News

In 1978, the USS Stein, a US Navy frigate, suddenly had an emergency that resulted in an immediate reroute to its home base – the radar system responsible for identifying submarine threats suddenly went unserviceable (US). The Stein headed for land and reached dry dock so that the engineers could examine the fault, which likely laid […]

Taking inspiration from the floating trains that travel at incredible speeds, researchers from China have now tested Maglev cars that float above dedicated magnetic highways. Hovering 3.5 centimeters (1.4 inches) above the highway, the modified car wobbles its way through the course in what looks like a pretty uncomfortable ride.   If the technology could […]

The mighty weather phenomenon La Niña will continue for the third year in a row and may last until early next year, according to World Meteorological Organization (WMO). This is set to have a knock-on effect on weather across the globe, from droughts in Africa to a wet and wild summer in Australia. In a […]

What weighs more: a kilogram of feathers or a kilogram of lead? This old joke is actually no joke to physicists – since the time of Galileo, they have been trying to demonstrate that objects in a gravitational field experience the same acceleration. This is the universality of free fall, and it has now proven […]

The reproductive system is an essential part of the continuation of the human population. But, it is actually a very complex system and when it goes wrong… boy your body can let you know about it. September is polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) awareness month – so, what exactly is PCOS, and are there any treatments? […]

A person in Los Angeles has become the first confirmed death due to monkeypox in the US. The Los Angeles Department of Public Health announced the death in on September 12, noting that the patient was “severely immunocompromised” and had been hospitalized. Few other details were given.  The statement notes that the death was “due […]

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is a life-saving procedure that should be known more widely than it is. It has helped countless people around the world and European Space Agency astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti has decided to show us online how it could also save lives in space. On Earth, CPR relies on us using our bodyweight to […]

Psychopaths are more likely to act as “parasitic” fathers should they have children, a study published in the journal Evolutionary Psychological Science has found. Psychopaths are loosely defined as people with egocentric and antisocial personalities, showing little empathy for others. Because of this, you would expect that they would have little interest in having and […]

Non-formally-trained scientists have been playing an increasingly revolutionary role over the last 15 years. The rise of Citizen Science has had impacts on every discipline, and every month new projects are launched to involve, inform, and ask the public for help in tackling mysteries at the cutting edge of human knowledge. By any metric, involving […]

The US now meets the criteria to enter the World Health Organization’s (WHO) list of countries where circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPVs) have been identified and are in circulation, the CDC announced on Tuesday. This is due to an ongoing outbreak in Rockland County, New York state, and surrounding areas. Joining them on the watchlist are […]

Pareidolia is the peculiar human behavior of seeing meaningful images in random patterns. We see faces in plug sockets, queens in clouds, and the entire world in funny-shaped rocks. Martian rocks are no exception, with everything from the famous “face” that turned out to be a hill to secret doors spotted on the Red Planet. […]

In just two weeks, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission will test humanity’s capabilities to alter the path of an asteroid by slamming into Dimorphos, a small moonlet orbiting the larger asteroid Didymos. The asteroids pose no threat to Earth but will allow NASA to test a crucial approach to planetary defense in a way […]

BA.4.6, a subvariant of the omicron COVID variant which has been quickly gaining traction in the US, is now confirmed to be spreading in the UK. The latest briefing document on COVID variants from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) noted that during the week beginning August 14, BA.4.6 accounted for 3.3 percent of samples […]

It takes a lot to distinguish yourself if you are the fourteenth king named Louis. Louis XIV managed to do this in several ways: becoming one of the most powerful French monarchs and helping to bring surgery on the anus (and elsewhere) into the modern ages. Louis XIV had a number of illnesses, with recurring […]

The British Monarchy has been dominating headlines following the death of Queen Elizabeth II on September 8. After her majesty’s bejeweled, lead-lined coffin made its way across the UK, we find ourselves asking, yet again, just how much is the royal family worth? In true British nature, the royals aren’t big on disclosing their financial […]

COVID-19 has infected over 600 million people (as of September 13) in practically every patch of the planet. Yet still, somehow, some people have managed to avoid the virus. That might include health carers who spent months surrounded by infected patients or even just people who have shared a bed with a sick partner. If […]

Scientists have discovered how a rare form of diamond is created in space. Found in four meteorites in north-west Africa, the strange hexagonal diamonds do not naturally occur on Earth. Now, we may know where they come from.  Billions of years ago, there was a dwarf planet in the inner Solar System that had carbon […]

All that is gold is not gold-colored, as Bilbo Baggins probably meant to say. Sometimes it’s purple, as in the Alhambra Palace where a gold layer on wall and ceiling ornaments has changed color over centuries. The chemistry of this conversion has finally been explained. The Alhambra Palace in Granada is considered one of the […]

Results from a huge study have shown the fight against cancer may have an incredible new weapon: a simple blood that test can detect multiple different types of cancer before they even show symptoms.   The Pathfinder study, which enrolled 6,600 adults aged 50 and over, offered the blood test to each adult and mixed […]