The universe is showing off in dazzling images highlighted by the Astronomy Photographer of the Year awards. From closeup views of our solar system to distant wonders of galaxies and nebulae, this ye… [+6419 chars]

The haunting beauty of the universe is on full display in this year's astrophotography competition.

Gizmodo.com

A Deep-Space Shark Is Prowling the Cosmos—and the Photo Just Won a Major Award - Gizmodo

Charred to a crisp during Mount Vesuvius eruption in AD 79, hundreds of papyrus scrolls lie tucked away unread in Italys National Library of Naples.
The majority of these carbonized artifacts, known… [+5300 chars]

By re-creating carbonized scrolls, researchers found lead-based ink is easier to detect with X-rays, potentially helping AI reveal texts in Herculaneum scrolls.

How lead-based ink may reveal hidden text on scorched Herculaneum scrolls - CNN

Indy Clinton's young daughter, Soul, has somehow befriended a wild kookaburra, and we can't help but be jealous. We're not sure how long this has been going on or whether this was their first meeting… [+1768 chars]

Her mom says it's totally on-brand for the little girl.

Pawnation.com

Little Girl Makes Friends With a Kookaburra, and We're Totally Jealous - Yahoo

The second half of the 20th century was something of a golden age for nuclear technology.
Following the atomic devastation of WWII, the world found new, more benign uses for radioactive decay. Power… [+7446 chars]

The second half of the 20th century was something of a golden age for nuclear technology.

ScienceAlert

150,000 Tons of Radioactive Waste Were Dumped in The Atlantic. Decades Later, It's Visibly Oozing. - ScienceAlert

Researchers have captured direct radio wave emissions originating from a planet outside our Solar System.
Using South Africas MeerKAT radio telescope array, an international team of astronomers succ… [+3884 chars]

Radio signals have been detected coming from a planet beyond our Solar System, giving astronomers insight into exoplanets' magnetic fields.

Skyatnightmagazine.com

Radio signals detected from a planet beyond our Solar System. Landmark discovery could help us search for habitable worlds - BBC Sky at Night Magazine

Yeah, as an ultimate unshieldable SciFi weapon. Neutrinos rarely interact, but when they do they deposit their energy. When a very large number of neutrinos fly through matter, that can add up to the… [+2049 chars]

As cool as it would have been to wield lasers that produce a beam of neutrinos, recently two papers were published by MIT researchers that seem to dampen the likelihood of such lasers being at all …

Hackaday

New Research Suggests That A Neutrino Laser Is Impossible - Hackaday

In a teaspoon of healthy soil, there can be up to 10 metres of living fungal thread. Scale that up across every grassland, forest and tundra on Earth and the total length of arbuscular mycorrhizal fu… [+8991 chars]

A team led by the Society for the Protection of Underground Networks has mapped Earth's arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi for the first time: 110 quadrillion kilometres of living thread in the top 15 centimetres of soil, roughly 40 per cent of it beneath grassland.

Space Daily

Scientists mapping the underground fungal networks that link tree roots estimate the threads stretch for 110 quadrillion kilometres worldwide, enough that laid end to end they would reach from Earth to the Sun nearly a billion times - Space Daily

PROVO In the Beehive State and throughout the Mountain West, massive water reserves are frozen, sheltered and hidden under some of the region's most striking mountain ranges.
Utah's own Mount Timpan… [+2696 chars]

Researchers at Brigham Young University are studying rock glaciers, or underground frozen water reserves hidden high in mountain ranges across Utah and the Mountain West.

KSL.com

'Great for our water supply': BYU study examines how rock glaciers fit into Utah's water puzzle - ksl.com

A synthetic biology technology has been developed that converts easily degraded messenger RNA (mRNA) into a ring-shaped form inside microbial cells, increasing protein production.
A research team le… [+8449 chars]

A synthetic biology technology has been developed that converts easily degraded messenger RNA (mRNA) into a ring-shaped form inside microbial cells, increasing protein production.

Phys.Org

Circular mRNA helps cell factories make up to six times as much protein - Phys.org

Every GPS position on the planet is calculated against one invisible point: Earths center of mass. Satellite navigation treats that point as fixed. It isnt.
Snowmelt, ocean currents, and shifting ai… [+5388 chars]

Every GPS position on the planet is calculated against one invisible point: Earth’s center of mass. Satellite navigation treats that point as fixed.

Earth.com

Earth’s center of mass is moving, and scientists just found something surprising - AOL.com

A University of Iowa-led research team has reported in a new study the most detailed observations to date of the bow shock at Jupiter, our solar system's gas giant. The findings from NASA's Juno miss… [+4195 chars]

A University of Iowa-led research team has reported in a new study the most detailed observations to date of the bow shock at Jupiter, our solar system's gas giant. The findings from NASA's Juno mission reveal key differences between Jupiter's bow shock and E…

Jupiter uses a surprisingly complex system to fend off particles from the sun - Phys.org

Paleontologists have described a new genus and species of therizinosaur based on a nearly complete skeleton found in northeastern China. Named Kayrasaurus changliensis, the species is the largest the… [+4291 chars]

Paleontologists have described a new genus and species of therizinosaur based on a nearly complete skeleton found in northeastern China.

Sci.news

New Therizinosaurian Dinosaur Unearthed in China - Sci.News

"You don't often have a situation which is really tiny but also extremely heavy."

Space.com

Large Hadron Collider is still on the hunt for short-lived quantum black holes and a theory of everything - Space

When NASA's Perseverance rover reached the inner edge of Mars' Jezero Crater in September 2023, mission scientists were surprised by what they found. The geologic area, called the "Margin Unit," stre… [+5772 chars]

When NASA's Perseverance rover reached the inner edge of Mars' Jezero Crater in September 2023, mission scientists were surprised by what they found. The geologic area, called the "Margin Unit," stretches along the shoreline of an ancient Martian lake, so the…

Early Mars rocks reveal at least three separate water episodes - Phys.org

Literary records indicate that ancient China had five types of physical penalties. These included nasal amputation, although researchers had yet to find archaeological evidence of criminals subjected… [+3971 chars]

Researchers say the woman received medical attention after the procedure but was eventually buried in shame.

This Skeleton May Prove That Imperial China Really Did Cut Off Noses as Punishment - Gizmodo

Have you ever seen something that doesn't quite add up? Maybe a shape in the dark resembles a face, or an orange momentarily looks like an apple. Scientists now have a new idea about how different br… [+3594 chars]

Have you ever seen something that doesn't quite add up? Maybe a shape in the dark resembles a face, or an orange momentarily looks like an apple. Scientists now have a new idea about how different brain regions may work together to resolve these visual mix-up…

Medical Xpress

When the eyes play tricks, the brain builds consensus - Medical Xpress

Beneath the vast frozen wastes of Antarctica lie the remains of ancient mountains that have long since eroded. Even though they're no longer standing, they can still reveal a few lost secrets. New re… [+3880 chars]

Beneath the vast frozen wastes of Antarctica lie the remains of ancient mountains that have long since eroded. Even though they're no longer standing, they can still reveal a few lost secrets. New research published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters sugg…

Antarctica's lost mountains may have helped early life flourish - Phys.org

We're one step closer to interstellar weather forecasting.

The James Webb Space Telescope is helping astronomers become alien weather forecasters - Space

For decades, Arctic sea ice has been melting earlier in spring and freezing later in fall, extending the melt season and contributing to widespread ice loss. A new NASA-led study published in Communi… [+4354 chars]

For decades, Arctic sea ice has been melting earlier in spring and freezing later in fall, extending the melt season and contributing to widespread ice loss. A new NASA-led study published in Communications Earth & Environment has found that while the Arctic …

Satellite record reveals Arctic melt season has plateaued after decades of lengthening - Phys.org

For more than 170 years, paleontologists have been trying to solve the mystery of what created the strangely uniform hexagonal tunnels found in fossils. In a new study published in Earth Science Revi… [+6732 chars]

For more than 170 years, paleontologists have been trying to solve the mystery of what created the strangely uniform hexagonal tunnels found in fossils. In a new study published in Earth Science Reviews, a team of researchers pored over the evidence and concl…