News

The astonishing discovery of 27 fossil bird footprints dating back 120 to 128 million years is changing the way we view avian evolution and migration. Found in the Wonthaggi Formation south of Melbourne, they were laid down in the Early Cretaceous and created by birds stepping across soft sand or mud. The footprints are so […]

Modern day Texas is home to deer, rattlesnakes, and bobcats, to name a few animals, and – according to news from a de-extinction company – soon, it might also have mammoths. The company behind the ambitious target is Colossal Biosciences, and it’s their goal to have living, breathing mammoths at their Texas-based facility by 2028. […]

If you’ve ever spent time around babies, you’ll know that the main way they communicate their needs and feelings is through crying. New research suggests plants take a similar approach – when they’re thirsty or stressed, they make “airborne sounds.” How to detect a crying plant While you’d be hard-pressed not to hear a tiny […]

When humans get hungry, our stomachs appear to protest with a series of rumbles and growls that can be audible even to those around us. It’s a normal part of being human and something all of us have experienced, but what’s actually going on to make those peculiar sounds? The reason why our stomachs growl […]

If you hear the word “tetanus”, there’s a good chance you’ll have a cringe-inducing vision of stepping on a rusty nail, followed by a swift trip to the hospital. However, this is a bit of a misconception: tetanus doesn’t actually have much to do with rust.  Tetanus is a serious, life-threatening condition caused by the […]

This week Jupiter’s Great Red Spot has shrunk to the smallest we’ve ever seen it, a 71-million-year-old snoozing dinosaur suggests they slept like birds, and one of nature’s “most intimidating spectacles” may become a lot more common. Finally, we investigate how the natural world made ancient warfare pretty weird. Subscribe to the IFLScience newsletter for […]

The known universe is full of exciting things like black holes, hypernovas, and merging neutron stars. All of those, however, look tame compared to items physicists think might exist but have yet to find. Perhaps chief among these are wormholes, which theoretically join parts of space and time, allowing those who enter them a shortcut […]

Two phase 3 trials of an Alzheimer’s drug have failed to demonstrate significant improvements in cognitive function, throwing doubt on one of the leading theories as to the cause of the neurodegenerative disease. The so-called “amyloid hypothesis” proposes that build-up of a protein called amyloid-beta is responsible for the neuronal death and degeneration that is […]

Gender has a curious effect on pain perception, according to new research from Lund University in Sweden. In one study, it was discovered that male participants needed stronger pain stimulation to reach a required threshold when the scientist inflicting the pain was female. In another, male patients recovering from surgery tended to report less pain […]

Few people have shaped the global population to the same extent as Genghis Khan – a man whose armies killed as many people as his genitals later replaced. In amongst all the slaughtering and siring, however, the legendary warrior-ruler may also have inadvertently sequestered huge amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, possibly even cooling […]

A fast-moving plant might sound like the stuff of science fiction, but the reality is that our planet’s greenery is far from static. Come with us to discover rapid growers, spore-spreading explosions, and snappy aquatic predators – it’s time to meet the fastest plants on Earth. Growth Traditionally, bamboo has been thought of as the […]

We have all probably heard stories about creative individuals who are brilliant in their field but otherwise haunted by deep inner torment. The late comedian Robin Williams and the iconic painter Vincent Van Gogh are probably among the more recognizable examples. But Is creativity always associated with higher levels of psychopathology? Well, new research has […]

If you live in a long but narrow part of the world, you have an opportunity next month to contribute to a global project exploring one of the most famous and enigmatic stars. That’s because on December 12, on a path running almost half the way around the planet, the asteroid 319 Leona will pass […]

A team of archaeologists working in southwest Spain have discovered a Bronze/Iron Age funerary stone with intricate carvings that challenges a long-standing interpretation of gender representation and social roles in prehistoric ages. The discovery has the team pretty excited, and the results are likely going to shake things up quite a bit. The excavation is […]

If you’re anything like us you’ve probably had the order of the planets in the Solar System memorized since school, with the older amongst you cursed to put Pluto in there despite it being downgraded a whole 17 years ago. So, which is the closest planet to Earth? Well if you said Venus – according to […]

There are dozens of cities across the world that have been lived in by humans for thousands upon thousands of years. However, when it comes to pinpointing the oldest continuously inhabited city, there is no straightforward answer. The conundrum is a bit like the Ship of Theseus thought experiment: if a city is knocked down, […]

Iceland’s geology is particularly moody at the moment. As Fagradalsfjall volcano gears up for its impending eruption, hundreds of earthquakes are rocking the island’s Reykjanes Peninsula each day. Thanks to Northwestern University’s Earthtunes app, it’s possible to hear the creaking and clattering of deep seismic forces currently working beneath the island. The latest collection of […]