NASA has released time-lapse footage of flying over Earth taken from the International Space Station. Turn off your mind, relax, and float downstream (but don’t forget to click the bottom right corner…
Prime Minister Julia Gillard has announced she wants the Australian Labor Party to change its policy of not selling uranium to countries that have not signed up to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty…
The mining boom is gaining momentum with massive investment either underway or slated but the benefits to Australia have peaked and we must now face the difficulties of being a high-dollar quarry where…
The Gillard Government’s Clean Energy Bill enters legislation after today passing the Senate 36 votes to 32. Voting ‘no’ were the Coalition, independent Nick Xenophon, and the Democratic Labor Party’s…
Honey bees are trapped in a Catch 22 where antibiotics used to protect them from bacterial illnesses ravaging hives are making them die from commonly used pesticides, some of which are used to ward-off…
Recent outbreaks of deadly bat-borne diseases could be a sign of things to come as rising heat and changing rains help the spread of infectious disease in Australia. Such is the warning that Professor…
The United Nations has set Halloween as the day when homosapiens are estimated to reach seven billion, up from six billion in 1999 and five billion in 1987. Two centuries ago there were one billion people…
The Gillard government’s carbon pricing legislation passed the House of Representatives by 74 votes to 72, and is expected to pass through the Senate with the support of the Greens next month. Under the…
Dispersants used to break down the 300 tonnes of oil that has leaked from a cargo ship into New Zealand’s Bay of Plenty may do marine ecosystems more harm than good, an ocean oil spill expert has said…
The world’s largest virus has been found in seawater off the coast of Chile, measuring around 10 to 20 times the length of most viruses. Named Megavirus chilensis, the giant virus infects single-cell marine…
Experts have warned of damage to marine ecosystems after the cargo ship Rena struck a New Zealand reef and leaked around 50 tonnes of oil into the Bay of Plenty. New Zealand maritime authorities said on…
The Times Higher Education World University Rankings has named the University of Melbourne Australia’s best university, but higher education experts have warned that such rankings tables are easily misinterpreted…
Crows can recognise and ascribe numerical meaning to symbols, a new study shows, suggesting that the unusually intelligent birds may be able to “read” numbers and simple icons. Crows are known for their…
A hole in the Arctic ozone layer grew at unprecedented levels this year, a new study has found, exposing densely populated northern hemisphere countries to potentially harmful levels of UV radiation. The…
A new report on Australian birds has added four more species to the critically endangered list and found that a total of 39 species or sub-species are more threatened now than they were a decade ago. The…
Half of Canada’s ancient ice shelves have disappeared in the last six years, researchers have said, with new data showing significant portions melted in the last year alone. The rate at which ice melts…
Nearly 40% of academics under 30 and one-third of staff aged 30-39 years plan to leave the Australian higher education sector within 10 years, according to a new report, raising the prospect of severe…
Fifteen frog species have been discovered in the Western Ghats region of India, including 12 completely new species and three that had not been spotted in nearly 100 years. The “night frogs”, so named…
Laughing with friends for around 15 minutes boosts a person’s pain threshold by an average of 10%, an international study has found. Laughter has long been associated with well-being, even inspiring a…
A top environmental adviser to the Indian government has described the Gillard government’s proposed carbon tax as an “interesting mechanism” that may be useful for Indian climate policy makers. With annual…
An explosion at a nuclear waste facility in Southern France has killed one and badly burned another but is unlikely to cause a dangerous radioactive leak, experts said on Tuesday. The blast occurred late…
As the Gillard government prepares to introduce its carbon price legislation to parliament, senior environment policy advisers from big emitters China and India have said they are watching closely Australia’s…
Breathtaking before-and-after pictures showing how fast a Greenland ice sheet has melted in just two years have shocked a climate change expert familiar with the glacier. The melting of glaciers is seen…
Coral ecosystems cope much better than was first thought when the reef habitat is fragmented, a new study has found, meaning that efforts to restore even small parts of the damaged Great Barrier Reef could…
Global climate change and the El Niño weather event may have played a role in 21% of all civil conflicts since 1950, according to a new study published in the journal Nature. El Niño refers to the periodic…