AB
Angharad Brewer Gillham
Editor
56 news posts
Featured news
20 May 2025
Baby on board: humpback whales give birth while migrating and carry on travelling
Humpback whale population’s recovery could reveal we were wrong about where humpback whales give birth — tropical waters aren’t the only nursery.
Environment
19 May 2025
‘Every single species is a unique product of evolution, like a work of art’: how Dr Kit Prendergast champions bees and biodiversity
Macrophotography and bee hotels introduced Dr Kit Prendergast to the world of native bees. Inspired, she began her PhD on protecting native bee biodiversity in urbanised habitats, and investigating the role of the introduced European honey bee on indigenous bee biodiversity and pollination networks. Since completing her PhD, she has worked in diverse roles as an ecological consultant, working to conduct native bee research for not-for-profits, environmental consultancies, Landcare groups, and local and state government, as well as with research institutions. She was awarded a Federal Government Grant to lead a project using bee hotels to help with the recovery of native cavity-nesting bees after the 2019/2020 bushfires. She is also a prolific science communicator, and has won a number of awards for her articles and scientific outreach.
Featured news
14 May 2025
Chimpanzees use medicinal leaves to perform first aid
Scientists observed chimpanzees in Uganda apparently cleaning and treating their own and others’ wounds.
Featured news
07 May 2025
Humans prefer to put more effort into empathizing with groups than with individuals
Study participants asked to choose whether to empathize with or describe people preferred to empathize with groups, despite finding it difficult and distressing.
Featured news
07 Apr 2025
Scientists link a phytoplankton bloom to starving dolphins in Florida
A phytoplankton bloom damaged habitats, deprived bottlenose dolphins of nutritious prey, and led to a sharp rise in strandings and deaths.
Featured news
31 Mar 2025
One hour’s screen use after going to bed increases your risk of insomnia by 59%, scientists find
Using a screen in bed at night makes it much more likely you’ll sleep less and sleep badly — but social media use is no worse than any other form of screen use.
Featured news
21 Mar 2025
Home sweet home: some great hammerhead sharks stick to the perfect neighborhood in the Bahamas instead of migrating
Scientists tracking endangered great hammerhead sharks show that Andros Island, in the Bahamas, is a year-round refuge for some individuals that choose not to migrate.
Featured news
11 Mar 2025
New research reveals how a 252 million year old climate crisis accompanied the ‘Great Dying’ mass extinction event, completely reorganizing the Earth’s ecosystems
By comparing climate models to fossil vegetation, scientists trace the remains of climate chaos following the Permian-Triassic mass extinction — including 10 degrees of global warming caused by CO2 emissions.
Health
07 Mar 2025
Suicide, the music industry, and a call to action
Dr George Musgrave is both a musician and an academic, with first-hand experience of the music industry’s challenges. In this guest editorial, inspired by their moving and urgent new article in Frontiers in Public Health, he and co-author Dr Dorian Lamis, who is a clinical psychologist and suicide prevention expert, turn the spotlight on the toll of death by suicide in the music industry, and call for immediate action to support vulnerable artists.
Featured news
25 Feb 2025
Laser-powered device tested on Earth could help us detect microbial fossils on Mars
Scientists successfully identify microbe fossils in terrestrial rocks like those found on Mars, opening up the possibility of searching for fossils on the Red Planet.
Featured news
18 Feb 2025
Restoring African grassland habitats makes life more peaceful for humans and wildlife, scientists find
Conservation researchers working on grassland restoration in Kenya found that larger areas of restored habitat reduced both social conflicts and human-wildlife conflicts.
Featured news
10 Feb 2025
Scientists find that a playful approach to life activates ‘lemonading’, which helps people cope with adversity
Highly playful people are realistic about their circumstances, scientists say, but they are more resilient in the present and more optimistic about the future.
Neuroscience
31 Jan 2025
Ear muscle we thought humans didn’t use — except for wiggling our ears — actually activates when people listen hard
The auricular muscles, which helped our distant ancestors move their ears to improve hearing quality, activated when people were trying to listen to competing sounds.
Featured news
30 Jan 2025
How tackling sepsis can save millions of lives — and prevent future pandemic deaths
Understanding the different types of immune dysregulation that cause sepsis will let us target treatments, lower future death tolls, and prevent lingering illness like long COVID-19.
Featured news
22 Jan 2025
Curious blue rings in trees and shrubs reveal cold summers of the past — potentially caused by volcanic eruptions
Blue growth rings found in woody plant stems represent years when cells did not lignify properly because of summers too cold for growth.