Science

Seismology has been ubiquitous on Earth for decades, and missions such as InSight have recently provided the same data for the inside of Mars. Understanding a planet’s inner workings is key to understanding its geology and climate. However, the inner workings of Venus, arguably our closest sister planet, have remained a mystery. The sulfuric acid

In 1997, a lone wolf crossed an ice bridge that briefly connected Canada with the remote Isle Royale, which lies off the coast of Michigan in Lake Superior and is renowned for its rich biodiversity. His arrival revived the flagging fortunes of the wider wolf population, which had been hit by disease and inbreeding, and

Scientists at Stanford University have designed a new paint that could help reduce our growing reliance on air conditioners and heaters. It comes in an array of colors, and if used properly, it could seriously slash electricity bills and emissions. The paint is capable of reflecting up to 80 percent of mid-infrared light from the

WASHINGTON — A Falcon 9 launched a multinational crew to the International Space Station Aug. 26 after a one-day delay to check the spacecraft’s life support system. The SpaceX Falcon 9 lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center at 3:27 a.m. Eastern on the Crew-7 mission for NASA. The Crew Dragon

Most spiders pose very little danger to humans, including the notorious noble false widow (Steatoda nobilis). But the half-inch predator does punch surprisingly far above its weight. According to a recent study, for example, the noble false widow spider may habitually prey upon vertebrates, with known victims including lizards, bats, and now shrews. In fact,

Nothing can go faster than light. It’s a rule of physics woven into the very fabric of Einstein’s special theory of relativity. The faster something goes, the closer it gets to its perspective of time freezing to a standstill. Go faster still, and you run into issues of time reversing, messing with notions of causality.

Personally witnessing the contorted forms of Vesuvius’s human and animal victims drives home the horror of their final moments like no words or footage ever could. The famous casts of Pompeii have allowed this experience to be shared by generations of people across the world, from Italy to Australia. Unfortunately, the plaster may have also

India made history as the first country to land near the south pole of the Moon with its Chandrayaan-3 lander on August 23, 2023. This also makes it the first country to land on the Moon since China in 2020. India is one of several countries – including the US with its Artemis program –

​Japan began releasing wastewater from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean on Thursday, prompting a furious China to ban all seafood imports from its neighbour.​ The start of the discharge of around 540 Olympic swimming pools’ worth of water over several decades is a big step in decommissioning the still highly dangerous

When a magician tells you there’s nothing up their sleeve, you’re invited to look past the arm sweat and stale air for cards or rabbits lurking within. But when a manufacturer of high-quality microchips says there’s nothing in their vacuum chamber, you really need to trust them. Hairs, dust motes, or even molecules of pollutants

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea said Aug. 24 its second attempt to launch a spy satellite ended in failure due to an “error in the emergency blasting system” during the third-stage flight. The failed launch came about three months after the nation’s first attempt failed in May, when the new carrier rocket Chollima-1 crashed

At the Davidson Seamount, off the coast of California, a world of wonder lurks on the seafloor. There, in the shimmering warmth that seeps through from the volcano below, thousands of ‘pearl’ octopuses (Muusoctopus robustus) gather to mate, to nest, and to nurture their eggs to hatch. Discovered in 2018, the nursery is the most

To take a picture, the best digital cameras on the market open their shutter for around around one four-thousandths of a second. To snapshot atomic activity, you’d need a shutter that clicks a lot faster. With that in mind, scientists have unveiled a way of achieving a shutter speed that’s a mere trillionth of a

A chemical analysis of the letters of the legendary historical figure reputed to have inspired fictional vampire Dracula has revealed Vlad Drăculea (aka Vlad the Impaler) may have cried tears of blood. Traces left behind on the paper by the 15th century ruler of Wallachia suggest he was afflicted by a condition known as hemolacria,

The glowing debris surrounding a dying star is revealed in intricate new detail by images from the James Webb Space Telescope. New observations of Messier 57, AKA the Ring Nebula, were unveiled earlier this month; now, cleaned, polished, and processed, the images show the dying star like you’ve never seen it before. Using the near-infrared

It’s the midst of winter in the Southern Hemisphere and Antarctica is missing an obscene amount of ice. “One might think that the huge remote continent of Antarctica with its kilometers-thick ice sheet could withstand extremes brought about by climate change, but this is absolutely not the case,” says University of Leeds glaciologist Anna Hogg.

SAN DIEGO — Eutelsat has scheduled a shareholder vote Sept. 28 to get the final approval needed to take over OneWeb after clearing all regulatory hurdles for the multi-orbit merger. The French operator of geostationary satellites is expected to complete its all-share deal for the British low Earth orbit (LEO) broadband network shortly after the

New fossils found in China reveal marine reptiles from the Triassic Period were sifting tiny edibles from copious amounts of water long before modern whales made it cool. Analysis of the skulls of two recently discovered specimens of Hupehsuchus nanchangensis by researchers from China and the UK identified structures that allowed the animals to scoop

Superconductivity promises to transform everything from power grids to personal electronics. Yet getting the low-waste form of power to operate at ambient temperatures and pressures is proving to be easier said than done. A discovery by a team of researchers from Emory University and Stanford University in the US could inform theories that might help

Imagine a steamy sex scene involving a woman and a man from your favorite television show or movie. It’s likely that both parties orgasm. But this doesn’t reflect reality. Because during heterosexual sexual encounters, women have far fewer orgasms than men. This is called the orgasm gap. And it has been documented in the scientific

Asteroids are chunks of rock left over from the formation of our Solar System. Approximately half a billion asteroids with sizes greater than four metres in diameter orbit the Sun, travelling through our Solar System at speeds up to about 30 kilometres per second – about the same speed as Earth. Asteroids are certainly good

Over the past decade, deadly wildfires have become increasingly common because of both human-caused climate change and disruptive land management practices. Southern California, where the three of us live and work, has been hit especially hard. Southern California also experienced a wave of wildfires 13,000 years ago. These fires permanently transformed the region’s vegetation and

WASHINGTON — Russia’s first lunar mission in nearly half a century suffered an “emergency situation” during an attempted maneuver Aug. 19, putting plans for a landing into question. In a brief statement posted to its channel on the social media service Telegram, the Russian space agency Roscosmos said that the Luna-25 spacecraft was commanded to

Researchers have reported on what they’re calling the ‘Coliseum’ site of dinosaur tracks, a large and multi-layered rock formation in Denali National Park in Alaska that carries markings dating back some 70 million years. A team of US researchers has been exploring the site, which was first discovered in 2010 – and it contains a

Using an anvil made of diamond, physicists have successfully squeezed iron into the form we think it has deep in the center of Earth. It’s called hexaferrum, or epsilon iron (ϵ-Fe), and it’s only stable at extremely high pressures. Scientists think the majority of the iron in Earth’s core takes this form, and a detailed

Imagine if one-day ChatGPT was joined by CatGPT – an AI-based machine that allowed us to communicate with our pet cats using meows, purrs, or hisses. Now that large language models have become experts at human speech, many are wondering what it would take for AI to talk with animals. Two neurobiologists discuss the answer

French novelist Jules Verne delighted 19th-century readers with the tantalizing notion that a journey to the center of the Earth was actually plausible. Since then, scientists have long acknowledged that Verne’s literary journey was only science fiction. The extreme temperatures of the Earth’s interior – around 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit (5,537 Celsius) at the core –

The single most species-rich habitat on Earth has been identified, and it’s not the oceans, rainforests, or swamps. Most life on Earth lives (at least in part) within the soils beneath our feet. “Soil is likely home to 59 percent of life, including everything from microbes to mammals, making it the singular most biodiverse habitat

We’re seeing major advancements in tech that can decode brain signals, interpreting neural activity to reveal what’s on someone’s mind, what they want to say, or – in the case of a new study – which song they’re listening to. US researchers have been able to reconstruct a “recognizable version” of a Pink Floyd song

TAMPA, Fla. — Terran Orbital expects to get $180 million this year from Rivada Space as it prepares to build 300 satellites for the venture, even as plans to fund the full $2.4 billion manufacturing contract remain under wraps. It would be the first significant revenues Terran Orbital has gained from Rivada under a contract