BBC News

Five planets will align across the dawn sky on Wednesday in a rare treat for skywatchers.

Global temperatures in 2015 were the warmest since records began, according to data published by meteorologists in the UK and the US.

What is China doing to clean its air?

Do beards hold the key to new antibiotics?

Images from an unmanned aerial vehicle suggest excessive management of floodplains limit their ability to hold water and slow the flow of floodwater.

Residents of one of Germany's foremost car manufacturing bases are urged to leave their vehicles at home after smog breaches maximum safe levels.

The present-day English owe about a third of their ancestry to the Anglo-Saxons, according to two new studies.

The amount of fish taken from the world's oceans has been underestimated by more than 50% according to a new study.

A company producing GM mosquitoes says it is to open a new factory in Brazil as it expands its operations.

A private UK fertility clinic is offering couples a new form of IVF treatment that allows conception to occur in the womb rather than in the lab.

This is the moment an unmanned SpaceX Falcon rocket exploded on landing after successfully delivering an ocean monitoring satellite to orbit.

Jason-3, a US-European satellite that is fundamental to our understanding of the oceans, is launched from California.

The UK government extends the "blue belt" of protected marine areas around the British coastline.

The making of British space hero Tim Peake

Nasa has ended the spacewalk involving British astronaut Tim Peake after his US colleague reported water in his helmet.

The European Space Agency is eager to develop its interest in a robot mini-shuttle just selected by Nasa to help ferry cargo to the space station.

Tim Peake is carrying out the first ever spacewalk by an astronaut representing the UK.

Major Tim Peake and Nasa astronaut Tim Kopra are repairing a faulty component outside the International Space Station.

A butchered mammoth carcass pulled from frozen sediments in the far north of Russia proves humans were present in the Arctic some 45,000 years ago - 10,000 years earlier than previously indicated.

Astronomers have seen what could be the most powerful supernova yet detected - an event so big it shone with 570 billion times the brightness of our Sun.

African lions are set to gain greater international protection this year in the wake of the killing of Cecil in 2015.

Fog on Mars, storms on Jupiter and fiery flares on the Sun

The next ice age may have been delayed by more than 50,000 years because of the greenhouse gases put in the atmosphere by humans, scientists in Germany say.

A vast, previously unrecognised canyon system could be hidden under the Antarctic ice sheet, say scientists.

Most seagrass meadows around the British coast are in a poor condition, say scientists.

A prehistoric giraffe that died out 10,000 years ago might have been the largest ruminant that walked the Earth.

A special vault has been built in the Arctic to store thousands of seeds, as scientists fear the impact of climate change and prolonged conflicts could have devastating consequences on food crops around the world.

Astronaut Tim Peake demonstrates what happens to water in space for the Stargazing Live programme.

Science editor David Shukman goes deep inside an Arctic mountain to see the world's most important seed store.

Birds from Russia and eastern Europe form what is known as murmurations, grouping together to create a spectacular show in the Middle Eastern sunset.

Archaeologists in Cambridgeshire uncover Britain's "Pompeii" with what they describe as the "best-preserved Bronze Age dwellings ever found".

Giant icebergs could be responsible for the processes that absorb up to 20% of the carbon in the Southern Ocean's carbon cycle, a study suggests.

US researchers say they have developed a technique that can significantly improve the efficiency of the traditional incandescent lightbulb.

The first children with debilitating, "mystery" diseases have finally been given a diagnosis as part of a huge scheme to analyse people's DNA.

Senior MPs accuse David Cameron of double standards over climate change, ahead of his appearance before a Commons committee.

Chris Hadfield says he felt that David Bowie's Space Oddity showed the singer "recognised what it was going to be like" to be in space.

Space data is used to draw the deep anatomy of last year's devastating quake in Nepal, detailing how the rocks under the country ruptured and providing new insights on how the Himalayas are built.

Environment Agency chairman Sir Philip Dilley, who faced criticism during the recent floods, resigns.

A mountain lion killed in the US state of Idaho had a set of fully-formed teeth growing out of its forehead, wildlife officials say.

Scientists make microscopic 3D maps of the tracks carved by comet dust when a Nasa spacecraft collected samples in blocks of gel.

The growth in number of seal pup births on a public beach in Norfolk is described as "spectacular".

By measuring the age of 70,000 stars across the Milky Way, astronomers make a "growth chart" for our galaxy.

Fracking firms exploring for shale gas are to be allowed to sink boreholes and set off explosive charges without planning permission.

The evidence suggesting we have entered a new geological epoch defined by humanity's impact on the Earth is now overwhelming, believes an international scientific panel.

Astronomer Feryal Ozel speaks to the BBC's Jonathan Webb about the Event Horizon Telescope.

Sandringham School in St Albans makes a small piece of history by making the first amateur radio call from the UK to a British astronaut on the space station.

Scientists at Newcastle University fit tiny 3D glasses on praying mantises in experiments which could help visual perception in robots.