Science

WASHINGTON — Commercial space station developer Vast Space has signed an agreement with the government of the Czech Republic that could allow a Czech astronaut fly on a future mission by the company. Vast announced Nov. 8 that it signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Czech Ministry of Transport to explore potential partnerships

The devastation of Pompeii by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 CE is one of the best-recorded disasters in human history. The ash and pumice that rained down preserved traces of the dying where they fell, leaving us to guess the identities and relationships of the people left frozen in time. But we humans are

We finally know what brought light to the dark and formless void of the early Universe. According to data from the Hubble and James Webb Space Telescopes, the origins of the free-flying photons in the early cosmic dawn were small dwarf galaxies that flared to life, clearing the fog of murky hydrogen that filled intergalactic

The mysterious black balls that washed up on Sydney’s beaches in mid-October were likely lumps of “fatberg” containing traces of human faeces, methamphetamine and PFAS, according to a new detailed analysis of their composition. Initial reports suggested the ominous lumps were probably tar balls from an oil spill. However, analysis with a barrage of scientific

WASHINGTON — Virgin Galactic is proposing to raise $300 million in additional capital to accelerate production of suborbital spaceplanes and a mothership aircraft the company says can fuel its long-term growth. In a Nov. 6 earnings call to discuss the suborbital spaceflight company’s third quarter financial results, Virgin Galactic executives said that while work on

Are you scared of clowns? You are not alone. Coulrophobia, or the fear of clowns, is a widely acknowledged phenomenon. Studies indicate this fear is present among both adults and children in many different cultures. Yet it is not well understood due to a lack of focused research. While numerous possible explanations of the phobia

From all over the sky, the Universe is hurling mysterious signals. We don’t really know what they are, or what’s making them; but a new analysis of where they are coming from gives us clues about the sources of the strange emissions we call fast radio bursts (FRBs). Led by astronomer Kritti Sharma of the

If you’ve ever seen yourself through a thermal imaging camera, you’ll know that your body produces lots of heat. This is in fact a waste product of our metabolism. Every square foot of the human body gives off heat equivalent to about 19 matches per hour. Unfortunately, much of this heat simply escapes into the

WASHINGTON — Japan and Poland are set to gain access to the U.S. military’s Wideband Global Satcom (WGS) satellite network, marking a strategic expansion of the system that currently supports the United States and several other partner nations.  Officials said the inclusion of these new partners reflects the growing importance of space-based communications for military

Anthropologists have peered through the thick jungle of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula and identified a long-lost Maya city with stepped temple pyramids to rival Chichén Itzá, Río Bec, and Tikal. Fieldwork on the ground is yet to be conducted by archaeologists, but based on remote sensing data, which maps entire landscapes under dense forests in minute

Early in the life of the Solar System, things were a lot more violent than they are today. Rocks were flying everywhere, willy-nilly, smacking into the newly formed planets, pocking them with craters and gouging out impact basins. Mercury, Mars, and the Moon are all heavily scarred. Even Earth – where geological and weathering processes

A new study published in the journal One Earth explores how marine biodiversity conservation, human health and wellbeing are connected. The results suggest that marine protected areas can be good for both planet and people. These areas of the ocean are legally recognised by governments as being important for marine conservation. They are protected by

WASHINGTON — Rocket Lab is aiming to chip away at SpaceX’s dominance in military space launch, confirming its bid to compete for Pentagon contracts with its new medium-lift rocket Neutron. “We’re excited to bid this time round for NSSL Lane 1, and we think Neutron is a really good vehicle for it,” Rocket Lab’s founder

Early Homo sapiens and their Neanderthal cousins started burying their dead around the same time and roughly the same place, some 120,000 years ago. This suggests the two species may have had, at least in part, a shared culture at the time. A new study of these ancient burial sites across the Levant region in

Scientists have long thought that the highest-energy gamma rays in space are forged in the intense furnaces of very active supermassive black holes, far, far away. But a new study has traced some of these high-energy photons to an object much closer to us. V4641 Sagittarii is a system about 20,000 light-years from Earth, in

Editor’s note – In 2022, as generative AI began to take the world by storm, a very creepy phenomenon started to emerge. This Halloween we’re revisiting the eerie mystery of Loab. Here’s our original story from December 2022: She’s out there somewhere, lurking in a parallel universe of possibilities. All you have to do to

TAMPA, Fla. — Satellite operator Globalstar stock closed up more than 30% Nov. 1 after disclosing Apple’s plans to invest $1.5 billion in a new constellation to improve space-based communications for iPhones. Apple would take a 20% equity stake in the constellation for $400 million, if the deal closes as expected Nov. 5, and make

TAMPA, Fla. — Satellite operator Globalstar stock closed up more than 30% Nov. 1 after disclosing Apple’s plans to invest $1.5 billion in a new constellation to improve space-based communications for iPhones. Apple would take a 20% equity stake in the constellation for $400 million, if the deal closes as expected Nov. 5, and make

The discovery of a 4,000-year-old fortified town hidden in an oasis in modern-day Saudi Arabia reveals how life at the time was slowly changing from a nomadic to an urban existence, archaeologists said on Wednesday. The remains of the town, dubbed al-Natah, were long concealed by the walled oasis of Khaybar, a green and fertile

Come Ragnarök, and the end of things as we know them, according to the Norse Prose Edda, the great celestial wolf Sköll will finally catch and devour his quarry, the Sun that races daily across the sky. Far away, in another corner of the galaxy, another cosmic ‘wolf’ is performing the opposite function, in spite

In Morocco’s southeastern desert, a rare downpour has brought lakes and ponds back to life, with locals – and tourists – hailing it as a gift from the heavens. In Merzouga, an attractive tourist town some 600 kilometres (370 miles) southeast of the capital Rabat, the once-parched golden dunes are now dotted with replenished ponds

Last week, the tragic news broke that US teenager Sewell Seltzer III took his own life after forming a deep emotional attachment to an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot on the Character.AI website. As his relationship with the companion AI became increasingly intense, the 14-year-old began withdrawing from family and friends, and was getting in trouble

WASHINGTON — A recent series of anomalies by SpaceX prompted a warning by a NASA safety panel to stay focused on safety for crewed flights. At an Oct. 31 meeting of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel (ASAP), Kent Rominger, a former astronaut who serves on the committee, went through a list of “recent issues” with

The dead, if you are to heed the warning of burials conducted hundreds of years ago, may not always lay so quietly in their grave. Over a span of more than 1,000 years, in different parts of Europe, burials were conducted seemingly to keep the dead safely in their graves, and not walking about causing

In May 2023, the ESA’s Exomars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), currently in orbit around Mars, sent a signal to Earth to simulate a possible extraterrestrial transmission. As part of the multidisciplinary art project “A Sign in Space,” the purpose was to engage citizen scientists in helping to decode it. The campaign was inspired by Cosmicomics

Greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere reached new record highs in 2023, locking in future temperature increases for years to come, the United Nations warned Monday. Levels of the three main greenhouse gases – the climate-warming carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide – all increased yet again last year, the UN’s weather and climate agency

SAN FRANCISCO – Southern California startup Viridian Space Corp. is developing an electric propulsion system for spacecraft in very low Earth orbit that scoops up air for plasma thrusters. The technology promises to extend the life of satellites and enable them to move around in orbit, Rostislav Spektor, Viridian CEO and former manager of the

Recent research on animal sleep behaviour has revealed that sleep is influenced by the animals around them. Olive baboons, for instance, sleep less as group sizes increase, while mice can synchronise their rapid eye movement (REM) cycles. In western society, many people expect to sleep alone, if not with a romantic partner. But as with

In the year 1181 CE, the sky exploded. Well, a part of the sky – a pinprick of nothing suddenly blossoming into visibility, a new, temporary ‘guest star’ in the constellation of Cassiopeia that astronomers in China and Japan watched and recorded for months. That star was a supernova, the violent eruption as a dead

Hurricane season seems to be rallying for a final surge of storms. AccuWeather, a world-leading weather forecasting company, predicts that November will bring one to three tropical storms strong enough to get names, and the first one could come in just a week. Florida and the Carolinas are the most at-risk states. Communities there are