Every year, lightning kills around 320 million trees across the globe, not with raging wildfires but through direct strikes that often go unseen. The trees don’t always fall dramatically; many die slowly from internal damage, their trunks fried from the inside out. In dense forests, these deaths blend into the background, unnoticed by satellites or…
Teens say they are turning to AI for advice, friendship, ‘to get out of thinking’ (Image: AP) TOPEKA: No question is too small when Kayla Chege, a high school student in Kansas, is using artificial intelligence.The 15-year-old asks ChatGPT for guidance on back-to-school shopping, makeup colours, low-calorie choices at Smoothie King, plus ideas for her…
German defence innovation is taking a creepy crawly turn with cyborg cockroaches now part of the battlefield blueprint. As Europe boosts military spending in the wake of the Ukraine war, Germany is pacing its bets on start-ups and artificial intelligence to modernize its arsenal. One standout innovation? living insects turned into surveillance bots. Developed by…
A study by the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ) and Utrecht University has revealed that the North Atlantic Ocean contains approximately 27 million tons of nanoplastics — microscopic plastic particles smaller than one micrometer. These tiny plastics, invisible to the naked eye, pose serious threats not only to marine ecosystems but also to…
In March 2025, central Myanmar was struck by a powerful 7.7 magnitude earthquake—the strongest to hit the region in over a century and one of the deadliest in its modern history. What sets this seismic event apart is the capture of the fault’s sudden rupture in real time by a nearby CCTV camera, marking the…
This is an AI generated image. Used for representation purpose only. Since at least the time of the ancient Egyptians, people across the world have gazed up in awe at Betelgeuse, one of the brightest stars blazing in the night sky. Now astronomers have discovered that this red supergiant, known to many as the hunter’s…
The Trump administration is actively seeking alternatives to Elon Musk‘s SpaceX for the ambitious Golden Dome missile defence system, a project envisioned to cost around $175 billion. This shift is largely driven by a deteriorating relationship between former President Trump and Musk, culminating in a public fallout in June. While SpaceX was initially a top…
In a bizarre effort to safeguard humanity’s health for centuries to come, scientists in Switzerland are freezing human feces. No, it’s not a joke. The initiative, called the Microbiota Vault, is based at the University of Zurich and aims to preserve the rich diversity of microbes found in human guts. With more than 1,000 samples…
A new scientific study has added weight to a long-held belief that the builders of Stonehenge, the iconic 5,000-year-old monument in southern England, transported its massive stones using only human effort and rudimentary tools. By analyzing a mysterious fragment known as the Newall Boulder, archaeologists have dismissed the theory that glaciers carried these stones to…
A surprising discovery by German researchers has identified fungi capable of breaking down synthetic plastics, potentially offering a natural solution to one of the planet’s biggest environmental threats. These plastic-eating fungi, found in freshwater habitats, can survive by feeding solely on certain types of plastic. While not a cure-all, scientists believe this could be a…
