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In Roman mythology, Jupiter was the god of lightning, as well as the sky and dubious sexual encounters in non-human form. It’s therefore highly appropriate that the planet named after him has been revealed to have a lot of lightning too. Decades after the existence of lightning on Jupiter was revealed by Voyager 1, we […]

Scrotums, let’s face it, are not the most attractive of the sexual organs. As the authors of a recent study describe it, it is “a sac-like structure containing the testicles” which “semifloat” around in there. The scrotum is outside of the body as the temperature inside is too high for sperm cells to be produced. […]

While whiling away the hours reading angry comments from strangers on the Internet, you may have come across the term “Luddite”. Usually thrown at people expressing even the slightest desire to pump the brakes on artificial intelligence (AI) before it takes all our jobs, the term is used to imply they are technophobes opposed to […]

It’s a ritual millions of us count on to get us through the day: we wake up, stumble into the kitchen, and pour ourselves a steaming hot mug of our favorite poop-inducer. But according to various urban legends, there’s more to your morning cup of joe than just the coffee beans and water you were […]

Prehistoric Planet has kicked off for a week of watch parties after an exhilarating first episode took viewers rafting among the island habitats of Earth 66 million years ago. While the tiny castaway Zalmoxes kicked off proceedings, the episode was arguably stolen by some of the series’ non-dinosaur stars, and there’s plenty more where that […]

Researchers report the peculiar motion of stars at the center of globular cluster M4, which is located 7,200 light-years away light-years from Earth. Researchers believe that the best explanation for the way the stars orbit is a black hole weighing about 800 times the mass of our Sun. A peculiar object in an extremely rare […]

A deep look at Uranus has revealed strong evidence of a polar cyclone swirling on top of the icy giant. This is something that’s never been definitively observed on the planet before, but affirms the long-held rule that all planets with an atmosphere in our Solar System, whether rocky or gas, will possess polar vortexes. […]

Scattered across the shores of the Great Lakes lie some pretty unassuming rocks – but hit them with a UV light, and they’ll start to glow like balls of lava. Fluorescent Sodalite-bearing Syenite, more commonly known as Yooperlites or Glowdalites, were discovered along the shores of Lake Superior by a professed rockhound and Michigan Upper […]

Relationship cheaters get a bad rap, but new research suggests that married people who have affairs often feel great about their infidelity and are rarely racked with guilt. Even more surprisingly, the study authors found that cheating is not generally motivated by a lack of love for one’s spouse or unhappiness in one’s marriage, and that […]

The earliest evidence of wine drinking in the Americas may have been found in the remnants of 15th-century ceramics. Discovered on a small Caribbean island, the sherds also tell a tale of changing culinary traditions of the area in the wake of Spanish colonialism. In a paper detailing their findings, researchers describe 40 pottery fragments […]

For a sustainable future, it’s widely accepted that the global population needs to move away from fossil fuels. While electric looks to be a suitably green alternative, it comes with one major flaw: there just aren’t enough metals to make the shift. We can get more metals by mining, something we’ve done for thousands of […]

Footage that is claimed to show ivory-billed woodpeckers in Louisiana has been released, almost eighty years after the last accepted sighting in the United States. With even the Cuban branch of the family not seen for 36 years, the bird’s rediscovery would be a rare moment of joy for lovers of endangered species. However, not […]

Tomorrow, Earthlings will get a dress rehearsal of what it may be like to receive a message from an extraterrestrial civilization. A message will be sent from the European Space Agency’s ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) on May 24 at 7 pm UTC (12 pm PDT). About 16 minutes later, it will be picked up […]

Dinosaurs have been defamed. Far from the ruthless, small-brained creatures often portrayed, a new study proposes they achieved a major advance in intellectual development 60 million years before our mammalian ancestors. Known as “visual perspective taking” it’s the capacity to recognize that not everyone sees the world the same way you do. It’s hard enough […]

With the pandemic and the increased cost of living, our financial situations may be playing more heavily on our minds than ever before. We wondered what financial assistance a financial advisor can give young scientists emerging from the pandemic.  As such, we caught up with the founder and lead advisor for Elliott Wealth Management Services, […]

Your brain is responsible for controlling most of your body’s activities. Its information processing capabilities are what allow you to learn, and it is the central repository of your memories. But how is memory formed, and where is it located in the brain? Although neuroscientists have identified different regions of the brain where memories are […]

After over a year of observations, the National Science Foundation’s Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope has completed the first cycle of its commission phase. To mark the occasion, eight new images have been released showing some highlights of the work undertaken there. The images focus on the photosphere, the region commonly referred to as the […]

A woman who underwent a heart transplant at 22 years old has visited her old heart, now on display at the Hunterian Museum in London. At university, Jennifer Sutton realized she was struggling with moderate exercise, the BBC reports. Soon, she was diagnosed with restrictive cardiomyopathy – a rare condition where the heart’s chambers stiffen […]

For the first time, scientists have been able to detect chronic pain as it happens, using electrodes implanted in the brains of four human volunteers. The detected brain signals could accurately predict an individual patient’s pain levels, and could one day lead to a solution to chronic pain where other treatments have been unsuccessful. Chronic […]