Today in Australia, the Coalition released its policy on the National Broadband Network (NBN). So what is the proposal? Amid rhetoric claiming Labor government inefficiency, cost blowouts and failure to…
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Displaying 5501 - 5525 of 6592 articles
How important is penis size? Authors from the Australian National University, Monash and La Trobe provide the most complete answer yet: the size of a flaccid penis can significantly affect how attractive…
It was labelled one of 2012’s most important inventions and “the next big thing”. So it was, with great fanfare, that Google sent its first batch of Google Glasses out into the geekdom in March - and was…
I once made the mistake of asking a mathematician why he devoted his whole life to maths. “Because it’s fun!” he replied wildly, his flabby cheeks beaming with childlike excitement. “Ah, of course,” I…
According to a report in Fairfax media today, the Labor government is set to announce funding for Melbourne’s A$9 billion metro rail tunnel, in addition to the A$40 million it has already contributed towards…
Harvesting space resources will raise living standards worldwide, without further damaging Earth. So how can those resources be tapped in a way that will produce a return on investment? That question may…
Nobel prizewinner Samuel Ting, early this morning (AEDT), announced the first results from the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) search for dark matter. The findings, published in Physical Review Letters…
Can podcasting be patented? If you are an instigator of what’s being referred to as the SHIELD Act – introduced into US Congress last month – the answer would seem to be no. If you represent a US company…
Like all relationships, our association with the moon has had its ups and downs. In this series we’ve talked about the nature of the satellite and how we think it was formed - in a giant collision that…
The launch of the Samsung Galaxy S4 last month garnered the type of media attention we’re getting used to for any new smartphone. Among the most talked-about feature pre-launch was “eye tracking” – the…
Last week, we woke to news that the largest cyber attack ever was underway in Europe, with reports of global internet speeds falling as a result of an assault on the anti-spamming company Spamhaus. In…
Forget “.com” - your next domain name could end with “.melbourne”, “.商店”, or even “.transformers”. The internet is about to expand massively with up to 2,000 new “top level domains” (TLDs) being added…
Do you buy expensive moisturisers in a bid to combat the ravages of age, or does catching a mid-afternoon whiff of your pits have you reaching for the roll-on? We smear various lotions and potions on our…
The village of Akazu’yw lies in the rainforest, a day’s drive from the state capital of Belém, deep in the Brazilian Amazon. Last week I went to Akazu’yw, carrying a dozen Android phones with a specialised…
Tectonic shifts are happening in the way scientific research is done. These changes, and the ways they may eventually affect us all, are chronicled in a new collection of articles commissioned by Nature…
From encouraging the first steps of life migrating from the oceans to the land, to stabilising Earth’s axial tilt against chaotic excursions, the moon is often put forth almost as a magical ingredient…
What is a male? What is a female? If you were to conduct a survey, most people would probably have little difficulty expressing some fundamental differences. After all, we learn to tell boys apart from…
It’s becoming rare to see or hear coverage of combat and conflict without the mention of unmanned “drones” and their use in targeted killings. The subject rated a mention in last year’s US presidential…
Digital technologies have made their way into all aspects of our lives that influence our wellbeing - affecting everything from social relationships and curiosity to engagement and learning. Psychologists…
Technically, Pink Floyd had it wrong. The space-facing side of the moon isn’t dark (except at full moon when the Earth is between the sun and the moon). Not that you’d know that, given we always see the…
There’s a very confusing exchange in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass: “When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more…
You’ve probably seen it happen. You’re driving your car and you come to a stop at the traffic lights. You’re mindful of traffic infringement fines and public safety, then someone on a bike rides past you…
This article was updated on April 12, 2013, and includes responses from WADA and GSK. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has taken the unusual step of warning athletes about the health risks of the banned…
The more we learn about the formation and evolution of our solar system, the more we realise it was far from a sedate, gentle process. Everywhere we look we find evidence the final stages of planetary…
So, the Higgs boson … Last week, researchers at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) finally announced the new particle discovered last summer is indeed a Higgs boson, a particle predicted…