The moons of Mars are not quite like our Earth's Moon. Phobos, the larger of the two, is much closer to its planet; compared to the Moon's 27-day orbit, Phobos swings around Mars in line with the planet's equator thrice every Martian day (sol). | Continue reading
When you visit your doctor, you might assume that the treatment they prescribe has solid evidence to back it up. But you'd be wrong. Only one in ten medical treatments are supported by high-quality evidence, our latest research shows. | Continue reading
When searching for signs of life in the Universe, we tend to look for very specific things, based on what we know: a planet like Earth, in orbit around a star, and at a distance that allows liquid surface water. But there could, conceivably, be other | Continue reading
The Moon, our closest cosmic neighbour, and the only other body in the Solar System on which humans have set foot, is fairly well known to us. We know that there is practically no air. We know that there is water ice, but no liquid water. | Continue reading
The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, which hold enough frozen water to lift oceans 65 metres, are tracking the UN's worst-case scenarios for sea level rise, researchers said Monday, highlighting flaws in current climate change models. | Continue reading
Plants have a seemingly effortless skill – turning sunlight into energy – and scientists have been working to artificially emulate this photosynthesis process. The ultimate benefits for renewable energy could be huge – and a new approach bas | Continue reading
If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? Perhaps not, some say. | Continue reading
Water covers 70 percent of the Earth's surface and is crucial to life as we know it, but how it got here has been a longstanding scientific debate. | Continue reading
Earlier this year, astronomers announced a dazzling discovery. A fast radio burst called FRB 121102 wasn't just repeating - it was repeating on a discernible cycle. | Continue reading
Radioactive dust deep beneath the ocean waves suggest that Earth is moving through a massive cloud left behind by an exploded star. | Continue reading
At some point in Earth's 4.5-billion-year history, its entirely liquid iron core cooled enough to form a solid ball in the centre. Today, our planet's core consists of a solid iron inner core surrounded by a molten iron outer core, but pinning down e | Continue reading
Radiation that would reduce the DNA inside our own cells into genetic confetti is no match for the microscopic tough-guy known as a tardigrade, and we just got closer to understanding just how these critters are so tough. | Continue reading
NASA is actively monitoring a strange anomaly in Earth's magnetic field: a giant region of lower magnetic intensity in the skies above the planet, stretching out between South America and southwest Africa. | Continue reading
Just as you thought it was safe to go back to ignoring Betelgeuse, the red giant star started acting up again. After its first round of dimming, and then brightening, Betelgeuse has now started to dim once again. | Continue reading
They may look all light and fluffy, but the reality is that clouds are actually pretty heavy. Researchers have calculated that the average cumulus cloud - which is that nice, white fluffy kind you see on a sunny day - weighs an incredible 500,000 kg | Continue reading
When NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) arrived in orbit around the Moon in 2009, scientists immediately started firing lasers at it. | Continue reading
In 2015, a team of scientists from the United States and China traveled to Tibet to gather samples of Earth's oldest glacial ice. | Continue reading
The predation of livestock by carnivores, and the retaliatory killing of carnivores as a result, is a major global conservation challenge. Such human-wildlife conflicts are a key driver of large carnivore declines and the costs of coexistence are oft | Continue reading
A new analysis of the genomes of the most famous of ancient humans - Neanderthals and Denisovans - has revealed an as-yet-unidentified ancestor for our species – a branch of our distant family tree without any known label to put to it. | Continue reading
We know that by wearing masks, we can help reduce the transmission of COVID-19, and we know that not every type of face mask is equally good at blocking viral droplets when we cough, sneeze, talk – or even simply breathe. But how can we really kno | Continue reading
The world has a new brightest fluorescent material, and it's the first of its kind. Rather than trying to improve fluorescent molecules, a team of chemists have developed a new material that preserves the optical properties of fluorescent dyes. | Continue reading
Here's the story – our protagonist rewinds history, locates baby Hitler, and averts global war by putting him on a path to peace … but, oh noes! This sets off a domino chain of events that stops our hero from being born, or worse, kicks off the a | Continue reading
The world's deadliest animal isn't a shark or even a human. Drawing from a graphic from Bill Gates' blog, we decided to rank the world's deadliest animals. | Continue reading
This stunning image captured last year by physicists at the University of Glasgow in Scotland is the first-ever photo of quantum entanglement - a phenomenon so strange, physicist Albert Einstein famously described it as 'spooky action at a distance'. | Continue reading
Scientists have, for the first time, discovered an active leak of methane gas from the sea floor in Antarctica. It is a process that's likely to accelerate the process of global heating. | Continue reading
A new DNA study published Thursday sheds fresh light on the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade, from the legacy of rape that can be seen in today's genetics to how disease likely decimated some groups forced to work in deadly conditions. | Continue reading
As exciting and thrilling as it is to watch all the historic footage from the Apollo Moon landings, you have to admit, the quality is sometimes not all that great. | Continue reading
Overpopulation has been a staple of dystopian fiction for decades, with stories predicting an unmitigated spread of humanity pushing Earth's resources to breaking point. A fresh look at the numbers paints a very different scenario. | Continue reading
It's a captivating idea: build an interstellar ark, fill it with people, flora, and fauna of every kind, and set your course for a distant star! The concept is not only science fiction gold, its been the subject of many scientific studies and proposa | Continue reading
There's a new exotic subatomic particle on the atom smasher. Physicists working with CERN's Large Hadron Collider beauty (LHCb) collaboration have found a new form of the elusive four-quark particle called a tetraquark that they have never seen befor | Continue reading
If you studied algebra in high school (or you're learning it right now), there's a good chance you're familiar with the quadratic formula. If not, it's possible you repressed it. | Continue reading
Imagine being completely blind but still being able to see. Does that sound impossible? Well, it happens. | Continue reading
In a time of ancient gods, warriors and kings, the tale of a tribe of warrior women was established in Greek mythology. Said to be daughters of the gods, these fierce female fighters from Asia Minor have caught people's imaginations for centuries and | Continue reading
Picture in your mind the delta of a river - the way the main channel splits into smaller rivulets and tributaries. Something similar occurs in waves as they propagate through a certain kind of medium: the path of the wave splits, breaking up into sma | Continue reading
So you want to colonize Mars, huh? Well Mars is a long ways away, and in order for a colony to function that far from Earthly support, things have to be thought out very carefully. Including how many people are needed to make it work. | Continue reading
Researchers in China have discovered a new type of swine flu that is capable of triggering a pandemic, according to a study published Monday in the US science journal PNAS. | Continue reading
Not everyone can see pictures in their minds when they close their eyes and summon thoughts - an ability many of us take for granted. | Continue reading
In the strange field of quantum physics, quantum entanglement – what Einstein called "spooky action at a distance" – stands out as one of the most intriguing phenomena. And now scientists just managed to successfully demonstrate it again, this ti | Continue reading
Here's something you might not have expected to see Boston Dynamics' robot dog Spot doing any time soon: herding sheep on a rugged New Zealand mountainside. | Continue reading
If we're really serious about solving the climate crisis, we need to start tackling our economy's overwhelming 'power' of consumption, researchers warn in a new report. | Continue reading
So much of our everyday tech runs on batteries, the importance of lithium-ion rechargeables cannot be overstated. But they are expensive to produce, with difficult-to-source materials. | Continue reading
The most severe extinction in Earth's history looks to have been preceded and enabled by a colossal coal fire lit by volcanism over 250 million years ago, according to new research. | Continue reading
High in the atmosphere of Mars, astronomers have found a phenomenon they've been hunting for decades: a faint green glow, caused by the interaction between sunlight and oxygen in the upper atmosphere. | Continue reading
It's easy to take time's arrow for granted - but the gears of physics actually work just as smoothly in reverse. Maybe that time machine is possible after all? | Continue reading
In July of 2018, NASA announced an incredible achievement. They had created the coldest spot in space - right there on the International Space Station, in orbit around Earth. | Continue reading
An area near Yellowstone National Park has been struck by nearly a dozen earthquakes on Friday, according to the US Geological Survey. | Continue reading
We know that global warming is forcing many animals around the world to flee their normal habitats, but now, an exhaustive analysis has shown marine species are booking it for the poles six times faster than those on land. | Continue reading