Science

In a galaxy billions of light-years away, two gargantuan black holes are trapped in a cosmic dance that routinely unleashes an enormous explosion that’s brighter than one trillion suns. One of the black holes is a complete colossus; weighing in at about 18 billion times more massive than the Sun, …

The Pentagon has released three declassified videos taken by US Navy pilots that appear to show unidentified flying objects (UFO). The black and white videos were recorded during training flights – one in November 2004 and two in January 2015 – and later leaked to the public, the Department of …

A Russian cargo capsule with 2.5 tons of supplies docked with the International Space Station (ISS) on Saturday after the fastest such trip yet from the earth, the national space agency Roscosmos said. The Progress capsule was launched atop a giant Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, reaching …

Norway has come under fire from environmental groups who accuse it of caving to oil companies over a decision to shift an Arctic no-go zone. The Norwegian government on Friday proposed an extension southwards of the so-called ice edge boundary, which marks the edge of the Arctic beyond which firms …

A group of researchers in Turkey is claiming to have come across the first credible records yet discovered of ‘death by a meteorite,’ dating from August 22, 1888. They cite multiple official documents recovered from the General Directorate of State Archives of the Presidency of the Republic of Turkey, which …

The spectacular eruptions of the Kīlauea volcano in Hawaii in 2018 were triggered by extreme rainfall in the preceding months, research suggests. Scientists say the finding raises the possibility that climate breakdown, which is causing more extreme weather, could lead to an increase in eruptions around the world. The 2018 …

A colossal collision of two black holes 2.4 billion light years away was detected by astronomers last year, but fresh developments show that the reverberations – both figurative and literal – have been felt ever since. The galactic smash was not between two equally sized black holes, as initially thought, …

BELGIAN scientists have discovered that antibodies found within llama blood could help to neutralise the coronavirus. Researchers from the Vlaams Institute for Biotechnology in Ghent have reported molecules in camelids blood may serve as useful “therapeutics” during the outbreak. These antibodies have proved effective against viruses such as Middle East …

Nasa has announced that next month it will launch its first crewed mission from US soil in almost 10 years. The rocket and the spacecraft it is carrying are due to take off from Florida’s Kennedy Space Centre on 27 May, taking two astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS). …

The Russian space agency, Roscosmos, accused Donald Trump on Tuesday of creating a basis to take over other planets by signing an executive order outlining U.S. policy on commercial mining in space. The executive order, which Roscosmos said damaged the scope for international cooperation in space, was signed on Monday. …

Scientists have found evidence of a “ghost population” that lived in Africa around 500,000 years ago and are genetically linked to modern-day humans. The existence of the mysterious ancestor was uncovered by researchers who were studying the genes of four West African populations. Up to 19 percent of human’s genetic …

With so many pieces of high-tech hardware at its disposal, it’s easy to forget that some of NASA’s most impressive machines are rapidly aging. The Spitzer Space Telescope is one of those machines, and after over 16 long years in space, the trusty spacecraft is now finally being retired. NASA …

The Daniel K Inouye Solar Telescope on Hawaii has released pictures that show features as small as 30km across. This is remarkable when set against the scale of our star, which has a diameter of about 1.4 million km and is 149 million km from Earth. The cell-like structures are …

E-cigarettes were barely heard of ten years ago and yet they are now the most widely used tobacco product within the US. E-cigarettes have been shown to be helpful in assisting adult smokers in quitting. Regarded as 95 percent less harmful than conventional smoking, e-cigarettes have equally drawn praise and …

Planets orbiting binary systems are an exciting curiosity and NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) has found its first one. What’s even more exciting is that the discovery was made by teenager Wolf Cukier on his third day of a NASA internship last summer. The planet’s new name is TOI …

NASA’s planet-hunting mission TESS has found its first potentially habitable exoplanet the size of Earth orbiting a star about 100 light-years from Earth, according to the agency. The findings were announced during the 235th meeting of the American Astronomical Society on Monday in Honolulu. The planet is part of a …

India has approved its third lunar mission months after its last one failed to successfully land on the moon, its space agency said on Wednesday, the latest effort in its ambitions to become a low-cost space power. The Chandrayaan-3 mission will have a lander and a rover, but not an …

The amount of food needed to feed the world’s population by the end of the century could increase by almost 80%, a study has suggested. Researchers from Germany said a trend of increasing Body Mass Index (BMI) is resulting in individuals requiring more calories. The authors warn that failure to …

An Earth observation satellite jointly developed by China and Brazil was launched into space on Friday under a bilateral program seen as a template for broader cooperation among BRICS nations. The China-Brazil Earth Resource Satellite-4A was launched on a Long March-4B rocket in the northern Chinese province of Shanxi, the …

Essentially the entirety of physics centers on four forces that control our known, visible universe, governing everything from the production of heat in the sun to the way your laptop works. They are gravity, electromagnetism, the weak nuclear force, and the strong force. New research may be leading us closer …