A person trying out the “Tree” virtual reality experience by the New Reality Company. Credit: James Orlando Virtual reality experiences can provide an uncanny sense of immersion that tricks participants’ brains into believing they are walking on that narrow beam high above a city or are being chased by a monster through dark halls. The New Reality Company wants to push the boundaries of virtual reality by adding real-world props and additional sensory stimuli b ...read more

If you know any flat-earth types, you might share this with them… Sometimes on a #spacewalk, you just have to take a moment to enjoy the beauty of our planet Earth. pic.twitter.com/liTnCB60c9 — Randy Bresnik (@AstroKomrade) November 27, 2017 Video shot by NASA astronaut Randy Bresnik from the International Space Station on Nov. 7, 2017 (Source: Randy Bresnik, Twitter) Sometimes, all it takes is a stunning new view of the home planet to make all the complications of every day life g ...read more

A Sri Lankan woman grinds flour by hand, similar to how prehistoric women may have. (Credit: Adam P/Shutterstock) Compared to hunting and gathering, farming can seem like pretty easy work. But the skeletons of Central European women who lived during agriculture’s earliest days would like to tell you otherwise. An analysis of prehistoric women’s upper arm bones shows they took on formidable tasks of manual labor, likely during the course of tilling, harvesting and otherwise managing ...read more

An animation of satellite images shows Mount Agung in Bali, Indonesia erupting. The images were acquired by Himawari-8, a Japanese weather satellite, between 12:00 UTC on Nov. 26th and 8:00 UTC on Nov. 27th.  (Note: When the animation page comes up, make sure to click on ‘play’ there. Source: SLIDER BY RAMMB/CIRA @ CSU) With magma boiling at its peak and swelling its body from within, Mount Agung in Bali, Indonesia has awakened from more than a half century of slumber. Agu ...read more

Each horizontal line is a snapshot of a single atom, whether its lit up or not indicates the atom’s magnetic state. (Credit: Data: J. Zhang et al.; graphic: E. Edwards) Science, especially these days, can move slowly. The days of big leaps in our understanding are mostly behind us, and the progress of scientists is typically slow, but steady. That’s why something like quantum computers, which you’ve probably heard a lot about, have been so slow to actually arrive. Adding Up Q ...read more

A partial femur collected from a cave in Tibet allegedly belonged to a yeti, the infamous cryptid also known as the abominable snowman. DNA tests showed it was from a Tibetan brown bear. (Credit Icon Films Ltd.) Researchers took another crack at hair, bone and other samples allegedly from the yeti, or abominable snowman, of the Himalayas. The analysis was the most sophisticated to date but — spoiler alert — the results won’t thrill cryptozoology fans. The study did reveal ...read more

I used to think of birds as delicate creatures, airy and carefree, with pretty feathers and pretty songs. Then I saw the film “Winged Migration” and came to understand just how gritty and daring these lovely creatures really are. The film uses bird’s-eye footage to document the treacherous treks birds across the globe make each year—over the Himalayas, across oceans, into raging storms, and through hunters’ lines-of-fire, and anyone who sees it can’t help but ...read more

(Credit: toysf400/Shutterstock) If you’ve ever spent any time at a hospital, you know what it’s like to be under constant supervision. Sensors and monitors keep track of your most basic bodily functions day and night, giving doctors and nurses to-the-second information on how you’re doing. All that supervision comes with wires and sensors taped and stuck all over a patient’s body, though, which is annoying and can throw off some readings. Now, two Cornell ...read more

Select Category Select Tag Select Archive ...read more