Milky Way black hole’s last big blast dated to 2 million years ago

A dormant “volcano” — a giant black hole — lies at the heart of our galaxy. Fresh evidence suggests it last erupted two million years ago, astronomers say.  The evidence, they say, comes from a lacy thread of gas, mostly hydrogen, called the Magellanic Stream, trailing our galaxy’s two small companion galaxies, the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds.

Termites create their own antibiotics

Termites have developed an ingenious defence against pesticide: They make antibacterial nests out of their own fæces.

Higgs boson could explain facets of dark energy

One of the biggest mysteries in physics is why a mysterious substance called “dark energy,” found to dominate the energy count in the universe, has a smaller value than it’s supposed to have. Scientists estimate that value as one-followed-by-120-zeros times smaller than would be expected based on fundamental physics. The puzzle is often called the cosmological constant problem. Now, two physicists suggest that the recently discovered Higgs boson—an entity considered responsible for giving objects their mass, so they can weigh something — is also behind the cosmological constant problem.

Researchers measure consciousness through brain activity

A new study seems to back up previous proposals that the level of complexity of your brain activity largely determines whether you’re conscious or not.

Orangutans found to plan, communicate future routes

Male orangutans plan their travel route up to a day in advance and communicate it to other orangutans, research indicates. Anthropologists at the University of Zurich found that wild-living orangutans make use of the planning ability to attract females and repel male rivals.

Fossil find solves marine mystery

The identification of the 12-million-year-old fossils pushes the record of sirenia or sea cows, the group of marine mammals that includes dugongs, in the region back seven millions years.