It will take until at least 2080 before women make up just one-third of Australia’s professional astronomers, unless there is a significant boost to how we nurture female researchers’ careers.

Today's risks will be tomorrow's normal. That means tough decisions have to be made about human settlements having to retreat from areas most at risk, whether from floods or bushfires.

The NSW floods are a textbook example of the theoretical impacts we can expect on Australian rainfall as climate change continues.

The unprecedented intensity of two summers of bushfires, first in the east and then in the west, offered harsh lessons for Australians. One is that some settlements must retreat from high-risk areas.

Cats kill a staggering 1.7 billion native animals each year, and threaten at least 120 species with extinction. Five experts analyse a parliamentary report on the problem.

All cultures have communicated their knowledge in diverse and marvellous ways throughout time. Failing to see the significance of this is racist and lazy.

Scientists hope samples of asteroid Ryugu may reveal traces of the chemical ingredients that formed life on Earth.

Unlike our hellish neighbour Venus, Earth was far enough from the Sun for liquid water to form and create a more hospitable environment for life.

Ancient fatty molecules, once believed to be traces of some of the first animals to live on Earth, may have been produced by algae instead.