Well, *anyone* could misplace a 600-mile barrier reef! Right?
The Atlantic (the magazine, not the ocean) just located a giant reef no one knew existed near the mouth of the Amazon River: A team […]
Science Art: Figs. 1315-1333 (Various rotary piston engines), 1890.
This is a page of figures from (deep breath) The engineer’s sketch-book of mechanical movements, devices, appli…
Read moreScience Art: Mirounga leonina 01, by H. Zell
This is a southern elephant seal, the largest marine mammal that isn’t a whale. They’re about twice as weighty …
Read moreScience Art: What can make any tape recorder sound a little more like an Ampex?, 1963.
This is an ad for Ampex tape from the August 1963 edition of Electronics Australia, a magazine (which I found o…
Read moreScience Art: Cygnus region in emission lines, 2025
This is a photo of space with a bit of color amplification so we can tell what we’re looking at. Nebulas on the…
Read moreScience Art: Heart apical two-chamber view myocardial regions, by Patrick Lynch
This is an illustration of a particular perspective in a cardiac echocardiogram. An “apical view” is one of the…
Read moreWe’re closing in on Planet Nine. (Or X. Whatever.)
Wired (with a little help from Cassini) narrows our search for the hidden, big planet orbiting the fringes of the solar system: Matthew J. Holman […]
New skin-cancer combo wipes out 20% of tumors.
Another BBC story, this one about a family of immune-boosting drugs that eat away melanoma in a fifth of patients: The first survival data on […]
Monarch migration mystery – solved! (We think.)
BBC reports on the computer model that seems to explain how the monarch butterflies make their amazing Canada-to-Mexico trek: Lead researcher Prof Eli Shlizerman, from […]
Science Art: Artist’s impression of JWST, European Space Agency, 2013
Click to embiggen This is an artist’s conception of the James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the Hubble. The European Space Agency is working […]
New astronomy from old sources: Planetary system found in a photographic plate from 1917.
Science Daily reveals how a century-old spectrographic analysis is probably the first ever evidence of an alien planetary system: bout a year ago, the review’s […]
These gloves translate sign language.
University of Washington undergrads have won $10,000 for designing gloves that translate sign language into text or speech: The Lemelson-MIT Student Prize is a nationwide […]
Inflatable space station could orbit by 2020.
New Scientist expands upon the company that just sent an inflatable room to the ISS… and what they’d like to do next: Bigelow Aerospace, which […]
Chinese researchers edit genes in human embryos – again.
Nature has more on the (non-viable) human embryos that were modified to resist HIV before being destroyed: Researchers in China have reported editing the genes […]
Science Art: Nutmeg Tree, from 40 drawings of plants at Bencoolen, Sumatra, c.1824.
Click to embiggen Spice. In watercolor. It looks like it would smell delicious. From 40 Drawings of Plants at Bencoolen, Sumatra, a collection of natural […]
Prostate drug tested as pedophilia treatment… in crowd-funded experiment.
Science has the convoluted story of the prostate-cancer drug that lowers testosterone levels enough that people are willing to try it as a cure for […]
Solar cells that generate power from *rain*, too.
Science Daily has our bases covered with the invention of photoelectric cells that create power from sunlight, and the motion of falling rain: For the […]
Metal whip for self-flagellating monks during Black Death: Go ahead, beat yourself up over it.
Discovery News has the painful truth on the braided copper whip: Found in 2014 at Rufford Abbey, Nottinghamshire, the braided-together length of copper wire, turned […]
Protein Diet Shaped Neanderthals
Archaeology thinks a paleo-version of the Atkins Diet made Neanderthals squat and wide-bodied: “During harsh Ice-Age winters, carbohydrates were scarce and fat was in limited […]
Science Art: HAPN-T 4800 Baud Modem, 1991.
Readers of a certain age will remember these waveforms – not by looking at them, but by sound. This is what data looked like as […]