The Case of the Magic Wine

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

I just came across a strange but quite charming scientific study claiming that human thought alone can make wine taste better. This miracle of vinomancy is reported in a paper in Explore, a unique if often credulity-stretching Elsevier academic journal dedicated to “healing arts, consciousness, spirituality, eco-environmental issues, and basic science as all these fields relate to health.” In the article in question, author Stephan A. Schwartz describes how he carried out an experi ...read more

Astronomers Find the Youngest Known Pulsar in the Milky Way

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

This composite image of Kes 75, the youngest known pulsar in the Milky Way, includes data from Chandra and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. The blue region represents the high-energy X-rays surrounding the pulsar, showing an area called the pulsar wind nebula, and the purple region shows lower-energy X-rays, emitted by debris left over from the original supernova explosion. (Credit: NASA/CXC/NCSU/S. Reynolds; Optical: PanSTARRS) Thanks to data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, a team o ...read more

Child Buried With Rock in Mouth May Have Been A 'Vampire'

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

A rock was inserted into the mouth of a 10-year-old to keep the deceased child from rising from the grave and spreading malaria, researchers believe. (Credit: David Pickel/Stanford University) Have you heard of the ‘Vampire of Lugano”? Apparently that’s what residents of the Italian commune of Lugano in Teverina are calling this strange archaeological find — the remains of a 10 year old child found in a 5th century cemetery originally thought to be reserved for tod ...read more

Using Gamma Rays, Scientists Map Out 21 New Constellations

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

The Godzilla constellation in the gamma-ray sky — a new set of constellations based off of gamma-ray emissions observed with NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. (Credit: NASA) Gamma-Ray Sky For countless years, humans have gazed up at the sky and made sense of the stars by finding shapes in them — constellations of heroes, animals, and well-worn tales. Now, to celebrate the 10th mission year of NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, scientists have used the telesco ...read more