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Unlike today, the Moon was once volcanically active. But exactly how long this period of volcanism persisted remains unclear. New analysis of lunar samples returned by the Chang’e-5 mission by the China National Space Administration suggest volcanic eruptions were occurring on the Moon as little as about 120 million years ago. The new findings, published […]

New research reveals a dire need to protect and preserve not only islands’ biodiversity, but their cultural and linguistic diversity too. Lindell Bromham, an evolutionary biologist from the Australian National University, has been working with linguists for a decade to understand why, when you plot both language diversity and biodiversity on a map, they tend […]

In fascinating research, which might change our understanding of the moon, scientists in the US have estimated a new timespan for when the Moon’s magnetic field could have existed, if it ever did. The analysis of lunar rocks collected from the Apollo missions suggests that, if a magnetic field did once exist on the Moon, […]

Pterosaurs were the largest creatures to ever take flight. How they did so has long been subject to debate. Research on new fossils from the Arabian Peninsula provides fresh answers. During the “Age of Dinosaurs”, large reptiles called pterosaurs soared through the skies. These animals were wiped out 66 million years ago when an asteroid […]

Clinicians can’t spy the blood vessels, muscle, and organs that lie beneath the skin with the naked eye when treating their patients. But researchers may have just found a way to make it possible one day. US scientists have turned living tissues transparent with the use of a common food dye found in the humble […]

Andrea Morello is Scientia Professor of Quantum Engineering at UNSW and a Program Manager in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology and a 2024 Australian Research Council (ARC) Laureate Fellow. He believes quantum computing is at a fork in the road. “To build a quantum computer, you still need to […]

Last year, the Victorian Government released more than  1.1 million recognised environmental pests into dams, lakes and reservoirs. These pests are brown and rainbow trout, popular among recreational fishers but seriously threatening to Australian native species. This year, the Government plans to release some 1.2 million more. Millions of dollars are given to the Victorian […]

The Australian Government has proposed 10 mandatory “guardrails” for high-risk AI development and use, with plans to regulate them in the works. The government, which appointed an expert group to develop the guardrails, is now taking submissions on how they might be regulated. The 10 guardrails include establishing and publishing accountability processes, appropriate governance for […]

Some of New Zealand’s most iconic species may actually have relatively recently trekked over from Australia according a more than 2-decades-long palaeontological study. Zealandia’s true ancients Researchers have found that the truly ancient species of New Zealand are animals like the kākāpō, small wrens, bats and freshwater limpets. These lineages have been present since the […]

NASA’s New Horizons Kuiper Belt search has revealed a population of objects in the outer solar system which suggest the solar system formed from a much larger protostellar disc than originally thought. The Kuiper Belt is a region beyond Neptune populated by ancient remains of planetary building blocks. It was first discovered in the 1990s. […]

From genetically engineered plants to the world’s first method to catalogue and describe all ecosystems on Earth, the winners of the 2024 Australian Museum Eureka Prizes were announced in Sydney last night. The 19 individuals and teams were recognised for their excellence across the categories of research and innovation, leadership, science engagement, and school science, […]

Recent research from the Marine Biological Laboratory at the University of Chicago, has uncovered an unusual form of cell division in one of the most common forms of bacteria – those that live in dental plaque. The researchers observed Corynebacterium matruchotii which produces precipitate calcium phosphate in the mouth, undergo a division process known as […]

A US study has found that vaccination against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) lowers the risk of hospitalisation in people over 60. The study is published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. RSV is a highly infectious disease that usually causes mild illness, but can be serious in young children and older adults. Vaccines […]

Telling tourists on the Great Barrier Reef about climate change doesn’t negatively affect their trip, according to a new study. Instead, finds the research, it could be a good avenue to promote climate action for people who wouldn’t otherwise be engaged. The study, done by a team of Queensland researchers, is published in People and […]

Fragments of the protein collagen have been found preserved in dinosaur fossils 80 million to195 million years old. But this shouldn’t be possible. With a half-life of only about 500 years, the peptide bonds that hold proteins together ought to break down much, much sooner. Now, a new study in ACS Central Science has described the […]

“Imagine a wristwatch that wouldn’t lose a second even if you left it running for billions of years,” says Professor Jun Ye, referring to the first “nuclear clock” which could keep time even more accurately than state-of-the-art atomic clocks. “While we’re not quite there yet, this research brings us closer to that level of precision,” […]

A new species of sauropod – or long-necked dinosaur – has been described from fossils found in Spain. The titanosaur has been named Qunkasaura pintiquiniestra in a paper published in Communications Biology. The dinosaur was discovered at the Lo Hueco fossil site in the central city of Cuenca, about 140km east of Madrid. More than […]

Marmosets do something that only humans, dolphins and elephants have been known to do: give each other names. “Phee-calls” – a specific vocal call – used to identify and communicate between individual marmosets are described in new research published in the journal Science. There are 22 species of marmoset native to South America and occasionally […]

Discovery of how the deadly avian influenza virus spread to the Antarctic has raised concerns about how vulnerable the region will be during seabird breeding season. In October 2023, British researchers confirmed for the first time the presence of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in the Antarctic and sub-Antarctic regions. The strain detected in remote […]

Researchers have made a cooling device that they say can chill environments with 50% of the energy used by conventional air conditioning. They are using the physics of radiative cooling. The personalised device works by making an extremely cold surface, rather than blowing air about. The Chinese team has published its results in Cell Reports […]

An asteroid 20 times larger than the one that ended the Age of Dinosaurs smashed into Jupiter’s largest moon Ganymede 4 billion years ago. New research suggests the impact shifted the moon’s axis. Ganymede is the solar system’s largest moon. With a diameter more than 5,260km, it is larger than the planet Mercury. It is […]

It really is a shark-eat-shark world. Scientists have reported the first ever case of a porbeagle shark – a 2.2-metre-long pregnant female – being eaten. A marine whodunnit investigation suggests that large sharks are eating each other. Porbeagle sharks are large – reaching up to 3.7 metres and 230 kg. They can live for 65 […]

Researchers at Monash University’s Applied Microfluidics & Bioengineering Lab are researching the environment inside fallopian tubes hoping to shed light on female infertility. Their new Nature Communications study has revealed a previously overlooked contributor to female infertility – the viscosity of fallopian tube fluid. They found a thicker, sticky fluid environment promotes the growth of […]