On December 1, 2020, the United Kingdom (U.K.) became the first western country to give emergency approval for a COVID-19 vaccine. The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) officials announced they would begin distributing 800,000 doses of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine to 50 British hospitals as early as next week. The initial vaccines will be administered to some of the nation's most vulnerable citizens — nursing home residents, health workers, and the elderly....

Over the years, the caretakers at the Southern Plains Wildlife Rehabilitation Center (SPWRC) in Lubbock, Texas, have sheltered hundreds of species of orphaned and injured animals, ranging from birds to reptiles. However, the hairless baby opossum, dropped off at the center in mid-October by a concerned resident, was unlike any animal they had encountered before....

With much of our world automated, many experts believe that coding should be a core part of modern education. Yet, only 20 US states offer high school students access to computer science courses, and just 8 of those make the subject accessible to kids in lower grades. However, thanks to Seattle-based Code.org's Hour of Code Challenge, learners of all ages and backgrounds can now get exposure to this all-important subject....

The next time you find an excuse to abandon your aspirations, think of Chris Nikic. On November 7, 2020, the 21-year-old Maitland, Florida, resident made history as the first person with Down Syndrome to attempt and complete an Ironman. Organized by the World Triathlon Corporation, the grueling competition requires athletes to swim 2.4 miles, bike 112 miles, and run a full, 26.2-mile, marathon — in under 17 hours!...

On November 24, 2020, President Donald Trump exercised his executive powers for a beloved Thanksgiving tradition — the turkey pardon. The gorgeous toms, dubbed "Corn" and "Cob," were raised at an Iowa family farm owned by National Turkey Federation Chairman Ron Kardel, a 6th generation turkey, corn, and soybean farmer. The lucky birds will spend the rest of their days under the watchful eyes of animal science students at Iowa State University....

Extreme athletes have been using wingsuits — unique jumpsuits with fabric stitched between the arms and body and between the legs — to fly untethered for many years. However, while the "birdman" or "squirrel" suits allow daredevils to soar in the skies, the pull of gravity makes it impossible to accelerate or fly higher. To push past the limitations, Austrian stuntman Peter Salzmann teamed up with German car manufacturer BMW. The result is an electrified wingsuit, which allows flyers to zoom to higher altitudes at speeds of up to 186 miles per hour!...

Stars that get too close to black holes usually end up getting sucked in by the strong gravitational forces of the dense space objects, from which no light can escape. Now, for the first time, researchers have been able to observe the cosmic phenomenon — nicknamed "spaghettification" because it pulls apart a star into thin "spaghetti-like" strands — in real-time....

Soft robots, which can move around the ocean without harming sea life, are ideal for underwater exploration. However, they are rarely deployed because they are extremely slow and have a hard time maneuvering through the water. But that may change soon thanks to an innovative, self-propelling soft robot created by researchers at the University of California, San Diego....

For non-believers, this year's second — and final — Friday the 13th is just the start of a weekend. However, for the estimated twenty million people in the US, and scores more worldwide, that suffer from "friggatriskaidekaphobia," or "paraskevidekatriaphobia," November 13, 2020, will be fraught with bad luck. Though some of the fear can be blamed on the Friday the 13th movie franchise, the day's bad reputation began long before the film’s hockey-masked villain, Jason Voorhees, made an appearance....

After almost a week of painstaking ballot counting, Joseph R. Biden Jr. was elected president of the United States on Saturday, November 7, 2020. The Associated Press — which bases its determination on freelance local reporters who accumulate vote counts from clerks in every county of the 50 states — announced that the former vice president had secured 290 electoral college votes, 20 more than the 270 needed to be selected the country's president....

The presence of ice in the permanently shadowed craters around the Moon's poles has been known for some time. However, researchers had been unsure if the hydration detected on the satellite's sunlit areas was "molecular" water (H2O), or hydroxyl (OH), a molecule that's one hydrogen atom shy of becoming water. On October 26, 2020, NASA confirmed that the liquid was indeed water....

Celebrated annually on November 11, Veterans Day gives Americans an opportunity to show their appreciation for some real-life superheroes — the brave men and women of the United States Armed Forces, who risked their lives to protect the nation's freedom. This includes all those who have served in the US Army, Navy, Marine Corps, National Guard, Air Force, and the Coast Guard....

Dogs are often referred to as "man’s best friend." But MacKenzie, a four-pound Chihuahua, who was named winner of the 2020 American Hero Dog competition on October 19, 2020, is making the world a better place for humans and animals alike....

Planning to stay up late on Halloween? Then you will be thrilled to hear that Sunday, November 1, 2020, marks the end of Daylight Saving Time (DST). This means that most Americans will add an extra 60 minutes of day time, by moving their clocks back. The simple act will effectively shift daylight back into the morning hours, and make waking up for school and work a little easier during the shorter winter days....

Scientists scrambling to find a cure for COVID-19 may have some help from an unexpected source — 14-year-old Anika Chebrolu. The youngster from Frisco, Texas, was named the winner of the 3M Young Scientist Challenge in a virtual event held on October 12 - 13, 2020, for her groundbreaking research that could lead to a cure for the coronavirus....

NASA's OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security, Regolith Explorer) probe made history on October 20, 2020, when it landed on Bennu, a 1,640-foot (500 meters) tall asteroid that lies 200 million miles away from Earth. The brief, six-second touchdown was planned to retrieve samples of the ancient space rock's surface and bring them back to Earth for analysis....

Oregon firefighters battling wildfires across the state have a new "force" on their team: a plush Baby Yoda doll. The adorable alien tyke, from Disney's popular Star Wars series The Mandalorian, has become a symbol of hope and joy among the first responders who have been tirelessly fighting the historic blazes that have wiped out communities and killed at least nine people since early September....

On October 14, 2020, Russia's Soyuz MS-17 spacecraft set a new speed record for transporting crew members to the International Space Station (ISS) in just 3 hours and 3 minutes. NASA astronaut Kate Rubins and Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov, blasted off from Kazakhstan's Baikonur Cosmodrome at 1:45 AM EDT and safely docked at the ISS at 4:48 AM EDT. The monumental journey was accomplished using a fast-track, two-orbit flight path to the ISS....

Suspended liquids and inverted floating boats may seem like something straight out of a Harry Potter novel. However, as a team of scientists at the ESPCI in Paris, France, recently demonstrated, the gravity-defying feats do not require magical spells — just the knowledge of some basic laws of physics!...

Zipping across the solar system in an electric car may seem like something straight out of a science fiction movie. However, that is exactly what Starman — a mannequin dressed in an astronaut's suit and seated inside a red Tesla Roadster — has been doing since being blasted into space aboard SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket on November 5, 2018....

The remains of German World War II steamer Karlsruhe, found in the seabed off the coast of Poland by Baltictech divers in late September 2020, may house more than the typical Nazi artifacts. It could contain the jewel-encrusted panels of Russia's legendary Amber Room. Often called the "Eighth Wonder of the World," the chamber was last seen in Königsberg, Germany — present-day Kaliningrad, Russia — before it vanished into thin air in 1945....

Columbus Day, which is commemorated annually on the second Monday in October, has been a US federal holiday since 1934. However, the celebration, honoring Christopher Columbus's arrival to the Americas, has always been somewhat controversial due to the European settlers' brutal treatment of the Native American people. It has also been argued that the indigenous people had already "discovered" America by the time Columbus landed on the Bahamian island he named San Salvador on October 12, 1492....

Human hair is about 50 times softer than a razor blade, which is made using heat-hardened stainless steel and often reinforced with diamond-like carbon. Yet, a few wisps of hair are powerful enough to dull a blade's sharpness within a few weeks of use. To understand how this impressive feat occurs, a team of researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) decided to take a closer look at what happens when the sharp edge of a blade slices through human hair....

A rat may seem like an unlikely candidate to receive a gold medal for bravery and devotion to duty. However, six-year-old African giant pouched rat Magawa, who was honored with British Veterinary Charity PDSA's highest animal award on September 25, 2020, is no ordinary rodent. Over the past five years, the "HeroRAT" has saved hundreds of lives by detecting 39 landmines and 28 unexploded items in Cambodia....