PC: Guinness World Records In 1986, Ann Bancroft set out across the Arctic as a 29-year-old elementary school teacher with a love of the outdoors and a place on an eight-member expedition. Fifty-five days later, she stood at the North Pole, becoming the first woman to reach it. The journey involved dog sleds, tonnes of…
Ella Lu. Image Credit: Chris Ayers/Society for Science Ella Lu, a 17-year-old student from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, has found a way to bring two different interests of ‘art’ and ‘computer science’ together. As a senior at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics(NCSSM), Lu developed a system that can study how objects are…
European hedgehog (Image Credit: Canva) What was once seen as a useful garden helper in New Zealand has become an unexpected threat to some of the country’s most vulnerable wildlife. European hedgehogs were deliberately introduced to New Zealand in the 19th century, with acclimatisation societies releasing them in the hope that they would help control…
Pythagoras is best known today for the mathematical theorem that bears his name, but the ancient Greek thinker was also associated with a broader philosophical tradition that explored morality, discipline, friendship and the pursuit of a virtuous life. One saying attributed to him offers a timeless reflection on the people we choose to keep close:…
Florence Nightingale, widely remembered as the “Lady with the Lamp”, became one of the most influential figures in the history of nursing and healthcare. Born in 1820, she challenged the expectations placed on women of her time and devoted her life to improving the treatment of sick and injured people. Her work during the Crimean…
A Dutch plant is turning a huge agricultural waste stream into renewable electricity and fertiliser. BMC Moerdijk in the Netherlands processes around 420,000 tonnes of poultry manure each year, using thermal conversion to generate electricity for the farms supplying the manure and enough additional power for around 45,000 households. The process does not end after…
At first glance, the fire salamander appears much as it always has: black skin broken by irregular yellow markings, a pattern long associated with the species’ chemical defences. But under ultraviolet light, that familiar appearance changes. According to the 2026 study published in the Royal Society, titled ‘Glandular biofluorescence in fire salamanders (Salamandra salamandra): first…
Antarctica holds more than 60% of the world’s meteorites, but warming could make thousands disappear into the ice (PC: AI Generated) More than 60% of all meteorites ever found on Earth have been recovered from Antarctica, where dark rocks can remain exposed on bright blue-ice fields for thousands of years. Now, climate warming is putting…
A conceptual illustration of CD-35 2722, featuring an object resembling a moon (Credit: ESO) For decades, astronomers have been finding planets orbiting stars far beyond our solar system. More than 6,000 exoplanets are now known.But there is one glaring omission.Not a single moon outside our Solar System has been confirmed with the same level of…
Argentine ants are invasive ants commonly found in homes and gardens in Southern California Seeing more Argentine ants after putting out pesticide bait may not mean the treatment has failed. A new University of California, Riverside, study found that the chemicals can change the ants’ behaviour, with the response varying depending on the type of…