Tag: story
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Batman’s Cocktail Party Mystery
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Every night, bats emerge out of roosts in massive numbers, creating what scientists have called a ‘cocktail party nightmare’ of clashing echolocations. Nobody knew how bats managed this severe sensorial challenge. Now, scientists have tracked bats within a …
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Taste This Machine
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Scientists have developed a device, called “e-Taste”, capable of recreating complex flavours of food and drink from five basic building blocks, and plan to use it to enhance virtual reality and augmented reality systems, boosting immersive experiences. Anthony and …
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Move with the Crowd
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Researchers have discovered that dense crowds can spontaneously synchronize into collective oscillations, with hundreds of people moving in coordinated, swirling patterns. How did they do it? By studying the Spanish tradition of running with the bulls. Jeff and Anthony …
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Try to Imagine It
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People with aphantasia lack the ability to summon images in their “mind’s eye.” But a new study suggests that the blueprints for those imaginary images might still be nestled in their brains. As someone with aphantasia himself, Anthony tries …
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Why Do We Itch?
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Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have uncovered new insights into the dual nature of scratching an itch, indicating that while it can worsen skin inflammation, it can also boost immune defenses against bacterial infections at the injury site. …
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Gut Health Among Friends
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More and more research points to the fact that the microbiome in our gut contributes sigificantly to both our phsyical and mental health. But what defines this microbiome? New analysis of nearly 2,000 people living in remote villages in …
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History’s Greatest Con Man
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In the 19th century, Scottish scammer Gregor MacGregor made a fortune selling land in Poyais. The only problem? Poyais never existed. Jeff and Anthony step through the history of this nortious fraudster, and try to resist parallels to modern …
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Lightning Milk
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Among rural communities in the 18th and 19th centuries, it was taken as fact that a thunderstorm would turn milk sour. Jeff and Anthony look at the journey of scientific discovery around such a strange myth, and what it …
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Do NOT join our secret society. You’ll just wind up with a bunch of cool stuff. It’s gross.