A comet is a magical sight in the heavens. Comets visible to the naked eye are a uncommon event, and sometimes they put up very suggestive shows in our skies. Those of us who have witnessed the…

Giving it a go... EPA By Angelo Niko Grubišić, University of Southampton SpaceX is attempting a huge feat in spacecraft engineering. It is seeking to land the first stage of its Falcon 9-R rocket on…

In many species of plants and animals, individuals from the same population often come in different color variants. It's always been that way but why one color doesn't eventually replace the others…

Can your online avatar say something about your personality that you haven't carefully chosen to be your public representation? It might say that some people are cats, or, since 85 percent of the…

After a wildfire burns a large swath across timberlands, logging companies come in to do salvage logging - they clean up the timber that has not been completely destroyed by the fire. It's a good…

As World War II ended and the Holocaust became shockingly more real than the rumor or propaganda some believed it was, people wondered how it could happen. Why, somewhere along the way, did not…

The gas giant Jupiter safeguards many secrets crucial to our understanding of the evolution of our solar system. It could also provide insights on how giant planets form and the role these titans…

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infection has gotten a lot of attention. It is caused by a strain of staph bacteria that's become resistant to the antibiotics commonly used to…

Nothing justifies the killing of people for expressing ideas no matter how repugnant one finds them. However, these things don't happen in a vacuum. These things are not simply the fault of the…

An affordable vaccine that has all but rid the 'meningitis belt' of a major cause of deadly epidemics is now going to be available for infants all across sub-Saharan Africa.  One of the most…

Academic wizardry. Shutterstock By Nick Butler, Lund University and Sverre Spoelstra, Lund University When McDonald’s came under sustained criticism from campaigners in the 1980s, the company…

Northern Europeans pride themselves on being tougher than the rest of Europe when it comes to enduring weather. While most people are more likely to die in bad weather, a new paper finds that…

A paper in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine links circumcision in boys to autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The results were drawn from part a cohort of all children born in Denmark…

Hypertension - high blood pressure - affects up to 80 million people in the United States and cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death so lowering blood pressure has the potential to save…

Can cancer biopsies spread more cancer? Some patients, and a few doctors think so.  Fine needle aspiration is a minimally invasive technique that uses a thin and hollow needle to extract a few…

Hydrogen fuel cells may be the best option for powering zero-emission vehicles, Toyota will make them available in the United States in 2015, but those fuel cells require an electrocatalyst -- a…

The terrorist attack of two days ago in Paris to the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo left most of us hit hard by the blow to freedom of the press and freedom of thought, which are among that core…

Social attitudes are reinforcing the negative beliefs towards people who self harm, according to an analysis of the life stories of people who self-harm and who were also diagnosed with a…

Making sure school-aged kids get to sleep at a regular hour is often a struggle for parents but it’s well worth the effort. The researchers behind a new paper say that a good night’s sleep is linked…

Yesterday (8th) I took this photograph of Venus and Mercury from the grounds of Reading University. In the photograph, Mercury is about two moon-breadths down and to the right of Venus. …