All Space Articles

Learn about why a predicted increase in phytoplankton is good news for our environment; how researchers can detect evidence of climate change from just one day of global weather conditions; and how Pablo Escobar's hippos became an invasive species in Colombia.

The five-part series THE EARTHSHOT PRIZE: REPAIRING OUR PLANET focuses on five major challenges facing the planet; Protect and Restore Nature; Clean our Air; Revive our Oceans; Build a Waste-free World; and Fix our Climate. If these ambitious goals for our planet were achieved by 2030, it would improve life for everyone.

In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following stories from Curiosity.com to help you get smarter and learn something new in just a few minutes:

Quantum signals can travel over interstellar distances, shows new findings.

Learn about how doctors on Earth diagnosed and treated an astronaut’s medical problem in space for the first time; a new study that explains why whales are so big, but not bigger; and a Stanford technique for getting better at picking creative ideas.

Learn about why the universe may have been teeming with life billions of years ago; why NASA’s Mars 2020 Martian rover mission is going to be a huge milestone; and four personality types people fit into, according to new research.

Learn the surprising reason why religious people tend to have more children; why sea turtles are actually pretty clumsy navigators; and where astronomers found the center of our solar system (spoiler alert: it’s not the center of our sun).

Learn about a simple way to reduce your internet carbon footprint; how brain images can make you more likely to believe fake science; and how loud the sun is.

Learn about why your wounds heal faster in the daytime; the Peter Principle, which explains why so much goes wrong; and why there’s one tame population of foxes on Earth, and what they’ve taught us about evolution.

Learn about a new discovery about rain on the sun; why flamingos stand on one leg; and why you blink the way you do when you’re watching a movie.

In this podcast, Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer discuss the following stories to help you get smarter and learn something new in just a few minutes:

Learn about how you can go on a simulated mission to Mars (in Spain); and, what the weather forecast really means when it says there’s a chance of rain. You’ll also learn about how people around the world talk differently online, with internet linguist Gretchen McCulloch.

Learn about why your dog might be lying about its size and how physicists just achieved room-temperature superconductivity for the first time. But first, food science expert Harold McGee is back to talk about the smells that existed before Earth did.

Learn how scientists induced an out-of-body experience in a human without using drugs; and Earth’s geological “pulse.”

Learn how a newly detected methane spike on Mars may change our understanding of the red planet; and how you can participate in a new research study on game transfer phenomena, with researcher Angelica Ortiz de Gortari.