Peter Dockrill

Peter Dockrill

Peter Dockrill is the Deputy Editor of ScienceAlert. With a background in law and technology journalism, Peter's work has appeared in APC, TechLife, PC User, Money, The Laws of Australia, and The Newcastle Law Review. Peter's science reporting was featured in "The Best Australian Science Writing 2018" anthology. He won most entertaining writer at the Consensus IT Writers Awards, and he was a finalist at the Australian IT Journo Awards. When not working, Peter likes spending time with friends, cooking, and making music. He lives in Newcastle, Australia with his wife, their two lovely daughters and a dog called Belle.

Articles by: Peter Dockrill

Reconstruction of the child's burial by Neandertals at La Ferrassie.

Child's bones buried 40,000 years ago solve long-standing Neanderthal mystery

By Peter Dockrill published

We don't know whether it was a boy or a girl. But this ancient child, a Neanderthal, only made it to about two years of age.

Unpublished notes of Sir Isaac Newton stand as a testament to his long and said-to-be obsessive interest in matters of the occult, alchemy, and biblical apocalypse theory.

Burnt 'Great Pyramid' notes reveal Isaac Newton's research into the apocalypse

By Peter Dockrill published

The petrovite mineral consists of oxygen atoms, sodium sulfur and copper, which form a porous framework.

Scientists discover exotic new mineral forged in the furnace of a Russian volcano

By Peter Dockrill published

Volcanoes rank among the most destructive and awe-inspiring phenomena on the planet. But these fiery fissures do much more than just destroy.

Earth from above showing China and Japan.

Ancient fragment of the Pacific Ocean found buried 400 miles below China

By Peter Dockrill published

Petermann is one of Greenland's largest glaciers, lodged in a fjord that, from the height of its mountain walls down to the lowest point of the seafloor, is deeper than the Grand Canyon.

Mysterious 'dark river' may flow hundreds of miles beneath Greenland

By Peter Dockrill published

A giant underground river fed by melting ice could be running in a state of perpetual darkness far below the surface of Greenland.

Risk factors for severe COVID-19 infection.

Mysterious 'gene within a gene' found in the coronavirus

By Peter Dockrill published

Researchers have uncovered a mysterious gene in the genetic code of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 – a segment virtually hidden from view in the virus's genome, and largely overlooked until now.

The Clavius crater on the moon as seen by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. The SOFIA observatory has detected water ice in shadowed regions of this sunlit lunar location.

An asteroid trailing after Mars could actually be the stolen twin of our moon

By Peter Dockrill published

A distant asteroid trailing in the gravitational wake of Mars our moon's long-lost twin.

Here, an illustration of the interstellar spacecraft Voyager 2.

NASA finally makes contact with Voyager 2 after longest radio silence in 30 years

By Peter Dockrill published

After long months with no way of making contact with Voyager 2, NASA has finally reestablished communications with the record-setting interstellar spacecraft.

Here, a false-color view of total ozone over the Antarctic pole on Oct. 19, 2020. The purple and blue colors are where there is the least ozone, and the yellows and reds are where there is more ozone.

The ozone hole over Antarctica has grown much deeper and wider in 2020

By Peter Dockrill published

The hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica has expanded to one of its greatest recorded sizes in recent years.

Cascade, Barry and Coxe glaciers, Prince William Sound, Alaska

Ice melt in Alaska threatens to unleash unprecedented 'mega-tsunami,' scientists warn

By Peter Dockrill published

Old Faithful at Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming.

800 years ago, Old Faithful went quiet. Soon, it might happen again.

By Peter Dockrill published

Old Faithful, the famed geyser in Yellowstone National Park that erupts with captivating regularity, could soon go quiet.

Volunteer divers from the nonprofit Badewanne team discovered this Dutch fluit ship in the Gulf of Finland in the Baltic Sea.

Eerily well-preserved 17th-century ship found in the dark waters of the Baltic Sea

By Peter Dockrill published

Divers from Finland have made an unexpected discovery while exploring the depths of the Baltic Sea, finding an incredibly well-preserved shipwreck dating back almost 400 years.