Joshua Howgego

2 months ago | newscientist.com | Joshua Howgego

The following is an extract from our monthly Launchpad newsletter, which explores the solar system and beyond. You can sign up for Launchpad for free here. There is no better place to start explaining what so fascinates me about meteorites than Winston Churchill’s fish pond. Churchill lived for many years at a grand old house called Chartwell, which happens to be close to my home.

2 months ago | livescience.com | Joshua Howgego

There are hundreds of thousands of meteorites hidden beneath Antarctica's icy surface, some of which are slowly sinking out of reach. You might think that these submerged space rocks would be very tricky, expensive and time-consuming to find. But in this excerpt from "The Meteorite Hunters" (Oneworld Publications, 2025), author Joshua Howgego reveals how researchers came up with a way to recover the lost objects — using just a lamp, a freezer and a block of ice.

Dec 11, 2024 | newscientist.com | Joshua Howgego

I had always felt ambivalent towards pigeons. Pigeons are everywhere in London, where I live, and that made them fade into the background for me. I didn’t hate them, but neither did I take any particular interest in them. Then a chance encounter set me wondering if I could learn to love the humble pidge, a question that I spent some of this year delving into. As I started my research, I stumbled upon pigeon fact after pigeon fact that really surprised me.

Dec 11, 2024 | newscientist.com | Joshua Howgego

I was walking in the park with a friend recently, when they pointed at a pigeon and told me I was looking at their favourite bird. I was incredulous. Pigeons? Those winged vermin? My friend responded with this twisted logic: it makes a lot of sense for pigeons to be your favourite bird, because you get to enjoy them all the time. Temporarily bemused, I wondered if anyone could really be so enamoured with pigeons. Turns out, the joke’s on me.

Jun 25, 2024 | newscientist.com | Joshua Howgego

This story is part of our Cosmic Perspective series, in which we confront the staggering vastness of the cosmos and our place in it. Read the rest of the series here. An astrophysicist and a surgeon walk into a bar. No, this isn’t the start of a bad joke. A few years ago, astrophysicist Franco Vazza met his childhood friend Alberto Feletti, who had become a neurosurgeon.