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NASA’s latest space telescope, SPHEREx, scheduled for launch on 28 February in tandem with another mission called PUNCH, has been hailed for both the colour range of the images it will produce and its ability to “peer back” to the first second after the Big Bang. What the telescope will actually do, however, is somewhat […]

The movement of massive glaciers during global ice ages contributed to the rise of complex life, new research reveals. By analysing zircon crystals in ancient rocks, geologists found that as glaciers flowed across the Earth’s surface, they carved deep into the crust and released key minerals from below. These minerals were later flushed out to […]

Australian scientists have identified 2 new species of whirring tree frogs in northern Queensland, which are already being pushed to the limits of their habitable ranges by the impacts of climate change. According to Michael Mahony, emeritus professor at the University of Newcastle and co-author of a study describing the new species, “the frogs are […]

As global immunologists race to get ahead of bird flu there’s some good news from Australia where scientists have found that molecules on the inside of highly pathogenic influenza A H5N1 virus could be promising targets for human vaccines. A new study found these proteins remain largely unchanged among different viruses, which suggests that vaccines […]

There’s more evidence, if it was required, that Mars once hosted cool water in large volumes, which would have been an environment well-suited for microbial life to evolve on the Red Planet. Two new pieces of research released this week dovetail nicely with a third which describes a new method to detect fossils of microbial […]

Is the evolution of intelligence partly driven by love? A new study involving tiny fish swimming in mazes suggests that smarter fish have a better chance of mating and reproducing. “Evolution of animal intelligence has long been thought to have been driven by natural selection,” says lead author Ivan Vinogradov, a biologist at the Australian […]

Analysis of ancient DNA has shed light on the origins and diversity of the Hun empire, revealing far-reaching genetic ties. The Huns suddenly appeared in Europe in the 370s CE. The influential but short-lived empire extended from Europe to the Caucasus and Central Asia until the 6th century. As world-leading historian of Central Asia Denis […]

A recent analysis of global breast cancer rates has found that, while Australia and New Zealand substantially decreased the disease’s mortality rate over the past decade, the countries’ breast cancer incidence rates were the highest in the world in 2022. For every 100,000 women living in Australia and New Zealand, 100.3 cases of breast cancer […]

In the not very distant past, the Arabian Peninsula was likely a savannah, with wolves, lions and leopards. That’s the conclusion from new research into ancient rainfall patterns in Arabia going back thousands of years, which reveals the region was much wetter than today. The findings raise questions about the region’s preparedness amid growing urbanisation. […]

You might be surprised to hear that there’s anything “inside” a proton. But scientists have mapped the forces between the quarks inside protons in unprecedented detail, adding to the understanding of fundamental characteristics of the universe and potentially leading to future proton-based technologies. Atoms are made of electrons, protons and neutrons. Protons and neutrons are […]

Across south-west Australia, Aboriginal peoples have long built lizard traps by propping up rocks on granite outcrops. Now, it’s been found that these traps are not just culturally important but ecologically important too, providing reptiles with habitat and vital shade. “Granite outcrops are ancient, biodiverse, and culturally significant ecosystems that are at risk from contemporary […]

NASA will soon launch a new telescope which it says will create the “most colourful” map of the cosmos ever made. The SPHEREx telescope is relatively small but will provide a humongous amount of knowledge in its short two-year mission. It is an infrared telescope designed to take spectroscopic images – ones that measure individual […]

Climate change is forcing sea turtles to nest earlier. Researchers monitoring nesting green and loggerhead turtles on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus have discovered that they are returning to their regular nesting spots earlier each year to compensate for rising temperatures. “Migratory marine species are some of the most endangered species globally, and among this […]

The threat of climate change has spurred the UN’s Green Climate Fund to provide a grant for 14 Pacific Island nations to purchase fish aggregation devices and other tools to manage food security risks associated with future tuna catches. The grant programme is worth almost $250m (US$156.8m). A third of the world’s tuna catch comes […]

When you wake up from a dream, is your brain full of vivid details that you recount to your friends and family? Or does the memory slip away by breakfast time? Our ability to remember dreams upon waking is called dream recall. But the factors that influence this ability are little understood. Now, new research […]

Chemical engineers have discovered a greener way to make an industrial chemical used to produce many everyday products – from plastics and textiles to antifreeze and disinfectants. The manufacture of ethylene oxide is estimated to be a US$40 billion per year global market. But its current production process requires the use of toxic chlorine gas, […]

Glaciers worldwide have lost a staggering 6,542 billion tonnes of ice in just 23 years – contributing 18mm to the global rise in sea levels and reducing vital supplies of freshwater. “To put this in perspective, the … [water] lost in one single year amounts to what the entire global population consumes in 30 years, […]

Astronomers believe they have found evidence to support a 30-year-old theory that Jupiter’s moon Callisto has a saltwater ocean. Callisto is Jupiter’s second largest moon, with a diameter of 4,820km – the same as the solar system’s smallest planet, Mercury, and roughly a third that of Earth. Callisto is one of the 4 Galilean satellites […]

Galaxies, planets, black holes: to most people, everything about our Universe sounds and feels enormous. But while it’s true that much of what happens millions of light years away is large, there are also processes happening at the quantum end of the scale. That’s the branch of science which explains how nature works at very […]

Researchers are working with the mining industry to create a new source of sand – which at present is being mined at an unsustainable rate and might run out with a generation. Miners are being asked to extract sand from their ore processing, to help alleviate the global sand crisis. Researchers are calling for a paradigm […]

Research into the shape of Neanderthal inner ears challenges the theory that the extinct human species originated out of an evolutionary event that led to a loss of part of their genetic diversity. The findings, published in Nature Communications, are based on fossils from across Europe and Western Asia. Unlike modern humans, Neanderthals never lived […]

Spine injections offer little, or no pain relief for certain kinds of chronic back pain compared to sham injections, a panel of international experts has found. They strongly recommend against the use of the procedures, such as epidural steroid injections and nerve blocks, for people living with chronic back pain that lasts least 3 months […]

King Thutmose II’s tomb has been found in Egypt – the first tomb found since 1922 when archaeologists uncovered the resting place of Tutankhamun. It is the last missing royal tomb from the 18th dynasty of Egyptian kings. Thutmose died before the age of 30 in 1479 BCE. It is not clear if he ruled […]

Dinosaur fossils found in southeastern Australia reveal a unique ecosystem unlike any other in the world. The research, published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, describes a hierarchy of predators in Cretaceous Australia which is unlike anywhere else. The fossils were unearthed along the coast of the state of Victoria. They are from the roughly […]