Science

A question from a curious kid quickly led a team of scientists down a research rabbit hole – one that has now culminated in fascinating new knowledge about our water-wrinkled fingertips. And there's more to this discovery than a cool piece of trivia.

Back in 2014, we heard about a so-called "salmon cannon" that safely shot spawning fish up over river-blocking obstacles such as dams. Its successor has since entered use, recently allowing herring to bypass a spillway for the first time in 80 years.

A new study published in the journal Evolution is challenging the prevailing belief that evolution is a one-way process. The findings suggest some species of fern can evolve backward, reverting to a more primitive form when the environment demands it.

In studying the conditions that emerged just after the Big Bang using the Large Hadron Collider, scientists turned lead into gold – for just fractions of a second. Not a whole lot of gold, but gold nonetheless.

A potentially destructive Soviet Venus lander that was lost in space for over half a century has reentered the Earth's atmosphere. Tracked by various space agencies and individuals, the capsule crashed on May 10 somewhere in the Indian Ocean.

If you ever travel back in time around 41,000 years ago, pack some sunscreen. New research suggests that during a cataclysmic polar reversal, our ancestors might have covered themselves in mineral-rich ochre to survive harmful solar radiation.

Given the fact that satellites orbit amongst one another at thousands of miles per hour, it's important to know exactly how fast they're going. A new device offers an improved way of doing so, and it's appropriately named the Spacecraft Speedometer.

The air at sea might be getting a bit cleaner as technology group Wärtsilä puts its Carbon Capture Solution (CCS) system on the market. The modular apparatus is claimed to capture as much as 70% of the CO2 emissions from cargo ship exhaust systems.

An alarming new report reveals that right across the country, 28 US cities are sinking, showing the kind of geologic subsidence that could impact buildings and infrastructure sooner rather than later. But, scientists say it's not yet too late to fix.

Researchers at Australia's RMIT University have devised a simple and clever contraption that could make drinking water available in disaster-stricken areas, by pulling it out of thin air.