For almost five decades, Saturn’s north pole has been famous for hosting a bizarre, six-sided jet stream known as the hexagon, a feature first spotted by NASA’s Voyager spacecraft in the 1980s and still churning today. Astronomers had long wondered whether the ringed planet’s southern hemisphere might hide a mirror-image structure. Now, it turns out the south pole has been quietly growing something...

Using a novel laboratory calibration, planetary researchers in Germany have produced the most reliable map yet of silica (SiO2) concentrations across the surface of Earth’s Moon, and a first silica estimate for Mercury. Their study is built around the Christiansen Feature (CF), a spectral signature in the mid-infrared that shifts predictably with a material’s silica content. This colorful view...

Long before Europeans arrived, cacao (Theobroma cacao) may have traveled far beyond its Central and South American homeland to reach Etowah, a major Mississippian-period city in what is now Georgia. An artist’s conception of Etowah, a Mississippian culture site located on the banks of the Etowah River in Bartow County, Georgia. Image credit: Herb Roe / Sci.News. “For decades archaeologists, historians,...

For several decades, paleontologists have described Miracinonyx trumani — an extinct species of cheetah-like felid that roamed the North American prairies and steppe terrains more than 13,000 years ago — as North America’s answer to the African cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus). New research led by the University of California, Santa Cruz suggests the picture was largely wrong. Miracinonyx...

Researchers tracking grunts, whimpers and laughter across two geographically separated chimpanzee populations found that vocal differences sharpen with age. Their findings challenge the long-held assumption that the chimp calls are inflexible and determined solely by genetics. Eastern chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii), a mother with a young, at Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania. Image...

Physicists using the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) dark matter detector deep underground in a former South Dakota gold mine say they’ve recorded a single particle interaction that they can’t easily explain, but they’re a long way from claiming a discovery. To search for dark matter, LZ uses photomultiplier tubes (shown here before installation in the detector) to capture light from particle interactions....

In a study of 2,266 workers in Finland, evening-type people, or night owls, were up to three times more likely to be treated for depression or anxiety than morning types, with poor work-life balance identified as a key contributing factor. Merikanto et al. showed that evening-types had more issues regarding work spillover to personal life and poor recovery from work and that these factors moderated...

For several decades, paleontologists have described Miracinonyx trumani — an extinct species of cheetah-like felid that roamed the North American prairies and steppe terrains more than 13,000 years ago — as North America’s answer to the African cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus). New research led by the University of California, Santa Cruz suggests the picture was largely wrong. Miracinonyx...

Zircon crystals and impact-altered minerals show that a massive asteroid slammed into what is now the Pilbara region of Western Australia about 3 billion years ago. The North Pole Dome crater: (A) simplified map of the East Pilbara Terrane (EPT, Western Australia), showing Paleoarchean granite domes (pink) and greenstone belts (greens and blues); the North Pole Dome (NPD) lies near the terrane center;...

In a study of 2,266 workers in Finland, evening-type people, or night owls, were up to three times more likely to be treated for depression or anxiety than morning types, with poor work-life balance identified as a key contributing factor. Merikanto et al. showed that evening-types had more issues regarding work spillover to personal life and poor recovery from work and that these factors moderated...