Seasteading: Libertarians dream of creating self-ruling floating cities. But can the many obstacles, not least the engineering ones, be overcome?
A spacecraft orbiting Mars has detected carbon dioxide snow falling on the Red Planet, making Mars the only body in the solar system known to host this weird weather phenomenon. The snow on Mars fell from clouds around the planet’s south pole during the Martian winter spanning 2006 and 2007, with scientists discovering it only…
It’s been well established that social isolation is a serious health risk, particularly for seniors. A 2010 study showed that too much alone time can be just as dangerous as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Many scientists have assumed that loneliness is the culprit, and subsequent research has backed this suspicion. But a new study…
Although the world produces enough food to feed everyone, two million children die of malnutrition every year. Food insecurity has become a symbol of inequity and remains the most crippling consequence of poverty. Campaigners for food security must include science in their goals — and in return scientists need to heed wider concerns around solutions….
After decades of wandering in the scientific wilderness, cold fusion may be returning to the land of the acceptable. It’s been more than 20 years since esteemed researchers Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann electrified the world with news that they’d observed low-energy nuclear reactions at the atomic level that generated excess heat, holding out the…
An adenovirus isolated from chimpanzee feces is proving more effective than human adenoviruses as a vaccine vector for hepatitis C. Collecting stool samples from zoos and animal facilities, Alfredo Nicosia of Okairos in Rome, Italy and his team isolated and characterized almost 30 different chimp adenovirus serotypes from some 1,000 stool samples. They made safe…
The first direct signs of cheesemaking now seen in potsherds from Poland may help reveal how animal milk dramatically shaped the genetics of Europe, scientists reported. Although cheese may just seem to be a topping on pizza or a companion to wine, it may have shaped the evolution of Europeans, researchers say. Cheese evolved after…