News
- Astronomy
Our first interstellar visitor may be a camouflaged comet
Originally thought to be a rocky asteroid, an interstellar traveler may have a comet’s icy heart.
- Astronomy
AI has found an 8-planet system like ours in Kepler data
An AI spotted an eighth planet circling a distant star, unseating the solar system as the sole record-holder for most known planets.
- Climate
These weather events turned extreme thanks to human-driven climate change
Ruling out natural variability, scientists say several of 2016’s extreme weather events wouldn’t have happened without human-caused climate change.
- Planetary Science
Saturn’s rings are surprisingly young and may be from shredded moons
Final data from the Cassini spacecraft put a date and a mass on the gas giant’s iconic rings.
- Science & Society
U.S. religion is increasingly polarized
Organized religion in the United States increasingly belongs to fervent believers, a new study finds.
- Neuroscience
In a tally of nerve cells in the outer wrinkles of the brain, a dog wins
Among some carnivores, golden retrievers rate at the top for numbers of nerve cells, study finds.
- Health & Medicine
Fracking linked to low birth weight in Pennsylvania babies
Babies born to moms living within one kilometer of a hydraulic fracturing site were more likely to be born underweight, researchers say.
- Tech
Electric eels provide a zap of inspiration for a new kind of power source
Battery-like devices inspired by electric eels could someday power wearable and implantable tech or soft robots.
- Planetary Science
Jupiter’s massive Great Red Spot is at least 350 kilometers deep
NASA’s Juno spacecraft has measured the depth of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot for the first time.
- Animals
Ticks had a taste for dinosaur blood
A tick found trapped in amber is evidence the bloodsuckers preyed on feathered dinosaurs, a new study says.
- Life
Not all of a cell’s protein-making machines do the same job
Ribosomes may switch up their components to specialize in building proteins.
- Astronomy
Most complete map of Titan reveals connected seas and cookie-cutter lakes
The latest map of Titan, based on all the data from the Cassini spacecraft, displays new details about the moon’s lakes and seas.
