How Neanderthals adjusted to climate change

Climate change occurring shortly before their disappearance triggered a complex change in the behavior of late Neanderthals in Europe: they developed more complex tools. This is the conclusion reached by a group of researchers from Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) and Università degli Studi die Ferrara (UNIFE) on the basis of finds in the Sesselfelsgrotte cave in Lower Bavaria.

Continue reading...

I confess, I'm scared of the next generation of supercomputers

Supercomputers are edging ever-closer to the landmark one exaFLOPS barrier

Continue reading...

Delta Air Lines has put 240 people on ‘no fly list’ for not wearing masks, CEO says

Delta Air Lines Inc. has placed about 240 people on a “no fly list’ for failing to comply with the airline’s face-mask policy, chief executive officer Ed Bastian said in a memo to employees on Thursday. There is no U.S. federal mandate on masks in airports or on airplanes, leaving U.S. airlines to enforce their own rules that passengers must wear face coverings while traveling.

Continue reading...

Particles From Space Are Messing With Our Quantum Computers, Scientists Discover

In an incredible example of cosmic scales meeting the tiniest possible realm, scientists found that radiation including cosmic rays causes superconducting qubits to slip into disarray.

Continue reading...

Physicists: Wormholes large enough to travel through are possible

Scientists at Princeton have good news for interstellar travel.

Continue reading...

Atheists Are More Likely to Sleep Better

Atheists and agnostics are less likely to experience sleep problems than those who have religious faith. 73% of atheists and agnostics report getting more than seven hours of nightly sleep, compared to 63% of Catholics and 55% of baptists. Atheists also report experiencing fewer difficulties in falling asleep.

Continue reading...

Meteorite study suggests Earth may have always been wet

A new study finds that Earth’s water may have come from materials that were present in the inner solar system at the time the planet formed — instead of far-reaching comets or asteroids delivering such water. The findings published Aug. 28 in Science suggest that Earth may have always been wet.

Continue reading...

Fusion Power Breakthrough: New Method for Eliminating Damaging Heat Bursts in Toroidal Tokamaks

Picture an airplane that can only climb to one or two altitudes after taking off. That limitation would be similar to the plight facing scientists who seek to avoid instabilities that restrict the path to clean, safe, and abundant fusion energy in doughnut-shaped tokamak facilities. Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and General Atomics (GA) have now published a breakthrough explanation of this tokamak restriction and how it may be overcome.

Continue reading...

56-year-old NASA satellite expected to fall to Earth this weekend

The derelict spacecraft poses no threat.

Continue reading...

NASA just announced in a blog post that SLS will cost 30% more

In a fairly anodyne update on NASA's "Artemis" blog published Wednesday, the space agency's new chief of human spaceflight laid out progress made on key hardware programs. "Already within my short time on the job, NASA is checking-off key milestones and marching swiftly toward Artemis I," wrote Kathy Lueders, who moved into the job after leading the Commercial Crew program. "That mission, the first uncrewed flight test of our powerful Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft, is just a little more than a year away from launch."

Continue reading...

5,700-year-old Neolithic house discovered by archaeologists in Cork

IRISH ARCHAEOLOGISTS have made an incredible discovery in Cork, having unearthed the foundations of a house from the Neolithic era. The ancient house is believed to be 5,700 years old, and was likely the home of a family from one of the earliest farming communities to have settled in the south of Ireland.

Continue reading...

California Rolls Out Tough Emissions Regulations on Ships, Big Rigs

Calling for a crackdown of two major contributors to California’s notoriously hazy air, the state is moving forward with stringent new anti-smog laws for the shipping and transportation industries. Aimed at cargo ships and heavy-duty diesel trucks, the California Air Resources Board estimates the new rules will drastically reduce air pollution and prevent over $35 billion in medical costs over the next three decades. The board cast the decision as a win for environmental justice and passed it despite the billions it will cost the industries to implement various new technologies.

Continue reading...

What silence can teach you about sound

What can you hear in silence? In this exploration of sound, host of the podcast "Twenty Thousand Hertz" Dallas Taylor tells the story of arguably the most debated musical composition in recent history -- composer John Cage's iconic piece 4'33" -- and invites you to take notice of the soundscape around you. Watch to the end to experience a performance of 4'33''.

Continue reading...

Scientist uses algorithm to make the perfect peanut butter and banana sandwich

The optimal peanut butter and banana sandwich should have each ingredient in every bite, according to Ethan Rosenthal. That means banana placement is important. Rosenthal, who has a PhD in physics, is a data scientist for Square, and lives in New York City. He found himself with a lot of time on his hands during COVID-19 lockdown, so he set out to determine the best way to get optimal banana slice coverage on a piece of bread.

Continue reading...

Video Games Are the 'Future of Storytelling,' Not Movies, Says Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Joseph Gordon-Levitt believes that video games are the future of storytelling, not movies.

Continue reading...

Japan's 'flying car' gets off ground, with a person aboard

The decades-old dream of zipping around in the sky as simply as driving on highways may be becoming less illusory. Japan’s SkyDrive Inc., among the myriads of “flying car” projects around the world, has carried out a successful though modest test flight with one person aboard.

Continue reading...

Cold War Politics Shaped the International Space Station

A global surge of nationalism and the commercialization of space means the ISS may be the first — and last — of its kind.

Continue reading...

Japan's 'flying car' gets off ground, with a person aboard

TOKYO (AP) — The decades-old dream of zipping around in the sky as simply as driving on highways may be becoming less illusory.

Continue reading...

Bacteria from Earth can survive in space and could endure the trip to Mars

A type of bacteria that is highly resistant to radiation and other environmental hazards survived outside of the International Space Station for three years, according to a new study. The Japanese Tanpopo mission involved including pellets of dried Deinococcus bacteria within aluminum plates that were placed in exposure panels outside of the space station.

Continue reading...

Body fat transformed by CRISPR gene editing helps mice keep weight off

CRISPR gene editing can turn white fat cells into brown fat that burns energy, a technique that limited weight gain in mice and could potentially be used to treat obesity-related disorders

Continue reading...

Drug cocktail touted by Trump increases chance of death by 27%, claims new study

‘No need for further studies’ into unproven Covid-19 treatment supported by US president, researchers say

Continue reading...

For the first time, humans have been placed in biostasis

Biostasis, or "suspended animation," is a hibernation-like technique that researchers and doctors believe could help save many lives in the future. Indeed, at present, there are already short or partial techniques that have an almost automatic and natural reversibility.

Continue reading...

In a first, a person’s immune system fought HIV — and won

Some rare people may purge most HIV from their bodies, leaving only broken copies of the virus or copies locked in molecular prisons, from which there is no escape.

Continue reading...

Continuous infrared winds discovered during the eruption of a stellar mass black hole

A team of researchers from the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) has, for the first time, detected constant infrared emission from winds produced during the eruption of a black hole in an X-ray binary. Until now, these flows of material had been detected only in other wavelength ranges, such as X-rays or within the visible spectrum, depending on the phase in which the black hole consumes its surrounding material.

Continue reading...

Did a supernova cause Earth's mass extinction 360 million years ago?

The fossil record suggests Earth's ozone layer took a protracted beating.

Continue reading...

Scientists Discover Exposed Bacteria Can Survive in Space for Years

An experiment conducted outside the International Space Station leads to a controversial theory about how life might travel between planets

Continue reading...

Bird deaths down 70 percent after painting wind turbine blades

The study ran for nine years at Norway's Smøla wind farm.

Continue reading...

Hong Kong's terracotta tile army marches to the rescue for coral

In 2018, a super-typhoon destroyed 80% of the corals in Hoi Ha Wan bay off the Sai Kung peninsula in Hong Kong. In the city’s strongest storm since records began, winds reached 155mph (250km/h) and battered the reefs, leaving behind mostly scattered debris and broken coral skeletons. A few coral species survived, but these will likely take decades to regrow to their former state.

Continue reading...

Researchers achieve fastest-ever internet speed that could download all of Netflix in one second

Researchers have created the fastest-ever internet connection, much quicker than any ever successfully tried before. The team behind the breakthrough, from University College London, were able to transmit data at 178 terabits per second. The speed is double the capacity of any system currently used in the world, and a fifth faster than the previous record.

Continue reading...

A mystery gas is currently shooting out of the centre of our galaxy 'like bullets'

Findings could shed light on where our galaxy is going

Continue reading...

Scientists inspired by 'Star Wars' create artificial skin able to feel

Singapore researchers have developed "electronic skin" capable of recreating a sense of touch, an innovation they hope will allow people with prosthetic limbs to detect objects, as well as feel texture, or even temperature and pain.

Continue reading...

Einstein’s two mistakes

Albert Einstein may have been the ultimate example of a visionary genius, but that did not stop him from twice losing his way due to beliefs that were perhaps not so scientific.

Continue reading...

What Apollo 18 can teach us about COVID-19

The Moon mission that never happened illustrates the difference between what we can do, and what we choose to do.

Continue reading...

Worries grow following 'dramatic' drop in monarch butterfly population

Flight of the Monarch Day was held in Toronto Saturday, as well as various other locations across Canada, in an effort to raise awareness around declining monarch butterfly populations and ways to help the fluttering insects.

Continue reading...

Navy F/A-18 Squadron Commander's Take On AI Repeatedly Beating Real Pilot In Dogfight

Everyone has an opinion when it comes to the stunning results of DARPA's AlphaDogfight trials, now hear what the skipper of a fighter squadron thinks.

Continue reading...

Japan steps up renewables investment to beat 2030 target

Japan will invest more than $100bn in wind and solar generation before 2030, beating its renewables goals according to analyst firm Wood Mackenzie.

Continue reading...

Machines can spot mental health issues—if you hand over your personal data

When Neguine Rezaii first moved to the United States a decade ago, she hesitated to tell people she was Iranian. Instead, she would use Persian. “I figured that people probably wouldn’t know what that was,” she says. 

Continue reading...

‘For climate protesters, we are like filth’: the German village where coal is still king

Europe is going coal-free, but a vast lignite mine is expanding in eastern Germany and coronavirus has delayed new climate laws

Continue reading...

NASA investigating small air leak on International Space Station

There's no threat to crew safety, NASA officials stressed.

Continue reading...

A 70-degree Shift on Europa Was the Last Event to Fracture its Surface

Houston, TX and Columbia, MD — August 21, 2020. Europa’s outer icy shell has completely reoriented itself in one of the last geologic events recorded on its young surface. Europa’s poles are not where they used to be. Cracks in the surface of Jupiter’s icy moon indicate its shell of ice rotated by 70 degrees sometime in the last several million ...

Continue reading...

Scientists create 3D-printed buildings from soil

Eco-friendly technology could potentially replace concrete and revolutionise sector

Continue reading...

5 NASA science projects that can help teach kids astronomy

Kids and adults can get involved these citizen science experiments from NASA researchers. Each one comes with educational materials that can help you learn about everything from alien planets to find

Continue reading...

Atlantic microplastic 'weighs millions of tonnes'

There are 12-21 million tonnes of tiny plastic fragments floating in the ocean, scientists say.

Continue reading...

New Research Suggests In-Person Voting May Be Less Risky Than Previously Thought

The report concludes Wisconsin voters who braved the pandemic and went to the polls in April did not see a surge in COVID-19 infections, although another study reaches the opposite conclusion.

Continue reading...

Why Babies Don't Always Remember What They Have Learned

The mood in which a baby is in when it learns new information plays a key role in their ability to recall information.

Continue reading...

Why babies not always remember what they have learned

No one can remember the first years of their life. A study suggests possible reasons.

Continue reading...

American Airlines is dropping service to these 15 cities. This is likely only the beginning

American Airlines will temporarily stop flying routes to 15 small cities across the United States in October, signaling that some areas could wind up underserved as the coronavirus pandemic continues to devastate the travel industry.

Continue reading...

Blue Origin and its partners deliver a lunar lander mock-up to NASA

An industry team led by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture has delivered a mock-up of its proposed lunar lander to NASA’s Johnson Space Center.

Continue reading...

Machine-learning model finds SARS-COV-2 growing more infectious

A novel machine learning model developed by researchers at Michigan State University suggests that mutations to the SARS-CoV-2 genome have made the virus more infectious.

Continue reading...

Florida Keys releasing genetically modified mosquitoes to fight illness

The plan involves the striped-legged Aedes aegypti mosquito, which is not native to Florida.

Continue reading...