Skeleton of Homo naledi, found in the Rising Star cave system in South Africa John Hawks/Shutterstock Blazing the Trail Australian Museum, University of Sydney, BreakThru Films It is after 10pm and I am on a cycleway in Sydney returning from dinner with friends. It is a warm evening in the week before Christmas and people…
Is your favourite sci-fi short story in this list? Sometimes you’re in the mood for a slice of science fiction but you haven’t got the time to embark on a Red Mars or a Dune. All hail, then, the sci-fi short story, bringing you a slice of the weird, the mind-expanding and the futuristic in…
The stones that make up Stonehenge came from all over Britain Heritage Image Partnership Ltd /Alamy Stonehenge may have been built to symbolise a unification in Stone Age Britain. The idea could explain why so many of the stones making up the monument were brought in over huge distances. Located on Salisbury plain in southern…
Colour, smell, taste and chemical constituents can all be used to distinguish whiskies Jane Barlow/PA Images/Alamy Artificial intelligence can tell Scotch whisky from American whiskey and identify its strongest constituent aromas more reliably than human experts – by using data rather than tasting the drinks. Andreas Grasskamp at the Fraunhofer Institute for Process Engineering and…
A Guam kingfisher chick Thomas Manglona KUAM Amid a torrent of gloomy news about the decline of nature, there have been a handful of inspiring success stories from the world of wildlife this year, including positive developments for frogs, tigers and pangolins. Conservation managers should cherish these moments, says Jayson Semmens at the University of…
Are we ready for a dose of digital medicine? Jackie Niam/iStock/Getty Images One of OpenAI’s leading artificial intelligence models can outperform humans at diagnosing medical conditions, but does that mean AI is ready to replace human doctors? Not quite, although such technology could increasingly play a role in medical treatment. Adam Rodman at Harvard Medical…
If you want to make a huge splash when dive-bombing, you need to get your technique just right Studio Nut/Shutterstock To make the biggest splash when you dive-bomb into water, the secret seems to be to use the Manu technique practised by the Maori of New Zealand. This involves folding yourself so your torso and…
Kyle Ellington Here are the questions. The answers can be found at the bottom of this page, but don’t scroll down until you’ve given them a good go. 1. Uncle Johannes has outdone himself this year, serving up an eight-course Christmas feast (though some of the dishes are a little unusual). In order, the first…
Carolyn Jenkins/Alamy “Lloyd,” he tells me. “His name is Lloyd.” Naturally. Why would a green Lego Ninjago be called anything else? The plastic figurine has shot to top spot on my son Sam’s Christmas list. Anyone who knows a young child will sympathise. They crave the Barbie Colour Reveal Deluxe Styling Head that promises instant-but-fleeting…
A destructive storm in Spain in 2022 produced large hailstones up to 12 centimetres in diameter Tomeu Rigo Ribas A scanner at a dentist’s office has produced the first high-resolution 3D images of the internal structure of large hailstones. Such detailed views could help researchers better forecast which storms will generate these destructive pieces of…