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It’s a well-known rule that the higher you go on Earth, the colder it gets. But there are a few people who haven’t quite grasped why this is the case, with some asking why it is that the tops of mountains are colder when hot air rises and others asking why the tops of mountains […]

Back in the day, we simply learned that the Moon has no atmosphere. However, schools, institutions, and museums have correctly started to point out that scientists have measured an extremely thin atmosphere on the Moon. Nothing like Earth’s or even Mars’s, which is 100 times less dense than our planet’s. But it is measurable. So […]

When people first set foot in the Amazon Basin thousands upon thousands of years ago, they were greeted by countless never-before-seen animal species. Remarkably, a smattering of the early encounters between humans and beasts were documented in the ancient rock art of Colombia.  Advertisement In a new study, researchers report the wealth of animals depicted […]

What separates us from animals that share 98.8 percent of our DNA? While there might be many varied and valid answers, something that has been at the forefront of this debate is the lack of speech from chimpanzees. Two theories exist as to why chimpanzees might not be able to make human speech sounds: either it […]

Around 4,200 years ago, in the third millennium BCE, humans in the western Russian steppes began a new era in human history by entangling their lives with another species of animal. Recent research has argued that, at this time, the numbers of domesticated horses bred by people expanded quickly, which introduced unprecedented changes. Horses not […]

A deep-sea predator has raised a few eyebrows after revealing that, when looking for love, the eye size of males increases significantly. It’s only the second time sexual dimorphism in the visual system has been established in fish, making the male dragonfish something of an anomaly among vertebrates. Advertisement Bioluminescence is a crucial means of […]

In a matter of days, thousands of astronomers will head to Cape Town and thousands more will log in to participate in the International Astronomical Union General Assembly. This event has already drawn headlines for the proposal of a new definition of a planet, improving the one that redefined Pluto at another general assembly 18 […]

A new State Park has recently opened in California, offering visitors a “journey into the past” that shows how the Central Valley looked before modern agriculture.  Advertisement Dos Rios officially opened to the public on June 12, 2024, marking the first state park created since Eastern Kern County Onyx Ranch State Vehicular Recreation Area in […]

Across the United States and even as far as South America, plaques bearing a strange message can be found embedded in the street. Their message? “Toynbee idea in movie 2001 resurrect dead on planet Jupiter”. Advertisement Well alright then. Exactly where the tiles came from, who created them, and what their messages mean aren’t clear, […]

The Great Red Spot is a storm larger than our whole planet. It is clearly visible on the Southern Hemisphere of Jupiter, even to small telescopes, and we have been observing it for centuries. It became clear in the last few years that it is shrinking. Now, new research suggests that the cause of this […]

A new study has looked into the influence of switching to a vegan diet in twins, finding that even a short-term change in meal choices appeared to alter biological markers of aging. The observational study raises interesting questions about the influence of diet on biological age, including what the long and short-term effects of a […]

Shards retrieved from the alchemy laboratory of 16th Century scientific pioneer Tycho Brahe have traces of unexpected elements, not truly discovered for almost two more centuries. This and other elemental traces may give some insight into what Brahe was doing in his basement laboratory, although many questions may never be answered. Advertisement In an era […]

So, there you are, scrubbing away, belting out your favorite tunes, when suddenly… you’re attacked! By a flimsy piece of waterproof fabric. We’ve all been there at some point, grumbling as we try to un-stick ourselves from the shower curtain that’s randomly decided to billow in at us – which kind of raises the question: […]

Birds are weird little creatures. They used to be the most terrifying predators the world has ever seen, and now they just spend their time getting drunk, facetiming their pals, and occasionally killing one in three humans across the globe. Oh – and, of course, tweeting. Advertisement And every so often, they go crazy and […]

What’s the biggest number you can think of? A googol? TREE(3)? Fourteen?  Advertisement How about an infinite number of nines? No, we’re not being facetious – in higher math, that’s not just a legit possible answer, but it’s also a really bad one. Why? Because an infinite number of nines is actually equal to negative […]

When the ancient Greeks told the legend of Icarus, doomed to forever be a warning against flying too close to the sun, they couldn’t have known that the real dangers at such heights would be athlete’s foot and strangers’ pee. Advertisement But here we are – because, apparently, some of you need telling: don’t take […]

Issue 25 (August 2024) of CURIOUS is out now, bringing you science highlights for the month plus deep dives into intriguing topics, interviews, exclusives, diary dates, and explanations for some of Earth’s most perplexing natural phenomena and landscapes. Read Issue 25 of our digital magazine now by clicking below! Use the arrows to navigate or […]

This week, “dark oxygen” appears to be made from natural batteries found on the deep ocean floor, the most complete Neanderthal skeleton ever found still can’t be excavated, and the record for the hottest day has been smashed twice this week. Finally, we ask which events animals would win if they could compete in the […]

The modern world is so marked by sharp political divides and rampant misinformation that it’s led to the creation of a new term to describe the phenomenon: the “reality gap.” Advertisement But even if we can’t agree on things like whether the entire country is being run by a group of Satan-worshipping pedophiles or not, there are some […]