Feed aggregator

Ramses II (1303–1213 BCE), aka Ramses the Great, is easily one of ancient Egyptian history’s most recognizable rulers. While he isn’t the pharaoh cited in the biblical story of Exodus (a common misconception), Ramses II remained a certifiably powerful and accomplished king who oversaw Egypt’s New Kingdom for roughly 66 years at the height of its influence and grandeur.

This pharaoh wanted everyone to know it, too. Ramses II was responsible for many massive architectural projects across the kingdom, including sprawling temple complexes and extensive gold mining operations. These endeavors also included towering monuments carved in his image. In the eastern Nile Delta, archaeologists recently discovered the top portion of yet another statue of his highness. 

The sculpture section is now stored in a secure facility for further examination. Credit: Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities

Located at the ancient site of Imet now known as Tel Faraoun, the sculpture’s proportions are in keeping with Ramses II’s sense of grandeur. According to the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, the upper half is 7.2-feet-tall and weighs between five and six tons. To guard against further damage, Egyptologists quickly relocated the statue fragment to a nearby storage facility, where they will analyze and restore the artifact for potential public display.

The over 3,000-year-old statement piece is in comparatively rough condition today, but archaeologists believe its surviving artistic details almost certainly tie it to Ramses II. Despite its size, experts also say the statue wasn’t crafted by nearby artisans. Instead, it was likely made in Pi-Ramsesse, the Egyptian capital established by the pharaoh himself, before workers transported it roughly 15 miles north to Imet.

The statue was likely crafted elsewhere before being transported to the site. Credit: Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities

But despite the statue’s enormity, researchers suspect it was once part of an even larger installation. Many similar archaeological sites have included immense sculpture projects called triads, which depict a ruler between a pair of deities to confer divine authority and safekeeping. 

Regardless of religious favor, life was apparently kind to Ramses II. Historical records indicate that by the time of his death in 1213 BCE, the pharaoh was 90 years old and father to somewhere between 88 and103 children.

The post Archaeologists discover 7-foot-tall statue of legendary Egyptian pharaoh appeared first on Popular Science.

The sun is an incomprehensibly gigantic, constantly roiling nuclear furnace—but some days are even busier than others. Based on data collected by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory, our solar system’s central star recently fired off not one, but two impressive X-class flares within hours of each other. The sun emitted an initial X2.4 solar flare at 9:07 p.m. EDT on April 23, followed by an X2.5 sibling of extremely hot, charged energy at 4:13 a.m. EDT the next morning. But while the X-class designation signifies the most intense tier of events, the latest pair pale in comparison to some of the most powerful on record.

Solar flares are as inevitable as they are powerful. While the sun’s baseline may seem chaotic to us, astronomers know that the yellow star follows a relatively predictable, 11-year cycle of electromagnetic fluctuation. These timelines switch between apex and nadir phases known as the solar maximum and minimum. In October 2024, NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Space Weather Prediction Center confirmed that the sun had entered its most recent, roughly year-long solar maximum. Although it’s now firmly out of that phase, the sun still produces regular flares across its surface.

How solar activity affects Earth depends on a range of factors, including an emission’s strength and its direction. Direct encounters can affect the planet’s magnetosphere, generating colorful auroras, while also disrupting radio communication, GPS, satellite operations, and energy grids. Other times, we may barely even notice when a flare happens. 

Flare strength is classified in ascending tiers, with each subsequent level denoting at least a tenfold increase in power. A-class events are the weakest, followed by the B, C, M, and X-class.

Although the recent X2.4 and X2.5 flares were strong enough to cause temporary radio blackouts over portions of the Pacific Ocean, Australia, and East Asia, they don’t even rank in the top 50 strongest examples on record. The most powerful solar flare ever observed took place on November 4, 2003. The massive flare was rated at least X40, if not higher. The associated coronal mass ejection erupted into space at a speed of over 2.6 million miles per hour, causing massive energy grid and communications disruptions.

The post The sun just fired off two massive solar flares appeared first on Popular Science.

Tesla financial and operations numbers like free cash flow and margin were growing. Those were good things. They beat on earnings and other forecasted metrics. However, the discussion about higher capital expenditures spooked Wall Street. There was also not a hard core locked in timeline for scaled unsupervised robotaxi. The growth in FSD and the ...

Read more

The brain of a honeybee (Apis mellifera) weighs less than one milligram and contains fewer than one million neurons, but that may be more than enough for surprisingly complex calculations. For decades, cognitive researchers and biologists have debated just how much the seemingly simple insects can comprehend. The answer may sound inconsequential, but it has major implications for how intelligence functions and evolves across species. Now, a team at Monash University in Australia says they have a definitive answer about bee smarts: Earth’s vital pollinators are pretty good at counting.

Previous work has indicated that bees understand addition, subtraction, and even the concept of zero. While skeptics countered with the theory that the insects are solely reacting to visual cues, some biological scientists including Scarlett Howard remained confident in their assessment.

“It can be challenging to put ourselves in the mind of a bee to imagine how they see the world, but trying to see the world through an animal’s eyes is an essential part of our work,” Howard said in a statement. “The bees always surprise us with how they move through the world, interpret our questions, and make decisions.”

To investigate the honeybee’s environmental comprehension, Howard’s team reviewed stimulus queues—in this case, increasing the varieties and quantities of black shapes on a surface—but with an added twist. They also included a blank surface to represent “zero” in their experiments.Using reward-based incentives, they then analyzed how well honeybees learned to comprehend and associate number frequency with shapes and numbers based on visual capabilities.

According to the team’s study recently published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, they eliminated the theory that honeybee choices are only influenced by low-level perceptual hints.

“This finding strongly suggests that bees were engaging in abstract numerical reasoning rather than relying on spatial frequency alone—something that a purely associative, frequency-based mechanism cannot explain,” the study’s authors wrote.

University of Trento neuroscientist and collaborator Mirko Zanon added, “Our results show that [previous] criticism doesn’t hold when you consider the biology of the animal.”

Outside of a laboratory setting, these cognitive skills may translate to a honeybee’s ability to count flower petals to determine and remember which plants are the most nourishing. The findings also may help improve artificial intelligence modelling, showing that in some cases, “less is more” when it comes to computational needs. Regardless, the team’s discoveries underscore the importance of appreciating nature’s wide, often surprising range of cognition.

“We see and experience the world quite differently from animals, so we must be careful of centering human perspectives and senses when studying animal intelligence,” said Howard.

The post Honeybees understand basic math appeared first on Popular Science.

Deepseek v4 is out now, about expected, close to frontier behind about 3-6 months maybe. The big thing is price, its 1.74 per million tokens in and 3.48 per million tokens out. The output tokens are like up to 10x cheaper than the frontier. If you accept gpt 5.2 or gemini 3 performance they will ...

Read more

Just a few weeks ago, I had a long-haul flight to Europe from the East Coast. As I packed and prepared, excited about what was planned, I also wondered and worried: How the heck was I going to sleep on this eight-hour flight, so I wasn’t sleepwalking through sightseeing the next day?

It’s a conundrum many of us have faced. There are TikTok videos, articles, products, and advice galore about how to meet the challenge. But what exactly does the science say? What’s the best way to sleep on a plane?  

Popular Science went to the experts. Here’s why it’s so difficult to get sleep on a plane, and how to set yourself up for the best chance of getting some shut eye up in the air.

Why it’s so hard to sleep on planes 

Nearly every environmental cue is working against us on planes, making it near impossible to get to sleep. The human body evolved to sleep in dark and quiet spaces, explains clinical psychologist and sleep scientist Dr. Joseph Dzierzewski, senior vice president of research and scientific affairs at the National Sleep Foundation.

A circadian rhythm—our body’s internal clock—guides us. It helps regulate our cycles of sleep and wakefulness and is largely set by our exposure to the sun, he says. 

Inside an airplane, we get the opposite. Not only are we sitting upright—or only slightly reclined in smaller and smaller airplane seats—but light and noise are unpredictable and largely outside our control on a flight. A seatmate may decide to turn on their reading light all night—or the guy in the row behind you keeps calling the flight attendants for one more cup of water. 

Cabin conditions and timing add to the challenge. The air on planes is dry, which can contribute to dehydration, and long-haul flight schedules often don’t line up with our normal sleep window. 

And, when we attempt to force sleep at the wrong time for our body clock, we can get frustrated and anxious, Dzierzewski says. That can lead to a kind of performance anxiety about sleep itself that only makes it harder to drift off as we start worrying about being too tired for the next day’s business meeting or sightseeing excursion. 

Airplane seats have been getting steadily smaller since the 1970s. Image: Jon Hicks / Getty Images Jon Hicks

Even that much-touted in-flight drink can backfire. Alcohol contributes to dehydration and can also mean more overnight bathroom trips, sleep and health experts say.

Beware of TikTok advice

It’s also important to be cautious of advice from TikTok or Instagram influencers without a background in sleep science and plane safety. 

“Just because we all sleep does not make everyone a sleep expert,” Dzierzewski says. “Sleep is a science. You should want to consume sleep information from people with advanced degrees who are credible, trustworthy, independent, and perhaps not mainstream influencers.” 

Viral TikTok travel hack is actually a really bad idea

For instance, a viral TikTok travel hack claims to help you get better shut-eye in the air with a sleep position best suited for a contortionist. In the videos, travelers put their knees up against their chest and strap the seatbelt around their ankles or legs to keep them in place, which they claim allows them to rest more easily.

Don’t do it, say doctors and experts. Strapping the seatbelt around your legs poses serious safety risks if you encounter turbulence or another emergency while in the air. The posture could also set you up for a potentially fatal blood clot.

Don’t do this. Video: Wrap the seatbelt around your legs, @ZoreTomek

The position impedes blood in the veins in your lower extremities from getting back to your heart, says Dr. Marc J. Kahn, chief of hematology at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, who spoke with Popular Science.

That creates stasis, or sluggish, pooled blood, which increases your risk for a blood clot in an environment that’s already conducive to clotting, Kahn says. When you sit for long periods, blood flow in the legs slows down.

How to actually sleep on a plane

Unfortunately, there is no single miracle hack to ensure you get a few hours of sleep on a plane, especially for those of us confined to seats that don’t convert into beds—something I experienced firsthand on my own red-eye flight to Europe. But, experts say, there are some practical strategies to improve your odds of getting some sleep on a plane. 

Control light and noise 

You can’t control what your seatmate—or the guy behind you—does when the cabin lights dim, but you can take some control of your personal environment. Pack an eye mask to create darkness, and earplugs or noise-canceling headphones to blunt the roar of engines or the endless chatter of the person in front of you. Some travelers love a neck pillow, but it’s not for everyone. 

Related 'Ask Us Anything' Stories

The best sleep position, according to science

Why are airline seats so small? It all started in 1978.

White noise vs brown noise: What’s the best sound for sleeping?

How do airplane toilets work?

Is it better to be a morning person or a night owl? What the science says.

Is turbulence really like Jell-O? Pilots weigh in.

“You want to create a more welcoming environment for yourself when you’re on the plane as much as possible,” says Erin Clifford, a licensed professional counselor, who works with professionals about maintaining wellness routines while traveling, and author of Wellness Reimagined. 

“When we zone everyone around us out, it can help a little bit with our sleep.”

Prepare before you board 

Good in-flight sleep starts on the ground, Clifford says. Before a long flight, avoid heavy meals and caffeine and stay hydrated. Some travelers may benefit from carefully timed melatonin, a sleep-promoting hormone, under medical guidance, or apps that gradually shift sleep schedules toward the destination time zone. 

To wear yourself out—don’t skip your workout that day, Clifford says. “When we exert ourselves, it makes us want to sleep more.” 

Create a familiar, soothing routine

To work with your body clock, replicate home sleep cues in the air. Wear comfortable clothing and swap your screen for a book, podcast, or audiobook as “lights out” approaches, experts recommend. Tune into a white noise app through your headphones or slather on some favorite lotion if that’s something you do at home.

“If you’re a person who always does A, B, and C before bed, and you have a night flight and you want to try to sleep on this flight, if you can translate any of those behaviors or activities to the plane, go for it,” Dzierzewski says. “It’ll help serve as a cue that this is a safe place and it’s time for me to prepare for bed.” 

Maybe the secret to sleeping on a plane is just being exhausted. Image: SolStock / Getty Images SolStock Adjust your expectations

Even with perfect preparation, be realistic. Few people get a great night’s sleep on an airplane. Control what you can, and accept that some variables—from chatty seatmates to turbulence—will always be out of your control.

“Effort is the enemy of sleep,” Dzierzewski says. “The harder you try to do it, the more arousing you become, the more anxiety, the more frustrated, and all those emotions are incompatible with sleep.” 

Exhausted enough

During my overnight flight to Frankfurt, I did what the sleep and travel experts I’d interviewed recommended. The screen on the back of my seat froze—mid-movie—so I ended my screen time early for the evening. I donned an eye mask and earplugs and tried to get cozy with the airplane-provided blanket and pillow. Earlier in the day, I made sure to make time for my usual exercise routine and walked up and down the terminal for an hour before we boarded. 

Sleep came, but fitfully and sporadically. Later that morning, on my two-hour connecting flight, however, something different happened. Without all those extras, my eyes barely stayed open for takeoff. I slept for nearly the entire flight. Not even the noise of the drink and snack service jostled me awake. My eyes opened as we landed and, ultimately, the first day of my long-awaited vacation was everything I hoped it would be. 

So, perhaps, the moral of the story is this: Sometimes, to sleep on a plane, you just need to be exhausted enough. 

In Ask Us Anything, Popular Science answers your most outlandish, mind-burning questions, from the everyday things you’ve always wondered to the bizarre things you never thought to ask. Have something you’ve always wanted to know? Ask us.

The post The best way to sleep on a plane, according to science appeared first on Popular Science.

China is $8.4 billion in credit lines + state-backed plans targeting gigawatt-scale AI compute in space by 2035. China’s orbital AI data center push, led by startup Orbital Chenguang (Beijing Orbital Twilight Technology Co., Ltd.) with massive state-aligned backing, represents an ambitious, hybrid public-private effort to sidestep terrestrial constraints on AI scaling. The goal is ...

Read more

SpaceX filed FCC application SES-LIC-20260306-00745 for a next-generation quad-band gateway earth station called First of Its Name for the Starlink factory in Bastrop, Texas. The station will use 40 antennas, each with a 1.99-meter parabolic dish, to harness additional spectrum in the Ka-, V-, E-, and W-bands. This will allow connection to more satellites simultaneously ...

Read more

About 2,200 years ago, a Roman Republic ship sank off the coast of modern-day Croatia, with wood and amphorae (ancient storage containers) of wine on board. Scientists are not sure why it sank, but the Ilovik–Paržine 1 shipwreck was discovered in 2016. However, the archeologists and researchers behind a new study published today in the journal Frontiers in Materials weren’t interested in its precious cargo. The ship’s critical waterproofing layer was their treasure. 

This unique protective layer on a ship traps pollen in its stickiness just like tree sap. By studying the type and quantity of pollen, as well as the molecular composition of the coating itself, researchers can start forming theories about where the boat was when this essential coating was created and applied. 

“In archaeology little attention is paid to organic waterproofing materials. Yet they are essential for navigation at sea or on rivers and are true witnesses of past naval technologies,” Armelle Charrié-Duhaut, first author of the paper and an archaeometrist from the University of Strasbourg in France, said in a statement. 

As such, Charrié-Duhaut and her colleagues employed structural, molecular, and pollen analyses to investigate 10 coating samples from Ilovik–Paržine 1. The waterproofing layer’s “molecular fingerprint” thus came to light, revealing that either heated coniferous tree resin or heated coniferous tar (also called pitch) was the main ingredient in all their samples. However, according to one sample, some unknown quantity of the coating consisted of a mixture of beeswax and tar that Greek shipbuilders called zopissa. 

“The use of pitch and beeswax by the Greeks is mentioned in Pliny the Elder’s Natural History (XVI, 23),” Charrié-Duhaut tells Popular Science. “The identification of this mixture on the Ilovik-Paržine 1 shipwreck attests to the continued use of this type of composition in an Adriatic context.”

The use of zopissa on an ancient Roman ship also supports the hypothesis that the vessel was built in Brundisium. Now the present-day Italian city of Brindisi, the region was in contact with mainland Italy’s Greek colonies at the time. The pollen analysis aligns with this theory as well, indicating that part of the coatings were put on the ship in proximity to that area. The ship may have received others somewhere on the northeastern Adriatic coast—where it met its final doom.  

More broadly, the pollen came from a diverse group of environments, including forests of holly oak and pine,shrublands with olive and hazel trees, areas with alder and ash trees, and regions with fir and beech trees. Some of these plants are typical of Mediterranean and Adriatic coasts and valleys.

As for the protective layers themselves, the vessel probably received four to five different rounds of coatings. The same layer was applied on the stern and central part of the ship, but the bow had three separate batches of application, which may suggest consecutive patch-up jobs using materials from across the Mediterranean. 

“Our study highlights navigation routes based on clues related to the ship’s construction areas

and, especially, to the different phases of coating application on the ship. It suggests that this vessel traveled between the western Adriatic coast, where it was likely built and where the first layer of coating was applied, and the eastern Adriatic coast,” says Charrié-Duhaut. “Movements between the southern and northern sections of this eastern coastline are also possible, where repairs or recoating could have been carried out during the ship’s lifetime.”

The post 2,200-year-old Roman shipwreck unlocks mysteries of how ships were built and repaired appeared first on Popular Science.

OpenAI GPT-5.5 tops the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index by 3 points, breaking a three-way tie with Anthropic and Google. There is indication that is faster and has some good results but some results are mid. More time is needed. It is a good model but it does not appear to be groundbreaking. OpenAI topping five ...

Read more

Tesla Cybercab is now in production at Giga Texas. They are very different from the wrapped engineering versions. Purpose-built for autonomy Cybercab in production now at Giga Texas pic.twitter.com/Y9qG3KyWBa — Tesla (@Tesla) April 23, 2026

Around 100 million years ago, real kraken-like creatures stalked Earth’s prehistoric oceans. According to a study published today in the journal Science, some of the planet’s oldest known octopuses measured nearly 65-feet-long and ruled their underwater domains.

“Our findings suggest that the earliest octopuses were gigantic predators that occupied the top of the marine food chain in the Cretaceous,” Yasuhiro Iba, a study co-author and marine paleontologist at Hokkaido University in Japan, explained in a statement, adding that they “may have surpassed the size of large marine reptiles of the same age.”

Invertebrates like these are notorious for leaving little trace of their existence. Without bones, there simply isn’t much material to fossilize or preserve for millions of years. But as with today’s cephalopods, the huge octopuses of the Cretaceous Period featured powerful, beak-like jaws used to devour their prey. Unlike the rest of their bodies, these appendages frequently become excellent fossil specimens after coming to rest on the calm ocean seafloor.

Iba’s team examined prehistoric jaws from octopuses belonging to members from the still-living Ciratta subgroup found in rock samples in Japan and on Vancouver Island in Canada. They then used an imaging technique known as high-resolution grinding tomography to scan each sample before using a machine learning program to build a rough anatomical sketch of the creatures.

The results were startling. Dating estimates on the jaws push back the fossil record for giant, finned octopuses by around 15 million years, as well as the wider octopus timeline by 5 million years. This means the invertebrates first arrived around 100 million years ago during the Late Cretaceous.

The state of the jaws revealed another surprise. In both examined species, one side of the jaw was often more eroded than the other. This implies the octopuses displayed lateralization—a behavioral asymmetry tied to living animals with highly evolved neural processing abilities. If true, octopuses have been especially smart for a very long time.

Overall wear-and-tear on the jaws indicates that the invertebrates didn’t choose the easiest prey, either. Some adult specimens had even lost around 10 percent of their jaw tips relative to their total length.

“This indicates repeated, forceful interactions with their prey, revealing an unexpectedly aggressive feeding strategy,” said Iba.

Taken altogether, the discoveries contradict a longstanding evolutionary theory that vertebrates were designed to become the oceans’ apex predators. In actuality, these ancient kraken proved they didn’t need a backbone to be terrifying.

“Our findings show that powerful jaws and the loss of superficial skeletons, common characteristics of octopuses and marine vertebrates, were essential to becoming huge, intelligent marine predators” added Iba.

The post 65-foot-long octopuses ruled ancient oceans appeared first on Popular Science.

Some pretty tough muscles lay beneath the macaroni penguin’s (Eudyptes chrysolophus) somewhat goofy exterior. These small penguins from the islands and waters of the South Atlantic Ocean are known for their distinctive bright-yellow plumes. They are also built for powerful and efficient movement for both walking and swimming, according to a study recently published in the journal The Anatomical Record.

Since penguins don’t fly through the air like most birds, they’ve evolved to fly through the water instead. For macaroni penguins, their key wing muscles look different than in flying birds. For example, a muscle responsible for lifting the wing called the supracoracoideus is much larger in penguins. A bigger supracoracoideus allows them to generate more power during the upstroke and downstroke of their flipper motion, which appears to be a crucial adaptation for swimming through dense water. This special configuration of shoulder muscles also gives penguins a stroke akin to underwater flying that has a stronger backwards component. This backwards motion improves their propulsion through water, which is over 700 times more dense than air and offers more resistance. 

The study also solved a penguin mystery that has puzzled scientists for over 100 years. A distinct muscle in the macaroni penguin’s hindlimb appears to help the penguin’s legs stay tucked close together. Just like with dolphins, whales, and even humans, that streamlined posture makes the penguins more efficient swimmers, while also helping them maintain balance while standing up on two legs when on land. The team proposes that this new hindlimb muscle be called the adductor tibialis.

The penguin’s signature waddle may also come from this combination of leg position and specialized muscles that keep their limbs close to their body. While it looks clumsy to us, that walk is an energy-efficient way to get around on land and in the water. 

According to the team, solving these anatomical puzzles could help penguins in zoos and wildlife rehabilitation settings. Understanding the penguin musculature could improve veterinary care, injury treatment, and rehabilitation strategies.

The post Macaroni penguins are surprisingly buff appeared first on Popular Science.

Astronomers knew 3I/ATLAS wasn’t a local comet not long after first spotting it in July 2025. As only the third interstellar object ever detected in our solar system, it offered researchers a rare—and brief—opportunity. With the right timing and equipment, scientists around the world could examine a cosmic visitor who possibly formed under far different conditions than those experienced in our own region of the galaxy.

3I/ATLAS is now sailing away from Earth and our solar system itself, but astronomers have already learned a wealth of information. The fastest comet ever recorded is covered in ice volcanoes, and emits a dusty trail of methanol and cyanide in its wake. 

Earlier this month, the European Space Agency confirmed that 3I/ATLAS is also spewing the equivalent of 70 Olympic swimming pools’ worth of water every day. However, the exact type of water isn’t often seen here on Earth.According to astronomers at the University of Michigan (UM), the hydrogen in the comet’s H2O contains one extra neutron, which technically makes it an isotope called deuterium. The rarity isn’t simply a strange quirk—it indicates 3I/ATLAS originated somewhere much colder than the solar system.

“Our new observations show that the conditions that led to the formation of our solar system are much different from how planetary systems evolved in different parts of our galaxy,” Luis Salazar Manzano, a UM astronomer, said in a statement.

The co-author of a paper published today in the journal Nature Astronomy, Manzano explained that 3I/ATLAS contains 30 times the deuterium seen in other comets, as well as 40 times the amount that exists in Earth’s oceans.

“The amount of deuterium with respect to ordinary hydrogen in water is higher than anything we’ve seen before in other planetary systems and planetary comets,” he added.

Measuring subatomic particles in a comet millions of miles away required some of the most sensitive tools available. Manzano and colleagues utilized equipment at the MDM Observatory in Arizona, while also collaborating with astronomers at the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile. Thanks to ALMA, the team could separate standard and deuterated water in the comet, then get accurate ratio estimates between the two. It’s not only impressive—it’s the first time anyone successfully accomplished the analysis on an interstellar object.

So what does a lot of deuterium mean, exactly? For one thing, 3I/ATLAS’ birthplace was much colder than conditions that created our solar system—less than 30 degrees Kelvin, or -387.67 Fahrenheit. The region likely also experienced much lower levels of radiation.

“Gas-phase and ice-grain deuterium enrichments occur through chemical processes that operate at low temperatures (<30 K) pointing towards an origin in the prestellar molecular cloud or in the outer parts of the protoplanetary disk,” the study’s authors wrote.

Since the Milky Way galaxy is a vast place, it may not come as a huge surprise to learn other locations exhibit different formative environments. But as astronomer and study co-author Teresa Paneque-Carreño explained, you can’t base science on assumptions—even when they sound ironclad on their own.

“This is proof that whatever the conditions were that led to the creation of our solar system are not ubiquitous throughout space,” said Paneque-Carreño. “That may sound obvious, but it’s one of those things that you need to prove.”

The post Fastest comet ever recorded spewed 70 Olympic pools’ worth of water daily appeared first on Popular Science.

Some much-needed relief may be on the way for beloved “flat-faced” dog breeds. After over 15 years of research, a team of scientists from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia and biotechnology company Snoretox have created a new treatment they say can ease breathing in flat-faced dogs. Called Snoretox-1, the new injectable treatment uses a modified version of tetanus toxin. It is  placed directly into the dog’s geniohyoid muscle—in the inside of the mouth, on top of the throat area. Snoretox-1  works to improve muscle tone in the mouth, which helps keep the airway open, and could potentially be an alternative to invasive surgery. 

While pugs, bulldogs, and similar flat-faced dogs are adored by many for their snubbed-nose look, their undeniable cuteness comes at a steep cost. Generations of selective breeding have shortened the bones in the skull, blocking airflow and leading to a condition called BOAS (brachycephalic obstructive airway syndrome).This chronic upper airway obstruction condition is responsible for the breeds’ notoriously beleaguered breathing. A study published in the journal PLOS One in February, found that nearly 90 percent  of flat-faced dogs studied had at least some difficulty breathing. More than half (54 percent) fell into the more concerning category “clinically significant.” The issue, which limits the dogs’ ability to sleep and exercise, has even prompted some countries including Norway and The Netherlands to ban the breeds altogether.

As far as new breathing treatments, Snoretox-1seems to work so far. In clinical tests of six bulldogs, each saw improvement and could  complete a brief walk that had previously left them struggling to breathe. And while the researchers are focusing first on BOAS due to its widespread impact, the team believes a similar treatment could be adopted down the line to address other medical issues involving weak muscle tone in dogs, and possibly even other animals. Results of the study were recently published in The Veterinary Journal

“This project is focused on making a real difference to animals, with the potential for broader impact in the future,” Calum Drummond, RMIT Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research and professor said in a statement. 

Snoretox-1 drug being injected into a bulldog’s geniohyoid muscle. Image: RMIT University / Snoretox
The cost of cuteness 

While BOAS has been widely observed in pugs for years, more recent research suggests that the condition affects a wider range of dog breeds than once thought, including Shih Tzus, Boston terriers, King Charles spaniels, Pomeranians, boxers, and Chihuahuas. At its worst, airflow blockage impairs the dog’s breathing at all times, leading to difficulty sleeping and constant snoring even while they’re awake. Difficulty tolerating walks or exercise leads some dogs to put on excess weight, worsening  their health problems as they age. These breathing issues are also a major contributor to why short-nosed breeds tend to have a lifespan several years shorter than longer-nosed dogs.

Until now, owners of these dogs had two real options: Medical management like weight loss and applying sedative, or invasive surgery to widen nostrils and remove excess throat tissue. Surgery can provide a lifeline for dogs with severe BOAS cases, but it doesn’t always work and it exposes the dog to another danger. Past studies show dogs undergoing BOAS surgery have a mortality rate of just under three percent.

“BOAS Syndrome is a highly significant yet often inadequately treated condition,” the team wrote in the paper.

Bulldogs could walk without choking

This new injection works by combining an active tetanus toxin with inactivated, or “decoy,” tetanus toxin. The underside of the throat was chosen as the injection site both for its efficacy and relative ease of physical access. In testing, the six bulldogs received the treatment and assessments were taken 14 days after, 28 days after, and then every four weeks. To gauge whether it was working, the dogs’ owners were asked to provide daily observations about their pets’ alertness, appetite, drinking behavior, and any observable signs of distress. The most important finding was that all of the dogs appeared to handle their walk with noticeably less physical burden and effort.

It’s still not entirely clear how the treatment will hold up over longer periods of study or among more dogs and breeds. When or where it will be available is also unclear. Popular Science reached out to Snoretox about when the treatment is expected to reach the market but had not heard back by the time of publication. More testing will also be needed before we know if  a similar treatment could work for other medical issues.

If it becomes widely accessible, the drug could be a welcome development for flat-faced dogs and their owners. Scientists previously developed a special collar called the FitBark. Similar to how smartwatches and rings track sleep in humans FitBark provides more precise analysis of a dog’s sleep patterns before and after BOAS surgeries.. Prior to that, knowing whether surgeries actually improved a dog’s breathing relied largely on subjective observation from owners, which isn’t ideal.

While there are still some unknowns, the new findings suggest pugs and other flat nosed dogs may soon be able to breathe just a bit easier. 

The post Pugs and Frenchies could find breathing relief for squishy faces with new treatment appeared first on Popular Science.

The entire field of archaeology hinges on what can withstand the test of time. This typically means that most excavations center on hard evidence including structural remains, pottery, weapons, or metalwork. Occasionally, researchers discover something softer that’s been preserved for thousands of years despite the odds. In Switzerland, archaeologists recently identified what may be an especially rare find. While clearing the grounds of an upcoming residential development about 20 miles northeast of Zurich, specialists at the Aargau Cantonal Archaeology service found what they believe is a chunk of charred, 2000-year-old Roman bread.

The “alleged pastry” described in an online post from the Aargau Cantonal Department of Education is approximately four inches wide and 1.2 inches thick and likely a type of flatbread. Researchers spotted the burnt morsel in August 2025 while combing through a 43,000-square-foot area near the Roman site of Vindonissa. Known for its strategic position along major river routes, Vindonissa began as an outpost for Roman legion soldiers in what was once the empire’s northern frontier.

Archaeologists needed to carefully excavate the bread within surrounding earth before transporting it to a lab. Credit: Canton of Aargau KAA 6

However, archaeologists have questioned the settlement’s origins for decades. Until the latest excavations, it was unclear when Vindonissa expanded from a temporary encampment into a full-fledged and permanent military fortification. Based on the latest findings, it seems Rome’s presence in the area solidified earlier than previously believed. An exact date remains unclear, but military legions certainly operated a well-stocked and furnished hub well before the first century CE.

Rarities like this preserved bread are exceptionally unique artifacts. Food and other organic materials generally decays extremely quickly, unless they are preserved under intense circumstances. The most common examples occur thanks to sudden carbonization—a process that only happens in disastrous situations like the volcanic destruction of Pompeii in 79 CE. Until they conduct a laboratory analysis, archaeologists won’t be able to provide a confident theory of how the Roman flatbread has survived for thousands of years. That said, its charred condition certainly suggests some kind of kitchen mishap.

Regardless, the new information gleaned from Vindonissa will help experts better understand more than simply when Rome extended its reach into present-day Switzerland. Rare finds like the ancient bread also contextualize and humanize history—while reminding us that humans have always loved our bread.

The post 2,000-year-old Roman bread discovered under construction site appeared first on Popular Science.

For humans, humidity often makes us cranky, sweaty, and downright uncomfortable. For sweat bees, humidity changes their already vibrant colors. According to research recently published in the journal Biology Letters, moisture in the air makes the bees go from blue to green. 

“When people think of bees, they often picture drab, brown honey bees,” Dr. Madeleine Ostwald, a study co-author and behavioral ecologist at Queen Mary University of London, said in a statement. “In reality, bees are incredibly diverse and colourful—and we’re only just starting to understand how their appearance reflects the climate they live in.”

A sweat bee in the wild. Image: Photo ©Jeremiah Bender.

Insects use color to help control their body temperature, communicate, camouflage, and more. However, it’s still unknown how color shifts affect their behavior or ability to survive in the wild.  There are nearly 4,500 known sweat bee species. These largely harmless bees are native to North America, but can be found on every continent except Antarctica. The name “sweat bee” comes from their supposed attraction to human sweat. As far as appearances, sweat bees are known for their bright, metallic green and blue hues that anecdotal evidence suggests change color from time to time. This study provides the first experimental proof of their chameleon-esque capabilities. 

For this study, the team looked at the fine-striped sweat bee (Agapostemon subtilior), a species found in North America. They placed the bees in dry air, where they appeared a deep blue color. When the humidity increased, they changed into a more copper-green. Once the air dried out again, they returned to their original blue.

Related Color Stories

Why blue animals are so rare in nature

One in 100 million cotton candy lobster caught in New Hampshire

Early mammals were all one color, study suggests

First known wild ‘grue jay’ hybrid spotted in Texas

In most animals, color comes from pigments. Instead of pigments, sweat bees get their color from microscopic structures on their bodies that scatter and reflect light at particular wavelengths. This same wavelength warping effect creates the iridescent feathers of hummingbirds and cuttlefish’s shifting scales.

These tiny structures also swell slightly when exposed to moisture in some animals. The swelling makes them reflect more red colors. A similar process may be happening in bees—even if they are not turning red—but more work is needed to fully understand what’s going on behind the scenes. 

The team also compared the color changes in the lab with those in the wild. They analyzed hundreds of photos posted to iNaturalist, comparing the sweat bee’s color with local humidity levels. The bees in drier areas tended to appear more blue, matching what they observed in the lab. 

A single museum specimen (about 1 centimeter long) from the experiment,changing color as it goes from blue in dry air (left) to green in humid air (right). Most of the change happened in the first 24 hours. Image: Photograph by Leslie Cervantes Rivera.

Surprisingly, the older museum specimens they also analyzed showed the strongest color changes. This could be because the bees’ outer shells slowly degrade over time, allowing moisture to get in more easily.

According to the team, these findings suggest that color changing may be common among bees. The insects already display a wide range of shimmering colours and live in environments ranging from dry deserts to moist rainforests.

“Most people associate colour‑change with animals like chameleons that actively control it. These bees aren’t choosing to change colour—it’s happening passively, simply in response to the humidity around them,” said Ostwald. “That adds a whole new layer of mystery to why these colours evolved in the first place.”

The post Humidity makes these bees go from blue to green appeared first on Popular Science.

In about seven months Tesla will Start region by region deployment of unsupervised TESLA FSD for Customer Usage. The owners of FSD will start to get unsupervised FSD. This will be before extreme (aka material) scaling of unsupervised robotaxi. Getting beyond 20,000 to 60,000 unsupervised robotaxi will be a few months after FSD 15 is ...

Read more

Yellowstone National Park doesn’t just sit on a volcano—it is a volcano. Underneath the park, red-hot magma reservoirs flow, superheating hot springs and geysers like Old Faithful. This vast volcanic system is known as the Yellowstone Caldera, and with one blast it could plunge the world into chaos. 

About two million years ago, as sabertooth tigers and mastodons roamed the future United States, Yellowstone was a powder keg. Large amounts of hot magma accumulated beneath the Earth’s crust, building pressure and volcanic gases that triggered a major eruption. It was among the largest volcanic eruptions in our planet’s history, blanketing large parts of North America with ash. 

Since then, Yellowstone has seen two more major volcanic eruptions and many smaller ones—earning the name “supervolcano.” The three “super” explosions carved out giant craters (or calderas), which contain much of the park and give the Yellowstone Caldera its name. 

Though Yellowstone hasn’t had a supereruption in millennia, it’s impossible not to wonder: Will Yellowstone’s so-called supervolcano ever explode again? 

Yellowstone’s supervolcano isn’t erupting anytime soon—we think

Experts studying the Yellowstone volcano say it probably will erupt again—it’s just a matter of time, a lot of time. A major Yellowstone eruption likely won’t happen for thousands, and potentially millions, of years.  

Scientists say that the magma underneath Yellowstone is mostly solid and not eruptible. One study that identified magma hotspots underneath the Yellowstone Caldera suggests the magma is more concentrated underneath the northeast section, and that magma is shifting in that direction. 

It’s possible that Yellowstone’s magma, as it draws heat from Earth’s mantle and potentially concentrates in the northeast, may one day become liquid enough to erupt. But Poland says the shifting magma could also lose heat and stall as it hits thick, continental rock within the Earth’s crust. 

“We know there’s a magma chamber beneath Yellowstone,” Michael Poland, the scientist-in-charge of the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory, tells Popular Science. “But we know that it’s mostly solid, so it’s not really capable of feeding a large eruption. It’s like the odds of being struck by lightning are one in a million, but if you’re standing in a field, not a cloud in the sky, the odds you’re going to be struck in the next five minutes are basically zero.”

Yellowstone might see other volcanic activity sooner

The next volcanic incident in the Yellowstone Caldera likely won’t be a volcanic explosion. A powerful hydrothermal eruption from a geyser, activity that can create impressive craters but has limited impact outside the park, is more likely. 

Named in 1870, Old Faithful is one of the most famous geysers in Yellowstone National Park due to its frequent and consistent hydrothermal explosions. Image: Photography by Deb Snelson / Getty Images Deb Snelson

Another possibility is a lava flow, which occurs when slow-moving, thick lava erupts and forms rock piles that creep across the landscape over months or years.  

The Caldera has already caused a massive bulge in the ground the size of 279 football fields, but Poland says that change isn’t surprising due to the magma flowing beneath the park. 

The term supervolcano can be misleading

Poland isn’t a big fan of the term “supervolcano,” which refers to volcanic systems that have experienced eruptions emitting more than 1,000 cubic kilometers of magma, ash, and other volcanic deposits. 

Poland says using the term “supervolcano” for Yellowstone can be misleading, because it implies the system experiences only supereruptions, when lava flow eruptions are far more common. Still, the last lava flow incident was about 70,000 years ago.

These days, Poland worries more about hazards from hydrothermal eruptions or earthquakes, many unrelated to volcanic activity, in the park. 

Related 'Ask Us Anything' Stories

Someone dies in a national park. Now what?

Why can’t we just launch all of Earth’s garbage into the sun?

Could the Carrington Event happen again?

Without humans, what would happen to Earth?

Is the universe really infinite? Astrophysicists explain.

How marine mammals stay hydrated in a salty sea

At the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory, a consortium of scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey, the National Park Service, and several universities constantly monitor the Yellowstone volcanic system. They tap into a network of seismic stations, which measure earthquake activity, and steam gauging stations, which monitor volcanic heat release.

If Yellowstone’s volcano were to erupt, scientists at the observatory would likely know weeks to months beforehand. As of now, it looks like we’re safe—though experts like Poland are keeping a close watch. 

But what if Yellowstone’s supervolcano did erupt?

Poland says the chances of a major eruption in the Yellowstone Caldera within the human timeline are as close to zero as it gets. But what if Yellowstone did erupt while billions of humans still walked this planet?

Yellowstone National Park covers nearly 3,500 square miles, mostly in Wyoming. Every year, the national park welcomes roughly 5 million visitors. 

If the supervolcano erupted tomorrow, it would happen like this: hot magma would have already accumulated in the Earth’s mantle, building more and more pressure—until cracks formed in the Earth’s crust. Then, magma would finally burst forth in a massive explosion. 

Upon eruption, the immediate radius, including parts of Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho, would be swept clean—as huge eruption columns, pillars of superheated volcanic ash and gas, collapse under their own weight and incinerate the land. 

These avalanches of ash, gas, and rock, known as pyroclastic flows, would wipe out trees, homes, and infrastructure in their path. Any remaining ash would settle over the landscape. 

Using models, scientists at the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory predict that a supereruption would drop thousands of feet of ash within the park radius, and coat communities stretching from Missoula, Montana, to Albuquerque, New Mexico. 

In April 1815, Mount Tambora erupted on Sumbawa Island in present-day Indonesia. The event was the largest volcanic eruption in human history, and plunged the world into a prolonged period of frigid temperatures. Image: mikroman6 / Getty Images mikroman6 The explosion heard around the world

Poland says that a Yellowstone supereruption would drop at least a few millimeters of ash over much of the U.S. and parts of Canada, devastating agriculture, water supplies, and electrical grids. Huge amounts of ash and gas launched into the stratosphere would act as aerosols, blocking sunlight and plunging the Earth into a long period of cold and dark. 

A common example cited by volcanologists modeling the global impact of large volcanic eruptions is the 1815 Mount Tambora eruption in present-day Indonesia. Widely considered the largest eruption in recorded human history, this catastrophic explosion claimed tens of thousands of lives and plunged Earth into the “Year Without Summer”—a prolonged period of low temperatures that ravaged crops and caused widespread famine and disease epidemics around the world.

Based on evidence from past volcanic eruptions and climate models, Poland says scientists believe the effects of a supereruption like Yellowstone could last five to 10 years—though he is confident that Earth would recover. 

“A lot of people would die, but it would not wipe out humanity,” Poland says. “No explosive volcanic eruption has ever been associated with a mass extinction on Earth. We’d make it, but it definitely wouldn’t be fun.”

In Ask Us Anything, Popular Science answers your most outlandish, mind-burning questions, from the everyday things you’ve always wondered to the bizarre things you never thought to ask. Have something you’ve always wanted to know? Ask us.

The post What would happen if Yellowstone’s ‘supervolcano’ erupted today? appeared first on Popular Science.