This week in science: A ‘universal’ kidney, an exciting new Alzheimer’s experiment, a growing anomaly in Earth’s magnetic field, and much more!
Category: 1. Edi-Choice
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Science news this week: Revived permafrost microbes spew CO2, scientists image object ‘moving’ at 99.9% the speed of light, and James Webb telescope spots something exciting blasting from black hole M87*
This week’s science news was led by a spate of climate stories that were as worrying as they were fascinating. Topping the bill are microbes that were woken up after lying frozen in the Alaskan permafrost for up to 40,000 years, only for them to…
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Big questions on how food affects our health
Editor in Chief Nancy Shute explores the science behind major questions on food and health — from the addictive potential of ultraprocessed foods to the high-protein diet craze to the drawbacks of keto.
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3,500-year-old Egyptian military fortress with ancient ovens and fossilized dough discovered in Sinai Desert
Archaeologists have discovered a 3,500-year-old military fortress with a zigzag-style wall in the north Sinai Desert of Egypt, not far from the Mediterranean coast. The fort is remarkably well preserved, and even has the remnants of ovens and a…
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Can you actually get high from licking a toad?
In 2022, the U.S. National Park Service posted a blurry photo of a toad, snapped by a night-vision wildlife camera and accompanied by a tongue-in-cheek warning:
As we say with most things you come across in a national park, whether it be a banana…
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Earth from Space: Chilean glaciers
The changing face of the Chilean glaciers in the Laguna San Rafael National Park is featured in these satellite images from 1987 and 2024.
Located on the Pacific coast of southern Chile, the park covers an area of around 17 000 sq km and…
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Loss of macroevolutionary species fitness explains the rise and fall of clades
Raup, D. M. Biological extinction in Earth history. Science 231, 1528–1533 (1986).
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Benton, M. J. The Red Queen and the Court Jester: species diversity and…
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A Plant-Eating Croc? Newly Identified Species Demonstrates Crocodilian Versatility
Illustration by Dane Johnson, Museum of the Rockies – released to the press Measuring no more than 2 feet long from nose to tail, a newly-described crocodilian nicknamed “Elton” likely lived its entire life on land where it lounged…
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Mathematicians Just Found a Hidden ‘Reset Button’ That Can Undo Any Rotation
Some of the many paths that can be taken through the mathematical space SO(3), corresponding to sequences of rotations in real space. Credit: Tsvi Tlusty. If you twist something — say, spin a top or rotate a robot’s arm — and…
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Scientists just debunked the calcium and dementia myth
New findings from Edith Cowan University (ECU), Curtin University, and the University of Western Australia show no evidence that taking calcium alone increases the risk of developing dementia over time. The results help ease earlier fears that…
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