The first 18 satellites of a planned Chinese mega constellation are brighter than all but 500 stars in the sky, raising fears of a huge impact on astronomy
A monkey that performed poorly on vision tests did much better after having a stem cell transplant to patch up holes in its retina
A computer simulation suggests that some collisions between exotic, hypothetical stars would make space-time ripple with detectable waves
A traditional yogurt-making practice from south-eastern Europe uses live ants as a starter, with the insects providing the bacteria and acid needed to initiate fermentation
The epilepsy medication sodium valproate is linked to developmental problems in fetuses, but lab studies may now have found a way to prevent this
AI chatbots from Google and Microsoft sometimes parrot disinformation when answering questions about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – but their performance depends on language and changes over ...
Machines are fighting machines on the Ukrainian battlefield, as a technological arms race has given birth to a new way to wage war
Google DeepMind claims its AlphaChip AI method can deliver “superhuman” chip designs that are already used in its data centres – but independent experts say public proof is lacking
A young boy who lived towards the end of the last glacial period had dark skin, blue eyes and a congenital heart condition, a study of his genome reveals
Musing on John Lewis-Stempel's latest book, England: A natural history, James McConnachie marks the flowering of other, more diverse voices in nature writing
Smartphones have indeed created an "anxious generation", but it isn't young people, it is their parents, argues neuroscientist Dean Burnett
Feedback is pleased to find that researchers are finally exploring if skin redness is a good indication of "the affective state of hens"
Techno-Orientalism is a strand of futurism that condemns and erases Asian cultural power. We need to eradicate it, says Annalee Newitz
Andrew McConnell's otherworldly photograph captures a Russian cosmonaut in front of the just-landed Soyuz MS spacecraft in Kazakhstan's remote grasslands
With just one week to go until the world's greatest festival of ideas and discoveries, New Scientist editor Catherine de Lange reveals what you can expect from the show this year
If artificial intelligence chatbots are fine-tuned to improve their responses using human feedback, they can become more likely to give deceptive answers that seem right but aren’t
Confidence in politics is falling around the world. Can scientific insights help us create a fairer, smarter foundation for government?
Captive dolphins are more likely to make an open-mouthed expression when their playmate can see them and they often reciprocate, hinting that it is a form of visual communication
The compound creatine, a popular exercise supplement that only occurs naturally in animal products, could one day be produced in edible plants
People report greater life satisfaction six months after starting Parkrun events, which could partly be due to the supportive environment
Cracks running through samples of asteroid Ryugu were probably formed by the repeated thawing and freezing of water inside it, which could have helped asteroids like this carry the building block...
Understanding the “effort paradox” can help you reshape your relationship to exertion so that you commit to those hard but truly meaningful activities
Time travel from Alan Moore and Pride and Prejudice in space? There's plenty on offer for science fiction fans this October
Astronomers have detected an exoplanet around Barnard’s star, one of the sun’s closest neighbours, but it is too hot for liquid water or life
Unravelling the complex biological process that allows fish to regrow injured fins could help advance regenerative medicine in humans
Fishers in Albania caught a blue shark with an 18-centimetre fragment of swordfish bill embedded in its skull, in the first known case of a shark surviving such an injury
Google, Microsoft and others have taken big steps towards error-free devices, hinting that quantum computers that solve real problems aren’t far away
Plankton that lived during the last glacial maximum have helped confirm the accuracy of our climate models – suggesting the predictions those models make about future El Niño events are accura...
Coral reefs around the world are at risk of collapse due to rising temperatures and acidifying oceans, but the natural adaptability of some species may help buy time
Rapid erosion caused by a geological act of “piracy” tens of thousands of years ago may have raised Earth’s crust and elevated Mount Everest by as much as 50 metres
How did the supermassive black holes we’re now seeing in the early universe get so big so fast? Astrophysicist Sophie Koudmani is using sophisticated galaxy simulations to figure it out
A beam of radioactive carbon ions has been used to destroy cancer cells in mice, demonstrating a therapy that may cause less collateral damage than current techniques
Mosquito larvae die after consuming hemp leaves because they react strongly to the cannabidiol in the foliage. The discovery might lead to the development of a new pesticide to control mosquito n...
Our immune cells change a lot as the decades progress, which could explain why we become more susceptible to certain conditions
A US standards agency has issued new guidance saying organisations shouldn’t require users to change their passwords periodically – advice that is backed up by decades of research
Bacteria that have been genetically engineered to work like computers can solve a range of problems, using a very simple type of artificial intelligence
An AI-assisted analysis of satellite images suggests the vapour trails produced by aircraft have a net cooling effect in the daytime because they reflect sunlight back into space
Voice assistants can build profiles of their users’ habits and preferences, but the consistency and accuracy of these profiles vary
Astronomers listened for radio signals emanating from planets in the TRAPPIST-1 system, but found no evidence of any interplanetary communications
Northern sea robins are formidable marine hunters, and they owe their success to modified fin rays that let them find prey buried in the seabed
For an undercover operative, Sadie Smith takes unnecessary risks as she infiltrates an eco-activist group. Why? And where do the Neanderthals fit into Creation Lake, Rachel Kushner's Booker-short...
It has become trivially easy to use artificial intelligence to edit images or generate video to remove unwanted objects or beautify scenes, but doing so leads to people misremembering what they h...
Replacing some existing vegetable oil crops with camellia oil could boost production while reducing environmental impacts such as greenhouse gas emissions
A distant planet should have been consumed when its star expanded to become a red giant, perhaps offering insights into planetary migration
A flurry of studies has found microplastics in nearly every organ in the human body, from the brain to the testicles. But very few have revealed whether these tiny bits of plastic impact our heal...
DNA and genealogical evidence reveal, for the first time, the identity of cannibalised remains recovered from the Franklin expedition
It seems to be more energy efficient for emus to keep one foot on the ground when running at a moderate pace, and the same may have been true for dinosaurs
These dazzling images taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope are from the upcoming book Cosmos: Explore the wonders of the universe, which has a foreword by astrophysicist Becky Smethurst
What if tech bros ruled the world, asks Asif Kapadia's 2073. This docudrama is captivating and disturbing, but lacks enough heft to stand out
Fear of maths has been around for at least a century. Here are some ways to overcome it, says Sarah Hart, professor emerita of mathematics at Birkbeck, University of London
Bake Off finalist and chemical biologist Josh Smalley shares his recipe for the perfect caramel sauce with Catherine de Lange
Feedback explores the painstaking science of hair-pulling, and learns that experts have discovered that its effects can range from "hot-burning" to "aching"
There has been plenty of controversy over GM crops, but if deployed well they could have a positive environmental impact, says Graham Lawton
There can be no victory in a war against nature, says Sunil Amrith in The Burning Earth, a must-read history of our environmental crisis
If we want to preserve the dwindling ice in the Arctic, cutting our emissions is no longer enough – we also need to use geoengineering to refreeze this precious ecosystem
Tree ring data reveals the impact a fluctuating jet stream has had on Europe for 700 years – and sheds light on future risks amid our warming planet
Though it was first predicted in the 1930s, chemists have just now managed to create a covalent bond that only uses one electron
Using more training data and computational power is meant to make AIs more reliable, but tests suggest large language models actually get less reliable as they grow
DNA and protein analysis has identified a white substance smeared on mummies in China as a kind of kefir cheese, made from cow and goat milk
Neuroscientists have been surprised to discover that the human brain is teeming with microbes, and we are beginning to suspect they could play a role in neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer...
Smart TVs from Samsung and LG monitor what you are watching even when you are using the screens to display a feed from a connected laptop or video game console
Dopamine was long thought to play a part in the placebo effect for pain relief, but a new study is questioning its true role
In most vertebrates, a pattern of chemical marks on the genome is a reliable indicator of age, but in axolotls this clock seems to stop after the first four years of life
New research is revealing that common sense is a lot more idiosyncratic than we thought, with important implications for tackling political polarisation and the future of AI
High-temperature superconducting cables that could transform the power grid may be increasingly viable, thanks to a side effect of fusion energy research and new ways to cool the wires
Archaeologists have used AI to discover hundreds of large-scale drawings depicting figures like llamas, decapitated human heads and killer whales armed with knives
Interacting with animals seems to provide emotional support to young people with a serious illness, even when the contact is via letters and not face to face
An octopus will work with several different species of fish to find and catch prey - and punch those that aren't helping
Astronomer Jo Dunkley is planning to use the Simons Observatory to snare evidence for inflation, the theory that the universe expanded at incredible speed after its birth
Ancient DNA extracted from layers of sediment in a Czech forest shows how a drop in biodiversity coincided with a shift to pig herding about 4000 years ago
Field trials indicate that pumping seawater onto the snow on top of Arctic sea ice can make the ice thicker, offering a possible way to preserve sea ice throughout the summer
CAPTCHA tests are supposed to distinguish humans from bots, but an AI system mastered the problem after training on thousands of images of road scenes
A new covid-19 variant called XEC may spread more easily than past variants, but current vaccines are still effective against it
A sprawling research program aims to improve hurricane forecasts by collecting data at the chaotic interface of ocean and atmosphere
Forest loss is thought to have played a part in record low rainfall across South America this year, in a sign that environmental destruction is accelerating climate collapse
Medically evacuating an astronaut from space is difficult and expensive, and a new model predicts that one in three long-duration moon missions may require it
Here’s what members of the New Scientist editorial team are keenest to catch at the world’s greatest festival of ideas and discovery, which runs from 12 to 13 October
As a six-year investigation into the Thwaites glacier in Antarctica wraps up, the scientists involved are pessimistic for the future of this glacier and the consequences for sea level rise
Genetic analysis shows that microbes growing inside the International Space Station have adaptations for radiation and low gravity, and may pose a threat to astronauts
Making hydrogen from seawater can be tricky because the salt is corrosive and the process can create toxic chlorine gas – new electrodes can split ocean water to make the clean fuel more easily
Nearly imperceptible quantum flickers used to limit how precisely we could detect the way space-time ripples, but squeezing the laser light used in detectors overcomes this and doubles the number...
The average surface temperature varied more widely and was even hotter than previously thought during much of the past 500 million years, according to the most rigorous study so far
Genetic testing on samples collected during the earliest days of the covid-19 outbreak suggests it is likely that the virus spread from animals to humans at the Huanan seafood market
A meta-analysis of 137 clinical trials finds triptan drugs are among the most effective for treating migraines, while newer ditan and gepant drugs were rated less highly
African giant pouched rats proved adept at detecting four commonly trafficked products derived from endangered species including rhino horn and elephant ivory
Particles of light can spend "negative time" passing through a cloud of extremely cold atoms – without breaking the laws of physics
Geographer Alastair Bonnett on his pick of the most diverse maps, from a collection of 100,000 galaxies to a 12th-century Chinese depiction of rivers on a grid
Our gardening columnist James Wong isn’t convinced, and does the maths to get some answers
Modern life disrupts the circadian rhythms controlling our biology – increasing our risk of developing conditions ranging from diabetes to dementia. Lynne Peeples's new book The Inner Clock exp...
A recent atomic physics workshop was outside my dark matter comfort zone, but learning about science beyond my usual boundaries was invigorating, says Chanda Prescod-Weinstein
We're trying to avert Judgment Day yet again – this time in an anime series for Netflix. But striking visuals can't make up for shortcomings in narrative and character development
Simple words like "force" and "particle" can mislead us as to what reality is actually like. Physicist Matt Strassler unpacks how to see things more clearly
A quantum computing protocol makes it possible to extract energy from seemingly empty space, teleport it to a new location, then store it for later use
Snoring is often viewed as harmless, at least to the snorer, but we are now uncovering its potentially serious effects on cardiovascular health. And finding ways to stop is surprisingly challengi...
Artificial intelligence has more in common with ants than humans, says Neil Lawrence. Only by taking a more nuanced view of intelligence can we see how machines will truly transform society
We're finally pinning down the mechanisms that drive obsessive-compulsive disorder, revealing a complex combination of imbalanced brain networks, the immune system and even gut microbes
The latest research on caffeine reveals why coffee and decaf can be so good for your health, but energy drinks can be lethal
A better understanding of what happens to our bodies when we get fitter can unlock ways to speed up the journey – and it might be simpler than you think
Male pattern baldness could soon be a thing of the past, with new hair loss treatments beginning to show tantalising results
A new diet based on research into the body's ageing process suggests you can increase your life expectancy by up to 20 years by changing what, when and how much you eat