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In the third century BCE, a clever Greek chap by the name of Eratosthenes came up with a novel new piece of mathematics: a “sieve”, by which one could painstakingly trawl through every integer in order and discard any with more than two factors, leaving only the primes behind.  It was smart for the time […]

The world’s most expensive cheese costs more than some people’s monthly rent.  By some accounts, picking up a pound of Pule in 2016 would have left you $1,700 out of pocket – accounting for inflation, that is somewhere in the region of $2,300 in today’s dollar. Other estimates put the cheese at a still eye-watering […]

All the elements in the periodic table exist in multiple forms, known as isotopes. These isotopes are classified as stable or unstable, with the unstable isotopes undergoing radioactive decay or fission to become something else. There are, however, hundreds of known stable isotopes that have never been seen to undergo decay, so you might think […]

The world is full of terrifying things,  jellyfish and hair loss, just to name two. And while 3 am isn’t exactly the ideal time to start panicking about them, that’s when many of us find ourselves wide awake, wondering if we’d really have to pee on ourselves after a jellyfish sting. Or is that just […]

After getting a plastic lid stuck around its neck as a cub two years ago, a young black bear in Michigan is finally free of his unwanted accessory, after state wildlife biologists successfully removed it. According to a statement from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR), the bear first caught the attention of biologists […]

Pangolins, the most trafficked mammals on the planet, could soon be protected under the US Endangered Species Act. These enchanting creatures aren’t native to the US, but the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has recently proposed that seven species of pangolin in Asia and Africa should receive federal protection as a tool to solve the […]

At up to 18 meters (60 feet) long, the whale shark is the largest fish in the ocean. That’s quite a size, especially considering that it, along with all other sharks, has no bones. So, how do these behemoths get so big? Sharks don’t have bones Instead of bone, shark skeletons are made up of […]

Buckle up and batten down the hatches: we’re almost halfway through 2025, and it’s already a whirlwind year for tornadoes. This season is highlighting a shift in US tornado trends, with more activity brewing in the East and rising danger across the board. At least 1,200 tornadoes were reported between January 1 and June 20, […]

For the last year or so, astronomers and sky lovers have been waiting for the explosion of T Coronae Borealis. The system is a notorious recurring nova, which is expected to go any moment now, but still has not. So, while astronomy can be a cruel mistress, making us wait, it can also be a […]

What goes on beneath the waves is a mystery to many people. While scientists can work out whale behavior, discover new species, and even store messages in bubbles, sometimes the casual observer can also learn something. Recently, a diver witnessed a remarkable interaction between an octopus and a ray in which only one came out […]

Where does life on Earth end? You’d think it must be at the crust, right? Oh-ho-hoo, dear reader, think again. Allow me to introduce you to a little something called the deep biosphere. The crust is Earth’s outermost shell, and it can be as thin as 5 kilometers (3 miles) at the bottom of the […]

Families can come in all sorts of different shapes, sizes, and even species, as it turns out. That’s certainly the case in Madison, Wisconsin, where a pair of sandhill cranes with a leggy young chick of their own have also adopted a fluffy little Canada gosling. If that sounds pretty darn adorable, we can confirm […]

Interspecies breeding is creating a slippery problem in Florida’s conflict with invasive pythons. A few years ago, scientists discovered that a significant number of the giant snakes stalking the Everglades are hybrids created as a result of breeding between two different species: Burmese pythons (Python bivittatus) and Indian pythons (P. molurus). Remarkably, these hybrids appear […]

The dead speak! Humanity has heard a mysterious signal, but the origin is not a broadcast from Star Wars’ Emperor Palpatine – it is from another seemingly defunct object. The NASA Relay 2 satellite, which worked for several years in the 1960s, appears to have sent a radio pulse back to Earth. Is the satellite […]

What’s your preferred sleeping position? Do you lie on your side like a fetus, sleep on your back like a log or corpse, or do you lie on your stomach like you’ve fallen from a great height? You might think your preferred sleeping position is a trivial quirk, but scientists believe some positions are better […]

This week on Break It Down: Two spacecraft just created the first ever artificial solar eclipse, thanks to some impressive drone photos we know now dancing dinosaurs might have been leaping around to impress females in Colorado, a child from the world’s oldest burial site appears to be a Neanderthal-Homo sapiens hybrid, for the first […]

When Queen Elizabeth II died in September 2022, her 70 years on the throne fell slightly short of the record for a sovereign state monarch. That accolade belongs to Louis XIV of France, who ruled for 72 years until his death in 1715 – although even his reign was but a flash in the pan […]

The world’s first microfiber recycling facility has just opened in Cornwall, England. Run by the Cleaner Seas Group, the new Microfibre Filter Hub, Microplastic Recycling Lab, and Return and Recycle Center aim to transform our approach to microplastic pollution in the world’s oceans. Many of us are probably aware of the prevalence of microplastics, given […]

For clues as to how dinosaurs dated, we can look to the last living dinosaurs: birds. On Earth today, several species perform lek mating, a spectacular display that sees males gather together for what is essentially a dance-off. Females will watch the males perform, and the most impressive wins the chance to mate with her. […]

Astronomers are ready to share with the world the very first groundbreaking images from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory. The facility, supported by the National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy, is set to observe the sky like never before, thanks to its incredible digital camera, the largest in the world.    You can […]