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New Horizons Beams Back Sharpest-Ever Images of Ultima Thule

This composite picture combines nine individual images taken with New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI), each with an exposure time of 0.025 seconds, just 6 ½ minutes before the spacecraft’s closest approach to Ultima Thule. The image was taken at 12:26 a.m. EST (5:26 a.m. GMT) on January 1, 2019, when the spacecraft was 4,109 miles (6,628 km) from Ultima Thule and 4.1 billion miles (6.6 billion km) from Earth. The angle between the spacecraft, Ultima Thule and the Sun -- known as the ‘phase angle’ - was 33 degrees. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute / National Optical Astronomy Observatory.
Feb 25, 2019 by News Staff

NASA’s New Horizons probe has returned the sharpest images of Ultima Thule to date, taken during the spacecraft’s historic flyby of the Kuiper Belt object on January 1, 2019. This composite picture combines nine individual images taken with New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI), each with an exposure time of 0.025 seconds, just 6 ½ minutes before the spacecraft’s closest approach to Ultima Thule. The image was taken at 12:26...

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Moros intrepidus. Image credit: Jorge Gonzalez.

Moros intrepidus: New Deer-Sized Species of Tyrannosaur Discovered

Feb 22, 2019 by News Staff

Paleontologists have unveiled a remarkable new species of tyrannosauroid dinosaur from the Cretaceous period: a small relative of Tyrannosaurus rex. The...

The Wallace’s giant bee (Megachile pluto). Image credit: Clay Bolt.

Wallace’s Giant Bee: World’s Largest Bee Rediscovered in Indonesia

Feb 22, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

A living individual of a bee species feared to be extinct has been found in the Indonesian islands known as the North Moluccas. The Wallace’s giant...

An artist’s concept of Hippocamp. Image credit: NASA / ESA / J. Olmsted, STScI.

Hippocamp: Seventh Inner Moon of Neptune May Have Broken from Larger Moon

Feb 21, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

A new study led by SETI Institute astronomers suggests that the recently-discovered moon of Neptune, Hippocamp, is probably an ancient fragment of a much...

Ringed White Dwarf Spotted 145 Light-Years Away

Feb 20, 2019 by News Staff

Professional astronomers and volunteers working with the Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 citizen science project have spotted the oldest and coldest known white...

The great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias). Image credit: Byron Dilkes, Danah Divers.

Researchers Sequence Genome of Great White Shark

Feb 19, 2019 by News Staff

An international team of scientists from the United States and Europe has successfully sequenced the genome of the great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias)...

Volume rendering showing continuity between sheet and string morphologies in a single specimen. Scale bars - 1 cm. Image credit: El Albani et al, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1815721116.

Multicellular Life Began 1.5 Billion Years Earlier than Thought

Feb 19, 2019 by News Staff

Approximately 2.1-billion-year-old fossilized tracks discovered in Gabon suggest the existence of a cluster of single cells that came together to form...

Cassowaries use their casque much in the same way as some other birds use their beaks for heat exchange. Image credit: Lolame.

Cassowary’s Distinctive Helmet Acts as Thermal Radiator

Feb 19, 2019 by News Staff

The cassowary (Casuarius casuarius) is a large, flightless bird that bears a prominent helmet (or casque). The function of the cranial structure has attracted...

An artist’s impression of Orion Source I, a young, massive star about 1,500 light-years away. The blue region -- about 1/3 the way out from the center of the disk -- represents the region where ALMA detected the millimeter-wavelength ‘glow’ from the salts. Image credit: NRAO / AUI / NSF / S. Dagnello.

ALMA Detects Salts around Young Star

Feb 18, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have detected the chemical fingerprints of sodium chloride (NaCl), potassium...

Mnyamawamtuka moyowamkia in its environmental setting. Image credit: Mark Witton.

New Titanosaurian Dinosaur Unearthed in Tanzania

Feb 15, 2019 by News Staff

Paleontologists in Tanzania have found fossil fragments from a new species of giant dinosaur that walked the Earth approximately 100 million years ago...

Gestures of our primate cousins may be more similar to our own language than previously thought. Image credit: Republica.

Chimpanzees’ Gestural Communication Follows Same Laws as Human Language: Study

Feb 14, 2019 by News Staff

According to a new study, published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, gestures of chimpanzees follow the same mathematical patterns — known...

The south pole of Mars. Image credit: NASA.

Underground Volcanism on Mars May Have Been Active Extremely Recently

Feb 14, 2019 by News Staff

Recent radar observations from ESA’s Mars Express spacecraft were interpreted as evidence for melting beneath the south polar ice cap of Mars. Now, a...

Illustration of a plasma jet impact (yellow) generating standing waves at the boundary (blue) of Earth’s magnetic shield (green). Image credit: E. Masongsong, UCLA / M. Archer, QMUL / H. Hietala, UTU.

Earth’s Magnetopause Vibrates Like Giant Drum When Hit by Strong Impulses

Feb 13, 2019 by News Staff

As strong impulses strike the Earth’s magnetopause, the abrupt boundary between the planet’s magnetosphere and the surrounding plasma, ripples travel...

The bright spots near the center of Occator crater are shown in enhanced color in this view from NASA’s Dawn robotic spacecraft. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA / PSI / LPI.

Ceres’ Crust Kept Cryomagma Liquid for Millions of Years, Researchers Say

Feb 13, 2019 by News Staff

NASA’s Dawn mission recently spotted mysterious bright spots in the center of Occator Crater on the dwarf planet Ceres. According to a new study published...

Abramson et al developed a drug capsule that could be used to deliver oral doses of insulin. Image credit: Felice Frankel.

Microneedle Pill Could Be Used to Deliver Oral Doses of Insulin

Feb 12, 2019 by News Staff

An international team of researchers from the United States, Denmark and Sweden has pioneered a new approach that brings an oral formulation of insulin...

Just 114 miles from the recently-discovered Hiawatha impact crater under the ice of northwest Greenland, lies a possible second impact crater. The 22.7-mile-wide feature would be the second crater found under an ice sheet, and if confirmed, would be the 22nd-largest crater on Earth. Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center / Jefferson Beck.

Scientists Find Possible Second Subglacial Impact Crater in Northwest Greenland

Feb 12, 2019 by News Staff

Following the discovery of the 19.2-mile (31 km) wide Hiawatha impact crater beneath the northwest margin of the Greenland Ice Sheet, Dr. Joe MacGregor...

Neptune and Uranus. Image credit: NASA / ESA / A. Simon, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center / M. Wong & A. Hsu, University of California, Berkeley.

Hubble Spots New Dark Storm on Neptune, Giant Polar Cap on Uranus

Feb 8, 2019 by News Staff

Since its launch into orbit in 1990, the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has helped astronomers to amass an album of outer planet images. Yearly monitoring...

Mosquitoes can hear up to 32 feet away. Image credit: Egor Kamelev.

Mosquitoes Can Hear Sound over Surprisingly Long Distances

Feb 8, 2019 by News Staff

Yellow fever mosquitoes (Aedes aegypti) can use their antennae to detect sounds that are at least 32 feet (10 m) away, according to a new study published...

Howard et al show that honeybees can learn to use blue and yellow as symbolic representations for addition or subtraction. In a free-flying environment, individual bees used this information to solve unfamiliar problems involving adding or subtracting one element from a group of elements. Image credit: Ralph.

Study: Honeybees Can Do Basic Arithmetic

Feb 7, 2019 by News Staff

A new study published in the journal Science Advances shows that honeybees (Apis mellifera), with a miniature brain, can be taught to recognize colors...

An artist’s impression of the protoplanetary disk around the young star V883 Orionis. Image credit: National Astronomical Observatory of Japan.

ALMA Detects Complex Organic Molecules around V883 Orionis

Feb 6, 2019 by News Staff

V883 Orionis is a young star located approximately 1,300 light-years away in the constellation Orion. This star is experiencing a so-called FU Orionis...

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