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New Stretchable Circuitry Is Inspired by Rose Petals

If you’ve ever toyed with the petals of a rose, you’ll know that they’re pleasingly stretchy. Now, their material properties arebeing aped to produce a new breed of stretchable electronics. The idea of flexible circuitry continues to appeal, and it’s easy to understand why: a rollable tablet or bendable phone would be a joy to…

Radiation Is Dangerous, But Awesome To Watch

Radon gas is a hazardous thing to have around the house. It hangs around a short time before shooting out alpha particles. With a cloud chamber, scientists show us exactly what that decay process looks like, and it’s stunning. A cloud chamber is not a difficult thing to set up. With a little alcohol, a…

France’s Nuclear Aircraft Carrier,  Aglow in the Dark

This long exposure night shot shows a Rafale M multirole fighter aircraft parking on the flight deck of Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier, the flagship of the French Navy. Charles de Gaulle is the only nuclear-powered carrier completed outside of the United States Navy. It started military operations against Islamic State in Iraq on the…

This GIF Party Is Ready To Dance

Cue up your favorite playlists, GIFs! It’s time for a party. What did you do this week? Set your party GIFs to dancing in the comments, while you update us on any news, plans, and anything else you want to talk about right now.

Bluetooth Beacons Will Help Blind People Navigate London’s Subway

A new smartphone app and Bluetooth beacon system is currently being trialled at Pimlico Station on the London Underground, and could revolutionise the way blind and partially sighted people navigate the capital’s Tube system. Born from the Royal London Society for Blind People’s Youth Forum, the Wayfindr system offers independence to those that would otherwise…

Star Trek Gets The Ultimate Concert For Its 50th Anniversary

Next year marks half a century since Star Trek debuted on NBC. I imagine we’re in for a good deal of celebration and anniversary events, but the “Star Trek: The Ultimate Voyage” concert will likely be one of the biggest — a 100-stop tour of live music from the TV series and movies, performed by…

I could spend hours watching this guy roll Cuban cigars by hand

According to the Youtube description, this is Miguel, a worker at the farm of Hector Luis Prieto, one of the best cigar manufacturers in Cuba. Someone had the idea of strapping a GoPro to his head to show, from his point of view, how he rolls the cigars by hand. And it’s mesmerizing. SPLOID is…

How Do You Stop A Murderous Elephant Gang?

Believe it or not, this was a question that South African officials in the early 2000s had to answer. Young elephant males had formed groups that attacked and killed rhinos for recreation. How could they stop it? The problem was first noticed in the late 1990s and early 2000s, when workers at nature preserves in…

Insane night wingsuit flight results in this spectacular picture

Wingsuit flyerPatrick Kerber didn’t seem to be daunted by the idea of jumping from the top of a mountain to a dark void—only slightly illuminated by a red flare he holds in his hand—to take a picture. It’s true that the resulting photo is stunning but also one of the craziest and most dangerous stunts…

Java Now Dumps Adware on to Macs, Too

There are a lot of reason not to use Java—but here’s one more to add to the list. The latest release of Oracle’s ubiquitous software now also dumps a load of crapware on to your Mac. Java has long installed adware onto Windows PCs, but now it also does the same to OS X too.…

Steven Moffat Hints The Doctor Will Lighten Up In Doctor Who Season 9

The next Toy Story won’t continue the story of the first three. There’s another tease of Jared Leto’s version of the Joker. Jeph Loeb says Marvel’s Netflix shows won’t cross over with the films just yet. John Barrowman gets a new series. Plus, Flash set pictures tease the return of Reverse Flash. Spoilers Now! Top…

The Man Who Ate 25 Eggs a Day (Or, Why Cholesterol’s Not All Bad)

Each morning at the retirement community, the healthy 88-year-old man received a delivery of 25 soft-boiled eggs, which he would consume during his day. This had been his way for many years. He’d had one experience of chest pain that might have been angina, but aside from that, he had a healthy cardiovascular system. He…

This Origami Donut’s Hole Stays the Same Size However Much You Squash It

A structure whose internal dimensions remain the same regardless of the external forces applied to it sounds fanciful—but that’s exactly what this high-tech piece of origami does. Created by Bin Liu at the University of California, Merced, this is no normal origami. The donut-shaped structure, while made from paper, was scored at high-precision using laser.…

A Ten-Minute History of Robotics

Present-day robotics hasn’t turned out quite as the futurists intended: for better or worse, we don’t live in a world of robot butlers and Skynet. This ten-minute history of robotics does a nice job of explaining why. Fundamentally, of course, the truth is that robotics as a discipline is just… quite difficult. Some headaches that…

How much snow has the United States seen this year? The New York Timeshas a set of composite photos showing snow cover from 2013, 2014, and 2015. Two things stand out: one is the photos for the Northeast, which shows the thicker more snow this year. The other is the disappearance of snow from the…

A Defense Department Satellite Exploded, Scattering Junk In Orbit

Defense Meteorological Satellite Program satellite number 13 (DMSP-13) exploded in orbit in February, spewing 43 more pieces of garbage into low Earth orbit. The more aggravating part? This isn’t the first satellite of the model to explode.

How Close Was The Simpsons To Figuring Out the Mass of the Higgs Boson?

Given the time it happened and, you know, that he’s a cartoon, the answer is that Homer Simpson did come pretty close to figuring out the mass of the Higgs Boson before scientists did. Screencap from Springfield! Springfield! This is from the episode “The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace,” which aired on September 20, 1998. The…

If They Can’t Move Their Abdomen, Mantises Can’t Jump

This slow motion clip of a jumping praying mantis is by Gregory Sutton, one of the authors of a study on how these insects manage to precisely target and hit their jumps. They need to be able to move their abdomen, hind legs, and front legs. Just one immobilized, like in the clip, and things…

Animation recreated frame-by-frame in real life with 3D printing 

This clever art installation shows a CGI animation that’s been converted into a real life frame-by-frame depiction of the animation with 3D printing. As in, the artists took the digital animation they had in a video and showed what every frame would look like (all at once) with actual figures. It gets pretty trippy. So…

Check out the amazing acrobatic skills of a jumping praying mantis

When a young praying mantis leaps into the air, it can reach its target in literally a blink of an eye (less than a tenth of a second). Speed aside, the mechanics of a praying mantis jump is what makes it special: three different body parts rotate in different directions and different combinations in an…