sciencetech

Cars can now ‘talk to traffic lights’ so vehicles can anticipate the green light

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Drivers will soon be able to avoid idling traffic lights thanks to cutting-edge tech from SEAT that knows when the lights will turn red or green. The latest SEAT Leon, revealed today, is connected to the cloud which provides instantaneous data on nearby traffic lights. It then tells drivers what colour the light will be when … Read more

Mysterious creature called a ‘floating city’ is spotted in rare sighting 

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Population of extremely rare ‘floating city’ creatures made up of multiple smaller organisms is spotted in shallow water off the coast of Australia The benthic siphonophore is made of many smaller organisms working together  They are normally thought to live around 1,000ft (3,000m) underwater  Little is known about this mysterious creature as it is rarely … Read more

Praising pupils rather than punishing them can improve focus by up to 30 per cent, study claims 

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Hey teacher, leave those kids alone! Praising pupils rather than punishing them can improve focus by up to 30 per cent, study claims Experts monitored 2,536 students in US classrooms over a three-year period The pupils ranged from kindergarten to sixth-grade level — or between 5–12  Those receiving more praise from teachers were found to be … Read more

Amateur astronomers discover a new form of Northern Lights that resemble sand dunes

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Amateur astronomers have discovered a new form of Northern Lights that resemble sand dunes, caused by waves of oxygen flowing through a stream of solar particles. The evenly patterned, green-tinged light show stretches for more than 30 miles and is found more than 60 miles up in the mesosphere. They were identified by chance after … Read more

NASA’s new spacecraft will travel within 26 million miles of the sun in order to gather data

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NASA has a new mission on the horizon that will snap the first pictures of the sun’s north and south poles. In collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA), the team is launching the Solar Orbiter that will use Venus’s and Earth’s gravity to swing itself out of the ecliptic plane — the area of … Read more

The kinds of fonts political campaigns choose for their signs could trigger political biases

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The choice of fonts in political campaigns could trigger unconscious bias according to a new study, which finds serif fonts are seen as more conservative and sans serif are more liberal Researchers at Virginia Tech interviewed 987 test subjects about fonts They found the subjects viewed serif fonts as slightly more conservative Sans serif fonts … Read more

Buzzybodies! Single mother bees inspect their neighbours’ nests for signs of parasite infection

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Buzzybodies! Single mother bees scour their neighbours’ nests for signs of parasitic infection to find the best location for their own larvae to hatch Vast majority of wild bees are solitary species which have their own small nest   Scientists found bees assess the state and fitness of various neighbouring nests  When they saw parasitic infection … Read more

Grave of Iron Age warrior buried with sword, scabbard and SPEAR is found

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Iron Age warrior buried with a sword, scabbard and SPEAR after his death 2,000 years ago is unearthed by builders in West Sussex The remains were found on the outskirts of Walberton, near Chichester The male body was buried with a sword in a highly-decorated scabbard   A long spear was also found alongside the 2,000-year-old skeleton  … Read more

Before and after pics of NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover reveal the Red Planet has taken its toll

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The search for life on other planets has captivated mankind for decades. But the reality could be a little less like the Hollywood blockbusters, scientists have revealed. They say if there was life on the red planet, it probably will present itself as fossilized bacteria – and have proposed a new way to look for … Read more