Science Illustrated

That’s 8 issues of for just $8.12 a copy (normally $9.99)! Every issue of Australian Science Illustrated includes news and features on: • New science discoveries• Astronomy, cosmology and the universe• Plant and animal biology• Archaeology and palaeo

The Solar System’s biggest planet is a bubbling gas inferno in which toxic gases are constantly spinning. When gas is heated deep inside Jupiter and rises to the surface, some of the gases freeze so rapidly into ammonia that white ice crystals form,

Although badly fragmented, the dentition and basic features (the snout is to the right) of this giant wombat head have been preserved since it roamed Australia 25 million years ago. Mukupirna – meaning ‘big bones’ in the Dieri and Malyangapa language

COSMOLOGY The vast majority of matter in the universe is invisible to us, and we don’t know what it is. Dark matter reveals its existence only by the influence of its gravity. Yet without dark matter, visible matter would never have gathered into the

PALAEONTOLOGY When a global disaster 66 million years ago sent dinosaurs and many other species extinct, among those which survived were the ancestors of modern birds. A new discovery shows us what some of them may have looked like. Scientists from t

ECOLOGY Biologists can list 50+ different microorganisms that we can use to break down plastic waste, but large animals with the same qualities are rare. Scientists from Canada’s Brandon University were hence surprised when they examined the Galleria

Since 2014, ISS astronauts have experimented with growing lettuce. Previous experiments have shown that the lettuce is safe to eat, and now new analyses demonstrate that it is actually healthier than lettuce grown here on Earth. Space lettuce is rich

TECHNOLOGY Jellyfish are the most efficient swimmers in the oceans, consuming very little energy as they move through the water, and they keep moving 24/7. But they are also slower than most other creatures. Researchers into robotics at Stanford Univ

COSMOLOGY Einstein’s relativity theory from 1915 forms the basis of our understanding of gravity, and its predictions have been confirmed many times in recent decades by astronomers’ observations of black holes and gravitational waves. Now a third pr

OCEANOLOGY The further down the food chain we can eat, the more efficient that food usually is, and a 1977 NASA report conjectured that humans might in future use a diet of krill as the most efficient use of ocean resources. Since then, krill harvest

MEDICINE People who get an organ transplant often require anti-rejection drugs for the rest of their lives. The medication prevents the body from attacking the new organ, but has the side-effect that the patients become more vulnerable to infection.

An armada of robotic ships is designed to map out Earth’s most unknown region – the ocean floor. As part of an international cooperation project, the Ocean company is building 11 robotic ships of 21-37 metres length. They are to sail side by side and

PALAEONTOLOGY The unrivalled heavyweights among dinosaurs, sauropods were huge. Some were 40 metres long and weighted 100 tonnes. They had powerful legs to carry all this weight, but their gait must have been slow, moving one leg at a time in small s

BIOLOGY Rigor mortis usually originates 3-4 hours after death, when the muscles’ energy stores are depleted. The muscles consume energy when they contract, although they consume the most energy when they relax, as the contractions themselves don’t re

The first seat belt was invented in the 1800s by aeronautics pioneer George Cayley, but the modern three-point design was created in 1958 by Swedish engineer Nils Bohlin. In 2002, Volvo estimated that the invention had saved at least one million live

NATURE Monkeys, rabbits, rodents, wombats, wallabies and deer have all been known to eat the Cannabis sativa plant without experiencing the effects of the euphoriant tetrahydrocannabinol. The animals remain unaffected because of both behaviour and ph

CLIMATE Happily, not too much. Cows, on the other hand, are more of a problem. A big ruminant will emit 1000 times more methane than a human being – around 120kg a year for a cow, whereas the average human being emits only about 120 grams a year. As

The organism in the photo is a cancer cell from a sarcoma as it ‘migrates’ during a lab experiment. 1 Scientists study cancer cell motion carefully. This electron microscope image shows cancer cells from a sarcoma as they migrate through the filter o

PHYSICS Obviously all plans for Mars missions involve astronauts being well-protected against the adversities of space and life on another planet. But even if they venture outside on Mars without a spacesuit, an astronaut’s blood wold not boil immedi

ZOOLOGY Fruit flies buzz about our homes all the time, and can be so small that we barely notice them. The flies primarily feed on the yeast cells which exist in stale fruit, but also in dead potted plant leaves. Fruit flies have an excellent sense o

BIOLOGY Just as green plants harvest the energy of sunlight with their chloroplasts and chlorophyll, at least three fungus species are able to feed on radioactivity: C. sphaerospermum, W. dermatiti-dis, and C. neoformans. Such fungi could deliver a p

Until Covid-19 disrupted travel, some 20 million people were travelling each year on one of the world’s approximately 250 cruise ships. Passengers produce tonnes of waste of different types. Some is collected in tanks and left on dry land. Some is pu

H U M A N B O D Y If you have not eaten anything for a long time, your mouth can get dry, which creates favourable conditions for bacteria. It is their waste products that can make your breath reek of vomit, smelly feet, or rotten meat. When we eat,

5-15km Volcanic glass Angular 800-1000°C Ash clouds consist of angular grains that wear down plane bodies and external sensors, making even windows dim. Ash grains have a low melting point so could collect into disastrous clusters inside warm plane e

… or as far as we can get, anyway. The current world record for deep drilling was set by the Kola Superdeep project, begun in 1970 in a cold corner of the Soviet Union. But it was limited by drilling techniques of the day, and Earth held on to many o

New ice world is half as big as Pluto One of the remote heavenly bodies that the probe will pass close by and study carefully is the small ice world of Quaoar. The enigmatic object was discovered in 2002 and may be a dwarf planet. With a diameter of

As the Interstellar Probe heads around the Sun it accelerates to a speed far faster than any man-made vehicle has ever achieved before, exceeding 300,000km/h as it picks its path out of the Solar System. At this speed the space probe could travel to

The phenomenon of electromagnetism was named only 200 years ago. Its discovery and subsequent scientific application have shaped the world as we know it today, and will continue to shape the future, with physicists now aiming to harness the force to

Magnetic needle shocks scientists Danish physicist Hans Christian Ørsted discovers that electricity generates magnetic fields which influence a compass needle proving that electricity and magnetism are linked as one and the same force of nature – whi

Your phone wakes you up at the exact time you programmed into its magnetic memory chip. You drive your electric car to the office, where you turn on a computer and log on to the server. After work you drive to a restaurant somewhere you’ve never been

1 In an induction hob, the hotplate is a fixed magnetic coil. By sending an alternating current through the coil, the magnetic poles are constantly reversed and an alternating magnetic field materialises. 2 The alternating magnetic field reacts with

Radio waves are used for communication – from radio news broadcasting to contacting space probes. Unlike light, these longer radio waves are not slowed by physical objects and they are harmless to health, as they don’t carry sufficient energy to affe

As hot as Earth’s core – Tokamak Energy’s physicists made the temperature of their fusion ball reactor increase to 15 million degrees Celsius in 2018. The reactor copies the processes in the Sun's interior, turning hydrogen into helium through fusion

A cooling system supplies liquid helium at a temperature of minus 271 degrees. Some 7000 litres of liquid helium flows in a circuit around the scanner’s huge magnet in order to maintain the superconducting current. The scanner contains 182km of wirin

Half a man is walking across a green field covered with solar panels. Only his feet, head, and one arm are visible. The rest of the man is invisible, replaced by the green grass of the field. The effect is created by a new and promising attempt at an

1 When light strikes a material, the result is positive refraction, as when a straw is immersed in a glass of water. To the observer, it looks as if the straw bends slightly outwards at the point where it enters the water. 2 The invisible plastic con

NEW SERIES : YOUR life is a hallucination, your memories are partly fiction, and you cannot control your own thoughts. Scientists are discovering how our brains deceive us all the time. Memory Senses Logic Free will FALSE MEMORY COUNTERMEASURE DETECT

1 An experience activates different parts of the brain – the impression of a human being can activate the insula, while a tree triggers thoughts in the frontal lobe. The sub-elements are stored in tiny networks linked into a particular memory via the

1 Patients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are tormented by traumatic memories. A war veteran might experience extreme fear when he sees a weapon that reminds him of some experienced horror of war, and his body releases adrenaline to the c

Take a look at these 15 photos one at a time. Spend about two seconds on each picture. Read the other two problems, and wait 10-20 minutes. Then turn to page 81 and follow the instructions. WHITE, ORANGE, BLACK, GREEN, BROWN, PURPLE, SUN, YELLOW, PIN

DETERRENCE The regal horned lizard can strike the face of a predator with a jet of toxic blood from a distance of a metre. Regal horned lizards are sturdy reptiles the size of frogs that live in dry regions of North and Central America. The 15 known

Imagine the drive-through queue to a restaurant in the near future. You order breakfast and drive to the next window, where your food bag is handed through the car window, and you drive away. Did you forget to pay? No – it happened automatically, no

1 The human eye is constantly making tiny motions known as microsaccades, which last 6-30 milliseconds. Microsaccade patterns are unique, and scientists from the University of Potsdam have discovered that a person can be identified reliably if one ey

1 Cars include many electric components – from cables to instrument panels and computers. All units emit electromagnetic radiation, and the combined radiation represents a unique fingerprint. The radiation from all units can be captured by an antenna

1 As soon as a user account has been set up, it earns nims by the minute that are saved in a digital ‘purse’. Once nims have been created, they can never disappear again, so there will always be more nims. A total of 683,748 nims (the number of nims

In regions of the world lacking fertile soil, the Nemo’s Garden research project could provide a solution. Underwater biospheres function like greenhouses, warmer than the water around them, and once a little fresh water is added to the biosphere, it

The distance from Westtown to Easttown is 11km. Midtown is 3km from Westtown in the direction towards Easttown. Uptown is located 4km directly north of Westtown. And Downtown is located 6km directly south of Easttown. 1 So what is the direct distance

Earth, the Sun, and everything else in the universe formed from dust. And right here in Australia scientists have discovered a dust particle that is much older than the Solar System, and have reconstructed its seven billion years of history. JANAÍNA