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Mars Terraforming: Silica Aerogel Could Warm Widespread Regions of Martian Surface

An artist’s impression of a terraformed Mars. Image credit: Daein Ballard / CC BY-SA 3.0.
Jul 16, 2019 by News Staff

New research by scientists from Harvard University, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the UK Centre for Astrobiology shows that widespread regions of the surface of Mars could be made habitable to photosynthetic life via a solid-state analogue to Earth’s greenhouse effect. Through experiments and modeling under Martian environmental conditions, the team demonstrated that a 0.8 to 1.2-inch (2-3 cm) thick layer of silica aerogel — a translucent,...

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Hospital insects present a potential to contribute to persistence and spread of antimicrobial-resistant pathogenic bacteria in the hospital environment. Image credit: Virvoreanu Laurentiu.

Insects Experience Chronic Pain after Serious Injury

Jul 15, 2019 by News Staff

Insects can enter a neuropathic pain-like state after nerve injury, according to a new study in fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster). Khuong et al offer...

Full-frame single image of Bell entanglement. Scale bar - 1 mm. Image credit: Moreau et al, doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aaw2563.

Physicists Unveil First-Ever Photo of Quantum Entanglement

Jul 15, 2019 by News Staff

A team of physicists from the School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Glasgow has captured an image of Bell entanglement, a strong form of...

This Hubble image shows the multi-armed spiral galaxy NGC 2985. The color image was made from separate exposures taken in the visible and near-infrared regions of the spectrum with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). It is based on data obtained through two filters: F658W and F814W. The color results from assigning different hues to each monochromatic image associated with an individual filter. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / L. Ho.

Hubble Sees Multi-Armed Spiral Galaxy

Jul 15, 2019 by Natali Anderson

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured a striking new photo of the spiral galaxy NGC 2985. This Hubble image shows the multi-armed spiral galaxy...

An artist’s impression of the peculiar thin disk of material circling a supermassive black hole at the heart of NGC 3147. Image credit: M. Kornmesser / ESA / Hubble.

Thin Accretion Disk around NGC 3147’s Central Black Hole Surprises Astronomers

Jul 12, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have found an unexpected thin disk of material furiously whirling around a supermassive black hole...

Microraptor swallowing Indrasaurus wangi. Image credit: Doyle Trankina.

Microraptors Ate Lizards for Lunch

Jul 12, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

Paleontologists in China have uncovered a nearly complete, fully articulated skeleton of Microraptor zhaoianus, a pigeon-sized, four-winged dinosaur that...

Artist’s reconstruction of an Asian caveman. Image credit: Peter Schouten.

Enigmatic Skull Found in Greece Suggests Early Homo sapiens Reached Europe 210,000 Years Ago

Jul 11, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

A 210,000-year-old partial skull found in southern Greece about four decades ago has been identified as the earliest example of anatomically modern Homo...

Denisovans were probably dark-skinned, unlike the pale Neanderthals. The picture shows a Neanderthal man. Image credit: Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London.

Modern Asians Acquired Rare Dental Trait from Denisovans: Study

Jul 10, 2019 by News Staff

A 3-rooted lower molar, a rare trait primarily found in modern Asian lineages, was previously thought to have evolved after Homo sapiens dispersed from...

This image of 2019 LF6 was captured by ZTF on June 10, 2019. Image credit: ZTF / Caltech Optical Observatories.

Astronomers Find Asteroid with Record-Short Year

Jul 10, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), a state-of-the-art camera at the Palomar Observatory in southern California, have spotted a very...

Scanning electron micrograph of HIV particles infecting a human T cell. Image credit: National Institutes of Health.

Scientists Use CRISPR and Antiviral Therapy to Eliminate HIV-1 DNA from Genomes of Mice

Jul 9, 2019 by News Staff

Using the modified CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing system and a therapeutic strategy known as long-acting slow-effective release antiviral therapy (LASER ART),...

A dust storm underway at the edge of the north polar ice cap of Mars. The image was taken by Mars Express’ Visual Monitoring Camera on May 29, 2019. Image credit: ESA / GCP / UPV / EHU Bilbao.

ESA’s Mars Express Spots Dust Storms at Martian North Pole

Jul 8, 2019 by News Staff

ESA’s Mars Express orbiter has observed several local and regional dust storms brewing at the north pole of the Red Planet. A dust storm underway at...

World’s Largest Macroalgal Bloom Discovered

Jul 5, 2019 by News Staff

Free-floating mats of brown macroalgae called Sargassum in the center of the North Atlantic were first reported by Christopher Columbus in the 15th century...

An artist’s impression of CSIRO’s ASKAP radio telescope detecting a fast radio burst. Image credit: Swinburne University of Technology / OzGrav ARC Centre of Excellence.

Second Non-Repeating Fast Radio Burst Traced Back to Its Home Galaxy

Jul 4, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Deep Synoptic Array-10 at the Owens Valley Radio Observatory have discovered a new non-repeating fast radio burst (FRB), called FRB...

Nolden et al assessed the ability of common beverages to reduce oral burn from capsaicin. Image credit: Jill Wellington.

Milk is Best Choice to Mitigate Oral Burn from Chili Peppers: Study

Jul 4, 2019 by News Staff

Capsaicin, a chemical compound derived from chili peppers, is classically considered an irritant, due to the warming and burning sensations it causes....

This artist’s illustration shows a giant cloud of hydrogen streaming off the warm Neptune GJ 3470b. The host star’s intense radiation is heating the hydrogen in the planet’s upper atmosphere to a point where it escapes into space. GJ 3470b is losing hydrogen at a rate 100 times faster than a previously observed warm Neptune whose atmosphere is also evaporating away. Image credit: NASA / ESA / D. Player, STScI.

Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes Probe Atmosphere of Sub-Neptune

Jul 3, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers are curious about the two recently-discovered classes of planets not found in the Solar System: the so-called super-Earths and sub-Neptunes,...

This artist’s impression shows the first interstellar asteroid -- 1I/2017 U1 (’Oumuamua). Image credit: M. Kornmesser / ESO.

Interstellar Object ‘Oumuamua Has Purely Natural Origin, Say Astronomers

Jul 2, 2019 by News Staff

A fast moving, cigar-shaped object of extrasolar origin was discovered on October 19, 2017 by the Pan-STARRS 1 telescope in Hawai’i. Named 1I/2017 U1...

Astronomers have monitored the Eta Carinae binary system for more than two decades. It has been prone to violent outbursts, including an episode in the 1840s during which ejected material formed the bipolar bubbles seen here. Now, using Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) instrument to probe the nebula in ultraviolet light, they have uncovered the glow of magnesium embedded in warm gas (shown in blue) in places they had not seen it before. The luminous magnesium resides in the space between the dusty bipolar bubbles and the outer shock-heated nitrogen-rich filaments (shown in red). The streaks visible in the blue region outside the lower-left lobe are a striking feature of the image. These streaks are created when the star’s light rays poke through the dust clumps scattered along the bubble’s surface. Wherever the ultraviolet light strikes the dense dust, it leaves a long, thin shadow that extends beyond the lobe into the surrounding gas. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / N. Smith, University of Arizona / J. Morse, BoldlyGo Institute.

Hubble Captures Eta Carinae in Ultraviolet Light

Jul 2, 2019 by News Staff

Eta Carinae is a binary stellar system approximately 7,500 light-years away in the constellation Carina. Also known as HD 93308 and Hen 3-481, the system...

An artist’s conception of the L 98-59 planetary system. Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

TESS Discovers Planetary System with Three Terrestrial-Size Exoplanets

Jul 1, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) have discovered three small planets orbiting a bright M-dwarf star called L 98-59....

Self-Torque: Physicists Discover New Property of Light

Jul 1, 2019 by News Staff

An international team of physicists has theoretically predicted and experimentally generated light beams with a new property that they call the self-torque...

An artist’s impression of ASKAP finding a fast radio burst and determining its precise location. The Keck, VLT and Gemini South optical telescopes joined ASKAP with follow-up observations to image the host galaxy. Image credit: Andrew Howells / CSIRO.

Astronomers Pinpoint Location of Non-Repeating Fast Radio Burst

Jun 28, 2019 by News Staff

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are brief radio emissions from distant astronomical sources. Some are known to repeat, but most are single bursts, occurring only...

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