Zimbabwe’s dinosaurs were different from South Africa’s: new species offers clues

Africa boasts up to 25% of Earth’s animal and plant species. This diversity is driven by diverse habitats: harsh deserts, vast grasslands, dense forests, towering mountains, lush coastlines and teeming seas. It is also due to deep evolutionary roots, as many animal and plant groups originated here in the distant past. Palaeontologists have been excavating […]

Continue Reading

Nobel prize in chemistry awarded for work on mirror-image molecules

Shutterstock AI generator The 2026 Nobel prize for chemistry has been awarded to two researchers for their work on mirror-image molecules. Frances’s Henri Kagan and Japan’s Kensō Soai were announced as this year’s winners during a news conference in Stockholm. Some molecules, like amino acids, the building blocks of proteins in living beings, exist in […]

Continue Reading

Ocean, desert rainfall and a parasitic disease: researchers connect patterns

Climate does more than shape the weather. It can influence when and where infectious diseases emerge by changing how disease-carrying vectors and animal hosts survive and behave. Scientists use weather data to anticipate some disease risks days or weeks ahead. But forecasting how those risks will change across seasons and years remains difficult. We asked […]

Continue Reading

The ick: the psychology of why a romantic partner can suddenly repulse you

The ick can strike without warning. Prostock-studio/Shutterstock Ever felt a sudden wave of cringe toward someone you were into – all because they wore questionable shoes or chewed a bit too loudly? Congratulations, you’ve caught “the ick”. That instant flip from attraction to total repulsion is everywhere on TikTok and Instagram, with singletons and couples […]

Continue Reading

Rhinos and elephants can cause huge problems if reintroduced badly – here’s how to get it right

Rhinos in the Kruger national park in South Africa. Karel Gallas/Shutterstock Moving large animals around is a seductive idea in conservation. If there are plenty of animals in one place and too few in another, moving some between the two seems an obvious solution. Sometimes it is. But with animals as large, mobile and socially […]

Continue Reading

Teenager Suspected of Leading KillSec Ransomware Group as Law Enforcement Seizes Infrastructure and Leak Site

HAMBURG, Germany — A multinational law enforcement operation has disrupted the KillSec ransomware syndicate, identifying a 16-year-old as the suspected leader and main administrator of the cybercrime network. Dubbed “Operation KillSwitch,” the joint action culminated on September 30, 2026, when authorities seized control of KillSec’s dark web leak site and infrastructure, securing at least 110 […]

Continue Reading

Secret chambers in Tutankhamun’s tomb could hold the burial of a lost Egyptian queen – we may get answers soon

A growing body of research is generating renewed interest in potential hidden spaces beyond the decorated walls of Tutankhamun’s burial chamber in Egypt. Some researchers have raised the possibility that these concealed chambers – if they exist – could contain the burial place of Nefertiti, Tutankhamun’s stepmother and mother-in-law. Nefertiti was made famous by a […]

Continue Reading

What space travel teaches us about sleep and circadian rhythms

On Earth, most of us rarely have to think about the signals that keep our internal clocks aligned. The Sun rises, daylight changes, darkness arrives and morning comes again. Our bodies have evolved alongside this roughly 24-hour cycle. Light is one of the strongest signals our bodies use to synchronise the circadian clock. But what […]

Continue Reading

How deep do AI relationships really go? An expert in attachment theory explains

SvetaZi/Shutterstock Attachment is the term psychologists use for the most significant relationships that hold people’s lives together. But what makes an attachment relationship different from all others? According to the pioneering American-Canadian developmental psychologist Mary Ainsworth, it must meet the following six conditions. (1) The relationship must persist over time, having (2) been formed with […]

Continue Reading

Confronting demons: how acoustic and AI technology brought ancient Etruscan tombs back to life

A demonic figure painted on the wall of the Tomba dei Demoni Azzurri (Tomb of the Blue Demons, 420-410BC). Sailko via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-ND Although it not always obvious, sound guides how we experience the world around us. And the latest archaeoacoustic techniques show that even the world’s earliest architects understood this. The ancient […]

Continue Reading