The most likely impact zone for an object big enough to punch through the Earth's atmosphere is somewhere in the planet's oceans.
The most likely impact zone for an object big enough to punch through the Earth's atmosphere is somewhere in the planet's oceans.
Brace yourself for a BIG splash
Call it the ultimate swimming pool bomb ... German and US scientists have tried to work out what kind of waves would be generated if a space rock hundreds of metres in diameter hit the ocean.
The most likely impact zone for an object big enough to punch through the Earth's atmosphere is somewhere in the planet's oceans, and, while researchers have previously suggested this wouldn't do much damage on land, the splashdown would be huge.
It would first cause a momentary crater in the ocean - up to 40 times larger than the rock's diameter - and then send out tsunami waves.
These would travel across the ocean, but in different forms and probably over shorter distances than the tsunamis generated by earthquakes or underwater landslides.
Swallowing small electronic things has never been the best thing for your health, but that might soon change.
Swallowing small electronic things, as some tots have been known to do, has never been the best thing for your health ... but a "smart pill" being investigated by researchers could change that.
They want to develop a pill-sized electronic device that could be swallowed to detect problems in the gastrointestinal tract and treat them by releasing the required drugs.
In the journal Trends in Biotechnology, Dr Christopher Bettinger, of Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania, outlined a future of safe, consumable electronics, such as those powered by the charged ions within digestive tracts.
Bored by dinosaurs? Meet a prehistoric beastie with real bite
An Auckland University PhD student, sick of seeing dinosaurs hogging the prehistoric news headlines, is championing another ancient beast that has garnered less publicity.
It is the sea scorpion, or the eurypterid as Ian Randall knows them - a deadly predator that lived in the ocean 250 million years ago and was among the first creatures to walk on to the land.
It had segmented armour, claws, compound eyes and was up to 2.5m long.
Yet, in the New York Times, for example, eurypterids have only featured a couple of times in the past 30 years, Randall said. They pop up twice in recent Herald records.
"Dinosaurs can be great for getting the public interested in palaeontology and science in general, but they are one small piece of a much larger puzzle."
He makes the point in his entry in the Trans-Tasman 3 Minute Thesis competition, being held in Brisbane on Friday.
Rare snubfin pops up to say hi
The rare snubfin dolphin was recently spotted popping its head above the water near Hinchinbrook Island this month.
If you thought our Maui's dolphin was a pretty distinctive looking mammal, wait until you see Australia's cartoon-like snubfin dolphin. Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service ranger Emma Schmidt spotted one of the rare cetaceans popping its head above the water near Hinchinbrook Island. "They are very rare, so this photo was just pure luck," she told the Townsville Bulletin.
The sociable but vulnerable dolphin, which was not described as a separate species until 2005, is distinctive for its rounded forehead and small, snubby dorsal fin.
Gruesome find gives clues on death ritual
German archaeologists have made a grim discovery in Brazil - evidence of what might be the oldest ritual case of decapitation in the New World.
The remains, found at the rock shelter of Lapa do Santo, are thought to be 9000 years old.
The archaeologists found amputated hands laid over the face of the severed skull arranged opposite each other, and observed v-shaped cut marks on the jaw and vertebra.
This morbid presentation led the authors to think that this was probably a ritualised decapitation instead of trophy-taking, which could demonstrate newfound and sophisticated mortuary rituals among hunter-gatherers of the time in the Americas.
