Think back to the earliest memory you have. How old were you? Three, maybe 2? Younger? If it’s the latter, you’re not alone. Problem is, you’re probably imagining it. Most brain experts agree we’re not really capable of forming full, autobiographical memories until we’re a little more than 3 years old; our brains just aren’t that sophisticated yet. But a new paper published in Psy ...read more
Alexandria, known for its ancient library and a lighthouse counted among the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, just keeps on giving. The reaction to its latest gift has been bad mummy jokes online. During a construction survey, a sealed sarcophagus was found in the Egyptian city 16 feet beneath the Sidi Gaber district, according to a news release this month. The tomb is made of black granite, 9 feet long and 5 feet wide, the largest ever discovered in the city. Mortar seals the ...read more
Most of us think of coffee as a morning essential, not a cancer-causing hazard. So the nation got a jolt after a California judge made a final ruling in May that Starbucks and other coffee sellers must inform customers about carcinogenic chemicals in their brews. The ruling stemmed from a court case invoking Proposition 65, a state law that requires warnings if products or places contain certain types of hazardous chemicals. But the implications reach far beyond the Golden State. Californ ...read more
Jupiter’s family has really grown since Galileo first recorded its four largest moons in 1610. On Tuesday, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) announced the discovery of 10 new moons orbiting Jupiter. Along with two found through the same research project but announced in June 2017, this brings the roster of Jupiter’s known natural satellites to 79. One of these new moons turned out to be a bit of a rebel. Of the 12 latest moons to join Jupiter&ac ...read more
News out of Hawaii today is that we have had one first major injury event related to Kīlauea's ongoing lower East Rift Zone eruption. A tour boat sailing near the ocean entry from the Fissure 8 lava flows was struck by volcanic debris thrown by an explosion, injuring at least 23 people and tearing a hole through the roof of the boat (see below). The boat was apparently outside the 300 meter safety zone near the ocean entry (although some news reports say the b ...read more
We've become accustomed to striking imagery of wildfires captured by earth-monitoring satellites, including weather satellites stationed about 26,000 miles from the surface. That may seem amazing enough (it always does to me). But check out the image above of a plume of wildfire smoke so big and thick that it was visible to a satellite nearly a million miles away. Make sure to click on the image so see a larger version, and then click again to enlarge it. You'll see a f ...read more
Earth's interior is dark, but filled with diamonds. A study published Monday estimates the composition of deep rock layers known as cratons and concludes that they may be far more glittery than previously suspected. Parts of Earth's mantle may be up to two percent diamond by composition, far more than previously suspected. In terms of sheer mass, that works out to around a quadrillion, or thousand trillion, tons of diamond. Sparkly Science A team led by a researcher from the Univers ...read more
Last week, on Monday, July 9, Darlene Cavalier, the founder of SciStarter and Science Cheerleader and a Professor of Practice at Arizona State University, presented on a panel at a American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) event. The panel was part of a larger two-day conference hosted by ASEE for engineering communicators. The panel was moderated by Pamela Phetphongsy, Assistant Dean for Communications at the Cla ...read more
Five “Jawsâ€�-dropping projects for Shark Week  As a prelude to the Discovery Channel’s 30th year of Shark Week, SciStarter’s editors picked these five projects you can do related to sharks and their conservation. Whether it’s collecting and reporting shark egg cases or documenting sightings to track species, there are many ways to unlock your inner elasmobranchologistÂ&nb ...read more
Agriculture is thought to have been developed 11,000 years ago in the Levant, where Iraq, Israel and Jordan are today. But in recent years, archaeologists have discovered sites in the region suggesting hunter-gatherers were making use of crops thousands of years earlier. In a paper published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a team of researchers reveals that foragers in northeastern Jordan were baking bread from wild cereals more than 14 millennia ago. C ...read more