News Archive for March 2017

This is an artist’s rendition of a woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius). Image credit: Flying Puffin / CC BY-SA 2.0.

Wrangel Island Mammoths Experienced ‘Genomic Meltdown’ Just Prior to Extinction, Says New Study

Mar 3, 2017 by News Staff

According to a new study published in the journal PLoS Genetics, dwindling populations created a ‘mutational meltdown’ in the genomes of the last wooly...

Blue skies on Pluto. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

The Secrets of Pluto’s Thin Blue Line

Mar 3, 2017 by James Romero

“Like a summer’s evening here on Earth just after sunset. A faint blue glow follows the Sun below the horizon — the only bit of color within...

Reconstruction of Darwinylus marcosi on a gymnosperm host. Based on the pollen grains found in the amber with the beetle, paleobiologists believe that the beetle was closely associated with cycads, an ancient gymnosperm group of plants that have living relatives today throughout the warmer parts of the world. Image credit: Enrique Peñalver / Museo Geominero, Instituto Geológico y Minero de Espana.

105-Million-Year-Old Amber Preserves Pollinating Beetle, Pollen

Mar 3, 2017 by News Staff

An international team of paleobiologists has uncovered the fossil of a 105-million-year-old gymnosperm pollinating beetle, named Darwinylus marcosi. The...

Artist impression illustrating a supermassive black hole with X-ray emission emanating from its inner region (pink) and ultra-fast winds streaming from the surrounding disk (purple). Image credit: ESA.

XMM-Newton, NuSTAR Telescopes Measure Temperature Swings of Black Hole Winds

Mar 2, 2017 by News Staff

For the first time, researchers have measured rapidly varying temperatures in hot gas flowing from the vicinity of a black hole. Artist impression illustrating...

This is a three-color composite image of Saturn and its rings taken January 23, 2008 with the COMICS instrument on the Subaru Telescope. The Cassini Division and the C ring appear bright. Color differences reflect the temperatures; the warmer part is blue, the cooler part is red. Image credit: NAOJ.

Researchers Measure Brightness, Temperatures of Saturn’s Main Rings

Mar 2, 2017 by Enrico de Lazaro

Using mid-infrared data from the 8.2-m Subaru Telescope, a research team led by Dr. Hideaki Fujiwara, Subaru scientist at the National Astronomical Observatory...

African elephants. Image credit: Ro Dobby.

Shortest-Sleeping Mammal? African Elephants Sleep Only Two Hours Per Day

Mar 2, 2017 by News Staff

A new study published in the journal PLoS ONE has revealed that wild African elephants (Loxodonta africana) sleep an average of two hours a day and regularly...

Abell 2744 takes on a ghostly look where total starlight has been artificially colored blue in this Hubble view. Image credit: NASA / ESA / IAC / HFF Team / STScI.

Astrophysicists Unveil Most Detailed Maps of Dark Matter to Date

Mar 2, 2017 by News Staff

A team of astrophysicists led by Yale Professor Priyamvada Natarajan has unveiled the most detailed maps to date of dark matter, offering a detailed case...

An artist’s conception of a free-floating planet-like object. Image credit: NASA / JPL.

Astronomers Hunt for Free-Floating Planetary-Mass Objects in Solar Neighborhood

Mar 1, 2017 by News Staff

There may be a large number of undetected giant planet-like bodies in the neighborhood of our Sun, according to a Carnegie-led team of astronomers from...

Hematite tubes from the NSB hydrothermal vent deposits that represent the oldest microfossils and evidence for life on Earth. Image credit: Matthew Dodd, University College London.

World’s Oldest Known Fossils Found in Canada Push Evidence for Life back by 70 Million Years

Mar 1, 2017 by News Staff

An international team of paleontologists has discovered in Quebec, Canada, the oldest physical evidence of life on Earth — fossils that date back...

This VLT image shows the spiral galaxy NGC 1055. This large galaxy appears to lack the whirling arms characteristic of a spiral, as it is seen edge-on; however, it displays odd twists in its structure that were probably caused by an interaction with a large neighboring galaxy, Messier 77. The VLT observed NGC 1055 with the FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph 2 (FORS2) instrument using visible-light filters. Image credit: ESO.

ESO’s Very Large Telescope Spies Spiral Galaxy Edge-On

Mar 1, 2017 by News Staff

A new image from ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) gives a detailed view of NGC 1055, an edge-on spiral galaxy. This VLT image shows the spiral galaxy...

1 2 3 45