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Have we found evidence of alien life? The picture is getting much, much murkier. Last month, astronomers said they'd found "strong evidence" of alien life. They've now reanalysed the data and found more possible molecules that fit the data. www.newscientist.com/article/2480...

submitted 28 days ago • 2 comments

Training an AI model on the English population's health data is a massive legal and ethical grey area, but researchers have done it anyway. It might one day help doctors predict disease, but it's unclear whether it ever can without breaking the law. www.newscientist.com/article/2479...

submitted 41 days ago • 0 comments

Sensational claims of life on another planet are just that - claims. What would we need for those claims to be verified? More work from independent groups, more data and a real look at non-biological alternatives, which could take years, or forever. www.newscientist.com/article/2477...

submitted 61 days ago • 0 comments

Interesting tale here on D-Wave claiming last year that their quantum computers could do things that no classical computer could do. This week that paper passed peer-review. Success, right? No. Two teams of classical computer scientists say they've caught up. www.newscientist.com/article/2471...

submitted 97 days ago • 0 comments

The asteroid Bennu, which NASA brought back samples from to Earth in 2023, is baffling scientists with its abundance of nitrogen and odd magnetic properties. www.newscientist.com/article/2471...

submitted 97 days ago • 2 comments

A computer contained in a thin thread of stitchable fabric could be used to record, and understand, all sorts of information about the body that devices like Apple watches can't. And it's being tested on Canadian and US soldiers right now, in the Arctic. www.newscientist.com/article/2470...

submitted 110 days ago • 0 comments

50 years after it was first dreamt up by Douglas Hofstadter, this fascinating fractal butterfly has been found in a real physical system (in graphene, no less)! It's butterflies all the way down 🦋 www.newscientist.com/article/2470...

submitted 110 days ago • 0 comments

Another moon launch tomorrow, including: 🌑 The southern-most point ever visited 🌑 A hopping robot entering a crater w/ permanent shadows (for the 1st time) 🌑 An asteroid mining mission 🌑 A rover with a tiny cute ant-sized rover on its back www.newscientist.com/article/2469...

submitted 113 days ago • 0 comments

A lucky bit of timing meant astronomers could witness a thunderstorm on Jupiter in exquisite detail, as NASA's Juno spacecraft floated directly overhead 🛰️ www.newscientist.com/article/2469...

submitted 113 days ago • 0 comments

Good news: asteroid 2024 YR4, which was on a collision course for Earth, will probably miss us. But that doesn't mean scientists aren't still considering a space mission to study it up close! (The chance of a moon impact has also quadrupled, at 1.2%) www.newscientist.com/article/2469...

submitted 116 days ago • 2 comments

Absolutely shocking and very worrying from NOAA www.newscientist.com/article/2469...

submitted 117 days ago • 18 comments

Microsoft researchers have shown off a new AI tool that can produce full-length, physically accurate gameplay sequences for Bleeding Edge, a multiplayer online battle game 🎮 Could this lead to fully AI-designed games? Probably not anytime soon. www.newscientist.com/article/2469...

submitted 118 days ago • 1 comment

When the first exoplanets were discovered 30 years ago, we had only the faintest idea of what they looked like. Fast forward to today, and we have mindboggling detail - 3D atmospheres, actual wind speeds (70,000 km/h!) and altitude-dependent elements! www.newscientist.com/article/2468...

submitted 118 days ago • 0 comments

The asteroid barreling towards Earth (maybe) has just got an even higher risk rating from NASA - it's now at a 1-in-38 chance, the highest odds yet of collision. Not worth worrying (yet), but the world's space agencies are keeping a very close eye. www.newscientist.com/article/2468...

submitted 119 days ago • 0 comments

Jonathan McDowell has painstakingly amassed one of the world's largest collections on the space industry 🚀 @planet4589.bsky.social is now retiring, after four decades, and considering the future of his collection. We spoke all things space for @newscientist www.newscientist.com/article/2468...

submitted 123 days ago • 2 comments

If this planet's atmosphere really is as packed full of sulphur as it looks, then it is probably brimming with volcanoes 🌋 Volcanoes as far as the eye can see, magma ocean just below nearly the whole planet, eggy-smelling air - hell, basically. www.newscientist.com/article/2467...

submitted 127 days ago • 1 comment

See this circle with four blotches of white? It's light from a galaxy, 6 billion light years away, warped by a 2nd galaxy close to us. Astronomers have known about the close-by galaxy since 1886, and Einstein himself could have seen it if he'd had a good enough telescope 🔭

submitted 127 days ago • 2 comments

The new largest thing in the universe is mind-bogglingly large 🫨 Quipu is a structure of nearly 70 galactic superclusters and, in total, is more than 100,000 times as massive than a galaxy like our Milky Way. (1.4 billion light years across!) www.newscientist.com/article/2467...

submitted 127 days ago • 1 comment

This robotic hand is almost as dexterous as a human hand, but half as heavy 👋 The hand, which is voice-controlled, can tie knots, comb hair and play chess, thanks to a clever system of heat-sensitive metal strips that function like human tendons. www.newscientist.com/article/2467...

submitted 130 days ago • 0 comments

There is now a 1-in-43 chance that asteroid 2024 YR4 will hit Earth in 2032. It could be as wide as 100-metres, and would cause serious damage if it collides in populated areas. How worried should we be? My analysis for @newscientist www.newscientist.com/article/2467...

submitted 131 days ago • 2 comments

If you want to cook a perfect boiled egg, then set aside 30 minutes and grab yourself two pans. That's according to new research from Italian food physicists who say that they have found a foolproof (but admittedly time-consuming) method for egg cooking. www.newscientist.com/article/2467...

submitted 131 days ago • 2 comments

A mysterious kind of superconductivity found in a twisted crystal could eventually help us build room-temperature superconductors. But first, we need to figure out what's going on inside it. www.newscientist.com/article/2465...

submitted 146 days ago • 0 comments

Human urine contains lots of tasty nutrients (for plants), but it's difficult to separate them out into useable fertiliser. A new method from Chinese researchers shows that we might be able to more easily extract fertiliser from wastewater. www.newscientist.com/article/2464...

submitted 146 days ago • 0 comments

The winds on this alien planet are blisteringly fast 🌬️ WASP-127b, a puffball planet 500 lightyears from Earth, has circulating winds of 33,000 km/h, or nearly 30 times the speed of sound on Earth. That's the fastest planetary winds we know of. www.newscientist.com/article/2464...

submitted 147 days ago • 1 comment

Two strange clouds of ice and dust floating in space have baffled researchers, who say they don't match any known object in space ❄️ We could be witnessing an entirely new kind of star, but there's still much more to figure out. www.newscientist.com/article/2464...

submitted 147 days ago • 0 comments

Tiny insect-sized pollinating robots, hopping from plant to plant, are a little bit closer to reality with these nimble machines. The size of a stamp and the weight of a grain of rice, they're capable of some extraordinary aerial manoeuvres www.newscientist.com/article/2464...

submitted 149 days ago • 0 comments

SpaceX vs. Blue Origin. Elon Musk vs. Jeff Bezos. Two very different rockets and space companies, but competitors all the same 🚀 What does this week's launches mean for the future of the space industry? It's not straightforward. www.newscientist.com/article/2464...

submitted 151 days ago • 2 comments

Amazingly, having a robot hand move your fingers very fast can make you play piano even faster than you can through practice, even for expert pianists! 🎹 www.newscientist.com/article/2464...

submitted 151 days ago • 0 comments

Ever wanted to dance with a robot? 💃 It's now a little bit easier, thanks to some great work from researchers at MIT that uses a motion capture database to help robots mimic human movements.

submitted 152 days ago • 2 comments

Tomorrow's SpaceX launch kicks off what will be an incredibly busy year for spacecraft heading to the moon, with a dozen spacecraft teams having their sights set on lunar glory in 2025 🌑 www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 154 days ago • 0 comments

We can now measure long distances with truly mindboggling precision. Take this work, by Jian-Wei Pan and colleagues, which uses lasers to measure more than 100 kilometres to within a thousandth of the width of a human hair 🤯 www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 154 days ago • 1 comment

Strange rhythmic X-ray signals emanating from a supermassive black hole appear to be getting faster 🕳️ It's not clear exactly why, but one explanation could be a white dwarf orbiting perilously close to the black hole's event horizon. www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 155 days ago • 1 comment

If you're lucky, you might be able to see the brightest comet in 20 years next week ☄️ Or it might fly too close to the sun and be invisible, if you're unlucky. www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 158 days ago • 1 comment

What's the secret to a scientifically perfect cacio-e-pepe? 🍜 These Italian researchers spent months investigating, and found this seemingly simple dish is extremely physically complex. But to start, you'd do well to make sure you have enough starch. www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 159 days ago • 1 comment

We've just received some stunning images of Mercury's scorched surface, thanks to ESA/JAXA's BepiColombo 🔥 It's the last of six fly-bys before the spacecraft starts orbiting around the scorched planet late next year. www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 159 days ago • 1 comment

An entirely different class of particle from all particles we know of might exist and be measurable, after decades of physicists thinking it impossible. Whether we will ever have technology advanced enough to find these paraparticles is another matter. www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 159 days ago • 0 comments

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin is hoping a successful launch of its New Glenn rocket will allow it to compete with SpaceX. My primer on New Glenn and what its inaugural launch, on Friday, might mean👇 www.newscientist.com/article/2463...

submitted 160 days ago • 0 comments

Pluto's moon, Charon, is so large and on such a close orbit that it's difficult to explain how it came to be there. Scientist have now offered a new theory: billions of years ago, the bodies locked together in a cosmic "kiss" before gently separating. www.newscientist.com/article/2462...

submitted 161 days ago • 1 comment

What happens if we suddenly decide that chatbots are sentient or deserve rights? Some researchers are arguing that we should pay more attention to AI welfare than we currently are. My column for @newscientist on why they might have a point. www.newscientist.com/article/mg26...

submitted 167 days ago • 1 comment

A short look back on how AI models this year have become better at mathematics ✒️ (and an inaugural post on my new website and blog) www.alex-wilkins.com/blog/aimaths...

submitted 174 days ago • 0 comments

Graphene was famously first made by simply peeling off a layer of graphite using sticky tape. Now researchers have found they can use the same technique to make wafer-thin diamond 💎 www.newscientist.com/article/2461...

submitted 181 days ago • 0 comments

Scientists can't agree how old Saturn's rings are 🪐 We used to think they were billions of years old, but NASA's Cassini made them look fresher and younger, between 100 to 400m years old. A new study now says they are in fact old, but not everyone is convinced www.newscientist.com/article/2460...

submitted 183 days ago • 1 comment