Author: Editorial Board

CSIRO scientists are combining micro sensing, sterile insect technology and new insect trapping systems to protect our farms from one of Australia’s most economically damaging pest – the Queensland fruit fly. Although only 8mm in length the Queensland fruit fly, or Q-fly, is a highly mobile insect capable of infecting a wide range of major…

What do a dancer, a chess player, a visual artist, a trumpeter, an architect, and a cab driver have in common? In the case of the dancer, the chess player, the visual artist, the trumpeter, the architect, and the cab driver profiled in trained molecular biologist and neuroscientist and The Rough Guide to the Brain…

A new CSIRO-developed map of Australia’s stored soil carbon provides an important benchmark against which Australia can track future changes in soil carbon storage or carbon sequestration. Providing the most detailed and accurate representation of soil organic carbon stocks, to a depth of 30 cm, at a national scale, the 2010 soil organic carbon map…

The world is a dynamic mess of jiggling things, if you look at it right. When you see an ordinary rubber band stretched around and holding together a stack of stuff over a long period of time, you’re actually witnessing a miraculous force of physics at work — a perpetual pounding of the atoms as…

An international team of researchers has found evidence that the steam and heat from volcanoes and heated rocks allowed many species of plants and animals to survive past ice ages, helping scientists understand how species respond to climate change. The research could solve a long-running mystery about how some species survived and continued to evolve…

“When the profit motive gets unmoored from the purpose motive, bad things happen.” The question of how to avoid meaningless labor and instead find fulfilling work brimming with a sense of purpose is an enduring but, for many, elusive cultural ideal. Daniel Pink tackles the conundrum in this wonderful animation by the RSA — who…

The reason that there is clearly more water on the Earth than on the other planets of the Solar System has not been clarified. There are few theories on how the world’s oceans were formed over the past 4.6 billion years. Some of the most likely contributory factors to the origin of the Earth’s oceans…

Oxford University professor Marianne Talbot has a number of excellent philosophy podcasts online, some of which we’ve previously featured on the site. Today, we bring you Talbot’s A Romp Through Ethics for Complete Beginners (Web – iTunesU – YouTube), which addresses one of philosophy’s central questions: what is the right way to conduct yourself in…

Everyone’s had one of those days when everything seems to go wrong. At this point, some of us resort to nature’s tried and true stress relief method – crying. But, why do we cry? Is there any scientific explanation to this phenomenon? Basically, there are some research explanations which we would like to present you…

Over the decades security experts all around the world have been debating what sort of protection is the most suitable for a PC. So, what do you think you should do to keep your computer cyber safe? Below are some key steps to protecting your computer from intrusion: Keep Your Firewall Turned On A firewall…

What the ancient proto-chicken has to do with how wolves became dogs. Since the dawn of recorded history, philosophers have pondered which came first, the chicken or the egg, as a causality dilemma exploring grander existential inquiries into the origin of life and the universe. But, it turns out, science has an answer that bypasses…

Queensland’s researchers and scientists are encouraged to apply for fellowships to help them develop and establish their professional reputations through innovative, practical and applied research, working closely with business. The $3 million Accelerate Fellowships funding program was opened today by Queensland Chief Scientist Dr Geoff Garrett AO who said the program will support scientists to…

If you head over to the Huy Fong Foods web site, they’ll tell you that Sriracha, their ever-popular Thai condiment, is “made from sun ripen chilies which are ground into a smooth paste along with garlic and packaged in a convenient squeeze bottle.” It’s the chilies that make your mouth burn when you pour that…