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The beer-producing yeast strain EBEgT12 isolated from a vessel from the site of En-Besor, Israel. Image credit: Aouizerat et al, doi: 10.1128/mBio.00388-19.

Researchers Brew Beer with 5,000-Year-Old Yeasts

May 24, 2019 by News Staff

A multidisciplinary team of scientists has successfully isolated several yeast strains from ancient vessels excavated at archaeological sites in Israel....

Microphotograph of Ourasphaira giraldae. Image credit: Loron et al, doi: 10.1038/s41586-019-1217-0.

Paleontologists Find One-Billion-Year-Old Fossil Fungi in Canada

May 23, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

An international team of paleontologists has discovered 1,000- to 900-million-year-old microfossils of a fungus in estuarine shale of the Grassy Bay Formation...

This composite image of Ultima Thule was compiled from data obtained by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft as it flew by the object on January 1, 2019. The image combines enhanced color data (close to what the human eye would see) with detailed high-resolution panchromatic pictures. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute / Roman Tkachenko.

Ultima Thule: Surprises in Science Results from New Horizons Mission

May 21, 2019 by News Staff

After flying past the dwarf planet Pluto in 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft shifted course to Ultima Thule (also known as 2014 MU69), a much smaller...

This artist’s impression shows exocomets orbiting beta Pictoris. Image credit: L. Calçada / ESO.

TESS Detects Exocomets in Beta Pictoris System

May 20, 2019 by Sergio Prostak

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanets Survey Satellite (TESS) has spotted the long tails of extrasolar comets orbiting the very young star beta Pictoris. This...

This digitally-colorized scanning electron micrograph revealed some of the ultrastructural morphology displayed on the ventral surface of Cimex lectularius; from this view you can see the insect’s skin piercing mouthparts it uses to obtain its blood meal, as well as a number of its six jointed legs. Image credit: Janice Harney Carr, CDC.

Bedbugs Arose 115 Million Years Ago, Roamed Earth alongside Dinosaurs

May 17, 2019 by News Staff

Bedbugs are blood-sucking parasites in the family Cimicidae. A multinational research team led by University of Sheffield, the University Museum Bergen...

Has Voynich Manuscript Been Decoded? Mysterious Book May Be Written in Proto-Romance Language

May 15, 2019 by News Staff

The Voynich manuscript, sometimes described as the ‘world’s most mysterious text,’ may be written in proto-Romance, a language that arose from a...

The ammonite Puzosia sp. Image credit: Yu et al, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1821292116.

99-Million-Year-Old Ammonite Found in Burmese Amber

May 14, 2019 by Natali Anderson

An international team of paleontologists has found a piece of amber containing the beautifully preserved ammonite, several marine and land organisms that...

Gao et al present a tomato pan-genome constructed using genome sequences of 725 phylogenetically and geographically representative accessions, revealing 4,873 genes absent from the reference genome. Image credit: Hans Braxmeier.

Scientists Assemble Pan-Genome of Cultivated Tomato and Its Wild Relatives

May 14, 2019 by News Staff

An international team of researchers led by Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research and the U.S. Department of Agriculture- Agricultural Research Service...

The lanternfish has bioluminescent organs and an increased number of rod opsin genes. Image credit: Zuzana Musilová, Charles University.

Deep-Sea Fishes Catch Color with Rods

May 13, 2019 by News Staff

Some deep-sea fishes have developed highly sensitive color vision that could help them determine predator from prey in the dimly-lit depths. The lanternfish...

This artist’s illustration shows what one of the very first galaxies in the Universe might have looked like. Image credit: James Josephides, Swinburne Astronomy Productions.

Universe’s Early Galaxies were Much Brighter than Expected

May 10, 2019 by News Staff

New data from Spitzer and Hubble space telescopes show that in a few specific wavelengths of infrared light, some of the first galaxies to form in the...

Ambopteryx longibrachium. Image credit: Chung-Tat Cheung & Min Wang / Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Tiny Jurassic Dinosaur Had Membranous Wings

May 9, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

A previously unknown species of bird-like dinosaur with pterosaur-like wings has been discovered by a team of paleontologists working with the Institute...

The first artist’s illustration shows a key part of the process that created this new black hole, as the two neutron stars spin around each other while merging. The purple material depicts debris from the merger. Image credit: NASA / CXC / M.Weiss.

LIGO and Virgo Observatories Detect Two New Gravitational Waves

May 8, 2019 by News Staff

On April 25 and 26, 2019, NSF’s Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) and the European-based Virgo detector registered two new gravitational...

An artist’s rendering of how Suskityrannus hazelae may have looked. Image credit: Andrey Atuchin.

Small T. rex Relative Found in New Mexico: Suskityrannus hazelae

May 7, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

A new species of predatory tyrannosauroid dinosaur that lived about 92 million years ago (Cretaceous period) has been identified from fossils found in...

The western yellow wagtail (Motacilla flava), a small passerine bird in the family Motacillidae. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Songbirds Have Unusual Chromosome in Germ Cells: Study

May 7, 2019 by News Staff

An international team of researchers has discovered that all songbirds have an additional chromosome in their germ cells — the ‘germline restricted...

Merging neutron stars. Image credit: Mark Garlick, University of Warwick.

Violent Collision of Two Neutron Stars Occurred near Pre-Solar Nebula 4.6 Billion Years Ago

May 5, 2019 by News Staff

According to new research, a nearby binary neutron-star merger gave birth to 0.3% of the Earth’s heaviest elements, including gold, platinum and uranium;...

A male giant panda named Xiao Liwu at San Diego Zoo, California, the United States. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Study: Giant Pandas are ‘Macronutritional Carnivores’

May 3, 2019 by News Staff

Giant pandas (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) feed almost exclusively on highly fibrous bamboo, yet they bear a mix of herbivore and carnivore traits. A new study...

The S-type asteroid Itokawa. Image credit: JAXA.

Scientists Find Water-Bearing Minerals in Samples from Asteroid Itokawa

May 3, 2019 by News Staff

A duo of researchers from the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University has made the first-ever measurements of ancient water contained...

Astronomers developed a mosaic of the distant Universe -- called the Hubble Legacy Field -- that documents 16 years of observations from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The image contains nearly 265,000 galaxies that stretch back through 13.3 billion years of time to just 500 million years after the Big Bang. The new set of Hubble images, created from nearly 7,500 individual exposures, is the first in a series of Hubble Legacy Field images. Image credit: NASA / ESA / G. Illingworth & D. Magee, University of California, Santa Cruz / K. Whitaker, University of Connecticut / R. Bouwens, Leiden University / P. Oesch, University of Geneva / Hubble Legacy Field Team.

Hubble Captures Nearly 265,000 Galaxies in Legacy Field Image

May 2, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers have produced the largest, most comprehensive ‘history book’ of galaxies in the Universe, using 16 years’ worth of observations from...

Denisovans were probably dark-skinned, unlike the pale Neandertals. The picture shows a Neanderthal man. Image credit: Mauro Cutrona.

160,000-Year-Old Denisovan Jawbone Discovered in Tibetan Cave

May 2, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

In 1980, a Buddhist monk found the right half a fossilized hominin jawbone in Baishiya Karst Cave on the Tibetan Plateau, Xiahe, China. An analysis of...