Science news, expert analysis and the latest discoveries (2024)
Latest
Solar storm slams Mars in eerie new NASA footageByMeredith Garofalo published 15 June 24A powerful solar storm in May 2024 created auroras on Mars and provided scientists with crucial information that could aid future crewed missions to the Red Planet.
Mars
Skeletons of Incan kids buried 500 years ago found marred with smallpoxByKristina Killgrove published 15 June 24Archaeologists in Peru have discovered two 16th-century toddler burials with evidence of smallpox, indicating that the foreign illness spread quickly with European contact.
Archaeology
Qinling panda: The shrunken pandas that diverged 300,000 years ago and sometimes come out brown ByLydia Smith published 15 June 24Qinling pandas were officially recognized as a subspecies in 2005, but the mystery of their brown fur was only resolved almost two decades later.
Pandas
Gilgamesh flood tablet: A 2,600-year-old text that's eerily similar to the story of Noah's ArkByJennifer Nalewicki published 15 June 24The baked clay tablet tells the tale of an epic flood.
Archaeology
Why does the sun make people sneeze?ByCharles Q. Choi published 15 June 24People who sneeze in bright lights, like the sun, may have autosomal dominant compelling helio-ophthalmic outburst syndrome, or ACHOO.
1st-known human case of H5N2 bird flu remains under investigationByNicoletta Lanese last updated 14 June 24A man in Mexico died after catching the world's first laboratory-confirmed case of H5N2 bird flu in humans. However, authorities think he likely died of existing conditions, rather than the infection itself.
Flu
Melatonin may stave off age-related vision loss, study hintsByEmily Cooke published 14 June 24A large new analysis has tied the use of supplemental melatonin to a lower risk of developing one of the most common age-related causes of vision loss.
Florida shark attacks caused by heat, not scary orcas, experts sayByJacklin Kwan published 14 June 24People had linked recent shark attacks in the Florida panhandle to orca activity in the Gulf. But a combination of dry weather and heat was the real driving force.
Sharks
Gen Xers will have higher cancer rates than boomers, study forecastsByEmily Cooke published 14 June 24A new modeling study predicts that cancer rates in people over 60 may be rising among successive generations.
Cancer
Vera C. Rubin Observatory: The groundbreaking mission to make a 10-year, time-lapse movie of the universeByJamie Carter published 14 June 24Armed with the world's largest digital camera, the forthcoming Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile will take night-sky images that revolutionize astronomy.
Space Exploration
How long would it take to reach Planet 9, if we ever find it?ByHarry Baker published 14 June 24Some experts believe that the solar system's hypothetical ninth planet could be just a few years away from being discovered. If this is the case, how long would it take for humans to send probes to the elusive world?
Planets
Planet Nine: Is the search for this elusive world nearly over?ByHarry Baker published 14 June 24Astronomers have been scouring the outer solar system for signs of a hypothetical ninth planet for almost a decade, without success. However, we may finally be on the cusp of finding it, experts say.
Planets
Orangutan 'stoically waits' for tourists in award-winning photograph 'See No Evil'ByHannah Osborne published 14 June 24Aaron Gekoski's image of an orangutan sitting patiently at Safari World in Bangkok has won the 2024 Environmental Photography Award competition.
Animals
NASA will put a 'new star' in the sky by the end of the decade in 1st-of-its-kind missionByHarry Baker published 14 June 24The newly announced Landolt NASA Space Mission will launch a bread box-size "artificial star" satellite that will mimic stars by shining lasers directly at ground-based telescopes. This will enable astronomers to fine-tune instruments and potentially revolutionize how we study the universe.
Astronomy
Leatherback turtle dives deeper than a Navy sub, smashing world record in the processByPatrick Pester published 14 June 24A Western Pacific leatherback migrating from her nesting grounds in the Solomon Islands dove to a whopping 4,409 feet, conservationists say.
Turtles
Hot Tub of Despair: The deadly ocean pool that traps and pickles creatures that fall inBySascha Pare published 14 June 24This stagnant brine pool at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico is so toxic it kills and embalms any crabs and amphipods that are unlucky enough to stumble into it.
GPT-4 has passed the Turing test, researchers claimByDrew Turney published 14 June 24Most people couldn't distinguish ChatGPT from a human responder, suggesting the famous Turing test has been passed for the first time.
Artificial Intelligence
New RSV shots tied to rare nervous system disorder — should you worry?ByStephanie Pappas published 13 June 24There's been some reports of Guillain-Barré syndrome in older adults who got the vaccines. But health officials still recommend that this population get the shots, in consultation with their doctors.
James Webb telescope discovers most distant supernova ever seenByBen Turner published 13 June 24The James Webb Space Telescope has spotted a supernova dating to just 1.8 billion years after the Big Bang, as well as 80 others in the early universe. The ancient explosions could help scientists figure out the mysteries of how the cosmos evolved.
Astronomy
2,500-year-old slate containing drawings of battle scenes and paleo-alphabet discovered in SpainByJennifer Nalewicki published 13 June 24Archaeologists discovered the stone tablet at a Tartessian site in southwestern Spain.
June 28, 2024 — Researchers developed a new wireless receiver that can block strong interference signals at the earliest opportunity, which could improve the performance of a mobile ... June 27, 2024 — Researchers have developed a tiny robot replicating the aerial dance of falling maple seeds.
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Nuclear fusion generates more net energy with ignition
Nuclear fusion is the process that powers the sun and stars. For decades, the idea of replicating nuclear fusion on earth as a source of energy, in theory, could fulfill all the planet's future energy needs.
Answer: The scientific discovery that is considered to be the most breakthrough in the scientific world in the past 300 years is the discovery of the structure of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) by James Watson and Francis Crick.
Science News is published by the Society for Science, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to expanding scientific literacy, effective STEM education and scientific research through its award-winning publications and world-class science education competitions.
Science News is published by the Society for Science, a nonprofit 501(c) (3) organization dedicated to the public engagement in scientific research and education.
This led to a better understanding of how our universe works, with Einstein's work inspiring countless other scientists in fields such as astrophysics and quantum mechanics.
Researchers using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope may have detected atmospheric gases surrounding 55 Cancri e, a hot rocky exoplanet 41 light-years from Earth. This is the best evidence to date for the existence of any rocky planet atmosphere outside…
The latest discovered state of matter is Bose-Einstein condensate. It is a state of matter in which separate atoms or subatomic particles, cooled to near absolute zero, coalesce into a single quantum mechanical entity.
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Introduction: My name is Cheryll Lueilwitz, I am a sparkling, clean, super, lucky, joyous, outstanding, lucky person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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