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New Research

Nicole Mann poses for a portrait in a T-38 trainer jet at Ellington Field in Houston, Texas, in 2018.

Nicole Mann Becomes the First Native American Woman in Space

She is the mission commander of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission that will spend five months on the International Space Station

A picture of Saturn's moon Enceladus, with Saturn in the background, taken by the Cassini spacecraft.

A Moon of Saturn May Be More Habitable Than Expected

With the prediction of phosphorus in its oceans, Enceladus has become an even more promising candidate for hosting life

The archaeological site at Himera in Sicily

Mercenaries Were More Common in Greek Warfare Than Ancient Historians Let on

New research finds that many soldiers who fought in the fifth-century B.C.E. battles at Himera were born outside of the empire

Researchers at Northwestern University examined the brains of six super-agers.

‘Super-Agers’ Might Have Super Neurons

Elderly people with exceptional memories have larger neurons in a brain area responsible for recollection

An artist's rendering of a field of first-generation stars as they would have appeared 100 million years after the Big Bang. 

An Early Star’s Remains May Be Swirling Around a Black Hole

The first stars exploded long ago, but scientists say they’ve detected the chemical fingerprint that one of them left behind

Svante Pääbo poses with a model of a Neanderthal skeleton after winning the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Svante Pääbo Wins Nobel Prize for Unraveling the Mysteries of Neanderthal DNA

The Swedish geneticist used 40,000-year-old bones to sequence the early humans’ genome

A new study provides further evidence that dogs really are man's best friend.

Dogs Can Smell When You’re Stressed Out

A small study suggests that highly sensitive canine noses can pick up on the odors that frazzled humans emit

Past research has found that people’s personalities are relatively immune to changes following collective stressful events, but Covid-19 appears to be an exception.

The Future of Mental Health

Has the Pandemic Changed Your Personality?

Research suggests younger adults’ dispositions shifted the most during Covid-19

Five-day-old red-eyed treefrog embryos are tightly curled inside dehydrated eggs packed closely together. It’s dry enough to make them begin to hatch early amid heating.

Panama

When the Heat Is on, Red-Eyed Treefrogs Hatch Early

The embryos make the move from clutches on leaves to rainforest ponds below

Ruins of Tikal, where researchers found high concentrations of mercury 

Ancient Maya Cities Were Polluted With High Levels of Mercury

The concentrations at some dig sites could be hazardous for today’s archaeologists

Goods from a grave site at Issendorf cemetery in Lower-Saxony, Germany. 

DNA From Skeletons Reveals Large Migration to Early Medieval England

A new study could close a long-standing debate about movement of people post-Roman rule

An artist's renditon of the "alien goldfish." Scientists identified a toothy structure in the animal's gut, suggesting it was some kind of mollusk.

Mysterious ‘Alien Goldfish’ May Have Been a Mollusk

The bizarre creature’s anatomy had stumped scientists for decades

Some of the 14th-century B.C.E. vessels found at the Tel Yehud burial site

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Discover Evidence of Earliest Known Opium Use

At a burial site in Israel, pottery from the 14th century B.C.E. contained traces of the drug

An X-ray of the Dancing Horse earthenware sculpture, which dates to 608 to 907 C.E. during China's Tang dynasty

Art Meets Science

Chemistry Reveals the History of an Ancient Dancing Horse Sculpture

The artwork dates to China’s Tang dynasty, when horses were a symbol of prosperity

Ants have several key roles in keeping their environments in balance, including aerating the soil, dispersing seeds, decomposing organic material and serving as a food source. 

An Estimated 20 Quadrillion Ants Live on Earth

The weight of the world’s ants exceeds that of all wild birds and mammals combined

The blood test screens for over 50 types of cancer, some of which can not be screened for currently.

Could a Blood Test Effectively Screen for Cancers?

The innovation shows promise, but so far, it returns many false positives

A photo of Saturn taken by NASA's Voyager 1 space probe from a distance of 34 million kilometers in 1980. 

What Caused Saturn’s Rings and Tilt? Perhaps the Destruction of a Moon

Scientists propose that about 160 million years ago, the moon was torn apart, creating the planet’s iconic rings

A rendering of the MICROSCOPE satellite in space. 

Scientists Test How Objects Fall in Space

In the most precise experiment to date, researchers confirm a principle of Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity

The newly discovered Opisthiamimus gregori preys on a now-extinct water bug.

Scientists Discover Bug-Eating Reptile That Lived Among Dinosaurs

Delicate fossil reveals a cousin of the modern tuatara

The artificial intelligence has looked for patterns between audio recordings and the brain activity of people listening to those recordings. 

By Reading Brainwaves, an A.I. Aims to Predict What Words People Listened to

The research is a long way off from practical use, but researchers hope it might one day aid communication for people who experienced brain injuries

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