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Scientists Find Long-Sought-After Mechanism that Creates Immunity to Influenza A Virus

This image illustrates the beginning stages of an influenza infection and shows what happens after the influenza viruses enter the human body. Image credit: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

An international team of researchers from Australia, China and the United States has shown for the first time that RNA interference is active in the response of human cells to some important viruses, including influenza A virus. The research is published in the journal Nature Microbiology. This image illustrates the beginning stages of an influenza infection and shows what happens after the influenza viruses enter the human body. Image credit: Centers...

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This map of dark matter was obtained from data from the KiDS survey, using ESO’s VLT Survey Telescope. It reveals an expansive web of dense (light) and empty (dark) regions. This image is one out of five patches of the sky observed by KiDS. The invisible dark matter is seen rendered in pink, covering an area of sky around 420 times the size of the full Moon. This image reconstruction was made by analyzing the light collected from over 3 million galaxies more than 6 billion light-years away. The observed galaxy images were warped by the gravitational pull of dark matter as the light traveled through the Universe. Some small dark regions, with sharp boundaries, appear in this image. They are the locations of bright stars and other nearby objects that get in the way of the observations of more distant galaxies and are hence masked out in the map as no weak-lensing signal can be measured in these areas. Image credit: Kilo-Degree Survey Collaboration / H. Hildebrandt & B. Giblin / ESO.

Deep Space Images Shed More Light on Dark Matter

Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

An international research team led by Dr. Massimo Viola from the Leiden Observatory and Dr. Hendrik Hildebrandt from the Argelander-Institut für Astronomie...

Artist rendition of NASA’s TIMED spacecraft. The satellite is orbiting at 388 miles (625 km) and viewing in the anti-sunward limb direction. Image credit: NASA.

NASA’s TIMED Satellite Finds Hot Atomic Hydrogen in Earth’s Thermosphere

Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

Using data from NASA’s TIMED satellite, scientists have discovered the existence of hot atomic hydrogen atoms in the thermosphere (from about 56 to 311...

This graphic shows the closest approaches of Cassini’s final two orbital phases. Ring-grazing orbits are shown in gray (at left); Grand Finale orbits are shown in blue. The orange line shows the spacecraft’s Sept. 2017 final plunge into Saturn. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

NASA’s Cassini Orbiter Makes Its First ‘Ring-Grazing’ Dive

Dec 6, 2016 by News Staff

On Dec. 4, 2016 at 8:09 a.m. EST (5:09 a.m. PST), NASA’s Cassini spacecraft made its first close dive past the outer edges of Saturn’s rings. This...

Wadi Faynan, where J.P. Grattan et al found evidence of ancient pollution caused by bead making and/or repeated combustion of copper ores in hot fires. Image credit: University of Waterloo.

World’s Very First Polluted River? Scientists Find Evidence of Ancient Metallurgical Activity in Jordan

Dec 6, 2016 by News Staff

A research team led by Liverpool John Moores University scientists has discovered what could be the world’s very first polluted river, contaminated 7,000...

Bathochordaeus charon and its ‘house’ in Monterey Bay: giant larvaceans use their oikoplastic cells to secrete complex filters or ‘houses’ that allow them to concentrate and feed on particles; a ‘house’ consists of a large, diaphanous outer structure as well as a smaller, more convoluted and bi-lobed inner structure that functions as a filter; together these serve to concentrate appropriately-sized food particles from the surrounding water; in situ, larvaceans in the genus Bathochordaeus are often visible from several meters away because their houses may span a meter in longest dimension. Image credit: MBARI.

Mysterious Deep-Sea Animal Rediscovered after 116 Years

Dec 6, 2016 by Natali Anderson

Bathochordaeus charon — an extremely rare species of giant larvacean — has been rediscovered, more than a century after the only previous known...

Astronaut Bruce McCandless II, STS 41-B mission specialist, participates in a historical spacewalk. He is pictured a few meters away from the cabin of the Earth-orbiting Space Shuttle Challenger. This spacewalk represented the first use of a nitrogen-propelled, hand-controlled device called the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU), which allows for much greater mobility than that afforded previous space walkers who had to use restrictive tethers. Image credit: NASA.

Researchers Identify Cause of Visual Impairment in Long-Duration Mission Astronauts

Dec 6, 2016 by News Staff

Astronauts on long-duration flights experience visual impairments due to volume changes in cerebrospinal fluid, the clear fluid that helps cushion the...

Distribution of the atmospheric ammonia concentration in June, July, and August 2008 at 9.3 mile (15 km) height as observed by MIPAS. Bright areas are measurement gaps due to high cloud cover. Image credit: Michael Höpfner / Karlsruhe Institute of Technology.

Ammonia Detected in Earth’s Upper Troposphere

Dec 5, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

Ammonia, a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen with the formula NH3, has been found for the first time in the upper troposphere of our planet. Distribution...

Egyptian Queen Nefertari playing senet, one of the world’s earliest known board games; a painted depiction in the tomb of Nefertari, the Valley of the Queens, Thebes, Egypt.

Mummified Remains Identified as Queen Nefertari, Pharaoh Ramesses II’s Royal Spouse

Dec 5, 2016 by News Staff

A pair of mummified knees on display in the Egyptian Museum in Turin, Italy, belongs to Egyptian Queen Nefertari, the favorite wife of Pharaoh Ramesses...

Fossils of the left and right elytra of the Ball’s Antarctic tundra beetle (Antarctotrechus balli): the left elytron, 2.36 mm in length, is designated as the paratype. A small part of the right elytron of the same individual is attached along the suture near the apex. The siltstone matrix is visible along the outer margin near the apex. The small rhomb-shaped crystals on the surface are authigenic calcite; the right elytron is designated as the holotype; the elytron is 2.40 mm in length; the base is deformed by a crack and concealed by sediment grains; a small part of the left elytron of the same individual is still attached along the suture near the base. Image credit: A.C. Ashworth / T.L. Erwin.

Miocene Ground Beetle Fossils Found in Antarctica

Dec 5, 2016 by News Staff

Fossilized forewings (elytra) from two individuals, discovered at the Oliver Bluffs on the Beardmore Glacier, revealed the first ground beetle species...

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the highly inclined spiral galaxy NGC 4388. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

Hubble Captures Spectacular Image of Spiral Galaxy NGC 4388

Dec 5, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has taken a colorful photo of NGC 4388, an active spiral galaxy at the core of the Virgo Cluster. This image from the...

B.H.C. Emonts et al found that the Spiderweb, a massive galaxy in the center of a distant protocluster, is forming from a large reservoir of molecular gas. In this artist’s conception of the protocluster, the protogalaxies are shown in white and pink, and the blue indicates the location of the carbon monoxide gas. Image credit: M. Kornmesser / ESO.

Astronomers Witness Birth of Massive Cluster Galaxy

Dec 3, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

Massive galaxies may grow from cold molecular gas that condenses as stars rather than forming in violent mergers, according to an international team of...

Star of Bethlehem May Not Have Been Star After All, Says Astrophysicist

Dec 2, 2016 by News Staff

Grant Mathews, professor of theoretical astrophysics and cosmology in the University of Notre Dame’s College of Science, believes the event that led...

Model of the Sutton Hoo ship-burial. The placement of the burial chamber is marked white. Image credit: Steven J. Plunkett / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Middle Eastern Bitumen Found in Early Medieval Buried Ship in UK

Dec 2, 2016 by News Staff

Bitumen — a rare, tar-like material — from the Middle East is present in the 7th century Anglo-Saxon ship-burial at Sutton Hoo, Suffolk, UK,...

Compared with study participants who did not participate in the corresponding sport, risk of death from cardiovascular disease was: 56% lower among those who played racquet sports, 41% lower among swimmers, and 36% lower among those who participated in aerobics. Image credit: Geralt.

Aerobics, Racquet Sports and Swimming are Best for Heart Health, Researchers Say

Dec 2, 2016 by News Staff

A team of researchers from Australia, Austria, Finland and UK has found that swimming, aerobics, racquet sports (badminton, tennis and squash) and cycling...

This Hubble image shows the elliptical galaxy NGC 4696. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / A. Fabian.

Hubble Space Telescope Observes Hidden Depths of NGC 4696

Dec 1, 2016 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured the most detailed image yet of NGC 4696, an unusual looking galaxy with a bright core wrapped in a system...

An artist’s impression of a near-Earth asteroid. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

2015 TC25: Astronomers Find Smallest Known Near-Earth Asteroid

Dec 1, 2016 by News Staff

An international team of astronomers led by University of Arizona scientist Dr. Vishnu Reddy has obtained observations of the smallest near-Earth asteroid...

This image is a digital reproduction of a painting by John Lewin of a platypus in 1808.

Platypus Venom Could Hold Key to Successful Treatment of Type 2 Diabetes

Dec 1, 2016 by News Staff

The same hormone produced in the gut of the duck-billed platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) to regulate blood glucose is also produced in the animal’s...

As computer models predicted, genetically modified plants are better able to make use of the limited sunlight available when their leaves go into the shade. Image credit: Julie McMahon.

New Biotechnology Increases Crop Yield by 20%

Dec 1, 2016 by Marcus Nield

Scientists from the University of Illinois have boosted crop yields in a revolutionary procedure that genetically enhances photosynthesis. The UN claims...

Earth’s technosphere now weighs some 30 trillion tons -- a mass of more than 50 kg for every sq.m of the planet’s surface, according to Jan Zalasiewicz et al.

Geologists: Total Mass of Earth’s Technosphere is about 30 Trillion Tons

Nov 30, 2016 by News Staff

A multinational team of geologists has made the first estimate of the sheer size of the physical structure of Earth’s technosphere — suggesting...

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