News
- Life
Bloodthirsty bedbugs have feasted on prey for 100 million years
Research sheds light on the evolutionary history of the bloodsucking bedbugs. The first species evolved at least as early as the Cretaceous, scientists say.
- Anthropology
Fossil teeth push the human-Neandertal split back to about 1 million years ago
A study of fossilized teeth shifts the age of the last common ancestor between Neandertals and humans.
- Planetary Science
China’s lunar rover may have found minerals from the moon’s mantle
The Chang’e-4 mission spotted material on the lunar surface that appears to contain bits originating from the moon’s interior.
- Genetics
Tweaking one gene with CRISPR switched the way a snail shell spirals
The first gene-edited snails confirm which gene is responsible for the direction of the shell’s spiral.
- Planetary Science
Apollo-era moonquakes reveal that the moon may be tectonically active
Moonquakes recorded decades ago suggest the moon is tectonically active. Knowing more about that activity could help scientists identify where to land future spacecraft.
- Artificial Intelligence
A new AI acquired humanlike ‘number sense’ on its own
A new artificial intelligence seems to share our intuitive ability to estimate numbers at a glance.
- Animals
Deep-sea fishes’ eye chemistry might let them see colors in near darkness
An unexpected abundance of proteins for catching dim light evolved independently in three groups of weird deep-sea fishes.
- Life
A gut bacteria transplant may not help you lose weight
A small study finds that transplanting gut microbes from a lean person into obese people didn’t lead to weight loss, as hoped.
- Astronomy
Dying stars called collapsars may forge much of the universe’s gold
Spinning stars that collapse into black holes could help explain the origins of heavy elements such as gold and silver.
- Physics
What a nearby kilonova would look like
Physicists imagined what we’d see in the sky if two neutron stars collided just 1,000 light-years from Earth.
- Earth
A belly full of wriggling worms makes wood beetles better recyclers
Common beetles that eat rotten logs chew up more wood when filled with a roundworm larvae, releasing nutrients more quickly back to the forest floor.
- Physics
LIGO is on the lookout for these 8 sources of gravitational waves
Gravitational wave hunters are on a cosmic scavenger hunt. Here’s what they’re hoping to find.
