Celebrating 50 Years of the Moon Landing

On this week’s news update…

Dolphin Friendships

How dolphin friendships are formed…

Moon Landing

Marking 50 years since the first Moon landing…

News Update Highlights

And highlights from a year of news updates!

First up…

What do you and your friends have in common?

Maybe you all like dancing, or coding, or karate?

Well, there’s new evidence that dolphin friendships are also based on shared interests!

Shark Bay, Australia

Here in Shark Bay, Australia, there’s a special group of bottlenose dolphins.

Some of them have learned to use animals, called sea sponges…

sea sponges

To protect their snouts as they hunt for food on the seafloor!

Now, scientists have found that these dolphins, called “spongers," spend more time with each other than they do with non-spongers.

They say this suggests the dolphins become friends thanks to common interests—not just because they’re related.

Dolphins are already thought to use names for each other…

And to touch fins with their friends while swimming.

This new research is further evidence of how complex their friendships are.

Next up… it’s Space Track.

July 20th 1969

Nearly fifty years ago, on July 20th, 1969, astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first people to walk on the Moon.

Their mission was called Apollo 11.

Apollo 11

Since then, ten more people have walked on the Moon—but the last time was in 1972!

Now, as the world celebrates fifty years since the first Moon landing, NASA has announced that it plans to send astronauts back to the Moon, in 2024.

What’s more, the space agency aims to set up a Moon base within the next 10 years—so astronauts can live there long-term.

NASA hopes the scientific research they carry out will eventually help people explore even further into space!

And finally: over the past year, we’ve reported on some amazing science stories!

Here are just a few of the things we’ve learned.

Goats prefer smiley faces to angry ones…

Gulper eels are also known as umbrella-mouths…

Engineers have designed a smash-proof guitar…

Dogs can be trained to sniff out malaria…

Lava sometimes explodes when it meets water…

Bricks can be made from pee… or poop!

Ocean waves are getting more powerful…

A student-built rocket has reached space…

And playing hip hop to cheese makes it taste stronger!

If you missed any of those stories, then check out our collection of news updates!

That’s all for this year.

Have a great summer!