Tragic and bestowed with a sense of ambition, a German aerospace startup’s endeavor to deliver heavenly memorials and perform unique agricultural experiments in space ended in the Pacific Ocean. Aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, the Exploration Company launched a Nyx capsule containing human remains and cannabis seeds. The female capsule’s operational orbit was reached ...
The Japanese quail has a résumé that is very strange for a bird. What started out as a songbird in 11th-century Japan has become a scientific wonder that produces foamy semen, struts around after mating, and even hatches in space. These small birds, no bigger than a human hand, have strange evolutionary traits that have ...
A strange ceramic vessel shaped like a penguin stands out in the dry deserts of southern Peru, where the Nazca culture thrived between 100 BCE and 800 CE. It shows how curious and aware they were of their surroundings. This 1,600-year-old “Penguin Vessel,” which is now in the Art Institute of Chicago, makes us wonder: ...
Picture a robot that not only sees the world, but also feels it. A soft pat, a searing burn, or even the sharp cut of a scalpel. Scientists have created a new type of “electronic skin” made of gelatin that could make machines feel almost like humans do. This new material passed a lot of ...
The postcard-perfect sandy beaches and nostalgic piers of England’s beautiful coastal towns hide a darker truth. Young people in these areas are having a mental health crisis at rates much higher than their peers in the inland areas, even though they look like they are having a great time on vacation. New research shows that ...
Holloman Lake used to be an unlikely oasis in the dry Chihuahuan Desert of New Mexico. It was a shimmering mirage for migratory birds, campers, and wildlife. But underneath its calm surface is a nightmare that can’t be seen: the highest levels of “forever chemicals” ever found in a natural ecosystem. What started out as ...
Pretty much every politician seems to be avoiding taking real action on climate change, because they think no one cares about net zero anymore. That’s not what the numbers tell us, though. While political figures are growing more skeptical of these policies, the British public is still largely supportive of climate action policies, even when ...
A deadly mix of weather systems caused chaos in Texas over the Fourth of July weekend. Heavy rains of more than 300 mm (12 inches) in just a few hours turned the state’s Hill Country into a deadly waterway. The floods, which were made worse by leftover effects of Tropical Storm Barry and unstable weather, ...
There is a hidden crisis in the beautiful green fields of the British countryside. Every year, millions of tons of sewage sludge, now called “biosolids,” are spread on farms. These sludge is full of toxic chemicals, microplastics, and drugs. Even though there is more and more proof of pollution, the UK’s rules about spreading sludge ...
The extraordinary features of a rapidly moving celestial object are scintillating astronomers’ interest. Upon initial discovery, A11pl3Z was given a name but recently NASA has confirmed it as 3I/ATLAS, the third interstellar object out of four comets or asteroids discovered. Unlike the comets or asteroids which are bound to the sun’s asteroid belt and viewable ...
