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Archaeologists Find 200,000-Year-Old Grass Beds in South African Cave

Vertical field section of 43,000-year-old bedding grass from Border Cave, South Africa. Scale bar - 10 mm. Image credit: Wadley et al, doi: 10.1126/science.abc7239.
Aug 17, 2020 by Enrico de Lazaro

An international team of archaeologists reports the discovery of grass bedding used to create comfortable areas for sleeping and working by Paleolithic humans who lived in South Africa’s Border Cave at least 200,000 years ago. Vertical field section of 43,000-year-old bedding grass from Border Cave, South Africa. Scale bar – 10 mm. Image credit: Wadley et al, doi: 10.1126/science.abc7239. Border Cave, which is located in the Lebombo Mountains...

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Left eye of Aulacopleura koninckii. Image credit: Choenemann & Clarkson, doi: 10.1038/s41598-020-69219-0.

Silurian Trilobite Had Modern Type of Compound Eye

Aug 17, 2020 by Natali Anderson

Paleontologists have found that Aulacopleura koninckii, a species of trilobite that lived around 429 million years ago (Silurian period), was equipped...

This image depicts a Pleistocene landscape in northern Spain with woolly mammoths (Mammuthus primigenius), a woolly rhinoceros (Coelodonta antiquitatis), and European cave lions (Panthera leo spelaea) with a reindeer carcass. Image credit: Mauricio Antón.

Climate Change Drove Woolly Rhinoceros to Extinction: DNA Study

Aug 14, 2020 by News Staff

An international team of researchers has sequenced and analyzed a complete nuclear genome and 14 mitochondrial genomes from the extinct woolly rhinoceros...

This artist’s impression was generated using an image of Betelgeuse from 2019 taken with the SPHERE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope. Image credit: ESO / NASA / ESA / Hubble / M. Kornmesser.

Betelgeuse’s Mysterious Dimming Likely Caused by Huge Outburst

Aug 13, 2020 by News Staff

The red supergiant Betelgeuse is one of the brightest stars in the night sky and appears even more luminous because it is so close to Earth, only 650 light-years...

Terraced banana cultivation site at Wagadagam, Mabuyag Island, Australia. Image credit: Australian National University.

Torres Strait Islanders Cultivated Bananas 2,145 Years Ago

Aug 13, 2020 by News Staff

New research suggests Indigenous people on the tiny island of Mabuyag in the western Torres Strait, Australia, practiced banana (Musa cultivars) cultivation...

A reconstructed image of SPT-S J041839-4751.9. Image credit: ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / Rizzo et al, doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-2572-6.

ALMA Finds Young Milky Way-Like Galaxy in Early Universe

Aug 13, 2020 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have discovered an extremely distant galaxy that looks surprisingly like our...

An artist’s impression of Vectaerovenator inopinatus’ final moments. Image credit: Trudie Wilson.

New Carnivorous Dinosaur Unearthed on Isle of Wight

Aug 12, 2020 by News Staff

A new genus and species of theropod dinosaur from the Cretaceous period has been identified from bones found on the Isle of Wight, the United Kingdom. An...

Eight New Colonies of Emperor Penguins Discovered in Antarctica

Aug 12, 2020 by News Staff

Using images from ESA’s Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite, a team of researchers from the British Antarctic Survey has spotted 8 new colonies of emperor...

Ancient Beavers Gnawed Trees for Harvesting Food, Not To Build Dams

Aug 12, 2020 by News Staff

Extinct semi-aquatic beavers of the genus Dipoides lived 4 million years ago (Pliocene epoch) in the Canadian High Arctic and were approximately two-thirds...

An artist’s illustration of NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

NASA’s TESS Spacecraft Completes Its Primary Mission

Aug 11, 2020 by News Staff

On July 4, 2020, NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) completed its primary mission and is continuing its search for new extrasolar worlds. An...

This false-color image shows the dwarf planet Ceres. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA.

Dwarf Planet Ceres is Water-Rich World, New Research Suggests

Aug 10, 2020 by News Staff

High-resolution observations from NASA’s Dawn spacecraft of mysterious bright spots (faculae) in Occator crater on the dwarf planet Ceres suggest the...

Tanystropheus hydroides. Image credit: Emma Finley-Jacob.

Triassic Aquatic Reptile Had Extraordinarily Long Neck

Aug 10, 2020 by News Staff

Tanystropheus hydroides, the newly-described species of reptile that lived 242 million years ago (Triassic period), was about 6 m (20 feet) long, with...

This image of Eurybates and its moon (circled) was captured by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) on September 14, 2018. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / Noll et al, arXiv: 2008.01858.

Hubble Spots Small Moon Orbiting Trojan Asteroid Eurybates

Aug 10, 2020 by Natali Anderson

The trojan asteroid (3548) Eurybates, one of the targets of NASA’s upcoming Lucy mission, has a tiny moon. This image of Eurybates and its moon (circled)...

Denisovans Interbred with Mysterious Archaic Hominin: Study

Aug 7, 2020 by News Staff

In a new study published in the journal PLoS Genetics, researchers analyzed the genomes of two Neanderthals, a Denisovan, and two African humans; and found...

This illustration uses data obtained by NASA’s Juno mission to depict high-altitude electrical storms on Jupiter. Juno’s Stellar Reference Unit camera detected unusual lightning flashes on Jupiter’s dark side during the spacecraft’s close flybys of the planet. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS / Gerald Eichstädt.

Juno Discovers ‘Shallow Lightning’ on Jupiter

Aug 6, 2020 by News Staff

An unexpected form of electrical discharge, ‘shallow lightning’ originates from Jovian clouds containing an ammonia-water solution, according to a...

The tuatara (Sphenodon punctatus). Imager credit: Michael Hamilton, Digitaltrails / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Scientists Sequence Genome of Tuatara

Aug 6, 2020 by News Staff

An international team of researchers has sequenced and analyzed the genome of the tuatara (Sphenodon punctatus), the only living member of the reptilian...

An artist’s conception of the dwarf star TVLM-513-46546 and its massive planet TVLM 513b. Image credit: Luis A. Curiel Ramirez.

Radio Astronomers Discover Saturn-Sized Exoplanet around Ultracool Dwarf

Aug 5, 2020 by Natali Anderson

Astronomers using NSF’s Very Long Baseline Array, a continentwide system of 10 radio telescope antennas located between Hawaii and Puerto Rico, have...

A camelid figurine made of Spondylus shell and a rolled gold sheet found in a stone offering box from Lake Titicaca. Image credit: T. Seguin, Université libre de Bruxelles.

Archaeologists Find Shell Llama and Gold Foil in Inca Offering Box from Lake Titicaca

Aug 5, 2020 by Enrico de Lazaro

Archaeologists from the Pennsylvania State University and the Université libre de Bruxelles have found a stone offering box near a reef close to the north-eastern...

Plumage of the 99-million-year-old enantiornithine bird. Image credit: Xing et al, doi: 10.3389/feart.2020.00264.

99-Million-Year-Old Bird Wings and Feet Found Encased in Amber

Aug 4, 2020 by Natali Anderson

The partial skeletal remains of an enantiornithine bird that lived 99 million years ago (Cretaceous period) have been found preserved in a piece of amber...

A larval sunfish (Mola sp.) collected off New South Wales coast, Australia. Image credit: Kerryn Parkinson / Australian Museum.

Giant Sunfish Develop from Tiny Larvae, Marine Biologists Say

Aug 4, 2020 by News Staff

An international team of marine biologists has for the first time genetically identified a larva of the bump-head sunfish (Mola alexandrini). A larval...

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