Over 1.4 million years ago, a group of eight ancient hominins walked across a shallow mudflat, but their footprints don’t match those of Paranthropus boisei or Homo erectus

Climate campaigners are angry at reports that the UK government is set to allow oil and gas drilling projects to go ahead, but the focus must be on ending fossil fuel consumption, not production, says Michael Le Page

Astronomers have caught a supermassive black hole straying far from the centre of its galaxy using light from a star being ripped apart

As you get older, your body’s response to food changes significantly. But by making the right changes to what you eat from midlife and beyond, it might be possible to add a decade to your life 

An eye implant and a pair of high-tech glasses that enable people with a severe form of vision loss to read have been approved for use by a European regulator

An increasing number of studies have linked ultra-processed foods with depression, anxiety and even dementia. Columnist Helen Thomson explores how strong the evidence is for the brain effects of a diet full of these foods

The Deep Space Network is our best way to communicate with spacecraft beyond Earth’s orbit, and one of its three stations around the world is in the middle of a wildfire

Researchers have created a textile made from the parasitic fungus Cordyceps militaris, which is biodegradable and can be adapted for different purposes with various microbes

To understand where climate change is heading, we have to look at the planet’s distant past and appreciate the disturbing uniqueness of our situation, says Bill McGuire

In a small study, restricting calories led to greater weight loss among people with a biological age younger than their chronological age

Humans have been observing solar eclipses for millennia – carving, painting, sketching and finally photographing as the moon blocks out the disc of the sun

We tend to think of the brain as being made up of highly specialised cells, but a study in mice suggests that most neurons are generalists

When researchers found evidence of a black hole flying out of its galaxy, nobody knew how that could happen. Now we have an explanation

When it comes to supplements to stave off the effects of ageing, columnist Graham Lawton admits he is a hardened sceptic. But he finds some evidence for a few that can improve biological age as we grow older

The super El Niño now developing in the tropical Pacific has a 90 per cent chance of becoming the strongest in 150 years, breaking global temperature records and unleashing extreme weather

For the second time in a week, a long-standing conjecture has been disproved by artificial intelligence, highlighting the advanced mathematical capabilities of ChatGPT and its ilk

Haivya has developed acoustic signals designed to influence plant development, and its trials reportedly show large yield increases in soybean, pepper and cannabis crops

Mathematicians who helped unify laws of physics and cracked decades-old problems in geometry are among this year's recipients of the Fields medal

An analysis of supernovae argues that the universe’s expansion is not speeding up, so there is no need for dark energy to exist to explain it

Viscera, voids and light-gobbling Vantablack conspire to disturb and amaze in Anish Kapoor’s new exhibition, which has heavy nods to the nature of reality, science and religion

Orcas have been seen smashing into sharp-tail sunfish so hard that the fish bursts into thousands of fragments, perhaps as a form of play as well as food processing

Long overlooked, the connection between our gut microbes and brain is yielding new insights into mental health

Software that is free to use creates many opportunities – not all of which are good

Sublimation, in which a person can split into two when crossing an international border, is tip-top stuff. Don't miss it, says science-fiction columnist Emily H. Wilson

While Europe’s heatwave makes us run for shade, the intriguing In Defense of Sunlight reveals sunlight’s health-giving effects – in moderation, says David Robson

This week's cartoon from Twisteddoodles

Tom Gauld's weekly cartoon

Feedback is surprised to learn that geology is a particularly deadly speciality to pick if you're a fictional character, with a new study revealing an "alarming rate" of mortality for geologists in films

What is the optimal way to ice a cocktail: fewer big cubes or lots of small ones? And what is the smallest creature that needs to sleep, and what does this tell us about the nature of and need for sleep itself?

Readers take issue with a former answer to this question, arguing for the different behaviour of wasps and flies – and for a more defined plan of escape than has previously been posited

Preserved plant cells show that grasses were brought into Cloggs cave in Australia and burnt over many millennia, revealing the ancient origins of rituals practised by the GunaiKurnai people

On a trip along the Silk Road, columnist Annalee Newitz discovers that ancient technology can offer us a framework for our own advances. The most important drivers of technology aren’t inventions or devices, it turns out, but the people making them

Earth contains more than enough heat to power humanity many times over, but so far only a few lucky places have been able to exploit it. Now we may have a way to tap this vast clean energy source almost anywhere

For more than a decade, mathematicians have been unable to settle the question of whether the ABC conjecture has been solved. Fresh attempts to settle the debate are struggling to make headway

The Loki actor is the unlikely host for a three-episode docu-series about the Roman city. It's occasionally a little silly, but it's also entertaining and informative, says Josh Bell

Complex systems, be they living beings or fundamental particles, need to have enough structure to hang together along with unpredictability that can allow for change. Columnist Thomas Lewton explores whether this idea is simply a pattern seen across the cosmos or could be a “theory of everything”

Intermittingly inhaling a high dose of carbon dioxide seems to remove the proteins amyloid and tau, which are implicated in Alzheimer's disease, from the brain by boosting its glymphatic system

Mathematicians have been trying to prove the Jacobian conjecture for nearly a century, but now the Claude Fable 5 AI has apparently found a counterexample that disproves it

Don’t just hit the beach. Research is revealing how to have a holiday that leaves you mentally restored and refreshed – with long-lasting effect

Neither matter nor force, paraparticles would be something else entirely. Fresh hints that they exist are raising hopes that they could explain reality at its deepest level

Low cloud cover has been expanding since 1979, reflecting more sunlight into space, but scientists expect that trend to reverse and accelerate global warming

Many centuries before the advent of agriculture in Norway, ancient people transported fish into mountain lakes to create a source of food, then built wooden traps to catch them

An experiment showed AI users had the most creative ideas when they used it in moderation – not too much and not too little. Columnist David Robson puts the finding to the test, and explores what we lose when we over-rely on AI

A supplement comprised of dead bacteria seems to remove microplastics, and prevent their absorption into cells, by attracting them to the bacteria's rough surfaces

An open-source flight-control system found in consumer drones has been installed in Ukraine’s latest cruise missile, showing how cheap technology is making military hardware accessible to all

The mummified daughters of pharaohs who lived thousands of years ago have bone changes that suggest they fought with bows and daggers

Zombie, or senescent, cells accumulate in our body with age, when we become less able to clear them. But a study in mice suggests that a drug could restore this ability and improve ageing outcomes

Keith Thomas, 48, has paralysis, but brain stimulation gave him some feeling and movement in his hands – and this was maintained even when the stimulation was turned off

Astronomers have only previously found atmospheres around exoplanets that are very large or incredibly hot – but now they have found one adorning a world that may well be right for life

A new kind of antibody drug that more efficiently enters the brain could slow the progression of Alzheimer's disease with a much lower risk of dangerous side effects than existing therapies

A drone that spins 25 times a second can avoid being spotted by becoming nothing more than a vague blur – though the creators admit that it can still be easily heard

The 2026 Tour de France has been the hottest ever. Norwegian-method pioneer and Uno-X Mobility coach Olav Aleksander Bu reveals how Nordic athletes have been learning to beat the heat

In this New Scientist CoLab podcast, experts from global life sciences leader Cytiva explain the hidden, high-stakes science of purification that is required to close the gap between drug discovery and the pharmacy shelf.

Low levels of replicating Epstein-Barr viruses might be the main driver of the autoimmune condition multiple sclerosis. This may mean that targeting them would be as effective as suppressing the immune system, with fewer side effects

A black colobus monkey from a remote part of the Congo Basin rainforest, known locally as likweli, is thought to be severely threatened by poaching

The impact of high humidity on top of high temperatures is often underappreciated, but most of us aren't prepared for such extreme conditions, which will become more common with global warming

This week's cartoon from Twisteddoodles

Tom Gauld's weekly cartoon

Feedback has been spending far too much time reading the latest output of entirely made-up research studies from the Journal of Imaginary Research

Why don’t dogs look up when a low-flying plane or helicopter passes overhead? I’ve never seen one do this. And what changes will occur on Earth as the moon moves further away from us?

Cutting back on our use of energy and materials so that we live within Earth’s means can seem like an insurmountable challenge. But after a decade grappling with these problems, a historic Portuguese city is beginning to walk this tightrope

Marine bristle worms have jaws made from a mix of proteins and metal ions that may constitute a whole new kind of material, with possible applications in engineering

In some parts of the world, the probability of rain rises with every day it doesn’t rain, and communities in these places are more likely to carry out rain-making rituals

Powerful artificial intelligence models built by Chinese companies have gone from inducing widespread panic to being met with a shrug of the shoulders – what changed?

When considering what makes up a human body, a physicist drills down beyond the atomic level. Columnist Chanda Prescod-Weinstein explores the not-exactly-real particles that allow the stuff we’re made of to hang together

Hieroglyphs on the wall of a Maya building record calculations concerning the orbits of Earth, Mars and Venus, as well as the name of a mathematician who wrote the text around 1200 years ago

Artistic representations of ancient humans often show large men with bulging muscles – but our ancestors were actually smaller than us, in both height and body mass. Columnist Michael Marshall reveals surprising details about the short kings of prehistory

Researchers have long suspected early life may have been helped by sugars brought to Earth by asteroids – now a sugar found in raspberries has been spotted in a cosmic cloud nearly 27 light years away

Sustained heat stress is bad for our health and can be deadly. But we’re discovering that heat therapies like sauna, when used in the right way, have surprisingly wide-reaching benefits for health

Two types of jet stream patterns seem to be causing persistent heat domes over Europe, with big questions for the future

A list of global space launches designed to calm cold war tensions and promote transparency has been missing from the UN's website for months

Climate change is already having a big impact on crop yields, and the subsequent financial losses will continue to rise as the world keeps warming

A list of global space launches designed to calm cold war tensions and promote transparency has been missing from the UN's website for months

Climate change is already having a big impact on crop yields, and the subsequent financial losses will continue to rise as the world keeps warming

At an event in London, mathematicians have made unexpectedly fast progress on formalising Fermat's last theorem using AI

At an event in London, mathematicians have made unexpectedly fast progress on formalising Fermat's last theorem using AI

How can you have a proof without proving anything? Mathematicians found a way and, in the process, came to blows over it – but 100 years on, this trick is a common part of modern maths, says columnist Jacob Aron

How can you have a proof without proving anything? Mathematicians found a way and, in the process, came to blows over it – but 100 years on, this trick is a common part of modern maths, says columnist Jacob Aron

During the August 2026 solar eclipse, scientists will be rushing to gather data on the sun, but even if you aren't a professional scientist, you can still help the research

During the August 2026 solar eclipse, scientists will be rushing to gather data on the sun, but even if you aren't a professional scientist, you can still help the research

An experiment with a charged molecule of bismuth and carbon reveals how effects from Albert Einstein’s special relativity reshape the standard understanding of chemical bonds

An experiment with a charged molecule of bismuth and carbon reveals how effects from Albert Einstein’s special relativity reshape the standard understanding of chemical bonds

Perfusing donor human retinas with blood and oxygen meant they continued to respond to light for up to 10 hours after death, marking a significant step towards eye transplants that restore vision

Perfusing donor human retinas with blood and oxygen meant they continued to respond to light for up to 10 hours after death, marking a significant step towards eye transplants that restore vision

The laws of physics that concern heat and work could gain a firmer mathematical footing thanks to “gauge theory”, which already helps us understand quantum fields

The laws of physics that concern heat and work could gain a firmer mathematical footing thanks to “gauge theory”, which already helps us understand quantum fields

Egg cells missing a key protein may be more likely to end up with the wrong number of chromosomes, but an mRNA injection that helps the cells make the protein reduces the problem

Egg cells missing a key protein may be more likely to end up with the wrong number of chromosomes, but an mRNA injection that helps the cells make the protein reduces the problem

Fossils of Spriggina floundersi provide the earliest evidence of animals favouring one side of the body over the other – a feature of nervous systems that we see in our own right- and left-handedness

Fossils of Spriggina floundersi provide the earliest evidence of animals favouring one side of the body over the other – a feature of nervous systems that we see in our own right- and left-handedness

A modelling study suggests marine cloud brightening could shade the eastern Pacific and reduce a global temperature spike from El Niño, but there could be unexpected consequences

Homer still matters, argues Adam Nicolson in The Mighty Dead, a great primer to Christopher Nolan's new adaptation of the Odyssey, says Kelsey Hayes

Feedback is delighted by a study of how many animals produce poop that echoes the look of the poop emoji – even the lugworm, which does it upside down

The first six months of 2026 have seen bright threads in sci- fi series including Fallout and Paradise. But for pure gold, advises TV columnist Bethan Ackerley, try Star City

From AI with Hannah Fry to David Attenborough's early days, these are the five must-watch science documentaries of the year to date, says Bethan Ackerley

Dads are often overlooked when it comes to parenting science. Darby Saxbe's fascinating new book Dad Brain is out to change that, says Olivia Goldhill

A drug that softens the ovaries helped mice and rats conceive more easily at an older age, and produce more pups

Seeking out the simplest, most elegant explanations has served scientists well for centuries, but cognitive scientist Marina Dubova’s experiments are revealing better ways to uncover reality

Pioneer of quantum mechanics Erwin Schrödinger's look at living organisms is one of the most influential popular-science books of the 20th century. So how does it hold up today, asks Karmela Padavic-Callaghan