News
- Health & Medicine
Surplus chromosomes may fuel tumor growth in some cancers
Extra copies of some genes on excess chromosomes may keep cancer cells growing. Without those extras, cancer cells form fewer tumors in mice.
- Space
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx must avoid ‘Mount Doom’ to return a sample of the asteroid Bennu
The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft finally has a target spot for sample collection, called Nightingale, on the asteroid Bennu.
- Animals
Why some whales are giants and others are just big
Being big helps whales access more food. But how big a whale can get is influenced by whether it hunts for individual prey or filter-feeds.
- Space
NASA’s MAVEN probe shows how wind circulates in Mars’ upper atmosphere
By using the MAVEN spacecraft to track winds in the Martian thermosphere, researchers hope to better understand how the atmosphere leaks into space.
- Space
NASA’s Parker probe has spotted the Geminid meteor showers’ source
For the first time, we’ve spotted the trail of space debris responsible for the Geminid meteor shower.
- Life
Prions clog cell traffic in brains with neurodegenerative diseases
Prions may derail cargo moving inside brain cells, perhaps contributing to cell death in prion diseases.
- Earth
Flooding Earth’s atmosphere with oxygen may not have needed a triggering event
Building an oxygen-rich world doesn’t require volcanism, supercontinent breakups or the rise of land plants — just nutrient cycling, a study finds.
- Quantum Physics
Quantum jitter lets heat travel across a vacuum
In a first, scientists observed tiny, vibrating membranes exchanging heat due to quantum fluctuations.
- Archaeology
A nearly 44,000-year-old hunting scene is the oldest known storytelling art
Cave art in Indonesia dating to at least 43,900 years ago is the earliest known storytelling art, and shows otherworldly human-animal hunters.
- Climate
How the Arctic’s poor health affects everyday life
A new NOAA report features testimony from indigenous communities in Alaska who are weathering the impacts of Arctic warming.
- Earth
Fingerprints of climate change are increasingly appearing in extreme weather
A new report finds evidence that some of 2018’s extreme weather events were linked to human-caused climate change.
- Paleontology
Licelike insects munched on dinosaur feathers around 100 million years ago
Fossils in amber push the origin of feather-feeding insects back over 50 million years, a study finds.
