[ad_1] Eric S Neitzel Fireground Communications LLC/AdobeStock One of the rare places in New York City where you can get a good view of clouds is the Central Park reservoir. Looking north from its edge, a gap between the buildings is wide enough to see them roll in from the harbour. This is where climate…
Read More “We’re finally solving the puzzle of how clouds will affect our climate” »
[ad_1] Scientists who study the climate work with data that goes back thousands of years and build models that project centuries into the future. Meanwhile, CEOs and politicians base their decisions on business, political and news cycles. Can we reconcile this gap? A new gathering is going to try. This week, world leaders will arrive…
Read More “A Declaration on Future Generations could bring the changes we need” »
[ad_1] You may seek to beat the slots, but that’s down to luck’s complexities Martin Parr/Magnum Photos The Art of UncertaintyDavid Spiegelhalter (Pelican (UK, out now); W. W. Norton (US, 4 March 2025)) I am not a twin, but I share a birthday with my sister, who is three years older than me. When I tell…
[ad_1] Shutterstock/Creative-Touch A century ago, it was possible for a physicist to know almost everything there was to know about physics. Now, this is far from the case. It isn’t that the physicists of today are less competent. The problem is that humans simply know so much about the inner workings of the universe that…
Read More “We physicists could learn a lot by stepping beyond our specialisms” »
[ad_1] Ten unexpected things were honoured at the 34th Annual Ig Nobel prizes last week, each so extremely surprising that, in the event’s long tradition, it makes people laugh, then think. The awards gala happened at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in a lecture hall filled with paper airplanes thrown by audience members respectful of…
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[ad_1] Seawater could be a source of clean hydrogen fuel Tamara Kulikova / Alamy For the first time, electrodes that can make hydrogen from seawater without generating corrosive and toxic chlorine gas will be produced at commercial scales. “Traditional electrolysis has only been possible with pure water, an increasingly scarce global resource,” Doug Wicks at…
Read More “Special electrodes will produce hydrogen fuel directly from seawater” »
[ad_1] African giant pouched rats proved adept at detecting four commonly trafficked products derived from endangered species including rhino horn and elephant ivory [ad_2]
[ad_1] Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China, on 31 December 2019 Imaginechina Limited/Alamy An analysis of genetic samples taken from the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China, has identified a shortlist of wild animals being sold there that were the most likely source of the virus that sparked the covid-19 pandemic. While bats are thought…
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[ad_1] Illustration of pterosaurs over a Cretaceous landscape, in a time when Earth was warmer than today MasPix / Alamy During the past 500 million years – the time when animals and land plants evolved – the average surface temperature of the planet varied more widely and got even hotter than previously thought. The mean…
Read More “Earth got even hotter than we thought during past 500 million years” »
[ad_1] Gravitational wave detectors use laser beams in tubes that span kilometres The Virgo Collaboration Gravitational waves that span thousands to billions of miles can be obscured in our detectors by the smallest of quantum fluctuations that permeate space-time. But now, researchers at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) have found a way to beat…
Read More “We’ve just doubled the number of gravitational waves we can find” »
