Freshwater ecosystems have spent years under growing pressure from pollution, changing weather patterns and rising temperatures. Rivers and lakes in many parts of the world have been losing dissolved oxygen, placing fish, aquatic plants and countless smaller organisms under increasing strain. That broader pattern has often been presented as one of the more difficult environmental…
Cockroaches are already famous for surviving some of Earth’s harshest conditions, but scientists have now pushed their abilities even further. Researchers have developed remote-controlled cockroaches capable of walking underwater for up to three hours by fitting them with miniature oxygen-supplying suits. The unusual technology could one day help emergency teams search flooded buildings, inspect dangerous…
During the mid-20th century, large areas of Israel were transformed by one of the country’s most ambitious reforestation programmes. Millions of pine trees were planted to stabilise soils, combat erosion and create forests on previously open landscapes. At first, the initiative appeared to be an environmental success, with barren hillsides becoming green woodlands. However, decades…
DEEP has completed the installation of Vanguard, its pilot subsea human habitat, at Tennessee Reef in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. The system now sits 17 metres below the water’s surface following a complex marine operation, marking a significant milestone in subsea engineering and long-duration underwater research capability.The installation enables multi-day subsea missions, allowing…
Stretching from the Atlantic coast of Senegal to the shores of Djibouti on the Red Sea, Africa is undertaking one of the most ambitious environmental projects ever attempted. Known as the Great Green Wall, the initiative spans around 8,000 kilometres across the Sahel, a vast semi-arid region bordering the Sahara Desert. Its goal is far…
pc: Discover Magazine (Image Credit: Dr Stephen Chester) A tiny tooth can disappear between your fingertips without much effort. Yet some of the earliest clues to our own evolutionary story come from fossils no larger than that. In collections of ancient mammal remains from western North America, palaeontologists have spent decades piecing together fragments of…
Almost everyone has noticed it. The water at home tastes perfectly normal, yet the moment you travel to another town or country, every sip feels noticeably different. Some water seems sweet and refreshing, while others taste metallic, salty, earthy or even slightly like chlorine. This isn’t simply imagination. The flavour of drinking water is influenced…
For most space missions, the launch is the headline moment. For BepiColombo, the real milestone arrives years later. After spending nearly eight years weaving through the inner Solar System, the European-Japanese spacecraft is now approaching the point it was designed to reach from the very beginning. As reported by ESA, in November 2026, Mercury is…
In the early years of the 20th century, conservation in the United States was still taking shape as a profession rather than a philosophy. Forests were being mapped, species counted, land divided into managed zones with a confidence that nature could be organised if only enough data were gathered. Among the young men entering that…
Earth will reach its farthest point from the Sun on July 6, a yearly astronomical event known as aphelion. At around 152.1 million kilometres from the Sun, the planet will be about 5 million kilometres farther away than it is in early January. Yet, despite this greater distance, the Northern Hemisphere will remain firmly in…