Our short-term memory is wired to deceive us on purpose, scientists have found – a trick that enables us to better recognise what we’re seeing in the world around us. The deception kicks in when we take a second glance at something: our brains partly falsify that second glance, so it matches up with the
Month: April 2020
We’re pretty familiar with our Sun. We’ve even sent a probe to go study it; we haven’t done that with any other star. Given how closely we study it, it would be tempting to think of it as a typical example of a G-type main-sequence star, or yellow dwarf. New research suggests that this is
The hailstone is so massive it even stunned meteorologists. “It’s incredible,” said meteorologist Matthew Kumjian from Penn State University in the US. “This is the extreme upper end of what you’d expect from hail.” The hefty ice lump smashed down from a supercell thunderstorm in Argentina two years ago, in the heavily populated town Villa Carlos
In the depths of space 3.5 billion light-years away, two supermassive black holes are locked in one of the most extreme orbital dances in the Universe. Their riotous, somewhat erratically flaring death spiral has been documented for decades. With new observations, astronomers have now characterised the way they whirl about each other in the centre
A single tail from one of the largest and most enigmatic dinosaur species looks to have solved a longstanding mystery about these extinct creatures: whether they could swim. The discovery of a giant fossilised tail belonging to the theropod Spinosaurus aegyptiacus suggests these huge predators were aquatic animals after all, using tail-propelled locomotion to swim
A comet only just discovered in December of last year has already met its demise. It didn’t reach perihelion, or its closest approach to the Sun. It didn’t even pass inside Earth orbit. Yet Comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) has now absolutely shattered. In images taken on April 20 and April 23, the Hubble Space Telescope
It’s not every day that scientists uncover an entirely new species of mammal, let alone a creature whose shrouded origins lie so far back in time, they emanate from the mysterious supercontinent of ancient Gondwana. In a new study, researchers have unveiled the fossilised remains of a new genus and species discovered in Madagascar. Dubbed
As the Roman Empire drew to a dramatic collapse towards the end of the 5th century, ripples were felt across its former territories. Balances shifted as new powers rushed to fill the vacuums Rome’s retreats left behind. The changes to the everyday lives of the people are far less well documented, but a cemetery in