Signs of Terry Pratchett’s dementia may have been hidden in his books 12. March 2025 (16:34) Terry Pratchett was diagnosed with posterior cortical atrophy, a type of dementia caused by Alzheimer’s disease, in 2007 – but an analysis of his Discworld books suggests there were signs of the condition a decade earlier(New Scientist)
Doubts cast over D-Wave's claim of quantum computer supremacy 12. March 2025 (16:14) D-Wave's claim that its quantum computers can solve problems that would take hundreds of years on classical machines have been undermined by two separate research groups showing that even an ordinary laptop can perform similar calculations(New Scientist)
Saturn has 128 new moons – more than the rest of the planets combined 11. March 2025 (21:20) Saturn has dozens of new moons, bringing it to a total of 274. All of the new moons are between 2 and 4 kilometres wide, but at what point is a rock too small to be a moon?(New Scientist)
Saturn gains 128 moons, giving it more than the other planets combined 11. March 2025 (21:20) Saturn has dozens of new moons, bringing it to a total of 274. All of the new moons are between 2 and 4 kilometres wide, but at what point is a rock too small to be a moon?(New Scientist)
The asteroid Bennu is even weirder than we thought 11. March 2025 (21:11) Analysis of samples brought back to Earth from the asteroid Bennu reveal that it has a bizarre chemical make-up and is unusually magnetic(New Scientist)
The biggest coincidence in human evolution 11. March 2025 (18:00) Farming arose on multiple continents among populations with radically different cultures and environments and with no means of communicating with each other – how did it crop up independently at about the same time?(New Scientist)
Can we rely on forests to soak up the extra CO2 in the atmosphere? 11. March 2025 (16:00) A patch of old oak trees in the UK is helping scientists to predict how the world’s forests will respond to higher levels of carbon dioxide, a crucial question for our future climate(New Scientist)
H5N1 flu is now killing birds on the continent of Antarctica 11. March 2025 (15:03) A highly pathogenic strain of bird flu is spreading south along the Antarctic Peninsula and could devastate populations of penguins and other seabirds(New Scientist)
