One might imagine the hostile environment of space as bad news for any organic molecules. However, Japanese engineers just created a wooden satellite called LignoSat, with preparations for a summertime 2025 launch. The mission is meant as a demonstration of the capacities of this … | Continue reading
A pair of lost cities in the highlands of Uzbekistan recently found by archaeologists using lidar demonstrate that the bounty of the Silk Road trade was so lucrative, it allowed urban populations to flourish without agriculture to support them. Tugunbulak and Tashbulak were two m … | Continue reading
Artificial intelligence successfully detected a woman’s breast cancer, after a routine scan evaluated by humans came back as ‘normal’. Sheila Tooth was given the all-clear after her most recent mammogram was examined by two experienced radiologists who determined that there were … | Continue reading
A team of U.S. National Science Foundation astronomers have discovered a supermassive black hole at the center of an early galaxy just 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang that is consuming matter at a phenomenal rate. Indeed, the black hole appears to be consuming matter at over … | Continue reading
A breakthrough in understanding how and why some cancer tumors are particularly aggressive and non-responsive to treatments has placed blame on breakaway strands of roguish DNA. The discovery implicates several documented forms of cancer, including of the breasts, lungs, and brai … | Continue reading
Facing one obstacle after another, the operators of NASA’s Voyager 1 probe continue to find creative solutions to keep the farthest manmade object from Earth transmitting radio communications. Launched in 1977, it is currently 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) from Earth, … | Continue reading
In a new study, scientists seeking to better understand how physical activity protects against neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s found it’s because exercise makes the brain larger. 2 to 3 days of moderate to vigorous physical activity was correlated to a significant inc … | Continue reading
A major Mayan urban center has been found in a recent lidar survey on the Yucatan Peninsula that includes pyramids and ball courts. The archaeologists triumphantly declare that the world is yet far away from the last major discovery under the jungles of Central America. The surve … | Continue reading
German scientists have found a way to extend the lifespan of zinc-ion batteries more than 100-fold, allowing the fringe battery technology to potentially replace the controversial lithium-ion standard found in today’s mobile phones and EVs. This means instead of just a few thousa … | Continue reading
With government funding, a team of engineers at Univ. of Las Vegas are poised to revolutionize how water is supplied in desert climes. Their new system pulls gallons of water a day out of the air around us, and far from sitting on a bench in a laboratory, this incredible innovati … | Continue reading
A team of MIT graduates has invented a commercial device that will give an alternative to sleeping pills for those who struggle to sleep. It’s a minimally disruptive headband that looks like something that would be sold at an Apple Store. Technically speaking it’s an electroencep … | Continue reading
A 9th grader from Snellville, Georgia, has won the 3M Young Scientist Challenge, after inventing a handheld device designed to detect pesticide residues on produce. Sirish Subash set himself apart with his AI-based sensor to win the grand prize of $25,000 cash and the prestigious … | Continue reading
Included in the broad scientific consensus on climate change is the notion that it’s unlikely humans can prevent the worst events of 2°C of warming without removing excess carbon that’s already in the atmosphere. To that end, student inventors at UC Berkeley have created this yel … | Continue reading
An international team of neurosurgeons and organ transplant specialists recently discovered that a brain can be revived 50 minutes after being removed from the body if connected to a liver. It was a bit of a ghoulish experiment, but the results could be vital to improving common … | Continue reading
Plants around the world absorb 37 billion more metric tons of carbon than was previously thought, a new study has demonstrated. It means every tree planted to try and prevexnt the worst of climate change goes 31% farther than earlier models on Earth carbon systems have calucated, … | Continue reading
A plant-derived compound was shown in a recent study to kill strains of tuberculosis that were resistant to existing therapies. The compound was found in a plant native to North America, and was not only able to suppress dormant TB bacteria from resurfacing but also didn’t damage … | Continue reading
Targeting the fourth most common cancer in women globally, a new treatment regime combining chemo and chemoradiation therapy has reduced the rates of death by 40%. Cervical cancer affects over 300,000 women worldwide, and the regime has been heralded as “remarkable”— “the biggest … | Continue reading
Picture this: knee-deep in the stingy, bitey, steamy jungles of Madagascar, you and your research team discover 7 new species of frog—what do you name them? Inspired by the various sounds of American sci-fi films and television, 7 tree frogs that make otherworldly sounds were nam … | Continue reading
A discreet and flexible armband made of electrodes has been found in a small study of stroke patients to aid in restoring flexibility in their disabled arms. Manufactured by a startup called Neubond the device is intended to seamlessly integrate into daily routines, allowing pati … | Continue reading
The 5th test launch of the SpaceX Starship vehicle came with a party trick—a landing—which it stuck. Not since the Moon landings has an American been able to say with as much certainty that they witnessed something straight out of science fiction—a vessel coming down from space a … | Continue reading
Can organisms without a brain still show signs of intelligence? Researchers at Tohoku University had this question in mind when conducting a study to measure the decision-making processes in fungi. While it may sound like science fiction, this level of basal cognition is possible … | Continue reading
Hemp leaf extract rich in CBD was recently shown in a study to kill both species of yellow fever mosquito in their larval phase, including one that had developed insecticide resistance. The study demonstrates yet again how many different things hemp products can be used for, but … | Continue reading
There’s never a dull moment down in the land of the Nile for those with a shovel. A recent discovery of two exquisitely detailed sarcophagi, one sealed inside another, was made recently in the ancient land of Asyut, dating to the 19th century BCE, in the earlier days of the Middl … | Continue reading
Researchers have found evidence suggesting that Earth may have had a ring system that formed 466 million years ago, a discovery that challenges the common understanding of our planet’s ancient history. This surprising hypothesis, published last month in Earth and Planetary Scienc … | Continue reading
Researchers have developed a novel method of 3D printing that uses acoustic holograms, and while it’s a little technical and difficult to understand, the discovery might be a paradigm shift. The researchers say it’s quicker than existing methods and capable of making more complex … | Continue reading
The everyday effects of sleep, exercise, heart rate, and mood—both good and bad—could linger in our brains for over two weeks, according to a pioneering study. Finnish researchers tracked one person’s brain and behavioral activity for five months using brain scans and data from w … | Continue reading
Among the sandstone hills and boulders of Madagascar’s Isalo National Park, the curious archaeological site of Teniky has puzzled researchers for decades. These rock-cut niches, once believed to be a makeshift shelter for shipwrecked Portuguese sailors, have now been reinterprete … | Continue reading
During an archaeological dig in a desert area north of Jerusalem 40 years ago, a seed was discovered which was determined to be in pristine condition but had obviously seen many a year. Now, despite falling from its parent 1,000 years ago, it has grown into a mature tree, and bot … | Continue reading
NASA has seen some outstanding recent successes in robotic exploration over the past 20 years, but now the agency’s flagship explorer—the largest spacecraft ever built for planetary science—is poised for launch. Delayed by chip shortages, budget negotiations, and soon-to-arrive H … | Continue reading
Excavations on a pre-Inca site in northern Peru revealed the presence of a throne room where court was held by a woman. Unfairly obscured by the glory of the Incan Empire, the medieval Moche Culture are known as prolific builders and inspired artists, but it was during this seaso … | Continue reading
A radical new fabric that enables temperature-controlled clothing was inspired by squid—and allows for user-adjusted warmth, according to scientists. Current athletic clothing brands boast temperature-controlling fabrics that may adapt to every climate, with lightweight but warm … | Continue reading
An unusual rock formation deep in the Australian outback could hold key clues to future climate change, now that it has finally been dated correctly. The Pinnacles—part of the world’s largest wind-blown limestone belt, spanning more than 600 miles—are providing new insights into … | Continue reading
It took nearly a century to locate the 430 geoglyphs hidden in the Nazca Desert of Peru, but archaeologists surveying almost the entire region with the help of AI just turned up another 303 in a single study period. Nazca is one of the greatest mysteries in anthropology—why did t … | Continue reading
The analysis of health records of more than 120,000 adults in the UK with an average age of 57 found that people who are happy with their lives are significantly less likely to suffer a heart attack or stroke. They were also less likely to develop coronary artery disease, suffer … | Continue reading
Last month, while trundling across the Martian landscape, the eyes of the Perseverance Mars rover settled on an extraordinary rock. Featuring black and white striations like Alpine granite, it has NASA scientists excited that the rover is entering an area where new discoveries ab … | Continue reading
Four years ago, someone came across an extraordinary find—a juvenile rhino from the Pleistocene ‘mummified’ in the Siberian permafrost. Alerting the relevant authorities, the discovery turned out to be a 4-year-old woolly rhino (Coelodonta antiquitatis) with its fur, skin, and or … | Continue reading
For generations, humanity has had to be content with artistic illustrations of black holes as a means to imagine these difficult-to-imagine cosmic objects. Now, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) Collaboration which gave the world its first real image of a black hole in 2019, has … | Continue reading
Reprinted with permission from World At Large, a news website of nature, politics, science, health, and travel. Depending on where you live in the world, you may be opening this story with every tree in your neighborhood blushing bright yellow, orange, and red, or you could be wo … | Continue reading
“I can eat sugar now,” said a woman from Tianjing, China, who recently became the first human to have their type-1 diabetes cured through a stem cell procedure. Using the patient’s own stem cells, the results offer hope of limitless treatment options for type-1 diabetes, where sp … | Continue reading
The oldest traces of fermented dairy ever discovered were recently found in western China’s Tarim Basin, dating back 3,600 years. A DNA analysis shows that rather than being cheese, as the physical profile of the sample suggested, it was actually solidified kefir. Kefir is a type … | Continue reading
Regular coffee or caffeine consumption may offer a protective effect against developing multiple cardiometabolic diseases like coronary heart disease and stroke, the most common killers in human society today. Detailed in new research published in the Endocrine Society, three cup … | Continue reading
An international team of researchers believe electric cars could go farther on a single charge, and their batteries last longer, now that they’ve made a discovery—the reason batteries lose capacity over time. It is well known that, for example, older mobile phones run out of powe … | Continue reading
Some teachers consider finger counting a signal that youngsters are struggling with math, while others associate its use as advanced numerical knowledge. Now, new research is the first to show that children’s performance in arithmetic can show a “huge” improvement through the tea … | Continue reading
A cheap new test using origami paper sensors can help detect infectious diseases, such as COVID-19, much earlier and easier than current methods, say scientists. The innovative method identifies biomarkers in wastewater, enabling rapid tracking of diseases using the camera in a m … | Continue reading
This incredible critter is the queen conch, and look out fellas she’s single. She’s one of many queen conch bachelorettes being saved by a new initiative in Florida that’s relocating these endangered mollusks to deeper waters. Warming seas off the Florida Keys have made this spec … | Continue reading
Spanish technical archaeologists have identified ancient irrigation ducts in desert regions around the world using AI. The AI was trained to pour through old spy satellite photos taken during the Cold War and look for evidence of underground aqueducts that carried water from high … | Continue reading
With the flick of a light, researchers have found a way to rearrange life’s basic tapestry, bending DNA strands back on themselves to reveal the material nature of the genome. Scientists have long debated the physics of chromosomes—structures at the deepest interior of a cell tha … | Continue reading
It’s probably fair to say that Starry Night is the second most famous painting ever made behind the Mona Lisa, but what its many admirers likely do not know is that its famous swelling skies are “alive with real-world physics.” Van Gogh’s brush strokes create an illusion of sky m … | Continue reading