Gulls Work Out The Timing of School Lunch Breaks So They Can Steal Food
They’ve been watching us for decades. Monitoring our movements. Studying our behaviour. Tracking our routines. Stealing our chips. In the seaside city of Bristol gulls are the ultimate human stalkers,…
What You Need to Know About That Controversial New Climate ‘Tipping Point’ Study
Even if humanity stopped emitting greenhouse gases tomorrow, Earth will warm for centuries to come and oceans will rise by metres, according to a controversial modelling study published Thursday. Natural…
Wild New Paper Proposes Using ‘Tractor Beams’ to Control Lightning Strikes
It may sound like something straight out of a sci-fi movie, but real-life scientists have been busy working on a super-precise laser tractor beam system to change the path and…
Invisible Air Rivers in The Sky Have Been Leaving Giant Holes in Antarctic Ice
It appeared in 1973, seemingly out of nowhere: a hole in the sea ice off the coast of Antarctica. But this was no ordinary hole. It was so big it…
200 Queens Found in Single ‘Murder Hornet’ Nest Destroyed by US Authorities
After months of searching, in October scientists located and destroyed the first nest of giant ‘murder hornets’ ever discovered in the US, eradicating a hidden enclave of the invasive insects…
After 86 Years, Physicists Have Finally Made an Electron Crystal
In 1934, theoretical physicist Eugene Wigner proposed a new type of crystal. If the density of negatively charged electrons could be maintained below a certain level, the subatomic particles could…
Passengers Just Took First-Ever Test Ride in Virgin’s Hyperloop And Didn’t Throw Up
The Virgin Hyperloop made its first journey carrying passengers Sunday, in a test the company claimed represented a major step forward for the “groundbreaking” technology capable of transporting people at…
Ancient Lake Discovered Under Greenland May Be Millions of Years Old, Scientists Say
The remains of a giant, ancient lake have been discovered under Greenland, buried deep below the ice sheet in the northwest of the country and estimated to be hundreds of…
Eerie Footage Captures Elusive Deep-Sea Squid Near Australia For The First Time
The bigfin squid (Magnapinna) is one of the most elusive creatures that we know. It dwells in the permanently dark depths of the ocean and is an extremely rare sight,…
This Impressive Plasma Jet Eradicates Coronavirus on Surfaces in Seconds
Amongst the many problems we’ve had with the spread of COVID-19 is the coronavirus‘s ability to survive on surfaces for hours on end. While we can effectively wipe down hard…
Archaeologists Look Inside Egyptian Mummies First Found in 1615 Without Opening Them
Two ancient mummies discovered in a rock-cut tomb in Egypt more than 400 years ago are finally spilling their secrets, now that scientists have CT scanned their remains, a new…
This Year’s Hurricane Season Has Now Officially Broken a Disturbing Record
This year’s hurricane season has seen a record 29 named tropical storms wreak havoc across the southeastern United States, the Caribbean and Central America, experts said on Tuesday. The cyclonic…
This Extinct Human Ancestor Evolved to Cope With Climate Change, But Didn’t Survive
The discovery of a 2-million-year-old skull in a South African cave is changing what we think we know about one of humanity’s primitive ancestors, scientists report in a new study.…
Scientists Just Discovered a Whopping 12,000 New Species of Microbes
Growing microbes in a petri dish is pretty simple – swab basically anything, wipe it on an agar plate, let it sit for a few days in a warm room…
‘Gorgeous’ Spider Presumed Extinct Found Alive And Kicking at UK Military Base
A 2-inch-long (5 centimeters) spider thought to be extinct in Great Britain is actually alive and thriving on a British military base. A program manager at the Surrey Wildlife Trust…
Drop Everything And Look at These Newly Discovered Glider Species From Australia
Scientists in Australia have made a remarkable discovery, with DNA evidence revealing that one of the country’s adorable airborne marsupials is in fact three separate species. The furry-bodied greater glider…
Climate Change May Have Driven Ancient Human Species to Extinction
Several close relatives of our species, Homo sapiens, have walked this Earth since the genus Homo evolved more than 2 million years ago. These hominins lived in diverse habitats and…
Neanderthal Children Grew Up And Were Weaned in a Similar Way to Humans
Neanderthals may have lost out to Homo sapiens in the evolutionary battle for survival, but as time goes on we’re learning about more and more similarities between the species –…
Duo of African Lizards Use Different Survival Strategies to Outwit The Same Predators
Fitness, the way the naturalist Charles Darwin conceptualised it, refers to the ability of organisms to survive and reproduce successfully. Reproductive success lies in species’ ability to have offspring that…
Some Zoo Monkeys Prefer Traffic Sounds to The Natural Noise of a Jungle
They may be naturally suited to swinging in rainforests, but monkeys in a Finnish zoo have demonstrated a “significant” preference for traffic sounds instead of the noises of the jungle,…
The Gentoo Penguin Is Actually Four Distinct Species We Mistook For One
Birds are one of the most well studied groups of animals in the world, and yet, we’re still finding new species, some of which we’ve never seen before and others…
Heavy Metal Pollution Is Weakening Scallop Shells And Threatening Their Survival
Shellfish such as scallops, mussels, and oysters – bivalve molluscs – readily take up tiny specs of metals into their tissues and shells. In sufficient concentrations, this can harm their…
A Modem With a Tiny Mirror Cabinet Could Help Connect The Quantum Internet
Quantum physics promises huge advances not just in quantum computing but also in a quantum internet – a next-generation framework for transferring data from one place to another. Scientists have…
2 °C of Warming Could Open The Floodgates For 230 Billion Tons of Carbon to Escape
Most of us know about the vast stores of carbon in our atmosphere, and yet beneath our feet, Earth’s soil contains nearly three times as much CO2, absorbing roughly a…
Here’s The Amazing Way The Sides of Our Brain Adapt if They Can’t Talk to Each Other
Between the two halves of our brains is a gap filled with fluid and spanned only by the corpus callosum: a bridge of neural fibres that ferries information to either…
Thai Hermit Crabs Are Facing an Unexpected Housing Crisis
Hermit crab numbers in southern Thailand have boomed as foreign tourists have stayed away – so much so that the national park authority appealed on Friday for the public to…
The Fossil of a Duckbill Dinosaur Has Been Found on The ‘Wrong’ Continent
The final chapter of dinosaur history is a tale stretching across two very different worlds, each a vast supercontinent dominated by its own unique mix of predators and herbivores. Fossilised…
A Teeny Tiny Amphibian Had The Earliest Known Example of a Rapid-Fire Tongue
Albanerpetontids, or “albies” for short, are the cute little salamander-like amphibians you’ve likely never heard of. Now extinct, albies had a dream run. They’d been around since the Middle Jurassic…
World’s Biggest Iceberg Is on a Collision Course With a Remote Penguin Sanctuary
The world’s biggest iceberg is on a collision course with a remote South Atlantic island that is home to thousands of penguins and seals, and could impede their ability to…
Study Finds What Sets Ultra-Runners Apart From Other Athletes, And It’s Not Muscles
For most of us mere mortals, tackling even a typical marathon would be a major achievement. So what kind of mindset are ultra-runners tapping into when they complete gruelling races…
Geologists Find Magma ‘Conveyor Belt’ That Fuelled Earth’s Longest Supervolcano Burst
A subterranean ‘conveyor belt’ of magma, pushing up to Earth’s surface for millions of years, was responsible for the longest stretch of erupting supervolcanoes ever seen on the planet, according…
Social Media Isn’t Necessarily Harmful. Here’s How You Can Use It For Good
Between COVID-19 lockdowns and nail-biting elections, 2020 is certainly driving many of us to spend more time on social media than ever before. We all know this habit isn’t necessarily…
Tireless Volunteers And Navy in Sri Lanka Just Saved 120 Whales From Stranding
Sri Lanka’s navy and volunteers rescued 120 pilot whales stranded in the country’s biggest mass beaching, but at least two injured animals were found dead, officials said. Sailors from the…
US Just Officially Left The Paris Climate Agreement. Here’s What That Means
Nearly five years ago, world leaders gathered in Paris and agreed to collectively cut greenhouse-gas emissions. The US ratified that landmark climate accord in 2016, alongside almost every other nation.…
9,000-Year-Old Grave of a Female Hunter in Peru Shows Women Tackled Big Game, Too
Silently moving in the wilderness of the Andes mountains, ancient hunter-gatherers stalked a herd of vicuña. The hunters threw stone projectile points with ease, hitting some of the beasts and…
This Weird Rock Naturally Glows in The Dark, And Now Scientists Have Figured Out How
The afterglow of the mineral hackmanite (or tenebrescent sodalite) is a fascinating natural phenomenon that has long been a mystery to scientists – even if we’re now able to engineer…
Ants Slurp Their Own Butt Acid to Protect Themselves From Germs
Recently, a team of researchers noticed something odd about ants. Every time the insects swallowed food or water they would start cleaning the glands on their butt ends. “The behaviour…