An invasive river monster has become a big problem for native wildlife in parts of the US and Canda. The flathead catfish is set to become an apex predator as it eats its way through America, having been detected as far as Canada. The flathead catfish (Pylodictis olivaris) really is a river monster, with the … Read moreA 100-Pound River Monster That Feeds At Night Is Eating Way Too Much
A while back, I went on a quest to figure out and—and live by—the original meaning of America’s Founding document: the Constitution. I bore a musket on the streets of New York. I renounced social media in favor of expressing his First Amendment right to scribble pamphlets with a quill pen. The reason for this … Read moreI Asked Chat GPT to Take on the Persona of James Madison. Here’s What It Said
How and when flowering plants evolved has been a longstanding question in botany – one that has a huge impact on the field and beyond, also affecting conservation, agriculture, and even medicine. Now, with the creation of the most detailed tree of life so far, we are poised to get some answers. After a mammoth sequencing … Read moreWhen Did Flowering Plants Evolve? Huge Study Shakes Up Their Tree Of Life
In the bubbling, super-acidic hot springs of Yellowstone National Park there lives a strange gang of viruses with an ancient origin. Because thermophiles – organisms that thrive at scorching hot temperatures – are deeply rooted in the evolutionary “tree of life,” it might even be possible to learn about the origins of life by studying … Read moreGiant Viruses With Ancient Origins Lurk In Yellowstone’s Hot Springs
If you are even vaguely interested in the way the universe works, you have likely read about a mysterious substance proposed by physicists called “dark matter“. Dark matter is invisible matter that doesn’t emit, reflect, or absorb light, and only interacts with normal matter through gravity. We have never detected it directly – but physicists … Read moreWhat Dr Vera Rubin Saw In Spiral Galaxies Changed Physics Forever
You’re in the gym, and it’s nearly the end of your workout. You’re finishing on the stationary bike, so you hop on and get pedaling, dreaming of what you’re going to cook for dinner…but then you look at the clock. You’ve been cycling for longer than that, right? According to a new study, time really … Read moreTime Seems To Move Slower In This One Place, And You Might Be Going There Today
Silicon is the cornerstone of computing. Its properties and abundance have made it so. You are reading this on a device that uses silicon chips. Quantum computers are the next giant leap in computing, capable of doing calculations that not even our most powerful supercomputers can do. And they might still based on silicon, but … Read morePurest Silicon Might Be Secret Ingredient To Build Reliable Quantum Computers
Two approaches to improving the amount of charge that capacitors can store look to be bearing fruit, based on simultaneous publications by unconnected teams. Each offers the potential to make supercapacitors more potent energy storage devices, and perhaps put them into the race for large-scale energy storage. Supercapacitors have long had an advantage over batteries … Read moreSupercapacitors Become More Super With 19 Times As Much Capacitance
When was the last time you wrote something down by hand? For many of us, writing by hand may have become an infrequent – if not abandoned – practice. The ability to make notes on phones or to type out ideas with keyboards is generally quicker and easier, but is the value of writing by … Read moreWriting By Hand Is Surprisingly Important For Thinking And Learning
This weekend was a treat for lovers of the night sky all the way to mid-latitudes. The intense solar activity of the past week culminated in an extreme auroral event seen even to latitudes where you usually do not see such night sky spectacle. Social media was wonderfully inundated with pictures – probably helped by … Read moreWhy Were Aurorae Seen So Far Away From The Poles This Weekend?