The lines worn into an engraved limestone object from the Netherlands are consistent with the idea that it was a Roman game board, according to an AI analysis | Continue reading
Ripples in space-time from a pair of merging black holes have been recorded in unprecedented detail, enabling physicists to test predictions of general relativity | Continue reading
Scientists have pinpointed a group of bacteria that consistently appear in high numbers in healthy people, suggesting that these could one day be targeted through diet or probiotics | Continue reading
People classed as “overweight” according to BMI can be perfectly healthy. But there are better measures of fat, and physicians are finally using them | Continue reading
A type of cognitive training that tests people's quick recall seems to reduce the risk of dementia, including Alzheimer's disease | Continue reading
Paul Erdős was one of the most prolific mathematicians to ever live, known for showing up at the door of others in the field and declaring they should host and feed him while they do maths together. His radical life should be immortalised by Hollywood in a comedy biopic, says col … | Continue reading
One type of friction can waste energy even when two perfectly smooth surfaces move against each other, but researchers are getting a handle on how to attenuate or stop it completely | Continue reading
The first people to reach the Kitsissut Islands off the north-west coast of Greenland were Indigenous peoples, who crossed over 50 kilometres of treacherous water | Continue reading
The flow of ice at Pine Island Glacier in West Antarctica has sped up dramatically due to the disintegration of the ice shelf in front of it, and this could lead to faster sea level rise | Continue reading
Science funding cuts in the UK are expected to be a "devastasting blow" for physics research, affecting international projects such as particle detection experiments at CERN | Continue reading
When we exercise more, our bodies may compensate by using less energy for other things – especially if we eat less too | Continue reading
Five volcanoes on Jupiter’s moon Io erupted simultaneously, spewing a mind-boggling amount of lava onto the surface and giving us clues to what may lie underneath | Continue reading
By matching uterine contractions up with the body’s natural circadian rhythms, inducing labour in the early morning is linked to shorter labour and fewer emergency c-sections | Continue reading
A review of the evidence suggests that statins are no more likely than a placebo to cause most of the side effects listed on their labels | Continue reading
An otherworldly coral, a very cute moth and an intricately beautiful mushroom are among the winners in the prize this year | Continue reading
Pesticides are becoming more toxic and just about every country is using more of them year after year, despite a UN target to halve the overall risk by 2030 | Continue reading
A change in atmospheric chemistry during the covid pandemic resulted in methane concentrations spiking, raising concerns that cleaning up pollution could have similar knock-on effects in the future | Continue reading
Kanzi, a bonobo with exceptional language skills, took part in a make-believe tea party that demonstrated cognitive abilities never seen before in non-human primates | Continue reading
An experiment with superconducting qubits opens the door to determining whether quantum devices could be less energetically costly if they are powered by quantum batteries | Continue reading
Two-year-olds raised in vegan or vegetarian households don't necessarily have restricted growth, according to a study of 1.2 million children | Continue reading
An antibody that has the power to neutralise any influenza strain could be widely administered in the form of a nasal spray if a flu pandemic emerges | Continue reading
The late photographer's work depicting some of the world's coldest places is collected in his new book Genesis | Continue reading
The books, TV, games and more that New Scientist staff have enjoyed this week | Continue reading
It's a truism that weeds love poor soil, but is there anything to it? And what is a weed, anyway? James Wong investigates | Continue reading
In his lyrical book Frostlines, Neil Shea argues that we are more connected to the Arctic than we might think, says Elle Hunt | Continue reading
Feedback is delighted by an experiment on the Milan metro system, which involved a prosthetic bump, a Batman costume and some unexpected displays of public decency | Continue reading
As a doctor working in genomic research, I know that we lack vital data for Black people and many other groups. Here's how we can change that, says Drews Adade | Continue reading
Nearly 40 years after Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time, Sarah Alam Malik's epic exploration of the cosmos reflects a changed landscape around science in the 21st century, finds Alison Flood | Continue reading
Companies are happy to sell you personalised tracking of your biomarkers or a tailored nutrition plan, but truly personalised medicine should be able to tackle the vast differences some people have in response to the same diseases | Continue reading
As Elon Musk and Pete Hegseth talk about wanting to make Star Trek real, long-time fan Chanda Prescod-Weinstein says they've misconstrued the heart of the story | Continue reading
In The Beauty, mysterious deaths of models are linked to a new drug and a sexually transmitted infection, both of which kill as they beautify. But if you want great body horror, this isn't the place to look, concludes Bethan Ackerley | Continue reading
The psychedelic 5-MeO-DMT seemed to induce similar patterns of brain activity in a lama - a revered spiritual teacher in Tibetan Buddhism - as meditation, advancing our understanding of the drug's neurological effects | Continue reading
The psychedelic 5-MeO-DMT seemed to induce similar patterns of brain activity in a lama - a revered spiritual teacher in Tibetan Buddhism - as meditation, advancing our understanding of the drug's neurological effects | Continue reading
Some think the rise of C-sections means that one day all births will require serious medical intervention. But a surprising new understanding of the pelvis suggests a different story | Continue reading
An array of 15,000 qubits made from phosphorus and silicon offers an unprecedentedly large platform for simulating quantum materials such as perfect conductors of electricity | Continue reading
A social network where humans are banned and AI models talk openly of world domination has led to claims that the "singularity" has begun, but the truth is that much of the content is written by humans | Continue reading
Chemicals used in refrigeration break down in the atmosphere to produce trifluoroacetic acid, a persistent pollutant that could be harmful to humans and aquatic life | Continue reading
While pilots are flying in a VR simulation, their brainwave patterns can be fed into an AI model that assesses how challenging they are finding a task and adjusts the difficulty accordingly | Continue reading
Can a single particle have a temperature? It may seem impossible with our standard understanding of temperature, but columnist Jacklin Kwan finds that it’s not exactly ruled out in the quantum realm | Continue reading
John Martinis has already revolutionised quantum computing twice. Now, he is working on another radical rethink of the technology that could deliver machines with unrivalled capabilities | Continue reading
SpaceX says it wants to deploy an astronomical number of data centres in orbit to supply power for artificial intelligence, but the proposal might not be entirely serious | Continue reading
The meaning of life has puzzled philosophers for millennia, but new research suggests it could be as simple as lending a helping hand | Continue reading
Ants rely on scent to recognise their comrades, and when they are exposed to common air pollutants, other members of their colony react as if they are enemies | Continue reading
For the first time, researchers have found what seems to be a cloud of dark matter about 60 million times the mass of the sun in our galactic neighbourhood | Continue reading
The most robust evidence to date shows that people with a type of lung cancer lived longer if they received immunotherapy before 3pm | Continue reading
Your organs are constantly talking to each other in ways we’re only beginning to understand. Tapping into these communication networks is opening up radical new ways to boost health | Continue reading
We are getting a clearer sense of where and how often Homo sapiens and Neanderthals interbred, and it turns out the behaviour was much more common than we first thought | Continue reading
To eliminate bedtime struggles, a growing number of parents have turned to melatonin gummies, but these hormone supplements are largely unregulated. Columnist Alice Klein digs into the evidence on the risks of regularly using melatonin as a sleep aid for children | Continue reading