“‘I’ve seen the devil’: Brazil’s UFO capital marks 30 years since ‘alien encounter.'”
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Accessed on 21 March 2026, 2058 UTC.
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Russ Roberts (https://hawaiisciencejournal.com).
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Today
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Sightings in Varginha in 1996 have been dismissed as hoax, but saga continues to draw people from around world The skies over this far-flung coffee-growing hub went charcoal black, the heavens opened and one of Brazil’s greatest mysteries was born. “It really was something unique,” recalls Marco Antônio Reis, a zoo director, who was at his ranch outside Varginha one stormy day in January 1996 whe
Yesterday
This frightening outbreak is not yet over, and serves as a reminder of why plans to manage infectious diseases exist The public health measures taken in response to this month’s meningitis outbreak in Kent so far appear to be working . Two young people have tragically died – one a sixth-former in Faversham, the other a student at the University of Kent. In the Canterbury area, where cases have be
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Moon orbit program, preceding planned landing in 2028, has been delayed due to fuel leaks and clogged helium lines For the second time this year, Nasa moved its moon rocket from the hangar out toward the launchpad on Friday in hopes of sending four astronauts on a lunar fly-around next month. If the latest repairs work and everything else goes Nasa’s way, the Space Launch System could blast off a
Experts continue to analyse strain of MenB to understand whether it has become more likely to spread or cause disease The Kent meningitis outbreak may have reached its peak after only two new cases were reported by officials on Friday. The UK Health and Security Agency said that as of 12.30pm on Thursday, there were 18 confirmed and 11 probable cases of meningitis linked to the Kent outbreak , ta
Causes of meningitis, what the public health response has been, and how the situation differs from Covid The deadly outbreak of meningitis in Kent has fuelled concerns about how far the disease will spread and seen the return of people wearing masks and queueing for vaccines. The scenes are reminiscent of the Covid crisis, but meningitis is very different. Here we look at how the outbreak has unf
Mar 19, 2026
After series of delays, US space agency hopes to carry out first crewed flyby of the moon in more than half a century Nasa has begun returning its towering SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft to its Florida launch pad before a planned flyby of the moon, after completing necessary repairs. Artemis engineers began the manoeuvre, which can take up to 12 hours, at 8pm local time. The US space agency will
Discovery at Monte Verde puts north-to-south expansion theory back at centre of heated debate on continent’s human history A groundbreaking new study may have once again upended our understanding of human prehistory in the Americas. For years, the predominant theory of how humans arrived in the western hemisphere centred around the Clovis culture, which crossed the Beringia land bridge from Asia
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Researchers find snake metabolite that suppresses appetite of obese mice ‘without some of side-effects’ of GLP-1 drugs Pythons follow the ultimate crash diet, swallowing an antelope in a single sitting and then going for months without eating. Now scientists have identified a molecule that appears to be crucial for this metabolic feat, and which they say could pave the way for a new class of obes
Mar 18, 2026
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Research finds cockapoo, cavapoo and labradoodle dogs display more undesirable behaviours than breeds they derive from The UK has oodles of doodles but a study might offer paws for thought: researchers have found some of these designer crossbreed dogs show more behavioural problems than the pure breeds from which they derive. Crosses between poodles and other dog breeds have become increasingly p
Drugs such as semaglutide may be useful for mental health conditions associated with diabetes, authors say Diabetes drugs could prevent anxiety and depression from worsening, according to research . Type 2 diabetes affects more than 800 million people globally and research shows that those with the condition are about twice as likely to have depression as the wider population. Continue reading…
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Glasses use verbal cues and floating text to assist wearers and are expected to be available in early 2027 AI software that can be embedded into smart glasses has won a £1m prize for technology to help people with dementia. Built into chunky, black-rimmed frames that have a camera, microphone and speakers, the tech – known as CrossSense – guides wearers through everyday life by means of a chatty
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Scientists trying to work out why Gauls chose to bury some of their dead in seated position facing west Children at a primary school in eastern France found a strange attraction next to their playground this week: a skeleton sitting upright, peeking out of a circular pit. It is the latest in a series of bodies discovered in the city of Dijon that were buried in a seated position facing west. Cont
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Trillions of insects embark, largely unnoticed, on epic journeys every year across mountain ranges, deserts and seas, and it is only now, as their numbers suffer huge declines, that scientists are tracking their movements On a cloudless sunny day in October 1950, ornithologists Elizabeth and David Lack stood on a mountain pass in the Pyrenees and observed a once-in-a-lifetime spectacle – clouds o
Mar 17, 2026
Researchers say their prototype is a big step towards fully functioning batteries with rapid charging times Australian scientists have developed what they say is the world’s first proof-of-concept quantum battery. Quantum batteries, first proposed as a theoretical concept in 2013, use the principles of quantum mechanics to store energy, and have the potential to be more efficient than conventiona
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Perhaps the biggest surprise is that it tricks ants into moving its seeds with a scent that mimics their larvae Plants are superb at enticing animals to pollinate their flowers or carry off their seeds. But one plant co-opts an astonishing combination of fire, bees and ants to mastermind its reproduction. The South African Natal crocus, Apodolirion buchananii , has a gloriously bright white flowe
Over the weekend, news emerged of an outbreak of meningitis among university and school students in Kent in south-east England. The outbreak has killed two young people and left several others seriously ill. Health officials confirmed that the meningitis B strain has been identified in some of the cases. To find out what we know about the outbreak, who is most at risk and why questions are being
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Study highlights the movements in people’s gait that give away most about their emotional state A long face is not the only sign that someone is down in the dumps. How people walk is revealing too, particularly the swing of the arms and legs, researchers say. Scientists asked volunteers to guess people’s emotions from video clips of them walking and found that bigger swings portrayed more aggress
A meteor that fell over the Cleveland area on Tuesday shook homes and startled residents, who heard a sonic boom that some compared to an explosion. The American Meteor Society said it received reports from Wisconsin to Maryland Meteor over Ohio causes large boom heard as far away as Pennsylvania Continue reading…
Nasa spokesperson says meteor was traveling at 45,000mph but no reports of debris found A meteor over Ohio caused a large boom that jolted people as far away as Pennsylvania on Tuesday morning, Nasa has confirmed. The meteor entered the atmosphere at about 9am local time on Tuesday, producing a sonic boom felt across a wide swath of northern Ohio and beyond. Reports poured in from Cleveland and o
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Physicist who won a Nobel prize for his work on superfluids and superconductors at Sussex University in the 1970s The launch in the 1950s of Sputnik, the world’s first artificial satellite, played an unexpected but important role in propelling Anthony Leggett towards his 2003 Nobel prize for physics. Leggett, who was to become a world-leading researcher in the field of low-temperature physics, ha
Huge rise in demand since outbreak in Kent, which killed two people and left 13 seriously ill, means supplies becoming unobtainable Worried parents are contacting pharmacies in an “increasingly desperate” effort to get their children vaccinated against meningitis after the outbreak in Kent that killed two young people and left 13 others seriously ill. The surge in demand has led to stocks of the
Mar 16, 2026
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Snappily named Xi-cc-plus, Cern physicists spotted the particle in shower of debris that lit up Large Hadron Collider Scientists at the Cern nuclear physics laboratory near Geneva have discovered a heavier version of the proton, the subatomic particle that sits at the heart of every known atom in the universe. They spotted the particle in a shower of debris that lit up a detector at the Large Had
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Grey-market injectable peptides – a category of substances with obscure, alphanumeric names such as BPC-157, GHK-Cu, or TB-500 – have developed a devoted following among biohackers and health optimisers. To understand how these unregulated substances have become mainstream and what they could be doing in our bodies, Madeleine Finlay hears from journalist Adrienne Matei and from Dr Anna Barnard, a
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The answers to today’s problems Earlier today I posed four puzzles from the Hyde Park Math Zine, a maths fanzine from Austin, Texas. Here they are again with solutions. 1. Ring it Continue reading…
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Scientists in the US have uploaded a fruit fly to a computer simulation, while an Australian lab has taught neurons on a glass chip to play a 90s video game. How long before we are all living in a sci-fi movie? It sounds like the opening of a sci-fi film, but US scientists recently uploaded a copy of the brain of a living fly into a simulation. In San Francisco, biotechnology company Eon Systems
Recording of humpback whale from 1949 could also provide new understanding of how the huge animals communicate A haunting whale song discovered on decades-old audio equipment could open up a new understanding of how the huge animals communicate, according to researchers who say it is the oldest such recording known. The song is that of a humpback whale, a marine giant beloved by whale watchers fo
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US based Covid vaccine guidance for children and pregnant people on ideology instead of evidence, critics say Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox There was scant data behind ending the Covid vaccine recommendation for pregnant people and children, according to internal memos made public because of a lawsuit against the US Department of Health and Human Se
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Latest observations of L98-59d, about 35 light years from Earth, suggest it could be different to anything seen before Astronomers have identified a planet composed of molten lava, suggesting the existence of an entirely new category of liquid planet. The distant world, known as L98-59d, is about 1.6 times the size of Earth and orbits a small red star 35 light years away. Astronomers initially th