Philippa Kaur

The newly discovered Moai statue found on Rapa Nui, also known as Easter IslandComunidad Ma'u Henua HANDOUT/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
A moai statue has been discovered on Easter Island at the bottom of a recently dried crater lake. The statue is the first of the island’s famous giant-headed figures to be found in the lake.
Easter Island, located more than 3500 kilometres from the South American continent, is dotted with more than 900 of the iconic statues, carved from volcanic rock more than 500 years ago by the Rapa Nui people.
Most of the statues were carved from rock quarried at the Rano Raraku volcano. Some were left at the volcano, which is now a national park and UNESCO World Heritage Site. Hundreds of others, each of which weigh tens of thousands of pounds, were transported to other parts of the island.Advertisment
“We think we know all the moai, but then a new one turns up,” Terry Hunt at the University of Arizona told the television program Good Morning America, which first reported the find on 25 February.
The new statue is 1.6 metres tall and is “full-bodied with recognisable features but no clear definition,” according to a statement from Ma’u Henua, the Rapa Nui organisation that manages the park. It was found lying face down among tall reeds.
“Under the dry conditions that we have now, we may find more,” said Hunt.
Jeff Overs/BBC News & Current Affairs via Getty Images
The monolithic statues have long inspired awe and speculation about their role in an apparent collapse of the island’s population in the 17th century; the first European on the island landed in 1722. For indigenous Rapa Nui, Hunt said the statues represent deified ancestors.
“For the Rapa Nui people, it’s [a] very, very important discovery,” Salvador Atan Hito, the vice president of Ma’u Henua, told the tv program.
Rano Raraku’s crater is normally filled with water, but the lake has been shrinking since 2018, Ninoska Avareipua Huki Cuadros, director of Ma’u Henua, told Agence France-Presse.
Easter Island has seen a decade of drought, driven in part by climate change as well as the pattern of below-average temperature in the tropical Pacific known as La Nina. The current La Nina is the third in a rare “triple dip” event, which may itself be linked to human-caused climate change.

Topics: More

Anti-evolution books on sale in Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images
Magisteria
Nicholas Spencer (Oneworld Publications)
SCIENCE and religion are in opposition from their foundations upwards, right? One is built on reason and evidence, the other on belief.
Well, I have a confession to make: I don’t buy it. I am an evangelical Christian and a New Scientist editor. Some might say I am the definition of a square peg in a round hole – but there it is.
I say all this by way of explaining why I was excited to get hold … More

Watch
The Mandalorian begins its third season with a journey to Mandalore, spiritual home of protagonist Din Djarin and his fellow helmet-wearing warriors. The Star Wars spin-off is now streaming on Disney+.

Read
The Lives of Beetles are examined by entomologist Arthur Evans in a handsomely illustrated book, full of the latest findings. Considering that beetles make up one-fifth of all living species, it is remarkably concise. On sale from 7 March.

Visit
British Science Week is a 10-day, UK-wide celebration of science, technology, engineering and mathematics run by the British Science … More

Mike Darwin was president of a cryonics company called Alcor Life Extension FoundationSipa/Shutterstock
Frozen Head
Hosted by Alaina Urquhart and Ash Kelley
Wondery
FROM his childhood, Laurence Pilgeram was preoccupied with death. He would vividly imagine his parents in their caskets, wondering why people had to die. Pilgeram went on to build a lab on the family farm in Montana and experimented on guinea pigs, injecting bovine growth hormone into their pituitary glands to see if he could stop ageing and dying. “He was just so afraid of death,” his brother … More

Anti-evolution books on sale in Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images
Magisteria
Nicholas Spencer (Oneworld Publications)
SCIENCE and religion are in opposition from their foundations upwards, right? One is built on reason and evidence, the other on belief.
Well, I have a confession to make: I don’t buy it. I am an evangelical Christian and a New Scientist editor. Some might say I am the definition of a square peg in a round hole – but there it is.
I say all this by way of explaining why I was excited to get hold … More

Lianna Nixon; Leap of ScienceLianna Nixon
FEMALE scientists are still a minority, making up a third of all researchers. In celebration and support of the UN’s International Day of Women and Girls in Science, the UK-based Royal Photographic Society held its first Woman Science Photographer of the Year competition.
Margaret LeJeuneAdvertisment
“Representation helps to invite the next generation to follow their curiosity and get involved in the fields of science and art,” said Margaret LeJeune, who took the adult category’s top prize for her image titled Watershed Triptych (pictured above). It shows maps of the three largest watersheds in the US, lit by bioluminescent marine algae called dinoflagellates. Though their glow looks dazzling, the toxins some of them release can pose a threat to ocean life.
Kelly Zhang
The Young Woman Science Photographer award, open to under-18s, went to Kelly Zhang for The Beauty of Soap Bubbles (pictured above) – a trippy shot of the iridescent surfaces of these delicate spheres. Finalists also included Lianna Nixon for Leap of Science (main image), which provides a snapshot of the recent MOSAiC Expedition that probed how the Arctic will be affected by climate change. Here, researchers are searching for a spot to measure the surface reflectivity of sea ice.
Some shortlisted photos are shown in the trio of images below.
Jindra Jehu
A paper and engine oil structure transformed by the growth of pink oyster mushrooms, by Jindra Jehu (above);
Lina Yeleuova
A nanosatellite launched in 2022 to analyse air pollution, by Lina Yeleuova, runner-up in the under-18 category (above);
Irina Petrova Adamatzky
The skin of a corn snake under UV light, by Irina Petrova Adamatzky (above).

Topics: More

Faith, freedom and spirituality are key to a well-made sci-fi psychological thriller, Animalia. But writer-director Sofia Alaoui leaves the aliens dangling in an unsatisfying ending

Humans

24 February 2023

By Davide Abbatescianni
Oumaïma Barid appears in Animalia by Sofia Alaoui.Courtesy of Sundance Institute
Animalia
Sofia Alaoui (director)
Sundance Film Festival premier
Animalia, a French-Moroccan-Qatari co-production that premiered at last month’s Sundance Film Festival, opens with an intriguing set-up. A deeply pious pregnant woman of modest origins, Itto (Oumaïma Barid), looks forward to a day of quiet when her rich husband Amine (Mehdi Dehbi) and his family go away on business.
On the same day, a mysterious state of emergency is declared nationwide. Amine remains stuck somewhere on the other side of Morocco, while … More