Laser scans of a Cyprus temple wall revealed 23 ship carvings invisible to the naked eye, two more than archaeologists found there in the 1980s. The etchings span 300 years, suggesting the Bronze Age collapse didn't wipe out knowledge the way historians assumed.
— via Popular Science, Andrew Paul
A retrofitted Cessna Caravan just flew 3,199 miles across the US with zero human input, handling its own taxiing, takeoffs, landings, and even storm rerouting near Phoenix. The onboard safety pilot never touched the controls.
— via Popular Science, Andrew Paul
Mathematicians just closed a 21-year-old gap by proving you can trap a notoriously hard-to-analyze graph between two simpler ones, a "sandwich" that hands over hard-won properties for free. The trick, finished in 2025, pushes existing techniques to their breaking point to link two random processes no one realized were so tightly bound.
— via Quanta Magazine, Paulina Rowińska
The flesh-eating New World screwworm, eradicated from the U.S. decades ago, has reached Texas and New Mexico. Researchers built a dashboard that mines news reports alongside lab data to flag outbreaks before official confirmation, which can take weeks.
— via ScienceDaily
A century-old crocodile fossil from Spain just gave up secrets no one could see: shine UV light on it, and skin scales, sensory organs and chest cartilage 125 million years old snap into view. The find suggests some crocodile traits evolved far earlier, and in stranger patterns, than expected.
— via ScienceDaily
Chemists say a rule taught to nearly every student for almost 100 years is wrong: the inductive effect doesn't fade over three or four bonds, it stops after one. Two A-level exam boards are already revising lessons based on the finding.
— via ScienceDaily
Lab tests found sucralose-6-acetate, a trace impurity in Splenda, broke DNA strands in human blood cells and weakened intestinal barrier tissue. The catch: the studies were in vitro, and a 2026 European review found no proof the compound forms during digestion or that normal sucralose use is unsafe.
— via ScienceDaily
Engineered yeast can turn PET soda bottles and corn stalks into proteins, vitamins and flavorings, which researchers then 3D print into cookies called µBites. Taste tests are still pending, but the aroma has already passed muster.
— via ScienceDaily
Rocks from Western Australia's Pilbara Craton show water was sinking deep into Earth's mantle and fueling volcanoes over three billion years ago, long before modern plate tectonics existed. Researchers say a process they call "dripduction" may explain how it got there.
— via ScienceDaily
ALICE physicists at CERN turned lead nuclei smashing near-misses into a gluon microscope, resolving structures down to 0.2 femtometers, about a quarter the size of a proton. The new data may finally show gluons acting collectively, evidence for a long-debated effect called saturation.
— via ScienceDaily
Senescent "zombie" cells drive chronic inflammation through a two-step mitochondrial trick: one pathway loosens DNA around SASP genes, another flags them for activation via leaked mitochondrial DNA. Blocking part of the process eased inflammation and aging in mice, researchers report in Nature.
— via ScienceDaily
Among 7,308 people with both atrial fibrillation and Alzheimer's, those on newer NOAC blood thinners lost cognitive ground more slowly than patients on warfarin or no anticoagulant at all. NOAC users also faced lower risks of death, stroke and fractures, though the observational study can't prove the drugs caused the improvement.
— via ScienceDaily
Caspases are famous for killing cells, but Weizmann Institute scientists found they can also make certain cells death-resistant, letting them multiply and rebuild irradiated tissue within 48 hours. The same trick may explain why some cancers come back more aggressive after treatment.
— via ScienceDaily
A space rock generated a blast radius as wide as two football fields. The post The moon’s new crater is 728 feet wide and a once-in-a-century find appeared first on…
— via Popular Science, Andrew Paul
Some of the 2,500-year-old Greek building's architectural tricks are virtually nonexistent. The post Mathematician debunks the Parthenon’s famous optical illusions appeared first on Popular Science.
— via Popular Science, Andrew Paul