science
The hunt for alien life on nearby exoplanet Wolf 1061c has begun
The search for aliens on a nearby exoplanet has started, with astronomers examining Wolf 1061c to see if it has the potential to sustain life. Stephen Kane and colleagues have found the rocky planet – just 14 light years away – is within the habitable zone and could be cool enough to support extraterrestrial...
It’s official: 2016 was the hottest year on record
It has been confirmed that 2016 was the hottest year on record since records began in 1850, official data show. The finding has been confirmed by the UK's Met Office and NOAA and NASA in the US. The full dataset for the year shows that 2016 was 0.77C above the long-term 1961-90. Last year saw global temperatures 1.1C above...
Torrential downpour resurrects alien-like prehistoric shrimp in Australian outback
Millions of crustaceans have been rehydrated by rain in Australia in normally arid desert areas, where precipitation only comes once every half a century. Floods in December 2016 were so severe that Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock), near Alice Springs, was shut to the public as extensive areas of the outback were submerged....
Two stars are about to smash into each other and the explosion will be visible with the naked eye
Two stars are set to collide, creating a huge explosion that will be visible from Earth with the naked eye. The cosmic crash is to take place in 2022, give or take a year, and will see one of the stars increase in brightness 10,000-fold – meaning it would be one of the brightest stars in the night sky, for a period....
A new organ has been identified in the human body – here’s how doctors missed it for centuries
For centuries it was thought that the mesentery was a fragmented collection of folds in the membrane lining the abdominal cavity. But now doctors have said that it is a distinct organ, which could change the way diseases of the digestive tract are understood. Leonardo da Vinci was the first to characterise the mesentery in a...
Earth ‘will be destroyed in October 2017’ – and the rich are already building bunkers
Don’t bother sticking to those New Year’s Resolutions, because in autumn this year, a massive death planet is about to hit our planet, killing us all. Mother 'humiliated' after being told to dump breast milk by airport security Or at least that’s what ‘researcher’ David Meade, author of...
Myth buster: Our big brains and small teeth did not evolve at the same time
The human brain and teeth have not evolved together in humans, unlike what past studies had suggested. Diverse and unrelated behavioural and ecological factors might have influenced the evolution of postcanine teeth and brain size within the Hominin group. Compared with other hominins, one of modern humans' most distinctive...
From Yellowstone to Toba: Here are some of the world’s biggest supervolcanoes
Supervolcanoes are loosely defined as volcanoes that can eject more than 1,000km3 of material during an eruption – around 1,000 times bigger than a normal volcano. These eruptions measure magnitude 8 or more on the Volcano Explosivity Index (VEI). In any given century, there is around a one in 500 chance one of the...
The next big thing in tech: Why augmented reality will dominate 2017
There is one technology story from this past year which can help inform us of any predictions we make about the technology trends which will dominate 2017. It is not Apple's stance against the US Department of Justice and refusal to undermine the security of its iPhones. It is not Facebook's growing influence on the...
The pollutant ammonia has been detected 15km up in the atmosphere, but it may not be all bad
The gas ammonia is usually only found in the atmosphere in tiny trace amounts, but scientists have now detected it at significant levels in the upper troposphere for the first time. The gas was at levels of 33 molecules per trillion air molecules over north India and south-east China, which have a huge consumption of...
Deadly duo: Diabetes and hypertension drugs combined to kill cancer cells
A combination of two drugs currently used to treat diabetes and hypertension have been found to kill cancer cells. Metformin, used to treat Type II diabetes, and syrosingopine, an anti-hypertension drug, were found to drive cancer cells to programmed 'suicide' in mouse models of the disease. Metformin has previously...
Six more fast radio bursts have been discovered coming from the same mystery cosmic source
Six additional repeating fast radio bursts have been discovered coming the same unknown source in space. The FRBs came from the same region beyond the Milky Way where 10 bursts had previously been detected – and their discovery should give a greater insight into what caused them. FRBs are radio signals from deep space...