Page 607 | Sci.News: Breaking Science News

Scanning electron micrograph of the bladder of Utricularia gibba, color added; the plant is a voracious carnivore, with its tiny, 1-mm-long bladders leveraging vacuum pressure to suck in tiny prey at great speed. Image credit: Enrique Ibarra-Laclette / Claudia Anahi Perez-Torres / Paulina Lozano-Sotomayor.

Genetic Researchers Amazed by Carnivorous Bladderworts

Feb 23, 2015 by News Staff

According to a group of genetic scientists led by Prof Victor Albert of the University at Buffalo, the carnivorous plant Utricularia gibba, commonly known...

Large Hoard of Gold Coins Found in Israel

Feb 23, 2015 by News Staff

Almost 2,000 gold coins, discovered by amateur divers near the port city of Caesarea in Israel, form the largest single hoard of medieval gold coins ever...

Comparing Hubble images of the gas-and-dust disk encircling the young star Beta Pictoris taken in 1997 and 2012, astronomers find that the dust distribution has barely changed over 15 years despite the fact that the entire structure is orbiting the star like a carousel. Image credit: NASA / ESA / D. Apai, University of Arizona, Tucson / G. Schneider, University of Arizona, Tucson.

Hubble Sees Gas-and-Dust Disk around Beta Pictoris

Feb 23, 2015 by News Staff

Using the unique observing capabilities of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have produced the most detailed picture so far of an edge-on...

Supermassive black holes at the cores of galaxies blast radiation and ultra-fast winds outward, as illustrated in this artist's conception, based on an image of the Pinwheel galaxy from Hubble. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

NuSTAR and XMM-Newton Space Telescopes Capture Ultra-Fast Black Hole Winds

Feb 23, 2015 by News Staff

Using ESA’s XMM-Newton and NASA’s Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) X-ray telescopes, astronomers have discovered that the super-fast...

The Maya city of Palenque in modern-day Mexico. Image credit: Peter Andersen / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Ancient Human Settlements Grew Same Way as Modern Cities Do, Scientists Say

Feb 21, 2015 by News Staff

A new study published in the journal Science Advances strengthens the view that human settlements of all times and places function in the same way by manifesting...

Windbeeches on the Schauinsland in Germany. Image credit: Richard Fabi.

Feeling Cold is Contagious, New Research Finds

Feb 21, 2015 by News Staff

According to a new study led by Dr Neil Harrison of the University of Sussex, UK, humans are susceptible to the so-called temperature contagion. Windbeeches...

This artist's impression shows the structure of our Milky Way Galaxy, including the location of the spiral arms and other components such as the bulge. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / ESO / R. Hurt.

Dark Matter May Have Caused Earth’s Cataclysms, Mass Extinctions

Feb 20, 2015 by News Staff

The Solar System’s movement through a dark-matter halo enveloping our Milky Way Galaxy may perturb the orbits of comets and lead to additional heating...

This image was acquired by ESA’s Mars Express on October 8, 2014. Image credit: ESA / DLR / FU Berlin / CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.

ESA’s Mars Express Zeroes in on Phlegra Montes

Feb 20, 2015 by News Staff

ESA’s Mars Express orbiter has obtained a spectacular color image of the southernmost portion of Phlegra Montes, a mountain range in the Cebrenia quadrangle...

The blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus) is the largest extant animal and the heaviest that has ever existed. Image credit: NOAA / CC BY 2.0.

Marine Animals Tend to Evolve Toward Larger Body Size Over Time – Study

Feb 20, 2015 by News Staff

A study reported in the journal Science provides new support for the so-called Cope’s rule – a theory in biology that states that animals tend...

Resembling looming rain clouds on a stormy day, dark lanes of dust crisscross the giant elliptical galaxy NGC 5128, also known as Centaurus A. The warped shape of NGC 5128’s disk of gas and dust is evidence for a past collision and merger with another galaxy. The resulting shockwaves cause hydrogen gas clouds to compress, triggering a firestorm of new star formation. At a distance of just over 11 million light-years, NGC 5128 contains the closest active galactic nucleus to Earth. The center is home for a supermassive black hole that ejects jets of high-speed gas into space, but neither the supermassive black hole or the jets are visible in this image. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble Heritage / STScI / AURA / Hubble Collaboration / R. O'Connell, University of Virginia / WFC3 Scientific Oversight Committee.

Dark Matter Influences Growth of Galaxies’ Central Supermassive Black Holes

Feb 20, 2015 by News Staff

A new study of elliptical galaxies led by Dr Akos Bogdan of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has revealed a surprising link between galaxies’...

Life restoration of Ichthyosaurus anningae. Image credit: James McKay.

Ichthyosaurus anningae: New Species of Extinct Marine Reptile Discovered

Feb 20, 2015 by News Staff

Paleontologists Dean Lomax of the University of Manchester, UK, and Prof Judy Massare of Brockport College in New York have discovered a new species of...

Exoplanet KIC 1255b orbits its parent star followed by a comet-like dust tail. Image credit: Maciej Szyszko.

KIC 1255b: Astronomers Observe Giant Dust Tail of Disintegrating Exoplanet

Feb 19, 2015 by News Staff

Using the ULTRACAM instrument on the 4.2-m William Herschel Telescope, a group of astronomers led by Jakub Bochinski of Open University in Milton Keynes,...

Proto-Indo-European was spoken around 4,500 BC in the Pontic-Caspian steppe – the steppeland stretching from Moldova and western Ukraine across the Southern Federal District and the Volga Federal District of Russia to western Kazakhstan. This image shows a 4,000 BC site of the Trypillian culture near modern-day Nebelivka, Kirovograd region, Ukraine. Image credit: Nataliia Burdo / Mykhailo Videiko.

Indo-European Languages Originated in Pontic-Caspian Steppe, Research Suggests

Feb 19, 2015 by News Staff

A new study led by Dr Andrew Garrett from the University of California, Berkeley, provides evidence that a common ancestor of the Indo-European languages...

The Ruby Seadragon (Phyllopteryx dewysea). Image credit: Western Australian Museum.

Ruby Seadragon: Scientists Discover First New Seadragon Species in 150 Years

Feb 19, 2015 by News Staff

Marine biologists from Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Western Australia Museum have made a surprising discovery in the waters off the coast...

This image shows a bee pollinating a flower of a wild rose.

Nicotine Could Help Bees and Bumblebees Beat Parasites

Feb 19, 2015 by News Staff

Nicotine and other chemicals found in flowers of tobacco and other plants could be the right prescription for diseased bumblebees and bees, says a group...

Nix (identified by a orange diamond) and Hydra (yellow diamond) are visible in the images taken by the New Horizons spacecraft. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins APL / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Captures Two Moons of Pluto: Nix and Hydra

Feb 19, 2015 by News Staff

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has provided its first views of Nix and Hydra – the small moons of Pluto. Nix (identified by a orange diamond) and...

A group of bottlenose dolphins in Xcaret, Mexico.

Dolphins Colonized Mediterranean Sea 18,000 Years Ago, Says New Study

Feb 18, 2015 by News Staff

According to a new study reported in the journal Evolutionary Biology, bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) only colonized the Mediterranean after...

Temperature and salinity measurements (averaged between 2010 and 2014) from several satellites, including ESA’s SMOS mission, have been used to map ocean alkalinity, the ability of a solution to neutralize acids and thus resist to changes in pH. Image credit: Ifremer / ESA / CNES.

New Satellite Maps Reveal Global Ocean Alkalinity

Feb 18, 2015 by News Staff

Innovative techniques that use satellites to monitor ocean acidification are set to revolutionize the way that scientists study the Earth’s oceans....

The Bahama woodstar (Calothorax evelinae): two males (left; lower right) with one female (top right). Illustration by John Gould, 1880.

Inaguan Lyretail: Scientists Unveil New Species of Hummingbird

Feb 18, 2015 by News Staff

According to a group of ornithologists led by Dr Christopher James Clark of the University of California, Riverside, the two subspecies of a hummingbird...