Hackers are after your personal data, for profit EThamPhoto/Alamy Make sure you use a good mix of characters. Avoid your pet’s name. Most of all, never reuse a password. We all know the rules for ensuring that the keys to our digital kingdoms remain secure, and we probably all break them – and that is…
One June 20, 1975, a fictional great white shark stalked beachgoers on Amity Island — and struck terror into moviegoers around the world. Jaws, based on Peter Benchley’s best-selling novel, was a blockbuster. Its portrayal of sharks as bloodthirsty man-eaters bred widespread mistrust, fear and outright ill-will toward these animals. In truth, you’re more likely…
You’ve probably watched this sort of science-fiction scene more than once: some stalwart starship captain and their crew are fleeing from aliens/escaping a supernova /running out of fuel and are seemingly out of options, about to get eaten/vaporized/stuck. But then, just ahead, they spot a planet! So they head right for it, rockets blazing, then…
An illustration of NASA’s Relay 1 satellite, the precursor to Relay 2 NASA A satellite that had been dead for decades suddenly blasted out a powerful radio pulse that briefly outshone every other object in the sky. Astronomers think the flash may have been caused by a freak micrometeorite impact or a random spark. NASA’s…
What number should replace the question mark? Show puzzle solution The number 129 replaces the question mark. The key is the sequence of prime numbers: 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29, … The number in each polygon with n sides is the sum of the first n prime numbers’ values. The…
A tree-planting project in British Columbia, Canada James MacDonald/Bloomberg via Getty Images It would be nearly impossible to plant enough trees to compensate for the climate impact of burning through the world’s fossil fuel reserves. Offsetting the estimated 182 billion tonnes of carbon held in the reserves of the world’s largest fossil fuel companies would…
FINDING A TOXIC SOURCE In “Penguin Cartography” [Advances], Gayoung Lee reports on research by marine biologist John Reinfelder and his colleagues about the accumulation of mercury in penguins. The story highlights gold mining as a source of such mercury. But according to an October 2010 article in the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution’s (WHOI’s) journal Oceanus,…
Exposure to hormones in utero could affect human brain growth Peter Dazeley/Getty Images The human brain is one of the most complex objects in the universe – and that complexity may be due to a surge of hormones released by the placenta during pregnancy. While numerous ideas have been proposed to explain human brain evolution,…
Flesh-Eating ‘Screwworm’ Parasites Are Headed to the U.S. Screwworm parasites primarily infect livestock, but human cases have risen in Central America after the pests escaped containment By Stephanie Pappas edited by Jeanna Bryner Screwworm parasites are getting closer and closer to the U.S. border. The parasites primarily infect cows. Ferrantraite/Getty Images Officials in nine countries…
Illustration of CAR T-cell therapy targeting multiple myeloma, a type of blood cancer Nemes Laszlo/Alamy CAR T-cell therapy has the potential to revolutionise how we treat certain types of cancer by genetically engineering someone’s own immune cells to attack the disease – but it is also cumbersome and expensive. Now, scientists have managed to create…
