We predict that the rare extinction-level event type craters like Chicxulub, which may have lead to the extinction of the dinosaurs, were a byproduct of the current high bombardment rate. These new findings could have implications for the evolution of Phanerozoic life – our current geologic era – and the history of life including extinction […]

Astronomers all around the world started watching the Cow, which is one of the strangest and most observed objects recently discovered. Measurements of its brightness and wavelength suggest that it is located close to 200m light years away, far outside our own galaxy. This means that the explosion would have been extremely bright to have […]

Petr Kilian, Senior Lecturer, Chemistry, University of St Andrews It’s time to buy a lot of candles. And if we light them with matches, it will only be possible because of the anniversary in question. It’s happy 350th birthday to the discovery of phosphorus, an element that is essential for life as we know it. […]

Little Foot could have interacted with its surroundings differently than our more recent human ancestors. Amélie Beaudet, Postdoctoral fellow, University of the Witwatersrand Little Foot is one of the oldest known hominins in southern Africa. This almost complete skeleton, belonging to the genus Australopithecus, dates back more than three million years. It was found in […]

TikTok is a video sharing platform with a twist – videos can be no longer than 15 seconds, using simple tools to add music and special effects. TikTok can be thought of as a video version of Instagram or Snapchat. Michael Wade, Professor of Innovation and Strategy, Cisco Chair in Digital Business Transformation, IMD Business […]

  David Rothery, Professor of Planetary Geosciences, The Open University In a spectacular few days for solar system exploration – during which NASA whizzed the New Horizons spacecraft past the Kuiper Belt object 2009 MU69 (somewhat controversially nicknamed “Ultima Thule”) and eased OSIRIS-REx into orbit about the asteroid Bennu – the Chinese National Space Administration […]

Frank J. Cilluffo, Director, McCrary Institute for Cyber and Critical Infrastructure Security, Auburn University and Sharon L. Cardash, Deputy Director, Center for Cyber and Homeland Security, Auburn University The Chinese telecommunications company Huawei is under scrutiny around the globe over concerns that its close ties with the Chinese government present national security threats to the […]

Imogen Whittam, Post-doctoral researcher in Astrophysics, University of the W.Cape Supermassive black holes are giant black holes found at the centre of almost every galaxy. Astronomers recently made the clearest image yet of the supermassive black hole at the heart of our own galaxy using the new MeerKAT radio telescope in South Africa, revealing the […]

The studies support the argument of her discoverer, Professor Ronald Clarke of the University of the Witwatersrand, that there were two species of Australopithecus living at the same time in South Africa’s ‘Cradle of Humankind’, Australopithecus africanus, which was small, like Lucy, and probably primarily tree-dwelling, and Australopithecus prometheus, which was probably just within the […]

For the first time, we were able to describe at a detailed level how two proteins, as they exist in nature, interact with each other and how they behave in their own molecular worlds. Michal Gwizdala, Postdoctoral researcher in photosynthesis, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and Tjaart Krüger, Associate Professor in Biophysics, University of Pretoria People have […]