Blog

A three metre wide Pac-Man maze with glowing LED ghosts and a robotic Pac-Man will entertain festival goers at Sydney’s Vivid Light festival. An avid student maker group from the University of New South Wales (UNSW), called CREATE, is working hard to make the game in only five weeks.

Five winners from this years’ BHP Billiton Science and Engineering Awards are representing Australia at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (Intel ISEF) in Pennsylvania, USA from 10 to 15 May.

Written by Beth Askham How can we predict extreme weather events like the Sydney storm in Australia last week? The wild storm that hit Sydney was the result of a weather system called an east coast low.

Written by Beth Askham The New Horizons spacecraft has begun sending back images of the much loved dwarf planet. As it gets closer, we will see features on Pluto’s surface for the first time. Craters, canyons, mountains will appear in New Horizons’ images. But what shall we call them?

Written by Beth Askham Even though it has the cutest smile in the marsupial world, quokkas still need a good supply of food, water and rest spots to survive. The biggest population of these adorable marsupials live on Rottnest Island off the coast of Perth in Western Australia.

Written by Hugo Taylor Have you ever heard of the Brontosaurus? This giant dinosaur pops up in books, movies, television shows, in fact, almost everywhere! Even when it was thrown out by scientists, we didn’t want to let it go from our collective imagination. The good news is that this much-loved dinosaur is back.

Written by Beth Askham Deep underground in the centre of Australia is evidence of the biggest asteroid impact in the Earth’s history. It wasn’t just a single impact, but a twin strike from a meteorite that may have split into two as it plummeted towards Earth.

Written by Beth Askham When mysterious lumps of pumice stone washed up on beaches in Tasmania, Australia, Rebecca Carey knew that they must be coming from an underwater volcano. Rebecca is a Tasmanian volcanologist (someone who studies volcanos), and she had been tracking the travelling pumice for more than a year.

Written by Beth Askham A minor geomagnetic storm was forecast for around midday (Australia time) Friday the 13 of March. The storm is a result of three solar flares from the Sun that occurred earlier this week. Looks like we’re in for some rough space weather!

Written by Beth Askham Drones, lasers, planes and liquid nitrogen were all called in to measure the growth of a Tasmanian forest. Sometimes measurement can be a little more exciting than you might think.