Science

Representative Image (AI-generated) For thousands of years, layers of partially decomposed plants accumulated beneath a vast wetland in North Carolina, creating a deep store of carbon. That changed when an abandoned farming venture carved about 50 miles of drainage ditches through the land, lowering the water table and exposing the ancient peat to air. The…

The upgraded bridge reconnects habitat between Heathcote National Park, Garrawarra State Conservation Area and Royal National Park (Image Credit: Greg Bigello/ ABC News) An idea proposed by an Australian park ranger more than five decades ago has finally become a wildlife crossing. In 1974, Royal National Park ranger Bob Crombie suggested using Cawleys Bridge to…

Daniel ZhangPhoto: Tumor Tactics/ Instagram In a San Diego high school classroom, a deck of 72 cards sits on a desk, each one representing a different cancer treatment option, side effect or patient factor. The game built from these cards was designed to help young patients and their families visualise complex treatment decisions, turning abstract…

Concrete has a major environmental cost, while human waste creates another difficult waste-management challenge. Researchers have now brought the two problems together in an unusual laboratory experiment. A team converted treated faecal sludge into biochar and used the resulting material to replace part of the cement in concrete. The researchers tested mixtures containing 5%, 10%…

The red kite, once pushed close to extinction in Britain because of human persecution, has made one of the country’s most successful wildlife recoveries. After centuries of hunting and egg collecting reduced the UK population to fewer than 10 breeding pairs in remote Welsh valleys, a reintroduction programme launched in 1989 brought birds from Spain…

PC: Youth Service America At just 17, Vivian Liu has turned a childhood passion for origami into a worldwide movement built around one simple idea: making people feel remembered. Through Origami For Good, the teenager from Katy, Texas, has helped bring together thousands of young volunteers who fold recycled paper into cranes, flowers, animals and…

Elephant in Tanzania. Image Credit: Nevit Dilmen/Wikimedia Commons In parts of Tanzania, small farms are increasingly coming into contact with African elephants, leading to a hard conflict between wildlife conservation and rural livelihoods. A 2026 study, published in the ‘International Journal of Biodiversity and Conservation’ found that most of the reported crop raids in the…

Charles Darwin, the English naturalist whose theory of evolution by natural selection transformed our understanding of life, also left behind observations that extended beyond biology. One of his most memorable reflections was on the value of time and how people choose to use it. His words, “A man who dares to waste one hour of…

Egg and rice waste can be converted into a material for storing electrical energy. Researchers developed a nitrogen- and oxygen-co-doped porous carbon from a mixture of egg waste and rice waste and tested it for use in supercapacitors. The material was produced through pre-carbonisation followed by pyrolytic activation. According to the study published in Molecules…

For 12-year-old Yuvi Agarwal, a keyboard became more than a musical instrument after he noticed it could calm his restless dog, Bozo. The discovery inspired him to wonder whether music could also comfort animals facing the stress of life in shelters. In 2023, Yuvi turned that idea into Wild Tunes, a non-profit that brings volunteer…