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Curiosity captured these clouds just after sunset on March 19, 2021, the 3,063rd Martian day, or sol, of the rover’s mission. The image is made up of 21 individual images stitched together and color corrected so that the scene appears as it would to the human eye. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS.

Curiosity Spots Carbon Dioxide-Ice Clouds in Martian Skies

May 28, 2021 by News Staff

In March 2021, NASA’s Curiosity rover observed clouds made of carbon dioxide (CO2) ice at high altitudes in the atmosphere of Mars. Curiosity captured...

This panorama shows the central region of the Milky Way Galaxy. It builds on previous surveys from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes, and expands Chandra’s high-energy view farther above and below the plane of the Galaxy than previous imaging campaigns. X-rays from Chandra are orange, green, and purple, showing different X-ray energies, and the radio data from MeerKAT are gray. Image credit: NASA / CXC / UMass / Q.D. Wang / NRF / SARAO / MeerKAT.

New Map Reveals X-Ray-Emitting Threads and Plume-Like Structures near Milky Way’s Center

May 28, 2021 by News Staff

Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the MeerKAT radio telescope in South Africa, an astronomer from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst has...

New Frog Species from New Guinea Has ‘Lovely Chocolate Coloring’

May 28, 2021 by Natali Anderson

A team of researchers led by Griffith University has described a new species of the Australasian tree frog genus Litoria from the rainforests of New Guinea. Litoria...

Two photons collide in this artist’s rendering of the pion experiment; the result is a charge-neutral pion shown as a green sphere; just 83 attoseconds later, the pion disintegrates and emits two photons, shown as purple spheres. Image credit: Jefferson Lab.

Physicists Precisely Measure Lifetime of Neutral Pion

May 27, 2021 by News Staff

Neutral pions (π0) have a lifetime of around 80 attoseconds, decaying into two photons. In new research, an international team of physicists has measured...

Reconstruction of Sea Elephant Bay circa 1802, with southern elephant seals and King Island emus. Image credit: Julian Hume.

Paleontologists Find First Complete Egg of Extinct King Island Dwarf Emu

May 26, 2021 by Enrico de Lazaro

While the egg was about the same size as those laid by mainland emus, a duo of avian paleontologists from Australia and the United Kingdom used it to calculate...

The surface of Europa looms large in this newly-reprocessed color view; image scale is 1.6 km per pixel; north on Europa is at right. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SETI Institute.

Europa Has Volcanoes on the Floor of Its Subsurface Ocean, Study Suggests

May 26, 2021 by News Staff

Jupiter’s moon Europa harbors underneath a tectonically modified ice shell a salty ocean in direct contact with its rocky interior. Such an oceanic environment...

Semi-aquatic anoles live along Neotropical streams and frequently dive for refuge, remaining underwater for up to 16 minutes. Image credit: Lindsey Swierk.

Diving Anole Lizards Can Respire Underwater by Rebreathing Exhaled Air

May 25, 2021 by News Staff

Inspired by natural history observations in Haiti and Costa Rica, a team of biologists from the University of Toronto and elsewhere conducted experiments...

Watermelon Was Domesticated in Sudan from Kordofan Melon, New Genetic Study Suggests

May 25, 2021 by News Staff

Scientists have sequenced and analyzed the genome of the Kordofan melon (Citrullus lanatus subsp. cordophanus), a Sudanese form of melon with nonbitter...

TESS Discovers Jupiter-Sized Exoplanet around Ancient Binary Star

May 24, 2021 by Natali Anderson

The newfound circumbinary planet, named TIC 172900988b, is slightly larger than Jupiter and transits both of its host stars, according to a paper to be...

Ancient horses crossed over the Bering Land Bridge in both directions between North America and Asia multiple times during the Pleistocene. Image credit: Julius Csotonyi.

Eurasian Horses Diverged from North American Horses One Million Years Ago, DNA Study Shows

May 24, 2021 by News Staff

In new research, an international team of scientists sequenced and analyzed mitochondrial and nuclear genomes of living and extinct caballine horses (Equus...

Life reconstruction of Pleurochayah appalachius. Image credit: Brent Adrian / Midwestern University.

Fossil of North America’s Earliest Side-Necked Turtle Unearthed

May 21, 2021 by News Staff

A new genus and species of side-necked turtle that lived 96 million years ago (Cenomanian age of the Late Cretaceous epoch) has been identified from the...

An artist’s impression of a pulsar. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

FAST Radio Telescope Discovers 201 New Pulsars

May 20, 2021 by Natali Anderson

Astronomers using the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST) have discovered 201 pulsars, including currently the faintest pulsars...

Iron and Nickel Detected in Atmospheres of Solar System Comets

May 20, 2021 by News Staff

Astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope have detected neutral atoms of two heavy metals — iron (Fe I) and nickel (Ni I) — in the atmospheres...

This image shows the spectrum of the interstellar comet 2I/Borisov on the bottom right superimposed to a real photo of the comet taken with ESO’s Very Large Telescope in 2019; the lines of nickel are indicated by orange dashes. Image credit: ESO / L. Calçada / O. Hainaut / P. Guzik & M. Drahus.

Astronomers Detect Nickel in Coma of Interstellar Comet 2I/Borisov

May 19, 2021 by Natali Anderson

Using spectroscopic observations from ESO’s Very Large Telescope, a duo of astronomers from Poland has detected atomic nickel vapor in the cold coma...

An artist’s impression of the early Earth. Image credit: NASA.

Earth’s Early Rise in Atmospheric Oxygen May Have Suppressed Evolution of Multicellular Organisms

May 19, 2021 by News Staff

Atmospheric oxygen is thought to have played a vital role in the evolution of complex multicellular organisms. The so-called oxygen control hypothesis...

Mars is kept company by two cratered moons -- an inner moon named Phobos and an outer moon named Deimos. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / Malin Space Science Systems / Texas A&M University.

Phobos and Deimos are Fragments of Larger Martian Moon, Study Suggests

May 19, 2021 by Enrico de Lazaro

Phobos and Deimos, two satellites of Mars, originated from disintegration of a much larger moon between 1 and 2.7 billion years ago, according to new computer...

The belemnite Passaloteuthis bisulcata with preserved arm crown and remains of its prey. Image credit: Klug et al., doi: 10.1186/s13358-021-00225-z.

180-Million-Year-Old Fossil Reveals Three Levels of Ancient Food Chain

May 17, 2021 by Enrico de Lazaro

A fossilized squid-like cephalopod holds crustacean remains in its arm crown and, in turn, represents the remains of the meal of a predatory shark, according...

Section of the 58-million-year-old tracksite demonstrating near-vertical tilting of the originally horizontal bedding with three separate trackways made by five-toed mammals walking in parallel. Image credit: Anton Wroblewski.

58-Million-Year-Old Mammal Footprints Found in Wyoming

May 13, 2021 by News Staff

The newly-discovered fossilized footprints were made by at least two mammalian species around 58 million years ago in a brackish water lagoon in what is...

An artist’s impression of Pluridens serpentis. Image credit: Andrey Atuchin.

New Mosasaur Species Unearthed in Morocco

May 13, 2021 by News Staff

Paleontologists have described a new species of mosasaur based on two complete skulls and jaws found in Morocco. An artist’s impression of Pluridens...