Category: Features
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Insect consciousness
The insect world is abuzz with life, but is there anything on their minds? Follow Amalyah Hart into a world of intricate research designed to explore the complexities of insect consciousness.
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Harmony of the Spheres
A new study of audience members’ physical response to a concert supports the theory that music has played a pivotal role in human evolution.
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Model or monster?
This story, published in Cosmos Magazine Issue 95, was highly commended in the UNSW Press Bragg Prize for Science Writing 2023, and was published in the Best Australian Science Writing 2023 anthology. In a two-room laboratory sequestered in a hunkered-down building in Werribee, Victoria, a small but mighty group of baby frogs, some of the…
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The consciousness question in the age of AI
Brett Kagan, a fast-talking neuroscientist with the charged energy of someone on the cusp of a breakthrough, opened the door of a refrigerated container and gently pulled out a petri dish. As rain lashed the windows, Kagan placed the dish under a microscope, fiddled with the resolution, and invited me to look. Packed between the…
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The possible dream
Ten fruit flies, encased in individual test tubes, pace the lengths of their glassy quarters like the prisoners they are. On a screen, a graph is plotting each fly’s horizontal position over time. For periods, the flies are still. The occasional nudge spurs a flurry of activity. Bruno van Swinderen, a professorial research fellow at…
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Mining the moon: do we have the right?
It’s a source of helium, oxygen, silicon, aluminium, iron, manganese and titanium, and legal headaches.
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Seaweed excites this marine scientist – even though it nearly killed her
On a summer’s morning in 2019, in the small New South Wales farming community of Bolong, on the Shoalhaven River, Dr Pia Winberg walked into the processing plant from which she was building her budding seaweed business. Winberg had overnight left a tank of liquid to filter. It contained an extract of a native species…
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Australia’s environmental scorecard: how are we performing? And whose job is it anyway?
As the climate catastrophe morphs from looming threat to ever-present reality, our relationship with it is changing. Australians in particular are watching its effects play out in record-breaking natural disasters, from fires to floods. It’s clear by now that our actions have consequences. Those consequences are being felt around the globe, often in those regions that are most vulnerable to extremes…
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Field robotics solves problems we can’t even imagine yet – but to capitalise, it needs a more diverse data set
Australia, a country with vast tracts of agricultural land, escalating natural hazards and a booming resources industry, is a world-leader in field robotics.
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Food waste is a problem. Is getting rid of “use-bys” and “best befores” a solution?
UK supermarkets are scrapping date labels on hundreds of products to tackle food waste: could it happen here? And is it microbiologically safe?
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Are Earth’s major climate cycles changing? And if so, what will that mean for local weather?
Stand by for the global weather report.
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The bother with biogas
The “clean” energy that needs to clean up its act.
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Climate versus cost: what does the UK’s energy crisis tell us about the economics of net-zero in an energy-scarce world?
Soaring power prices have fermented opposition to net-zero targets, so can lower energy bills and climate mitigation be compatible?
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Antibiotic resistance: an arms race going on millions of years
How can we fight antibiotic resistance by decoding its evolutionary history?
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How Australia’s land can drink up carbon
The IPCC report released this week signals hope, but it comes with a fair few ‘ifs’. One of them is about the success of carbon drawdown.
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The carbon offsets conundrum
As a whistle-blower exposes flaws in Australia’s carbon offsetting schemes it’s worth asking the question: can offsetting be done right?
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Critical and rare: the minerals Australia can supply to the world
Our national leaders have signalled the importance of mining and refining critical minerals in Australia. What are these resources, and what’s at stake?
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Will Australia play host to Jurassic Park?
It’s a multi-million-dollar project, and the best chance yet to bring the Tasmanian tiger back from the abyss. Could de-extinction become a reality? And should it?
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When is a new species not a new species?
What’s in a name? When it comes to conservation priorities, potentially a plant’s very survival.
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How prepared is Australia for its next big earthquake?
As well as providing vital insights into the risks from future earthquakes, Australia’s most sophisticated seismic network, run by Melbourne University, may also have a role to play in climate change mitigation. Read the full article in The Saturday Paper here.
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Clean, green, mean: what’s Australia’s hydrogen future?
The colour of hydrogen is a source of heated discussion and debate, but hydrogen’s rainbow is anything but clear cut.
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The Australian scientists greening ammonia for a sustainable future
New technology shows the promise of an energy revolution.
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The AI making waves in complex mathematics
Researchers are starting to use AI to develop and test abstract mathematical theorems – with surprisingly creative results.
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New laws to prevent space wars?
UN passes proposal to discuss new space laws as countries flex their cosmic muscles.
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Tracing human origins by foot
Six-million-year-old Cretan footprints challenge beliefs about human evolution
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Nuclear power in Australia: is it a good idea?
The AUKUS submarine deal has re-ignited debate around nuclear power. What are the pros and cons?
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Decoding the secrets of a forgotten human history during the Pleistocene
Dogged archaeologists continue to make discoveries that extend knowledge of early human history in this part of the world.
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A new window into the peopling of Polynesia
Population genetics and machine learning draw timelines on Pacific Island migrations.
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Native logging to end in Western Australia
The state will phase out native forest logging by 2024 – so is this decision backed by science?
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The fight for the Martuwarra
Competing interests are vying for the resources of WA’s magnificent Martuwarra (Fitzroy) River system, while Traditional Owners sound the alarm.
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First ancient human DNA from the gateway between Asia and Australia
Genomic clues from the grave of an ancient ‘princess’ reveal a vanished people.
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Afghanistan’s unreachable US$1 trillion mineral bounty
A green-future wealth that could stabilise Afghanistan for decades lies trapped by the country’s past.
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Here today, gone tomorrow: the IPCC’s new report predicts the sea-level rise flooding our backyard
It’s certain that rising sea levels are due to anthropogenic climate change, but the effects are not felt equally. Low-lying communities across Australia and the Pacific are already gasping for air – if action isn’t taken, some islands – and entire nations – could slip beneath the waves.
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COVID concerns drive supplement use
Sales of complementary medicines have been driven up by COVID fears, but Immune-boosting claims for them are doing more harm than good.
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Earth orbital space: who’s in charge?
Tech billionaire Elon Musk has said that his Starlink satellite-based internet will be able to connect anyone, anywhere – except the polar regions – by August of this year. Musk’s floating head made the extraordinary promise via video call at the 2021 Mobile World Congress (an annual mobile communications trade show) in early July. Starlink, a…
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Does nature have rights?
Ahead of World Environment Day, Amalyah Hart explores legal ‘rights of nature’.
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Standing sentinel: The vanishing giants of the Central Highlands
In Victoria’s Central Highlands, ancient survivors of a lost world cling on against the odds. Economy and industry, fires and drought, loom as close threats. Amalyah Hart journeys deep into the forest, navigating the human stories that will shape it’s future.
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Seared into country and memory, lessons for a fiery future
This year’s La Nina has allowed some respite and healing after the devastation of Black Summer, but scientists warn that recognising the risks of more fires, more often, will be crucial to species survival. Originally published at: https://www.thecitizen.org.au/articles/seared-into-country-and-memory-lessons-for-a-fiery-future The lush folds of the Newnes Plateau swamps, a critical but endangered habitat in the Blue Mountains…
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How Aboriginal health experts acted first and led the fight against the coronavirus
Enlisting local initiatives, networks and the lessons of the past, Aboriginal health services were quick off the mark when coronavirus came. Their success to date is powerful testimony to the importance of Indigenous leadership in narrowing the health gap, experts say.