Tag Archives: ScienceAlert

A skull that was found embedded in a cave wall in Greece more than 60 years ago may finally have an identification. A new dating of the minerals that surrounded and grew over the mysterious Petralona skull places its age at 277,000 years at least – and suggesting it is a member of a primitive, extinct hominid that lived alongside …

The ambitious mission to retrieve samples from asteroid Bennu and return them to Earth is paying off. Just as scientists had hoped, the asteroid is revealing details about the early days in our Solar System. More than just a simple space rock, Bennu contains not only material from the Solar System, but material from beyond our system. Bennu follows an …

The skull of a small child who lived and died many millennia ago represents the oldest direct evidence to date of the prolonged mingling between anatomically modern humans and our closely related cousins, the Neanderthals. Clearly showing features of both groups, the skull has been dated to around 140,000 years ago; more than 100,000 years older than the only other …

There are many ways to boost brain power, from exercising more often to learning new skills. But what about boosting the actual size of your brain? According to a new study, wearing the right kind of perfume or cologne can enlarge your brain’s gray matter. Researchers from Kyoto University and the University of Tsukuba in Japan asked 28 women to …

Jupiter holds secrets at its heart that continue to puzzle scientists. The largest planet in our Solar System has what researchers call a “dilute core” – a central region that doesn’t have sharp boundaries like once expected. Instead of a distinct rocky centre surrounded by layers of gas, Jupiter’s core gradually blends into the hydrogen-rich layers above it, creating a …

Wild rabbits in Colorado have been discovered with concerning horn-like growths protruding from their heads, startling people on social media. Thankfully the condition poses no threat to humans and other animals, with recent sightings also having been reported in Minnesota and Nebraska. The bunnies’ ‘horns’ are a symptom of the Shope papilloma virus, which spreads through the bites of mosquitoes, …

Exercise is a cornerstone of good health and evidence shows it can even help prevent cancers returning following treatment. But new findings are raising an unexpected question: could very high-volume endurance training carry its own risks? At the 2025 American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting, researchers from Inova Schar Cancer Institute reported that a surprising number of dedicated marathon and …

A genetically modified pig lung transplanted into a brain-dead human patient functioned for nine days in a new achievement that reveals both the promise and significant challenges of xenotransplantation. Over the course of the experiment, the patient showed increasing signs of organ rejection before scientists at the First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University in China terminated the experiment, allowing …

Most people know they should drink more water, but our new research reveals an unexpected consequence of falling short: it could be making everyday stress significantly harder to handle. Our study, published in the Journal of Applied Physiology, found that people who drank less than 1.5 litres daily showed dramatically higher levels of cortisol – the body’s primary stress hormone …

Following a comprehensive review of the latest research on hypertension, blood pressure guidelines in the US have been updated to cut risks of heart disease and dementia later in life further than ever. The updated guidelines replace a previous revision conducted in 2017, and are a joint effort from the American Heart Association (AHA), the American College of Cardiology (ACC), …