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When a woman becomes pregnant, the outcome of that pregnancy depends on many things — including a crucial event that happened while she was still growing inside her own mother’s womb. It depends on the quality of the egg cells that were already forming inside her fetal ovaries. The DNA-containing chromosomes in those cells must…

Physicists in Australia and Britain have reshaped quantum uncertainty to sidestep the restriction imposed by the famous Heisenberg uncertainty principle – a result that could underpin future ultra-precise sensor technology used in navigation, medicine and astronomy. The Heisenberg uncertainty principle, introduced in 1927, says that you can’t know certain pairs of properties – such as…

An international research team from Switzerland and Germany, led by Gaël Spicher (JURASSICA Museum, Porrentruy, Switzerland), has described a new ichthyosaur species based on fossils curated at the Urwelt-Museum Oberfranken (Bayreuth, Germany). The study was published in Museum für Naturkunde Berlin’s open-access journal Fossil Record. The new species was named Eurhinosaurus mistelgauensis, in reference to…

A decade ago, scientists first detected ripples in the fabric of space-time, called gravitational waves, from the collision of two black holes. Now, thanks to improved technology and a bit of luck, a newly detected black hole merger is providing the clearest evidence yet of how black holes work — and, in the process, offering…

After the formation of the Solar System, it took a maximum of three million years for the chemical composition of the Earth’s precursor to be completed. This is shown by a new study by the Institute of Geological Sciences at the University of Bern. At this time, however, there were hardly any elements necessary for…

Georgina RannardClimate and science correspondent Gwyndaf Hughes/BBC Nadine Mitschunas is the UK’s first rice grower Gwyndaf HughesClimate and science videographer In an ordinary field in a quiet part of east England, a unique experiment is taking root. “When I tell people what I’m doing here, they think I’m joking,” says Nadine Mitschunas, the UK’s first…