If you’re in Bermuda at the right time of the month, you’re in for a treat. Around 2-5 days after the full moon, and around 55 minutes after sunset, the Bermuda fireworm swims to the ocean surface and flares into brilliance, lighting up with an incredible bioluminescent glow. The creature lives most of its life in mucus
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In the Australian town of Jimboomba, 50 kilometres (30 miles) south of Brisbane, a tawny frogmouth had an unfortunate run-in with a barbed wire fence. “If you can picture a 6 foot chain fence with barbed wire at the top – that’s where it was stuck,” senior wildlife carer and president of Reptile Rehabilitation Queensland
Our DNA and chromosomes are the basic genetic information that make us what we are. Now, in a new first, scientists have figured out how our chromosomes move inside our cells – and that this movement may play a role in our health. There are 3 billion base pairs of DNA packed into 23 human
Scientists are pondering what might be called the volcanic solution to global warming. It would be the ultimate desperate measure, a climatological Hail Mary and, possibly, a very bad idea. The only reason it’s an actual subject of research is that human civilization has failed to take steps to stave off dangerous levels of climate
Aim your binoculars to the sky tonight, because we’re about to be visited by the remnants of a badass, glowing green comet nicknamed the ‘Incredible Hulk’. It’s likely the first time this comet will be visiting our Solar System, and is making its closest pass of our planet, reaching as close as 113.4 million km
When silkworms spin their cocoons so they can transition from caterpillar to moth, they produce one of the most valuable fibres in the world. Now a team of researchers has edited silkworm genes so that, in addition to producing their own silk, they spin that of another creature – the golden orb weaver spider. Spider
Whenever the 15th century polymath Leonardo da Vinci wasn’t painting masterpieces or coming up with new ways to launch humans into the sky, he could often be found outdoors, quietly contemplating the eddies of water flowing downstream. What amazed the Renaissance master has since puzzled countless scientists. Half a millennium later, we’re still scratching our
Our society has collectively decided that some weather is better than others. When was the last time 50 degrees Fahrenheit with rain was described as nice weather? How often do tourists flock to destinations where it’s 100 degrees with suffocating humidity? While it’s admittedly hard for even two people to agree on what ideal weather is,
Thousands of years before cats took up residence in 37 percent of American households, and managed to outnumber dogs by roughly 75 million across the globe, they were hopping continents with farmers, ancient mariners, and even Vikings, scientists have found. In the first large-scale study of ancient feline DNA, the results reveal how our inscrutable
The electromagnetic waves around Jupiter are much, much stronger around two of its moons. Around Europa, electromagnetic wave activity is 100 times stronger. And around Ganymede – the largest moon in our Solar System – it jumps to a massive 1 million times stronger. Around planets with a magnetic field, something strange and wonderful happens.
Every year, some 1,200 people make a mad dash for the summit of Mount Everest during the climbing season that begins in May – taking on the arduous, often congested route to the world’s highest peak that most will not complete and some will not survive. Working against them: temperatures far below zero, altitude sickness
Watching an explosion in super slow motion is what we expect from just about any Hollywood action blockbuster. But capturing details of an explosion that’s about the same size as a protein? That might not have the same appeal as a Michael Bay movie, but don’t let that fool you. There’s a lot we can
It’s easy to think the world is ending when natural disasters are pummelling vulnerable islands and politicians are threatening nuclear destruction. But take a step back and you’ll find a more encouraging picture of where the human race is headed – at least from a public health and quality of life perspective. Across the board,
China has successfully tested a new hypersonic aircraft, a potential “hypersonic strike weapon” that could one day be capable of carrying multiple nuclear warheads and evading all existing defence networks like the US missile shields, according to Chinese state-run and state-affiliated media, citing experts and the domestic designers. The Xingkong-2 (Starry Sky-2) hypersonic experimental waverider
Trees are ubiquitous around the globe. Everyone knows that a tree grows up from a seed in the ground. It’s a normal occurrence. But in order to do so, the tree needs to work against gravity – and now researchers have figured out the secret that allows them to do this. Spoiler: It’s bark. This
The coasts are gone. The waves crash high into what were once mountains. Many have perished, for food is scarce, and the deadly heat is inescapable. This bleak future scenario – called a “Hothouse Earth” – could be realised sooner than we think, scientists warn, if the planet breaches a pivotal climate threshold from which
Do you have a short temper? Uh, so, don’t hit us, but… you may not actually be as smart as you think you are. That’s according to a new study by researchers in Poland and Australia. And it’s because anger is strongly related to traits such as optimism and narcissism, which tend to lead a
County Wicklow in Ireland, has had a recent spate of wildfires threatening homes and forests. However, one good thing has emerged from this troubling situation – a message, hidden since the Second World War. The burnt remains of a gorse fire on Bray Head has revealed a sign saying ‘EIRE’ made of rocks, which would have
In 1959, Soviet scientists embarked on an audacious experiment to breed a population of tame foxes, a strain of animals that wouldn’t be aggressive or fearful of people. Scientists painstakingly selected the friendliest foxes to start each new generation, and within 10 cycles they began to see differences from wild foxes – fox pups that
NASA’s new planet-hunting space telescope TESS has been inserted into its orbit around Earth, and has just started its job of scanning the skies to look for planets beyond the Solar System. But before it even started work, NASA turned it on to do a few test observations – and it just so happened to
In 2016, the Nobel Prize in Physics went to three British scientists for their work on superconductors and superfluids, which included the explanation of a rather odd phase of matter. Now their discovery has a practical application – shrinking an electrical component to a size that will help quantum computers reach a scale that just
Facebook isn’t content to know just who you are, what you do, where you go, and who you talk to. It also wants to know how you spend your money. On Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported that Facebook is asking banks – including JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, and Citigroup – to turn over
After more than 125 years of mystery, scientists think they have reconfirmed the final resting place of the world’s forgotten ‘eighth wonder’, clearing up much of the uncertainty from previous studies. On 10 June 1886, Mt Tarawera blew its top in one of the largest volcanic eruptions in New Zealand’s history, sending volcanic debris flying
Academics at Imperial Tech Foresight (ITF), an offshoot of Imperial College London, have been working to bring to life nebulous and intangible technological advances in a way you’ve never seen before. They have created a table of disruptive tech, taking inspiration from the periodic table of chemical elements. It contains 100 innovations, ranging from the
Using a new holographic technology, researchers have been able to twist and manipulate a beam of laser light to tie it into knots, creating complex, three-dimensional light structures. Why? To study what happens to the space around them, of course. It involves manipulating something called polarisation. To our eyes, a laser beam looks like it’s
Astronomers have detected yet another mysterious and powerful fast radio burst hitting Earth from an unknown source in space. If that’s not strange enough, this particular fast radio burst is incredibly low, in the 580 megahertz frequency range – nearly 200 MHz lower than any other fast radio burst we’ve picked up on before. If
For roughly 17 months, she patiently waited. Like many expectant mothers, she looked forward to the day she would get to welcome her baby into the world. On Tuesday morning, it finally happened. J35, a member of an endangered population of southern resident killer whales, gave birth near Victoria, B.C. It was a baby girl.
After decades of looking, researchers have identified a molecule that plays an important role in guiding sperm to find eggs. The discovery, observed in the cellular biology of sea urchins, isn’t just of importance for marine invertebrates – as the findings may reveal new secrets about human fertility that could help us to treat male
A failed assassination attempt against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on Saturday was mounted with explosive-armed drones, according to news reports. Nine days earlier, and on the other side of the world, terrorists claimed to have sent an armed drone to attack the international airport in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. No
Meetings of the International Congress of Mathematics are usually pretty tame affairs, despite handing out one of the most prestigious award in mathematics. But this year, the meeting was shaken up after the Fields medal, also known as the ‘Nobel Prize’ of mathematics, was stolen from one of the winners just 30 minutes after he
On September 8, a massive and controversial plastic-cleaning system will be launched into the Pacific Ocean. The goal of the system, created by The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit organisation founded in 2013 by 24-year-old Dutch innovator Boyan Slat, is to remove plastic debris from the now-famous marine area known as the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch“.
New parenting books seem to pop up all the time. How to do it the French way, the Tiger Mom way, the New Kid by Friday way, or how to just muddle through – the choice can be a little overwhelming. How can we know which guide will give us the answers to the questions
Just in case you’re thinking of taking up a second language soon, language-learning website Voxy put together this handy infographic breaking down which languages are hardest for English speakers to learn. Compiled using information from multiple sources, including the Foreign Service Institute of the US Department of State, the infographic breaks down the amount of
When it comes to predicting who is most likely to act in a trustworthy manner, one of the most important factors is the anticipation of guilt, according to a new study. In the study, researchers identify a trait predictor of trustworthy intentions and behavior. They also provide practical advice for deciding in whom we should
One of Japan’s top medical universities has been systematically blocking female applicants from entering the school for at least eight years, local news agencies reported on Thursday. Tokyo Medical University, a private institution consistently ranked among the country’s best for clinical medicine, has been automatically lowering the entrance exam results of female applicants for the
In his book Fluent Forever, opera singer Gabriel Wyner suggests that one of the best ways to learn a new language is to practice remembering it. In other words, instead of reading and re-reading a list of vocabulary words, you should read it once and then test yourself repeatedly. The same strategy works for pretty much anything
HOUSTON — NASA on Friday announced the crews of the first flights from U.S. soil since the space shuttle retired in 2011, an elite group of astronauts that the agency hopes will help open a new era of space travel. The crews would fly on spacecraft developed not by NASA but by two corporations, SpaceX
The southern peak of the massif of Kebnekaise is the tallest mountain in Sweden, but it might not hold the title for much longer – after a week of particularly hot weather, the mountain has started to shrink. In fact, the glacier-topped southern peak might already be lower than the rocky northern peak, after four
It’s a nightmarish scenario – the elevator seals you inside, rises several floors, judders to a halt, and then SNAP! The frayed cable fails, and you plummet. Can you save yourself by jumping at the right time? In this predicament, the key point to realise is that along with the elevator, you are also falling.
Despite decades of ongoing research, scientists are trying to understand how the four fundamental forces of the Universe fit together. Whereas quantum mechanics can explain how three of these forces things work together on the smallest of scales (electromagnetism, weak and strong nuclear forces), General Relativity explains how things behaves on the largest of scales
There is a very strange object floating around our stellar neighbourhood and it has astronomers intrigued. It’s very large, and has an extremely strong magnetic field, and it’s a “rogue”, not attached to any other object. And we know this because astronomers have detected it using the Very Large Array radio telescope. At just 20
The metal lanthanum strontium copper oxide might not mean much to most of us, but to physicists it just might hold the secret to developing electronics that conduct electricity with near perfect efficiency. When placed inside a powerful magnetic field, the substance doesn’t conduct quite like other metals. Once we learn why, we might at
Unmarked graves, such as those in which murder victims are often callously concealed, may soon be easier to locate, thanks to a technique demonstrated by US researchers. They have found that LIDAR, a tool proving increasingly useful in archaeology, can also be applied to forensics. They have shown that the shallow graves these bodies are
Aftershocks are a common feature of big earthquakes, but they usually occur relatively close to the tremor’s epicenter. For the first time, researchers have found evidence of earthquakes triggering seismic events on the other side of the globe, suggesting a ripple effect that could potentially be used to forecast catastrophes in the future. Researchers at
NASA wants to stop relying on Russia to get American astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS). And little by little, SpaceX is making that happen. Back in 2014, the US agreed to pay Elon Musk’s aerospace company SpaceX US$2.6 billion for a spacecraft that could carry the nation’s astronauts into orbit. It struck the
The sediment under a lake in Mexico contains some of the long-sought answers to the mystery of the Mayan demise. Ancient Mayans, primarily concentrated in what is now the Yucatan Peninsula, were among the most advanced civilizations of their time. Mayans were some of the first to build cities. They used astronomy to advance agricultural
There are a lot of rocks up there in space, whizzing about and occasionally smacking into other objects. Here on Earth, our atmosphere burns up most of the pebbles that come hurtling our way. Not so with the Moon – and ESA telescopes caught two impacts on film just 24 hours apart. The two impacts,
In a rare and fortuitous moment, scientists have caught Madagascar’s red-fronted lemurs (Eulemur rufifrons) gnawing on toxic millipedes and rubbing them all over their genitals and anuses. The first-of-its-kind discovery was made in 2016 by Louise Peckre, an expert in primatology at the Leibniz Institute for Primate Research in Germany, when she was on a
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