Australasian Science Magazine
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Australasian Science magazine online is an independent source of news and commentary on scientific developments. Each month scientists and science journalists write about the latest research in plain language and offer opinions and analysis of topical scientific issues.
Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
OceanGate
The oxygen supply of the missing Titan submersible is expected to run out today around 10am GMT, or 8pm AEST.
A frantic search continues for the Titan and its five occupants, with sonar buoys having recorded “banging” noises in the search area on Tuesday and Wednesday.
With the vessel’s fate yet to be determined, the general public is asking questions about the safety of such touristic endeavours.
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
Google DeepMind/Unsplash, CC BY-SA
Our nation is experiencing its lowest productivity growth in 60 years, according to the Committee for the Economic Development of Australia. And this downturn is reflected across most advanced economies worldwide.
So it’s not surprising some see the rise of artificial intelligence (AI)...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
A long-exposure photo reveals the Sun's path in the sky every day for a six-month period. Bob Fosbury / Flickr, CC BY-SA
Happy solstice everyone! The mid-year...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
Unsplash
Fraud in science is alarmingly common. Sometimes researchers lie about results and invent data to win funding and prestige. Other times, researchers might pay to stage and publish entirely bogus studies to win an undeserved pay rise – fuelling a “paper mill” industry worth an estimated €1 billion a year.
Some of this rubbish can be easily spotted by peer reviewers, but the peer review system has become badly...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
OceanGate
An extensive search and rescue operation is underway to locate a commercial submersible that went missing during a dive to the Titanic shipwreck.
According to the US Coast Guard, contact with the submersible was lost about one hour and 45 minutes into the dive, with five people onboard. The vessel was reported overdue at 9.13pm local time on Sunday (12.13pm AEST, Monday).
...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
Shutterstock
Artificial intelligence (AI) seems to be everywhere these days, and healthcare is no exception.
There are computer vision tools that can detect suspicious skin lesions as well as a specialist dermatologist can. Other tools can predict coronary artery disease from scans. There are also data-driven robots...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
Marius Masalar / Unsplash
Fish are the most diverse group of vertebrates, ranging from tiny gobies and zebrafish to gigantic tunas and whale sharks. They provide vital sustenance to billions of people worldwide via fisheries and aquaculture, and are critical parts of aquatic ecosystems.
But fish around the world are getting smaller as their habitats get warmer. For example, important commercial fish species in the North Sea have declined in size by around 16% in the 40 years to 2008, while the water temperature increased by 1–2℃. This “shrinking” trend is...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
Obed Hernández/Unsplash
Over the past eight years, I have been asked to submit astronomical evidence for court cases all over Australia.
Normally when we think of evidence in court, we think of eyewitnesses, DNA or police reports. Often, this evidence requires an expert to explain it – to be able to communicate the findings and data to the members of the court to make an informed decision. These experts are typically in medicine, engineering, psychology, or other...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, A. Martel, CC BY-SA
As dawn rose over the German city of Bremen on May 7 1823, Heinrich Olbers put the finishing touches to an article that left his name in history. After the deaths of his wife and daughter, Dr Olbers had recently given up his work as an opthalmologist to devote himself to his nocturnal passions: the stars, the Moon, meteorites and comets.
Like many of his peers, Olbers trained...
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Australasian Science Magazine
11M ago
Google Deepmind/Unsplash, CC BY-SA
The launch of ever-capable large language models (LLMs) such as GPT-3.5 has sparked much interest over the past six months. However, trust in these models has waned as users have discovered they can make mistakes – and that, just like us, they aren’t perfect.
An LLM that outputs incorrect information is said to be “hallucinating”, and there is now a growing research effort towards...
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