Other Sciences News

Ankylosaurus magniventris, a large armored dinosaur species, witnesses the impact of an asteroid, falling on the Yucatan peninsula 66 million years ago. Image credit: Fabio Manucci.

Dinosaur-Killing Asteroid Didn’t Just Strike Earth, Its Dust Cloud Cooked It

Jul 29, 2026 by News Staff

The Chicxulub impact not only plunged Earth into an impact winter but also produced a dust blanket that later overheated the planet, according to new research...

One of 1.43-million-year-old footprints found at the GaJi10 site in the Koobi Fora Formation in northern Kenya; a 15-cm (6-inch) ruler is shown for scale. Image credit: Kay Behrensmeyer.

Ancient Footprints in Kenya Hint at Bigger Bodies and Group Behavior among Early Human Relatives

Jul 28, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

A set of 1.43-million-year-old fossil footprints preserved along the margin of an ancient lake in northern Kenya is offering paleoanthropologists new evidence...

Long-term financial stress accelerates age-related cognitive decline. Image credit: Thomas Breher.

Decades of Financial Hardship Linked to Faster Brain Aging

Jul 28, 2026 by Natali Anderson

A large British study spanning more than 70 years has found that people who experience chronic money struggles over their working lives show measurable...

Teenagers who regularly skipped breakfast improved the quality of their diets when they began eating a morning meal. Image credit: Pexels.

New Study Finds Eating Breakfast Boosts Diet Quality in Teens Who Usually Skip It

Jul 27, 2026 by Natali Anderson

Adding breakfast back into the daily routine of teens around age 18 who habitually skip the meal can meaningfully improve their nutrition, with the biggest...

Marcus et al. conclude that moderate caffeine or coffee consumption is safe for most adults and is linked to a lower risk of several cardiovascular conditions, including coronary heart disease, stroke, heart failure and atrial fibrillation, as well as hypertension and type 2 diabetes. Image credit: Sci.News.

Moderate Coffee and Caffeine Intake Poses Little Heart Risk, and May Even Help

Jul 20, 2026 by News Staff

In a new review paper, Dr. Gregory Marcus from the University of California, San Francisco and colleagues analyzed decades of research on how caffeine...

New research makes a case that runs against two different strands of popular nutrition advice at once: that water at meals is a simple ally in eating less, and that spicy food is something to approach with caution if you're watching what you eat; the research showed the opposite might be true: water tracked with eating more, and spice tracked with eating less. Image credit: Yukuaikuai.

Researchers Challenge Long-Held Beliefs about Water, Spicy Food and Digestion

Jul 20, 2026 by News Staff

A new review of previous studies in the journal Appetite undercuts the popular belief that water fills you up at the table. Meanwhile, a companion study...

The study sheds new light on the link between sleep deprivation and obesity. Image credit: Sweet Briar College.

Losing Even 80 Minutes of Sleep a Night Linked to Weight Gain

Jul 15, 2026 by News Staff

New research from Columbia University found that adults who cut their sleep by about 80 minutes for six weeks packed on a pound (0.45 kg) and moved less...

Paliki peninsula on the island of Kefalonia, Ionian Islands, Greece. Image credit: Christos Vittoratos / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Was Odysseus’ Ithaca Never an Island? Scholars Challenge Centuries-Old Assumption

Jul 13, 2026 by Sergio Prostak

For as long as readers have pored over Homer’s Odyssey they have pictured Ithaca, the homeland Odysseus fights for ten years to reach, as an island unto...

Sotos-Prieto et al show that modifying dietary habits can have a significant impact on health outcomes. Image credit: Silvia Rita.

Beans and Broccoli Linked to Lower Heart Risk in Young Adults

Jul 13, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

A new analysis of data from the Western Australian-based Raine Study suggests that two humble vegetable groups — legumes and cruciferous vegetables...

A group of Neanderthals in a cave. Image credit: Tyler B. Tretsven.

Ancient Turkish Cave Reveals Neanderthals and Homo sapiens Shared Same Way of Life

Jul 8, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

Üçağızlı II Cave on Türkiye’s Mediterranean coast has yielded a rare and detailed record of two Homo species living the same way of life, one after...

van der Merwe et al. assessed whether chronotype is associated with dietary intake (energy; nutrients), meal timing, body composition markers, and metabolic biomarkers in healthy European and Pacific New Zealand women. Image credit: RitaE.

Night Owls Eat Less at Breakfast, More at Midnight, Study Says

Jul 8, 2026 by Natali Anderson

People who naturally stay up late may be more prone to obesity and poorer metabolic health in part because they consume more of their daily calories late...

Paleo-Indians hunting a glyptodont, a relative of the armadillo that lived during the Pleistocene epoch. By Heinrich Harder, 1920.

Ancient Americans Were Megafauna Hunters, Not Generalists, Study Shows

Jul 6, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

New research suggests that the first widespread human cultures in the Americas were not opportunistic foragers who ate whatever they could find, but specialized...

An artist’s reconstruction of Clovis life 13,000 years ago shows the Anzick-1 infant with his mother consuming mammoth meat near a hearth. Another individual crafts tools, including dart projectile points and atlatls. A mammoth butchery area is visible nearby. Image credit: Eric Carlson / Ben Potter / Jim Chatters.

Did Clovis People Hunt Mammoths or Simply Scavenge Their Carcasses?

Jul 6, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

For decades, the discovery of stone spear points lying next to proboscidean (mammoth, mastodon, and gomphothere) bones has been treated as archaeology’s...

Reconstruction of Homo floresiensis. Image credit: Kinez Riza / Atelier Elisabeth Daynes, Sangiran Museum.

Homo floresiensis Probably Didn’t Hunt Stegodons or Use Fire

Jul 5, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

When paleoanthropologists announced the discovery of Homo floresiensis on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003, the tiny, small-brained species quickly...

Representative rock art figures from each of the 11 archaeological sites analyzed by Bossoms Mesa et al. Image credit: Bossoms Mesa et al., 10.1038/s41467-026-74234-2.

Scientists Recover Ancient Human DNA from Cave Walls

Jul 2, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

For the first time, researchers have extracted ancient human DNA directly from the walls of a cave. Although their results do not conclusively link ancient...

Variation in laughter tempo across five great ape species (orangutans, gorillas, bonobos, chimpanzees, and humans): each dot represents an individual observation; color indicates phylogenetic distance (in million years ago); each square contains an image of the corresponding species, with a matching dot color for intuitive reference. Image credit: De Gregorio et al., 10.1038/s42003-026-10499-z.

New Research Traces Origins of Human Laughter

Jun 28, 2026 by Natali Anderson

The way humans laugh — in rapid, rhythmically timed bursts — is not uniquely ours. New research by the University of Warwick and the University...

Reconstruction of a Neanderthal. Image credit: Neanderthal Museum.

Ancient DNA Sheds Light on Final Chapter of Neanderthal Life in Northwestern Europe

Jun 25, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

Scientists have generated genetic data from 27 Neanderthals who lived in Belgium and France less than approximately 52,500 years ago, painting a richer...

Zheng et al. uncovered a link between higher levels of daytime light exposure and a lower risk of dementia. Image credit: Zheng et al., doi: 10.1002/gps3.70039.

Getting Enough Bright Light during the Day May Help Protect against Dementia

Jun 25, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

Researchers at Guangzhou Medical University tracked nearly 88,000 people for over eight years, finding a significant link between daytime light exposure...

The North Pole Dome crater: (A) simplified map of the East Pilbara Terrane (EPT, Western Australia), showing Paleoarchean granite domes (pink) and greenstone belts (greens and blues); the North Pole Dome (NPD) lies near the terrane center; (B) geological map of the NPD and the shatter-cone field (yellow star); (C) A quartz (Qtz)-carbonate vein cutting shatter-cone lineation. Image credit: Kirkland et al., doi: 10.1130/G54866.1.

Australia’s North Pole Dome Crater is Earth’s Oldest and Only Known Archean Impact Structure

Jun 25, 2026 by Natali Anderson

Zircon crystals and impact-altered minerals show that a massive asteroid slammed into what is now the Pilbara region of Western Australia about 3 billion...