New Scientist

The barn owl’s tail has a surprisingly important role to play in making the bird more aerodynamic

A new website based on the latest scientific research offers people an indication of how their dietary choices can affect their lifespan

Northrop Grumman makes depleted uranium rounds for the US Army, but has made a surprise announcement it will no longer do so, suggesting the controversial weapons are becoming unacceptable

Leading surgeon David Cooper talks about the dawn of a new era of transplantation in which organs for human transplants come from genetically modified animals

When people who weren’t getting enough sleep took measures to sleep for longer, they ate fewer calories per day and lost weight without changes to their diet or exercise

In 2017, Hurricane Maria devastated Caribbean communities, and we now know it had an impact on monkeys too - macaques that lived through the stressful experience have aged at an accelerated rate

Sparrows on a collection of Canadian islands change their behaviour when they fear predators are nearby, and an experiment shows this reduces their ability to raise their offspring to adulthood

Chimps at Loango National Park in Gabon apply small winged insects to their wounds in an apparent form of self-medication, but it is unclear why

People with complete paralysis from the waist down following spinal cord injuries have regained some control over their legs with a spinal implant

A new global analysis suggests glaciers in the Andes contain less ice than we thought – but the glaciers of the Himalayas are thicker

Dogs’ urine and faeces bring large amounts of nitrogen and phosphorus into suburban nature reserves, which could be harmful to plant biodiversity

Moonfall is a disaster movie that starts slow, but when it gets going it is packed with action, incredible special effects and spooky tentacles emerging from a lunar crater. Despite the subject matter, the film succeeds in taking itself fairly seriously

Astronomers have calculated the size of a ‘mega comet’ originating in the Oort Cloud, a cluster of icy bodies that surrounds our solar system

Images captured by satellite have been run through an algorithm to automatically detect the biggest plumes of methane streaming from oil and gas facilities worldwide

The new variant has been found mainly in the Netherlands and it is more infectious, but it can be detected with existing tests and responds to treatment

Rogue black holes are usually detected by the matter falling into them, but the first truly isolated black hole has been found because of the way it bends the light of a distant star

The Central American country's experimental adoption of bitcoin has been beset by problems including identity theft and missing funds. Now the system is being relaunched with a US company providing the infrastructure

The "rolling stop" feature introduced by Tesla in October meant that cars rolled past stop signs instead of stopping, as many states require by law

Japanese folk songs evolved in the same way as those sung in English even though there are significant cultural differences in musical tone and scales

Lakes across the world have seen an increase in algal blooms that strangle freshwater ecosystems, according to an analysis of satellite images from 1982 to 2019