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The Guardian - Back to homeThe Guardian

Meet the superhumans

From seeing more colours to remembering more faces, some among us push the boundaries of what humans beings are able to do. In this series, we meet Australians with extraordinary abilities

16 April 2022

  • Ky Furneaux was Sharon Stone's stunt double in Catwoman. From Adelaide to Hollywood then back to South Australia, where she hunts feral goats with a bow and arrow, she talks to Guardian Australia down a scratchy outback line about "extreme survival".

    Taking inspiration from Chrissy Amphlett, Sharon Stone’s stunt double, and a diving superwoman

    Meet three Australian women who are pushing back on the expectations and stereotypes so often placed on them

26 February 2022

  • Rebecca Sharrock standing between two rows of shelves densely packed with books

    Meet the superhumans

    For four extraordinary people, superpowers are not beyond the imagination – they are an ordinary reality that they smell, remember and see every day

5 February 2022

  • Freediver Amber Bourke<br>Current Australian women's pool and freediving champion, Amber Bourke. She has dived beyond 70m without the use of tanks or fins and hold her breath for 5minutes and 44 sec.

    ‘I didn’t even know this was humanly possible’: the woman who can descend into the sea on one breath

    Scientists once thought humans could swim to a maximum depth of 30m on a single breath. Amber Bourke has gone deeper than 70m and physiology alone can’t explain why

29 January 2022

  • Artist Concetta Antico with rainbow colors from a prism on her eye in the Barrio Logan neighborhood in San Diego, California on January 21, 2022. Ariana Drehsler/The Guardian

    ‘I’m really just high on life and beauty’: the woman who can see 100 million colours

    As a kid, Concetta Antico was always ‘a bit out of the box’, but it took decades for her to discover just how differently she was seeing the world

22 January 2022

  • Dr Krati Garg in her garden at home

    ‘I’ve got this little extra strength’: the rare, intense world of a super-smeller

    From petrol and perfume to Parkinson’s disease, super-smellers can detect scents others are oblivious to. For Krati Garg, the ability’s both power and pain

18 January 2022

  • Rebecca Sharrock in a library

    ‘It’s awful to be a medical exception’: the woman who cannot forget

    Rebecca Sharrock is one of a handful of people worldwide with highly superior autobiographical memory. But remembering minute details of your own life has its downsides

15 January 2022

  • Yenny Seo near pedestrians on a street

    ‘I’d keep it on the down low’: the secret life of a super-recogniser

    Police employ them and scientists study them, but what is life like for the rare few who can never forget a face? Super-recogniser Yenny Seo didn’t think it was anything special
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