When a dog-sized Psittacosaurus was living out its days on Earth, it was probably concerned with mating, eating, and not being killed by other dinosaurs. It would never even have crossed its mind that, 120 million or so years later, scientists would be peering intensely up its clacker. However, that’s precisely what they have
Every day you walk around with your brain gently bobbing about inside your skull. Much like a soft egg yolk floating in a cloud of clear egg whites. All it takes is a sudden jolt or strike, and your brain is thrust aside with startling velocity. Whether it bumps against the skull or goes for
Striking new videos show how RNA – the genetic molecule that tells cells how to build proteins – tangles up in insane knots as it forms, only to disentangle itself at the last second, and in a way that took scientists by surprise. The high-resolution videos depict a bouncing conga line of nucleotides, the
A new technique using diamonds and titanium has the potential to help remove plastic microfibres before they enter the environment, by decomposing them into naturally occurring molecules. It’s a secret the fashion industry would prefer to keep under wraps – most of our synthetic clothes are made of plastic, and they’re contributing to a big problem,
Polarons are important nanoscale phenomena: a transient configuration between electrons and atoms (known as quasiparticles) that exist for only trillionths of a second. These configurations have unique characteristics that can help us understand some of the mysterious behaviours of the materials they form within – and scientists have just observed them for the first time.
It’s no accident that cats are adorable: We’ve selectively bred them across generations for maximum cuteness. But that breeding has a downside: It’s left some of our feline friends with permanent frowny faces that cannot show emotions. In particular, new research published in December in the journal Frontiers of Veterinary Science suggests that selective breeding for the “brachycephalic,”
Scientists have identified the traits that may make a person more likely to claim they hear the voices of the dead. According to new research, a predisposition to high levels of absorption in tasks, unusual auditory experiences in childhood, and a high susceptibility to auditory hallucinations all occur more strongly in self-described clairaudient mediums than
Even though we know the deep sea is weird, ‘carnivorous sea sponges’ still sound like something from a sci-fi movie. And yet, researchers just announced the discovery of three new such species off the coast of Australia. Go a few hundred metres deep into the ocean, and it starts to look like you’re in a whole
NASA announced Thursday that 2020 was likely the planet’s hottest year on record, edging out 2016 by one-tenth of a degree Celsius. The temperatures were close enough to fall within the scientists’ margin of error, so they considered it “a statistical tie.” Average global temperatures in 2020 were 1.84 degrees Fahrenheit (1 degree Celsius)
The end of the last ice age, around 12,000 years ago, was characterised by a final cold phase called the Younger Dryas. Scandinavia was still mostly covered in ice, and across Europe the mountains had many more, and larger, glaciers than today. There was a substantial icefield in the west of Scotland and glaciers could
Most people associate the word “coral” with sunshine, blue skies and Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. In fact, more than half of the 5,100 species on the planet exist as “cold-water corals” in deep and dark parts of the world’s oceans. Unlike most other animals, corals are immobile and so rely heavily on currents to
For most people, the word “vampire” brings to mind Dracula or perhaps slayers such as Blade or Buffy; or maybe even the vampire bats of South America. Few will think of a small and rather lovely bird – the finch. But there are indeed “vampire finches” that feast on the blood of much larger
Say a red gummy bear has a baby with a yellow gummy bear – what percentage of red and yellow do the parents give to their children? Well, assuming gummy bear genetics works the same way we do, they’ll have one set of chromosomes from their mum and one from their dad – so 50
A lonely rhinoceros at a Bangladesh zoo is looking for new love after losing her partner seven years ago, but pandemic travel restrictions are hampering her keeper’s attempts to play matchmaker. Kanchi, a star attraction at the Bangladesh National Zoo, is at her most fertile age. But since the death of her male partner
Underwater seagrass in coastal areas appear to trap bits of plastic in natural bundles of fibre known as ‘Neptune balls’, researchers said Thursday. With no help from humans, the swaying plants – anchored to shallow seabeds – may collect nearly 900 million plastic items in the Mediterranean alone every year, they reported in the journal
Apocalypse or revolution? Depending on the study making headlines, insect numbers around the world are either in dramatic freefall or simply an alarming state of flux, with some species even benefiting from changes in climate. While researchers debate the details, most are in agreement that our existing lifestyle is fundamentally linked with insect numbers,
Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity profoundly changed our thinking about fundamental concepts in physics, such as space and time. But it also left us with some deep mysteries. One was black holes, which were only unequivocally detected over the past few years. Another was “wormholes” – bridges connecting different points in spacetime, in
A desert gecko from Namibia has brilliant glow-in-the-dark markings that shine neon green by the light of the moon. The mechanism that produces its glow has never been seen before in land animals with backbones. Web-footed geckos (Pachydactylus rangei) have translucent skin with large, yellowish markings: stripes on their sides and rings surrounding their eyes.
Electric eels appear to not be the loners we thought they were. In a small lake deep in the Amazon River basin in Brazil, scientists have for the first time recorded the fish not just living together, but actively working together to forage, and to bring down their prey. There’s even evidence that the
We know that all the excess CO2 we’re pumping into the air – alongside a host of other damaging effects – is driving up the acidity of the oceans as it sinks and dissolves into the water, but it seems as though the hardy octopus can find ways to adapt to its rapidly changing environment.
Physicists have observed a new state of matter at work inside an elusive thread of quantum gas. The gossamer-thin strings of gas capable of binding giants sound items worthy of a quest in Grimm’s fairy tales. But versions of these materials are theoretically possible in physics – unfortunately though, in practice they inevitably collapse on
Forests and other land ecosystems today absorb 30 percent of humanity’s CO2 pollution, but rapid global warming could transform these natural ‘sinks’ into carbon ‘sources’ within a few decades, opening another daunting front in the fight against climate change, alarmed researchers have said. Climate skeptics often describe CO2 as “plant food”, suggesting that increased
For decades, scientists have wrestled with a complex mystery of physics: Could the immense amounts of energy theoretically produced by rotating black holes ever be tapped by human hands? If future societies were somehow able to pull off this magnificent feat, the power supply of far-off galactic civilisations would seemingly be assured – and
Curiosity affects everything from our relationships to our education, but it’s not easy to pin down and put under a microscope to study. With the help of Wikipedia though, researchers have now done just, exploring two main types of curiosity. Using Wikipedia browsing as an activity to observe, and a maths technique called graph
The emergency is not invisible. But that doesn’t mean we can see it. After decades of inaction and ineffective action on biodiversity decline, climate change, and pollution, civilisation stands on the precipice of a “ghastly future” it has gravely underestimated, an international team of scientific experts warns in an unnerving new study published this week.
The idea of artificial intelligence overthrowing humankind has been talked about for many decades, and scientists have just delivered their verdict on whether we’d be able to control a high-level computer super-intelligence. The answer? Almost definitely not. The catch is that controlling a super-intelligence far beyond human comprehension would require a simulation of that
The oldest-known animal drawing in the world is a 45,500-year-old depiction of a hairy, warty pig on a cave wall in Indonesia, a new study finds. The mulberry colored painting, drawn with the red mineral ochre, shows the profile of what is likely a Sulawesi warty pig (Sus celebensis), a wild stubby-legged beast with facial warts that can
The ancient, extinct dire wolf may have been among the lonest of the wolves – so genetically distinct from its closest wolf relative that it could no longer interbreed, forcing it into an evolutionary dead end when it died out 13,000 years ago. That’s the finding based on a new study, the in-depth analysis
They say the truth is out there, but nobody ever said it would be easy to find. Now, after a search lasting decades, a giant trove of long-classified records held by the CIA in relation to reported UFO activity has finally come to light. This huge public release of what the CIA claims is
Every eight years during fall, a plague of millipedes swarm train lines in mountainous Japan, earning them the nickname ‘train millipedes’. Working together, these small beasties (around 3 cm or 1.18 inches long) – which play a large role cycling nitrogen in Japan’s larch forests – have forced trains to come to a skidding halt.
Metals and insulators are the yin and yang of physics, their respective material properties strictly dictated by their electrons’ mobility – metals should conduct electrons freely, while insulators keep them in place. So when physicists from Princeton University in the US found a quantum quirk of metals bouncing around inside an insulating compound, they
At least two gorillas at California’s San Diego Zoo have caught the coronavirus, the first known instance of natural transmission to great apes, officials said Monday. Two primates began coughing last week and have since tested positive for COVID-19, while a third is showing symptoms, Governor Gavin Newsom said. They are thought to have
Microplastics are everywhere. These tiny plastic fragments can be found throughout the oceans, infiltrating the animals within it, the food we eat, and even our children. The proliferation extends from the highest peak in the world to the beginnings of life itself. Even the remoteness of Earth’s polar regions offers no shelter from the storm
Two thin strands wound together in a spiraling helix: This is the iconic shape of a DNA molecule. But sometimes, DNA can form a rare quadruple-helix, and this odd structure may play a role in diseases like cancer. Not much is known about these four-stranded DNA, known as G-quadruplexes — but now, scientists have developed
The thylacine has long been considered a truly remarkable species. The extinct Australian beast was a marsupial, but its skull was distinctly canine in appearance, almost identical to the skulls of red foxes and grey wolves. Now, new research has confirmed that this resemblance wasn’t limited to adult thylacines (Thylacinus cynocephalus) – it was
It’s not a question you might have thought about, but which came first: sleep or the brain? To put it another way, can organisms without brains go to sleep? Based on a study of primitive, water-dwelling life forms called Hydra vulgaris, scientists might finally have the answer. New research shows how these tiny creatures
Scientists have created new kinds of ‘living materials’ by tweaking the base ingredients of kombucha – the popular tea drink fermented with a symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast (aka SCOBY). This kind of ‘tea fungus’ – sometimes called ‘kombucha mother’ – can do a lot more than just produce sour-tasting beverages, it seems.
Scientists have identified an entirely new mode of snake locomotion. The newly documented climbing behaviour is difficult, but allows snakes to impressively shimmy up large, smooth cylinders. Researchers have dubbed it ‘lasso locomotion’, because the snake climbs poles by lassoing its body around the cylindrical structures, gripping them tightly in a looped noose from
In a first-of-its-kind discovery, scientists have found that a species of non-photosynthetic bacteria are regulated by the same circadian rhythms that hold sway over so many other life-forms. In humans, our circadian rhythms act as a kind of biological clock in our cells, controlling virtually all the processes in our bodies, influencing when we
Megalodon, the largest species of shark ever to have existed in Earth’s history, likely had a somewhat gruesome method for getting a head start in life. According to new research, the pups of the Megalodon shark (Otodus megalodon) are larger than most humans when they’re born. This suggests that they hatched in the womb and
2020 has tied 2016 as the hottest year on record, the European Union’s climate monitoring service said Friday, keeping Earth on a global warming fast track that could devastate large swathes of humanity. The six years since 2015 are the six warmest ever registered, as are 20 of the last 21, evidence of a
A long-extinct lineage of insect, known fondly as the ‘hell ant’, has been discovered frozen in 99-million-year-old amber, with its scythe-like jaw still pinning its prey. According to scientists, this fierce predator is a newly identified species of prehistoric ant, known as Ceratomyrmex ellenbergeri, and it’s the first time we’ve ever seen a hell ant actively
Scientists have recently discovered a totally new type of chemical bond – and it’s way stronger than it has any right to be. The new type of bond shows that the divide between powerful covalent bonds, which bind molecules together, and weak hydrogen bonds, which form between molecules and can be broken by something as
Taxonomy, or the naming of species, is the foundation of modern biology. It might sound like a fairly straightforward exercise, but in fact it’s complicated and often controversial. Why? Because there’s no one agreed list of all the world’s species. Competing lists exist for organisms such as mammals and birds, while other less well-known groups
Scattered across the world are a number of bewildering ‘mystery spots’ that appear to defy gravity – places where cars seem to drift uphill, and cyclists struggle to push themselves downhill. Also known as gravity hills, these bizarre natural phenomena can be found in places like Confusion Hill in California and Magnetic Hill in Canada,
Spend a few minutes watching the graceful dance of an octopus on the prowl and you’ll quickly appreciate their talent for making their arms flow like a living liquid. It’s one thing to marvel at their flexibility. To really get a grip on their motor skills, researchers from the Marine Biological Laboratory in Massachusetts put
Scientists are studying a major, once-in-a-century drought from Medieval Europe to better understand how extreme weather events indicate rapid climate changes. In the years leading up to the Little Ice Age, between 1302 and 1307, many regions on the European continent were facing exceptional heat and drought, according to historical records and data collected from
Humans and dogs have come a long, long way together. For tens of thousands of years, as our species hunted, foraged, farmed, and explored, canines have been by our side. Today, while many large predators face endangerment and extinction from human hunting and competition, dogs, which are descended from grey wolves, remain the most prolific