The hailstone is so massive it even stunned meteorologists. “It’s incredible,” said meteorologist Matthew Kumjian from Penn State University in the US. “This is the extreme upper end of what you’d expect from hail.” The hefty ice lump smashed down from a supercell thunderstorm in Argentina two years ago, in the heavily populated town Villa Carlos
In the depths of space 3.5 billion light-years away, two supermassive black holes are locked in one of the most extreme orbital dances in the Universe. Their riotous, somewhat erratically flaring death spiral has been documented for decades. With new observations, astronomers have now characterised the way they whirl about each other in the centre
A single tail from one of the largest and most enigmatic dinosaur species looks to have solved a longstanding mystery about these extinct creatures: whether they could swim. The discovery of a giant fossilised tail belonging to the theropod Spinosaurus aegyptiacus suggests these huge predators were aquatic animals after all, using tail-propelled locomotion to swim
A comet only just discovered in December of last year has already met its demise. It didn’t reach perihelion, or its closest approach to the Sun. It didn’t even pass inside Earth orbit. Yet Comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) has now absolutely shattered. In images taken on April 20 and April 23, the Hubble Space Telescope
The United States Pentagon is a secretive place by nature, but every once in a while, the public gets a little peek behind closed doors. After years of speculation, defence officials have now declassified and released three grainy videos from the Navy that have been circulating online for a while now, causing all sorts of
As the Roman Empire drew to a dramatic collapse towards the end of the 5th century, ripples were felt across its former territories. Balances shifted as new powers rushed to fill the vacuums Rome’s retreats left behind. The changes to the everyday lives of the people are far less well documented, but a cemetery in
The mata mata turtle of South America is known for its camouflage, blending in effortlessly with the plant detritus, rocks and algae of its freshwater homes. But little did we realise that it was also hiding an entire species. Yep – what we thought was a single species of turtle in the Chelus genus has
Scientists have found evidence that a fundamental physical constant used to measure electromagnetism between charged particles can in fact be rather inconstant, according to measurements taken from a quasar some 13 billion light-years away. Electromagnetism is one of the four fundamental forces that knit everything in our Universe together, alongside gravity, weak nuclear force, and
A long-known but under-studied deposit of Cretaceous rock on the edge of the Sahara desert was more than just an ancient stomping ground for dinosaurs, according to a comprehensive new paper. The Kem Kem Group in eastern Morocco might also represent a prime candidate for the most dangerous time and place to have been alive in
The glowing greenhouse of our dreams is still so very far away, but it just got a tantalising nudge closer. Scientists have genetically engineered a plant with not just a visible glow, but a self-sustaining glow that lasts for the duration of the plant’s life cycle. It’s a breathtaking improvement on previous glowing plants. It’s
When black holes swallow down massive amounts of matter from the space around them, they’re not exactly subtle about it. They belch out tremendous flares of X-rays, generated by the material heating to intense temperatures as it’s sucked towards the black hole, so bright we can detect them from Earth. This is normal black hole
It was around four to six million years ago when humans first evolved to walk upright. We continued to evolve into superb long-distance walkers and runners, made possible by our arched feet, long achilles tendon, and ability to cool through sweating. And surprisingly, for most of human history this long distance travel was done barefoot.
Scientists are warning that an increase in global warming could significantly slow down hurricanes, potentially leading to more destruction. While slowing down might sound like a good thing, the researchers are talking about the speed hurricanes progress, not wind speed. So this slow down means more time to carve out a trail of destruction with
Bronze swords made from copper and tin aren’t the most robust of weapons, which has led to some uncertainty about whether they were originally used for battle or just for show. Now, a group of archaeologists has tried to settle the debate by quite literally coming to blows with each other. Researchers commissioned the creation
A nova is a dramatic episode in the life of a binary pair of stars. It’s an explosion of bright light that can last weeks or even months. And though they’re not exactly rare – there are about 10 each year in the Milky Way – astronomers have never watched one from start to finish.
It’s not unusual for parents to worry about the next generation and the future planet they’ll inherit, but new research suggests having children doesn’t necessarily make you any ‘greener’ as a person – quite the opposite, in fact. A new study in Sweden has found that even those who really care about the environment often
Farewell! Even though the BepiColombo mission launched for Mercury in 2018, it’s still hanging around the Earth – at least, briefly, as shown in this stunning image recently released by the European Space Agency. In the image, the Earth hangs serenely in between BepiColumbo’s magnetometer boom (on the right) and its medium-gain antenna (on the
The world should fight climate change with the same determination it is showing in the battle against the new coronavirus, the United Nations said on Wednesday. The UN’s World Meteorological Organization said it was time to flatten the curve on climate change as well, with its impact on the planet “reaching a crescendo” in the
NASA engineers have designed a mass-producible ventilator tailored to coronavirus patients, and it could get emergency approval from the Food and Drug Administration by the weekend. A team of engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, designed and built the ventilator in just 37 days. The device, called VITAL as an acronym for
Stephen Wolfram is a cult figure in programming and mathematics. He is the brains behind Wolfram Alpha, a website that tries to answer questions by using algorithms to sift through a massive database of information. He is also responsible for Mathematica, a computer system used by scientists the world over. Last week, Wolfram launched a
News of an insect apocalypse has become a familiar headline in recent years, with study after study pointing to an alarming loss in invertebrate numbers. As consistent as the message seems, the results don’t always agree with one another. A new study led by ecologists from the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research suggests the
Researchers have finally found credible records of someone being killed by a falling meteorite. On 22 August 1888, according to multiple documents found in the General Directorate of State Archives of the Presidency of the Republic of Turkey, a falling meteorite hit and killed one man and paralysed another in what is now Sulaymaniyah in
Engineers have developed a semi-transparent solar cell that offers a viable level of efficiency, and it might get us closer to a future where windows that double up as solar panels could transform both architecture and energy production. Two square metres (around 22 square feet) of the next-gen perovskite solar cells (PSCs) would be enough to
In 2004 and 2006, the Hubble Space Telescope captured something incredible. There seemed to be a planet orbiting a star called Fomalhaut 25 light-years away, and it was directly detectable in visible light: extremely rare for exoplanets, which are usually too small and faint to be seen. The object, formally named Fomalhaut b or Dagon,
Herds of horses, bison and reindeer could play a significant part in saving the world from an acceleration in global heating. That is the conclusion of a recent study showing how grazing herbivores can slow down the pace of thawing permafrost in the Arctic. The study – a computerized simulation based on real-life, on-the ground
Stuck at home with clear skies? We’re all in a similar situation, as the ongoing pandemic sees most of the worldwide amateur astronomy community observing from home or from their backyard. One astronomical sure-fire event coming up this week requires no special equipment, just a set of working ‘Mk-1 eyeballs’ and a clear sky: the
In the midst of the current coronavirus pandemic, many of us find ourselves adjusting to working from home, with all the distractions of kids, pets, unfinished DIY projects and Netflix specials to contend with. This move to WFH has touched every business and industry where such a shift is possible, and luckily that includes the
Just over a year ago, on 12 April 2019, the LIGO-Virgo collaboration made a detection of gravitational waves, rippling out across space-time from the epic collision of two black holes from 2.4 billion light-years away. By now, marvellously, this is nothing out of the ordinary in and of itself. But, as astronomers have now revealed,
By now, we have discovered hundreds of stars with multiple planets orbiting them scattered throughout the galaxy. Each one is unique, but a system orbiting the star HD 158259, 88 light-years away, is truly special. The star itself is about the same mass and a little larger than the Sun – a minority in our
Whether you use Zoom, Skype or Microsoft Teams, the webcam on your home PC or laptop device has probably never been as active as it is during this pandemic. Most of us have a camera built into our phone, tablet, laptop, or a desktop webcam we use for work, study or virtual socialising. Unfortunately, this
Scientists have found a new way to structure carbon at the nanoscale, making a material that’s superior to diamond on the strength-to-density ratio. While the tiny carbon lattice has been fabricated and tested in the lab, it’s a very long way off practical use. But this new approach could help us build stronger and lighter
What goes down at the very center of our planet is largely a mystery, and so is what goes up. The truth is, no human has ever made it past the crust, or dug deep enough to penetrate Earth’s rocky mantle, let alone its liquid iron core, so we don’t know what type of interactions
Our planet is constantly bathed in the winds coming off the blistering sphere at the centre of our Solar System. But even though the Sun itself is so ridiculously hot, once the solar winds reach Earth, they are hotter than they should be – and we might finally know why. We know that particles making
Today, the world is grappling with more than just the climate crisis, and yet even now, in the face of a global pandemic, scientists are marching on with renewable solutions. Just this month, no less than three records have been broken in solar panel efficiency. The first and the second were achieved by scientists in
Much of the work undertaken by artificial intelligence involves a training process known as machine learning, where AI gets better at a task such as recognising a cat or mapping a route the more it does it. Now that same technique is being use to create new AI systems, without any human intervention. For years,
At an average altitude of around 1,800 metres (1.1 miles), high in the Jotunheim Mountains of Norway, a patch of ice is melting. It’s called the Lendbreen ice patch, and for millennia, it has been frozen year-round, accumulating a new layer every year. But in the past two decades, the ice has been slowly melting
As quantum computers continue to grow in size and complexity, engineers are hitting a major obstacle. All of that added machinery means higher temperatures – and if anything can ruin a perfectly good quantum bit, it’s heat. There are a few possible solutions, but any fix needs to be small and compatible with existing silicon
An international team of scientists have discovered an exciting, Earth-sized exoplanet that’s capable of supporting liquid water. “This intriguing, distant world gives us even greater hope that a second Earth lies among the stars, waiting to be found,” Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington, who was not part of the
You may have heard of Folding @ home, the number-crunching app you can run on your computer to help researchers tackle certain medical problems, including the new coronavirus. In the past month, the network of volunteers who’ve installed it has become so vast, the platform is outperforming the most powerful supercomputers in the world. According
Ancient archaeological sites across the Northern Hemisphere have been littered with a mystery. Where there were hominins, there too could often be found roughly rounded spheres of stone. Some have been dated back to over 2 million years ago, with marks suggesting that the balls had been deliberately shaped. New research has discovered a plausible purpose
A sunken ship found in the Nile river may have lain undisturbed for over 2,500 years, but it is finally ponying up its secrets. Scientists think that this ship has revealed a structure whose existence has been debated for centuries. In fragment 2.96 of Herodotus’ Histories, published around 450 BCE, the Ancient Greek historian – who
We’re all here only because reality is an imperfect reflection of itself. Thanks to a flaw in the symmetry of nature, plenty of material was available to clump into the billions of galaxies we now see in the Universe. Nearly a decade’s worth of data produced by the Tokai to Kamioka (T2K) particle physics experiment
Researchers working for industrial development company Carbios have created a mutant bacterial enzyme that can break down plastic bottles for recycling in only a couple of hours, according to The Guardian. The enyzme can break down PET plastic bottles into their individual chemical composites, which could later be reused to make brand new bottles. Conventional recycled
The amount of close and comforting contact that young infants get doesn’t just keep them warm, snug, and loved. A 2017 study says it can actually affect babies at the molecular level, and the effects can last for years. Based on the study, babies who get less physical contact and are more distressed at a
When the end of the world comes, how will you tweet? Thankfully for those of us who didn’t have a plan ready, Motherboard reports that software developer Virgil Dupras has built an operating system — Collapse OS — that can be run on parts salvaged from a post-apocalyptic hellscape. The idea is to find ways
A strange, undulating blob found in the waters of Ørstafjorden in Norway has turned out to be a rare sight: a giant mass of squid eggs. The otherworldly ball, floating mysteriously in the darkness of the fjord, was discovered by captain Nils Baadnes and diver Ronald Raasch with the research vessel REV Ocean. It wasn’t
You might not know the term ‘oobleck’, but it’s highly likely you came across it as a kid. Also known as a non-Newtonian fluid, the strange material sometimes behaves like a liquid, and sometimes acts like a solid. It’s usually made of corn-starch and water, and it produces hours of fun for children everywhere. Punch it
It’s been a busy week for astrophysicist Michel Mayor. On Tuesday, he won a Nobel Prize for his work detecting exoplanets. Then, on Wednesday, he crushed the dreams of anyone hoping to one day colonize those planets. “If we are talking about exoplanets,” Mayor told Agence France-Presse when asked about off-world colonization, “things should be clear: we will not migrate there.”
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