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Why are watermelons exploding in China?
Watermelons are bursting at the seams in farms throughout southeastern China, and no one is quite sure what’s causing it. Is it chemicals? Freak weather conditions? Or maybe it’s just time to prepare for a full-on attack of the watermelons. So far, the exploding watermelons have been localized around Danyang City in China’s Jiangsui province.…
By Alasdair Wilkins Published May 18, 2011 -
Has Fermilab really discovered an entirely new subatomic particle? And could this change the universe?
Yesterday, physicists announced the discovery of a strange anomaly, one that cannot easily be explained by our current understanding of particle physics. We examine what’s really going on here, and why we all may have missed the really exciting discovery. What’s the background for this result? The experiment in question involved Fermilab’s Tevatron collider together…
By Alasdair Wilkins Published April 7, 2011 -
The Greek engineer who invented the steam engine 2,000 years ago
Almost two millennia before the rest of humanity entered the industrial age, the Greek inventor Hero invented the steam engine, wind-powered machinery, and theories of light that couldn’t be improved for centuries. And then he invented some really crazy stuff. Scientific geniuses have to pull off a tricky balancing act before they’re even born. Great…
By Alasdair Wilkins Published January 25, 2011 -
Saturn’s moon Rhea may have a breathable atmosphere
Saturn’s icy moon Rhea has an oxygen and carbon dioxide atmosphere that is very similar to Earth’s. Even better, the carbon dioxide suggests there’s life – and that possibly humans could breathe the air. It seems oxygen is far more abundant than we ever suspected, particularly on moons that seem to be completely frozen solid.…
By Alasdair Wilkins Published November 26, 2010 -
Large Hadron Collider proves the universe was once a liquid
The world’s most powerful particle accelerator smashed together lead nuclei at the highest energies possible, creating dense sub-atomic particles that reach temperatures of over ten trillion degrees. Beyond being awesome, this achievement shows the early universe was actually a liquid. Normal matter can’t exist in any form at these sort of absurdly hot temperatures. Instead,…
By Alasdair Wilkins Published November 26, 2010 -
Have we found the universe that existed before the Big Bang?
The current cosmological consensus is that the universe began 13.7 billion years ago with the Big Bang. But a legendary physicist says he’s found the first evidence of an eternal, cyclic cosmos. The Big Bang model holds that everything that now comprises the universe was once concentrated in a single point of near-infinite density. Before…
By Alasdair Wilkins Published November 20, 2010
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