EDUCATION

A team of particle physicists from the University of Melbourne, the Australian National University, King’s College London and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory has calculated that energy transferred when dark matter particles collide and annihilate inside cold neutron stars can heat the stars up very quickly; it was previously thought that this energy transfer could take…

Two new Jurassic species — the morganucodontan-like Dianoconodon youngi and the pseudotribosphenic shuotheriid Feredocodon chowi — offer key information about the evolutionary shift from the jaw joint bones to those of the middle ear in early mammals. Dianoconodon youngi. Image credit: Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Both Dianoconodon youngi and…

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have captured a new image of the central starburst region of Messier 82 (M82, NGC 3034 or the Cigar Galaxy), a starburst irregular galaxy located 12 million light-years away in the constellation of Ursa Major. Messier 82 was observed by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope in 2006,…

In new research, a team of paleontologists examined the tooth structure of Feredocodon chowi, a new species of shuotheriid mammaliaform that lived in what is now China during the Jurassic period, to gain a better understanding of their phylogenetic relationships and evolutionary paths. Life reconstruction of Feredocodon chowi (right) and Dianoconodon youngi (left). Image credit:…

The rare amulet-seal is at least 2,800 years old (First Temple period), according to a team of experts from the Israel Antiquities Authority and the University of Fribourg. The 2,800-year-old amulet-seal from the site of Tel Rekhesh, Israel. Image credit: Israel Antiquities Authority. “The scarab, made of a semi-precious stone called carnelian, depicts either a…

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have captured a spectacular image of I Zwicky 18 (I Zw 18 for short), the archetypal extremely metal-poor, star-forming, blue compact dwarf galaxy in the constellation of Ursa Major. This Webb image shows I Zwicky 18, a blue compact dwarf galaxy some 59 million light-years away in…

Black-capped chickadees (Poecile atricapillus), small North American passerine birds that live in deciduous and mixed forests, have extraordinary memories that can recall the locations of thousands of morsels of food to help them survive the winter. Now, scientists at Columbia University’s Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute have discovered how the chickadees can remember so many…

A duo of planetary scientists from Brown University and the SETI Institute has found that the Kuiper Belt object (486958) Arrokoth, which was the target of the January 1, 2019 flyby by NASA’s New Horizons mission, may have ancient ices stored deep within it from when the object first formed billions of years ago. Using…

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have detected over 100 molecular species in the center of the starburst galaxy NGC 253 — far more than previously observed in galaxies beyond the Milky Way. An artist’s impression of the center of the starburst galaxy NGC 253. Image credit: NRAO / AUI / NSF. In…

The origins and dispersal of the chicken (Gallus gallus) across the ancient world is one of the most enigmatic questions regarding Eurasian domesticated animals. The lack of agreement concerning timing and centers of origin is due to issues with morphological identifications, a lack of direct dating, and poor preservation of thin, brittle bird bones. In…