening labyrinth. And while there’s little truth to this fable, archaeologists have just discovered a monumental labyrinthine structure atop a […]

The baobab tree looks almost alien in the modern environment, and no wonder, considering these plants first emerged around 200 million years ago when dinosaurs were making their debut. Hailing from the genus Adansonia, they have captivated humans for thousands of years, with records of Homo sapiens’ appreciation for baobab trees dating back 2,300 years […]

Taylor Swift and her fans (known as “Swifties”) have triggered earthquake sensors once more, this time setting off British Geological Survey (BGS) equipment 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) from the concert venue. Advertisement Swift is currently on tour in the UK, and played the Murrayfield Stadium in Edinburgh from June 7-9. Monitoring the seismic activity generated […]