By: Robin Andrews/IFL Science Earth’s tectonic plates make our world unique. Thanks to these colossal continentals and oceanic islands floating atop a partly molten hellish mantle, we have oceans and mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes, and even an atmosphere. That’s why a team of Dutch scientists from Utrecht University has conjured up a new database containing everything…
NASA Breaks Record With Ion Thruster That Could Take Humans To Mars
By: Jonathan O’Callaghan/IFLScience Scientists have announced a breakthrough with an ion thruster that could one day take humans to Mars. It’s called the X3 thruster, a type of ion propulsion known as a Hall thruster. This technology is alluring because it can theoretically achieve higher speeds than conventional chemical propulsion. In a series of tests at NASA’s Glenn…
The Sun Has Turned Red And There’s A Very Cool But Slightly Horrifying Reason Why
By: James Felton/IFLScience If you’re in the UK and you’ve looked out the window at any point today, it’s likely you’ve seen an unusually red-looking Sun. The hashtag #redsun is trending on Twitter, with people sharing many photos that to be honest, look like they’re straight out of an apocalyptic movie. It’s a pretty spectacular sight and can…
ESO Scientists Unveil An “Unprecedented Discovery” About Gravitational Waves
By: Brad Jones/Futurism New Wave Last week, the European Southern Observatory (ESO) teased news of an “unprecedented discovery.” Now, the organization has revealed that, for the first time ever, astronomers have observed both gravitational waves and light produced by the same event. “This discovery is significant because it gives us two completely different ways to view the same…
China’s First Space Station Will Fall To Earth Within A Few Months
By: Tom Hale/IFL Science China’s first space station, Tiangong-1, is doomed to plummet into Earth’s atmosphere within the coming months. Tiangong-1, which means “The Heavenly Palace”, was launched into orbit back in 2011. This relatively small 10.3-meter-long (34-foot-long) space station was China’s first space laboratory module, making it a major milestone in their drive to become a science…
Something Below The Ice Is Slicing Through An Ice Shelf In Antarctica
By: Jonathan O’Callaghan/IFL Science If a giant hole wasn’t enough, we’ve got more bad news. Scientists have discovered a huge inverted canyon under an ice shelf in Antarctica, which might cause its demise much quicker than expected. Using the ESA’s CryoSat satellite and the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission, researchers looked at the Dotson ice shelf in West Antarctica….
Physicists Will Be Announcing An “Unprecedented Discovery” On Monday – Here’s How To Watch Live
By: Alfredo Carpineti/IFL Science In the space of just a few weeks, the LIGO and VIRGO collaborations have announced the fourth detection of gravitational waves and three of their most prominent physicists received a Nobel Prize for their work. And on Monday they will announce something new. Everyone is being very tight-lipped on the nature of this big announcement but…
Professor Brian Cox Believes Humanity Will Soon Achieve Immortality. Here’s How We’ll Do It
By: Rosie McCall/IFL Science Humanity has been looking for a way to “fix” our own mortality since, well, forever. In medieval times, there were the alchemists who searched for a universal elixir or philosopher’s stone. In the 20th century, people paid to be cryogenically frozen and now we have companies, like Humaii and Carboncopies, using artificial intelligence (AI) and nanotechnology to enable…
You Can Now Send Your Ashes To Be Scattered In Space As British Company Launches Space Funerals
By: Katy Evans/IFL Science Add the word space to the front of any other word and it immediately becomes infinitely cooler. Space cowboy, space archaeologist, and now space funeral. A British company has launched a brand new service that sends the remains of your loved ones into space. Their ashes will be released into the cosmos, making the…