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Hailing from the University of Sydney, professor Lewis is set to deliver a talk at the National Science Week in the city today, and said the futuristic concept was actually embedded in Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity.
I’m not a big fan of selfies, but when you’re on Mars, you can take all the selfies you want! NASA’s Curiosity Rover has taken some pretty cool of itself – and the Martian surroundings. This latest picture was taken by the rover at “Buckskin” – the 7th rock the rover will sample for analysis. […]
Possibly the most hyper animal, the hummingbird, feeds by darting its thin tongue 20 times per second inside the flower to extract the precious nectar. Previously, biologists thought the nectar was being collected through capillary motion. However, after analyzing 18 different hummingbird species while they fed using high frame rate cameras, a group at University of Connecticut found that the fast flapping birds use a totally different way to suck food: the tongue employed as a tiny pump.
Matter accounts for 31.7% of the mass-energy content of the universe, and 84.5% of the matter is dark matter. In other words, what we can measure today (ordinary matter) accounts for only a tiny fraction of the Universe's mass-energy content. For years, scientists have been on the lookout for the elusive dark matter particles, as well as signs of dark energy. Efforts so far have been to no avail. Despite the setbacks, we know a thing for sure: dark matter exists. If it's there, we'll eventually find a way to detect it, but what if we've gone about this the wrong way? US physicists suggest a different approach: instead of looking for dark matter particles, we should be looking for evidence of their collision - dark radiation.
Virtual reality and 4K displays, coupled with ever more powerful processors and graphic chipsets will see gaming make a huge leap, and Intel wants to be at the forefront of the scene.
A team at George Washington University has found a way to hit two birds with one stone: mitigate climate change by pulling CO2 from the atmosphere and make a valuable material at the same time. The solar powered setup reacts a molten lithium carbonate in the presence of heat and an electrical current to produce carbon fibers, recently highly prized in engineering applications from cars and airplanes to wind turbines to tennis rackets.
China - the world's most populous country and the world's top polluter has a lot of responsibility on its shoulders. China gets a lot of well deserved flak for its often unsustainable ways, but according to a new study, at least some of the flak is undeserved. China's emissions have been overestimated, according to a study published in Nature.
The space shuttle Endeavor is currently retired, being displayed for everyone to see at the California Science Center. But that doesn't mean that its contributions to NASA's space program are over. NASA engineers will remove four tanks from the shuttle and use them for water storage aboard the International Space Station (ISS).
Staring straight into someone's eyes can be pretty intense, and is usually avoided by most people. But a team of researchers has shown that it's even weirder than you'd think: it actually alters your consciousness, and often causes hallucinations.
It’s big, it’s beautiful… and it reeks. Amorphophallus titanum, more commonly known as the corpse flower, is the flowering plant with the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world, and it often requires over 7 years to bloom. For this particular flower in Denver, it took 15. The flower will not only delight visitors with its unique look, […]
Researchers at University of Southampton, England report finding an alternative pathway to activate a key enzyme involved in cellular glucose uptake, mimicking the effects of exercise (some of it). In type two diabetes the enzyme in question is "lazy" and drugs are usually used to activate it, allowing glucose to enter the cell and produce energy (adenosine triphosphate or ATP for short). It's not clear yet whether the new molecular compound, for now simply called 'compound 14', is better than current treatments.
Television has perpetuated the already classic image of a violent, psychotic criminal, up to the point where we basically associate the two. We often tend to think of violent people as psychotic, and psychotic people as violent. But as a new study has found, that's not really the case: there's no strong correlation between violence and psychosis.
Using and understanding the intricacies of sarcasm is a fine art; one does not simply “become” sarcastic – you must dive into it, let it embrace you. You must become sarcasm. But jokes aside, sarcasm is a strange thing – we don’t know exactly how it appeared and why. The best theory seems to be […]
Show of hands, who here doesn't sometimes long for the good old days when you would play in the sandbox or at the beach, building mighty castles, sculpting awesome cities and raising mounds that would make the Misty Mountains look like mellow hills? Powered by Ge-Force GTX 750 Ti and OpenGL, the Augmented Reality Sandbox comes to bring back that supreme childhood fantasy only better - because it has technology.
Anthropologists have discovered the oldest known fossil of a bone resembling that of humans; the 1.85 million year old bone is the oldest evidence of a ‘modern’ hand and suggests that ancient humans may have been much larger than previously thought. A key feature that distinguishes humans from other species is the ability to create and use […]
For the first time, a group of researchers from Canada showed that the grime on buildings can emit ozone when exposed to light. Ozone is the main compound found in smog, a dangerous mixture to public health. Up until now, grimy urban buildings weren't included in models that assess how polluted an urban area is, but the new findings suggest their contribution is significant. Dirty buildings are thus not only unpleasant to look at, but also detrimental to your health.
Seriously – after making a complex cross-scenario examination, scientists found that given humanity’s current population growth momentum, not even WW3, a global pandemic or stringent fertility restraints will be enough to keep the global population at sustainable levels. In light of these findings, Australian researchers at Univ. of Adelaide’s Environment Institute conclude that lowering our environmental impact through […]
A research group has come up with an innovative way of dealing with blood clots through nanotechnology. This technology has the potential to save many lives every year, as blood clots are often associated with life-threatening events.
Octopuses are like aliens and there are few creatures weirder than these eight legged critters. They survive freezing waters, perceive light through their skin, are masters of camouflage and can do many other things, some still oblivious to science. One uncanny feature of octopuses is their mating behavior or social order. Most octopus species mate at a distance, with the male using its reproductive arm to reach the female's mantle. They have to do this to avoid being cannibalized by the female. Either way, once the job is done, the male dies while females only lives a little longer, just enough to lay the eggs. That's the peak of both the octopus' sex and social life. Besides a few instances, octopuses live their lives in isolation, alone in some shell or barren rock. However, there's one octopus that seems to be totally different, even human-like: the Larger Pacific Striped Octopus.
We tend to think of flowering plants and ubiquitous, but in truth, they’ve “only” been around for about 125 million years – which geologically speaking… is still a lot, it’s just not forever. Geologists may have just found the oldest flower. Looking through some previously discovered fossils, scientists were thrilled to find a spectacular specimen: […]
Scientists working at Monash University in Melbourne have developed the most energy-efficient ‘artificial photosynthesis’ method to date. The process relies on running an electrical current through water to separate it into oxygen and hydrogen, and the team behind it say it could be used to power our home on the cheap in just a few years.
Glaciers covering Asia's Tian Shan mountains have lost a quarter of their mass over the past 50 years, at a rate four times higher than the global average due to the particularly dry climate of the area. At this rate, by 2050 half of the remaining ice that covers the 2,500 kilometers long mountain rage could melt, threatening the water supply and affecting millions of people. If left unchecked, the situation might even turn into a conflict for the most basic resources (water and food).
One of the most peculiar languages in the world, whistled Turkish, is challenging the long-standing idea that the left brain hemisphere is solely responsible for processing language and extracting meaning. Any language, be it spoken, written or signed is processed in the left hemisphere, but whistled languages are processed equally by both sides of the brain. It's a striking discovery that suggests people devoid of left hemisphere processing abilities, following a stroke for instance, can still communicate using their right hemisphere. Just whistle.
Finding insects, plants or even dinosaur feathers trapped in amber s rare and exciting. But finding a fossil salamander in amber… that’s something else – it’s actually unique. But the salamander’s unfortunate fate sparked immediate interest from researchers: not only is it a unique finding, but it’s from a never-before seen species of salamander, and […]
Russian archaeologists have unearthed a trove of warrior jewelry of historical significance: the tomb of a Sarmatian woman warrior who worshiped fire.
We all know that pollution and smog in China is pretty bad, but China has only recently published their air quality data - so we get to know just how bad it is. According to a new study published by Berkeley Earth, smog alone kills 4,000 people in China every day; that's 17% of all premature fatalities.
Religion affects our lives, directly and indirectly, in many ways. A new study published in the Journal of Homosexuality has investigated how a person’s and a country’s religious orientation impacts their attitude towards gay people. The findings showed that the more religious a person or country is, the more hostile it generally is towards homosexuals. The smallest […]
Two of the biggest pension funds in California have lost $5 billion in assets last year by sticking to their fossil fuel investments. The report released by Trillium Asset Management suggests that the loss was due to the huge dip in oil and coal prices registered between July 2014 and June 2015.
Most people have an outdated belief that solar energy is too expensive. For most people living in the United States, this isn't true for some time and Google just released a new project to make a point of this. Called Project Sunroof, the tool uses extensive satellite imagery from Google Maps and superimposes sunlight energy flux data over them.
A drug called Flibanserin, also known under the name of Addyi, is marketed as the first designed to boost a woman's sexual desire. This week the FDA will decide whether to approve the drug or not, however looming safety concerns could count against Sprout Pharmaceuticals, the parent company marketing the Flibanserin.
Thoth Technology, a Canadian company, was granted an US patent for a space elevator. Technically, though, it's not exactly a space elevator since cargo and astronauts would only be ferried about 12 miles above sea level into the stratosphere. From here, a shuttle would carry the cargo and astronauts to the International Space Station or some other dropzone in space (maybe even the moon) for a third of the cost it currently takes
Every year, over 30,000 elephants are murdered, slaughtered for their tusks. Ivory is an extremely valuable commodity, and many people will stop at nothing to get it and sell it. With this in mind, investigative journalist Bryan Christy set out to see what the smuggling route is, so he commissioned a taxidermist to create two fake ivory […]
Taking a page from the oil industry “sponsorship” philosophy, Coca Cola spent millions funding scientists to say that soft drinks don’t make people fat. While there’s nothing inherently wrong with a company funding scientists to study its products, when the result is already known before the study actually starts, that’s not exactly science – that’s […]
The mystery of the octopus genome has finally been solved, and this will allow researchers to answer some intriguing questions: how does it regenerate so well? How does it control its 8 flexible arms and over 1000 suckers? How do they camouflage and mimic the environment, and most importantly - how did a relative of the snail become so incredibly smart?
An exciting "infant Jupiter" rich in methane has been discovered using an Earth-bound telescope. The newly found planet might reveal how planets like Jupiter formed and developed during their early stages.
If we want to send people to Mars, we're going to need some bigger engines - and that's exactly what NASA's building right now. In fact, we're going to need the most complex engine ever built by mankind.
Books and education save lives - but the Drinkable Book took things to the next level. Using the bacteria-killing properties of silver and copper, a US researcher has developed a low cost, light and cool way of purifying drinking water: through a book.
Paleontologists have discovered a set of dinosaur footprints that seem to indicate social behavior in carnivorous dinosaurs. The footprints, found in northern Germany, belonged to two dinosaurs, one larger, and one smaller.
Investment in the renewable project is estimated to reach £650m ($1bn), which will be partly funded through aids from the European Commission, and construction works would create around 1,100 jobs. Environmental technology firm Abengoa, based in Spain, along with Japanese industry giant Toshiba will be leading the project for their client, MGT Teesside, subsidiary to the British utility MGT Power.
A state of emergency has been declared this Saturday by Ecuador's president, Rafael Correa. The measure was taken as a precaution given the recent increase in volcanic activity of the Cotopaxi stratovolcano, allowing the government greater freedom to allocate financial resources and critical personnel in the event of an eruption.
The food industry has become much more efficient in the last few decades as a result of globalization, but also a lot more vulnerable to shocks. Climate change will lead not only to increased temperatures, but the extreme weather it causes in North, South America and Asia are likely to also lead to global food shortages.
The results of a new study show the benefits of playing tetris when fighting with an addiction or craving - a minimum of three minutes at a time can reduce cravings for drugs, food and other activities like sex and sleeping by almost 20%.
After Utrecht, another Dutch town is joining the basic income social experiment to see whether receiving an unconditional sum of money each month will make society more productive or slacking
This is the day that humanity's consumption exceeds the amount of resources than our planet can supply in that year. Overshoot day comes sooner each year; we hit that day on August 19 in 2014. This year it was August 13, a full six days earlier.
Maybe the most amazing of social insects, ants use complex cues of pheromones to determine to which cast in the colony each individual ant belongs to. A team at University of California at Riverside found ants do this by sniffing out hydrocarbon chemicals present on their cuticles (outer shell). These cues are extremely subtle, but the ants can sense them with great sensitivity due to the way they're hardwired. It's enough to notice that ants have more olfactory receptor proteins in their genome than we humans have. Amazing!
The buzzing racket of quadcopters and drones may be stressing wildlife, a new study shows. Drones have long ceased to be the provision of the military, and are now extensively been used for civilian purposes. Amazon, for instance, wants one day to deliver all its goods with unmanned aerial vehicles. In research, drones have proven to be particularly useful in observing wildlife. But these aren't as unobtrusive as some might believe and future research should take into account that flying drones overhead should be done carefully so as to not disturb the wildlife.
A robotics team lead by Cambridge University engineer Fumiya Iida have designed a robot that archeologists of the future (they will all be robots) will recognize as the moment the machines started to take over. They built a "mother" device that can create smaller, "baby" robots, and programed it (her?) so that experience obtained building them would be used to improve upon further generations.
Some conservationists are considering introducing the Tasmanian devil, currently only found in Australia's island state of Tasmania, back to the mainland. The devil went extinct on the mainland some 3,000 years ago, and scientists hope the predator might restore balance to the local ecosystem, currently destabilized by too many cats and foxes.
A lot of women in their thirties choose to delay motherhood by freezing their eggs to later fertilize them when they feel the time is right. Cryopreservation of eggs is still a field in its infancy, though, and there's not much we know about its effects of pregnancy or rate of success. Doctors are steadily gathering stats, though, and a recent analysis suggests there may be some drawbacks to freezing eggs. The report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggests fresh eggs have a significantly higher chance of success than cryopreserved ones. This is news for most, even for doctors working in fertility clinics and would be mothers (eventually) should understand this risk when they choose to bank their eggs in a clinic's frozen basket.
Shower heads are generally not very different one from another. Sure, you can get a different pressure, a different type of water jet, some have temperature control, but all in all, they’re the same thing. But now, a San Francisco start-up wants to change that: they’ve developed a new shower head that consumes 70% less […]
