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Stay informed with commentary and opinion pieces on the latest issues in science, technology, health and the environment, written by expert 51动漫 journalists and world-leading researchers and thinkers.

Life

Why non-human culture should change how we see nature

Our growing understanding of how other animals also share skills and knowledge will help us chip away at the folly of human exceptionalism, say Philippa Brakes and Marc Bekoff

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Humans

The hunt for where the last Neanderthals lived

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Mathematics

Why it鈥檚 easy to be misunderstood when talking about probability

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This new NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope Picture of the Month features a rare cosmic phenomenon called an Einstein ring. What at first appears to be a single, strangely shaped galaxy is actually two galaxies that are separated by a large distance. The closer foreground galaxy sits at the center of the image, while the more distant background galaxy appears to be wrapped around the closer galaxy, forming a ring.?? Einstein rings occur when light from a very distant object is bent (or ???lensed???) about a massive intermediate (or ???lensing???) object. This is possible because spacetime, the fabric of the Universe itself, is bent by mass, and therefore light travelling through space and time is bent as well. This effect is much too subtle to be observed on a local level, but it sometimes becomes clearly observable when dealing with curvatures of light on enormous, astronomical scales, such as when the light from one galaxy is bent around another galaxy or galaxy cluster. When the lensed object and the lensing object line up just so, the result is the distinctive Einstein ring shape, which appears as a full circle (as seen here) or a partial circle of light around the lensing object, depending on the precision of the alignment. Objects like these are the ideal laboratory in which to research galaxies too faint and distant to otherwise see. The lensing galaxy at the center of this Einstein ring is an elliptical galaxy, as can be seen from the galaxy???s bright core and smooth, featureless body. This galaxy belongs to a galaxy cluster named SMACSJ0028.2-7537. The lensed galaxy wrapped around the elliptical galaxy is a spiral galaxy. Even though its image has been warped as its light travelled around the galaxy in its path, individual star clusters and gas structures are clearly visible. The Webb data used in this image were taken as part of the Strong Lensing and Cluster Evolution (SLICE) survey (programme 5594), which is led by Guillaume Mahler at University of

Space

I’m calling it 鈥� 2026 is going to be the year of the galaxy

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Mind

Making autism into a partisan issue can only be harmful

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Life

Why connecting with nature shouldn’t mean disconnecting from science

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Space

The first quantum fluctuations set into motion a huge cosmic mystery

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Woman athlete trail runner running and climbing mountain cliff during her training.

Mind

The 3 things you should do this New Year to foster a positive mindset

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Space

Why I’m going to reap the mental health benefits of stargazing in 2026

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LIAOCHENG, CHINA - FEBRUARY 18: (CHINA OUT) People take photos with the glass sculpture of a Chinese cabbage installed at a square on February 18, 2016 in Liaocheng, Shandong Province of China. The glass sculpture is 9-meters tall and 5-meters wide. The Chinese cabbage is called "Bai Cai" in Chinese which is a homonym with "wealth". (Photo by Visual China Group via Getty Images/Visual China Group via Getty Images)

Life

Could James and the Giant Peach inspire the future of food?

In the latest in our imagined history of inventions yet to come, Future Chronicles columnist Rowan Hooper reveals how by the 2030s, botanists had worked out how to grow hybridised superplants to help feed the world

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Health

2026 is set to be an even bigger year for weight-loss drugs

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Health

Gene-edited babies are the future 鈥� but these CRISPR start-ups aren鈥檛

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Mind

Why it is important to make space for solitude over the festive season

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Technology

How not to misread science fiction

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