Science

Imagine you took all sunlight that hits our planet at any given moment, and focussed it on one (unfortunate) piece of Earth the size of a thumbnail. Now times that blistering intensity by 100, and you’re beginning to understand the insanity of the world’s most powerful X-ray laser.

KIC 8462852 continues to puzzle and fascinate scientists. Its unusual flickering has provoked an outpour of explanation, ranging from comets to an alien megastructure. Although we are pretty confident that it’s not artificial in origin, all the natural explanations have yet to be confirmed.

The director of Serbia's Centre for the Promotion of Science, Nemanja Djordjevic, risks being fired after he called on the Minister of Education to respond to a petition seeking the exclusion of Darwin's theory of evolution from schools.

Researchers from around the world are scratching their heads over a newly discovered radio burst detected on Earth, but with a completely unknown origin. A new report describing the event and the subsequent investigation is now available online, but the key takeaway is that despite our best efforts and wealth of technology employed to discover the source, humanity has simply come up short.

China’s ambitious plan to set up living spaces on the moon in the next two decades will see Chinese volunteers take part in a simulated space cabin for up to 200 days. Chinese President Xi Jinping called for the country to develop into a global power in space exploration, with plans to send a probe to the dark side of the moon and put astronauts there by 2036.

Tens of thousands of people turned out in cities across the United States and beyond on April 22 for Earth Day events billed as a "celebration of science" to counter what organizers say is a growing disregard for evidence-based knowledge in Washington.

Last week, a huge scandal rocked the Tunisian and Arab scientific and educational world: a PhD student submitted a thesis declaring Earth to be flat, unmoving, young (only 13,500 years of age), and the centre of the universe.

An 'unprecedented' 21 different types of dinosaur tracks have recently been found on a stretch of Australia's remote coastline in the Kimberley region, with scientists dubbing it the nation's Jurassic Park. Palaeontologists have said that it is the most diverse discovery in the world.

A moderate tremor measuring 4.2 on the Richter scale rattled the southern Aegean island of Crete at 8.12 a.m. on Thursday morning, the Geodynamic Institute of the National Observatory of Athens reported.

The quake's epicenter was located 57 kilometers southwest of Iraklio at a depth of 23 kilometers.

For or instance, last year scientists made clothes that could repair themselves with just a touch of warm water, shoes that lace themselves, a robot that can autonomously make a complete garment, and skin-like material that will mean an end to facelifts and dark bags under the eyes. Flying cars, anyone? They're not that far from becoming reality.