Science

Cyanobacteria, a blue-green algae is known to have played an ancient role in establishing Earth’s atmosphere. They love warm temperatures, lots of sunlight and slow-moving water. Florida’s year-round climate provides all of this and more. When rivers, lakes and estuaries are loaded with excess nitrogen and phosphorus, often due to agricultural runoff and improperly treated…

In 1970, Soviet scientists began drilling into the ground on the Kola Peninsula in the far northwest of the country, hoping to reach deeper into the earth than anyone before them. Almost two decades later, in 1989, the project hit its final depth of 12,262 metres, making it the deepest vertical borehole ever created by…

Bryan Johnson is a longevity influencer who claims to have spent millions of dollars tracking and streamlining nearly every aspect of his biology in order to slow down or reverse ageing. At 48, he is undeniably fit, sleeps more than 8 hours and has a fertile age, or so he claims.Over the years, he has…

On a cold November morning in 1957, a small stray dog that had wandered the streets of Moscow became part of one of the defining moments of the early Space Age. Her name was Laika. She was placed inside Sputnik 2, a spacecraft built in haste after the Soviet Union’s successful launch of Sputnik just…

We live in a world where everything, from the blood running in our veins to the oceans spanning our planet, is polluted by plastic in one way or the other. We see mountains of plastic rubbish growing day-by-day. We are currently facing a massive environmental crisis as humanity produces over 460 million tonnes of plastic…

Artificial intelligence has transformed wildlife photography, allowing people to sharpen blurry images, remove distracting branches and enhance colours with just a few clicks. But scientists now say these seemingly harmless edits could have unintended consequences far beyond social media. A new commentary published in Nature Ecology & Evolution warns that AI-enhanced bird photographs are beginning…

Zoe Kissane says the birds often ate at seed spills around agricultural operations (Supplied: Murdoch Univeristy) Scientists tracking endangered Carnaby’s black cockatoos across Western Australia’s Wheatbelt over three breeding seasons found worrying levels of chemical contamination in the birds’ food. Four out of five seed samples tested positive for pesticides, with some containing chemical levels…

Albert Einstein (Image: Wikipedia) Some people move through the world treating almost everything as ordinary. Others notice something remarkable in the same ordinary details. A line widely credited to Albert Einstein names that exact split. “There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as…

Black-and-white warbler (Mniotilta varia) is less likely to be seen when pollution level rises. Smoke from Canada’s record-breaking wildfires in recent years have done more than reduce air quality across parts of the United States. A new study suggests the wildfires made many birds harder for people to spot in New York State during the…

The sea anemone Nematostella vectensis. In the enlarged section, the nematosomes—which are key to the immune system of these invertebrates—are highlighted. (Credit: HHU/Nida Kaya) A simple sea anemone (a small plant with white, red, blue or purple flowers that are shaped like cups and have dark centres) can distinguish helpful bacteria from harmful invaders despite…