WEIRD SCIENCE
Nick Lavars – Skysource/Skywater Alliance develops deployable machines that can harvest freshwater from the air (Credit: Skysource/Skywater Alliance). Two years ago, XPrize extended its list of pioneering technology competitions with a new contest aimed at the problem of global water security. After …
Michael Irving – The incredibly-rare mineral reidite has been found in an impact crater in Western Australia (Credit: sdecoret/Depositphotos). It’s said that time heals all wounds, and apparently that even applies to wounds on the Earth itself. Woodleigh Crater in Western Australia …
David Szondy – The new catalyst combines an outer shell of platinum atoms (gray spheres) with ordered layers of platinum and cobalt atoms (blue spheres) in its core (Credit: Sun lab/Brown University). A team of Brown University scientists has developed a new …
Michael Irving – An artist’s rendition of fast radio bursts, being detected by the ASKAP telescope in Western Australia (Credit: OzGrav, Swinburne University of Technology). Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are one of the most intriguing celestial mysteries out there at the moment. …
Ben Coxworth – Egyptian blue is considered to be the world’s first synthetic pigment (Credit: Maugli/Depositphotos). Thousands of years ago, the ancient Egyptians created a blue pigment which they used in their depictions of gods and royalty. Derived from calcium copper silicate, the …
We’ve started searching for rare earth elements in some unlikely places Laura Mast, Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology. U.S. National Archives on Flickr. Rare earth elements — elements like scandium, neodymium, and dysprosium — have found their way into every aspect of our …
“The impacts on human well being, including mental health, may be catastrophic.” By Sarah Sloat – A landmark United Nations report revealed that catastrophic events induced by climate change could become regular occurrences as soon as 2040. In the report, published recently, the …
Rich Haridy – A new technique successfully edited a single genetic mutation prenatally, resulting in healthy mice being born (Credit: spgirolamo/Depositphotos). In a remarkable proof-of-concept study, scientists from the University of Pennsylvania and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia have, for the first time, …
Nick Lavars – A compound found in the venom of the Australian funnel-web spider was found to kill off melanoma cells in the lab (Credit: pelooyen/Depositphotos). Discoveries of potentially life-saving peptides in the venom of deadly animals are, counter-intuitively, not all that …
Michael Irving – The first steps towards brain-to-brain interfaces for collaborative problem solving are being made in the laboratory (Credit: Andreus/Depositphotos). The internet has made it easy for groups to collaborate from pretty much anywhere, but this experimental brain-to-brain “social network” could be …
