IFLScience - Break It Down

This week on Break It Down: Amazon river dolphins are saying it with urine proudly sprayed directly into the air, an inside look at the planetary defense response to asteroid 2024 YR4 (and no, it isn’t too late), find out what mummies smell like thanks to a team of “sniffers”, whale song follows Zipf’s Law, red light therapy – does it actually work? And say hello to kama muta, the emotion we've all felt but probably don’t know the name for.

So, sit back, relax, and let’s Break It Down…

Links:

Dolphin pee

Asteroid 2024 YR4

Ancient mummy smell

Whale song

Blue whale whispers

Red light therapy

Kama muta

We Have Questions

Vengeful Valentine’s

This week on Break It Down: the world's oldest runestone might have been carved by a woman in a language that predates the Vikings, asteroid 2024 YR4 has a 2.3 percent chance of hitting Earth in 2032 (but we’re not panicking yet), an ancient jawbone might reveal a new branch of the hominid family tree, science in the US is under attack after a slew of executive orders from the Trump administration, a fossil from Antarctica suggests ducks have been swimming around for a lot longer than we thought and we explore whether we actually own our bodies.

This week on Break It Down: A CIA report says the origins of COVID being a lab leak is “likely” but what does that really mean? The Doomsday Clock ticks closer to humanity's destruction, asteroid Bennu’s sample contains the building blocks of life (but not aliens), the oldest poison arrow dates back 7,000 years, a mouse with two male parents survives to adulthood in a world first, “boomerasking” might be the social snub of 2025, and we enter The Vault to explore why people believe in the Simulation Hypothesis. 

So sit back, relax, and let’s Break It Down…

COVID lab leak

This week on Break It Down: a new timeline shows exactly when and how the eruption of Vesuvius spread, chimps have been observed going to the bathroom together all at the same time, trust in science remains high worldwide despite recent global events, sex differences between male and female brains are present as early as newborn babies, and did COVID lockdowns actually affect the temperature on the Moon? Finally, what’s the best dino movie of all time? We asked the experts to find out.

So sit back, relax, and let’s Break It Down…

Links

Pompeii

This week on Break It Down: lasers revealed 1,200-year-old mummies’ sweet tats, the mission to de-extinct the thylacine takes a leap forward, video footage of a meteorite hitting someone’s garden might be a world first, China announces plans to build the solar power station equivalent of “Three Gorges Dam” in space, researchers discover an Iron Age society ruled by women, and how did dinosaurs have sex? We find out from palaeontologist Riley Black what we do (and don’t) know so far.

So, sit back, relax, and let’s Break It Down…

Links:

Tattooed mummies

Thylacine de-extinction

Meteorite strike

Can you keep meteorites you find?

Solar power in space

Iron Age women

Dinosaur sex

How did dinosaurs have sex? Podcast

Alligators’ penile jack-in-a-box

How did the chicken lose its penis?

We Have Questions

Subscribe

Skrunkly crab

Sunfish popcorn larva

This week on Break It Down: unexpected and unexplained structures have been discovered hiding under the Pacific Ocean, the oldest equatorial dinosaur fossil in the world dates back a whopping 230 million years, a painted dog penis bone has been found in a ritual shaft in England (some puns write themselves), cave art from France could be the oldest 3D map in the world, Nobel Prize winners can go loopy (and start talking to raccoons) after winning, and what was Plato talking about when he described a metal "more precious than anything except gold?”

So, sit back, relax, and let’s Break It Down…

Links:

Unexplained structures

This week on Break It Down: one of the most significant mammal recoveries ever recorded (and four other wildlife wins), a once-in-a-lifetime event is about to kick off in space, spookily accurate predictions made by a “professor” 100 years ago, an undersea volcano is about to erupt, scientists achieve a world-first embryo milestone on the path to giraffe IVF, and 100 years since Hubble proved the universe is unimaginably vast, we explore how he did it.

So sit back, relax, and let’s Break It Down…

Links:

Saiga antelope recovery

Coronae borealis nova event

Spooky 2025 predictions

Undersea volcano eruption

World-first giraffe embryo breakthrough

100 years since Hubble proved the Universe is massive

DNA phenotyping

How many ants are there in the world?

This week on Break It Down: Earth’s magnetic pole is in a new position, the second most cited paper to ever be withdrawn is finally retracted, Charlotte the bubble-butted turtle gets a special swimming harness, The Blob’s legacy marks the worst single-species mortality event in modern history, a Roman solution to Mars suggests blood makes for great cement, and we send one of our writers on a mission to test out ancient hangover cures. Anyone for cabbage?

Links:

Magnetic pole movements

Paper retracted

Turtle “bubble butt”

The Blob mortality event

Blood houses on Mars

Ancient hangover cures

We Have Questions

Sign up to receive CURIOUS

The Big Questions

Pacific sleeper shark

This week on Break It Down: fishers discover a mysterious tablet bearing an unknown language, sequencing the oldest human genome reveals when we first bred with Neanderthals, Jupiter’s got a shiny new ring, a new predator captured in the darkest depths of the Atacama Trench, working out the rules to an ancient boardgame, and can donor organs transfer memories? Transplant patients report strange personality changes.

So sit back, relax, and let’s Break It Down…

Links:

Mysterious tablet

Complaint tablet

Sequencing the oldest human genome

Jupiter’s new ring

Sharks older than Saturn’s rings

Deep-sea predator

Ancient boardgame

The Big Questions

Donor organs and memory

Piggyback heart transplant

Guitarfish

True crime

We Have Questions

Subscribe

This week on Break It Down: scientists may have discovered a new ancient relative of humans, collar cameras from Andean bears reveal Paddington may have a taste for cubs, we’ve been paying the salmon tax to dogs for 2,000 years more than thought, new biohybrid wood glows green in the dark, diamond batteries could last for thousands of years, and it turns out spaceports make for remarkably good wildlife sanctuaries.

Links:

New human species

Cannibalistic Paddington

Ancient dog friends

Sign up to CURIOUS

Glowing wood

Diamond battery

Spaceports and nature

The Big Questions

Genghis Khan

Frosty the orca

True Crime: Harold Shipman

Wisdom the albatross has laid an egg