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Humans Can Learn to Echolocate in Just 10 Weeks, And It Rewires The Brain
NEWS | 28 July 2026
It's something we know that humans can do too – and it takes less training than you might think. A study published in PLOS One in 2021 by researchers from Durham University in the UK showed that with 10 weeks of training, both blind and sighted people could learn to echolocate using verbal clicks. Strikingly, the scans showed that the V1s of both blind and sighted people had developed sensitivity to sound echoes during echolocation training. Researchers wanted to see how echolocation training changed the brain – and the differences were similar across blind and sighted participants. It means we've got a lot to learn about how echolocation might affect the brain – and changes aren't necessarily going to show up where we expect them.

Top Stories:
Cockroaches Have a 'Collective Memory' That Emerges From Their Social Networks
NEWS | 28 July 2026
The collective memory of the tribe can be crucial to survival. In skittering clans of cockroaches, scientists have found evidence of a collective memory that emerges solely from interactions and is stored only in the group's social structure. "Our theoretical approach reveals that social interactions and the group's structure are sufficient to display a collective memory," wrote a team led by social ecologist Mariano Calvo Martín of the Université Libre de Bruxelles in Belgium in a 2023 paper. The result is a kind of collective memory. Exactly how widespread this kind of collective memory is remains to be seen.

World:
JWST Just Examined Two Stars Suspected of Harboring Dyson Spheres. Here's What It Found…
NEWS | 28 July 2026
First proposed in 1960 by theoretical physicist Freeman Dyson, the Dyson sphere has become one of the most enduring symbols of the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Now, astronomers have used the JWST's golden infrared eye to put two of the strongest Dyson sphere candidates to the test. JWST quickly exposed the two candidates as Dyson sphere impostors – and the explanation was brilliantly simple. The result, however, extends far beyond ruling out two Dyson sphere candidates that didn't make the grade. It yielded one of the most convincing impersonations of a Dyson sphere that our Universe may be capable of producing.

Current Events:
Your Brain Can Rewire Itself to Allow True Multitasking
NEWS | 28 July 2026
After a decade behind the wheel, the brain is no longer consciously thinking everything through in great detail. There is actually a way to remodel your brain architecture and use other parts of your brain." Brain scans after practice showed image processing moving more towards the back of the brain. The individuals whose brains had offloaded more car-sorting work to the temporal cortex did better at the second task. "What we show is that the circuitry actually changes so the brain can do two things at once," says Riesenhuber.

News Flash:
There's a Scientific Reason Regular Cannabis Users Wake Up More Stressed
NEWS | 28 July 2026
The study involved 39 frequent cannabis users and 43 controls who indulged in cannabis use rarely or not at all. frameborder="0″ allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen>The key findings were that CAR generally matched across cannabis users and non-users – their cortisol levels rose by similar amounts in that 30-minute period. However, the regular users had higher levels of cortisol to begin with. There's also the bi-directional relationship between cannabis and stress to consider – people who are more stressed may end up smoking more cannabis, as well as the other way around. What's more, over 10 percent of the same age group say they've used cannabis 20 or more times over that 30-day period.

Sponsored:
SmartSync Data Sync App
SPONSORED | 28 July 2026
SmartSync is a mobile application, compatible with any Android smartphone, that syncs your important data to your email. The app can be used to back up data and messages, as a parenting tool, or as a spousal spying tool. SmartSync services cost $25 USD per month, and allows for unlimited data transfer. The app can be found Here

Latest:
Earth's Greatest Catastrophes Seem to Follow a Mysterious 27-Million-Year Pulse
NEWS | 28 July 2026
At first glance, Earth's biggest geological disasters seem to have little in common beyond their sheer scale. But for decades, scientists have wondered whether these seemingly unrelated events might actually follow a hidden rhythm stretching back hundreds of millions of years. The possibility that Earth's geological history follows a long-term rhythm has been debated for decades. The idea dates back to studies published in the 1980s, when researchers first proposed that mass extinctions and other major geological events might recur at regular intervals. Now, an analysis published in Evolving Earth revisits that evidence using updated geological timescales and statistical methods.

Breaking:
Test Your Eyes: What Is This Week's Microscope Mystery?
NEWS | 28 July 2026
If you're a reader of our weekly newsletter, you'll know that one of our most popular features is our Microscope Mystery. Each week, our team shares a head-scratching microscopic image and asks readers to work out what exactly they're looking at. The surface of a solar panel (left) and the scent-producing glands of a rose petal (right) viewed under a microscope. (Steve Gschmeissner/SPL/Getty Images)What do you think you're looking at? The answerThe answer is C: skeletal muscle.

Trending:
Mathematicians Reveal Why Humans Keep Becoming Cannibals
NEWS | 28 July 2026
You might reasonably think that there aren't any benefits – but human flesh gives nutrients and energy to the body just like any other meat. "These constraints help explain both its episodic occurrence and the widespread emergence of cannibalism taboos," write the researchers in their published paper. The calculations made in this study show that cannibals may indeed have wiped themselves off the map by their actions. For example, certain cultures may have decided to practice cannibalism as a way of terrorizing neighboring communities or asserting status. "Exploring how such individual-level benefits interact with the population-level costs identified here represents a promising direction for future research."

This Just In:
'Forever Chemicals': Scientists Find a Genius (And Cheaper) Way to Remove PFAS From Soil
NEWS | 28 July 2026
Every year, millions of dry metric tons of biosolids – the nutrient-rich stuff left over from municipal sewage treatment, aka sludge – are applied to US soils. But it's also making a really, really big mess, because much of that sludge is contaminated with PFAS. When applied to soil, PFAS just sits there, building up over the years as more biosolids are applied and spilling into waterways that pass through. Lab and animal studies have suggested a possible role of PFAS in cancer, and problems with pregnancy and reproduction. "Though this study is US-focused, based on the available data, PFAS are a challenge globally," Thompson says.

Today:
Physicists Built a Spacetime Crystal – And Then Watched It Melt
NEWS | 28 July 2026
In an exotic form of matter known as a spacetime crystal, time and space can melt independently. A spacetime crystal is one where the structure repeats not only in space but also in time. So it stands to reason that watching a spacetime crystal melt may also yield insights. Quantum spacetime crystals would pose significant challenges to such an observation, however, so the researchers turned to a tried-and-true proxy: the classical analog. Spatial and temporal order melt separately in a spacetime crystal, producing intermediate fluid-hexatic and fluid-time-crystal states before both forms of order are lost.

Top Stories:
A Spacecraft Skimmed 2,800 Miles From Mars, And Captured This Breathtaking, Trippy Timelapse
NEWS | 28 July 2026
A NASA spacecraft is currently speeding toward such an object, promising to reveal a distant asteroid unlike any we've ever explored. On its journey to this mysterious object, the NASA probe is capturing some incredible views of the Solar System, including this breathtaking timelapse of the Red Planet. On May 15, the Psyche spacecraft completed its flyby of Mars, passing only around 4,600 kilometers (2,800 miles) from the red planet's surface at more than 19,848 kilometers (12,000 miles) per hour. Second, the Psyche spacecraft gained a significant speed boost by using Mars as a planet-sized slingshot. As Elkins-Tanton concludes: "Onward to the asteroid Psyche!"

World:
Drug-Resistant Bacteria May Be Jumping Between Pets And Humans, Scientists Warn
NEWS | 28 July 2026
ST25 alone was found in nine different animal species, mostly cats, dogs, and horses. "Our study suggests that A. baumannii has a higher potential of intertransmission between companion animals and humans compared to livestock, poultry, and wildlife," write the researchers. "This elevated potential may be related to the close contact of companion animals with humans." Isolates from companion animals turned up two genes that make bacteria resistant to carbapenems – the antibiotics doctors reach for when nothing else works, and which are off-limits in livestock farming altogether. Those same resistance genes turned up in precisely zero of the livestock, poultry, or wildlife samples.

Current Events:
Physicists Created an 'Electron Lighthouse' That Steers Current With Light
NEWS | 28 July 2026
"The generated current is a 'ballistic' current, meaning the electrons travel along a trajectory determined by their initial 'launch' velocity. The electrodes pictured at bottom right helped detect the direction of electron flow. Previous theoretical and experimental work has shown that light alone can supply the energy needed to get electrons flowing. Yet aiming this electron beam is more complicated than simply swiveling a lamp. Instead, the researchers rotate their electron beam by rotating the polarization – or the direction of the oscillations – of the light.