Astronomers Have Found an Especially Sneaky Black Hole
Discovery sheds light on star death, black hole formation and gravitational waves Idan Ginsburg, Georgia State University There is always something new and exciting happening in the field of black hole research. Albert Einstein first published his book explaining the theory of general relativity – which postulated black...
Ice World: Antarctica’s Riskiest Glacier is Under Assault from Below and Losing its Grip
Ted Scambos, University of Colorado Boulder Flying over Antarctica, it’s hard to see what all the fuss is about. Like a gigantic wedding cake, the frosting of snow on top of the world’s largest ice sheet looks smooth and unblemished, beautiful and perfectly white. Little swirls of snow dunes cover the surface. But as you...
50 Years of UN Environmental Diplomacy: What’s Worked and the Trends Ahead
Mihaela Papa, Tufts University In 1972, acid rain was destroying trees. Birds were dying from DDT poisoning, and countries were contending with oil spills, contamination from nuclear weapons testing and the environmental harm of the Vietnam War. Air pollution was crossing borders and harming neighboring countries. At Sweden’s...
Wealthy Nations are Carving up Space and its Riches — and Leaving Other Countries Behind
Theodora Ogden, Arizona State University Satellites help run the internet and television and are central to the Global Positioning System. They enable modern weather forecasting, help scientists track environmental degradation and play a huge role in modern military technology. Nations that don’t have their own satellites...
Astronomy’s 10-Year Wish List: Big Money, Bigger Telescopes and the Biggest Questions in Science
Chris Impey, University of Arizona It takes expensive tools to learn about the universe, but projects like the Very Large Array for radio astronomy in New Mexico and the Chandra X-ray Observatory, which orbits Earth, have pushed scientific knowledge forward in ways that would not have been possible without these instruments. Every 10...
3 Tips On How to Create a Smart Laboratory in 2022
If there was a time when the world got to see just how much scientific research can change the odds in our favor, it was during the COVID-19 pandemic. True, it’s not over yet, but due to thorough research and dedicated scientists, we now have several vaccines and even some promising treatments to help us get to the other...
Science, Science Wherever You Go: SciFest All Access
The second running of the virtual SciFest All Access was a spectacular success, featuring the laughs, hands-on programs, personalities and diversity of programs that said one thing: ‘This is your future. And it’s going to be both very important and fun.’ Imagine waking up one morning knowing you’re going to play all day, and...
James Webb Space Telescope Reaches its New Home
Monday, Jan. 24, 2022, at 2 p.m. EST, the James Webb Space Telescope fired its onboard thrusters for nearly five minutes (297 seconds) to complete the final postlaunch course correction to Webb’s trajectory. This mid-course correction burn inserted Webb toward its final orbit around the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point, or L2,...
Why the Volcanic Eruption in Tonga Was So Violent, and What to Expect Next
The Kingdom of Tonga doesn’t often attract global attention, but a violent eruption of an underwater volcano on January 15 has spread shock waves, quite literally, around half the world. The volcano is usually not much to look at. It consists of two small uninhabited islands, Hunga-Ha’apai and Hunga-Tonga, poking about 100m above...
How the Earth’s Tilt Creates Short, Cold January Days
Deanna Hence, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Above the equator, winter officially begins in December. But in many areas, January is when it really takes hold. Atmospheric scientist Deanna Hence explains the weather and climate factors that combine to produce wintry conditions at the turn of the year. How does the...
Why Can’t We Throw All Our Trash Into a Volcano and Burn It Up?
Emily Johnson, US Geological Survey Curious Kids is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to curiouskidsus@theconversation.com. Why can’t we throw all our trash into a volcano and burn it up? – Georgine T. It’s true that lava is hot enough to burn...
How effective are vaccines against omicron? An epidemiologist answers 6 questions
Melissa Hawkins, American University The pandemic has brought many tricky terms and ideas from epidemiology into everyone’s lives. Two particularly complicated concepts are vaccine efficacy and effectiveness. These are not the same thing. And as time goes on and new variants like omicron emerge, they are changing, too. Melissa...
A.I. Could Boost Accuracy of Lightning Forecasts
By HANNAH HICKEY-U. WASHINGTON Lightning is one of the most destructive forces of nature, as in 2020 when it sparked the massive California Lightning Complex fires, but it remains hard to predict. Better lightning forecasts could help to prepare for potential wildfires, improve safety warnings for lightning, and create more...
Tornadoes and Climate Change: What a Warming World Means for Deadly Twisters
John Allen, Central Michigan University The deadly tornado outbreak that tore through communities from Arkansas to Illinois on the night of Dec. 10-11, 2021, was so unusual in its duration and strength, particularly for December, that a lot of people including the U.S. president are asking what role climate change might have played...
4 unexpected places where adults can learn science
Jill Zarestky, Colorado State University Modern society benefits when people understand science concepts. This knowledge helps explain how cryptocurrency works, why climate change is happening, or how the coronavirus is transmitted from person to person. Yet the average American spends less than 5% of their lifetime in classrooms...
6 priorities could deliver energy breakthroughs at the Glasgow climate summit – there’s progress on some of them already
Dolf Gielen, Colorado School of Mines and Morgan Bazilian, Colorado School of Mines Much of the news coming out of the U.N. climate conference has focused on the spectacle, and how countries’ pledges aren’t on track to prevent dangerous climate change. But behind the scenes, there is reason for hope. In many countries, the...
Tokyo Olympics: What are the limits of human performance?
Daniel Merino, The Conversation and Gemma Ware, The Conversation Are there limits to how much faster, higher, or stronger an athlete can get? In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, we talk to researchers in biomechanics, sports technology, and psychology, to find out. And we hear about what happened at the troubled 1920...
Crayola and OceanX Announce Tidal Wave Partnership
Crayola, the premier children's creativity brand, and OceanX, a leading global non-profit ocean exploration organization, are partnering to bring the wonders of the ocean to the next generation through imagination and creativity in the first collaboration of its kind for both parties. The multi-faceted relationship aligns with both...
Benjamin Franklin’s Fight Against Smallpox: Colonies Were Divided Over Inoculation, But He Championed Science to Skeptics
Mark Canada, Indiana University Kokomo and Christian Chauret, Indiana University Kokomo Exactly 300 years ago, in 1721, Benjamin Franklin and his fellow American colonists faced a deadly smallpox outbreak. Their varying responses constitute an eerily prescient object lesson for today’s world, similarly devastated by a virus and...