Unlike some pretty metal plants that thrive in the darkness, yeast generally doesn’t function well in the light. This fungi turns carbohydrates into ingredients for beer or bread when left to ferment in the dark. It must be stored in dark dry places, as exposure to light can keep fermentation from happening all together. However, a group of scientists have engineered a strain of yeast that may actually work better with light that could give these fungi an evolutionary boost in a simple way. The findings are described in a study published January 12 in the journal Current Biology.

[Related: The key to tastier beer might be mutant yeast—with notes of banana.]

“We were frankly shocked by how simple it was to turn the yeast into phototrophs (organisms that can harness and use energy from light),” study co-author and Georgia Institute of Technology cellular biologist Anthony Burnetti said in a statement. “All we needed to do was move a single gene, and they grew 2 percent faster in the light than in the dark. Without any fine-tuning or careful coaxing, it just worked.”

Giving yeast such an evolutionarily important trait may help us understand how phototropism originated and how it can be used to study evolution and biofuel production, as well as how cells age. 

Give it some energy

Previous work on the evolution of multicellular life by this research group inspired the new study. In 2023, the group uncovered how a single-celled model organism called snowflake yeast could evolve multicellularity over 3,000 generations. However, one of the major limitations to their evolution experiments was a lack of energy.

“Oxygen has a hard time diffusing deep into tissues, and you get tissues without the ability to get energy as a result,” said Burnetti. “I was looking for ways to get around this oxygen-based energy limitation.”

Light is one of the ways organisms can get an energy boost without oxygen. However, from an evolutionary standpoint, an organism’s ability to turn light into usable energy can be complicated. The molecular machinery that allows plants to use light for energy requires numerous proteins and genes that are difficult to synthesize and transfer into other organisms. This is difficult in the lab and through natural processes like evolution. 

A simple rhodopsin

Plants are not the only organisms that can convert light into energy. Some on-plant organisms can also use this light with the help of rhodopsins. These proteins can convert light into energy without any extra cellular machinery.

“Rhodopsins are found all over the tree of life and apparently are acquired by organisms obtaining genes from each other over evolutionary time,” study co-author and Georgia Tech Ph.D. student Autumn Peterson said in a statement. 

[Related: Scientists create a small, allegedly delicious piece of yeast-free pizza dough.]

A genetic exchange like this is called a horizontal gene transfer, where genetic information is shared between organisms that are not closely related. A horizontal gene transfer can cause large evolutionary leaps in a short period of time. One example of this is how bacteria can quickly develop resistance to certain antibiotics. This can happen with all kinds of genetic information and is particularly common with rhodopsin proteins.

“In the process of figuring out a way to get rhodopsins into multi-celled yeast,” said Burnetti, “we found we could learn about horizontal transfer of rhodopsins that has occurred across evolution in the past by transferring it into regular, single-celled yeast where it has never been before.”

Under the spotlight

To see if they could give a single-celled organism a solar-powered rhodopsin, the team added a rhodopsin gene synthesized from a parasitic fungus to common baker’s yeast. This individual gene is coded for a form of rhodopsin that would be inserted into the cell’s vacuole. This is a part of the cell that can turn chemical gradients made by proteins like rhodopsin into needed energy. 

With this vacuolar rhodopsin, the yeast grew roughly 2 percent faster when it was exposed to light. According to the team, this is a major evolutionary benefit and the ease that the rhodopsins can spread across multiple lineages might be key. 

“Here we have a single gene, and we’re just yanking it across contexts into a lineage that’s never been a phototroph before, and it just works,” said Burnetti. “This says that it really is that easy for this kind of a system, at least sometimes, to do its job in a new organism.”

Yeasts that function better in the light could also increase its shelf life. Vacuolar function may also contribute to cellular aging, so this group has started collaborating with other teams to study how rhodopsins may reduce aging effects in the yeast. Similar solar-powered yeast is also being studied to advance biofuels. The team also hopes to study how phototrophy changes yeast’s evolutionary journey to a multicellular organism. 

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Even the brilliant minds at NASA sometimes have trouble opening up a tightly-sealed container. Engineers and scientists from Johnson Space Center finally opened a container of asteroid sample material, after two fasteners had been stuck for about 3.5 months. 

[Related: NASA’s OSIRIS mission delivered asteroid samples to Earth.]

On September 24, 2023, the agency received roughly 2.5 ounces of rocks and dust collected from a 4.5 billion year-old near-Earth asteroid named Bennu. The regolith was dropped off by OSIRIS-REx in a Utah desert. This is the first United States mission to collect samples from an asteroid. The spacecraft traveled 1.4-billion-miles from Earth, to the asteroid Bennu, and then back again to drop off the asteroid dust. However, NASA announced in October that some of the material was out of reach in a capsule inside a robotic arm with a storage container called the Touch-and-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism (TAGSAM). 

The asteroid samples must be analyzed in a specialized glovebox with a flow of nitrogen to prevent them from becoming contaminated. According to NASA, 35 fasteners were holding the sampler shut and two of the fasteners were too difficult to open with any of the pre-approved ways to access containers of such precious samples. They initially managed to collect some black dust and debris l from the TAGSAM head when the aluminum head was first removed and could access some of the material from inside the canister with tweezers or a scoop, while the TAGSAM head’s mylar flap was held down. 

To pry open the stuck fasteners, NASA needed to develop new materials and specialized tools that minimize the risk that the precious space rock samples will be damaged or contaminated. These new tools include custom-fabricated bits built from a specific grade of surgical, non-magnetic stainless steel. This is the hardest metal approved for use in the container’s pristine curation gloveboxes. These techniques enabled the team to open the stuck fasteners. 

“In addition to the design challenge of being limited to curation-approved materials to protect the scientific value of the asteroid sample, these new tools also needed to function within the tightly-confined space of the glovebox, limiting their height, weight, and potential arc movement,” Johnson Space Center OSIRIS-REx curator Nicole Lunning said in a statement. “The curation team showed impressive resilience and did incredible work to get these stubborn fasteners off the TAGSAM head so we can continue disassembly. We are overjoyed with the success.”

After a few additional disassembly steps, the remainder of the sample will be fully visible. Image specialists will be able to take ultra-high-resolution pictures of the sample while it is still inside TAGSAM’s head. After imaging, this portion of the sample will be removed, weighed, and the team will determine the total mass of the asteroid material captured by the mission. 

Bennu dates back to the crucial first 10 million years of the solar system’s development. Its age offers scientists a window into what this time period looked like. The space rock is shaped like a spinning top and is about one-third of a mile across at its widest part–slightly wider than the Empire State Building is tall. It revolves around the sun between the orbits of Earth and Mars.

An analysis of Bennu’s dust conducted last fall revealed that the asteroid had a lot of water in the form of hydrated clay minerals. The team believes that signs of water on asteroids support the current theory of how water arrived on Earth.

[Related: NASA’s first asteroid-return sample is a goldmine of life-sustaining materials.]

OSIRIS-REx principal investigator Dante Lauretta told PopSci in October that asteroids like Bennu were likely responsible for all of Earth’s oceans, lakes, rivers, and rain. Water likely arrived when space rocks landed on our planet about 4 billion years ago. The asteroid Bennu has water-bearing clay with a fibrous structure, which was the key material that ferried water to Earth, according to Lauretta.

The Bennu sample also contained about 4.7 percent carbon. According to Daniel Glavin, the OSIRIS-REx sample analysis lead at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, this sample has the highest abundance of carbon that a team from the Carnegie Institution for Science have measured in an extraterrestrial sample. Glavin told PopSci that when the team opened it, “There were scientists on the team going ‘Wow, oh my God!’ And when a scientist says that ‘Wow;’ that’s a big deal.”

In the spring, the curation team is scheduled to release a catalog of the OSIRIS-REx samples for the global scientific community to study. OSIRIS-REx is now renamed OSIRIS-APEX and is currently on its way to study a potentially asteroid named Apophis. That rendezvous is scheduled for sometime in 2029.

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Hummingbirds are some of the fastest and most agile birds on Earth. They can squeeze into incredibly small spaces to get nectar and hit flight speeds as high as 9Gs while courting without getting physically hurt. They also appear to have very controlled methods of flight. Hummingbirds use two distinct sensory strategies to control how they fly, depending on whether they are moving forward or hovering. The findings are described in a study published January 10 in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

[Related: Hummingbirds have two creative strategies for flying through tight spaces.]

When flying forward, hummingbirds rely on an “internal forward model.” This model is an ingrained and intuitive autopilot that allows them to gauge speed while experiencing multiple visual stimuli. 

“There’s just too much information coming in to rely directly on every visual cue from your surroundings,” study co-author and University of British Columbia zoologist and comparative physiologist Vikram B. Baliga said in a statement. 

However, when the birds are hovering or handling cues that may require them to change their altitude, the team found that they use more real-time, direct visuals from their environment. 

To study these flight patterns, the team brought 11 wild adult male Anna’s hummingbirds (Calypte anna) into the lab. They prompted the birds to repeatedly fly from a perch to a feeder in a tunnel about 13 feet long and recorded videos of each flight. The team also projected patterns on the front and side walls of the tunnel to test how the hummingbirds reacted to this variety of visual stimuli.

In some flight scenarios, the researchers projected vertical stripes that were moving along at various speeds on the side of the tunnel to mimic forward motion. Other times, they used horizontal stripes on the side to mimic a change in altitude. On the front wall, the team projected  rotating swirls. These circular patterns were designed to create the illusion of a change in position.

“If the birds were taking their cues directly from visual stimuli, we’d expect them to adjust their forward velocity to the speed of vertical stripes on the side walls,” said Baliga. “But while the birds did change velocity or stop altogether depending on the patterns, there wasn’t a neat correlation.”

However, the team observed that the hummingbirds adjusted more directly to stimuli indicating a change in altitude while they were flying. When the birds were hovering, they also worked to adjust their position so they were closer to the shifting spirals on the front wall. 

[Related: This hybrid hummingbird’s colorful feathers are a genetic puzzle.]

“Our experiments were designed to investigate how hummingbirds control flight speed,” study co-author and University of British Columbia zoologist and comparative physiologist Doug Altshuler said in a statement. “But because the hummingbirds took spontaneous breaks to hover during their flights, we uncovered these two distinct strategies to control different aspects of their trajectories.”

The findings provide insight on how these speedy birds perceive the world when they transition their flight patterns. Data like this could also help engineers develop better onboard navigation systems for drones and hovering vehicles in the future.

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Following a successful launch aboard a Vulcan Centaur Rocket on Monday January 8, private space company Astrobotic has abandoned its attempt to land its Peregrine spacecraft on the moon. In an update from the Pittsburgh-based company, Astrobotic reported that Peregrine sent back a few images from the earlier parts of its journey. One of the images showed what Astrobotic described as a “curved sliver” that appears to be Earth. 

[Related: Peregrine lunar lander experiences ‘critical loss of propellant’ following successful launch.]

“Our flight dynamics team has confirmed that the curved sliver in this image taken on our first day of operations is, in fact, Earth! This image from our spacecraft simulator shows the camera’s view of Earth at the time the photo was taken,” the company wrote in the January 10 update.

Astrobotic also has gathered data from the payloads that were designed to communicate with the lander. “All 10 payloads requiring power have received it, while the remaining 10 payloads aboard the spacecraft are passive,” Astrobotic wrote in a January 11 update. “These payloads have now been able to prove operational capability in space and payload teams are analyzing the impact of this development now.”

What went wrong?

About seven hours after launch, Peregrine was unable to shift its solar panels towards the sun so that its batteries could charge. While the engineering team was able to turn the panels, more problems developed. 

Astrobotic believed that the root of the problem was a failure in the vehicle’s propulsion system that was causing a critical loss of propellant. The company shared the first image of the lander in space, with its outer insulation appearing very crinkled. 

By Monday evening, Astrobotic announced that this fuel leak was causing the thrusters in the spacecraft’s attitude control system to “operate well beyond their expected service life cycles to keep the lander from an uncontrollable tumble.” The mission’s priority also became maximizing the data and scientific information that Peregrine could capture and send back to Earth. 

On Tuesday January 9 Astrobotic said that the leak meant that “there is, unfortunately, no chance of a soft landing on the moon. By January 10, Peregrine was roughly 192,000 miles from Earth. The spacecraft was “stable and fully charged” and gathering “valuable data.” They estimated that it will likely shut down at around sometime on Friday January 12.

[Related: Inside NASA’s messy plan to return to the moon by 2024.]

What will happen to Peregrine?

Peregrine will join the estimated 29,000 pieces of space debris larger than 10 centimeters (3.9 inches). The spacecraft will also be a floating gravesite. Its payload contained DNA samples and portions of cremated remains of three former United States presidents, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, and several members of the original cast of the groundbreaking sci-fi series. 

What is next for public-private lunar exploration?

With this mission, Astrobotic hoped to become the first private business to successfully land on the moon. This is a feat only four countries–Russia, China, India, and the United States–have accomplished. 

A second lander from Houston-based Intuitive Machines is scheduled to launch in February. NASA has given both of these companies millions of dollars to construct and fly their own lunar landers, so that the privately owned landers can explore landing sites before astronauts arrive and deliver critical technology and experiments. Astrobotic’s contract with NASA for the Peregrine lander was $108 million with more to come. 

[Related: NASA delays two crewed Artemis moon missions.]

This week, NASA leadership announced that it is delaying future missions to the moon, citing safety issues and delays in developing lunar landers and spacesuits. Originally scheduled to launch in November of this year, the Artemis II mission that will send four astronauts around the moon has been postponed to September 2025. Meanwhile, the moon-landing mission Artemis III will now aim for September 2026 instead of late 2025. The Artemis IV mission remains on track for September 2028.

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On January 9, NASA leadership announced that it is delaying future missions to the moon. Originally slated to launch November 2024, the Artemis II mission that will send four astronauts around the moon has been postponed to September 2025. Meanwhile, the moon-landing mission Artemis III will now aim for September 2026 instead of late 2025. The Artemis IV mission remains on track for September 2028. 

[Related: Inside NASA’s messy plan to return to the moon by 2024.]

The agency cited safety concerns with its spacecraft and development issues with the lunar landers and spacesuits, both of which are being made by private industry. The announcement came within hours of private space company Astrobotic abandoning its attempt to land a spacecraft on the moon due to a fuel leak. Peregrine Mission One launched on January 8 as part of NASA’s commercial lunar program and the lander was intended to serve as a support scout for Artemis astronauts. 

When it eventually launches, Artemis II will not enter orbit around the moon the way that Apollo missions did. Instead, the Orion capsule will swing around the moon and use lunar gravity to sling the spacecraft back towards the Earth. The entire trip is expected to take about 10 days. In April 2023, NASA announced that the crew will be three of its astronauts—Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Reid Wiseman—and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen. 

NASA plans to land two astronauts on the moon near its south pole for the first time in its now rescheduled Artemis III mission. If successful, it will mark humanity’s first return to the lunar surface in over 50 years. 

“Safety is our top priority, and to give Artemis teams more time to work through the challenges with first-time developments, operations and integration, we’re going to give more time on Artemis II and III,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in the live streamed briefing. 

The officials cited several technical issues for the delay, including the electronics in the life support system that will need to sustain the astronauts inside the Orion and the heat shield on the capsule. 

According to deputy associate administrator for NASA’s Moon to Mars program Amit Kshatriya, the heat shield issues that the Orion capsule experienced during the uncrewed Artemis 1 test flight around the moon in November and December 2022 have been a major concern while the data from that mission has been analyzed. They’ve found that while Orion’s heat shield sufficiently protected the capsule, a large amount of the shield was burned away from the spacecraft. 

[Related: Before the Artemis II crew can go to the moon, they need to master flying high above Earth.]

“We did see the off-nominal recession of some char that came off the heat shield, which we were not expecting,” Kshatriya said in the briefing. “Now, this heat shield is an ablative material—it is supposed to char—but it’s not what we were expecting, with some pieces of that char to be liberated from the vehicle.”

Over the past 10 years, NASA’s moon-landing effort has been delayed repeatedly. In December 2023, the Government Accountability Office reported that Artemis III’s targeted December 2025 lunar landing was unlikely. The accountability office cited an optimistic schedule for developing Space X’s Starship lunar lander and the spacesuits necessary for walking on the moon. In 2023, two Starship test launches failed to reach orbit. 
These delays have added billions of dollars to the cost of the program. According to the Associated Press, recent government audits project that it will cost $93 billion through 2025.

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Beginning about 2.6 million years ago, giant primates almost 10 feet tall weighing 551 pounds roamed the plains of southern China. Gigantopithecus blacki (G. blacki) towered over today’s largest monkeys by about five feet and is believed to be the largest primate to ever roam the Earth. However, it went extinct just as other primates–like orangutans–were thriving. 

[Related: These primate ancestors were totally chill with a colder climate.]

Now, a team of scientists from China, Australia, and the United States believe that this giant ape went extinct between 295,000 and 215,000 years ago because it could not adapt its food preferences and behaviors and was vulnerable to extreme changes in the planet’s climate. The findings are detailed in a study published January 10 in the journal Nature. 

“The story of G. blacki is an enigma in paleontology–how could such a mighty creature go extinct at a time when other primates were adapting and surviving? The unresolved cause of its disappearance has become the Holy Grail in this discipline,” Yingqi Zhang, study co-author and Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and Palaeoanthropology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IVPP) paleontologist, said in a statement. 

Seasonal shifts 

Roughly 700,000 to 600,000 years ago, the rich forest environment that G. blacki lived in began to change. The new study proposes that as Earth’s four seasons began to strengthen and G. blacki’s habitat saw more variability in temperature and precipitation, the structure of these forest communities began to change. 

In response, G. blacki’s close relatives the orangutans adapted their habitat preferences, behavior, and size over time. However, G. blacki was not quite as nimble. Based on its dental anatomy, these giant apes were herbivores that had adapted to eat fibrous foods like fruits. However, when its favorite food sources were not available, the team believes that G. blacki relied on a less nutritious backup source of sustenance, decreasing the diversity of its food. They likely suffered from a reduced geographic range for foraging, became less mobile, and saw chronic stress and dwindling numbers. 

“G. blacki was the ultimate specialist, compared to the more agile adapters like orangutans,  and this ultimately led to its demise,” said Zhang. 

Honing in on a date

G. blacki left behind roughly 2,000 fossilized teeth and four jawbones that helped paleontologists put together the story of G. blacki’s time on Earth, but more precise dating of these remains was needed to determine its extinction story. To find definitive evidence of their extinction, the team took on a large-scale project that explored 22 cave sites in a wide region of Guangxi Province in southern China. 

[Related: Nice chimps finish last—so why aren’t all of them mean?]

Determining the exact time when a species disappears from the fossil record helps paleontologists determine a timeframe that they can work to rebuild from other evidence. 

“Without robust dating, you are simply looking for clues in the wrong places,” Kira Westaway, a study co-author and geochronologist at Macquarie University in Australia, said in a statement

In the study, the team used six dating techniques the samples of cave sediments and teeth fossils. The techniques produced 157 radiometric ages that were combined with eight sources of environmental and behavioral evidence. They took this combined figure and applied it to 11 caves that had evidence of G blacki in them and 11 caves of a similar age range that did not have any remains of G. blacki.

The primary technique that helped the team hone in on a date range was luminescence dating. It measures a light-sensitive signal that is found in the burial sediments that encased the G. blacki fossils. Uranium series and electron-spin resonance were also critical in dating the G. blacki teeth themselves. 

“By direct-dating the fossil remains, we confirmed their age aligns with the luminescence sequence in the sediments where they were found, giving us a comprehensive and reliable chronology for the extinction of G. blacki,” Renaud Joannes-Boyau, a study co-author and geochronologist at Southern Cross University  in Australia, said in a statement. 

Building a world from teeth and pollen 

Researchers also used a detailed pollen analysis to reconstruct what the plant life looked like hundreds of thousands of years ago, a stable isotope analysis of the teeth, and a detailed analysis of the cave sediments to re-create the environmental conditions leading up to the time G blacki went extinct. Trace element and dental microwear textural analysis of the apes’ teeth enabled the team to model what G. blacki’s behavior likely looked like when they were flourishing, compared to their demise. 

[Related: An ‘ancestral bottleneck’ took out nearly 99 percent of the human population 800,000 years ago.]

“Teeth provide a staggering insight into the behavior of the species indicating stress, diversity of food sources, and repeated behaviors,” said Joannes-Boyau.

The dates of the fossils combined with the pollen and teeth analysis revealed that G.blacki went extinct between 295,000 and 215,000 years ago, earlier than scientists previously assumed. The team believes that studying their lack of adaptation has implications for today’s changing climate and the need for adaptation. 

“With the threat of a sixth mass extinction event looming over us, there is an urgent need to understand why species go extinct,” said Westaway. “Exploring the reasons for past unresolved extinctions gives us a good starting point to understand primate resilience and the fate of other large animals, in the past and future.”

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Some fruit bats eat up to twice their body weight in sugary mangoes, bananas, or figs every day to not only survive, but thrive. Unlike humans, these flying mammals can have an essentially permanent sweet tooth and do not develop some of the negative health consequences such as diabetes. A study published January 9 in the journal Nature Communications found that genetic adaptations have helped keep their sugary diets from becoming harmful. 

[Related: How do bats stay cancer-free? The answer could be lifesaving for humans.]

The study could have future implications for treating diabetes, which affects an estimated 38 million Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It is the eighth leading cause of death in the United States and the leading cause of kidney failure, lower-limb amputations, and adult blindness.

“With diabetes, the human body can’t produce or detect insulin, leading to problems controlling blood sugar,” study co-author and University of California, San Francisco geneticist Nadav Ahituv said in a statement. “But fruit bats have a genetic system that controls blood sugar without fail. We’d like to learn from that system to make better insulin-or sugar-sensing therapies for people.”  

Fruit bats vs. insect bats

Every day, fruit bats wake up after about 20 hours of sleep and feast on fruit before returning back to their caves, trees, or human-built structures to roost. To figure out how they can eat so much sugar and thrive, the team in this study focused on how the bat pancreas and kidneys evolved. The pancreas is an abdominal organ that controls blood sugar. 

Researchers compared the Jamaican fruit bat with an insect-eating bat called the big brown bat. They analyzed the gene expression–which genes were switched on or off–and regulatory DNA that controls gene expression. To do this, the team measured both the gene expression and regulatory DNA present in individual cells. These measurements show which types of cells primarily make up the bat’s organs and also how these cells regulate the gene expression that manages their diet. 

They found that the compositions of the pancreas and kidneys in fruit bats evolved to accommodate their sugary diet. The pancreas had more cells to produce insulin, an essential hormone that tells the body to lower blood sugar. It also had more cells that produce another sugar-regulating hormone called glucagon. The fruit bat kidneys had more cells to trap scarce salts and electrolytes as they filter blood.  

Changes in DNA

Taking a closer look at the genetics behind this, the team saw that the regulatory DNA in those cells had evolved to switch the appropriate genes for fruit metabolism on or off. The insect-eating big brown bats had more cells that break down protein and conserve water and the gene expression in these cells was calibrated to handle a diet of bugs. 

[Related: Vampire bats socially distance when they feel sick.]

“The organization of the DNA around the insulin and glucagon genes was very clearly different between the two bat species,” study co-author and Menlo College biologist Wei Gordon said in a statement. “The DNA around genes used to be considered ‘junk,’ but our data shows that this regulatory DNA likely helps fruit bats react to sudden increases or decreases in blood sugar.” 

While some of the fruit bat’s biology resembled what is found in humans with diabetes, the bats are not known to have the same health effects.

“Even small changes, to single letters of DNA, make this diet viable for fruit bats,” said Gordon. “We need to understand high-sugar metabolism like this to make progress helping the one in three Americans who are prediabetic.” 

Studying bats for human health

Bats are one of the most diverse families of mammals and everything from their immune systems to very particular diets are considered by some scientists to be examples of evolutionary triumph. This study is one of recent examples of how studying bats could have implications for human health, including in cancer research and virus prevention. 

For this study, Gordon and Ahituv traveled to Belize to participate in an annual Bat-a-Thon, where they took census of wild bats and field samples. One of the Jamaican fruit bats that they captured at the Bat-a-Thon was used to study sugar metabolism.  

“For me, bats are like superheroes, each one with an amazing super power, whether it is echolocation, flying, blood sucking without coagulation, or eating fruit and not getting diabetes,” Ahituv said. “This kind of work is just the beginning.” 

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Every animal must urinate to get rid of liquid waste in their body. While the pee of a healthy person has a distinctly yellow color, it’s been unclear to scientists for centuries what actually gives urine this hue. Now, a team from the University of Maryland and National Institutes of Health believe that they have solved this mystery by pinpointing the microbial enzyme that makes our pee yellow. The findings are detailed in a study published January 3 in the journal Nature Microbiology.

[Related: Renaissance-era doctors used to taste their patients’ pee.]

According to study co-author and University of Maryland microbiologist Brantley Hall, the team built on decades of research going back to the 1960s and a difficult three-and-a-half-year long lab experiment to find that an enzyme in the gut microbiome called bilirubin reductase is responsible for urine’s color.

“The gut microbiome is just full of incredible chemists. It’s so important to human physiology, all these molecules that the gut microbes are making,” Hall tells PopSci. “As we understand more about microbial chemistry in our gut, we’re going to understand the important things. But the first step for any of this is to figure out the enzymes responsible. If you don’t know what’s going on, you basically can’t even start with the research.”

Solving a microbial mystery 

Previously, scientists knew that the yellow color comes from how the body gets rid of old blood cells. Red blood cells typically reach the end of their life cycle after about 120 days and they are degraded in the liver. A byproduct of this process called bilirubin is a bright orange substance that is secreted from the liver and into the gut. Bacteria living in the gut then convert bilirubin into a colorless substance called urobilinogen. The urobilinogen is finally degraded into the yellow pigment molecule called urobilin that plays a part in the coloring. What scientists did not know was the bacterial enzyme responsible. 

Identifying this enzyme has long been a microbial mystery for two primary reasons. According to Brantley, the first challenge is that culturing anaerobic microbes has historically been very difficult and expensive to do in the lab.

“The microbes that perform this function cannot live with atmospheric oxygen. They die within minutes or seconds,” says Hall. “And those definitely never grow.”

Brantley and the team were able to harness scientific advances made over the past 15 years in culturing these microbes that survive and thrive without oxygen.

The second challenge has been the lack of genome sequences of the microbiomes in the gut. Recent improvements in genetic sequencing means that there were more sequences available for the team to study to see how the microbes in the gut work. 

“In our case, we identified microbes that reduced bilirubin and microbes that did not. And then we performed a comparative genomics analysis between the two and identify candidate genes,” says Hall.

Into the gut microbiome

In the study, the team compared the genomes of the exact species of human gut bacteria that convert bilirubin into urobilinogen with the species of gut bacteria that can’t. This helped them identify the specific gene that encodes bilirubin reductase. Next, they used Escherichia coli (E. coli) to test if this enzyme could convert bilirubin into urobilinogen in it as well as in other gut bacteria.

After searching for this gene in all known bacterial species, the team found that the enzyme is primarily produced by a species belonging to a large group of bacteria that dominate the gut microbiome called Firmicutes. After genetically screening the gut microbiomes of over 1,000 adults to find the pee coloring gene, they found that 99.9 percent of people have gut bacteria that carry the gene for bilirubin reductase. 

[Related: Bees make more friends when they’re full of healthy gut bacteria.]

“I think the biggest surprise to me is how prevalent this function is in adult humans,” says Hall. “Basically, everyone’s urine is yellow, and everyone’s stool is brown, so we knew that there must be microbes that did it. There are actually not that many microbes that do it and they’re essentially prevalent in every person.”

Potential medical applications

The study also looked to see if this gene was present in adults with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and infants with jaundice. Only about 68 percent of those with IBD had the gene and about 40 percent of babies under three months old who were at a heightened risk for jaundice. While more research is needed, identifying what these enzymes and genes could help develop better treatments for IBD, jaundice, and even gallstones.

“People are so excited about gut health and I just love talking to people about gut health,” says Hall. “Everyone either has or knows someone who has gut issues and I just think there’s an enormous opportunity to really modulate the human gut microbiome and health in a positive way.”

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On January 8 at 2:18 a.m. local time, the United Launch Alliance’s (ULA) new Vulcan Centaur rocket successfully launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The rocket separated from the lander after about an hour and sent Peregrine Mission One into space.

Several hours after the launch, the company who built the Peregrine lander announced that it had experienced an “anomaly” that stopped Peregrine from pointing its solar panels stably at the sun. In a press release, Astrobotic stated that it has engineers working on this issue, but without the spacecraft’s ability to charge its battery, the plan to for a soft landing on the moon is in jeopardy.

At 1:03 p.m. EST Astrobotic issued an update saying that the mission will likely not go on as planned, as the lunar lander is experiencing a failure within its propulsion system.

Later, Astrobotic announced that Peregrine is suffering a critical fuel leak and has less than two days of fuel left.  An image taken by the lander in space showed damaged insulation on the spacecraft, which indicates a leak in Peregrine’s propulsion system.

“An ongoing propellant leak is causing the spacecraft’s Attitude Control System (ACS) thrusters to operate well beyond their expected service life cycles to keep the lander from an uncontrollable tumble,” the company wrote.

On Tuesday January 9, Astrobiotic announced that it would be abandoning its attempt for a soft landing on the moon. The lunar lander was slated to attempt to make the first soft landing on the moon by the United States since 1972. Peregrine’s mission is to study the lunar surface ahead of future human missions to the moon.

The launch also began a new chapter in the age of private space exploration. The United Launch Alliance is a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, with the Vulcan rocket designed to replace two older rockets and compete with SpaceX. The private company owned by Elon Musk sent close to 100 rockets into orbit in 2023 alone. The United States Space Force is also counting on the Vulcan Centaur rocket to launch spy satellites and other spacecraft that Space Force believes are in the interest of national security. 

The Peregrine lander was built by Pittsburgh-based space robotics firm Astrobotic and aimed to become the first lunar lander constructed by a private company. This is also the first mission to fly under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative, where NASA pays private companies to send scientific equipment to the moon.

“It’s a dream … For 16 years we’ve been pushing for this moment today,” said Astrobotic CEO John Thornton during a webcast of the launch according to CNN. “And along the way, we had a lot of hard challenges that we had to overcome and a lot of people doubted us along the way. But our team and the people that supported us believed in the mission, and they created this beautiful moment that we’re seeing today.”

Peregrine has a total of 20 payloads on board, five for NASA and 15 others. They include five small moon rovers and the first Latin American scientific instruments attempting to reach the lunar surface. If successful, the technology on board will measure properties including radiation levels, magnetic field, ice and water on the surface and subsurface, and a layer of gas called the exosphere. A better understanding of the exosphere and the moon’s surface is expected to help minimize risks when humans return to its surface, as early as 2025.  

Several non-scientific payloads are aboard as well, including a lunar dream capsule with over 180,000 messages from children around the world, a chunk of Mount Everest, and a physical coin containing one bitcoin.

Controversially, Peregrine is carrying human remains on behalf of commercial space burial companies Celestis and Elysium Space. Celestis offers to carry ashes to the moon for prices starting at more than $10,000. The 265 capsules include human remains from Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry and original cast members and DNA samples from three former US presidents–George Washington, Dwight Eisenhower, and John F. Kennedy. Bringing human remains to the moon is strongly opposed by the Navajo Nation, as allowing human remains to touch the lunar surface would be desecration of a body that many tribes consider sacred. In a statement on January 4, Navajo Nation president Buu Nygren said that NASA or other government officials should address the tribe’s concerns ahead of the launch. 

“The moon holds a sacred place in Navajo cosmology,” Nygren wrote. “The suggestion of transforming it into a resting place for human remains is deeply disturbing and unacceptable to our people and many other tribal nations.”

[Related: The moon is 40 million years older than we thought, according to crystals collected by Apollo astronauts.]

According to The New York Times, NASA officials said in a news conference that they were not in charge of this mission and do not have a direct say on the payloads that were sold on Peregrine. ”There’s an intergovernmental meeting being set up with the Navajo Nation that NASA will support,” deputy associate administrator for exploration at NASA Joel Kearns said on January 4.

Peregrine 1 was originally scheduled to touch down on the surface of the moon on February 23, near Sinus Viscositatis–or the Bay of Stickiness. This area is named for rock domes that were potentially created by viscous lava.

Update January 9, 2:39PM: Additional information from the company about the technical problems has been added.

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For decades, images taken of Neptune have looked like the planet has a deep blue hue, while Uranus seemed more green. However, these two ice giants may actually look more similar to eachother than astronomers previously believed. According to a study published January 5 in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, our solar system’s furthest planets’ true colors could both be similar pale shades of greenish blue. 

[Related: The secret to Voyagers’ spectacular space odyssey.]

Images versus reality

NASA’s Voyager 2 mission remains the only flyby of both ice giants conducted by a spacecraft. It gave us the first detailed images of these far-flung planets. Voyager 2 conducted a flyby of Uranus in 1986, and the images revealed a planet with a more pale cyan or blue color. The vessel flew by Neptune in 1989 and the imagery showed a planet with a rich blue color.

However, astronomers have long understood that most modern images of both planets don’t accurately reflect their true colors. Voyager 2 captured images of each planet in separate colors and these single-color images were then put together to make composites. These composite images were not always accurately balanced, particularly for the planet Neptune which was believed to appear too blue. The contrast on the early Voyager images of Neptune were also strongly enhanced to better reveal the clouds and winds of the planet. 

“Although the familiar Voyager 2 images of Uranus were published in a form closer to ‘true’ color, those of Neptune were, in fact, stretched and enhanced, and therefore made artificially too blue,” study co-author and University of Oxford astronomer Patrick Irwin said in a statement. “Even though the artificially-saturated color was known at the time amongst planetary scientists–and the images were released with captions explaining it–that distinction had become lost over time.”

Creating a more accurate view

In the new study, the team applied data taken from the Hubble Space Telescope’s Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) and the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope. 

With both the STIS and MUSE, each pixel is a continuous spectrum of colors, so their observations can be processed more clearly to determine the more accurate color of the planets, instead of what is being seen with a filter. 

The team used the data to rebalance the composite color images that were recorded by Voyager 2’s onboard camera and by the Hubble Space Telescope’s Wide Field Camera 3. The rebalancing revealed that both Uranus and Neptune are actually a similar pale shade of greenish blue. Neptune has a slight hint of more blue, which the model showed to be a thin layer of haze on the planet. 

The changing colors of Uranus

This research also provides a likely answer to why Uranus changes color slightly during its 84 year-long orbit around the sun. The team first compared images of Uranus to measurements of its brightness that were taken at blue and green wavelengths by the Lowell Observatory in Arizona from 1950 to 2016. These measurements showed that Uranus looks a little greener during its summer and winter solstices, when its poles are pointed towards the sun. However, during the equinoxes–when the sun is over the planet’s equator–it appears to have a more blue tinge. 

One already established reason for the change is due to Uranus’ a highly unusual spin. The planet spins almost on its side during orbit, so its north and south poles point almost directly towards the sun and Earth during its solstices. Any changes to the reflectivity of Uranus’ poles would have a major impact on the planet’s overall brightness when viewed from the Earth, according to the authors. What was less clear to astronomers was how and why this reflectivity differs. The team developed a model to compare the bands of colors of Uranus’s polar regions to its equatorial regions. 

They found that polar regions are more reflective at green and red wavelengths than at blue wavelengths. Uranus is more reflective at these wavelengths partially because gas methane absorbs the color red and methane is about half as abundant near Uranus’ poles than the equator.

[Related: Neptune’s bumpy childhood could reveal our solar system’s missing planets.]

However, this wasn’t enough to fully explain the color change so the researchers added a new variable to the model in the form of a ‘hood’ of gradually thickening icy haze which has previously been observed when Uranus moves from equinox to summer solstice. They believe that this haze is likely made up of methane ice particles.

After simulating this pole shift in the model, the ice particles further increased the reflection at green and red wavelengths at the planet’s poles, which explained that Uranus looks greener at the solstice due to less methane at the poles and increased thickness of the methane ice particles. 

“The misperception of Neptune’s color, as well as the unusual color changes of Uranus, have bedeviled us for decades,” Heidi Hammel, of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy said in a statement. “This comprehensive study should finally put both issues to rest.” Hammel is not an author of the new study. 

Filling in this gap between the public perception of Neptune and its reality shows how data can be manipulated to show off certain features of a planet or enhance visualizations. 

“There’s never been an attempt to deceive,” study co-author and University of Leicester planetary scientist Leigh Fletcher told The New York Times. “But there has been an attempt to tell a story with these images by making them aesthetically pleasing to the eye so that people can enjoy these beautiful scenes in a way that is, maybe, more meaningful than a fuzzy, gray, amorphous blob in the distance.”

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The nearly half a billion year old remains of some enormous and extinct carnivorous worms have been discovered near the top of the world by an international team of researchers. The ancient creature named Timorebestia, or ‘terror beasts’ in Latin, lived in the water column of North Greenland over 518 million years ago. The new fossils indicate that the worms had fins on the sides of their bodies, a head with a long antenna, and enormous jaw structures on the insides of their mouth. They could grow to almost 12 inches long. These were some of the largest swimming animals of the Early Cambrian period and are described in a study published January 3 in the journal Science Advances.

[Related: A three-eyed organism roamed the seas half a billion years ago.]

An ‘explosion’ of life

When these terror beasts were alive over 500 million years ago, the Earth was undergoing a major expansion of life called the Cambrian Explosion. This is when most major groups of animals first appear in the fossil record, partially due to cooler temperatures and tectonic changes. All of this biological diversification also occurred in a relatively short period of time–in about 30 million years. 

The Timorebestia fossils were found during a 2017 expedition to the Early Cambrian Sirius Passet fossil locality in a very remote section of North Greenland. Timorebestia may be some of the earliest carnivorous animals to have colonized the water column here and reveal a past potential dynasty of predators that were previously unknown to scientists. Early arthropods were known to be the dominant predators during the Cambrian period, including some “weird shrimp from Canada” called anomalocaridids.

“Our research shows that these ancient ocean ecosystems were fairly complex with a food chain that allowed for several tiers of predators,” study co-author and University of Bristol paleontologist Jakob Vinther said in a statement. “Timorebestia were giants of their day and would have been close to the top of the food chain. That makes it equivalent in importance to some of the top carnivores in modern oceans, such as sharks and seals back in the Cambrian period.”

Timorebestia is also a distant but close relative of living arrow worms called chaetognaths. These worms are much smaller than today’s enormous ocean predators and only eat zooplankton, a far cry from their apex predator days of the past.

Opening a 518 million-year old digestive system 

The fossils from the Sirius Passet were exceptionally well preserved so the team was able to study the remains of their muscle anatomy, nervous systems, and digestive systems very closely. When they looked inside Timorebestia’s fossilized digestive system, they found the remains of a common, swimming arthropod called Isoxys. 

“We can see these arthropods was a food source [for] many other animals,” study co-author and University of Bristol paleontologist Morten Lunde Nielsen said in a statement. “They are very common at Sirius Passet and had long protective spines, pointing both forwards and backwards. However, they clearly didn’t completely succeed in avoiding that fate, because Timorebestia munched on them in great quantities.”

While arthropods like Isoxys appear in the fossil record about 521 to 529 million years ago, modern living arrow worms can be traced back at least 538 million years. Since arrow worms and these more early Timorebestia were swimming predators, the team believes that they dominated the oceans before arthropods took off. Their dynasty may have lasted about 10 to 15 million years before they were superseded by other groups of marine predators. 

Jaw predator evolution

The discovery of Timorebestia is also helping paleontologists understand where jawed predators came from. The arrow worms living today have bristles on their heads for catching prey, instead of having jaws inside of its head like Timorebestia. By comparison, today’s microscopic jaw worms have an oral setup that is more similar to Timorebestia, so arrow worms and jaw worms likely shared an ancestor over half a billion years ago.Timorebestia and some of the other specimens that the team found on this expedition are revealing the evolutionary links between organisms that may look different, but are closely related. It is also helping paint a better picture of how arrow worms evolved over hundreds of millions of years. 

[Related: A 500-million-year-old sea squirt is the evolutionary clue we need to understand our humble beginnings.]

“Living arrow worms have a distinct nervous center on their belly, called a ventral ganglion. It is entirely unique to these animals,” study co-author and Korean Polar Research Institute paleontologist Tae Yoon Park said in a statement. “We have found this preserved in Timorebestia and another fossil called Amiskwia. People have debated whether or not Amiskwia was closely related to arrow worms, as part of their evolutionary stem lineage. The preservation of these unique ventral ganglia gives us a great deal more confidence in this hypothesis.”

The team collected a wide variety of organisms during the expedition and plan to continue to study these specimens to learn more about how the planet’s earliest animal ecosystems evolved. 

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In order to eat, Matabele ants have to fight with their one and only food source: termites. These pre-meal encounters often lead to dangerous injuries from a termite’s fierce mandibles, which can pierce the ants with rapid blows. However, these ants have developed their own saliva-based system to treat their fellow ant’s injuries. New research has found that Matabele ants may even be able to tell if a wound is infected or not and then treat the infected wounds with the antibiotics produced in their saliva. The findings are described in a study published in the journal Nature Communications on December 29, 2023. 

[Related: Ants’ brains are surprisingly good at communicating danger to others.]

A necessary and risky meal

Matabele ants are found in regions south of the Sahara desert in Africa. They can be close to one inch long and are one of the largest known ants on Earth. The termites that they rely on for sustenance often inflict life-threatening injuries on the ants. Up to 22 percent of ants can lose one or more of their legs during these encounters over the course of their foraging lives. Injured ants are even sometimes carried back to the nest by their fellow ants for recovery. 

According to the team on this study, the main cause of death for the ants is an infection from the bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa). The ants have been observed treating wounds with P. aeruginosa more frequently. 

Mammals including dogs and bats have molecules in their saliva that potentially have healing properties and are known to lick wounds in an effort to possibly curb the growth of bacteria. The team believes that while other animals have an instinct to lick their wounds, they don’t actually know if they have an infection. However, Matabele ants may have a more discriminating brain and can tell if the wound requires treatment due to specific changes in the chemical profile of an infected wound versus an uninfected wound. 

Studying the saliva

In the study, researchers analyzed the chemical composition of the Matabele ants’ saliva in a lab. For an infected wound, the insects are possibly applying saliva that has antimicrobial compounds and proteins. These antibiotics are taken from their metapleural gland, which is found on the side of their thorax. The secretion has 112 components and half of them are known to have antimicrobial or wound-healing effects. These molecules likely take a lot of energy to produce, so it is helpful for the ants to detect if P. aeruginosa and potentially other threatening bacteria that is common in the soils where Matabele ants live are present before they start to put in the work to produce these compounds. 

When the team applied soil from these areas to wounded and infected Matabele ants, the bacterial loads increased in only two hours at both the wound site and the ants’ thoraxes. This suggested that the ants could recognize changes in the chemical profile of the wound.

[Related: Army ants could teach robots a thing or two.]

“Chemical analyses in cooperation with JMU [Julius-Maximilians-Universität] Professor Thomas Schmitt have shown that the hydrocarbon profile of the ant cuticle changes as a result of a wound infection,” Erik Frank, a study co-author and animal ecologist at Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg in Germany said in a statement. “With the exception of humans, I know of no other living creature that can carry out such sophisticated medical wound treatments.”

To test this further, some of the infected ants were placed in isolation away from their nestmates. Among this group, 90 percent of them died within 36 hours. However, the mortality rate dropped to 22 percent among a group of wounded ants that returned to their colony instead of going to isolation. Ants that were injured but not infected had similar survival rates regardless of being alone or back with the colony. 

The team found that the death rate of infected insects is reduced by about 90 percent after the saliva therapy was applied. They also found that the secretions were deposited significantly more often on the ants with infected wounds than on the insects with sterile wounds. 

The researchers hope to explore more to learn just how unique the Matabele ants are in respect to their wound care behaviors. The study notes that P. aeruginosa is a leading cause of combat wounds in humans, and the team would like to further identify and analyze the antibiotics in Matabele ant saliva with other chemistry research groups. This could lead to the discovery of new antibiotics, as antibiotic resistance continues to grow. 

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On January 1, pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) discontinued Flovent, a popular steroid inhaler that is used to lower the frequency of asthma attacks and other symptoms. The company discontinued production of the branded product in preparation for the rollout of an “authorized generic” version of the widely prescribed medication. The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America estimates that about 25 million people have asthma in the United States and using inhaled corticosteroids like Flovent are among the most effective treatments for the disease. Here’s what you should know.

[Related: Gas stoves could be making thousands of children in America sick.]

What is Flovent?

Flovent is the brand name of fluticasone, a medication that has been sold since 2020. It is an inhaled corticosteroid that can be used by people four years of age and older for treating asthma long term. Fluticasone helps to keep inflammation in the lungs low and the airways open. It is used twice per day and is not a rescue inhaler. When it is taken every day, it can lower the number and severity of asthma attacks. 

GSK first notified the FDA about the decision to stop manufacturing Flovent in June 2023.

Why is there a new ‘authorized generic’ version?

According to a statement from GSK to the Allergy Foundation of America, the generic version of the prescription inhaler will have an identical formula and drug-delivery mechanism. GSK says that this new version will provide lower cost alternatives. 

However, this switch from the branded version to a generic one occurs at the same time as the elimination of the rebate cap removal of Medicaid drug prices. This provision was made as part of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. Under it, pharmaceutical companies are required to pay states higher Medicaid rebates if they raise the cost of the drug more than inflation. According to GoodRx, Flovent’s average price increased from about $207 in 2013 to $292 in 2018 and has gone up by 47 percent since 2014. 

“Flovent Diskus has been on the market since 2000 and Flovent HFA since 2004, and GSK has hiked the price on both products numerous times since their launch,” Dr. William Feldman, an associate physician in the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, told CNN. “These are precisely the sort of drugs that will be affected by the new policy eliminating the Medicaid rebate cap.”

Instead of being a typical generic medication that is made by a different company to compete with the original product, the “authorized generic” is made by the same company. GSK can continue to set prices. 

[Related: Common asthma medications may change brain matter, but don’t panic.]

Are doctors concerned?

In late 2023, both the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America expressed concern that discontinuing Flovent may leave those who rely on it with higher co-pays and delayed access, as patients have to clear coverage with their insurance company. 

“In general, people think generics should be cheaper,” Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America president and CEO Kenny Mendez told NPR. “That’s kind of the common knowledge, but it really depends on… your insurance plan and what’s covered and what’s not.”

Doctors are reporting that some insurers are not covering GSK’s new authorized generic version. Even if insurance authorizes coverage, patients may end up paying more than they would have if they were purchasing the previous branded version of the medication at a pharmacy. Some patients will also need to change asthma drugs or get new prescriptions for GSK’s authorized generic, which adds barriers that could disrupt critical asthma care. 

Due to its popularity over the past 24 years, some medical professionals fear it will create a “huge shock to the system” for doctors and those with asthma. Patients are advised to see their doctors as soon as possible to explore alternative medications and see if the new authorized generic version of Flovent is not covered by their insurance. 

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Over the holiday weekend, NASA released new images of Jupiter’s icy, volcanic moon Io. The Juno spacecraft flew within roughly 930 miles of the celestial body’s surface on December 30, 2023, capturing images that show off a volatile and pockmarked moon. 

[Related: Astronomers find 12 more moons orbiting Jupiter.]

The JunoCam imager captured the new images. They depict a red sphere dotted with giant gray volcanoes. Io is considered the most volcanic world in our solar system. By comparison, Earth sees roughly 50 eruptions each year and Io may have volcanic activity that is 100 times greater. Jupiter’s gravitational pull is largely responsible for Io’s volcanism. A tug-of-war between the large planet and the additional gravitational effects of Jupiter’s other giant moons–Ganymede, Europa, and Callisto–intensifies frictional tidal heating on Io. It takes this moon about 42 hours to orbit Jupiter, and the immense heat produced during orbit likely creates an ocean of magma underneath Io’s surface, fueling eruptions.

According to NASA, this was the closest flyby of Io since a similar flight made by the Galileo spacecraft in October 2001. Launched in 2011, the Juno spacecraft first entered Jupiter’s orbit in 2016. It is the first explorer to look below the gas giant’s dense clouds, with a mission to study our solar system’s largest planet and the origins of the solar system as a whole. The Juno mission has been monitoring the moon’s volcanic activity from distances ranging from about 6,830 miles to more than 62,100 miles. The team hopes that information collected in the December flyby and previous observations from the mission help them learn more about these intense volcanoes.  

“We are looking for how often they erupt, how bright and hot they are, how the shape of the lava flow changes, and how Io’s activity is connected to the flow of charged particles in Jupiter’s magnetosphere,” Scott Bolton, Juno’s principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute, said in a statement. 

[Related: A mysterious magma ocean could fuel our solar system’s most volcanic world.]

A second close flyby of Io is scheduled for February 3, 2024, where Juno will fly within about 930 miles of the moon’s surface again. The spacecraft has also performed close flights near the of the Jupiterian moons Ganymede and Europa.

“With our pair of close flybys in December and February, Juno will investigate the source of Io’s massive volcanic activity, whether a magma ocean exists underneath its crust, and the importance of tidal forces from Jupiter, which are relentlessly squeezing this tortured moon,” said Bolton. 

Beginning in April, Juno will also perform a series of occultation experiments that use Juno’s Gravity Science experiment to probe the makeup of Jupiter’s upper atmosphere. Studying what materials compose this part of the planet’s atmosphere should provide astronomer’s with key data on Jupiter’s shape and interior structure. The Juno mission is scheduled to wrap-up in late 2025. 

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A new year often means resolutions and a fresh planner. This year brings another 366 days of stargazing, since 2024 is a leap year. While the lack of daylight in the Northern Hemisphere can zap our energy, the extra hours of darkness means more time for watching the stars. The cold air this time of year is less hazy  than it is during the summer, so celestial bodies are easier to see if there are fewer clouds. Here are some cosmic events to keep and eye on as we welcome in 2024.

[Related: 7 US parks where you can get stunning nightsky views.]

January 3 and 4– Quadrantids Meteor Shower Predicted Peak

The Quadrantids is technically the year’s first meteor shower. It typically begins in the middle of November of the preceding year and ends by the middle of January. This year, it is predicted to peak in the early morning hours on January 3 and 4. 

While it is not as dramatic as December’s Geminids or July’s Persieds, the Quadrantids can produce over 100 meteors per hour under a dark sky without a bright moon. It is also known for producing the occasional fireball. According to NASA, “fireballs are larger explosions of light and color that can persist longer than an average meteor streak. This is due to the fact that fireballs originate from larger particles of material. Fireballs are also brighter, with magnitudes brighter than -3.”

For 2024, looking for shooting stars after 1 a.m. local time wherever you are will be the best bet for stargazing. However, the moon will also be rising, so the light may drown out the more faint shooting stars. 

January 12– Mercury at Greatest Western Elongation

Mercury will reach its greatest separation from the sun on January 12. Look for the Mercury low in the eastern sky just before sunrise local time. The planet will brighten rapidly at the beginning of this morning apparition. Before it appears, Mercury will have passed between the Earth and the sun. When its unilluminated side is turned towards Earth, it will appear as a thin, barely-lit crescent. As the apparition continues, the crescent will grow and the planet will get brighter. 

January 13 and 14– The Moon and Saturn ‘Dance’

While not as exciting as 2020’s ‘Great’ Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn, the moon will appear close to our solar system’s most famous ringed planet this month. The moon will appear to float above Saturn on the 13th and then will dip below the ringed planet on the 14th. In Eastern Time, the two will be visible before the moon sets at about 8:10 p.m.

[Related: ‘Skyglow’ is rapidly diminishing our nightly views of the stars.]

January 25– Full Wolf Moon

The first full moon of 2024 rises on January 25 and reaches peak illumination at 12:54 p.m. EST

If peak illumination is during daylight hours where you are, the moon will still be bright visible in the northeastern horizon after sunset.

January’s full moon is called the Wolf Moon. The name is believed to have Celtic and Old English roots and references to the hungry packs of wolves that prowl during the winter months. Additional names for this first full moon of the year include the Start of the Winter Moon or Maajii-bibooni-giizis in Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe), the Waning Moon or Tahch’awɛka in Tunica, and the Cracking Tree Moon or Putheʔnaawe Mtokw Neepãʔuk in the Mahican Dialect of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Wisconsin.

The same skygazing rules that apply to pretty much all star gazing activities are key this month: Go to a dark spot away from the lights of a city or town and let your eyes adjust to the darkness for about a half an hour.

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From the ‘brains’ of NASA’s Europa Clipper to a lion’s mane jellyfish, the 29 images selected for the 2023 annual National Geographic Pictures of the Year issue commemorate extraordinary photographs taken all over the world. 

For the issue’s cover image, patience is the theme. National Geographic photographer Kiliii Yuyan took the photo of a banded sea krait when he was working on a story about Indigenous stewardship of the waters off of Palau. “I had to spend the entire time with that sea snake, just being there with it on its own terms to finally be there to make that image,” Yuyan tells PopSci.

Yuyan was diving about 100 feet down when he saw the four foot long banded sea krait checking out nooks and crannies in the coral. The snake swam around Yuyan’s legs a bit to investigate and eventually went back to the coral to look for prey. Yuyan took several images of the sea krait during the first 45 minutes of the dive and had to constantly adjust his lights and buoyancy. It was not until the snake swam up to the surface to breathe that Yuyan was able to get the photo. “I followed it up partway into the sparkling rays of the sun,” says Yuyan. “It wasn’t until the very end that the background changed from the complex scene of coral to a minimal blue sea and the image became more powerful.”

Check out five more images included in this year’s issue below.

For more on this story, visit Natgeo.com.

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This time of year, it’s not unusual to see a family member or a friend get impatient and try to figure out what is inside a wrapped present by shaking it. But what are they trying to figure out? Are they attempting to find out the shape of the present inside or how many objects are in there? A recent study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that it only took observers of the present-shaker a few seconds to tell which information they’re looking for. This research into human cognition and perception could have implications for artificial intelligence in the future.

[Related: Can exercising the mind improve our abilities, or is it just another self-improvement fantasy?]

“Just by looking at how someone’s body is moving, you can tell what they are trying to learn about their environment,” study co-author and Johns Hopkins University cognitive scientist Chaz Firestone said in a statement. “We do this all the time, but there has been very little research on it.”

Pragmatic vs. epistemic actions

Without even realizing it, our brains recognize and analyze another person’s actions multiple times a day. Pragmatic actions include anything that moves a person towards a goal. Our brains analyze these actions to guess which way someone is walking down a street or determine what they’re reaching for. Earlier studies have shown that people can quickly and accurately guess the goal of another person’s pragmatic actions just by observation.

The new study investigates a different kind of behavior consisting of epistemic actions. These kinds of actions are performed when a person is trying to learn something about their surroundings. Epistemic action is dipping your toes into a pool to test out the water temperature or sampling a soup to see if it needs more seasoning. 

While pragmatic and epistemic actions are similar, there are some subtle differences. Firestone and the team were curious to see if participants could detect another person’s epistemic goals just by watching them and designed a series of experiments to find out.

What’s in the box?

Researchers asked 500 participants to watch two videos of a person picking up a box full of objects and shaking it. One video showed a person shaking a box to determine the numbers of objects that are inside of it. The other video showed someone shaking the box in order to decipher the shape of the objects inside. 

Almost every participant in the study could tell who was shaking the box to figure out the number of objects and who was shaking to figure out the content’s shape. 

“What is surprising to me is how intuitive this is,” study co-author and Johns Hopkins graduate student Sholei Croom said in a statement. “People really can suss out what others are trying to figure out, which shows how we can make these judgments even though what we’re looking at is very noisy and changes from person to person.”

[Related: How you see these shapes may depend on your culture.]

More research into epistemic actions could help engineers develop more anticipatory AI systems that are designed to interact with humans better. In future studies, the team is curious if it is possible to observe epistemic intent versus their pragmatic intent and decipher what is going on in their brain when someone performs an action like sticking your hand out of a  window to test the air temperature. They’re also curious it’s possible to build models that detail exactly how observed physical actions reveal epistemic intent. 

“When you think about all the mental calculations someone must make to understand what someone else is trying to learn, it’s a remarkably complicated process,” said Firestone. “But our findings show it’s something people do easily. It’s one thing to know where someone is headed or what product they are reaching for, but it’s another thing to infer whether someone is lost or what kind of information they are seeking.”

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An unusual jellyfish species found in the eastern Pacific Ocean called Cladonema pacificum is only about the size of a pinkie nail, but it can regenerate an amputated tentacle in just two or three days. Jellyfish need their tentacles to hunt and feed, so keeping them intact is crucial to their survival. How jellyfish form the parts necessary to regrow appendages has been a mystery. Now, a team based in Japan is beginning to understand the cellular processes that these tiny jellyfish use in limb regeneration. The findings are described in a study published December 21 in the journal PLOS Biology.

[Related: Even without brains, jellyfish learn from their mistakes.]

Finding the blastema

Salamanders and insects like beetles form a clump of undifferentiated cells that have not developed into specific cell types yet. These undifferentiated cells can grow into a blastema, which is critical for repairing damage and regrowing appendages. 

To look for signs of the crucial blastema in jellyfish, the authors of this study amputated a tentacle from a Cladonema pacificum jellyfish in the lab. They then studied the cells that were growing in the jellyfish post-amputation. The team found that jellyfish have stem-like proliferative cells actively growing and dividing, but are not yet changing into specific cell types. These cells appear at the site of injury and help from the blastema.

“Importantly, these stem-like proliferative cells in blastema are different from the resident stem cells localized in the tentacle,” study co-author and University of Tokyo cell biologist Yuichiro Nakajima said in a statement. “Repair-specific proliferative cells mainly contribute to the epithelium—the thin outer layer—of the newly formed tentacle.”

These resident stem-like cells near the jellyfish’s tentacle are responsible for maintaining and repairing whatever cells the jellyfish needs throughout its life. However, the proliferative cells needed to repair a missing appendage only appear when the jellyfish is injured.

“Together, resident stem cells and repair-specific proliferative cells allow rapid regeneration of the functional tentacle within a few days,” Nakajima said. 

Bilaterians vs. non-bilaterians

According to the authors, this finding helps researchers better understand how blastema formation differs among different animal groups who have different developmental shapes. For example, salamanders are bilaterian animals that develop two equal sides on the right and left. Jellyfish are considered non-bilaterians, but both jellyfish and salamanders are capable of regenerating limbs despite their symmetrical differences. Salamander limbs have stem cells restricted to specific cell-type needs and this process appears to operate similarly to the repair-specific cells the team observed in jellyfish.

[Related: There’s no stopping this immortal jellyfish.]

“Given that repair-specific proliferative cells are analogues to the restricted stem cells in bilaterian salamander limbs, we can surmise that blastema formation by repair-specific proliferative cells is a common feature independently acquired for complex organ and appendage regeneration during animal evolution,” University of Tokyo cell biologist Sosuke Fujita said in a statement.

It is still unclear where the repair-specific proliferative cells observed in the blastema originate. The research tools that are currently available to investigate these cellular origins are too limited to explain the source of these cells or find other stem-like cells. More study and new tools for studying genetics are needed. 

“It would be essential to introduce genetic tools that allow the tracing of specific cell lineages and the manipulation in Cladonema,” Nakajima said. “Ultimately, understanding blastema formation mechanisms in regenerative animals, including jellyfish, may help us identify cellular and molecular components that improve our own regenerative abilities.”

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A nebula can look like a lot of different animals—a crab, tarantula, seagull, a cat’s eye, and even a chicken on the run. The European Southern Observatory’s VLT Survey Telescope in Chile took a new 1.5-billion-pixel image of IC 2944 aka the Running Chicken Nebula. It is located roughly 6,500 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Centaurus and this new image shows the nebula in new detail.

[Related: What animal do you see in this image of a nebula?]

According to NASA, a nebula is a giant cloud of dust and gas. Some nebulae come from the gas and dust that is thrown out by the explosion of a dying star. Others are regions where new stars are beginning to form. The Running Chicken Nebula is home to thousands of young stars in the making. These starlets within the nebula release intense radiation that makes the surrounding hydrogen gas take on a pinkish hue with the filters used to create the image. 

This image is a mosaic of hundreds of separate frames that were stitched together. The individual images were taken with filters that allow the light of different colors through and the filters were combined to create the final image. The observations were taken using a wide-field camera called the OmegaCAM on the VST. The telescope is located in Chile’s Atacama Desert which maps the southern sky in visible light. 

The Running Chicken Nebula is made up of several different stellar regions, which are all in this new image that spans an area of space that’s about 270 light-years wide. It would take the average chicken almost 21 billion years to run across it, according to the ESO. The brightest region within the nebula is IC 2948. This is where some observers see the bird’s head, while others see a chicken’s butt. The wispy pastel streams are additional plumes of gas and dust.

A region called IC 2944 is in the center of the image and is marked by brilliant and pillar-like structures. The brightest twinkle in this particular spot is called Lambda Centauri. This star can be bright enough to be seen without a telescope and is actually much closer to Earth than the rest of the nebula itself.

[Related: NASA releases Hubble images of cotton candy-colored clouds in Orion Nebula.]

Both IC 2948 and IC 2944 are home to many young stars that are not very bright. However, what they lack in brilliance, they make up for in radiation. These stars spew out huge amounts of ultraviolet radiation that make the region appear to look like a chicken running around. Some parts of the nebula called Bok globules can actually withstand the fierce bombardment from the ultraviolet radiation. These globules can be seen as dark, small, dense pockets of gas and dust throughout the image. Aside from the nebulae, numerous orange, white, and blue stars appear like fireworks with the filters. 

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The hedgehog family tree is ending 2023 by getting a few more branches. A study published December 21 in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society identified five new species of soft-furred hedgehogs native to Southeast Asia that were found with the help of some DNA analysis and some decades-old museum specimens.

[Related: Why Danish citizen scientists were on a quest to find the oldest European hedgehog.]

Fur instead of spines

Soft-furred hedgehogs–or gymnures–are tiny mammals that are members of the hedgehog family. Instead of being covered in spines like other hedgehogs, they have soft fur. Hedgehogs are not rodents and they have a pointy snout like their relatives. Previously, scientists believed that there were only two species, but this new study increased that number to seven. 

These newly-identified species belong to a group of soft-furred hedgehogs called Hylomys that live in Southeast Asia. Two of the hedgehogs are entirely new species of soft-furred hedgehog. They are named Hylomys vorax and Hylomys macarong and both are endemic to an endangered and incredibly biodiverse tropical rainforest in North Sumatra and Southern Vietnam called the Leuser ecosystem. 

H. macarong has dark brown fur and is about 5.5 inches long. It was named for a Vietnamese word for vampire–Ma cà rồng–since the males have fang-like incisors. Further field study is needed to figure out what these fangs do, but their larger size suggests that it could have a role in sexual selection. The males also have rust-colored chest markings that may have been stained by scent glands.

H. vorax is slightly smaller at 4.7 inches long and also has dark fur. It has a black tail and a very narrow snout. It is believed to only be found on the slopes of Mount Leuser in Northern Sumatra. It was named after a description made by mammalogist Frederick Ulmer, who collected the specimens during an expedition to Sumatra in 1939. Ulmer identified it as a type of shrew in his field notes.

“They were voracious beasts often devouring the whole bait before springing the trap,” Ulmer wrote. “Ham rind, coconut, meat, and walnuts were eaten. One shrew partially devoured the chicken head bait of a steel trap before getting caught in a nearby Schuyler trap baited with ham rind.”

The other three have been promoted from subspecies up to species. A subspecies is a smaller group within a species. They are genetically distinct from other groups within that same species, but can still interbreed and produce viable offspring. These three were initially considered to be a subspecies of Hylomys suillus, but the study found enough genetic and physical differences for them to be upgraded to species. They are named Hylomys dorsalis, Hylomys peguensis and Hylomys maxi.

H. dorsalis lives in Northern Borneo’s mountains and has a dark stripe on its head that bisects its back. 

H. peguensis is only 5.1 inches long with more yellow fur and can be found in many countries in mainland Southeast Asia.

True to its name, H. maxi is also on the larger end of the new species of soft-furred hedgehogs at 5.5 inches and can be found in mountainous regions on the Malay Peninsula and in Sumatra.

According to study co-author and evolutionary biologist Arlo Hinckley, soft-furred hedgehogs generally look more like a mixture between a mouse and a shrew, since they do not have the spines of their cousins’ spines. These small mammals are generally active during both the day and night and are omnivores. They likely eat a wide variety of insects and other invertebrates, and fruit if it is available. 

“Based on the lifestyles of their close relatives and field observations, these hedgehogs likely nest in hollows and take cover while foraging among tree roots, fallen logs, rocks, grassy areas, undergrowth and leaf litter,” Hinckley said in a statement. “But, because they’re so understudied, we are limited to speculate about the details of their natural history.” 

Hinckley is a postdoctoral fellow at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC and the University of Seville in Spain. 

Digging in museum drawers 

During his doctoral studies in 2016, Hinckley became interested in the soft-furred hedgehogs. After studying them in Borneo with study co-author Miguel Camacho Sánchez, their early genetic data and studies of many known populations in Southeast Asia suggested that there may be more species than scientists currently recognize. They began to search through natural history collections in search of specimens assigned to this group. Many soft-furred hedgehogs were only preserved skins and skulls.

[Related: Why preserving museum specimens is so vital for science.]

“We were only able to identify these new hedgehogs thanks to museum staff that curated these specimens across countless decades and their original field collectors,” said Hinckley. 

The H. vorax specimen was from the Smithsonian’s collection and sat in a drawer for 84 years. H. macarong spent the last 62 years at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University in Philadelphia. Hinckley and the study’s co-authors from institutions in the United States, Switzerland, Singapore, Spain, and Malaysia ultimately assembled 232 physical specimens and 85 tissue samples from across the Hylomys group. They made detailed physical observations of and collected measurements to determine the differences in size and shape of skulls, teeth, and their fur.

They then started the genetic analysis at the Doñana Biological Station’s ancient DNA laboratory in Spain and the Smithsonian’s Laboratories of Analytical Biology. The results identified seven distinct genetic lineages and indicated that the number of recognized species in the group was about to increase.

[Related: A key to lizard evolution was buried in a museum cupboard for 70 years.]

“It might be surprising for people to hear that there are still undiscovered mammals out there,” Hawkins said. “But there is a lot we don’t know—especially the smaller nocturnal animals that can be difficult to tell apart from one another.”

The team hopes that describing these new species can expand scientific understanding and be used to conserve threatened habitats such as Northern Sumatra’s Leuser ecosystem. This region faces threats from logging, mining, the fragmentation of forests by road projects, and climate change. 

“This kind of study can help governments and organizations make hard choices about where to prioritize conservation funding to maximize biodiversity,” Hinckley said.

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Frogs are well known for their sticky, whip-like tongues, lumpy warts, and the colorful, poisonous skin covering some species. One group of frogs in Southeast Asia has another distinguishing feature–fangs. Scientists recently discovered a new species of fanged frog that uses these bony jaws jutting out of their lower jawbone to fight with other frogs and hunt shelled prey like giant centipedes and crabs. Limnonectes phyllofolia is also the smallest known species of fanged frog and is described in a study published December 20 in the journal PLOS ONE.

[Related: Female frogs appear to play dead to avoid mating.]

“This new species is tiny compared to other fanged frogs on the island where it was found, about the size of a quarter,” study co-author and biologist Jeff Frederick said in a statement. “Many frogs in this genus are giant, weighing up to two pounds. At the large end, this new species weighs about the same as a dime.” Frederick is a postdoctoral researcher at the Field Museum in Chicago and conducted this research as a doctoral candidate at the University of California, Berkeley.

The frogs were found on the mountainous island of Sulawesi in Indonesia. It’s a large 71,898 square mile-long island with a large network of volcanoes, mountains, lowland rainforest, and cloud forests in the mountains.

“The presence of all these different habitats mean that the magnitude of biodiversity across many plants and animals we find there is unreal—rivaling places like the Amazon,” said Frederick.

Members of a joint United States-Indonesia amphibian and reptile research team noticed something surprising on the leaves of tree saplings and moss-covered boulders in the jungle–frog eggs.

Frogs lay eggs covered by a jelly-like substance instead of a hard and protective shell like a bird. To keep them from drying out, most amphibians will lay their eggs in water. Instead, these frogs left their egg masses on leaves and mossy boulders above the ground. After finding these nests, the team began to see the small, brown frogs. 

“Normally when we’re looking for frogs, we’re scanning the margins of stream banks or wading through streams to spot them directly in the water,” Frederick says. “After repeatedly monitoring the nests though, the team started to find attending frogs sitting on leaves hugging their little nests.” 

The close contact with the eggs allows the adults to coat them with the right compounds to keep them moist and safe from bacterial and fungal contamination. They were named Limnonectes phyllofolia, which translates to “leaf-nester.”

[Related: Go (virtually) adopt an axolotl, the ‘Peter Pan’ of amphibians.]

The frogs who laid these eggs on leaves and boulders were tiny members of the fanged frog family. The caretakers of the nests were all males. According to Frederick, egg-guarding behavior from male frogs is uncommon, but not unheard of. The team theorizes that the frogs’ unusual reproductive behaviors may also relate back to their smaller fangs. While some of their relatives have larger fangs that help them ward off competition, these frogs likely evolved a way to lay their eggs away from the water and lost the need for such big fangs. 

“It’s fascinating that on every subsequent expedition to Sulawesi, we’re still discovering new and diverse reproductive modes,” says Frederick. “Our findings also underscore the importance of conserving these very special tropical habitats. Most of the animals that live in places like Sulawesi are quite unique, and habitat destruction is an ever-looming conservation issue for preserving the hyper-diversity of species we find there. Learning about animals like these frogs that are found nowhere else on Earth helps make the case for protecting these valuable ecosystems.”

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While refrigerators store food at safe temperatures and keep it fresh, they can also be a breeding ground for fuzzy gray mold that spoils fruit. Most molds thrive in warm temperatures, but many can grow in the refrigerator by producing spores. The spores can go airborne and accumulate inside the refrigerator and infect fruits and vegetables. However, plants may not be completely defenseless against this creeping fungus. According to a study published December 15 in the journal Cell Host & Microbe, plants use a stealth molecular weapon to attack the cells of gray mold. 

[Related: A bit of care can keep your houseplants from sheltering harmful mold.]

To look closer, the team profiled the messenger RNA (mRNA) molecules present in a plant called Arabidopsis thaliana–or Thale cress–against gray mold (Botrytis cinerea). mRNA are small molecules within the cells that have a set of instructions like a blueprint. While all three types of RNA can build proteins, mRNA is the one that acts like a messenger, delivering the recipe for a protein. 

In the lab, they observed how the plants send small lipid “bubbles” called extracellular vesicles that are filled with RNA and the mRNA molecules that can attack the cells of the aggressive mold. Once the bubbles are inside, the molecules can suppress the infectious mold cells.

“Plants are not just sitting there doing nothing. They are trying to protect themselves from the mold, and now we have a better idea how they’re doing that,” study co-author and University of California, Riverside microbiologist Hailing Jin said in a statement.

Jin’s team previously found that plants use these same bubbles to send small mRNA molecules that can silence the genes that make the mold more poisonous. This new study found that these bubbles have mRNA molecules that attack important cellular processes in the mold cells, including the functions of organelles.

“These mRNAs can encode some proteins that end up in the mitochondria of the mold cells. Those are the powerhouses of any cells because they generate energy,” said Jin. “Once inside, they mess up the structure and function of the fungal mitochondria, which inhibits the growth and virulence of the fungus.”

The team on this study is not entirely sure why the fungus accepts the lipid bubbles to begin with. They believe that the fungus may simply be hungry. Fungi may take in the bubbles for the nutrients, unaware that there is something dangerous inside. For the plants, this is an efficient strategy because one tiny mRNA molecule can have a large effect on the fungus. According to Jin, molecular weapons with mRNA can be translated into millions of copies or proteins and amplify their effect. 

Interestingly, mold uses these same lipid bubbles to deliver small, damaging RNAs into the plants that they infect. They will suppress the plant’s immunity and provide good protection for the genetic information the fungi needs to take over the plant host. 

[Related: Nightmare-fuel fungi exist in real life.]

“During infections, there are always a lot of communications and molecule exchanges where plants and fungi try to fight against each other,” Jin said. “Previously people looked at proteins being exchanged. Now, modern technology has enabled us to discover another important group of players in this battle.”

In future studies, the team hopes to use the discovery of this stealth RNA delivery system to create more eco-friendly fungicides. They believe that these potential RNA-based fungicides wouldn’t leave toxic residue in the environment or affect animals and humans. 

“There is a never-ending battle to control pests and pathogens,” said Jin. “If we can deliver mRNA that interferes with mold cellular functions, we may be able to help plants more effectively fight in this battle.”

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Volcanic eruptions are not a major threat to the Martian landscape, but an area about the size of Alaska was potentially covered with lava as recently as one million years ago. The findings are detailed in a study published December 15 in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets and reveal that the presence of large fissures could have resulted in major flooding events. The reactions from the mixture of lava and water from the floods may have created an environment that could harbor life. 

[Related: Giant quake that shook Mars for hours had a surprising source.]

A geologically ‘dead’ planet?

Planet Earth is home to very active plate tectonics and these constantly churning chunks of crust alter our planet’s surface. Mars has long been considered a geologically “dead” planet due to its lack of plate tectonics and volcanic activity has never been observed there. However, some recent discoveries have questioned the notion that Mars was always this way, including evidence that a giant mantle plume underneath the region of Elysium Planitia was once behind intense seismic and volcanic activity in the planet’s relatively recent past. Elysium Planitia has the youngest terrain on the Red Planet, so studying it helps scientists better understand its past, including more hydrological and volcanic events. 

In this new study, a team from the University of Arizona and the University of Alaska Fairbanks, combined images taken with NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and measurements from ground-penetrating radar to recreate a 3D model of every individual lava flow they could detect evidence of in Elysium Planitia. The survey revealed more than 40 volcanic events in the planet’s recent past. One of the largest flows possibly filled a Martian valley named Athabasca Valles with almost 1,000 cubic miles of basalt.

“Elysium Planitia was volcanically much more active than previously thought and might even still be volcanically alive today,” study co-author and planetary geologist Joana Voigt said in a statement. Voight completed this research as part of her PhD at the University of Arizona and is now postdoctoral researcher at Caltech’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

The Marsquakes recorded by NASA’s InSight lander between 2018 and 2022 also provided the team on this study with further proof that the Red Planet is not so dead just below the surface. 

“Our study provides the most comprehensive account of geologically recent volcanism on a planet other than Earth,” study co-author and University of Arizona planetary geologist Christopher Hamilton said in a statement. “It is the best estimate of Mars’ young volcanic activity for about the past 120 million years, which corresponds to when the dinosaurs roaming the Earth at their peak to present.”

What steam could mean for finding evidence of life 

These study’s findings have implications for future research into whether Mars harbored life at some point in its history. Elysium Planitia has traces of several large floods and the interaction of the outpouring lava with flood water or ice likely shaped the landscape in dramatic ways. The team found evidence of steam explosions across Elysium Planitia. Astrobiologists are interested in these types of interactions, as they may have created hydrothermal environments that were conducive to microbial life.

For a closer look, the team used images taken with the Context camera onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and other images from the orbiter’s HiRISE camera in selected areas. They also used data records from the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter aboard NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor. They then combined the images with survey data taken with NASA’s Shallow Radar (SHARAD) probe. 

[Related: Mars rover snaps pics of dusty craters that may have once roared with water.]

“With SHARAD, we were able to look as deep as 460 feet below the surface,” said Voigt. “Combining the datasets allowed us to reconstruct a three-dimensional view of the study area, including what the topography was like before lava erupted from multiple cracks and filled basins and channels previously carved by running water.”

This detailed reconstruction of Mars’ geological features provides scientists a peek into the processes that shaped its past. Understanding the relationship between the planet’s volcanoes and crust is a key to recreating the planet’s paleo-environmental conditions. In addition to water from within the magma being flung into the Martian atmosphere and then freezing on the surface, eruptions can also allow for major releases of groundwater onto the surface.

The team plans to continue to use complex datasets obtained with various imaging methods to build more detailed insights of the Martian surface and what lies beneath.

According to Voigt, lava flow surfaces are similar to “open books that provide a wealth of information about how they came to be if you know how to read them. These areas that used to be considered featureless and boring, like Elysium Planitia, I think they contain a lot of secrets, and they want to be read.”

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Following weeks of increased seismic activity, a volcano erupted in southwestern Iceland’s Reykjanes Peninsula on December 18. According to Iceland’s meteorological office, the eruption began at about 10:17 p.m. local time, following a series of small earthquakes that began at 9:00 p.m. Between 3,530 and 7,060 cubic feet of lava was emerging per second at the time of the initial eruption, several times more than previous eruptions in this area. The eruption itself could stop at any time or continue for several months.

[Related: Geologists: We’re not ready for volcanoes.]

The roughly 2.5 mile-long fissure spewed semi-molten rock and red-tinted smoke into the air near Iceland’s main airport, the Svartsengi Power Plant, and the town of Grindavík. A community of about 4,000 people was evacuated in November following increased seismic activity that raised fears of an eruption and damaged several buildings. According to Grindavík Mayor Fannar Jónasson, no locals were present in the vicinity at the time of the eruption on December 18. 

In a press conference, Iceland’s Prime Minister, Katrín Jakobsdóttir said “now we see the earth opening up. Our thoughts are with the local people as before, we hope for the best, but it can be clear that this is quite an eruption. It is important to give emergency responders space to do their work and follow traffic instructions.” 

Volcanologists initially stated that the eruption had occurred in one of the worst possible locations due to its proximity to a power plant and Grindavík. However, the immediate situation did not appear as dire after a flyover. “If everything is normal, this will subside in the afternoon tomorrow, the crack will begin to retreat into craters. The eruption could last a week to 10 days,” volcanologist Ármann Höskuldsson told RUV on Monday. The eruption’s size was anticipated, but the direction of the lava flow remains unpredictable.

“This is larger than previous eruptions on Reykjanes,” volcanologists Magnus Gudmundsson, a volcanologist among the first people to observe the eruption from the air, told The New York Times.

Iceland sits just above a volcanic hot spot in the North Atlantic. The island nation of only 387,758 people averages an eruption roughly every four to five years. The Reykjanes Peninsula about 31 miles southwest of the capital city of Reykjavik. In November, the peninsula was hit by a swarm of over 1,000 small earthquakes in only 24 hours. It put the entire island on alert of an imminent eruption. One of Iceland’s largest tourist attractions, the Blue Lagoon geothermal spa was also closed temporarily due to its proximity to the seismic activity. 

Volcanologists urged tourists and locals to strictly follow advice, as major hazards can quickly put people in danger.

[Related: How the Tonga eruption rang Earth ‘like a bell.’]

“As is common with this eruptive style, it began with a sustained eruption of ballistics that, over time, has lengthened to form a fire curtain—a long fissure out of which lava is being violently ejected,” University of Bristol volcanologist  Matthew Watson told the Associated Press. “This style of eruption is amongst the most spectacular ever seen, and there will be a strong pull for tourists, even though the Blue Lagoon complex has again shut.”

The most disruptive eruption in recent memory was the 2010 eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano that spewed enormous clouds of ash and led to major airspace closures over Europe. This 2023 Reykjanes Peninsula eruption was not expected to release large amounts of ash into the air. According to Iceland’s foreign minister Bjarne Benediktsson, there are currently no flight disruptions and international flight corridors remain open.

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Aardvarks (Orycteropus afer) are a crucial part of the ecosystem in sub-Saharan Africa. They eat termites that can destroy human-built structures and are ecosystem engineers like beavers. They build large tunnels underground and these burrows can provide shelter that protects other animals. Their poop can also offer clues to how this elusive species is impacted by climate change. 

[Related: Humans are now the African savannah’s top predator.]

In a study published December 13 in the journal Diversity and Distribution months of poop samples revealed that the aridification–or drying and heating–of the aadvarks’ landscape is isolating the animals from one another. The study’s authors believe this could have implications for the species’ long-term survival.

“Everyone had heard of aardvarks and they are considered very ecologically important but there has been little study of them,” study co-author and Oregon State University wildlife biologist Clint Epps said in a statement. “We wanted to see if we could collect enough data to begin to understand them.”

Aardvarks are burrowing nocturnal mammals that can weigh up to 180 pounds. They have long snouts that they used to dig out ant and termite hills. They are primarily found throughout the southern two-thirds of Africa. Aardvarks are often compared to pigs and the South American anteater, but they are not related to them. Their closest living relatives are golden moles, manatees, and elephants. 

They are categorized as a species of least concern by the IUCN Red List, partially due to the broad range of ecosystems that they can live in. However, little is known about their current population trends or their real distribution across the landscape since they are difficult to study. 

“During times of rapid environmental change, evaluating and describing changes in the landscape where a species lives is important for informed conservation and management decisions,” study co-author and Oregon State University wildlife geneticist Rachel Crowhurst said in a statement. 

Aardvark DNA has been examined in the past for studies on how mammals evolved, but never using wild aardvark populations. Eps and Crowhurt believe that aardvarks are understudied because they are nocturnal, difficult to trap, and live in low densities across large and often remote landscapes. 

They also bury their poop. Epps learned how to recognize aardvark tracks and how to find their buried fecal matter while working as post-doctoral researcher nearly two decades ago in Tanzania. He returned to Africa for six weeks in 2016 to see if he could still spot the signs of aardvark digging and track them through the bush to find the buried treasure.  

“I wanted to work on a system that was understudied, where anything I learned would likely be truly new information to the scientific community,” Epps said. “I also wanted to work over large landscapes, on foot, alone or with a friend or with guards when needed, in protected areas, with minimal logistical support and little cost.”

In this new study, the team used the genetic information aardvark poop samples as a way to better understand the range of where they live. They surveyed eight protected and four privately owned areas in South Africa, two protected areas in Eswatini, and one location in Kenya. In total, they collected 253 fecal samples and analyzed 104 high quality samples for their genetic information.

Next, they used the genetic information to make inferences about where the aardvarks were distributed and how they moved across the landscape. For instance, if the genetic testing revealed that fecal samples collected in different spots all came from the same aardvark, the team used that to determine the scale of an individual animal’s movement.

The genetic information suggested that there are three regional divisions of aardvarks in South Africa. The animals in the western, central, and eastern regions of the country were also somewhat isolated. Individuals were detected at various locations separated by up to 4.3 miles. Their home ranges may be larger than previously determined, particularly in more arid areas where food may be more scarce. 

[Related: Rare parasites found in 200 million-year-old reptile poop.]

Closely related aardvarks were detected as far as 27.3 miles apart and individuals found less than 34 miles were more genetically similar. The team also found that aardvarks may disperse up to 34 miles from where they are born. The genetic differences between individuals was larger when the landscapes between the animals were more dry and hot, which suggests that the movement throughout those arid areas may be restricted.

“Our initial findings suggest that climate change will increase habitat fragmentation and limit gene flow for aardvarks, particularly where precipitation is expected to decrease and temperature increase,” Epps said. “With aridity expected to increase in southernmost Africa under most climate change scenarios, the need for further research is clear.”

The team plans to perform genomic analysis on new samples and conduct field work across a wider area.

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To survive the dark and snowy Arctic winters, reindeer have evolved unique visual systems. Their eyes change color to adjust to the huge swings in sunlight between Arctic summer and winter, but may do even more to help them forage. A study published December 15 in the journal i-Perception found that their eyes may have evolved to see light in the ultraviolet spectrum to help them find their favorite food in their desolate  home.

[Related: Jackrabbit’s color-changing fur may prepare them for climate change.]

Reindeer primarily eat Cladonia rangiferina (C. rangiferina), which is appropriately nicknamed reindeer moss. This plant is not a moss, but a species of algae-fungus called lichen. It forms a thick and crunchy blanket on the ground across the Earth’s northern latitudes and helps play an important role in the ecosystem as a food source. 

In the study, the team worked in the Cairngorms mountains in the Scottish Highlands, home to Britain’s only reindeer herd. Reindeer were locally hunted to extinction, but began to be reintroduced from Scandinavia in 1952. The Cairngorms are home to more than 1,500 species of lichen, but the reindeer here only rely on C. rangiferina during the winter months

“A peculiar trait of reindeer is their reliance on this one type of lichen,”  study co-author and Dartmouth College anthropologist and evolutionary biologist Nathaniel Dominy said in a statement. “It’s unusual for any animal to subsist so heavily on lichens, let alone such a large mammal.”

When up against snow, the white lichen is invisible to the human eye.. However, co-authors Catherine Hobaiter and Julie Harris from the University of St. Andrews found that C. rangiferina and some other lichen species that supplement the reindeer diet absorb ultraviolet (UV) light. The team used spectral data from the lichen and light filters that were made to mimic reindeer vision and found that the plants may look like dark patches against a bright landscape to the reindeer. They stand out like Dalmatian spots and are easier for the reindeer to locate.

According to Dominy, this is one of the first studies to use a visual approximation of how these mammals may see their world. 

“If you can put yourself in their hooves looking at this white landscape, you would want a direct route to your food,” Dominy said. “Reindeer don’t want to waste energy wandering around searching for food in a cold, barren environment. If they can see lichens from a distance, that gives them a big advantage, letting them conserve precious calories at a time when food is scarce.”

Some animals that can see on the UV spectrum include dogs, cats, pigs, and even ferrets. They generally do this with the short blue photoreceptors called cones present in their eyes. 

Earlier studies have shown that reindeer eyes change from golden in the summer and a vivid blue in the winter. The light-enhancing membrane that gives many animals a shiny eye called the tapetum transitions every season. The blue hue of their eyes is believed to amplify the low levels of sunlight present during polar winters. 

[Related: How do animals see the world?]

“If the color of the light in the environment is primarily blue, then it makes sense for the eye to enhance the color blue to make sure a reindeer’s photoreceptors are maximizing those wavelengths,” Dominy says.

However, the blue tapetum also lets up to 60 percent of UV light pass through to the eye’s color sensors. The reindeer likely see the winter world as a shade of purple the way a human may see a room with a black light. Snow and other UV-reflecting surfaces then shine brightly while surfaces that absorb UV light are dark.

Scientists have investigated why an Arctic animal that is active during the day would have eyes that are so receptive to UV light that reflects off of the snow. This study suggests that the answer to this question is tied to C. rangiferina and other lichens, since UV light doesn’t reflect from those organisms. The team believes that it is possible that reindeer eyes are optimized to single out lichens during the times of year where it is most difficult to find since it is a food staple. 

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Even six years after its dramatic plunge into Saturn’s atmosphere, NASA’s now complete Cassini mission continues to fuel discovery. Data from the mission recently revealed evidence that the giant plume of water vapor and ice grain spewing from Saturn’s moon Enceladus contains hydrogen cyanide. This linear molecule is key to the origin of life. Cassini found strong confirmation for the molecule and the possibility that the ocean under Enceladus’ icy outer shell holds a powerful source of chemical energy. The findings were published December 14 in Nature Astronomy.

[Related: NASA hopes its snake robot can search for alien life on Saturn’s moon Enceladus.]

In June, a new analysis of Cassini data found that, in theory, Enceladus has all the chemicals it needs to support life within its plume. The ocean under Enceladus likely supplies most of this material for the plume streaming off of the moon. This newly identified energy source also comes in the form of several organic compounds. Some of these compounds serve as fuel for organisms here on Earth. It’s possible that there is more chemical energy inside of this small moon than astronomers previously thought. The more energy, the more likely it would be for the celestial body to sustain life. 

“Our work provides further evidence that Enceladus is host to some of the most important molecules for both creating the building blocks of life and for sustaining that life through metabolic reactions,” study co-author and Harvard University doctoral student Jonah Peter said in a statement. “Not only does Enceladus seem to meet the basic requirements for habitability, we now have an idea about how complex biomolecules could form there, and what sort of chemical pathways might be involved.”

The ‘Swiss army knife of amino acid precursors’

Hydrogen cyanide is of the most crucial and versatile molecules needed to form the amino acids needed to sustain life, because its molecules can be stacked together in many different ways. The team on this study calls hydrogen cyanide the “Swiss army knife of amino acid precursors.”

“The discovery of hydrogen cyanide was particularly exciting, because it’s the starting point for most theories on the origin of life,” said Peter. “The more we tried to poke holes in our results by testing alternative models, the stronger the evidence became. Eventually, it became clear that there is no way to match the plume composition without including hydrogen cyanide.”

In 2017, scientists found evidence that Enceladus potentially had chemistry that could help sustain life in its ocean. The combination of hydrogen, methane, and carbon dioxide inside of the plume pointed to a methanogenesis. This metabolic process produces methane and is widespread on Earth. Methanogenesis also may have been critical to the origin of life on our planet.

[Related: Here’s how life on Earth might have formed out of thin air and water.]

The new study found evidence for additional energy chemical sources that produce a process stronger than methanogenesis. Scientists found numerous organic compounds that were oxidized. Oxidation helps drive the release of chemical energy, so the presence of oxidized compounds indicates that there are multiple chemical pathways to potentially sustain life present in Enceladus’ subsurface ocean. 

“If methanogenesis is like a small watch battery, in terms of energy, then our results suggest the ocean of Enceladus might offer something more akin to a car battery, capable of providing a large amount of energy to any life that might be present,” study co-author and astrobiologist and planetary scientist at NASA’S Jet Propulsion Laboratory Kevin Hand said in a statement.

How Earth math works on Saturn’s moons

The team also performed a detailed statistical analysis to recreate the conditions that Cassini found on Enceladus. They examined data on the gas, ions, and ice grains around Saturn that Cassini’s ion and neutral mass spectrometer gathered. The statistical models helped the team tease out the small differences in various chemical compounds.

“There are many potential puzzle pieces that can be fit together when trying to match the observed data,” Peter said. “We used math and statistical modeling to figure out which combination of puzzle pieces best matches the plume composition and makes the most of the data, without overinterpreting the limited dataset.”

While determining if life could originate on Enceladus is still a long way off, this new research shows the chemical pathways for life on this Saturnian moon can be tested in the lab on Earth. 

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About 72 million years ago, a mosasaur the size of a modern great white shark terrorized the Pacific Ocean. Nicknamed Wakayama Soryu or “blue dragon,” the large extinct marine reptile was propelled by extra-long rear flippers and a long finned tail. Wakayama Soryu also had a unique dorsal fin like a shark or dolphin. This back fin would have helped it turn very quickly and precisely in the water, making Wakayama Soryu a formidable foe. This newly described reptile is detailed in a study published on December 11 in the Journal of Systematic Palaeontology.

[Related: Newfound mosasaur was like a giant Komodo dragon with flippers.]

Mosasaurs were marine apex predators that lived when Tyrannosaurus rex and other late Cretaceous dinosaurs dominated life on land. They ate cephalopods, fish, sharks, birds, and were even known to munch on other mosasaurs. Mosasaurs died off during the same mass extinction event that killed almost all of the dinosaurs about 66 million years ago. Mosasaur specimens have been uncovered all over the world, including in North Dakota, The Netherlands, and Morocco. 

Wakayama Soryu was found along the Aridagawa River in Wakayama Prefecture along the central coast of Japan. Its dragon nickname is a reference to Japanese folklore. 

“In China, dragons make thunder and live in the sky. They became aquatic in Japanese mythology,” study co-author and University of Cincinnati vertebrate paleontologist Takuya Konishi said in a statement. 

The specimen was first discovered in 2006 along by study co-author Akihiro Misaki from the Kitakyushu Museum of Natural History & Human History. Misaki was searching for ammonite fossils when he spotted an interesting dark fossil in the sandstone. A closer look at the dark stone revealed that it was a back bone and part of  the most mosasaur skeleton ever found in Japan of the northwestern Pacific.

“In this case, it was nearly the entire specimen, which was astounding,” Konishi said.

Konishi has spent decades studying ancient marine reptiles, but this new specimen had some features that defied simple classification. The rear flippers are longer than the front flippers and are even longer than its head. 

“I thought I knew them quite well by now,” Konishi said. “Immediately it was something I had never seen before.”

The Wakayama Soryu has some features that are similar to mosasaurs found in New Zealand and is fairly comparable to a mosasaur specimen found in California. Konishi said it also had nearly binocular vision that would have made it a deadly hunter.

The team categorized the new specimen in the subfamily Mosasaurinae and gave it the scientific name Megapterygius wakayamaensis, to recognize where it was discovered. Megapterygius means “large winged” in keeping with the mosasaur’s enormous flippers. The paddle-shaped flippers were potentially used for locomotion. Another prehistoric marine reptile called the plesiosaur used paddle fins for propulsion, but it was not equipped with a rudder-like tail the way Wakayama Soryu does.

[Related: Megalodon’s warm-blooded relatives are still circling the oceans today.]

“We lack any modern analog that has this kind of body morphology—from fish to penguins to sea turtles,” Konishi said. “None has four large flippers they use in conjunction with a tail fin.”

The team believes that these large front fins might have helped with rapid moving, while the rear fins would have given pitch to dive down or surface. Like other mosasaurus, the tail would have generated powerful and fast acceleration during hunting. 

“It’s a question just how all five of these hydrodynamic surfaces were used. Which were for steering? Which for propulsion?” said Konishi. “It opens a whole can of worms that challenges our understanding of how mosasaurs swim.”

The orientation of the neural spines along the Wakayama Soryu’s vertebrae indicate that it had a dorsal fin, unlike other mosasaurs. The neural spines are arranged in a way that is similar to present-day harbor porpoises, which also have a prominent dorsal fin.

“It’s still hypothetical and speculative to some extent, but that distinct change in neural spine orientation behind a presumed center of gravity is consistent with today’s toothed whales that have dorsal fins, like dolphins and porpoises,” Konishi said.

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A team using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) spotted the smallest free-floating brown dwarf star ever recorded and two other “failed stars.” They are located in a star cluster that’s only 1,000 light-years from Earth and is not associated with a parent star. The findings were published December 13 in the Astronomical Journal and may help astronomers better determine the boundaries between stars and planets. 

[Related: A Jupiter-sized dwarf star burns half as hot as a campfire.]

Failed Stars

Brown dwarfs are celestial bodies that are more massive than planets, but not quite as large as stars. They form the way stars do, growing dense enough to collapse under the weight of their own gravity, but they never become dense and hot enough to start fusing the hydrogen needed to turn into a star. This is why they get the nickname “failed stars.”

The brown dwarf JWST spotted has a mass around eight times that of the planet Jupiter. Meanwhile, the smallest of these stars has a mass around three times that of Jupiter, which challenges current theories about how these types of celestial bodies are formed. Astronomers are using JWST to try and determine what the smallest celestial objects that can form in a star-like manner are. 

“One basic question you’ll find in every astronomy textbook is, what are the smallest stars? That’s what we’re trying to answer,” study co-author and Pennsylvania State University astronomer Kevin Luhman said in a statement. 

Scouring the skies

Luhman and his colleague Catarina Alves de Oliveira began their search with star cluster IC 348. This grouping is only about 1,000 light-years away in the Perseus star-forming region. Star cluster IC 348 is relatively young, at only about 5 million years old. Due to its age, any brown dwarfs present would still be relatively bright in infrared light and be glowing from the heat of their formation.

They imaged the center of the star cluster with JWST’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) to identify any brown dwarf candidates from their brightness and colors. They then used the microshutter array on the telescope’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) to look at the most promising targets. The JWST’s sensitivity to infrared light allowed the team to detect fainter objects than other ground-based telescopes. 

They narrowed the star cluster down to three possible targets. All of the stars weighed three to eight Jupiter masses and had surface temperatures ranging from 1,500 to 2,800 degrees Fahrenheit. According to the team’s computer models, the smallest target was only three to four times the size of Jupiter and can offer clues to the star formation process.

[Related: Two tiny stars fit into an orbit smaller than our sun.]

“It’s pretty easy for current models to make giant planets in a disk around a star,” study co-author and European Space Agency (ESA) astronomer Catarina Alves de Oliveira of ESA said in a statement. “But in this cluster, it would be unlikely this object formed in a disk, instead forming like a star, and three Jupiter masses is 300 times smaller than our Sun. So we have to ask, how does the star formation process operate at such very, very small masses?”

A strange molecule

Tiny brown dwarfs can also help astronomers better understand exoplanets because the smallest brown dwarfs overlap with the largest known exoplanets. While they would generally be expected to have some similar properties, a free-floating brown dwarf is easier to study than a giant exoplanet. The glare of its host star generally hides giant exoplanets, making them more difficult to observe.  

Two of the brown dwarfs in this study also have evidence of an unidentified hydrocarbon, a molecule made up of both hydrogen and carbon atoms. NASA’s Cassini mission detected the same infrared signature in the atmosphere of Saturn and its moon Titan and in the gas between stars.

“This is the first time we’ve detected this molecule in the atmosphere of an object outside our solar system,” said Alves de Oliveira. “Models for brown dwarf atmospheres don’t predict its existence. We’re looking at objects with younger ages and lower masses than we ever have before, and we’re seeing something new and unexpected.”

The star or planet identity crisis

The question remains whether brown dwarfs are considered stars or rogue planets that were ejected from planetary systems. This team argues that the brown dwarfs in this study are most likely brown dwarf stars, and not an ejected planet. 

While the rogue planet theory couldn’t be completely ruled out, it is unlikely. Most of the stars in cluster IC 348 are low-mass and the team believes that it’s unlikely that they are capable of producing massive planets. The cluster also may not have had enough time during its 5 million years of existence for gas giants to form and be ejected from their planetary systems.  

Finding more objects like these brown dwarfs could help clarify their status as stars or planets. Some theories suggest that rogue planets are more likely to be spotted on the outskirts of a star cluster. Expanding the search area may reveal if they exist within IC 348. Future research could also take longer surveys that can pick up fainter and smaller objects. 

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Adjusting to life in cold air temperatures has been key to survival for the Arctic’s seals. Those adaptations go beyond thick layers of blubber for insulation and up into the pinniped’s nose. A study published December 14 in the Biophysical Journal found that Arctic seals have more convoluted nasal passages than seals that live in more mild places. 

[Related: Hungry seals may have begun following their whiskers 23 million years ago.]

Warming the air

In cold and dry places, animals lose moisture and heat when they breathe. Warmer and wet air is important for lung function, so breathing in cold air can put the lungs in danger and may make humans more susceptible to respiratory viruses. To help minimize the risk, most birds and mammal species have complex bones called maxilloturbinates inside their nasal cavities. These porous, bony shelves are covered with mucus and tissues that warm and humidify inhaled air. Maxilloturbinates also reduce the amount of heat and moisture that is lost when an organism breathes out.

Researchers believe that the nose structure helps Arctic seals efficiently retain moisture and heat as they inhale and exhale. 

“Thanks to this elaborate structure in their nasal cavities, Arctic seals lose less heat through nasal heat exchange than subtropical seals when both are exposed to the same conditions,” Signe Kjelstrup, a study co-author and physical chemist at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, said in a statement. “This provides an evolutionary advantage, especially in the Arctic where heat loss is energy dissipation, which must be replenished by food.”

According to Kjelstrup, Arctic seals retain 94 percent of the moisture in the air when they breathe in and out. Most of the water added to the air when they inhale is then recovered when they exhale.  

‘You can’t find reindeer in the middle of the Mediterranean’

The structure of maxilloturbinates varies between species. Reindeer noses also enable efficient heat exchange, but since they are only found in colder climates, Kjelstrup’s team turned to seals.

“You can’t find reindeer in the middle of the Mediterranean, but seals live in many different environments, so they allowed us to test this question,” said Kjelstrup. “And we knew from a previous study that Arctic seal noses are sponge-like and very dense, whereas the Mediterranean seal nose has a more open structure.”

In the study, the team used computer tomography to create 3D models of the nasal cavities of two seal species–the Arctic bearded seal (Erignathus barbatus) and the Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus). Next, they used energy dissipation models to compare how well each species warmed and moistened air when they inhaled and reduced the amount of heat and moisture lost when they exhaled.

[Related: Baby seals sing bass notes when they want attention.]

They tested the models of both species’ noses under Arctic conditions of -22°F and at about 50°F, or a cold day for a Mediterranean monk seal. They also adjusted different parameters within the model to highlight the crucial geometrical features of the nasal cavity.

According to the model, Arctic bearded seals are more efficient at retaining heat and water exchange in both Arctic and subtropical temperatures. At -22°F, the Mediterranean monk seals lost 1.45 times as much heat and 3.5 times as much water per breath cycle than the bearded seals lost. At 50°F, the Mediterranean monk seals lost 1.5 times as much heat and 1.7 times as much water.

It appears that the Arctic seal’s more complex and dense nasal cavity provided this advantage. Specifically, the team found that the increased perimeter of the Arctic seal’s maxilloturbinates is the key to limiting energy dissipation at lower ambient temperatures. 

While the study looked at the amount of heat loss for one inhalation and exhalation, the role breathing rate plays remains unclear. These breathing cycles are particularly complicated for seals, who will pause their breathing for several minutes at a time when they dive under water and ice.

Energy efficient pinnipeds

The team hopes to look deeper into the nasal structures of other species to see if different parts provide evolutionary advantages in other climates. 

“The camel, for instance, doesn’t need to save much on heat, but it does need to save on water, so one may speculate that it could tell us something about relative importance of the two,” said Kjelstrup.

They also plan to look to animals for cues on how to build more efficient heat exchange and ventilation systems. 

“If nature manages to create such great heat exchangers, I think we should copy that in engineering to create more efficient processes, for instance, in air conditioners,” said Kjelstrup.  

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If you naturally wake up earlier in the morning, some very old genetic variants may be behind your sleep patterns. Humans’ internal circadian clocks might be partially influenced by genetic material left behind by extinct Neanderthals. The findings are described in a study published December 14 in Genome Biology and Evolution and provides a window into how the sleep cycles of Neanderthals differed from our earliest ancestors. Studies like this one could be a step towards a better understanding of how genetic material from extinct hominins affects modern humans.   

Our bodies respond to the environment

Modern Homo sapiens trace their origins back 300,000 years. Biological features in these early humans were shaped by environmental factors like sunlight or altitude. Roughly 70,000 years ago, the ancestors of modern Eurasian humans began to migrate out of Africa north towards Europe and Asia. Here, they experienced new environments and more seasonal variation in both temperatures and daylight. 

[Related: Night owls can become early birds. Here’s how.]

“We also know from other species that live across broad ranges of latitude that their circadian clocks often adapt to the differences in light/dark cycles,” study co-author and University of California, San Francisco computational biologist Tony (John) Capra tells PopSci. “In particular, in higher latitudes there is more seasonal variation in light/dark cycles over the course of the year than in more equatorial latitudes.”

They also encountered different types of early hominins as they left Africa, including Denisovans and Neanderthals. The different environmental conditions on these northern continents meant that Neanderthals and Denisovans had different genetic variations from those coming out of Africa. When they began to interbreed with Neanderthals about 50,000 years ago, it created the potential for humans to get some of the genetic variants that were already adapted to this environment.

Which genes stay and which genes go

Roughly two percent of the present-day Eurasian genome is derived from Neanderthal genetic variants, but which two percent varies. Neanderthal genes have been shown to influence nose shape and even pain sensitivity. Natural selection can remove this older genetic ancestry that is not deemed beneficial to humans as we evolve. However, some of the older hominin genetic variants that remain in today’s human genome have evidence of adaptation. For example, Tibetans living at higher altitudes have variants associated with immune resistance to new pathogens, levels of skin pigmentation, fat composition, and differences in hemoglobin levels.

In the new study, Capra and co-authors were curious if the Neanderthals who lived at higher latitudes may have genetic variants that adapted to changes in environment over hundreds of thousands of years. They also wondered if the interbreeding influenced variation in the circadian rhythm that can make someone an early riser. 

[Related: Sex, not violence, could’ve sealed the fate of the Neanderthals.]

The researchers identified about 200 genes that are related to how light and temperature affects our circadian clock and about 20 that are crucial to our internal clocks themselves. “It turns out that the genes themselves are very similar, but what really matters is how much and when they are made,” says Capra. 

After pinpointing these genes, the team explored if the variants that moved from Neanderthals into modern humans have any associations with the body’s preferences for wakefulness and sleep. They looked at genetic data from the UK Biobank and found that many of the Neanderthal variants in modern humans affect sleep preference. In particular, the tendency to wake up early–or morningness–stuck out. Increased morningness is associated with a shortened circadian clock that is likely beneficial for those living at higher latitudes. Morningness has been shown to enable a faster alignment of the external cues that it’s time to fall asleep or wake up, like changes in sunlight. 

“We used machine learning methods to predict from Neanderthal DNA sequences how the ways that they turned the circadian genes on and off differed from in modern humans,” says Capra. “In general, it seems that having a faster running clock leads people (and other organisms) to be earlier risers and have an easier time adapting to seasonal variation.”

This increased morningness may have been evolutionarily beneficial for our ancestors living in higher latitudes, so the genetic variants associated with it would have been worth keeping. 

Sentinel hypothesis

Exploring the genetics behind what makes some of us early birds and others night owls is part of an emerging–yet difficult to prove–evolutionary theory called sentinel hypothesis. There could be an evolutionary benefit to having a mixture of sleep and wake patterns and in a given human population. To increase chances of survival, animals living in groups should trade off keeping watch, with some sleeping while others are awake. Study co-author and Vanderbilt University computational biologist Keila S. Velazquez-Arcelay identified a few genetic variants that could provide evidence for this.

“Keila discovered a few genetic variants that are associated with chronotype that have evidence of long-term ‘balancing’ selection. In other words, evolution appears to have preferred to maintain variation at these sites,” says Capra. 

In future work, the team from this study is interested in testing the effects of these Neanderthal genetic variants on circadian clocks in cells. According to Capra, using cells allows them to quickly introduce the Neanderthal variants and evaluate their effects. They are also curious to find patterns across different populations and see if this analysis technique can be applied to genes involved in immune system function, thermoregulation, and metabolism.

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No one likes having a dental cavity. They hurt and can be very expensive to take care of. Our species has been trying to fix our teeth for at least 14,000 years and painful dental problems even plagued Swedish vikings. More than 2,300 juvenile and adult teeth found near a church in Sweden dating back to the 10th through 12th Century CE had evidence of dental problems. They had evidence of tooth decay called caries and even oral diseases that some tried to treat. The findings are described in a study published December 13 in PLOS ONE.

[Related: This new synthetic tooth enamel is even harder than the real thing.]

“I think both dental caries and other dental diseases are very relatable,” Carolina Bertilsson, a study co-author and dentist at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, tells PopSci. “It is awful to imagine the suffering some of these individuals with decay, tooth extractions, and infections must have gone through, without any of the methods we use today in modern dentistry.”

The teeth were uncovered during a 2005 excavation of the remains of a Christian church in present-day Skara, Sweden. The nearby cemetery contained thousands of Viking graves and a team from University of Gothenburg examined teeth belonging to 171 individuals. The team used radiography to take detailed images of the teeth that were also physically examined by a team of dentists and osteoarchaeologists.

While none of the juveniles had evidence of dental caries, 60 percent of the adult remains showed signs of tooth decay. The team also saw traces of tooth infection and signs that some teeth had been lost before death. Many of the individuals likely had tooth decay that would have been severe enough to cause pain and there were signs of attempted dental treatments. One individual also showed signs of filed front teeth similar to those seen in other Swedish Viking remains. 

“It seems like the Vikings tried to file their teeth to ease the pain from infected teeth,” says Bertilsson.

Caries are caused by a buildup of bacteria near the teeth from not cleaning them often and consuming food high in starches and sugar. The diet during the late Viking Age primarily consisted of local produce, meat, fish, dairy, porridge, and breads made from rye, wheat, and barley. They drank beer, mead, and milk since water sources were likely not safe to drink. 

“Sweet taste came from honey, malt, and fruits and berries naturally grown in Scandinavia,” says Bertilsson.

The coarseness of the food and high intake of starch combined with the lack of dental care partially explain the tooth decay. Other factors including individual differences in saliva, genetics, and physiology also may have had an impact on the caries. Personal hygiene and habits also likely played a role in dental health the way consistent brushing and flossing does today. 

“In many individuals, we could also see wear from the usage of toothpicks which indicates that some of the Vikings were very keen to try and keep their teeth clean,” says Bertilsson.

There was also evidence of other attempts to treat dental infections like tooth extractions. It is unclear who would have performed these treatments, some type of professional or the individual with the teeth issues themselves. 

The prevalence of the dental caries in this population is also similar to what has been noted in other European populations from the time. However, nearly a quarter of these individuals appear to have lost teeth before death, which likely skews this analysis. The prevalence of tooth decay appeared to decrease with age, and this unexpected result likely reflects more tooth loss in older Vikings, so the most decayed teeth were not present in the remains. 

[Related: Plague DNA was just found in 4,000-year-old teeth.]

In future studies, the team plans to study other remains for evidence of the types of bacteria present in the body and what effect that may have had on the dental health of the Vikings. 

“It makes me appreciate the time I live in, with the possibility to help my patients with local anesthetics during dental treatments, and antibiotics when needed,” says Bertilsson.

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After several major recalls of eye drops and scathing inspection reports, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued new guidance this week on the use of homeopathic eye drops. The agency warned that all drops labeled homeopathic should not be sold. 

[Related: So, what’s the deal with homeopathy?]

Homeopathy can trace its root back to the Ancient Greeks, but was popularized by physician Christian Friedrich Samuel Hahnemann during the late 18th Century. Many of its methods are no better than a placebo. Homeopathy relies on two false principles. The false “law of similars” believes that something that causes a specific symptom in a healthy individual can also treat conditions and diseases with the same set of characteristics. The “law of infinitesimals” says that diluting a substance will make it more potent. Homeopathic products could take toxic substances and almost completely dilute them into more of an essence of the substance. There is no evidence to support the use of homeopathy. It can be very dangerous, as it keeps patients from seeking real medicine.

In November, Amazon stopped selling seven brands of eyedrops. The FDA sent a warning letter to Amazon CEO Andrew Jassy to stop selling “unapproved new drugs” at the major e-retailer. The products in question claimed to help pink eye, dry eyes, and eyestrain and the FDA says that these products violate federal regulations. 

“These products are especially concerning from a public health perspective,” the FDA wrote in the letter. “Ophthalmic drug products, which are intended for administration into the eyes, in general pose a greater risk of harm to users because the route of administration for these products bypasses some of the body’s natural defenses.”

Eyes are at a greater risk of harm since they are one of the body’s immune-privileged sites. Immune responses are restrained in the eyes to prevent inflammation that can damage our vision. 

Under the 1938 Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, homeopathic remedies are generally considered exempt from FDA safety and efficacy reviews if the active ingredient in the product is included in a list of substances approved by homeopaths. However, all seven of these unapproved products fall into the FD&C Act “because they are intended for use in the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease, and/or intended to affect the structure or any function of the body.”

In October, the FDA also warned consumers about 26 over-the-counter eye drops from major brands sold at retailers like CVS and Target due to infection risk due to unsanitary conditions found at the manufacturers. Even though these drops are not all homeopathic, consumers should not buy any of the products and should immediately stop using them if they’ve already purchased them. The complete list can be found here. 

The advisory posted by the FDA in October states that while no adverse effects had been reported for these products, the agency “found insanitary conditions in the manufacturing facility and positive bacterial test results from environmental sampling of critical drug production areas in the facility.”

[Related: Can our eyes ever fix themselves?]

The FDA is asking Congress for some new regulatory powers, including the ability to mandate drug recalls and require that the eyedrop manufacturers undergo and pass specific inspections before the products can be shipped to the US. 

To find safe eye drops amid all of these recalls, consumers should verify where the drops were manufactured, double-check expiration dates, and look up specific products using an eye drop safety tool from Dry Eye Foundation.

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A zoologist from the University of Otago in New Zealand spotted a rare bird with distinct half-male and half-female plumage. Hamish Spencer and amateur ornithologist John Murillo took photos and video of a wild green honeycreeper (Chlorophanes spiza) while on vacation in Colombia. A report on the find was published in the Journal of Field Ornithology and represents the second recorded example of gynandromorphism in this species in more than a century. 

[Related: These female hummingbirds don flashy male feathers to avoid unwanted harassment.]

A bilateral gynandromorph is an animal that is born with one male half and one female half. The animal is usually divided down the middle with characteristics of two sexes in one body. Bilateral gynandromorphism has been documented in other animals including bees, butterflies, spiders, and stick insects. Cardinals and the rose-breasted grosbeak have also been documented with this division, but bilateral gynandromorphs are believed to be rare.

“Many birdwatchers could go their whole lives and not see a bilateral gynandromorph in any species of bird. The phenomenon is extremely rare in birds, I know of no examples from New Zealand ever,” Spencer said in a statement. “It is very striking, I was very privileged to see it.”

Studying gynandromorphs are important for our understanding of how biological sex is determined in birds and their sexual behavior. Male green honeycreepers have predominantly blue plumage. Female green honeycreepers have green plumage. The observed bird has both. 

“This particular example of bilateral gynandromorphy–male one side and female the other–shows that, as in several other species, either side of the bird can be male or female,” said Spencer. 

While there are a range of theories of how gynandromorphic animals form, scientists believe that it could occur in birds when a female egg cell develops with two nuclei. For mammals, male sex cells generally have one copy of each sex chromosome (X and Y) and females have two copies of the X chromosome. In birds, it’s the opposite and their sex chromosomes are designated as Z and W instead of X and Y. The female’s egg cells will have a single copy of each (ZW) chromosome in their nucleus, while the male’s sperm will have two Z’s. According to ornithologist Daniel Hooper, gynandromorphism likely occurs if a female egg cell develops with two nuclei—one with a Z and one with a W. It is then “double fertilized” by the two Z-carrying sperm, resulting in a gynandromorph.

[Related: Sex and gender binaries don’t tell the entire story of life.]

The team did not observe any courtship behavior or take any blood or tissue samples to study its chromosomes. It was also not clear if the bird was fertile or reproduced over the 21 months that the bird was reportedly present in the forest in Villamaría, Colombia. The bird tended to keep to itself and acted as the other members of its species. 

There are five species of honeycreepers. Green honeycreepers live in southern Mexico, south towards Brazil, Colombia, and Trinidad. Green honeycreepers are generally found on the edges of evergreen forests, gardens, and plantations in Central and South America. They are only five to five and a half inches long and weigh less than a pound. Green honeycreepers eat fruit and some arthropods and some nectar from plants. Scientists also believe that they are doing well and are categorized as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List.

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The Great Lakes are facing invasive species that originated in homes across the United States. Common goldfish (Carassius auratus) released into lakes, rivers, and ponds by pet owners have been wreaking havoc for decades and scientists are trying to follow the fish to solve the problem. The species of freshwater fish native to Asia is usually only about five inches long in a home aquarium, but can grow to up to 19 inches long and tip the scales at nine pounds when they swim freely. 

[Related: Whatever you do, don’t set your pet goldfish free in a stream.]

In the Great Lakes, they’re an invasive species that will “eat anything and everything,” Fisheries and Oceans Canada aquatic research biologist Christine Boston told The New York Times. These seemingly benign household pets can harm native marine wildlife, uproot plants, contribute to harmful algal blooms, and eat vegetation in the environmentally and economically sensitive region. 

According to The Ohio State University College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences, invasive goldfish will eat the eggs of native fish species. They will also take over the spaces that other fish will use for reproduction and shelter. The goldfish are even able to reproduce with the native common carp to create bigger hybrid species that are equally harmful.

A study published in November in the Journal of Great Lakes Research details how an invasive population of goldfish in Hamilton Harbour has been changing the area. The harbor in Lake Ontario southwest of Toronto is one of the most environmentally degraded areas of the Great Lakes due to industrial activity and building. The team captured 19 adult goldfish between June 2017 and October 2018. They implanted transmitters in the fish that the scientists used to track where the goldfish swam. 

The team saw that the goldfish spent time in the same area over the winter and returned to the same places to spawn every year. They predicted when the fish would swim into spawning areas by studying how many fish were present, where they were congregating, and the water temperature. They then built models that accurately anticipated the tagged fish and saw that they tended to move into their spawning grounds when temperatures hit about 50 degrees Fahrenheit. 

The study helped point out goldfish populations for culling. Some of the options for catching them include using nets beneath winter ice, shocking them with electrical currents, or scooping them out of the water. Catching the goldfish before they start spawning is a good opportunity to get the fish out of the lakes, particularly since they reproduce several times in one mating season and they can even live up to 25 years. 

[Related: How goldfish use booze to get through a hard winter.]

 “They have the resources and they can take advantage of them,” said Boston, who is a co-author of the study.

Lake Erie is also not exempt from this problem. In August 2022, a foot-long goldfish was reported in Fairport Harbor north of Cleveland, according to the Ohio Division Wildlife. Goldfish have also been spotted in waterways in Minnesota and in Illinois.

If you can no longer care for a live goldfish, the United States Fish & Wildlife Service recommends trying to find another caregiver, donating a fish to a pet store or school, and checking online forums and social media dedicated to pet adoption.

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NASA has released a new image of supernova remnant Cassiopeia A (Cas A) taken by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). JWST used its Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) to image Cas A in a different way, despite it being among the most well-studied supernova remnants in the cosmos. 

[Related: An amateur astronomer spotted a new supernova remarkably close to Earth.]

Cas A is about 11,000 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Cassiopeia. It is made from the remains of gigantic star that astronomers believe exploded about 340 years ago. Since then, NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory, the Hubble Space Telescope, and now retired Spitzer Space Telescope assembled a multiwavelength picture of the remains of the stellar explosion. JWST enabled astronomers to observe Cas A at different wavelengths. The image shows the more intricate details of this expanding shell of material slamming into the gas that was shed by the star before it exploded.

Color coding

In April, an image of Cas A created with JWST’s Mid-Infrared Instrument revealed some new and surprising features in its inner shell. Astronomers are now looking into why many of these features are also present in the new image taken with NIRCam, which offers a different view of the same supernova remnants.

To the human eye, infrared light is invisible. Image processors and scientists translate these wavelengths of light into visible colors for images like this one. Colors were assigned to various filters from JWST’s NIRCam which sees in near-infrared light. Each hue hints at something different happening within Cas A.

The clumps of bright orange and light pink make up the inner shell of the supernova remnant. JWST detected tiny knots of gas made up of sulfur, oxygen, argon, and neon that originated from the now exploded star itself. A mixture of dust and molecules that should one day become the components of new stars and planetary systems are embedded within the gas. 

“With NIRCam’s resolution, we can now see how the dying star absolutely shattered when it exploded, leaving filaments akin to tiny shards of glass behind,” Purdue University astronomer Danny Milisavljevic said in a statement. “It’s really unbelievable after all these years studying Cas A to now resolve those details, which are providing us with transformational insight into how this star exploded.”

In the new near-infrared view, Cas A’s inner cavity and outermost shell are less colorful when compared with the mid-infrared view JWST previously took. A region which looked deep orange and red when imaged by MIRI now appears more white like smoke. This shows where the initial star explosion’s blast wave is colliding into surrounding circumstellar material. The dust is too cool to be detected directly at near-infrared wavelengths, but lights up in the mid-infrared.

[Related: Astronomers just confirmed a new type of supernova.]

The team believes that the smoke-like sections of the image are from synchrotron radiation. This kind of light is emitted across the electromagnetic spectrum, including the near-infrared. Synchrotron radiation is generated by charged particles that are hurtling through space at very high speeds and spiraling around magnetic field lines. 

A missing ‘Green Monster’ and a new ‘baby’

A loop of green light in the central cavity nicknamed the Green Monster is also not seen in this new image. When it was first spotted, researchers described it as “challenging to understand.” While it is invisible in the NIRCam image, the circular holes that were just visible in the previous MIRI image are faintly outlined in white and purple in this new NIRCam image. The white and purple represent ionized gas. The team believes that the ionized gas is caused by the supernova debris pushing through and sculpting the gas left behind by the star before it exploded.

While the Green Monster may have been missing from NIRCam’s image, the team was in for a different surprise. A large blob was visible at the bottom right corner of NIRCam’s field of view. This giant blob is called Baby Cas A since it looks like offspring of the main supernova remnant.

Baby Cas A is a light echo, where light from the long-ago stellar explosion is warming distant dust. This far away dust is glowing as it cools down. The team is particularly intrigued by Baby Cas A’s intricate dust pattern and its proximity to Cas A itself. Baby Cas A is likely located about 170 light-years behind the supernova remnant.

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The stomach of the teenage tyrannosaur Gorgosaurus libratus is a gift that keeps on giving. A team of paleontologists in Canada found the remains of two meals preserved inside of its stomach cavity, including the partially digested drumsticks of two birdlike dinosaurs. The findings were described in a study published December 8 in the journal Science Advances and is the first known time that well-preserved gut continents have been discovered in a fossilized tyrannosaur.

[Related: The ghosts of the dinosaurs we may never discover.]

Gorgosaurus lived about 75 million years ago, or several million years before its more famous relative the Tyrannosaurus rex. In the study, the Gorgosaurus was estimated to be between five and seven years old when it died, or a teenager in dinosaur years. It probably weighed about 738 pounds, or 13 percent of the body mass of a fully grown Gorgosaurus. Adults were about 33 feet long and weighed upwards of 2,200 pounds. 

The fossil was first discovered in 2009 by staff from the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology in Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta. Technicians noticed strange features poking out of the fossil’s rib cage while they were preparing it. These turned out to be small toe bones. Gut contents like these are rarely preserved in dinosaur fossils, but this specimen had the dismembered remains of two herbivorous dinosaurs–Citipes elegans. 

The tyrannosaur only ate the hind limbs of each tiny Citipes and they appear to be the last and second-to-last meal that the Gorgosaurus consumed before it died. 

“It must have killed… both of these Citipes at different times and then ripped off the hind legs and ate those and left the rest of the carcasses,” study co-author and University of Calgary paleontologist Darla Zelenitsky told CNN. “Obviously this teenager had an appetite for drumsticks.”

Tyrannosaurs digested the bones of their prey in their stomach, instead of regurgitating them the way present-day birds do. Since the elements of the two Citipes individuals are at different stages of digestion, the team concludes that these were two different meals eaten hours or days apart. 

This specimen also shows direct evidence that young Gorgosaurus had different diets than adults. Fully grown Gorgosaurus are known to have hunted megaherbivore dinosaurs including ceratopsians (horned dinosaurs) and hadrosaurs (duck-billed dinosaurs), based on the tooth marks left behind on bones. They used their massive skulls and teeth to capture their large prey, chomp through bone, and then scrape and tear the flesh. 

[Related: Scaly lips may have hidden the T-rex’s fearsome teeth.]

Juveniles were not yet built to hunt such large prey. They had more narrow skulls, blade-like teeth, and long and slender hind limbs. This made them better suited for capturing and dismembering small and young prey like the Citipes found in this specimen. The team also believes that this kind of prey was a preferred snack for these teenage dinos.

“This is a great case of showing small tyrannosaurids fed on small dinosaurs, much smaller than themselves,” University of Maryland paleontologist Thomas Holtz told The Washington Post., “Whereas the grown-up versions, we have the evidence of their bite marks on big adults that were about the same size as adults.”

The dietary shift towards eating bigger prey likely began around the age of 11. This is when the tyrannosaurs’ skulls and teeth started to get more robust. Differences in diet provide a competitive advantage by lessening competition for resources in modern ecosystems. This same strategy could have been applied when tyrannosaurs like Gorgosaurus lived. It would have allowed juveniles and adults to coexist in the same ecosystem with less conflict. Occupying different ecological niches during their lifespan was likely one of the keys to tyrannosaurs’ evolutionary success as some of Earth’s carnivores. 

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On November 25, paleontologist Martin Lockley passed at the age of 73. PopSci spoke with Lockley about his career studying dinosaur tracks and footprints earlier this year. 

Rows of razor-sharp teeth. Femur bones the size of telephone poles. The towering skeleton of an animal taller than a giraffe. The replicas of dinosaur bodies and giant fossils housed inside natural history museums around the world are usually our first exposure to the long-gone world of these extinct animals. Their sheer size draws people of all ages into the lost world of dinosaurs. However, for paleontologist Martin Lockley, it was their dinosaur footprints and tracks that stole the spotlight and launched his paleontology career.

“People found footprints interesting, but they had this perception that they were not very useful for interpretation of dinosaur activity. I don’t know why that was. You don’t have to be an expert to realize that tracks are made by animals,” Lockley told PopSci by phone in October. 

[Related: A newly discovered sauropod dinosaur left behind some epic footprints.]

Born in Wales in 1950, Lockley was a pioneer in the study of the dinosaur tracks and footprints preserved in rock formations around the world. He taught for over 30 years at the University of Colorado and published more than 1,000 peer-reviewed scientific papers, wrote 17 books. The dinosaur ichnogenus Lockleypus was named in his honor in 2018. Along the way, he earned multiple awards, including the University of Colorado Student Generated Award for Teaching and the Korean Presidential Citation for Contribution to Cultural Heritage Protection in 2020. 

Lockley was also the driving force behind the preservation track sites including the Dinosaur Ridge tracksite in Morrison, Colorado. The protected site is now one of the premier dinosaur track locations in North America. He also helped build the University of Colorado’s Fossil Tracks Collection of roughly 3,000 original or replica specimens of footprints and trackways and 1,600 full-size footprint and trackway tracings of a variety of extinct species.

“Some of the more interesting sites were made by smaller animals and they’re not the more typical known dinosaur tracks. We found tracks of pterosaurs and even some other smaller reptiles,” said Lockley.

Lockley’s work helped his fellow paleontologists understand what fossil footprints can tell us about dinosaurs and the world that they lived in.

“Martin created dinosaur footprint science,” colleague and curator at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Spencer Lucas tells PopSci. “Through his energy, drive, and his collaborative spirit he created a whole subdiscipline of paleontology.”

What trace fossils tell us

The footprints and tracks left behind by dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals are called trace fossils. These imprints can offer clues to how quickly an organism walked or ran and even what their skin may have looked like. Compared with the body fossils of bones to teeth, trace fossils contain evidence of the interactions that the animals had with their environment and can depict what the physical environment may have looked like. According to Lucas, they offer a more reliable way to estimate the speed of a dinosaur than analyzing the skeleton. 

“If you go back to the first Jurassic Park movie, where that T. rex is chasing the Jeep, you’ve had people who’ve looked at skeletons and said they could run 30 miles an hour or something,” says Lucas. “You’ve had other people have said these big dinosaurs could not run so fast. The problem with T. rex is we don’t have any trackways. We’ve only found a few isolated footprints.”

A T. rex trackway would be the best way to get a reliable estimate of the dinosaur’s speed while running. Trace fossils offer a glimpse of ancient animal behaviors, while body fossils tell us about their anatomy and structure. Having both types of fossils offers paleontologists the best comprehensive view of the dinosaurs.

“One of the most interesting things is why are there some formations that have only tracks or most tracks and very few bones, whereas others are mostly bones and very few tracks,” said Lockley. “It appears to have to do with preservation of certain conditions, whether it is wet or dry land that leads to good preservation of tracks in the formations, where others lead to more preservation of tracks.”

[Related: After 60 years, a mysterious Australian dinosaur just got downsized.]

According to Lockley, one of the enduring mysteries this next generation of dinosaur track hunters could solve is why certain species have left behind more bones than tracks, while others left behind more tracks and fewer physical specimens.

“Triceratops-like dinosaurs are very common as bones, but are rare as tracks,” said Lockley. “It does not appear to be related to size because we have other track sites in these formations that have large tracks. They’re still as common as other dinosaurs.”

How discoveries happen

Lockley was a lifelong student of nature who grew up searching for shells and fossils along the beaches of Wales. The son of the late ornithologist Ronald M. Lockley, his father encouraged him to “just go out and observe and trust your observations.” He took that advice with him to the United States where he saw the power of the “right place and right time” nature of scientific discovery very early. When he first arrived in Colorado in 1980, a student first suggested that Lockley visit a series of dinosaur tracks in Gunnison, southwest of Denver. The tracks would prove life-changing, as Lockley documented the then little studied or understood site. It turned out to be the largest dinosaur track site in North America. 

“The discoveries that excited me most have been so serendipitous,” said Lockley. “They came about from just walking along a beach going to what looked like one thing and finding that it’s something completely different.”

Following footprints around the world

While North America is home to some of the largest number of fossil footprints in the world, Lockley’s work with prints took him far and wide. He explored fossil and track sites in China, South Korea, Spain, South Africa, Mexico, Bolivia, and the United Kingdom.  

[Related: New dinosaur species is nicknamed Jurassic’s ‘smallest runner.’]

These footprints are good stand-ins for extinct animals, even if they are found on different continents. They also provide valuable information that bones or other remains wouldn’t necessarily reveal. 

“Martin has been very international in scope,” collaborator and Columbia University paleontologist Paul Olsen tells PopSci. “He was working on some South Korean tracks and found that they had beautiful skin impressions. It wasn’t a surprise that it had that kind of skin, but we wouldn’t have known those details without the footprints,” says Olsen.

In addition to finding the tracks, Lockley devoted time and energy preserving these important parts of the fossil record. This includes navigating the politics needed to create UNESCO world heritage sites so that future generations wouldn’t lose out on these precious relics of the past. His peers cite Lockley’s dedication to preserving and promoting dinosaur tracksuits and footprints around the world as his legacy. 

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Today, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a historic treatment for sickle cell disease. Casgevy is the first medicine based on CRISPR gene-editing technology. The procedure was approved for use in the United Kingdom in November. 

[Related: The UK becomes the first country to approve CRISPR treatment.]

“Sickle cell disease is a rare, debilitating and life-threatening blood disorder with significant unmet need, and we are excited to advance the field especially for individuals whose lives have been severely disrupted by the disease by approving two cell-based gene therapies today,” Doctor Nicole Verdun, director of the Office of Therapeutic Products within the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said in a statement. “Gene therapy holds the promise of delivering more targeted and effective treatments, especially for individuals with rare diseases where the current treatment options are limited.”

The life-long genetic condition is caused by errors in the genes for the protein hemoglobin. Red blood cells use hemoglobin to carry oxygen through the body. The abnormal hemoglobin makes the blood cells crescent-shaped and hard. The misshapen cells then clump together and block the flow of oxygen to the organs, which causes extreme pain. The cells can then die off early, which leads to anemia.

Sickle cell disease is particularly common among people with Caribbean or African ancestry and affects more than 100,000 Americans. Previously, the only known cure for sickle cell disease was a bone marrow transplant from a donor. These procedures come with the risk of rejection by the patient’s immune system and finding a matching donor is a difficult process. 

How Casgevy works

Casgevy uses CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technique, which allows scientists to make precise alterations to human DNA. French microbiologist, geneticist, and biochemist Emmanuelle Charpentier and American biochemist Jennifer A. Doudna shared the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work developing the technique.

The procedure uses stem cells taken from a patient’s bone marrow. The cells are then brought into a lab and the genes that are meant to switch on a functioning version of hemoglobin are edited with CRISPR. Patients must then go through a “conditioning treatment.” This can involve taking a drug that suppresses the immune system, radiotherapy, or chemotherapy to get the body ready for an infusion of CRISPR-modified cells back into the body. The new treatment does not come with the risk of graft versus host disease the way that a traditional bone marrow transplant does.

The approval comes on the heels of a clinical trial with 45 patients. Of these, 29 patients have been in the trial long enough for the researchers to gauge how effective Casgevy is. For at least 12 months after treatment, 28 were free of severe pain caused by the disease.

[Related: These organisms have a natural gene-editing system that could be more useful than CRISPR.]

How Lyfgenia works

The FDA also approved another sickle cell treatment called Lyfgenia. The gene therapy from Bluebird Bio. also modifies a patient’s stem cells. Both Lyfgenia and Casgevy require a conditioning treatment that removes cells and bone marrow so that they can be replaced with the modified cells.

According to the FDA,  patient’s blood stem cells are then genetically modified to produce HbAT87Q. This gene-therapy-derived hemoglobin functions similarly to hemoglobin A, or the normal adult hemoglobin produced by those who do not have sickle cell disease. Red blood cells that have HbAT87Q come with a lower risk of sickling and occluding blood flow. The modified stem cells are then delivered to the patient in a one-time, single-dose infusion. 

Lyfgenia’s safety and analysis is based on data from a 24-month study. Of the 32 patients in the study, 88 percent did not have a recurrent vaso-occlusive crises. These hallmarks of the disease occur when blood microcirculation is obstructed by sickled red blood cells, injuring organs and causing extreme pain.  It does have a risk of blood cancer and a black box warning is included in the label. The FDA also advises that patients should have continued monitoring for blood cnacer

Questions for the future

These groundbreaking therapies are expected to be incredibly expensive. A report from a fair prices nonprofit the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review, a nonprofit group that helps evaluate the value of medical tests and treatments found that the therapy could cost about $2 million per patient. It could be out of reach for many families and does not include additional care costs. 

“We really have to make sure that it is accessible,” Cleveland Clinic pediatric hematologist-oncologist Rabi told NBC News. “This could be an equalizer for people with sickle cell because many patients cannot pursue career options because of the illness.” Hanna previously served on the advisory board for Vertex, who makes Casgevy.

The treatments are also very time consuming. Between the pre-treatment conditioning, treatment itself, and follow up, patients have to spend weeks and possibly months in the hospital.

“I think there will be immediate uptake in some portion of the patients who have more severe disease—frequent pain episodes that cause hospitalization and require opioids for the treatment of pain,” said Boston Children’s Hospital hematologist and oncologist David Williams, told Stat. He added that there could be “bumps in the road” if pharmaceutical companies run into trouble manufacturing these complicated treatments or if the price tag keeps it out of reach for many patients. 

The long term effects are also still not known. The FDA says that patients who received Casgevy or Lyfgenia will be followed in a long-term study to evaluate safety and effectiveness.

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Six decades of human lunar exploration has shaped the moon’s environment. There has been enough change that some scientists argue that a new geological epoch on the moon should be declared. In a commentary published December 8 in the journal Nature Geoscience, a team of anthropologists and geologists say it should be called the Lunar Anthropocene and “space heritage” should be preserved and cataloged. 

[Related: Why do all these countries want to go to the moon right now?]

Why the Lunar Anthropocene?

Scientists used the term Anthropocene to describe the epoch where humans began to have a significant impact on Earth’s ecosystem and geology. The planet is about 4.5 billion years old, and modern humans have only been around for 200,000 years. In that short amount of time, Homo sapiens have significantly altered Earth’s biological, chemical, and physical systems. 

The beginning of the Anthropocene Epoch is still being debated and has a large range. Some suggest it began thousands of years ago. Others pinpoint 1950, when plutonium isotopes from nuclear weapons tests were found at the bottom of a relatively pristine lake in Canada. Emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses accelerating global warming, ocean acidification, increased species extinction, habitat destruction, and natural resource extraction are additional signs that humans have dramatically modified our planet.

“The idea is much the same as the discussion of the Anthropocene on Earth—the exploration of how much humans have impacted our planet,” study co-author and Kansas University archaeologist Justin Holcomb said in a statement. “Similarly, on the moon, we argue the Lunar Anthropocene already has commenced, but we want to prevent massive damage or a delay of its recognition until we can measure a significant lunar halo caused by human activities, which would be too late.”

64 years of moon exploration–and disturbance

On September 13, 1950, the USSR’s uncrewed spacecraft Luna 2 first descended onto the lunar surface. In the decades since, over 100 other spacecraft have touched the moon. NASA’s Apollo Lunar Modules followed in the 1960s and 1970s and China got the first seedling to sprout on the moon in 2019. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) successfully landed on the moon with the Chandrayaan-3 mission in August. 

All of this activity has displaced more of the moon’s surface than natural meteroid impacts and other natural processes. 

In Nature Geoscience, the team argues that upcoming lunar missions and projects will change the face of the moon in more extreme ways. They believe that the concept of the Lunar Anthropocene may help correct a myth that the moon is barely impacted by human activity and is an unchanging environment. 

[Related: Lunar laws could protect the moon from humanity.]

“Cultural processes are starting to outstrip the natural background of geological processes on the moon,” Holcomb said. “These processes involve moving sediments, which we refer to as ‘regolith,’ on the moon. Typically, these processes include meteoroid impacts and mass movement events, among others. However, when we consider the impact of rovers, landers and human movement, they significantly disturb the regolith.”

They believe that the lunar landscape will look entirely different in only half a century, with multiple countries having some presence on the surface of the moon. 

University College London astrophysicist Ingo Waldmann told New Scientist that the moon has entered its version of the Anthropocene. He said that lunar geology isn’t very dramatic. The moon might see an asteroid impact every couple of million years, but there aren’t too many other big events. “Just us walking on it has a bigger environmental impact than anything that would happen to the moon in hundreds of thousands of years,” said Waldmann.

The moon is currently in a geological division called the Copernican Period. It dates over one billion years ago. In that time, Earth has gone through roughly 15 geological periods.

Leave only footprints

The unofficial motto of the United States National Park Service here on Earth is “take only photographs, leave only footprints.” The authors of this commentary believe that a similar mindset should apply to the moon. Debris from human missions to the moon includes everything from spacecraft components, excrement, golf balls, flags, and more.

“We know that while the Moon does not have an atmosphere or magnetosphere, it does have a delicate exosphere composed of dust and gas, as well as ice inside permanently shadowed areas, and both are susceptible to exhaust gas propagation,” the authors wrote. “Future missions must consider mitigating deleterious effects on lunar environments.”

The team hopes that calling a similar attention to the environmental impact of the moon will protect their historical and anthropological value. There are currently no laws or policy protections against disturbing the moon. The team hopes that this concept of a Lunar Anthropocene will spark conversations about human impacts on the moon and how historical artifacts are preserved.

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Grinding coffee beans at home is arguably the best way to get a fresh cup of coffee, but this process can be pretty messy. The friction created by breaking up the beans generates static electricity that makes the coffee clump together and stick to the grinder. However, a team of chemists and volcanologists is here to solve this caffeinated nightmare, joining forces to investigate how moisture affects this static buildup. They found that adding a drop of water to the beans before grinding cuts the static and makes a better tasting espresso. Their findings are highlighted in a study published December 6 in the journal Matter. 

[Related: Scientists brew stronger concrete with coffee grounds.]

While coffee enthusiasts and the $343.2 billion United States coffee industry have long known that coffee grinding generates static electricity, how different properties including origin or roast impact static have been more mysterious. Some baristas already use the Ross Droplet Technique and use a wet teaspoon or water on beans before grinding. 

The new study shows how moisture in espresso beans affects static charge builds up and how it can be altered. The team found that when coffee beans have higher internal moisture, they produce less static electricity. This can eliminate some waste and give consumers more bang for their buck and makes more consistent and intense-tasting espresso.

“Moisture, whether it’s residual moisture inside the roasted coffee or external moisture added during grinding, is what dictates the amount of charge that is formed during grinding,” study co-author and University of Oregon computational materials chemist Christopher Hendon said in a statement. “Water not only reduces static electricity and therefore reduces mess as you’re grinding, but it can also make a major impact on the intensity of the beverage and, potentially, the ability to access higher concentrations of favorable flavors.”

To study what factors are behind the electricity generation, Hendon worked with a team of volcanologists. During volcanic eruptions, scientists study similar electrification processes.

“During eruption, magma breaks up into lots of little particles that then come out of the volcano in this big plume, and during that whole process, those particles are rubbing against each other and charging up to the point of producing lightning,” study co-author and Portland State University volcanologist Joshua Méndez Harper said in a statement. “In a simplistic way, it’s similar to grinding coffee, where you’re taking these beans and reducing them to fine powder.”

They ground both commercially and in-house roasted espresso beans. The beans varied by factors including country of origin, roast color, processing method (natural, washed, or decaffeinated), and moisture content. They measured the amount of static electricity produced during grinding and compared the impact of grinding coarseness on the amount of electricity produced.

[Related: How a popcorn popper can help you roast coffee beans at home.]

There was no association between static electricity and where the country was grown or its processing method. However, the team did find associations between electrification and particle size, roast color, and water content. 

When the coffee had a higher internal moisture content and when it was ground at a coarser setting, less electricity was produced. The lighter roasts produced less electrical charge and the charge was more likely to be positive. 

Darker roasts tend to be drier and the dark roasts studied were charged negatively and produced more overall charge. The team also saw that dark roast coffees produce much finer particles than light roasts when ground at the same setting.

The team then tested whether grinding the beans with water changed the way espresso is brewed. The beans ground with water had a longer extraction time and a stronger brew, even if they were made with the same beans. Using water in the grinder also produced espresso shots that tasted more similar from shot to shot.  

While they only tested espresso, the team believes that these benefits should apply to many other brewing methods. 

“The central material benefit of adding water during grinding is that you can pack the bed more densely because there’s less clumping,” said Hendon. “Espresso is the worst offender of this, but you would also see the benefit in brew formats where you pour water over the coffee or in small percolation systems like a stovetop Bialetti. Where you’re not going to see a benefit during brewing is for methods like the French press, where you submerge the coffee in water.”

In future studies, the team plans to follow up with more studies on the quest to prepare the world’s best cup of coffee. This work also has implications beyond the caffeinated, and could offer insight into how granular materials are electrified.

“It’s sort of like the start of a joke—a volcanologist and a coffee expert walk into a bar and then come out with a paper, but I think there are a lot more opportunities for this sort of collaboration, and there’s a lot more to know about how coffee breaks, how it flows as particles, and how it interacts with water,” said Méndez Harper. “These investigations may help resolve parallel issues in geophysics—whether it’s landslides, volcanic eruptions, or how water percolates through soil.”

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After spending millions of years tucked away in rocks, fossils can sometimes resemble a completely different living thing. A turtle fossil might even bear a striking resemblance to a plant. When a team of paleontologists and paleobotanists re-examined a plant fossil first described about 20 years ago, they found out that it is actually the fossil of a baby turtle. The re-discovery is described in a study published December 7 in the journal Palaeontologia Electronica.

[Related: This 6-million-year-old turtle shell still has some DNA.]

Colombian priest Padre Gustavo Huertas collected rocks and fossils near the town of Villa de Levya from the 1950s to the 1970s. Two of the specimens Padre Huertas found were small, round rocks that had lines on them that looked like leaves, so he classified them as a type of fossil plant. They were described by Huertas in 2003 as Sphenophyllum colombianum and they date back to when dinosaurs roamed the Earth between 132 and 113 million years (Early Cretaceous period). 

This fossil’s age and where it was found piqued the interest of Fabiany Herrera, the assistant curator of fossil plants at the Field Museum in Chicago and a paleobotanist at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá, Colombia and his postdoctoral student Héctor Palma-Castro.

“I am neither a turtle expert nor a paleo vertebrate [expert], but my student Héctor and I knew this specimen was not a fossil leaf,” Herrera tells PopSci. “Fossil leaves are usually preserved pretty flat and don’t have a bone-like texture, so we were quite intrigued as soon as we saw the fossil for the first time.” 

At first glance, the fossils that are about two inches in diameter, looked like rounded nodules with the preserved leaves of the plant Sphenophyllum. They then noticed some key features weren’t quite right. They searched through the university’s fossil collections for other plants for comparison, and deciphering the shape and margin of the leaf in question was a challenge. The lines seen in the fossil did not look like the veins of a plant, and Herrera and Palma-Castro thought it could be bone. 

For help, Herrara reached out to Edwin-Alberto Cadena, a colleague and paleontologist who specializes in turtles and other vertebrates at the Universidad del Rosario in Bogotá. Cadena examined photos of the fossil and believed it looked like the upper shell of a turtle called the carapace. He realized that not only was it a turtle, but a hatchling of one of the world’s oldest extinct turtle species that could grow up to 15 feet long.

“Considering that the fossil hatchlings were found in the same rocks where one of the most complete and oldest marine turtles from the Early Cretaceous has been discovered, known as Desmatochelys padillai, we believe that these hatchlings could correspond to this extinct species,” Cadena tells PopSci. “Desmatochelys padillai belongs to a group of marine turtles known as protostegids, which inhabited the planet during the Cretaceous period and includes some of the largest turtles ever to have lived on Earth.”

[Related: Gigantic fossils hint at super-sized 7,000-pound sea turtle.]

Cadena and his student, Diego Cómbita-Romero of the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, further examined the specimens and compared them with fossilized turtle shells and modern shells.

 “When we saw the specimen for the first time I was astonished, because the fossil was missing the typical marks on the outside of a turtle’s shell,” Cómbita-Romero said in a statement. “It was a little bit concave, like a bowl. At that moment we realized that the visible part of the fossil was the other side of the carapace, we were looking at the part of the shell that is inside the turtle.”

To determine its age, they looked at the thickness of its carapace and the spots where the animal’s ribs were joined together in solid bone. The turtle was likely between 0 and 1 year old at death and in a post-hatchling stage with a slightly developed carapace when it died. Cadena says it is very rare to find hatchlings of fossil turtles since the bones in their shells are quite thin and can easily be destroyed over time. 

The team does not fault Padre Huertas for the mistake, as the features that he thought were leaves and stems are actually the modified rib bones and vertebrae that make up a turtle’s shell. Cómbita-Romero and Palma-Castro nicknamed the specimens Turtwig after a Pokémon that’s half-turtle and half-plant.

“In the Pokémon universe, you encounter the concept of combining two or more elements, such as animals, machines, plants, etc. So, when you have a fossil initially classified as a plant that turns out to be a baby turtle, a few Pokémon immediately come to mind. In this case, Turtwig, a baby turtle with a leaf attached to its head,” paleobotany postdoctoral student Palma-Castro said in a statement. “In paleontology, your imagination and capacity to be amazed are always put to the test. Discoveries like these are truly special because they not only expand our knowledge about the past but also open a window to the diverse possibilities of what we can uncover.”

The team hopes to conduct more examinations of these specimens, including using  micro-computer tomography to peer into the more delicate details of the bone and anatomy. They also plan to search for new fossils preserved inside these same spherical rocks and hopefully will find better-preserved hatchlings and even fully intact skeletons.

“The general public is crucial for discovering new fossils and meteorites in the US and Latin America,” says Herrera. “At the Field Museum, we receive lots of inquiries every year. Next time you find an interesting specimen and don’t know what it is, ask an expert! You could discover an exciting new species or rock from our planet’s history.”

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While the name “fire-ice” may sound like an oxymoron, natural gas is very real. Fire-ice or methane hydrate is a natural gas that is frozen solid deep underneath the ocean floor. There is evidence that is previously thawed during periods of warming and released the potent greenhouse gas called methane, according to a study published December 6 in the journal Nature Geoscience. Increasing ocean temperatures from further human-caused climate change could potentially melt more fire-ice, releasing more polluting methane. 

[Related: How AI could help scientists spot ‘ultra-emission’ methane plumes faster—from space.]

Why is methane a problem?

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, methane accounts for roughly 16 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. It is the second most abundant anthropogenic greenhouse gas after carbon dioxide. It is 25 times more effective than carbon dioxide at keeping heat locked in the atmosphere. However, it has a much shorter half-life than carbon dioxide and generally lingers in the air for less than a decade. 

Agriculture is one of the primary methane polluters, but methane can come from anywhere food or plants decompose without oxygen, like marshes, landfills, and fossil fuels. In 2021, methane emissions was added to a list of climate change priorities to tackle in the next decade by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The methane from fire-ice is also believed to have played a role in past climate changes and methane was linked to current ocean warming in the southern hemisphere in 2020. 

Searching the pockmarks

In the new study, an international team of scientists used advanced 3D seismic imaging techniques to study a portion of fire-ice located off the coast of Mauritania in northwestern Africa. According to the Department of Energy, gas hydrates like these were once believed to be rare, but are now thought to exist in vast volumes and to include 250,000 to 700,000 trillion cubic feet of methane.

[Related: Satellites traced super methane plumes to Turkmenistan’s gas fields.]

The analysis found a specific instance where dislodged methane traveled over 25 miles from the deeper parts of the continental slope up to the edge of the underwater shelf. This possibly occurred when the portion of fire-ice separated during warming periods over the past 2.6 million years, when the frozen gas began to thaw. The methane was potentially released through a field of underwater depressions called pockmarks during past warm periods on Earth. 

“Our work shows they [pockmarks] formed because methane released from hydrate, from the deepest parts of the continental slope vented into the ocean,” study co-author and Newcastle University petroleum geologist Richard Davies said in a statement. “Scientists had previously thought this hydrate was not vulnerable to climatic warming, but we have shown that some of it is.”

Researchers have previously analyzed how changes in bottom water temperature near continental margins may affect the release of methane from hydrates. According to the team, these earlier studies primarily focused on a small portion of global methane hydrates in shallower areas. The new study looks at the release of methane from the base of an area called the hydrate stability zone. This region is if the ocean is roughly 1,476 to 2,296 feet deep. The study found that the methane released from the hydrate stability zone traveled a long distance towards land.

“This is an important discovery. So far, research efforts focused on the shallowest parts of the hydrate stability zone, because we thought that only this portion is sensitive to climate variations,” study co-author and geophysicist at the GEOMAR research institute in Germany Christian Berndt said in a statement. “The new data clearly show that far larger volumes of methane may be liberated from marine hydrates and we really have to get to the bottom of this to understand better the role of hydrates in the climate system.”

The team from this study plans to look for more evidence of methane vents along the margins of the ocean floor. It is planning an expedition to drill further into the ocean’s pockmarks and to search for evidence of past climatic warming events in the geologic record. This kind of data  could help scientists better predict where massive methane seeps are most likely to occur as the effects of human-caused climate change continue to warm the Earth. 

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From roughly the 9th Century BC to the 4th Century BCE, ancient Egyptians mummified a wide variety of animal species for religious purposes. These include local crocodiles for the god Sobek, bulls to honor the war god Bouchis, and cats for the goddess Bastet. It also includes some animals that were brought into the area from afar. Some roughly 2,500- to 2,800-year-old baboon remains show signs that the animals were raised in captivity before being turned into mummies. The analysis of at least 36 individual baboons is detailed in a study published December 6 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE. 

[Related: This is the best look yet into ancient Egyptians’ mummy-making chemicals.]

“The baboons were revered as representations of Thoth, the god of the moon and wisdom, and adviser to the sun god Ra,” Bea De Cupere, study co-author and an archaeozoologist at the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, tells PopSci. “Of all the animals revered by the ancient Egyptians, baboons were the only ones that are not native to Egypt. As such, they had to be imported and were kept in captivity.”

In this study, the team examined a collection of baboon mummies uncovered in 1905 and 1906 from the ancient Egyptian site Gabbanat el-Qurud. Also called the Valley of the Monkeys for these primate remains, the site is on the east bank of the Nile River in southern Egypt near Luxor. The remains belonged to monkeys of various ages and that date back to between 800 to 500 BCE.

The bones had lesions, deformations, and other abnormalities to the skeleton which indicate most of the animals suffered from a lack of sunlight and poor nutrition. These were likely due to being born and raised in captivity. De Cupre says that similar conditions have been seen in baboon remains uncovered from Saqqara and Tuna el-Gebe, two other sites of similar age as Gabbanat el-Qurud.

“The deformities that we observed are typical for rickets, a disease that is caused by chronic lack of vitamin D caused by a lack of sunlight and inadequate food,” says De Cupere. “Baboons are good climbers and they were therefore probably kept in buildings or enclosures with high walls (and roofs) to prevent them from escaping but thus taking away direct sunlight.”

[ Related: This Renaissance-era baby died from living in darkness for a year ]

Studying the mummified remains provides insights into how these imported baboons were treated and kept in Ancient Egypt before their mummification, but there is still more to explore. The authors are beginning to perform microwear analysis on the remains of the baboon’s teeth in an effort to get a better understanding of the types of foods they ate. 

If they can extract DNA from the remains, genetic data may also reveal where the animals were caught in the wild and the breeding practices that keepers used. A study of baboons from Egypt’s Gabbanat el-Qurud site published in September found that the remains had some genetic similarities with present-day populations south of Egypt, in the countries of Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Sudan.

According to DeCupere, “We think that the intentions of the ancient Egyptians were good. They most probably tried to take good care of the baboons, but this must not have been easy.”

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Mice may be one of only a small group of mammals that can recognize themselves in a mirror. A group of laboratory mice were given an assessment of consciousness called the mirror test. The study published December 5 in the journal Neuron suggests that some rodents display a behavior that resembles self-recognition and might be able to differentiate themselves from other mice.

[Related: What video game-playing mice taught neuroscientists about memory-making.]

Previous studies have shown that mammals including humans, great apes, chimpanzees, elephants, and dolphins have demonstrated the signs that they can recognize their reflections. The fish cleaner wrasse and the large-brained bird the Eurasian magpie have also demonstrated this ability in other studies. (However, the mirror test has faced criticism for its ability to measure self-awareness and can produce false negatives in human children.)  

In the study, scientists from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas marked the foreheads of black-furred mice with a spot of white ink, or black ink on white-furred mice. They observed the mice spending more time grooming their heads in front of the mirror—presumably trying to wash away the new ink. 

However, the team cautions that this does not mean that the mice are fully “self-aware.” The only mice that showed this potentially self-recognition-like behavior were those either already accustomed to mirrors, mice that socialized with other animals who looked like them, and the mice with a relatively large spot of ink on their heads.

“The mice required significant external sensory cues to pass the mirror test—we have to put a lot of ink on their heads, and then the tactile stimulus coming from the ink somehow enables the animal to detect the ink on their heads via a mirror reflection,” study co-author and psychiatrist Jun Yokose said in a statement. “Chimps and humans don’t need any of that extra sensory stimulus.”

Next, the team used gene mapping to identify a subset of neurons located in the hippocampus that are involved in developing and storing visual self-image. According to the team, these brain patterns provide a first glimpse of the neural mechanisms behind self-recognition. Pinpointing this activity has been difficult in neurobehavioral research.

“To form episodic memory, for example, of events in our daily life, brains form and store information about where, what, when, and who, and the most important component is self-information or status,” study co-author and neuroscientist Takashi Kitamura said in a statement. “Researchers usually examine how the brain encodes or recognizes others, but the self-information aspect is unclear.”

They saw that the neurons in the mouse’s hippocampus were activated when the mice appeared to recognize their reflections in the mirror. Socialization may play a key role in the mice developing self-recognizing behaviors. The more socially isolated mice did not exhibit any increase in grooming behaviors during the mirror and ink test. 

[Related: How science came to rely on the humble lab rat.]

“A subset of these self-responding neurons was also reactivated when we exposed the mice to other individuals of the same strain,” says Kitamura. “This is consistent with previous human literature that showed that some hippocampal cells fire not only when the person is looking at themselves, but also when they look at familiar people like a parent.”

In future studies, the team plans to try and disentangle the importance of visual and tactile stimuli like the ink to see whether mice can recognize changes in their reflection without it. This could be achieved with technology similar to popular photo filters like the ones used to create fake bunny ears on social media posts. The team also plans to study how other regions in the mouse brain may be involved in self-recognition and see if these areas of the brain share  information.

“Now that we have this mouse model, we can manipulate or monitor neural activity to comprehensively investigate the neural circuit mechanisms behind how self-recognition-like behavior is induced in mice,” says Yokose.

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When bioluminescent ostracods or ‘sea fireflies’ mate, they perform a courtship dance complete with glowing blue mucus. The males sway together in sync while basking in the light of the shiny slime. This mating ritual is detailed for the first time in a study published November 29 in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

[Related: Surprise! These sea cucumbers glow.]

Ostracods are tiny crustaceans that are about the size of a sesame seed. They are found in a variety of fresh and saltwater environments, from deep ocean depths to shallow seas to rivers, lakes, and estuaries. The dancing, shrimplike species in the study is called the entraining grassbed downer and was observed in the Caribbean Sea near Panama. 

During this dance routine, male EGDs create their distinct patterns of bioluminescence to attract females. They secrete packets of protein from a specialized gland. The females respond by angling themselves to these bright blue luminous displays and swimming towards the males. According to study co-author Nicholai Hensley, a Cornell University evolutionary biologist who specializes in animal behavior, the other males will then join in a synchronous light display and repeat the same pattern in the water during each dance.

The study found that this very coordinated swim also doesn’t happen randomly. The mating dance sequence only occurs after sunset at nautical twilight, when the moon isn’t bright in the night sky. The team found their level of precision and coordination very surprising. 

“This precise timing leads to the unexpected phenomena of huge waves of light that cascade across the grass bed, with hundreds of males displaying at the same time,” Hensley tells PopSci. “Amazingly, this is very similar in appearance to the fireflies most people are familiar with, where some species are also synchronized. But ostracods and fireflies last shared a common ancestor 500 million years ago, when most animal life was evolving beyond looking slightly more than worm-like.”

Ostracods are special because they evolved their bioluminescence and bioluminescent behaviors completely independently from other animals that act like them. “They are also spectacular little animals, whose whole world escapes notice by 98 percent of people unless you know where to look,” says Hensley.

Luckily, some of Hensley’s collaborators knew where to look and had some luck on their side. In 2017, James Morin, a professor emeritus of ecology and evolutionary biology at Cornell and Todd Oakley, a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara were diving near the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute’s Bocas del Toro island research station in Panama. When Morin turned on his dive light to test it out, hundreds of ostracods responded with their own light. According to Morin, there are more than 100 species of signaling ostracods in the Caribbean alone.

[Related: These newly discovered bioluminescent sea worms are named after Japanese folklore.]

“What’s really remarkable about EGD is the duration, the brightness and the density,” Morin said in a statement. “It was a remarkable experience. They really jump out at you. I’ve worked with ostracods for years and this species is spectacular.”

With this discovery, Hensley and study-co-author Trevor Rivers from the University of Kansas set up some preliminary experiments to determine just what the animals were responding to when a light flashed on them. They found that the EDGs are very sensitive to both the time and intensity of a light. 

“It’s how they coordinate their own signals with one another,” says Hensley.

The courtship ritual with snotty light likely evolved about 20 million years ago. However, why the males perform these gyrations is still a mystery. The team only knows that these displays are for attraction purposes, and are still figuring out the other functions. It’s possible that the males are competing with one another for attention, which leads to what Hensley calls a “giant free-for-all.” They also may be cooperating to make a brighter display that could attract more females. The team plans on testing how these displays look to females and measuring their behaviors to better understand this mating dance.

“There’s a whole world filled with new questions and unexplored ideas out there if you pay attention to the little details around you,” says Hensley. “Get out there, pay attention, and take chances, make sure to seize the moments of the rare opportunities that come your way. You can’t predict where it will lead, but you can be sure you learn something along the way.”

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Crocodiles are some of the most fierce ambush-predators in the world. There are only 24 crocodilian species around the world and seven are considered Critically Endangered by the international Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources. Now, a team of scientists have mapped the crocodile family tree, including their extinct relatives called Pseudosuchia. The family tree is detailed in a study published December 4 in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution and offers insight into the role that the environment has historically played on crocodile evolution. 

[Related: Why scientists gave vaccines to farmed crocodiles.]

Ruling reptiles

Crocodiles and birds share an evolutionary heritage with dinosaurs and pterosaurs, despite there being 11,000 living bird species compared to only 24 crocodile species. Crocodiles are the only living members of a mostly extinct clade called archosaurs or “ruling reptiles.” Archosaurs date back to the Early Triassic, about 251 million to 200 million years ago. 

Archosaurs belong to a group called Pseudosuchia, which includes multiple species that are more closely related to crocodiles than they are to birds. Pseudosuchias went extinct at or before the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event about 201.4 million years ago. However, one group called the crocodylomorphs, survived the major extinction and gave rise to the crocodiles. 

“The fossil record is a rich source of valuable information allowing us to look back through time at how and why species originate, and crucially, what drives their extinction,” study co-author and University of York biologist Katie Davis said in a statement. 

In the study, a team of researchers used the fossil record to build a large phylogeny, or evolutionary family tree of a species or group. The phylogeny included crocodiles and their extinct relatives, so the team could map out how many new species were being formed and how many species were going extinct over time. They then combined this family tree with data on past changes in climate. They were particularly interested in changes to temperature and sea levels to see if the emergence and extinction of species could be linked to climate change. 

Climate change and competition

They found that climate change and competition with other species have shaped the diversity of modern-day crocodiles and their extinct relatives. Surprisingly, the phylogeny also revealed that whether species lives in freshwater, in the sea, or on land plays a key role in its survival. 

When global temperatures increased, the number of species of the modern crocodile’s sea-dwelling and land-based relatives also went up. 

[Related: Crocodiles’ ancient ancestors may have walked on two legs.]

The crocodile’s freshwater relatives were not affected by changes in temperatures. Rising sea levels proved to be their greatest risk for extinction. According to the team, these results provide important insights for conservation efforts of crocodiles and other species in the face of human-made climate change. 

“With a million plant and animal species perilously close to extinction, understanding the key factors behind why species disappear has never been more important,” said Davis. “In the case of crocodiles, many species reside in low-lying areas, meaning that rising sea levels associated with global warming may irreversibly alter the habitats on which they depend.”

To look at how competition might have played a role, the team used the Information Theory. They calculated estimates of numbers of species present at any point in time and compared that number against new species and extinctions. These calculations allowed the team to estimate where climate change or species interactions like competition had a direct impact on whether new species were emerging or going extinct. Unsurprisingly, an increase in competition for resources, possibly from sharks, marine reptiles, or dinosaurs, likely caused the extinction of some species. 

“Crocodiles and their extinct relatives offer unique insights into climate change and its impact on biodiversity in the past, present and future,” said Davis. “Our findings advance our understanding of what factors have shaped, and continue to shape, life on Earth.”

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If you’ve ever been bitten by a mosquito, it was a female insect that chomped on your skin. Female mosquitoes are hematophagous, which means that they feast on animal blood. They then use the blood to produce their eggs. Male mosquitoes living today are not hematophagous. Instead, they survive on plant nectar because their piercing mouthparts–the proboscis–aren’t strong enough to pierce skin.

[Related: When insects got wings, evolution really took off.]

However, male mosquitoes may have been blood suckers hundreds of millions of years ago. A team of paleontologists found two male mosquito fossils from the Lower Cretaceous period with intact piercing proboscis and sharp mandibles needed to suck blood. The specimens are described in a study published December 4 in the journal Current Biology and help to narrow a “ghost-lineage gap” for mosquitoes.

Hematophagy is the ability for insects to suck on the blood of other animals. It’s believed to have evolved from a shift to using piercing-sucking mouthparts to extract fluids from plants instead of animals. Fleas that currently suck animal blood possibly arose from earlier species of the insects that primarily fed on plant nectar. The evolution of hematophagy has been more difficult to trace, partially due to gaps in the insect fossil record.

The fossils examined for this study were found preserved in amber in Lebanon and date back about 130 to 125 million years. Amber is a fossilized tree resin and deposits in Lebanon are some of the oldest known amber samples that contain traces of living things including insects. Studying this material can close “ghost-lineage gaps,” or a chain of ancestors that does not usually appear in the fossil record. Coelacanths are a famous example of a ghost-lineage gap. These lobe-finned have a long fossil record from the Devonian to the Cretaceous–or a period of about 300 million years. However, they were not found in sediments younger than the Cretaceous, so scientists assumed that they had been extinct 80 million years. A living coelacanth was caught off the coast of South Africa in 1938 and another population lives in Indonesia. Coelacanths have just not left any fossils over the past 80 million years. 

Amber deposits can also offer scientists clues into how pollinating bugs and flowering plants co-evolved over time. The pollinators include some members of the Culicidae family of arthropods which has over 3,000 species of mosquitoes. 

“Molecular dating suggested that the family Culicidae arose during the Jurassic, but previously the oldest record was mid-Cretaceous,” study co-author and entomologist at the National Museum of Natural History of Paris André Nel said in a statement. “Here we have one from the early Cretaceous, about 30 million years before.”

[Related: How can we control mosquitos? Deactivate their sperm.]

In the new study, the team describes the fossils of two male mosquitoes from the Cretaceous period that have piercing mouthparts. The parts include a very sharp triangular mandible and elongated structure with small, tooth-like denticles. The presence of these parts suggest that male mosquitoes living during the Late Cretaceous could have been strong enough to pierce the skin and feed on animal blood like their modern female descendents. 

The team also reports that the mosquitoes’ preservation in amber stretches the family tree of insects further back into the Cretaceous period. The fossils also suggest that the evolution of blood-sucking behavior was more complicated than they had previously suspected. According to Nel, the team hopes to investigate why being hematophagous was advantageous to Cretaceous male mosquitoes and why it no longer exists in future studies. 

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Alongside colder temperatures, stuffy nose season has officially arrived for many of us. This is also the first cold season since an independent advisory committee to the Food and Drug Administration declared that a common decongestant called phenylephrine is ineffective as when taken in pill form. In response, CVS pulled some of the products off of shelves completely. Here’s some guidance on what might actually work. 

[Related: What’s the difference between COVID, flu, and cold symptoms?]

How do decongestants work?

Nasal and sinus congestion is caused by viral infections from a cold or the flu or allergies. The mucus membranes that line the nose become swollen and more mucus is produced in response. Oral decongestants taken in pill form and topical decongestants in spray form can provide relief. 

“They stimulate the autonomic nervous system to give you a response similar to adrenaline or epinephrine, which constricts blood vessels,” Boston University physician and head and neck surgeon Michael Platt told The Brink. “So, in your nose, you’re shrinking the blood vessels and decreasing the blood supply into the nose. Structures in the nose, called turbinates, swell up when you get a cold or allergies. They’re like round balls of tissue in your nose, and they fill up with blood and get swollen, and when you take a decongestant, it shrinks those blood vessels. It also makes your blood pressure go up, just like adrenaline does.”

Look for pseudoephedrine

This FDA-approved oral decongestant is very effective at clearing congestion caused by common colds and seasonal allergies. It helps narrow the blood vessels in the nasal passages. Some brand name medications that contain pseudoephedrine include regular Sudafed, Dimetapp, and Biofed. 

While they don’t require a prescription, they require customers to show their driver’s license or another government-issued photo ID and there are limits to how many you can buy. The drug was moved behind the counter in 2006 after reports that it can be used to make the illegal drug methamphetamine in large quantities.

Vanderbilt University Medical Center ear, nose, and throat doctor Marc Feeley told AARP that while these are effective, medicines with pseudoephedrine may not be the best choice for those with cardiovascular issues, since it can raise blood pressure. Those with heart disease or hypertension should speak with their doctors before taking anything with pseudoephedrine.

[Related: Cold temperatures could make our respiratory systems more vulnerable to infection.]

Try a nasal spray

While the recently demoted phenylephrine is ineffective in pill form, it does work as a nasal spray. Sprays containing both phenylephrine and a nasal decongestant called oxymetazoline are good options for relieving congestion. Some brand name options with phenylephrine include Vicks Sinex and Nostril. Nasal sprays with oxymetazoline include Afrin, Mucinex Full Force, and Vicks Sinex 12 Hour.

Johns Hopkins Sinus Center director and rhinologist Andrew Lane told Scientific American that oxymetazoline is the stronger and quicker of the two, but that both sprays should only be used for three days. 

“These medications act on adrenergic receptors on the blood vessels that line the nose’s mucous membranes. If you take the spray around the clock for many days in a row, those receptors get overstimulated and become resistant to the medication,” said Lane. “The effects last less and less, and people keep using it more and more frequently, until they feel like they can’t breathe without it. We call that rhinitis medicamentosa, or rebound congestion.”

Steroid nasal sprays 

If your nose is less congested and more runny and also comes with itchy eyes, allergies may be causing the symptoms. H. James Wedner, a professor of medicine in the Division of Allergy and Immunology at Washington University School of Medicine, told AARP that corticosteroid nasal sprays are best in this situation.

These sprays include brand names like Flonase, Nasacort, and Rhinocort. According to Wedner, they must be taken for a few days or weeks for maximum benefits.

Hydration, steam, and more

Some other options that may work include using a humidifier, taking a warm shower, applying warm compresses to the nose, and flushing out the sinuses using a neti pot. It is also important to stay hydrated and drink plenty of fluids if you have cold and flu symptoms. 

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Now’s the opportunity to help one of Mexico’s iconic ‘water monsters.’ Animal lovers around the world can now virtually adopt an axolotl, an iconic fish-like amphibian. In late November, a group of ecologists from the National Autonomous University in Mexico City officially relaunched their “Adoptaxolotl” fundraising campaign to conserve the critically endangered axolotls.

[Related: Farmers and scientists unite to save the home of an endangered salamander.]

The 2022 Adoptaxolotl campaign raised over $26,300 towards an experimental captive breeding program and efforts. The goal of the revived virtual adoption program is to restore habitat in the ancient Aztec canals in Xochimilco, a southern borough of Mexico City.

A virtual adoption costs $30 for one month, $180 for six months, or $360 for a full year. Donors can select the age, sex, and name of their watery friend. If salamander budgets are tight this year, donors can buy an axolotl a nice meal for $10. A $50 donation will go to repair one of their homes for $50. Starting at $450, donors with deeper pockets can adopt the axolotl’s refuge on the islands in Lake Xochimilco called chinampas.

While the axolotls will remain in their home in Mexico, donors will receive an adoption kit complete with an identification card, infographic, adoption certificate, and thank-you letter.

The Peter Pan of amphibians

Axolotls (Ambystoma mexicanum) are amphibians that, in the wild, are only found in Lake Xochimilco in Mexico City. They weigh only half a pound at their largest and are about a foot long. They primarily eat insect larvae, worms, fish, and small crustaceans. They are known by their feathery external gills on each side of their heads. While adult axolotls do have lungs, they still primarily rely on their signature gills to breathe.

After most amphibians like frogs grow out of their aquatic phase (tadpoles), they begin the rest of their lives living on land. However, these ‘Peter Pan of amphibians’ do not go through metamorphosis. Axolotls keep many of their larval characteristics and spend their adult life in the water. 

According to Jeff Streicher, Senior Curator in Charge of Amphibians and Reptiles from London’s Natural History Museum, axolotls may have evolved this unusual life cycle because of their environment and the resources available.

“Axolotls are part of a group of closely related salamanders that have a range of lifestyles,” said Streicher. “Some can remain in the water if conditions on land are bad or can leave if, for example, the lake they live in starts to dry up.”

The god of fire and lightning

Axolotls are believed to be named after Xolotl, the Aztec god of fire and lightning. This mischievous deity can take on the form of a salamander to keep from being killed. The word ‘atl” is the term for water in the ancient Aztec language Nahuatl. Axolotl is generally translated to mean “water monster.” It can also mean  “water dog” since Xolotl was also associated with dogs. 

[Related: How we can help the most endangered class of animals survive climate change.]

The animals have become a cultural icon in Mexico for their very unique appearance and Deadpool-like ability to regenerate its limbs. Scientists believe that studying their healing power may help create better methods to repair tissue or even treat cancer. 

Why are axolotls endangered?

According to the scientists behind the fundraiser, the population density of Mexican axolotls has plummeted 99.5 percent in less than two years. Almost all 18 Mexican axolotl species are considered critically endangered. Their main threats include water pollution, the deadly chrytid fungus, and threats from non-native rainbow trout in the area. 

The funds raised from the adoption program will go toward building refuges for the axolotl and restoring its habitats. National Autonomous University ecologist Luis Zambrano told The Washington Post that their habitats have been devastated by Mexico City’s urbanization efforts. 

“A species can’t be a species without its habitat,” Zambrano said. “We went from 6,000 to 36 in less than 20 years. We need funds to conduct another census, but the outlook is grim. It’s more than likely that they’re nearly extinct.”

He added that losing the axolotl in the wild “would be incredibly bad for both Mexican culture and the science world.”

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While those of us in the Northern Hemisphere are in the grips of the darkest days of the year, the colder and less humid air makes it a prime time for stargazing. Here’s what to look out for in the last month of 2023. 

December 4 – Mercury at Greatest Elongation 

The planet Mercury will be at its farthest from the sun at 12:26 a.m. EST on December 4. According to EarthSky, Mercury shines at magnitude -0.3 when it is at greatest elongation, or angular distance from the sun. This makes it brighter than most stars. It will be in front of the constellation Sagittarius the Archer, but most of the stars in this constellation will be lost in the twilight. For best viewing, look to the western sky shortly after sunset.

[Related: A probe destined for Mercury ended up rubbernecking Venus.]

December 11 or 12 Asteroid Leona passes in front of Betelgeuse

Betelgeuse is one of the sky’s biggest and brightest stars, but it will vanish for about 12 seconds as a large asteroid passes in front of it.  Asteroid Leona will pass in front of the red supergiant star, temporarily blocking some of its light in a rare eclipse. With clear skies, should be visible to those along a narrow path stretching from Tajikistan and Armenia, westward towards Turkey, Greece, Italy, and Spain, across the Atlantic to Miami and the Florida Keys and parts of Mexico.

The timing and date will depend on where skygazers are located. In Cordoba Spain, the event will be at its midpoint at roughly 2:25 a.m. local time on December 12. In Miami, Florida it will be 8:24 p.m. local time on December 11. You can look up the exact time here. 

December 13 and 14 – Geminids Meteor Shower Predicted Peak

If shooting stars are more your thing, you won’t want to miss this year’s Geminid meteor shower. This is one of the most reliable annual meteor showers. Stargazers may see up to 120 shooting stars per hour at the shower’s peak if they are watching from a dark location with clear skies.

The Geminids are predicted to peak on December 14. However, since the shower rises in mid-evening, the meteors should be active all night close to the peak dates of December 13 and 14. The young waxing crescent moon will also not interfere with the Geminids this year. The shower should start in mid-evening and be highest around 2 a.m.

December 21 – Winter Solstice

The first day of winter in the Northern Hemisphere is marked by the winter solstice. The solstice officially arrives on Thursday, December 21, 2023, at 10:27 p.m. EST.

Since the Earth is tilted on its axis, on the solstice, one half of the planet is pointed away from the sun and the other half is pointed towards it. The solstice technically only lasts a moment, when a hemisphere–in this case, the Northern–is tilted as far away from the sun as it can be.

[Related: What is a solstice? And other questions about the shortest day of the year, answered.]

The winter solstice is the shortest day of the year and those in the Northern Hemisphere will see the fewest hours of sunlight on the 21st. After the solstice, the days will continue to grow longer until we reach the summer solstice in June.

December 22 and 23 – Ursids Meteor Shower Predicted Peak

In case you miss Geminids, you won’t have to wait too long for another meteor shower. This year’s Ursid meteor shower is predicted to peak on December 21 and 22. According to EarthSky, Ursids is a little bit more low key than Geminids, but still worth checking out. It will also potentially overlap with the Geminids. 

The first quarter moon may interfere with the Ursids this year, until the moon sets roughly three hours before the sunrise. However, the extra hours of darkness make it worth investigating. Under a clear sky, there can be about five to 10 meteors per hour. To catch the Ursids look towards the Little Dipper in the constellation Ursa Minor.

December 26 – Full Cold Moon

The last full moon of the year will appear full and bright on Christmas Day and will  reach its peak illumination on December 26 at 7:33 p.m. EST. The moon’s disk will appear fully illuminated a few days before this, so you can start looking on December 24 and 25 as it rises. According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, December’s full moon has a high trajectory in the sky. This means that it will be located above the horizon longer than most full moons. 

December’s full moon is called the Cold Moon for the cold air that grips the Northern Hemisphere this time of year. Other names for December’s full moon include the Little Spirit Moon or Manidoo-Giizisoons in Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe), the Storytelling Moon or Hiinaiwi Nuti in the Catawba Language of the Catawba Indian Nation in South Carolina, and the It’s a Long Night Moon or Wahsutes in Oneida.

The same skygazing rules that apply to pretty much all star gazing activities are key this month: Go to a dark spot away from the lights of a city or town and let your eyes adjust to the darkness for about a half an hour. Here’s to hoping for clear skies ahead!

Update, December 8, 2023, 8:39 a.m. This post has been updated to include Asteroid Leona passing in front of Betelgeuse.

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New research indicates that the traumatic memories of patients with post-traumatic stress disorder are represented very differently in the brain than “regular” sad autobiographical memories. A small study published November 30 in the journal Nature Neuroscience supports the idea that traumatic memories are a different cognitive entity than more routine bad memories. This may provide a biological explanation for why recalling traumatic memories can manifest as intrusive thoughts that are different from other negative recollections. 

[Related: PTSD found in 1 in 4 adults in Flint, Michigan, after water crisis.]

The study was conducted by a team from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York and Yale University. It examined patients’ real-life personal memories in an effort to link their lived experiences with the brain’s functioning.

“For people with PTSD, recalling traumatic memories often displays as intrusions that differ profoundly from processing of ‘regular’ negative memories, yet until now, the neurobiological reasons for this qualitative difference have been poorly understood,” study co-author and Icahn Mount Sinai neuroscientist Daniela Schiller, said in a statement. “Our data show that the brain does not treat traumatic memories as regular memories, or perhaps even as memories at all. We observed that brain regions known to be involved in memory are not activated when recalling a traumatic experience.”

Schiller told The New York Times that the brain can be in a different state in two different memories, depending on which type of memory is playing out. When recalling trauma, the brain looks like it is processing experiences of something in the present instead of the past. 

What is PTSD?

Posttraumatic stress disorder may occur in people who have experienced or seen a traumatic event, series of events, or set of circumstances. The American Psychiatric Association says PTSD may affect mental, physical, social, and/or spiritual well-being. Some events that can cause PTSD are are natural disasters, war or combat, sexual assault, intimate partner violence, and bullying.

PTSD symptoms are generally grouped into four types, according to The Mayo Clinic. These include intrusive memories, avoidance, negative changes in thinking and mood, and changes in physical and emotional reactions. Symptoms can be very individual and include things like flashbacks, avoiding specific places or people, and hopelessness. They can also vary over time.

According to data from the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, about six percent of people in the US will have PTSD at some point in their lives. Many with PTSD will recover and no longer meet diagnostic criteria for the disorder following treatment. Some treatments for PTSD include cognitive behavioral therapy and cognitive processing therapy. There are also four medications (sertraline, paroxetine, fluoxetine, and venlafaxine) that have a conditional recommendation to treat PTSD.

Where does PTSD affect the brain?

Earlier studies showed that a brain region called the hippocampus governs both the formation and retrieval of episode memories. PTSD is associated with structural abnormalities of the hippocampus, mostly a reduction of its volume. Impairments to the processes of the hippocampus are a focal point in studying how PTSD affects the brain. 

A region called the posterior cingulate cortex is also heavily involved in both narrative comprehension and processing of our memories. The PCC is particularly involved in the imagery of more emotional memories. Alterations in PCC function and connectivity are also very  focal to PTSD the way that the hippocampus is. 

Differentiating between traumatic memories and sad memories 

In the study, the team examined whether and how the hippocampus and posterior cingulate cortex differentiate a traumatic autobiographical memory from merely a sad one. They used functional magnetic resonance imaging to look at the brains of 28 participants diagnosed with PTSD. 

[Related: New human brain atlas is the most detailed one we’ve seen yet.]

They asked each of the participants a range of questions. These questions pertain to their traumatic experiences, sad events, and the moments when they felt relaxed. A team member wrote each person’s story down and then read it back to them while they underwent fMRI scans. The fMRI mapped the brain’s activity based on blood flow during the process.

Researchers found that the activity in the hippocampus followed similar patterns of activity among all of the subjects when they were reminded of sad or relaxing experiences. This suggests the memory formation here is more typical. 

However, when the stories of their traumatic experiences were read, that similar activity in the hippocampus disappeared. The hippocampus of each subject showed individualized and disjointed activity. The activity was more disorganized and fragmented across the brain and did not look like the more in-sync patterns the brain exhibits during normal memory formation. 

Additionally, if more PTSD symptoms were present, more activity appeared in the PCC.

How this could shape future PTSD treatment

The results may explain why PTSD patients have difficulty recalling traumatic experiences in a coherent way. It could also indicate why these past experiences can trigger disabling symptoms in patients with the disorder.

PTSD patients’ brains work differently when recalling traumatic experiencesudy co-author and Yale University clinical psychologist Ilan Harpaz-Rotem said in a statement. “However, when presented with stories of their own traumatic experiences, brain activity was highly individualized, fragmented, and disorganized. They are not like memories at all.”

Future treatments aimed at “returning” the traumatic memory to a more typical representation in the hippocampus may be beneficial. According to Harpaz-Rotem, this research could help psychotherapists guide PTSD patients to construct more helpful thought patterns that could help the brain eliminate the sense of immediate threat that trauma can cause.

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Every 13 or 17 years, the buzzy mating call of billions of cicadas is the soundtrack of the summer in some parts of the United States. Their clicky noises are so loud that they could potentially be detected by the same fiber optic cables that help deliver high-speed internet. A proof-of-concept study published November 30 in the Entomological Society of America’s Journal of Insect Science describes how this technology could help track the these loud and fleeting insects

[Related: The Brood X cicadas are coming, and you should eat them. Here’s how.]

When hung on a utility pole, fiber optic cables can be used as a sensor to detect changes in temperature, vibrations, and very loud noises. This emerging technology is called distributed fiber optic sensing and it was tested in the study. 

“I was surprised and excited to learn how much information about the calls was gathered, despite it being located near a busy section of Middlesex County in New Jersey,” study co-author and entomologist Jessica Ware said in a statement. Ware is the associate curator and chair of the Division of Invertebrate Zoology at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

Measuring ‘backscatter’

According to the team, distributed fiber optic sensing is based on finding and analyzing the backscatter when an optical pulse is sent through a fiber cable. Backscatter occurs when small imperfections or disturbances in the cable cause a tiny amount of the signal to bounce back to the source. Technicians can time the arrival of the backscattered light to calculate exactly where along the cable the light bounced back. Monitoring how backscatter varies over time creates a signature of the disturbance. In acoustic sensing, this signature can indicate the frequency of the sound and volume in the cable. 

One sensor can also be deployed on a large segment of cable. According to the study, a 31-mile-long cable with a sensor can detect the location of disturbances at a scale as precise as 3.2 feet. The authors report that this is identical to installing 50,000 acoustic sensors in a tested region that not only synchronized, but don’t require an onsite power supply.

However, according to co-author and NEC Labs America photonics researcher Sarper Ozharar, acoustic sensing in fiber optic cables “is limited to only nearby sound sources or very loud events, such as emergency vehicles, car alarms, or cicada emergences.”

Return of Brood X

In 2021, the Brood X population of cicadas emerged from the ground in at least 15 states. Brood X is the largest of several populations of cicadas that emerge on 17-year cycles. Ozharar, Ware, and colleagues from NEC Laboratories America, Inc. took this opportunity to use the lab’s fiber-sensing test apparatus to see if they could pick up the Brood X cicadas buzzing in trees. The cable was cable strung on three 35-foot utility poles in Princeton, New Jersey between June 9 and June 24, 2021.

[Related: The world’s internet traffic flows beneath the oceans—here’s how.]

The cable picked up the insects’ sounds. The buzzing appeared as a strong signal at 1.33 kilohertz (kHz) via the fiber optic sensing. This matched the frequency of the cicadas’ call when it was measured with a traditional audio sensor in the same location. 

The team also saw the cicadas’ peak frequency varying between 1.2 kHz and 1.5 kHz. This pattern appeared to follow changes in air temperature. The fiber optic sensing also showed the overall intensity of the bugs’ noise over the course of the testing period. The signal decreased over time, as the cicadas’ sounds peaked and then faded as they approached the conclusion of their reproductive period.

“We think it is really exciting and interesting that this new technology, designed and optimized for other applications and seemingly unrelated to entomology, can support entomological studies,” said Ozharar. 

Fiber optic sensors are multifunctional, so they can be installed and used for any number of purposes, detecting cicadas one day and some other disturbance the next. They could also be used to detect a variety of different insects, according to Ware. 

“Periodical cicadas were a noisy cohort that was picked up by these systems, but it will be interesting to see if annual measurements of insect soundscapes and vibrations could be useful in monitoring insect abundance in an area across seasons and years,” said Ware.  

Brood X cicadas are back underground and will not emerge until 2038. The long gap between their appearances does allow entomologists to make technological leaps in the interim. Using a mobile smartphone or an app was not feasible when Brood X last emerged in 2004, but both technologies heavily documented the 2021 emergence. Fiber optic cables could lead to a similar technological leap in cicada chorus study. 

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Fourteen states have reported an unknown respiratory illness sickening dogs. Multiple organizations including the Oregon and Colorado Departments of Agriculture and the American Veterinary Medical Association have issued warnings about the illness since early November. 

[Related: Dogs and wolves remember where you hide their food.]

“We really don’t want people to panic. Respiratory disease in dogs is nothing new,” Brian Collins, a veterinarian from the Richard P. Riney Canine Health Center at the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine, tells PopSci. “But there may be times when it seems like we’re seeing more disease than usual. We’re trying to keep a very open mind and are considering bacteria and viruses that we’re familiar with as well as novel ones.”

What symptoms should dog owners look out for?

Dogs with this illness generally have sneezing, coughing, eye or nose discharge, and unusual fatigue. They also do not test positive for any common causes of canine respiratory illness associated with kennel cough.

“What we’re seeing is that some of these dogs may have an acute cough that rapidly progresses to something more severe. That’s probably less common,” says Collins. “But the other general group that we’re seeing is dogs that develop a cough that just kind of sticks around for a lot longer, and doesn’t seem to be responding to the usual therapies.”

According to the AVMA, the illness can progress in three different ways. A dog could have a mild to moderate cough for six to eight weeks or more that either doesn’t respond to treatment with antibiotics or responds very little. There could also be chronic pneumonia that doesn’t respond to antibiotics. A more dire situation includes severe pneumonia that “often leads to poor outcomes in as little as 24 to 36 hours.”

Owners of dogs with comorbidities like heart disease, diabetes, cancer, or who are immunocompromised should pay close attention, as they could fare worse.

Where has the illness been reported?

According to the American Veterinary Medical Association via USA TODAY, the illness has been reported in California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington State.

In Oregon, more than 200 cases have been reported since mid-August. The other states have not reported their numbers at the time this article was published. It is also not known how many dogs have died from the illness. 

According to Collins, if you live in an area where there have been reported cases and your dog is more susceptible and more fragile, “it might be better to try to avoid areas where there are lots of dogs or maybe selecting a smaller doggie social group.”

Kurt Williams, director of the Oregon Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory at Oregon State University, told the Associated Press that his message for dog owners is, “don’t panic.” He added that it is hard to pinpoint how dogs had died from a severe form of the infection. 

How does it spread?

The exact transmission remains a mystery. David Needle, the senior veterinary pathologist at the University of New Hampshire Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory told USA TODAY that he thinks it is likely spread by dogs in close contact breathing in the same air as an infected animal. 

The NHVDL has been tracking the illness since 2022. It recently released some very early data that revealed a “non-culturable, bacterial-like organism, similar to Mycoplasma in a subset of the respiratory samples.” However, it is still too early to tell if it is a new bacterium and more samples are needed. 

“That’s very preliminary and generally that kind of very preliminary data wouldn’t typically have been shared publicly,” says Collins. “It’s hard to say if there really is an uptick in respiratory cases or if we are just doing a better job at getting the news out.”

How can I keep my dog safe?

According to the Riney Canine Health Center, you can keep your dog away from high risk situations, including dog parks, boarding kennels, and doggy day care facilities if you are not sure about the health status of the other dogs. It is also important to not share dog bowls, dog toys, or doggy chews.

[Related: Cannabis poisoning is on the rise in pets.]

Make sure your dog is up to date on their routine yearly vaccinations. If you are unsure when your dog was last vaccinated, check with your veterinarian. 

“If you live in an area where you haven’t heard of there being problems with respiratory disease outbreak, we’re not necessarily recommending that people change what they’re doing with their dog,” says Collins. “But certainly check in with the facilities where you go and your vet periodically. There are resources out there and veterinarians are using them to help make the best recommendations for their patients.”

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Scientists on the South Pacific island of Vangunu have taken pictures of a critically endangered, giant, coconut-eating rat for the first time. The Vangunu giant rat (Uromys vika or U. vika ) is at least twice the size of a common rat, lives in trees, and can reportedly use its teeth to chew through the tough husks of coconuts. It is only known to only inhabit one island in the Solomon Islands. The sighting was reported in a study published November 20 in the journal Ecology and Evolution. 

[Related: Elusive, unusually large tree-dwelling rodent discovered in the Solomon Islands.]

The rat was spotted by a team from University of Melbourne, Solomon Islands National University, and Zaira Village in Vangunu. First described in 2017, it is the first new species of rodent described in the Solomon Islands in more than 80 years. The deep traditional ecological knowledge of the rat from Vangunu’s people was crucial to the discovery.

“For decades anthropologists and mammalogists alike were aware of this knowledge, but periodic efforts to scientifically identify and document this species were fruitless,” study co-author and University of Melbourne mammalogist Tyrone Lavery said in a statement.

Co-author Kevin Sese from the Solomon Islands National University said that the field work was guided by this local knowledge. The team used camera traps to capture 95 images of four different individuals in their forest habitat.

“The knowledge is with the people. They are the custodians of the local knowledge,” Sese told The New York Times. “If it weren’t for them we wouldn’t have known where to place the cameras.”

U. vika is considered critically endangered due to logging of its lowland forest habitat. The images show it living in Zaira’s primary forests. These are ancient forests that have remained relatively undisturbed by humans. The lands and particularly the Dokoso tribal area represent the rat’s last remaining habitat, but logging has remained central to the economy of the island. 

“Capturing images of the Vangunu giant rat for the first time is extremely positive news for this poorly known species,” Lavery said. “This comes at a critical juncture for the future of Vangunu’s last forest–which the community of Zaira have been fighting to protect from logging for 16 years.”

[Related: Rats can’t barf—here’s why.]

Zaira has been battling to have this patch of forest recognized and protected under the Solomon Islands Protected Areas Act 2010. While the Zaira community were adamant that this enormous rodent species lived in their forests, the rats had never been documented in a scientific journal until now. Confirming the presence could be a vital part of conservation efforts for Vangunu.

“We thank the community of Zaira for [their] unwavering commitment to conserve their forests and reefs in the face of continuous attempts to undermine this commitment, and for their support of this research,” Lavery said. “We hope that these images of U. vika will support efforts to prevent the extinction of this threatened species, and help improve its conservation status.”

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For the first time, astronomers have observed a disc around a young star in a galaxy outside of ours called Large Magellanic Cloud. This extragalactic neighbor of our home Milky Way galaxy is located almost 200,000 light-years away from Earth and could crash into our home galaxy in about two billion years.

[Related: A ‘bridge of stars’ connects two of our closest galaxies.]

The new observations were made with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in Chile. A massive young star in the star system HH 1177 is growing and taking in matter from its surroundings. As the matter gathers, a spinning disc called an accretion disc is forming. This is the first time that astronomers have seen an accretion disc in an extragalactic area. The discovery is described in a study published November 29 in the journal Nature. 

“When I first saw evidence for a rotating structure in the ALMA data I could not believe that we had detected the first extragalactic accretion disc, it was a special moment,” Anna McLeod, a study co-author and astronomer Durham University in the United Kingdom, said in a statement.  “We know discs are vital to forming stars and planets in our galaxy, and here, for the first time, we’re seeing direct evidence for this in another galaxy.”

This new study follows previous observations of star system HH 1177 made with the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer instrument on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope. In 2018, the telescope spotted a jet from a forming star located deep inside a gas cloud in the Large Magellanic Cloud. 

“We discovered a jet being launched from this young massive star, and its presence is a signpost for ongoing disc accretion,” said McLeod. 

To confirm that there was an accretion disc around the star, the authors needed to measure the movement of dense gas around the young star. As matter is pulled towards this expanding star, it can’t fall directly onto it. The matter flattens into a spinning disc around the star instead. Near the center, the disc rotates faster. The difference in speed is the evidence the astronomers needed to determine that an accretion disc is present around the star. 

“The frequency of light changes depending on how fast the gas emitting the light is moving towards or away from us,” study co-author and astrophysicist at Liverpool John Moores University in the UK Jonathan Henshaw said in a statement. “This is precisely the same phenomenon that occurs when the pitch of an ambulance siren changes as it passes you and the frequency of the sound goes from higher to lower.”

[Related: Your guide to the types of stars, from their dusty births to violent deaths.]

ALMA’s detailed frequency measurements made it possible to distinguish the characteristic spin of a disc and confirm the detection of the first disc around a young star outside of our galaxy.

Enormous stars like this one form significantly faster and live far shorter lives than low-mass stars like our sun. In the Milky Way galaxy, these giant stars are particularly challenging for astronomers to observe. The dusty material that forms them can hide the stars from view right when a disc is shaping around them. 

However, in the Large Magellanic Cloud, the material from which new stars are being born is quite different from the star-making matter in the Milky Way. Due to its lower dust content, star system HH 1177 isn’t cloaked in the dusty cocoon it was born in. The lack of dust compared to similar systems in the Milky Way is giving astronomers a far away, but unobstructed view of star and planet formation in the Large Magellanic Cloud.

“We are in an era of rapid technological advancement when it comes to astronomical facilities,” McLeod said. “Being able to study how stars form at such incredible distances and in a different galaxy is very exciting.”

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Earlier this month, the United States Food and Drug Administration authorized the first at-home tests for chlamydia and gonorrhea. The Simple 2 Test is available over-the-counter and costs between $58 and $99 per kit. Results are returned within a week and officials with the FDA hope that it helps curb the country’s STI epidemic.

[Related: A guide to preventing, spotting, and managing STIs.]

Bacteria causes both gonorrhea and chlamydia. While HPV is a more prevalent STI, chlamydia and gonorrhea are the most commonly reported STIs in both the US and other countries. According to the FDA, roughly 1.6 million cases of chlamydia and over 700,000 cases of gonorrhea were reported in 2021. The STIs cause painful urination and bleeding between menstrual periods. They are generally easily treated with antibiotics, but if left unattended, both gonorrhea and chlamydia can cause serious health complications, including infertility.

Rates of gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis have skyrocketed over the past 20 years. The increase is at least partially driven by a lack of funding of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s budget to fight the spread of STIs. Public health officials believe that easy and more accessible testing for STIs is one of the necessary tools needed to combat the country’s STI crisis.

“This authorization marks an important public health milestone, giving patients more information about their health from the privacy of their own home,” Doctor Jeff Shuren, director of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, said in a press release on November 15. “We are eager to continue supporting greater consumer access to diagnostic tests, which helps further our goal of bringing more health care into the home.”

The Simple 2 Test kit can be purchased online at LetsGetChecked’s website. It comes with tools to collect urine specimens or vaginal swabs. The patient then uses a prepaid shipping label to send the specimens to a lab. Users also must complete an online questionnaire. After two to five days, the patient can view the results online. If the test is positive or the results are invalid, users can arrange a telehealth consultation with a healthcare provider.

Doctor Matthew Golden, Director of the  Seattle King County public health departmen’s HIV and STI control program, told NBC News that FDA is catching up on regulating an industry that has grown since the COVID-19 pandemic began.

[Related: This ‘morning after’ pill could prevent STIs from unprotected sex.]

“At some level, the horse has left the barn,” said Golden. He noted that self-testing kits have been widely used for years, but “some of those tests, how well they perform is not well known. So cleaning this up makes sense.”

University of Hawaii STI expert and medical consultant at the Hawaii State Department of Health’s Diamond Head STI/HIV Clinic Alan Katz told Stat News that the Simple 2 Test uses the same investigative procedure that clinicians use to diagnose chlamydia and gonorrhea.

“This option is exceptionally useful for individuals who live in rural areas or are geographically distanced from a clinic where STI testing can be done and there is no telehealth option available,” Katz said. “If a person screens positive, they can then contact a healthcare provider for further evaluation and treatment.”

While unapproved home tests for chlamydia and gonorrhea have already been on the market, The Simple 2 Test is the first to go through the FDA’s approval process. The approval could potentially make it easier for future such tests to clear the FDA’s regulatory pathway.

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The newts of the genus Taricha come armed with a powerful neurotoxin that they excrete from their skin called tetrodotoxin. The toxin is a chemical defense used against predators. In a study published November 28 in the journal Frontiers in Amphibian and Reptile Science, a team of biologists describes how female Taricha newts produce more tetrodotoxin than males. The findings suggest that tetrodotoxin is not only a line of defense, but also a kind of signal. 

[Related: Poisonous animals probably took their sweet time developing unappetizing bright colors.]

“It had long been considered that newts’ toxin concentrations do not change in their lifetime and that males and females tend to have the same toxin concentrations. Now, we have shown that female newts actually contain more toxin than male newts,” study co-author and University of California, Davis ecologist and evolutionary biologist Gary Bucciarelli said in a statement. “We observed significantly greater and more drastically fluctuating toxin concentrations in females, which may have numerous causes, like mate selection.”  

Totally toxic traits

Tetrodotoxin is also found in the deadly blue-ringed octopus, pufferfish, and some shellfish and amphibian species. In sexually reproducing animals, sexually dimorphic traits like canine tooth size and vibrant color can be a key to reproductive fitness and their survival. These differing traits are believed to increase an individual’s chances of producing the next generation of offspring.

Scientists already knew that Taricha newts had other sexually dimorphic traits, such as mass, size, and tail height, so they were curious to see if toxin production also differed between the sexes. 

In the study, the authors took tetrodotoxin samples from more than 850 newts across 38 different sites in California. They noted the sex, size, mass, and tail height for all of the animals, and if the female newts were pregnant. The newts that had been captured and released were also marked so that they could know if they had been previously sampled. 

Next, the team analyzed their skin to quantify how much of the toxin was found in males compared to females. They also looked at the relationship between sexually dimorphic variables  like size and tail height and how toxin levels changed at the study sites where they could sample more than once across the breeding season. 

Understanding how these toxins work could help biologists understand more about the newts’ reproductive strategies and aid in conservation measures. A recent study found that two out of five amphibians are threatened with extinction and they continue to be the most threatened class of vertebrates on Earth. 

Femme fatale

The authors found that the females carried more toxins than the male newts. While tetrodotoxin levels generally fluctuated in both sexes, the change in females’ levels of toxin was larger. This means that female newts are likely more dangerous than males. 

[Related: How we can help the most endangered class of animals survive climate change.]

“For would-be predators, these higher concentrations pose a serious threat,” said Bucciarelli. “Taricha newts should not be handled unless by knowledgeable personnel, because they can contain up [to] 54 milligrams of tetrodotoxin per individual. Doses up to 42 micrograms per kilo of bodyweight can lead to hospitalization or death.”

The tetrodotoxin also appeared to interact with some of the other sexually dimorphic traits. The heavier newts produced higher levels of the toxin than the lighter newts and the median concentration of toxin was always higher in females regardless of size or weight. The physical resources needed to produce the toxin are possibly invested differently by females than males. Their skin may also be able to carry more of the toxin.

The higher levels of tetrodotoxin might protect females that are vulnerable to predators while reproducing. It could also allow the females to transfer toxin-producing bacteria to their eggs to potentially protect their offspring from snakes. 

Poison patterns

Previously, tetrodotoxin was believed to just be a defense against snakes. The differing amount between the sexes suggests that there might be more to it. The aroma due to the higher concentrations of the toxin may be a cue that helps the newts decide where they look for mates and which mates they choose. 

“Taricha newts’ breeding patterns are highly dependent on precipitation patterns. Given the drought conditions of California, we did not always have a balanced design when field sampling,” said Bucciarelli. “However, we feel the pattern is still very strong. Our next plan is to explore how drought and fire affect newts and their toxin concentrations and how each sex responds to these natural disasters.”

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On November 25, a healthy male Sumatran rhinoceros was born at a western Indonesian sanctuary. This birth is welcome news for the critically endangered species. There are less than 50 Sumatran rhinos left, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

[Related: Rhino horns are shrinking, and humans are to blame.]

A seven-year-old female rhino named Delilah gave birth to the 55 pound calf at the Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary in Way Kambas National Park (SRS TNWK) on the island of Sumatra. According to officials from the sanctuary, a conservation guard found her laying next to her calf early on Saturday morning. The birth was about 10 days before the baby’s expected due date. The baby’s father is a rhino named Harapan who was born at the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden in Ohio before coming to Sumatra. 

“You never know if a first-time mom will know what to do, but Delilah brought that calf into the world and started nursing it with no fuss or fanfare. It’s an incredible event that gives hope to the future of this critically endangered species,” International Rhino Foundation executive director Nina Fascione said in a press release. 

Sumatran rhinos are the smallest of all rhino species at about 1,000 to 2,100 pounds and three to four feet tall. They have two horns that are dark gray to black. The horns are usually very smooth and form a slender cone that is curved backwards in the wild. Poaching, illegal trading of rhino horns, and climate change have pushed these mammals to the brink of extinction. According to the IUCN Red List, they are currently extinct in Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, India, Laos, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam, according to the Red List. It is uncertain if they are still present in Myanmar. 

Successful births like this one are also rare. In 2012, a male rhino named Andatu born at Way Kambas became the first Sumatran rhino born in an Indonesian sanctuary in over 120 years.

“Two years ago there was only one captive Sumatran rhino pair in the world able to successfully produce offspring. Now there are three pairs–six rhinos–who are proven breeders. Those are much better odds for the long-term survival of this species,” said Fascione.

According to Indonesian Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar, this still-to-be-named calf is the fifth born under a semi-wild breeding program at the park. The new addition brings the rhino herd at Way Kambas up to 10 animals and follows the birth of another calf in September. 

[Related: Rhinos pay a painful price for oxpecker protection.]

The sanctuary is part of a special zone in the national park where all of the rhinos are protected and looked after by local experts.

“The main objective is to produce Sumatran rhino calves to maintain the survival of the Sumatran rhino species which is now threatened with extinction,” sanctuary Director General of Natural Resources and Ecosystem Conservation Satyawan Pudyatmoko said in a statement. “The Sumatran rhino calves are the result of a breeding program. In the future, at SRS TNWK they can be released back into their natural habitat.”

Veterinarians from the Rhino Foundation of Indonesia (Yayasan Badak Indonesia) and animal care staff will continue to closely monitor Delialah and her new calf as they bond.

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The assortment of black dots that decorate African penguins’ mostly all-white fronts might help the birds tell each other apart. This is the first documented time that animal behaviorists and psychologists have pinpointed a physical feature that a bird species uses for visual recognition. The findings are described in a study published in the January 2024 issue of the journal Animal Behaviour.

[Related: How African penguins continue to survive changes in climate.]

In birds, distinguishing individual flock members is primarily based on auditory cues and not visual cues. For example, some parrots distinguish their offspring with squawking equivalent of individual names. This new research is one of the first studies to show that birds could use visual cues more than scientists previously believed. 

According to study co-author and animal psychologist Luigi Baciadonna, the dots on African penguins appear when they are about three to five months old. These birds molt annually and reemerge in the same position when the new plumage comes in. 

In the new study, a team from Italy’s University of Turin, the University of Oulu in Finland, and Zoomarine Italia marine park near Rome conducted a simple experiment with 12 penguins. The team built a small enclosure with plywood walls that was just tall enough to prevent a penguin from seeing over it. They placed cameras on either end of the pen and life-size pictures of two penguins on one of the far walls. One penguin entered the enclosure, where one of the pictures featured its specific mate. 

African penguins form lifelong bonds with their partners and the team tracked their responses to images of other penguins from their species. They found that the penguins spent more time looking at the picture of their partner than they did a picture of a different familiar penguin. This occurred even when the heads of the penguins were blurred. 

When the test penguins were shown two images of their partner, including one that had the spots removed, they preferred the images where the dots remained intact. However, this preference for their partner did not occur when the birds saw unspeckled versions of their mate and a different bird. According to the team, this suggests that the penguins use these spots to tell one another apart.

[Related: Jackass penguins talk like people.]

African penguins live along the coasts of Namibia and South Africa. They are about 24 to 27 inches tall and eat squid, anchovies, and other small fish. African penguins are known to be particularly communicative with one another, so scientists have studied their behavior to better understand some of the more advanced social behaviors seen in primates. A 2021 study found that African penguins are capable of vocal accommodation. Different group members have a different dialect and vocal accommodation allows group members to learn to speak more like the others. 

“Given how goofy penguins can seem–almost stumbling over their feet as they walk, for example–the birds may not seem like they are all that bright,” Baciadonna told New Scientist. “But we showed in these two or three experiments that actually they are quite complicated and complex. They’re also clever.”

Animal physiologist and director of the Institute of Neurobiology at the University of Tübingen Andreas Nieder told Science, “It is an original study with a remarkable finding.” Nieder was not involved in the new research.

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The itchiness that comes with some annoying dermatological conditions might be caused by certain microbes on skin. In a study published November 22 in the journal Cell, a team of scientists found that a common skin bacterium called Staphylococcus aureus can result in itchiness by acting directly on the nerve cells. 

[Related: Lab-made ‘super melanin’ speeds up healing and boosts sun protection.]

This is the first time that scientists have observed how this microbe works to create itching sensations. The finding adds an important piece to the puzzle of why some common skin conditions like eczema often have a persistent itch. Eczema, also called atopic dermatitis, affects about 20 percent of children and 10 percent of adults in the United States. It usually causes the equilibrium of microorganisms that keep our skin healthy to be thrown out of balance. These conditions allow S. aureus to flourish, according to the study’s authors from Harvard Medical School.

Previously, dermatologists believed that the itchiness that accompanies eczema happened because of skin inflammation. The new paper shows that S. aureus causes itch by beginning a molecular chain reaction that ends in the urge to scratch the skin.

“We’ve identified an entirely novel mechanism behind itch—the bacterium Staph aureus, which is found on almost every patient with the chronic condition atopic dermatitis. We show that itch can be caused by the microbe itself,” study co-author and dermatologist Isaac Chiu said in a statement.

In the study, researchers exposed the skin of mice to S. aureus. Over several days, the animals developed an intensifying itch. The repeated scratching caused worsening skin damage that eventually spread beyond the original site of exposure.

The mice exposed to S. aureus also became hypersensitive to unharmful stimuli that would usually not cause the skin to itch. They were also more likely to develop abnormal itching in response to a light touch than the mice that were not exposed to the bacterium. This hyperactive response called alloknesis and it is common in patients struggling with chronic skin conditions that have persistent itch. 

Researchers then identified several enzymes that were released by the bacteria once it began to grow on the skin. They tested each enzyme to see if it triggered any itching. It turned out that S. aureus releases the bacterial enzyme protease V8, which then activates the protein PAR1. This protein is located on the nerve fibers that send signals from the skin to the brain, prompting the sensation of itchiness. 

PAR1 proteins are also present on certain blood cells and are involved in clotting. Anti-clotting medications that are already available can block the protein activation on the skin neurons, which gave the team a place to start to look for a treatment. 

[Related: A new artificial skin could be more sensitive than the real thing.]

When the mice were given an anti-clotting medicine, the medication successfully blocked the activation of PAR1 on the skin’s nerve fibers. A critical step in the itch-scratch cycle was interrupted and the rodent’s symptoms appeared to be relieved. Scratching decreased. 

These findings could help lead to better oral medications or skin creams to treat persistent itching that comes with conditions linked to an imbalance in the skin microbiome, including eczema, prurigo nodularis, and psoriasis.

“Itch can be quite debilitating in patients who suffer from chronic skin conditions. Many of these patients carry on their skin the very microbe we’ve now shown for the first time can induce itch,” study co-author and immunologist Liwen Deng said in a statement. 

A question that the team plans to explore in future work is whether other microbes besides S. aureus can trigger itch.

“We know that many microbes, including fungi, viruses, and bacteria, are accompanied by itch but how they cause itch is not clear,” Chiu said.

Researchers are also exploring why microbes cause an itch and what evolutionary benefits the bacterium can gain from causing an itch. It could be that pathogens may hijack itch and other neural physical reflexes to their advantage. Earlier studies have shown that the tuberculosis bacterium directly activates the vagal neurons to cause cough, which might enable the bacteria to spread from one host to another. 

“It’s a speculation at this point, but the itch-scratch cycle could benefit the microbes and enable their spread to distant body sites and to uninfected hosts,” Deng said. “Why do we itch and scratch? Does it help us, or does it help the microbe? That’s something that we could follow up on in the future.”

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Geologists have discovered 10 new species of trilobite in a relatively unstudied area of Thailand. These extinct sea creatures were hidden for 490 million years and are helping scientists create a new map of the animal life during the late Cambrian period. They are described in a monograph that was published in October in the journal Papers in Palaeontology.

[Related: These ancient trilobites are forever frozen in a conga line.]

Trilobites were marine arthropods similar to today’s spiders and crustaceans and are known for a wide variety of body designs. A species called Walliserops may have jousted with ‘tridents’ on their heads to win mates and recent trilobite specimens have been found with full stomachs. More than 20,000 species lived in Earth’s seas before they went extinct about 250 million years ago.

The trilobite fossils described in the new paper were trapped between layers of petrified ash in sandstone and were the product of old volcanic eruptions. The sediment from the eruptions settled on the bottom of the sea and formed a green layer called a tuff. This important layer contains crystals of a critical mineral that formed during the eruption called zircon. Aside from being as tough as steel, zircon is chemically stable and heat and weather resistant. Zircon also persists while the minerals in other kinds of rocks erode over time. Individual atoms of uranium that transform into lead live inside these resilient zircon crystals and give paleontologists a benchmark for dating the fossils. 

“We can use radio isotope techniques to date when the zircon formed and thus find the age of the eruption, as well as the fossil,” study co-author and University of California, Riverside geologist Nigel Hughes said in a statement.

Finding tuffs from the late Cambrian period (between 497 and 485 million years ago) is also rather rare. According to the team, it is one of the “worst dated” intervals of time in Earth’s history.

“The tuffs will allow us to not only determine the age of the fossils we found in Thailand, but to better understand parts of the world like China, Australia, and even North America where similar fossils have been found in rocks that cannot be dated,” study co-author and Texas State University geologist Shelly Wernette said in a statement. Wernette previously worked in the Hughes Lab.

The trilobite fossils were found on the coast of an island called Ko Tarutao. This island is part of a UNESCO geopark site that has encouraged international teams of scientists to work in this area. 

One of the most interesting discoveries was 12 types of trilobites that scientists have seen in other parts of the world, but not in Thailand. 

“We can now connect Thailand to parts of Australia, a really exciting discovery,” said Wernette.

During trilobites’ lifetime, this area was located on the margins of an ancient supercontinent called Gondwanaland. The giant land mass included present day India, Africa, South America, Australia, and Antarctica. 

[Related: Ancient ‘weird shrimp from Canada’ used bizarre appendages to scarf up soft prey.]

“Because continents shift over time, part of our job has been to work out where this region of Thailand was in relation to the rest of Gondwanaland,” Hughes said. “It’s a moving, shape shifting, 3D jigsaw puzzle we’re trying to put together. This discovery will help us do that.”

They named one of the newly discovered species Tsinania sirindhornae in honor of Thai Royal Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, for her dedication to developing the sciences in Thailand.

“I also thought this species had a regal quality. It has a broad headdress and clean sweeping lines,” Wernette said.

If the team can get an accurate date from the tuffs that the remains of T. sirindhornae had been sitting in for millions of years, they could be able to determine if closely related species found in northern and southern China are roughly the same age. 

The team believes that the portrait of the ancient world hidden in these trilobite fossils contain invaluable information about our planet’s history.

“What we have here is a chronicle of evolutionary change accompanied by extinctions. The Earth has written this record for us, and we’re fortunate to have it,” Hughes said. “The more we learn from it the better prepared we are for the challenges we’re engineering on the planet for ourselves today.”

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A glass of red wine may pair well with a turkey dinner, but drinking even a small amount can cause headaches in some people. The dreaded “red wine headache” can occur between 30 minutes to three hours after consuming as little as a small glass’ worth. In a study published November 20 in the journal Scientific Reports, a team from the University of California, Davis and the University of California, San Francisco reports that they may have found the culprit.

[Related: Red wine is a trifecta of chemicals that can make some people feel terrible.]

Questioning the quercetin

The team believes that a flavanol found naturally in red wines can interfere with the body’s usual metabolism of alcohol, which may lead to a headache. This flavanol is called quercetin and it is found in multiple types of fruits and vegetables, including grapes. Quercetin is considered a healthy antioxidant and can even be taken as a supplement, but it can become a problem when metabolized alongside alcohol.

“When it gets in your bloodstream, your body converts it to a different form called quercetin glucuronide,” study co-author and UC Davis wine chemist Andrew Waterhouse said in a statement. “In that form, it blocks the metabolism of alcohol.”

The end result is an accumulation of a toxin called acetaldehyde.

“Acetaldehyde is a well-known toxin, irritant and inflammatory substance,” study co-author and UC Davis microbiologist Apramita Devi said in a statement. “Researchers know that high levels of acetaldehyde can cause facial flushing, headache and nausea.”

A medication called disulfiram that is prescribed to patients to help treat alcohol dependence to discourage drinking is known to cause these same symptoms if alcohol is consumed. Disulfiram also makes acetaldehyde from drinking alcohol build up when an enzyme in the body would usually break it down. Roughly 40 percent of the East Asian population also has alcohol metabolizing enzymes that allows for acetaldehyde to build up in their system.

“We postulate that when susceptible people consume wine with even modest amounts of quercetin, they develop headaches, particularly if they have a preexisting migraine or another primary headache condition,” study co-author and University of California, San Francisco neurologist Morris Levin said in a statement. “We think we are finally on the right track toward explaining this millennia-old mystery. The next step is to test it scientifically on people who develop these headaches, so stay tuned.”

Turn the lights down

According to the team, sunlight increases the headache-causing flavanol in the grapes grown to make wine. 

[Related: Can I be allergic to alcohol?]

“If you grow grapes with the clusters exposed, such as they do in the Napa Valley for their cabernets, you get much higher levels of quercetin. In some cases, it can be four to five times higher,” said Waterhouse.

Levels of quercetin can differ depending on how the wine is made, including skin contact during fermentation, the fining processes, and even aging.

The study cautions that there are still many unknowns about the causes of red wine headaches. While we have a better understanding of the biological processes behind red wine headaches, it is still a mystery why some people remain more susceptible to them than others. The team is working on comparing red wines that have a lot of quercetin like shiraz with those that do not have as much to test their theory that quercetin is truly behind red wine headaches on people. They are also curious if the enzymes of people who get red wine headaches often are more easily inhibited by the flavanol or if this group is more easily affected by the buildup of the toxin acetaldehyde.

“If our hypothesis pans out, then we will have the tools to start addressing these important questions,” Waterhouse said.

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Archaeologists have uncovered rare evidence of ritualized animal sacrifice at the Casas del Turuñuelo archaeological site in southwestern Spain. The site dates back to the 5th century BCE and offers a glimpse into the Tartessian culture of the Iberian Peninsula. The discovery is described in a study published November 22 in the open-access journal PLoS ONE.

[Related: Early humans carved old skeletal remains from burial caves into tools.]

The Tartessos were a historical civilization settled in the southern Iberian Peninsula from the 9th to 5th centuries BCE during the Iron Age. Archaeologists believed that their culture had a mixture of traits from local Iberian populations and Phoenicians arriving from countries in the eastern coast of the Mediterranean. It had a writing system called Tartessian, that had roughly 97 inscriptions in a Tartessian language. 

In the western Mediterranean region where the Tartessos lived, archaeological evidence of animal sacrifice is difficult to come by. However, written sources including Homer’s The Odyssey chronicle animal sacrifice in the Mediterranean at this time. The gap between the written record and archaeological evidence has made it difficult for archaeologists to establish a clear understanding of what protocols and patterns were behind the practice here. 

Mª Pilar Iborra Eres, a study co-author and archaeologist Spain’s Instituto Valenciano de Conservación, Restauración e Investigación, tells PopSci that the Casas del Turuñuelo site is special due to the “excellent conservation of the building and its contents. In this case, the accumulation of bone remains that testify to ritual activities.”

In this new study, Eres and her team studied an example of animal sacrifice from an Iron Age building that dates back towards the end of the 5th Century BCE. The excavation began in 2015 and they examined and dated 6,770 bones that belonged to 52 animals. The animals were predominantly adult horses, but also included cattle, pigs, and one dog. The remains show signs of intentional burial, which is one clue that they were sacrificed. 

They found that the animals had been buried in three sequential phases. In the first two phases, the skeletons were found to be mostly complete and unaltered. In the third phase, all of the skeletons except the horses show signs of having been processed for food. This suggests that a meal likely accompanied this ritual. 

A case study like this one allowed the team to establish some key details about ritual protocols at Casas del Turuñuelo in order to determine what was behind them. The bones indicate that adult animals were selected for sacrifice rather than young. The presence of burned plant and animal remains also shows that fires played a role in these rituals. 

[Related: Pompeii’s archaeological puzzles can be solved with a little help from chemistry.]

Casas del Turuñuelo also shows some unique features compared to other Mediterranean sites, including the large number of sacrificed horses. 

“The equine remains were discovered as a result of a methodical excavation of one of the areas of this building, the courtyard,” says Eres. “This is where animal sacrifices were made during the use of the building by Iron Age societies. 

The space was also likely used repeatedly over several years for a variety of sacrificial rituals.

The team was surprised that they were able to verify that the deposit here was so perfectly preserved and portrayed what they believe to be an accurate picture of the rituals that took place there. They hope to complete this study by applying new methods to study the samples. 

“Archaeology allows us to learn about many aspects of the life of past societies,” says Eres. “By applying innovative methodologies such as computed tomography, paleoparasitology, isotope analysis for the study of diet and mobility or ancient DNA, the aim is to carry out a complete study of this group of equids.”

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It’s been a wormy, sexual head-scratcher for years. The Japanese green syllid worm Megasyllis nipponica detaches its butt in order to reproduce. But how do these algae-eating invertebrates do this? The process could come down to some developmental genes, according to a study published November 22 in the journal Scientific Reports.

[Related: The jumping worm invasion may be less worrisome than it sounds.]

Bye bye, butt

Some segmented sea worms like the syllid worm go through a reproductive process called  stolonization. The stolon is the worm’s posterior organ and it is full of eggs or sperm depending on the worm’s sex. During stolonization, the stolon completely detaches from the rest of the worm’s body for reproduction. 

This detached butt swims around by itself and spawns when it meets another stolon of the opposite sex. This autonomous swimming is believed to protect the original body of the worm from dangers in the environment and help the eggs and sperm travel longer distances. 

In order to swim by themselves, the stolon have to develop their own eyes, antennae, and swimming bristles while still attached to their original body. How this happens has been a mystery. The formation of the stolon itself begins when the gonads near the worm’s butt mature. A head is then formed in the front of the developing stolon, with the eyes, antennae, and swimming bristles following close behind. It develops its nerves and the ability to sense and behave independently before the stolon detaches from the rest of the body.

Hot hox genes

In the new study, a team from the University of Tokyo looked into how the stolon’s head is formed in the first place. The researchers investigated the developmental gene expression patterns in worms as they were sexually maturing. A well-known group of genes that determine body part formation called hox genes help define the head regions of various animals. The team found that hox genes are expressed more in the head region of the stolon. The genes are not typically expressed as much in the middle of the body, except for when the gonads are developing. During this time, the hox genes are highly expressed in the worm’s middle and butt. 

“This shows how normal developmental processes are modified to fit the life history of animals with unique reproductive styles,” study co-author and University of Tokyo marine biologist Toru Miura said in a statement.

[Related: These newly discovered bioluminescent sea worms are named after Japanese folklore.]

Hox genes also determine the segmentation along the worm’s body. The team thought that the hox genes would be expressed differently along the invisible line that runs from the head of the worm to the back end.

“Interestingly, the expressions of Hox genes that determine body-part identity were constant during the process,” said Miura. 

Because of this consistency, the stolon does not have a separatedigestive tract. It also has repeated uniform body segments, except for in its head and tail. 

“This indicates that only the head part is induced at the posterior body part to control spawning behavior for reproduction,” said Miura.

The study showed the developmental mechanism of stolons for the first time and sparked more investigation into this reproductive method. Miura and the team hope to clarify the sex determination mechanism and the endocrine regulations during the worm’s reproductive cycles in future studies.

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If nematodes have nightmares, they might be dreaming about the terror of being eaten alive by a carnivorous fungus called Arthrobotrys oligospora. The very real fungus can sometimes set gooey traps for these worms. It is one of over 700 known species of carnivorous fungi. New findings on the basic processes behind its unique eating habits are described in a study published November 21st in the open access journal PLoS Biology.

[Related: Parasitic Fungi Can Fuse A Nematode’s Gut Into One Cell.]

Nematodes are not usually the first thing on A. oligospora’s menu. The fungus typically gets nutrients from decaying organic matter. Starvation and the presence of nearby worms can prompt this and other fungi to create traps to capture and eat the worms. Another meat eating fungi named Pleurotus ostreatus or the oyster mushroom even uses a nerve gas as its method of trapping down nematodes. 

A. oligospora has a different approach. It generally uses sticky secretions to keep the worms pinned down before they become a meal. Earlier studies have shown some of the biological processes and genetics behind A. oligospora’s predator-prey relationship, but the molecular details of the process have remained generally unclear.

“I think it’s fascinating to consider that right under our feet in the soil, there are micro-predators like A. oligospora are continually evolving new ways to hunt, capture and consume the nematode prey and there is [a] constant evolutionary arms races between these carnivorous fungi and nematodes,” study co-author and molecular biologist Yen-Ping Hsueh tells PopSci. 

To investigate, Hsueh and a team from Academia Sinica in Taipei, Taiwan designed a series of lab experiments to pinpoint the genes and processes involved when A. oligospora preys on a nematode worm species called Caenorhabditis elegans. They used a technique called RNAseq to see the level of activity occurring in various fungus genes at different points in time. When A. oligospora first senses a worm, two separate functions increase–DNA replication and the production of ribosomes. These are the structures that build proteins in a cell. Next, activity increases on many of the genes that encode the proteins that likely help the fungus build and use its traps. These traps include secreted worm-adhesive proteins and a family of proteins the team has identified for the first time.

“The most surprising finding was the dramatic expansion and diversification of the DUF3129 gene family in A. oligospora compared to other fungi,” says Hsueh. “We named members of this family ‘Trap Enriched Proteins’ or TEPs, since they localize to the fungal traps and contribute to trap adhesion and nematode capture.”

After A. oligospora has extended filamentous structures called hyphae into the worm to digest it, the activity in the genes that code for a variety of enzymes called proteases also increases. A group called metalloproteases that break down other proteins is increased even more. The team believes this suggests that A. oligospora uses these proteases to aid in digestion of worms like nematodes.

[Related: Nightmare-fuel fungi exist in real life.]

This research could serve as the foundation for more research into other fungal predator-prey relationships and how A. oligospora feeds on these worms. 

“Our next steps are to further investigate the molecular function of how traps adhere to nematodes,” says Hsueh. “It’s surprising how the traps catch nematodes in such a short time, and the binding of the traps are strong enough that the nematodes almost never get a chance to escape after being trapped.”

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A new image from NASA’s almost two-year-old James Webb Space Telescope features new details of a portion of our galaxy’s dense center for the first time. The image includes some parts of the star-forming hotspot that astronomers are still trying to fully understand. The region is named Sagittarius C and is about 300 light-years away from Sagittarius A*, or the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy.

[Related: Gaze upon the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy.]

“There’s never been any infrared data on this region with the level of resolution and sensitivity we get with Webb, so we are seeing lots of features here for the first time,” observation team principal investigator Samuel Crowe said in a statement. “Webb reveals an incredible amount of detail, allowing us to study star formation in this sort of environment in a way that wasn’t possible previously.” Crowe is an undergraduate student at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.

The image features roughly 500,000 stars and a cluster of young stars called protostars. These are stars that are still forming and gaining mass, while generating outflows that glow in the midst of an infrared-dark cloud. A massive previously-discovered protostar that is over 30 times the mass of our sun is located at the heart of this young cluster. 

The protostars are emerging from a cloud that is so dense that the light from stars behind it cannot reach the JWST. This light trick makes the region look deceptively less crowded. According to the team, this is actually one of the most tightly packed areas of the image. Smaller infrared-dark clouds dot the image where future stars are forming. 

“The galactic center is the most extreme environment in our Milky Way galaxy, where current theories of star formation can be put to their most rigorous test,” University of Virginia astronomer Jonathan Tan said in a statement. 

JWST’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) also captured large-scale emission from ionized hydrogen that is surrounding the lower side of the dark cloud. According to Crowe, this is the result of energetic photons that are being emitted by young massive stars. The expanse of the region spotted by JWST came as a surprise to the team and needs more investigation. They also plan to further examine the needle-like structures in the ionized hydrogen, which are scattered in multiple directions.

“The galactic center is a crowded, tumultuous place. There are turbulent, magnetized gas clouds that are forming stars, which then impact the surrounding gas with their outflowing winds, jets, and radiation,” Rubén Fedriani, a co-investigator of the project at the Instituto Astrofísica de Andalucía in Spain, said in a statement. “Webb has provided us with a ton of data on this extreme environment, and we are just starting to dig into it.”

[Related: ‘Christmas tree’ galaxy shines in new image from Hubble and JWST.]

At roughly 25,000 light-years from Earth, the galactic center is close enough for the JWST to study individual stars. This allows astronomers to collect data on both how stars form, but also how this process may depend on the cosmic environment when compared to other regions of the galaxy. One question this could help answer is if there are more massive stars in the center of the Milky Way, as opposed to on the edges of the galaxy’s spiral arms.

“The image from Webb is stunning, and the science we will get from it is even better,” Crowe said. “Massive stars are factories that produce heavy elements in their nuclear cores, so understanding them better is like learning the origin story of much of the universe.”

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EYES MIGHT NOT be able to speak, but they have plenty to say. Many animals use complex visual systems to help them survive in particular habitats. Sight is often a first line of defense against predators—or a crucial sense for catching prey. To dwell in Earth’s darkest locations or travel high through the sky, creatures have evolved special and bizarre ways to perceive their worlds.

Spookfish: Mirrored orbs

It’s gloomy year-round for the spookfish, a spiked carnivore that swims in the dark depths of the ocean. Sunlight rarely penetrates more than a few hundred feet below the surface, so this critter uses mirrors instead as well as lenses to see—the only known vertebrate with this feature. The disks, made of guanine crystals, can focus light emitted by bioluminescent plankton and other glowing marine life. Weirder still, the funky fish’s eyes are split into two connected parts: one section gazes up while the other looks down. That way, it can spy food above and below it, as well as lurking predators.

Golden eagle: Cones galore

In North America, Europe, and Asia, golden eagles soar on 7-foot wingspans while searching for small prey like rabbits, which they can spot more than a mile away. The birds can see from great distances thanks to an extreme density of visual cells known as rods and cones in their retinas. Rods generally register the overall shape of an object, whereas cones detect color and detail. In general, the density of rods and cones in a raptor’s eye is five times greater than in a human’s. 

Giant squid: Titanic eyes

The largest eyes in the animal kingdom, at up to 10 inches in diameter, belong to adult giant squids. And it makes sense: The biggest individuals can exceed 40 feet long, so the peepers on these invertebrates have to be proportionally massive. The species uses its dinner-plate-size eyes to draw in as much light as possible from its dark watery world to hunt fish and shrimp. Its line of sight can also detect a moving sperm whale—one of the squid’s main foes—up to 400 feet away in deep ocean zones that have little or no sunlight.

Mantis shrimp: Extra light

Mantis shrimp, known for their herculean strength and swift clubbed appendages that can break a snail’s shell in a single strike, also boast a unique vision system. Their eyes process 12 channels of color and can detect ultraviolet (UV) and polarized light, which has waves that all vibrate in the same direction. By comparison, humans can process only three channels of color—blue, green, and red—and can’t process polarized or UV light at all. The crustaceans’ 10,000 small photoreceptive units are organized in strips that log objects around them, similar to how a scanner reads a bar code. 

Arctic reindeer: Color play

In the Arctic reindeer, the tapetum lucidum, a part of the eye located behind the retina in many vertebrates, changes color with the seasons. Their eyes go from gold in summer to blue in winter, compensating for the drastic variation in sunlight at the North Pole. Blue eyes enhance the ungulates’ ability to detect shorter wavelengths of light during the dark and dreary winter, when they have only a few short hours per day to detect sunlight. During the extremely bright summer, their eyes no longer need to take in as much light in a short period and switch back to yellow. 

Read more PopSci+ stories.

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With their winding and buff arms made up of billions of stars, spiral galaxies offer some of the beautiful images of the universe. Our own Milky Way galaxy is a spiral galaxy, yet these types of swirling clusters are relatively scarce in a part of the universe called the Supergalactic Plane. A team of astrophysicists believes that the bright elliptical galaxies without a defined center are more common than swirling galaxies because of the difference in density of the environments found inside and outside of the Plane. The findings are described in a study published November 20 in the journal Nature Astronomy.

[Related: Behold six galactic collisions, masterfully captured by Hubble.]

Smoothing out the arms

The Supergalactic Plane is a flattened structure in the universe that extends nearly a billion light years across. Our own Milky Way galaxy is embedded within the Plane and is about 100,000 light years wide. There are dozens of enormous armless galaxy clusters called elliptical galaxies in the Plane, but not nearly as many disk-shaped galaxies with spiral arms. 

According to the new study, the different distributions of elliptical and disk galaxies are a natural occurrence. Galaxies experience frequent interactions and mergers with other galaxies in the Plane because the region is so densely packed. This galactic demolition derby then turns the spiral galaxies into elliptical galaxies. The arms are smoothed out and the lack of internal structure in the elliptical galaxy and presence of dark matter leads to the growth of supermassive black holes. Since the dark matter outweighs everything else, it has the power to shape the newly formed elliptical galaxy and tends to guide the growth of the central black hole.

The stars in an elliptical galaxy also orbit around the core in random directions and are generally older than those in spiral galaxies, according to NASA. 

In parts of the universe away from Plane, galaxies can evolve in relative isolation. This solitude helps them preserve their spiral structure.

“The distribution of galaxies in the Supergalactic Plane is indeed remarkable,” Carlos Frenk, a study co-author and astrophysicist at Durham University in the United Kingdom, said in a statement. “It is rare but not a complete anomaly: our simulation reveals the intimate details of the formation of galaxies such as the transformation of spirals into ellipticals through galaxy mergers.”

A galactic time machine

In the study, the team used a supercomputer simulation called Simulations Beyond the Local Universe. It follows the evolution of the universe over a period of 13.8 billion years from around the time of the Big Bang up to the present. 

[Related: Hubble image captures stars forming in a far-off phantom galaxy.]

Most cosmological simulations consider random patches of the universe, which cannot be directly compared to other observations. Instead, SIBELIUS works to precisely reproduce the observed structures in space, including the Supergalactic Plane. According to the team, the final simulation is remarkably consistent with observations of our universe through telescopes.

“The simulation shows that our standard model of the universe, based on the idea that most of its mass is cold dark matter, can reproduce the most remarkable structures in the universe, including the spectacular structure of which the Milky Way is part,” said Frenk.

Scientists have been studying the separation of elliptical and spiral galaxies since the 1960s. This partitioning features prominently in a recent list of cosmic anomalies that was compiled by cosmologist and 2019 Nobel laureate Professor Jim Peebles.

“By chance, I was invited to a symposium in honor of Jim Peebles last December at Durham, where he presented the problem in his lecture,” study co-author and astrophysicist at the University of Helsinki in Finland Till Sawala said in a statement. “And I realized that we had already completed a simulation that might contain the answer. Our research shows that the known mechanisms of galaxy evolution also work in this unique cosmic environment.”

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The male sex organs of the animal kingdom come in all shapes and sizes from some that look like a bottle opener to genital stingers. For mammals, penetrative sex with a penis is needed to successfully mate. However, scientists have documented the first non-penetrative sex ever seen in a mammal. The mating technique was observed in the serotine bat (Eptesicus serotinus) and it is described in a study published November 20 in the journal Current Biology.

The mysteries of bat sex

Serotine bats are quite common in Europe and Asia, but the intricacies of bat sex remain elusive. Most previous observations of bats mating have only offered a glimpse of the backs of mating pairs. But in the new study, a team from the University of Lausanne in Switzerland and a bat rehabilitation center in Ukraine got lucky. 

[Related: How echolocation lets bats, dolphins, and even people navigate by sound.]

“By chance, we had observed that these bats have disproportionately long penises, and we were always wondering ‘how does that work?’,” study co-author and University of Lausanne evolutionary biologist Nicolas Fasel said in a statement. “We thought maybe it’s like in the dog where the penis engorges after penetration so that they are locked together, or alternatively maybe they just couldn’t put it inside, but that type of copulation hasn’t been reported in mammals until now.” 

The team placed cameras behind a grid that the bats could climb hoping to get footage of their genitals and mating from one side of the grid. They found that bats’ penises are roughly seven times longer than their partners’ vaginas. Each has a “heart-shaped” head that is also seven times wider than the common bat vaginal opening. This size and shape would make penetration after an erection impossible. The study shows that instead of functioning as a penetrative organ, the penis is more like an extra arm. It pushes the female’s tail sheath out of the way to engage in contact mating, similar to cloacal kissing in birds. Instead of penetration, the birds touch their two rear orifices called the cloaca together for only a few seconds, but long enough for sperm to be released.

The bat sex detectives

Fasel collaborated with bat enthusiast and citizen scientist Jan Jeucker, who filmed hours of footage of the serotine bat in a church attic in the Netherlands. The team analyzed 97 mating events—93 from the Dutch church and four from the Ukrainian bat rehabilitation center. During the recordings, the team did not see a single incidence of penetration. The erectile tissues of the bat penis were completely enlarged before they made any contact with the vulva. The male bats grasped their partner’s nape and moved their pelvis like a probe until it made contact with the vulva. Once contact was made, the pair remained still. These interactions lasted less than 53 minutes on average, but the longest event extended to 12.7 hours. 

After copulation, the researchers saw that the female bats had wet abdomens. They believe this dampness indicates the presence of semen, but more research is needed to confirm if sperm was actually transferred during these assumed mating events.

[Related: What bats and metal vocalists have in common.]

The team also characterized the form of serotine bat genitalia by measuring the erect penises of live bats that were captured as part of other research studies. The necropsies on bats that had died at bat rehabilitation centers revealed how much longer and wider the serotine bat penises were compared to the bat vaginas. The penises are also about a fifth as long as the bats’ head to body length. Female serotine bats also have unusually long cervixes, which potentially helps them select and store sperm.

The team believes that the bats may have evolved their oversized penises as a way to push aside the female tail membranes.  

“Bats use their tail membranes for flying and to capture the insects, and female bats also use them to cover their lower parts and protect themselves from males,” said Fasel. “But the males can then use these big penises to overcome the tail membrane and reach the vulva.”

The team plans to study bat mating behavior in more natural contexts and further investigate penis morphology and mating behavior in other bat species. 

“We are trying to develop a bat porn box, which will be like an aquarium with cameras everywhere,” says Fasel.

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While we may never be able to read a dog’s mind, new research indicates that some “smarter” dogs may be able to better interpret where an object is in space. By studying how this phenomenon called spatial bias may reflect what dogs see, researchers could potentially show that dogs process information similarly to the way humans do. The findings are described in a study published November 18 in the journal Ethology.

[Related: Dogs and wolves remember where you hide their food.]

What is spatial bias?

Spatial bias is how the brain processes information related to space, location, or distance when that same information could easily apply to an object.

When a person points to an object, a human toddler will generally focus directly on the object. However, a dog will usually take the gesture as cue to look in that specific direction. This difference is not necessarily due to the dog’s eyesight, but how they think and interpret gestures. Spatial bias is often demonstrated in the difference in how dogs and children react when a person shows them where a toy or treat may be.

“Very early on, children interpret the gesture as pointing to the object, while dogs take the pointing as a directional cue. In other words, regardless of the intention of the person giving the cue, the meaning for children and dogs is different,” study co-author Ivaylo Iotchev said in a statement. Iotchev is a neuroscientist and ethnologist at Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, Hungary.

Spatial bias has been observed in behavioral tests that show how dogs learn and imitate, but hadn’t been studied until now, according to Iotchev. Earlier studies have not clarified if dogs behave this way due to inferior vision compared to primates, or if it is because the parameters of the space around them are more important to dogs than specific, nearby objects.

In this new study, a team of animal behavior experts was able to gain insight into how some dogs can overcome spatial biases on difficult challenges.

Learning location versus shape and color 

The team first tested two behavioral tasks on 82 domestic dogs of varying breeds and sizes. In one task, the dogs had a maximum of 50 trials to learn whether a treat was placed on the right or left side of a plate. This task was designed to teach the dogs about a location when they were directed to find where the treat was.

In the second task, the team used a white round plate and a black square one. Both plates were always placed in the middle and a dog was always given only one type of plate to eat from. However, the dog was exposed to each plate in a semi-random sequence, to teach them about the shape and color of the plate. This helped indicate if location or physical properties were easier for the dogs to remember. 

The team measured learning by how quickly a canine ran to the correct plate. They found that the dogs learned faster when the treat was placed to the right or left of a plate instead of on it. 

The dogs appeared to have more difficulty remembering whether the food was on the white round plate or black square one. The ‘spatial bias’ measure indicated that the dogs were learning about a specific place faster than an object’s features like color or shape. 

Measuring cognition and vision

A more complicated task looked to see if the dogs had retained the knowledge of where the treat had been placed. If the dog had previously received the treat on the right side of the plate, it was then placed on the left side. If the dog had previously been given the treat on a white plate, it was now on the black plate.

[Related: Do domesticated dogs howl back at wolves?]

To investigate if spatial bias is more sensory, cognitive, or a mixture of both, the team needed to note any differences between the visual and cognitive abilities of different dogs. They measured how short each dog’s head was, since this is correlated with visual acuity. They also observed how efficiently the dogs solved the problems. 

“The visual abilities of dog breeds differ from each other, which indirectly results from their head shape. Dogs with shorter heads–scientifically known as brachycephalic–develop human-like vision,” study co-author and PhD student Zsófia Bognár said in a statement. “The structure of their retina implies sharper and more focused vision than their longer-headed counterparts. “

To gauge their cognitive ability, the dogs took part in a series of tests of their memory, attention skills, and perseverance. They found that spatial bias is smaller in dogs with who could see finer details better. According to the team, as human children develop, spatial bias decreases with increasing intelligence and this could be possible for some canines with the right mindset as well.

Earlier studies have shown that for dogs, being “smart” has more to do with its memory than ability to learn new words. The dogs that exhibit characteristics that humans would label as intelligence demonstrated the ability to stick to a more complex task. Understanding how this works can help biologists better understand dogs’ evolution.

“Spatial bias in dogs is not simply a sensory problem but also a mindset. We also found that ‘smarter’ dogs are resilient in difficult learning situations and can overcome their biases,” said Iotchev.

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Adding liquid soap can boost the potency of some of the pesticides used on malaria-carrying mosquitoes. The discovery is detailed in a study published November 17 in the journal PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases and offers a tool in the fight against the disease.

[Related: New four-dose malaria vaccine is up to 80 percent effective.]

Malaria is most prevalent in Asia, Latin America, and sub-Saharan Africa and is caused by several species of parasites that are transmitted by the bites of infected female Anopheles mosquitoes. It causes severe fatigue, fever, headaches, and chills and can be fatal. When it is treated with the right medication, such as artemether-lumefantrine, it can be cured and the malaria parasites can be completely cleared from the body. The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that there were 241 million cases of malaria worldwide and 627,000 deaths in 2020. 

While the first malaria vaccines were approved and recommended in 2021, the mosquitoes that carry malaria are becoming more resistant to insecticides. 

“Over the past two decades, mosquitoes have become strongly resistant to most insecticides,” study co-author and University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) evolutionary biologist Colince Kamdem said in a statement. “It’s a race now to develop alternative compounds with new modes of action.”

Before coming to UTEP, Kamdem worked at Cameroon’s Centre for Research in Infectious Diseases, where he first saw soap’s potential potency during some routine insecticide testing. A special class of insecticide called neonicotinoids have shown to be a potential alternative that targets the mosquito populations that show resistance to current insecticides. However, they can have negative effects on bees if not used carefully and neonicotinoids do not kill some mosquito species unless their potency is boosted. 

World Health Organization protocols recommend adding a seed-oil based product to insecticides to test a mosquito’s susceptibility. When the compound was added, Kamdem noticed that it was more effective than when the insecticide was used on its own.

“That compound belongs to the same class of substances as kitchen soap,” Kamdem said. “We thought, ‘Why don’t we test products that have same properties?’”

The team selected three inexpensive, linseed-oil based soaps that are readily available in sub-Saharan African countries. They added the soaps to four different neonicotinoids. In every case, the potency was increased. 

[Related: Mosquitoes are becoming resistant to our best defenses.]

“All three brands of soap increase mortality from 30 percent to 100 percent compared to when the insecticides were used on their own,” study co-author Ashu Fred said in a statement. Fred is a PhD student at the University of Yaoundé I in Cameroon. 

They also tested a class of insecticides called pyrethroids. This class did not see the added benefits of the boost from soap. They hope to conduct additional testing to see exactly how much soap is needed to enhance insecticides. 

“We would love to make a soap-insecticide formulation that can be used indoors in Africa and be healthy for users,” Kamdem said. “There are unknowns as to whether such a formulation will stick to materials like mosquito nets, but the challenge is both promising and very exciting.”

Malaria was once endemic in the US, but was eradicated by the 1970s. However, the CDC issued a health advisory in June after at least four people in Florida and one in Texas contracted homegrown cases of malaria. The disease is most common in warm climates and some scientists worry that as global temperatures continue to rise, more regions will be affected by malaria. A 2022 study published in Nature found that climate change can exacerbate a full 58 percent of the infectious diseases that humans come in contact with worldwide.

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Today, the United Kingdom became the first country to give regulatory approval to a medical procedure that uses CRISPR gene editing. The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) approved Casgevy, a therapy that will be used to treat sickle cell disease and beta thalassemia (also called β -thalassaemia). 

[Related: CRISPR breaks ground as a one-shot treatment for a rare disease.]

What are sickle cell disease and beta thalassemia? 

Both diseases are painful, life-long genetic conditions that are caused by errors in the genes for a protein called hemoglobin. Red blood cells use hemoglobin to carry oxygen around the body. Sickle cell disease is particularly common among people with Caribbean or African ancestry. The abnormal hemoglobin makes the blood cells crescent-shaped and hard. The misshapen cells then clump together and block the flow of oxygen to the organs, which causes extreme pain. The cells can then die off early, which leads to anemia. 

Beta thalassemia primarily affects patients with Mediterranean, south Asian, southeast Asian, and Middle Eastern backgrounds. It also causes anemia since the mody cannot make as much hemoglobin.  

Casgevy was developed by Boston’s Vertex Pharmaceuticals and Switzerland’s Crispr Therapeutics and could be used to replace bone marrow transplants. The companies estimate that roughly 2,000 people in the UK are now eligible for the therapy.

“I am pleased to announce that we have authorized an innovative and first-of-its-kind gene-editing treatment called Casgevy, which in trials has been found to restore healthy hemoglobin production in the majority of participants with sickle-cell disease and transfusion-dependent beta thalassaemia, relieving the symptoms of disease,” interim executive director of healthcare quality and access at the MHRA Julian Beach said in a statement. 

How does Casgey use CRISPR gene editing?

The new treatment uses the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technique, which enables scientists to make precise alterations to human DNA. French microbiologist, geneticist and biochemist Emmanuelle Charpentier and American biochemist Jennifer A. Doudna, who shared the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work. 

Casgevy uses stem cells taken from a patient’s bone marrow. The cells are then brought into a lab and the genes that are meant to switch on a functioning version of hemoglobin are edited with CRISPR. According to the MHRA, patients must then go through a “conditioning treatment.” This can involve taking a drug that suppresses the immune system, radiotherapy, or chemotherapy to get the body ready for an infusion of CRISPR-modified cells back into the body. The new treatment does not come with the risk of graft versus host disease the way that a traditional bone marrow transplant does.

[Related: These organisms have a natural gene-editing system that could be more useful than CRISPR.]

After the infusion, patients may need to remain in a hospital facility for at least a month. During this time, the treated cells will begin to “take up residence” in the bone marrow and make red blood cells that have a stable form of hemoglobin.

While seeking regulatory approval, the researchers performed a clinical trial of 45 patients with sickle-cell disease. Of this group, 29 patients have been in the trial long enough for the researchers to gauge how effective Casgevy is. Of these eligible patients, 28 were free of severe pain crises for at least 12 months after treatment.  

In the clinical trial of 54 patients with transfusion-dependent beta thalassemia, 42 patients have been in the trial long enough to determine efficacy. Of these, 39 did not require a red blood cell transfusion for at least 12 months after the treatment. The remaining three had more than a 70 percent reduction in the need for red cell transfusions. 

“This is a great step in the advancement of medical approaches to tackle genetic diseases we never thought would be possible to cure,” University of Hertfordshire geneticist Alena Pance said a statement released by the Science Media Centre. “Modifying the stem cells from the bone marrow of the patient avoids the problems associated with immune compatibility, i.e. searching for donors that match the patient and following immunosuppression, and constituting a real cure of the disease rather than a treatment.”

The United States Food and Drug Administration is evaluating this same treatment. On October 31, an advisory committee to the FDA said that treatment was safe for patients. It is expected to make a decision by December 8. 

A price for the therapy has not been announced, but it will likely be expensive. 

Previously

Despite its potential for good, CRISPR has been tainted with controversy and ripe for debate over the fear of being able to pick and choose genes for so-called “designer babies.” In 2018, Chinese scientist He Jiankui announced that he had created the first gene-edited babies in the world. He was found guilty of conducting “illegal medical practices” and sentenced to 3 years in prison. This work furthered the debate of how to best regulate this powerful technique, with many saying that it shouldn’t be used to edit human genes that will be passed down to the next generation. 

Other experiments and trials with using the gene editing technique on rare diseases have continued. In 2021, a clinical trial for a drug called NTLA-2001 began, researchers attempted to treat six people with a rare genetic disease called transthyretin amyloidosis with a technology that delivers CRISPR directly to cells in the liver. The FDA cleared the trial to enter its critical third phase in October.

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Cooperation between different groups of humans lies at the root of our social norms, traditions, and culture. Groups of a great ape species called bonobos may also work collaboratively with other cliques, according to a study published November 16 in the journal Science.

[Related: Bonobo ladies get to choose their mates and boy oh boy are they picky.]

Along with chimpanzees, bonobos are some of our closest living relatives. Studying their relationships can help scientists reconstruct what human traits appear to be more innate and how they evolve. However, both species of primate exhibit different levels of cooperation despite living in similar social groups that have multiple adult members of both sexes. 

Chimpanzees appear to have more hostile relationships between different groups. Even lethal aggression is not uncommon. This hostility has led researchers to assume that group conflict is an innate part of human nature. 

Bonobos might be telling a different story about how social structures and communities have evolved over time. 

“The ability to study how cooperation emerges in a species so closely related to humans challenges existing theory, or at least provides insights into the conditions that promote between-group cooperation over conflict,’ study co-author and German Primate Center evolutionary biologist Liran Samuni said in a statement.

The study looked at two groups of 31 wild adult bonobos in the Kokolopori Bonobo Reserve in the Democratic Republic of Congo over a period of two years. When the different groups of bonobos met up, they often fed, rested, and traveled together. 

“Tracking and observing multiple groups of bonobos in Kokolopori, we’re struck by the remarkable levels of tolerance between members of different groups,” Samuni said. “This tolerance paves the way for pro-social cooperative behaviors such as forming alliances and sharing food across groups, a stark contrast to what we see in chimpanzees.” 

The authors also did not observe disputes that led to the lethal aggression that has been observed in chimpanzees. The bonobos did not not interact randomly between groups. Cooperation only happened among a select few group members. 

“They preferentially interact with specific members of other groups who are more likely to return the favor, resulting in strong ties between pro-social individuals,” study co-author and Harvard University evolutionary biologist Martin Surbeck said in a statement. “Such connections are also key aspects of the cooperation seen in human societies. Bonobos show us that the ability to maintain peaceful between-group relationships while extending acts of pro-sociality and cooperation to out-group members is not uniquely human.”

[Related: Humans owe our evolutionary success to friendship.]

Cooperation between human groups leads to exchanges of ideas, knowledge, innovation, and resources. The Bonobos in the study also shared food resources across groups without any strong cultural influence. The authors believe that this challenges another existing idea that a shared culture and traits are necessary components for groups to cooperate with one another. 

The study also highlights the importance of collaboration when studying bonobos that live in remote and largely inaccessible parts of the preserve. 

“It is through strong collaborations with and the support of the local Mongandu population in Kokolopori, in whose ancestral forest the bonobos roam, that studies of this fascinating species become possible,” said Subeck, who directs research in the Kokolopori Bonobo Reserve. “Research sites like Kokolopori substantially contribute not only to our understanding of the species’ biology and our evolutionary history, but also play a vital role in the conservation of this endangered species.”

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New research from Oxford University and the University of Adelaide found that asbestos exposure has led to a higher incidence of asbestos-related lung cancers in British and Australian naval personnel. The study published November 14 in the journal Scientific Reports estimates that the proportion of lung cancers related to onboard asbestos exposure was 27 percent in Australian naval personnel and 12 percent in British servicemembers.

[Related: The US never banned asbestos. These workers are paying the price.]

Toxic exposure

This study is a reminder of the continuing need for protections against exposure to harmful airborne dusts and other dangerous substances from sources like toxic burn pits. According to the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, nearly 300,000 United States veterans have reported exposure to pollution from burn pits since the early 2000s. The chemical pollutants that were released during these burns include volatile organic compounds associated with cancer, kidney disease, and nervous system damage. In August 2022, President Joe Biden signed the PACT Act into law to address the health concerns related to burn pits like these.

Illnesses related to asbestos exposure persist, despite the mineral being a known carcinogen. Asbestos has been used in a wide variety of building materials for their strength, flexibility, and electrical and heat resistant properties. Breathing it in can cause mesothelioma, lung cancer, and a non-cancerous condition called asbestosis. About 1,290 Americans die annually from asbestos-related causes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Australia currently has a ban and strict control on asbestos-containing materials, they still pose a risk to some workers. A 2021-2022 New South Wales Dust Disease Register report found that there were 142 cases of asbestosis and 111 deaths related to the illness. 

In the United States, asbestos use is not completely banned. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed another ban in April of 2022 that has yet to be finalized. 

An increased risk to sailors

For this study, researchers collected data from 30,085 United Kingdom and Australian personnel who served during the 1950s and 1960s. During this time period, asbestos-containing materials were still present in British and Australian naval vessels. Earlier studies of one Australian and two British cohorts also involved in this new research found that increased rates of lung cancer could not be attributed to radiation exposure from nuclear testing. The team used a separate study of Australian Korean War veterans as a comparison in this new research.

The team found that all four cohorts had an elevated incidence of mesothelioma among naval veterans. This same rate was not not statistically significant among sailors from the Korean War. British and Australian personnel involved in nuclear testing also saw higher rates of lung cancers.

Additionally, the rates of pulmonary disease and heart disease were similar between naval and army personnel. This suggests that smoking was not driving higher lung cancer rates among sailors.

[Related: The PACT Act will take the burden of proof off US veterans exposed to burn pits.]

“We found the lung cancer rate was higher overall in naval personnel than in the other armed services, and, while smoking remains the dominant cause of lung cancer, it is unlikely the excess could be explained by a higher smoking rate in the navy,” study co-author and University of Adelaide medical doctor Richard Gun said in a statement.  “Although actual measurements of airborne asbestos levels were not available, and estimates are difficult, we have concluded that the higher lung cancer rate in sailors was most probably caused by onboard asbestos exposure.”

The high occurrence of deaths in sailors from asbestosis also strengthened the team’s conclusion. The team believes that the effects of asbestos exposure are likely underestimated, unless lung cancer is considered alongside mesothelioma and asbestosis.

“Although it remains true that smoking causes most lung cancers, other agents such as asbestos can contribute to the incidence of cancer in an exposed population,” Gun said. “Moreover, we know from other studies that the combination of smoking and asbestos exposure has an enhanced influence on lung cancer risk; this interactive effect would have contributed to the observed lung cancer excess.”

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Like jellyfish, fungi, sea worms, and fireflies, some species of sea cucumbers glow in the dark. A team of researchers from Nagoya University in Japan have found that 10 known deep-sea species are bioluminescent in their natural habitats. The findings are part of a new textbook called The World of Sea Cucumber published on November 10.

[Related: The deepest known ocean virus lives under 29,000 feet of water.]

There are roughly 1,200 species of sea cucumbers. These marine invertebrates are found in every ocean on Earth, but they are best represented in the western Pacific and Indian Ocean. They generally live in shallow waters, but some species live at depths of thousands of feet deep. Most closely related to sea urchins, sea stars (aka starfish), sea lilies, and sand dollars, these bottom-dwellers range from as small as one inch long up to six feet. Some sea cucumbers are also known to shoot out a tangle of sticky, noodle-like goo from their butts when provoked. 

The new textbook takes readers deep underwater and discusses the bioluminescent properties of some of these sea cucumbers. According to NOAA, the light emitted by bioluminescent animals is produced by energy released from interior chemical reactions that are sometimes ejected from the organism. Its function is still a mystery, but it is generally used to ward off or evade predators, find food, or as a form of communication. 

The authors drew on previous sea cucumber research to highlight the differences between the shallow-dwelling and a bit more drab species and their brilliantly glowing deep-sea relatives. The book also shows the evolution of sea cucumbers from the Jurassic era roughly 180 million years ago up to the present day. 

To uncover the 10 bioluminescent sea cucumber species, the team deployed a remotely operated vehicle about 3,280 feet below the surface of Monterey Bay, California. The vehicle was equipped with a very sensitive and an arm that was robotically controlled from the ship. Unlike the more uniform bioluminescence seen in specimens taken onto ships, the light was shining from the sea cucumber’s head to tail and then back up similar to a wave.  

According to the authors, the previously unknown luminosity in these 10 deep-sea species suggests that sea cucumbers are more diverse than scientists once believed. A member of the order Molpadia is included in this discovery, which was previously believed to be a non-luminescent order of animals. 

While these sea cucumbers dwell in some of Earth’s deepest parts, they are still not immune to the effects of overfishing and particularly the drilling and mining activities that threaten their ecosystem. 

[Related: This headless chicken is the deep-sea ‘monster’ of our dreams.]

“As deep-sea exploration and development continue, information on their biodiversity and ecology, such as this book, becomes important as it allows us to assess the impact of human activities on deep-sea ecosystems,” textbook co-author and Nagoya University biochemist Manabu Bessho-Uehara said in a statement. “Heavy metal pollution from the mud discarded during drilling operations and motor-derived noise disrupting sound communication are important problems, but the effects on organisms when bioluminescence signals are disturbed, such as when light is obscured by drilling mud, have not been examined. It is necessary to clarify the importance of bioluminescence on the deep-sea floor and find measures that will lead to sustainable development.”

Studying the flora and fauna living in these extreme locations can also provide valuable knowledge of all life on Earth. It can help us discover new viruses that thrive in hydrothermal vents and the factors at play in Earth’s climate and carbon cycle. 

“I believe that understanding deep-sea ecosystems and interactions among organisms will lead to a better understanding of life on Earth itself,” said Bessho-Uehara.

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Piping plovers are showing signs of recovery from major population losses in the state of Massachusetts. They’re listed as threatened in Massachusetts, due to habitat loss from increasing human impacts. According to Mass Audubon, they’ve identified roughly 1,145 breeding pairs nesting in the state this year. When the organization first started to monitor and protect the species in 1986, there were less than 200 breeding pairs in the Bay State. That’s a 500 percent increase in three decades.

[Related: Remembering Monty and Rose, the Chicago shorebirds that became the face of a movement.]

“While Piping Plovers remain a federally threatened species, this season’s data shows that these iconic birds are making real progress toward recovery in Massachusetts,” Mass Audubon officials wrote in a statement. “Massachusetts Piping Plover populations have recovered at a faster rate than those of most other states along the Atlantic Seaboard. As a result, approximately 50% of Piping Plovers worldwide now nest in Massachusetts. That makes coastal conservation even more important in our state—we’re responsible for safeguarding a huge portion of this threatened species’ worldwide population.”

Piping plovers are small migratory shorebirds that nest in sand and gravel beaches and mudflats across North America. There are three main populations of the endangered birds. One lives along the shores of the Great Lakes, one in the lakes and rivers of the Northern Great Plains, and another along the Atlantic coast. These roughly six to seven inch tall birds eat marine mollusks, beetles, worms, fly larvae, crustaceans, and other small marine animals. Piping plovers have a tendency to run for a short distance, stop, and then tilt forward to pull an insect or worm up from the sand. Raccoons, skunks, and foxes are their primary natural predators. 

Their main threat is habitat loss. According to the US Fish & Wildlife Service, human development on beaches has reduced the amount of suitable areas for the birds to spend the winter months. Disturbance by humans and domestic animals like cats and dogs can also force migrating and wintering birds to expend unnecessary energy, which can lead breeding plovers to abandon their nests and young.

They have been listed as endangered or threatened since 1985 and piping plovers living in other states are also seeing some success and cautious optimism.  

In Maine, breeding pairs increased for the sixth consecutive year. Maine Audubon saw 157 breeding pairs in 2023, with some new nesting areas. However, the chick survival rate was the lowest since 2007.

[Related: Endangered sea turtles build hundreds of nests on the Outer Banks.]

“When monitoring an endangered species population, it is always good to proceed with caution. Despite an increase in our breeding pairs, the low fledge rate we saw this summer could be a cause for concern,” Maine Audubon wrote in a press release. “Piping Plovers migrate as far south as Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean for the winter, then have to make the trek all the way back up to Maine for the breeding season. A lot of variables are at play that are in nature’s hands during these long migrations.”

In the Midwest, 80 unique breeding pairs were counted across all five Great Lakes with a total of 85 nests. There are eight more pairs than 2022 and and the most since the species was first added to the federal Endangered Species List. Scientists with the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa in High Island, Michigan have been monitoring the island’s plovers as they nest and fledge for two decades. 

“This is the best year that we’ve had for monitoring as far as the total number of adults observed and the number of nests and chicks produced,” Bill Parsons, a scientist in the tribe’s natural resources department, told MLive in August. “We’ve definitely, over that 20 years, seen that the population is slowly, incrementally successful, but we’re nowhere near the target for rehabilitation of the population.”

Some general ways to help protect piping plovers include reporting nest locations to state or federal wildlife officials, keeping dogs on a leash during walks to protect nests, and leaving any driftwood or algae found on beaches for the birds. 

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A team using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has observed two of the most distant galaxies astronomers have ever seen. At close to 33 billion light years away from Earth, these distant regions can offer insight into how the universe’s earliest galaxies may have formed. The findings are detailed in a study published November 13 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

[Related: ‘Christmas tree’ galaxy shines in new image from Hubble and JWST.]

The galaxies UNCOVER z-13 and UNCOVER z-12 are the second and fourth most distant galaxies ever observed and are located in a region called Pandora’s Cluster (Abell 2744). The two galaxies are among the 60,000 sources of light in Pandora’s Cluster that were captured in some of the first deep field images the JWST took in 2022. This region of space was selected for this kind of imaging due to its location behind several galaxy clusters. The light creates a natural magnification effect called gravitational lensing. This happens when the gravitational pull of the clusters’ combined mass warps the space-time around it. It then magnifies any light that passes nearby and offers a larger view behind the clusters.

Other galaxies confirmed at this distance generally appear in images as red dots. However, these new galaxies are larger and look more like a peanut and a fluffy ball, according to the team.

“Very little is known about the early universe, and the only way to learn about that time and to test our theories of early galaxy formation and growth is with these very distant galaxies,” study co-author and astronomer Bingjie Wang from Penn State University said in a statement. “Prior to our analysis, we knew of only three galaxies confirmed at around this extreme distance. Studying these new galaxies and their properties has revealed the diversity of galaxies in the early universe and how much there is to be learned from them.” 

Wang is also a member of the JWST UNCOVER (Ultradeep NIRSpec and NIRCam ObserVations before the Epoch of Reionization) team that conducted this research. UNCOVER’s early goal is to obtain highly detailed images of the region around Pandora’s Cluster using JWST.

Since the light that is emitted from these galaxies had to travel for so long to reach Earth, it offers a window into the universe’s past. The team estimates that the light JWST detected was emitted by the two galaxies when the universe was about 330 million years old and that it traveled for about 13.4 billion light years to reach the space telescopes. 

However, the galaxies are currently closer to 33 billion light years away from Earth because of the expansion of the universe over this period of time. 

“The light from these galaxies is ancient, about three times older than the Earth,” study co-author, Penn State astronomer, and UNCOVER member Joel Leja said in a statement.  “These early galaxies are like beacons, with light bursting through the very thin hydrogen gas that made up the early universe. It is only by their light that we can begin to understand the exotic physics that governed the galaxy near the cosmic dawn.”

[Related: JWST takes a jab at the mystery of the universe’s expansion rate.]

The two galaxies are also considerably bigger than the three galaxies previously located at these extreme distances. While our Milky Way galaxy is roughly 100,000 light years across, galaxies in the early universe are believed to have been very compressed. A galaxy of 2,000 light years across like one of ones the team imaged came as a surprise.

“Previously discovered galaxies at these distances are point sources—they appear as a dot in our images,” Wang said. “But one of ours appears elongated, almost like a peanut, and the other looks like a fluffy ball. It is unclear if the difference in size is due to how the stars formed or what happened to them after they formed, but the diversity in the galaxy properties is really interesting. These early galaxies are expected to have formed out of similar materials, but already they are showing signs of being very different than one another.”

To make inferences about these early galaxies, the team used detailed models. They believed that in addition to being young (by space standards), the two galaxies also had few metals in their composition, and were growing rapidly and actively forming stars. 

“The first elements were forged in the cores of early stars through the process of fusion,” Leja said. “It makes sense that these early galaxies don’t have heavy elements like metals because they were some of the first factories to build those heavy elements. And, of course, they would have to be young and star-forming to be the first galaxies, but confirming these properties is an important basic test of our models and helps confirm the whole paradigm of the Big Bang theory.”

Astronomers will continue to use lensing clusters and the instruments aboard the JWST to continue to peel back the timeline of some of the universe’s first galaxies.  

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For the first time in over 60 years, a rare egg-laying mammal has been spotted by scientists. Attenborough’s long-beaked echidna (Zaglossus attenboroughi) was caught on camera during a major expedition in the Cyclops Mountains in Indonesia’s Papua Province.

[Related: Dams are hurting this enigmatic Australian species.]

A sacred animal

The long-beaked echidna is named for wildlife documentarian and conservationist Sir David Attenborough and has only been recorded by scientists once in 1961. It is considered a monotreme, or an evolutionary distinct group of mammals who can lay eggs. The platypus is also a monotreme and there are only five remaining species of these strange types of mammal on Earth. 

They live in burrows and mainly eat insects, earthworms, and termites. They are listed as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species and are only known to live in the Cyclops Mountains.

“Attenborough’s long-beaked echidna has the spines of a hedgehog, the snout of an anteater, and the feet of a mole. Because of its hybrid appearance, it shares its name with a creature of Greek mythology that is half human, half serpent,” University of Oxford biologist James Kempton said in a statement. “The reason it appears so unlike other mammals is because it is a member of the monotremes–an egg-laying group that separated from the rest of the mammal tree-of-life about 200 million years ago.”

The echidna also has cultural significance for the people in the village of Yongsu Sapari. They have lived on the northern slopes of the Cyclops Mountains for eighteen generations. Rather than fighting during conflicts, the tradition is for one party to go up into the Cyclops to find echidna while the other party goes to the ocean to search for a marlin. Both of these creatures were difficult to find and it would take decades to even whole generations to locate them. However, once they were found, the marlin and echidna would symbolize the end of the conflict.

Finding echidnas, whip scorpions, and forest shrimp

During an expedition that began in 2019, a group of scientists from institutions in multiple countries set up over 80 trail cameras. They did not see any signs of the echidna for four weeks of trekking through a “beautiful but dangerous land.” A sudden earthquake forced the team to evacuate, one team member broke his arm in two places, another contracted malaria, and another had a leech attached to his eye for a day and a half.

[Related: Meet the first electric blue tarantula known to science.]

On the last day of the expedition, they finally spotted Attenborough’s long-beaked echidna. The identification of the species was later confirmed by mammalogist Kristofer Helgen from the Australian Museum Research Institute.

In addition to this elusive egg-laying mammal, this expedition marked the first comprehensive assessment of mammal, reptile, amphibian, and invertebrate life in the Cyclops Mountains. They combined Western scientific techniques with the extensive local knowledge of Papuan team members. Among the new discoveries are several insect species that are completely new to science and an entirely new genus of ground and tree-dwelling shrimp.

“We were quite shocked to discover this shrimp in the heart of the forest, because it is a remarkable departure from the typical seaside habitat for these animals,” entomologist  Leonidas-Romanos Davranoglou from the Oxford University Museum of Natural History said in a statement. “We believe that the high level of rainfall in the Cyclops Mountains means the humidity is great enough for these creatures to live entirely on land.”

Some other funky underground species including blind spiders, blind harvestman, and a whip scorpion were also found living in a previously unexplored cave system. The team hope that its rediscovery of Attenborough’s long-beaked echidna and all of these new species will help bring attention to the conservation needs of the Cyclops Mountains and Indonesian New Guinea.

CORRECTION November 19, 2023 3:55 PM EST: An earlier version of the article summary said the animal was named after Richard Attenborough. Zaglossus attenboroughi is named for Sir David Attenborough. We regret the error.

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Two of the most powerful space telescopes in the universe have joined forces to showcase a panorama of colorful galaxy clusters about 4.3 billion light-years away from Earth. The image of  galaxy cluster MACS0416 is from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Hubble Space Telescope and combines both visible and infrared light. 

[Related: Euclid telescope spies shimmering stars and galaxies in its first look at the ‘dark’ universe.]

According to NASA, MACS0416 is a pair of colliding galaxy clusters that will eventually combine to form an even bigger cluster. It includes numerous galaxies outside of the cluster and some other light sources that vary over time. The variation is likely due to a phenomenon called gravitational lensing, where light is distorted and amplified from distant background sources.

Color coding

In the image, different colors represent the varying wavelengths of light. The shortest are blue, the intermediate are green, and the longest are red. The wavelengths range from 0.4 to 5 microns and the variation creates a particularly vivid landscape of galaxies.

The colors also give clues to how far away the galaxies are. The bluest galaxies are relatively close, tend to show intense star formation, and are best detected by Hubble. The more red galaxies tend to be further away and are best spotted by JWST. Some of the galaxies also appear very red because they have a large amount of cosmic dust that tends to absorb bluer colors of starlight.

“The whole picture doesn’t become clear until you combine Webb data with Hubble data,” Rogier Windhorst said in a statement. Windhorst is an astronomer at Arizona State University and principal investigator of the PEARLS program (Prime Extragalactic Areas for Reionization and Lensing Science), which took the JWST observations.

Oh Christmas tree

While the images are pleasant to look like, they were also taken for a specific scientific purpose. The team was using their data to search for objects varying in observed brightness over time, known as transients. All of these colors twinkling together in the galaxy look like shining colorful lights on a Christmas tree. 

“We’re calling MACS0416 the Christmas Tree Galaxy Cluster, both because it’s so colorful and because of these flickering lights we find within it. We can see transients everywhere,” said astronomer Haojing Yan of the University of Missouri in Columbia said in a statement. Yan is a co-author of one paper describing the scientific results published in The Astrophysical Journal.

The team identified 14 transients across the field of view. Twelve of the transients were located in three galaxies that are highly magnified by gravitational lensing. This means that they are likely to be individual stars or multiple-star systems that are very highly magnified for a short period of time. The other two transients are located within more moderately magnified background galaxies, so they are likely to be supernovae.

More observations with JWST could lead to finding numerous additional transients and in other similar galaxy clusters. 

Godzilla and Mothra 

One of the transients stood out in particular. The star system is located in a galaxy that existed roughly three billion years after the big bang and is magnified by a factor of at least 4,000. They nicknamed the star system Mothra in a nod to its “monster nature” of being both very bright and magnified. Mothra joins another lensed star the researchers previously identified that they nicknamed “Godzilla.” In Japanese cinema, Godzilla and Mothra are giant monsters known as kaiju.

In addition to the new JWST images, Mothra is also visible in the Hubble observations that were taken nine years ago. According to the team, this is unusual, because a very specific alignment between the foreground galaxy cluster and the background star is needed to magnify a star this much. The alignment should have been eliminated by the mutual motions of the star and the cluster.

An additional object within the foreground cluster could be adding more magnification. 

“The most likely explanation is a globular star cluster that’s too faint for Webb to see directly,” astronomer Jose Diego of the Instituto de Física de Cantabria in Spain said in a statement. “But we don’t know the true nature of this additional lens yet.” Diego is also a co-author of a paper published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics that details this finding. 

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Researchers in Denmark have discovered six new species of beetle, including one with some eye-opening genitalia. Loncovilius carlsbergi has a penis shaped like a bottle opener. The top looks like the protruding longer part of a bottle opener that latches onto the bottle cap, and the bottom resembles the pincer that holds the bottle in place. The specimen is described in a study published October 28 in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society.

[Related: Acrobatic beetle bots could inspire the latest ‘leap’ in agriculture.]

While the team from the Natural History Museum of Denmark still not sure why Loncovilius carlsbergi evolved this uniquely shaped penis, studying them can reveal the role that the genitals play in the bugs’ daily lives. 

“Genitalia are the organs in insects that evolve to be different in every species. As such, they are often the best way to identify a species,” study co-author and biologist Aslak Kappel Hansen said in a statement. “That’s why entomologists like us are always quick to examine insect genitalia when describing a species. The unique shape of each species’ genitals ensures that it can only reproduce with the same species.”

Aslak and his colleagues found and named six new species in the rove beetle genus Loncovilius that had been hidden within the insect collections at the museum. Loncovilius carlsbergi was named for the Carlsberg Foundation, which has funded research at the museum for years. Carlsberg is a popular 176-year-old Danish beer company.

Loncovilius beetles are only found in Chile and Argentina and entomologists don’t know too much about them. They are less than an inch long and all of their legs have sticky bristles on them, while other predatory rove beetles only have sticky front legs. 

Where Loncovilius beetles live make them special among this family of beetles. Most predatory rove beetles live on the ground, among dead leaves, fungi, and bark. Loncovilius beetles live on flowers. The authors believe that their sticky legs helped them adapt the ability to climb flowers and vegetation.

“We suspect that they play an important role in the ecosystem. So, it’s worrying that nearly nothing is known about this type of beetles, especially when they’re so easy to spot–and some of them are even quite beautiful,” study co-author and systematic entomologist Josh Jenkins Shaw said in a statement. “Unfortunately, we can easily lose species like these before they’re ever discovered.”

The forces of climate change, pollution, and habitat loss is exacerbating the Earth’s biodiversity crisis. These combined forces have threatened over one million plant and animal species with extinction, a rate of loss that is 1,000 times greater than previously expected. The team believes that this crisis will likely affect these newly discovered beetles as well.

[Related: A pocketful of bacteria helps these beetles through their most dramatic life changes.]

“Loncovilius populations are likely to change in coming decades. Our simulations demonstrate that at least three of the Loncovilius species are at risk because the rapidly changing climate strongly alters more than half of their habitat area by 2060,” study co-author and PhD student José L. Reyes-Hernández said in a statement. “It is important to stress that many more species will be affected by this change, but we don’t know how because only for four species we had enough data for our analysis.” 

The planet’s species are also going extinct faster than scientists can fully name and describe them. Some estimates place the number of species lost from the Earth every day at upwards of 150. According to Jenkins Shaw, as many as 85 percent of all species on the planet are still not formally named or described. 

“A taxonomic name is important because nature conservation relies on knowledge about species in particular areas. Without such a description, species are often left out of conservation efforts,” said Jenkins Shaw.

The authors hope that Loncovilius carlsbergi’s attention-grabbing genitals could spark broader interest in insects. They are also working on producing an actual bottle opener shaped like this beetle’s penis into production. 

“It’s important that we recognize the vast wealth of yet to be researched species around us before it’s too late. We would like for people around the world to talk about the crisis facing our planet’s species. A move towards serious learning and awareness may be sparkled by a light chat that takes place over a beer,” said Kappel Hansen.

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Hummingbirds are some of the world’s fastest birds and must frequently squeeze through tiny spaces in plants to get to the nectar that they need to keep up their energy. However, over time, they have lost their ability to fold their wings close to their bodies at the wrist and elbow like other birds. How hummingbirds squeeze into such tight spaces has remained a mystery to ornithologists until now. A study published November 9 in the Journal of Experimental Biology found that they deploy two very specific strategies: the sideways and the bullet.

[Related: This hybrid hummingbird’s colorful feathers are a genetic puzzle.]

Into the flight arena

The study focused on Anna’s hummingbirds (Calypte anna). These are among the most common hummingbirds living along the West Coast of the United States. They are about the size of a ping-pong ball and have iridescent emerald feathers and sparkling pink throat plumage. 

A team from the University of California, Berkeley designed a two-sided flight arena for the experiment. They used alternating rewards to train the hummingbird to fly through a 2.48 square inch gap in the partition that separated the two sides of the arena. To do so, they only refilled a feeder shaped like a flower with a sip of sugar water if the bird returned to the feeder that was on the other side through one of the gaps. This encouraged the birds with an only 4.7 inch-wide wingspan to flit around the arena. 

The team then replaced the gap between the two sides of the flight arena with a series of smaller oval and circular openings that ranged from 4.7 inches to only 2.3 inches in height, width, and diameter. The birds’ movements were recorded using high-speed cameras, to get a sense of how they negotiated the various openings. 

Next, the team wrote a computer program to methodically track the position of each bird’s bill as it approached and passed through each hole. The program also pinpointed where the hummingbird’s wing tips were, to calculate their wing positions as they transited through.

[Related: These female hummingbirds don flashy male feathers to avoid unwanted harassment.]

The experiment revealed that the hummingbirds used two unique strategies to negotiate the gaps. 

The sideways

In the first strategy, the hummingbirds approached the circular opening and usually hovered in front of it to assess its size. They then traveled through it sideways, reaching forward with one wing and sweeping the second wing back, similar to the shape of a cross. Their wings were still fluttering to fly through the door and then swiveled forward to continue on their way. 

The bullet

For the second strategy, the birds swept their wings backwards, pinning them to their bodies. They then quickly shot through the opening beak first like a bullet, before sweeping their wings forward. They resumed flapping their wings once they were safely through the circle. All of the hummingbirds in the study generally deployed this technique as they grew bolder and more familiar with the arena.

Changing tactics

The team observed that the hummingbirds who used the first strategy of sideways traveling tended to fly more cautiously than those that shot through the circles beak first. As the birds became more familiar with the openings after multiple approaches, they appeared to become more confident. They started to approach them quicker and dropped the more sideways way of getting through in favor of shooting through beak first. 

For the smallest opening–only half a wingspan wide–every bird zipped through facing forward with their wings back. Even the more cautious birds did this on their first attempt to avoid collisions. 

According to the team, about eight percent of the birds in the experiment clipped their wings as they passed through the partition and only one experienced a major collision. The bird who did experience the collision was able to successfully reattempting the move and continue flying.  

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On November 8, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a Type 2 diabetes drug called tirzepatide for use in chronic weight management. It has been sold under the brand name Mounjaro for treating diabetes, but it will be called Zepbound when prescribed for weight loss. The drug is made by pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and doses should be available after Thanksgiving.

[Related: 6 Ozempic facts that make sense of social media hype.]

How Zepbound works

The medicine is a weekly injectable medication and the main ingredient is called tirzepatide. It mimics two hormones called glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) and glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP). Both are naturally produced in the body and the drug targets receptors in the brain for these hormones.

Both GIP and GLP-1 bind to receptors in the brain that tell the body it is full. GLP-1 also slows digestion to make people feel fuller longer and with smaller portions. American Board of Obesity Medicine medical director Kimberly Gudzune told The Washington Post that GLP-1 targets the receptors in the brain that decrease appetite and it slows digestion to make people feel fuller longer and with smaller portions. Additionally, GLP-1 increases the amount of insulin that the pancreas releases after eating, which slows down the rise in blood sugar.

GIP meanwhile works in the brain to decrease appetite and may also improve how the body breaks down fats and sugars.

Who is eligible for Zepbound?

The FDA cleared Zepbound for adults 18 and older considered obese (a body mass index of at least) or overweight (a body mass index of 27 or more) with at least one weight-related health condition. The FDA also said that it should be taken with exercise and a reduced-calorie diet.

What is a ‘weight-related condition’?

Weight-related conditions are medical complications that can arise from being overweight or obese. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), they include high blood pressure (hypertension), high LDL cholesterol, high levels of triglycerides, and Type 2 diabetes. 

Roughly 70 percent of American adults are considered overweight or obese by body mass index, according to the FDA. However, body mass index (BMI) is an imperfect metric for measuring health that has been questioned by the American Medical Association. Losing five to 10 percent of body weight with diet and exercise has been associated with a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease in adults who are overweight or obese

“Obesity and overweight are serious conditions that can be associated with some of the leading causes of death such as heart disease, stroke and diabetes,” director of the FDA’s Division of Diabetes, Lipid Disorders, and Obesity John Sharretts, said in a statement. “In light of increasing rates of both obesity and overweight in the United States, today’s approval addresses an unmet medical need.”

[Related: TikTokers are taking a diabetes drug to lose weight. Now it’s in short supply.]

How effective is Zepbound?

The FDA’s approval comes on the heels of a phase 3 clinical trial. All of the participants in the study had obesity or were overweight and had at least one weight-related condition.

At the highest dosage of tirzepatide (15 milligrams) participants saw an average weight loss 22.5 percent body weight, or about 52 pounds, over a period of 72 weeks. At a 10 mg dose, the average weight loss was about 21.4 percent (48 pounds). At only five milligrams, average weight loss was about 16 percent (35 pounds).

How does it compare to Ozempic or Wegovy?

Ozempic and Wegovy contain an ingredient called semaglutide. It works by suppressing the appetite by mimicking GLP-1, a hormone that signals to the brain that the stomach is full. In similar clinical trials, semaglutide has been shown to reduce body weight by roughly 15 percent (34 pounds) after 68 weeks.

By comparison, the tirzepatide in Mounjaro and Zepbound works on both the GLP-1 and GIP pathways.

While those taking tirzepatide lost more weight than those taking semaglutide in separate trials, the data is not comparable due to potential differences in study length and population. More data is needed that compares both drugs at the higher doses needed for weight-loss, so it is too early to say if one is more effective than the other.

[Related: Fatphobia and medical biases follow people after death.]

What are the potential side-effects?

In studies, the main side effects were gastrointestinal issues like nausea, vomiting, constipation, and diarrhea. The FDA says that Zepbound’s label will contain warnings for inflammation of the pancreas, gallbladder problems, low blood sugar, acute kidney injury, diabetic retinopathy, and suicidal behavior or thinking.

How much will Zepbound cost?

A one month supply of Zepbound is estimated to cost about $1,060. While it is less than Wegovy’s $1,300 price tag, both drugs may be too expensive for many that are eligible. Ozempic costs $936 per month before insurance.

Many insurance companies do not cover weight loss medication that is intended to treat Type 2 diabetes, but that could change with the FDA’s approval. Medicare and Medicaid are currently barred by law from covering weight loss medications. 

According to Eli Lilly, patients can sign up on its website for a copay, or a discount card program. The company also said that those who can get Zepbound through commercial insurance may pay as little as $25 for a one-month or three-month supply. It is unclear what will happen after that period as far as coast and weight staying off. Those who are commercially insured, but don’t have coverage for Zepbound, might be eligible to pay as little as $550 for a one-month prescription.

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For the first time, scientists have observed one virus attaching itself to another virus. An electron microscope captured the interaction in stunning detail and shows how these two different viruses may have co-evolved. The findings were published in the Journal of the International Society of Microbial Ecology on October 31. 

[Related: The deepest known ocean virus lives under 29,000 feet of water.]

The viruses in the study are both categorized as bacteriophages. These are a group of viruses that are known to infect bacteria. Bacteriophages also infect single-celled prokaryotic organisms known as archaea and are commonly called “phages.” 

Some viruses called satellites (shown in purple) depend on both their host organism and another virus known as a helper to complete its life cycle. The satellite virus depends on the helper virus to build the protective shell that covers its genetic material called a capsid or to help it replicate its DNA.  For this relationship to continue, the satellite and the helper must be close to one another for at least a little while, but there were no known cases of a satellite virus attaching to the helper until this discovery. 

“When I saw it, I was like, ‘I can’t believe this,’” study co-author and University of Maryland, Baltimore County biologist Tagide deCarvalho said in a statement. “No one has ever seen a bacteriophage—or any other virus—attach to another virus.”

The students who isolated the satellite nicknamed it the MiniFlayer and dubbed its helper the MindFlayer. The team saw this viral relationship between the satellite MiniFlayer and helper MindFlayer while looking at some samples of a family of bacteriophage satellites that infect Streptomyces bacteria. They initially believed that the samples had been contaminated due to the large sequences of DNA and some smaller sequences of DNA that didn’t match anything they were familiar with. 

They took detailed electron microscopy images that show 80 percent of helper viruses in this sample had a satellite bound at its “neck,” where the helper’s outer shell connects to its tail. The ones that did not still had remnant satellite tendrils at the neck that the team said looked like “bite marks.”

Next, they analyzed the genomes of the bacteriophages and bacterial hosts. The satellite viruses had genes that coded for their outer protein shell, but did not have the genes needed to multiply within bacterial cells. This evidence supported the idea that both types of bacteriophages were actually interacting with each other. 

[Related: Ask Us Anything: Can viruses be good for us?]

They also saw that the satellite viruses did not have a gene that is necessary for them to integrate into the genome of bacterial host cells after they have entered them. Since most of the satellite viruses can hide in the host’s DNA, they can replicate once the right helper comes along. According to the team, the satellite thus attaches to the helper using a unique adaptation at its tail, so that it can survive without this key gene.

 “Attaching now made total sense, because otherwise, how are you going to guarantee that you are going to enter into the cell at the same time? This satellite has been tuning in and optimizing its genome to be associated with the helper for, I would say, at least 100 million years,” co-author and  University of Maryland, Baltimore County computational biologist Ivan Erill said in a statement. 

As of now, this kind of relationship has only been observed in a laboratory setting. Understanding these long-term viral relationships could help scientists discover numerous other examples in nature. 

“It’s possible that a lot of the bacteriophages that people thought were contaminated were actually these satellite-helper systems,” said deCarvalho. “So now, with this paper, people might be able to recognize more of these systems.”

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While the majority of fish are cold-blooded and rely on the temperature outside of their bodies to regulate their internal temperatures, less than one percent of sharks are actually warm-blooded. The extinct but mighty megalodon and the living great white shark generate heat with their muscles the way many mammals do. However, they are not the only sharks with this warm quirk. A study published November 7 in the journal Biology Letters found that there are more warm blooded sharks than scientists initially believed. 

[Related: Megalodons were likely warm-blooded, despite being stone-cold killers.]

Warmer muscles might help these giant carnivores be more powerful and athletic, by using that heat to generate more energy. Regional endothermy in fish has been seen in apex predators like the great white or giant tuna, but there has been debate on when this warm bloodedness evolved in sharks and if the megalodon was warm blooded. A previous study from June 2023 found that the megalodon was warm blooded and that the amount of energy it used to stay warm may have contributed to its extinction about 3.6 million years ago.

The new study looked at the results of autopsies from some unexpected shark strandings in Ireland and southern England earlier in 2023. The sharks belonged to a rarely seen species called the smalltooth sand tiger shark. These sharks are found around the world in temperate and tropical seas and in deep waters (32 to 1,700 feet deep). They have a short and pointed snout, small eyes, protruding teeth, and small dorsal and anal fins and can reach about 15 feet long. Smalltooth sand tiger sharks are considered a “vulnerable” species by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. While they are not targeted by commercial fisheries, the sharks may be mistakenly caught in nets and may face threats from pollution. 

Smalltooth sand tiger sharks are believed to have diverged from the megalodon at least 20 million years ago. The autopsies from this year’s stranded sharks unexpectedly served as a timeline that took marine biologists from institutions in Ireland, South Africa, and the United States back millions of years. 

The team found that these rare sharks have physical features that suggest they also have regional endothermy like the megalodon, great white, and some filter-feeding basking sharks. This new addition means that there are likely more warm-blooded sharks than scientists thought and that warm bloodedness evolved quite a long time ago.

“We think this is an important finding, because if sand tiger sharks have regional endothermy then it’s likely there are several other sharks out there that are also warm-bodied,” study co-author and marine biologist Nicholas Payne said in a statement. “We used to think regional endothermy was confined to apex predators like the great white and extinct megalodon, but now we have evidence that deep water ‘bottom dwelling’ sand tigers, and plankton-eating basking sharks also are warm bodied. This raises plenty of new questions as to why regional endothermy evolved, but it might also have important conservation implications.” Payne is affiliated with Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. 

[Related: Were dinosaurs warm-blooded or cold-blooded? Maybe both.]

Scientists believe that the megalodon’s warmer body allowed it to move faster, tolerate colder water, and spread all over the world’ oceans. However, this evolutionary advantage could have contributed to its downfall. The megalodon lived during the Pliocene Epoch (5.33 million years to 2.58 million years ago) when the world cooled and sea levels changed. These ecosystem changes and competition with newcomers in the marine environment like great whites may have led to its extinction. 

Understanding how extinct sharks met their end could help scientists gauge how today’s warm-blooded sharks could fare due to warmer ocean temperatures from human-caused climate change. It has potential conservation implications and could explain some shifting patterns of where sharks are foraging. 

“We believe changing environments in the deep past was a major contributor to the megalodon’s extinction, as we think it could no longer meet the energetic demands of being a large regional endotherm,” study co-author and Trinity College marine biologist Haley Dolton said in a statement. “We know the seas are warming at alarming rates again now and the smalltooth tiger that washed up in Ireland was the first one seen in these waters. That implies its range has shifted, potentially due to warming waters, so a few alarm bells are ringing.”   

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Reviled the world over for making our scalps itch and rapidly spreading in schools, lice have hitched their destiny to our hair follicles. They are the oldest known parasites that feed on the blood of humans, so learning more about lice can tell us quite a bit about our own species and migratory patterns. 

[Related: Ancient ivory comb shows that self-care is as old as time.]

A study published November 8 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE found that lice likely came into North America in two waves of migration. First when some humans potentially crossed a land bridge that connected Asia with present day Alaska roughly 16,000 years ago during the end of the last ice age and then again during European colonization. 

“In some ways, lice are like living fossils we carry around on our own heads,” study co-author Marina Ascunce, an evolutionary biologist with the United States Department of Agriculture, tells PopSci.  

Lice are wingless parasites that live their entire lives on their host and there are three known species that infest humans. Humans and lice have coevolved for thousands of years. The oldest louse specimen known to scientists is 10,000 years old and was found in Brazil in 2000. Since lice and humans have a very intertwined relationship, studying lice can offer clues into human migratory patterns.

“They went on this ride across the world with us. Yet, they are their own organism with some ability to move around on their own (e.g., from one head to another). It provides insight into what happened during our time together,” study co-author and mammal geneticist from the University of Florida David L. Reed tells PopSci. 

In this new study, a team of scientists from the United States, Mexico, and Argentina analyzed the genetic variation in 274 human lice uncovered from 25 geographic sites around the world. The analysis showed distinct clusters of lice that rarely interbreed and were found in different locations. Cluster I was found all over the world, while Cluster II was found in Europe and the Americas. The only lice that had ancestry from both clusters are found in the Americas. This distinct group of lice appears to be the result of a mixture between lice that were descended from populations that arrived with the people who crossed the Bering Land Bridge into North America and those descended from European lice. 

Researchers found genetic evidence that head lice mirrored both the movement of people into the Americas from Asia and European colonization after Christopher Columbus’s arrival in the late 1400’s.

“Central American head lice harbored the Asian background associated with the foundation of the Americas, while South American lice had marks of the European arrival,” Ariel Toloza, a study co-author and insect toxicologist at Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnica (CONICET) in Argentina, tells PopSci. “We also detected a recent human migration from Europe to the Americas after WWII.” 

[Related: Rare parasites found in 200 million-year-old reptile poop.]

The evidence in this study supports the theory that the first people living in the Americas came from Asia between 14,000 and 16,000 years ago and moved south into Central and South America. However, other archaeological evidence like the 23,000 to 21,000 year-old White Sands footprints and Native American tradition suggests that humans were already living in the Americas before and during the last ice age. Some potentially 30,000-year-old stone tools were discovered in a cave in Central Mexico in 2020, which also questions the land bridge theory. 

The study also fills in some of lice’s evolutionary gaps and the team sequenced the louse full genome for future research. 

“The same louse DNA used for this first study was used to analyze their whole genomes and also more lice were collected, so in the next year or so, there will be new studies trying to answer our ongoing questions,” says Ascunce. 

Technological improvements can also now help scientists study include ancient DNA from lice that has been found in mummies or even from louse DNA recovered from ancient combs. The study also offers some lessons in studying animals that we may generally experience as a nuisance.

“The world is full of a lot of plants and animals that are reviled or despised,” says Reed. “You never fully [know] what role they play in the environment or what their true value might be. So, be curious and see what stories the lowliest of animals might have to tell.”

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On November 7, the European Space Agency (ESA) released the first five images taken with its premier Euclid space telescope. The images show spiral galaxies, star nurseries, and incredible celestial objects in incredibly sharp detail. 

[Related: Euclid space telescope begins its search through billions of galaxies for dark matter and energy.]

Perseus cluster of galaxies

IC 342 aka the ‘Hidden Galaxy’

Irregular galaxy NGC 6822

[Related: Your guide to the types of stars, from their dusty births to violent deaths.]

Globular cluster NGC 6397

The Horsehead Nebula

Dark matter and dark energy

In July, Euclid launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. It’s on a mission of studying the mysterious influence of dark matter and dark energy on the universe and mapping one third of the extragalactic sky. According to the ESA, 95 percent of our cosmos appears to be made of these mysterious ‘dark’ entities. But we don’t understand what they are because their presence causes only very subtle changes in the appearance and motions of the things we can see.

“Dark matter pulls galaxies together and causes them to spin more rapidly than visible matter alone can account for; dark energy is driving the accelerated expansion of the Universe. Euclid will for the first-time allow cosmologists to study these competing dark mysteries together,” Carole Mundell, ESA Director of Science, said in a statement. “Euclid will make a leap in our understanding of the cosmos as a whole, and these exquisite Euclid images show that the mission is ready to help answer one of the greatest mysteries of modern physics.”

Euclid will observe the shapes, distances, and motions of billions of galaxies out to 10 billion light-years over the course of the next six years.

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Astronomers have discovered the most distant supermassive black hole ever observed. They had the help of a “cosmic magnifying glass,” or gravitational lensing. This happens when a massive celestial body creates a large curvature of spacetime so that the path of light around it can be bent as if by a lens.

The black hole is located in the galaxy UHZ1 in the direction of the galaxy cluster Abell 2744. The galaxy cluster is about 13.2 billion-years-old. The team used NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to find the telltale signature of a growing black hole. It started to form only 470 million years after the big bang when the universe was only 3 percent of its current age of about 13.7 billion years-old. The galaxy is much more distant than the cluster itself, at 13.2 billion light-years from Earth. 

[Related: Gravitational wave detector now squeezes light to find more black holes.]

Astronomers can tell that this black hole is so young because it is so giant. Black holes evaporate over time. Most black holes in galactic centers have a mass that is equal to roughly a tenth of the stars in their host galaxy, according to NASA. This early black hole is growing and as a mass that is on par with our entire galaxy. Astronomers have never witnessed a black hole at this stage before and studying it could help explain how some of the first supermassive black holes in the universe formed. The findings are detailed in a study published November 6 in the journal Nature Astronomy.

“We needed Webb to find this remarkably distant galaxy and Chandra to find its supermassive black hole,” study co-author and astronomer Akos Bogdan said in a statement. Bogdan is affiliated with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

“We also took advantage of a cosmic magnifying glass that boosted the amount of light we detected,” Bogman added. This magnifying effect is known as gravitational lensing. The team took X-ray observations with Chandra for two weeks. They saw intense, superheated X-ray emitting gas—a supermassive black hole’s trademark—from the galaxy. The light coming from the galaxy and the X-ray from the gas around the supermassive black hole were magnified by the hot gas and dark matter coming from the galaxy cluster. This effect was like a “cosmic magnifying glass” and it enhanced the infrared light signals that the JWST could detect and allowed Chandra to see the faint X-ray source.

“There are physical limits on how quickly black holes can grow once they’ve formed, but ones that are born more massive have a head start. It’s like planting a sapling, which takes less time to grow into a full-size tree than if you started with only a seed,” study co-author and Princeton University astronomer Andy Goulding said in a statement. 

[Related: ‘Rogue black holes’ might be neither ‘rogue’ nor ‘black holes.’]

Observing this phenomenon could help astronomers answer how some supermassive black holes can hit enormous masses so soon after the explosion of energy from the big bang. There are two opposed theories for the origin of these supermassive black holes–light seed versus heavy seed. The light seed theory says that a star will collapse into a stellar mass black hole and then grow into a supermassive black hole over time. In the heavy seed theory, a large cloud of gas–not an individual star–collapses and condenses to form the supermassive black hole. This newly discovered black hole could confirm the heavy seed theory. 

“We think that this is the first detection of an ‘Outsize Black Hole’ and the best evidence yet obtained that some black holes form from massive clouds of gas,” study co-author and Yale University theoretical astrophysicist Priyamvada Natarajan said in a statement. “For the first time we are seeing a brief stage where a supermassive black hole weighs about as much as the stars in its galaxy, before it falls behind.”

The team plans to use this and more data coming in from the JWST and other space telescopes to create a better picture of the early universe. 

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On November 3, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History debuted a piece of the asteroid Bennu to the public for the first time. The sample was deposited on Earth by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft on September 24. The spacecraft did not land, but instead dropped a capsule containing about nine ounces of asteroid samples down to Earth. The spacecraft continued on to a new mission called OSIRIS-APEX. It is set to explore the asteroid Apophis when it comes within 20,000 miles of Earth in 2029. 

On display is a 0.3-inch in diameter stone that weighs only 0.005-ounces. The stone was retrieved amidst rocks and dust collected by the spacecraft in 2020 after two years of exploring Bennu. 

[Related: NASA’s first asteroid-return sample is a goldmine of life-sustaining materials.]

OSIRIS-REx stands for Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, and Security-Regolith Explorer and is the first US mission to collect samples from an asteroid. The spacecraft traveled 1.4-billion-miles from Earth, to the asteroid Bennu, and then back again. Bennu is roughly 4.5 billion years old and dates back to the crucial first 10 million years of the solar system’s development. Its age offers scientists a window into what this time period looked like. The space rock is shaped like a spinning top and is about one-third of a mile across at its widest part–slightly wider than the Empire State Building is tall. It revolves around the sun between the orbits of Earth and Mars.

“The OSIRIS-REx mission is an incredible scientific achievement that promises to shed light on what makes our planet unique,” Kirk Johnson, the Sant Director of the National Museum of Natural History, said in a statement. “With the help of our partners at NASA, we are proud to put one of these momentous samples on display to the public for the first time.”

The sample was labeled OREX-800027-0 by NASA scientists at Houston’s Johnson Space Center and is being stored in a nitrogen environment to keep it safe from contamination. CT scans of the displayed stone revealed that it is composed of dozens of smaller rocks. The fragments were fused back together at some point and the entire stone was changed by the presence of water. The alterations to the stone produced clays, iron oxides, iron sulfides, and carbonates as its major minerals and even carbon. 

The samples from this mission hold chemical clues to our solar system’s formation. Evidence of essential elements like carbon in the rocks outside of the main sample container have already been uncovered by NASA scientists. These early samples also contain some water-rich minerals. Scientists believe that similar water-containing asteroids bombarded Earth billions of years ago, which provided the water that eventually formed our planet’s first oceans.

[Related: NASA’s OSIRIS mission delivered asteroid samples to Earth.]

“Having now returned to Earth without being exposed to our water-rich atmosphere or the life that fills every corner of our planet, the samples of Bennu hold the promise to tell us about the water and organics before life came to form our unique planet,” museum meteorite curator Tim McCoy said in a statement. McCoy has worked on the OSIRIS-REx mission for nearly two decades as part of an international team of scientists.

According to Space.com, a sizable crowd turned out to see the space rock and NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and other space agency and Smithsonian officials were present at the unveiling ceremony. Additional Bennu samples will be on display at a later date and at the Alfie Norville Gem & Mineral Museum at the University of Arizona in Tucson and Space Center Houston, next to to NASA’s Johnson Space Center.

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North Carolina’s Outer Banks saw a busy sea turtle nesting season this year. The barrier islands stretching from Ocracoke Island north to the Virginia state saw 459 total nests between May and October, according to reporting from The Virginian-Pilot and three conservation groups in the state dedicated to sea turtle nesting.

[Related: This waddling robot could guide baby turtles to the sea.]

There are six species of sea turtles native to the United States—green, hawksbill, Kemp’s ridley, leatherback, loggerhead, and olive ridley. All six species are protected by the Endangered Species Act and four of them are known to nest in North Carolina. Human activities are the biggest threats to sea turtle species around the world. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) says that their biggest threats are being caught in fishing gear, nesting and habitat loss, pollution and marine debris, boat strikes, climate change, and the direct harvest of sea turtles and eggs.

During the early to middle of the summer in the Outer Banks, female turtles return to the same beaches where they hatched to dig nests into the sand. They use their back flippers to dig a hole in the ground to deposit the eggs, and then cover it back up with sand. According to the National Park Service, the nesting process takes about one to three hours to complete. 

The tiny turtles hatch a few months later and follow the light of the moon to the ocean. However, their journey from their nests is quite hazardous, as they can be misdirected by artificial lights from homes and streets, crushed by human activity, or eaten by predators on their way to the ocean. 

[Related: Endangered green turtles are bouncing back in the Seychelles.]

At Cape Hatteras National Seashore, this year tied with 2022 as the second-busiest nesting season on record with 379 reported nests. The area covers more than 70 miles and stretches from Ocracoke Island north to Nags Head. The National Park Service says that the first nest was found on May 12 and the most recent was seen on October 29. The nests comprised 324 loggerhead turtles, 51 green turtles, three Kemp’s ridleys, and one leatherback. The leatherback nest was the first one seen on Hatteras National Seashore in 11 years.

Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge on the northern end of Hatteras island reported its third-busiest nesting season since 2009. The refuge covers about 13 miles and saw 43 sea turtle nests this year. By species, 37 nests belonged to loggerhead turtles and six were green turtle nests, according to data from the Sea Turtle Nest Monitoring System.

The nonprofit Network for Endangered Sea Turtles (NEST) also reported its third-busiest nesting season since 2015. Vice President Susan Silbernagel said 30 nests belong to loggerhead turtles and seven were green turtle nests. The all-volunteer organization covers about 50 miles from Nags Head up to Virginia. 

[Related: Safely share the beach with endangered sea turtles this summer.]

To better protect the endangered turtles, volunteers and scientists have been regularly monitoring the region’s beaches since 1997. Staff members and volunteers at Cape Hatteras will establish a buffer zone around the nests for added protection. 

“We could not manage and monitor sea turtle nesting without the help of over 50 dedicated volunteers that assist with monitoring of our nests and reporting and responding to sea turtle strandings,” Michelle Tongue told The Virginian-Pilot. Tongue is the deputy chief of resource management and science for the National Park Service’s Outer Banks Group. 

Sea turtles spend the vast majority of their lives in the ocean and are among the largest reptiles in the world. Kemp’s ridley and green sea turtles weigh about 75 to 100 pounds, while leatherbacks can weigh about 2,000 pounds. Sea turtles are set apart from their pond or land-dwelling relatives by their flippers. Instead of these appendages, land and pond turtles have feet with claws. 

Continued monitoring and vigilance during the 2024 nesting season will hopefully increase survival rates for these endangered reptiles.

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Humans are the only primates currently living in the wild in North America, but that was not always the case. The continent was once home to non-human primates, including big-eyed tarsier-like animals called omomyiforms and long-tailed critters called adapiforms. About 30 million years ago, a lemur-like creature named Ekgmowechashala was the last primate to inhabit the continent before Homo sapiens arrived. In a study published November 6 in the Journal of Human Evolution, fossil teeth and jaws shed some new light on this mysterious creature. 

[Related: 12-million-year-old ape skull bares its fangs in virtual reconstruction.]

From China to Nebraska

Understanding the origins of North America’s primates has been a paleontological puzzle. It’s been unclear whether they evolved on the continent or arrived from somewhere else via land bridges. The first first primates in North America date back about 56 million years at the beginning of the Eocene Epoch. Scientists believe that the primates like Ekgmowechashala generally flourished on the continent for over 20 million years. 

Ekgmowechashala was about five pounds and only one foot tall. They lived in what is now the American Plains just after the Eocene-Oligocene transition. At this time, a huge cooling and dying event made the continent much less hospitable for primates. Ekgmowechashala went extinct about 34 million years ago. 

For the study, paleontologists first had to reconstruct Ekgmowechashala’s family tree with the help of  an older “sister taxon,” or a closely related group of animals. Both groups generally share a branch on their family trees, but diverged at some point and have different lineages. This sister animal originates in and the team named it Palaeohodites, which means “ancient wanderer.” The fossils were collected by paleontologists from the United States in the 1990s from the Nadu Formation in Guangxi, an autonomous region in China. The fossils closely resembled the Ekgmowechashala material that had been found in North America in the 1960s, when the primate was still quite mysterious to North American paleontologists.

The Palaeohodites fossil potentially helps resolve the mystery of Ekgmowechashala’s strange presence in North America. It was likely a migrant to the continent instead of being the product of local evolution.

“Due to its unique morphology and its representation only by dental remains, its place on the mammalian evolutionary tree has been a subject of contention and debate. There’s been a prevailing consensus leaning towards its classification as a primate,” study co-author and University of Kansas PhD candidate Kathleen Rust said in a statement. “But the timing and appearance of this primate in the North American fossil record are quite unusual. It appears suddenly in the fossil record of the Great Plains more than 4 million years after the extinction of all other North American primates, which occurred around 34 million years ago.”

[Related: These primate ancestors were totally chill with a colder climate.]

The Ekgmowechashala fossils found in the US during the 1960s include an upper molar that looks very similar to the Palaeohodites molars found in China, according to study co-author and University of Kansas paleontologist Chris Beard. The team from Kansas closely analyzed the fossils to establish evolutionary relationships between the American Ekgmowechashala and its cousin Palaeohodites. 

The paleontologists believe that Ekgmowechashala did not descend from an older North American primate that survived the climate shift roughly 33 million years ago that caused other North American primates to go extinct. Instead, Ekgmowechashala’s ancestors likely crossed over the icy Beringian region that once connected Asia and North America millions of years later.

Rising from the dead

Ekgmowechashala is an example of the “Lazarus effect” in paleontology. This is where a species suddenly appears in the fossil record long after their relatives have died off. It is a reference to Lazarus who, according to New Testament mythology, was raised from the dead. It is also a pattern of evolution seen in the fossil record of North American primates, who went extinct about 34 million years ago. 

“Several million years later Ekgmowechashala shows up like a drifting gunslinger in a Western movie, only to be a flash in the pan as far as the long trajectory of evolution is concerned,” Beard said in a statement. “After Ekgmowechashala is gone for more than 25 million years, Clovis people come to North America, marking the third chapter of primates on this continent. Like Ekgmowechashala, humans in North America are a prime example of the Lazarus effect.”

The past is prologue?

Studying the way primates were affected by previous changes in climate can provide important insight to today’s human-driven climate change. Organisms generally retreat to more hospitable regions with the available resources or end up going extinct. 

“Around 34 million years ago, all of the primates in North America couldn’t adapt and survive. North America lacked the necessary conditions for survival,” said Rust. “This underscores the significance of accessible resources for our non-human primate relatives during times of drastic climatic change.

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The freshly released images from NASA’s Lucy spacecraft’s first asteroid flyby reveal that Dinkinesh is actually a binary pair. A binary asteroid pair has a larger main asteroid and a smaller satellite orbiting around it. In the weeks leading up to the flyby, the Lucy team had wondered if Dinkinesh was actually a binary system because Lucy’s instruments detected the brightness of the asteroid changing over time. This is a sign that something is getting in the way of the light, likely a body orbiting the main space rock. 

[Related: NASA spacecraft Lucy says hello to ‘Dinky’ asteroid on far-flying mission.]

From a preliminary analysis of the first available images, the team estimates that the larger asteroid body is roughly 0.5 miles at its widest and that the smaller body is about 0.15 miles in size.

Dinkinesh is another name for the Lucy fossil that this mission is named after. The 3.2 million-year-old skeletal remains of a human ancestor were found in Ethiopia in 1974. The name Dinkinesh means “marvelous” in the Amharic language. 

“Dinkinesh really did live up to its name; this is marvelous,” Hal Levison, Lucy principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute, said in a statement. “When Lucy was originally selected for flight, we planned to fly by seven asteroids. With the addition of Dinkinesh, two Trojan moons, and now this satellite, we’ve turned it up to 11.”

The November 1 encounter primarily served as an in-flight test of the asteroid-studying spacecraft. It specifically focused on testing the system that allows it to autonomously track an asteroid as it whizzes by at 10,000 miles per hour. The team calls this its terminal tracking system.

“This is an awesome series of images. They indicate that the terminal tracking system worked as intended, even when the universe presented us with a more difficult target than we expected,” Lockheed Martin guidance and navigation engineer Tom Kennedy said in a statement. “It’s one thing to simulate, test, and practice. It’s another thing entirely to see it actually happen.”

It will take up to a week for the remainder of the data from the flyby to be downloaded to Earth. This week’s encounter was carried out as an engineering check, but the team’s scientists are hoping this data will help them glean insights into the nature of small asteroids.

“We knew this was going to be the smallest main belt asteroid ever seen up close,” NASA Lucy project scientist Keith Noll said in a statement. “The fact that it is two makes it even more exciting. In some ways these asteroids look similar to the near-Earth asteroid binary Didymos and Dimorphos that DART saw, but there are some really interesting differences that we will be investigating.”

[Related: Why scientists are studying the clouds of debris left in DART’s wake.]

The Lucy team plans to use this first flyby data to evaluate the spacecraft’s behavior and  prepare for its next close-up look at an asteroid. This next encounter is scheduled for April 2025, when Lucy is expected to fly by the main belt asteroid 52246 Donaldjohanson. This asteroid is named after American paleoanthropologist Donald Johnson, one the scientists who discovered the Lucy fossils.

Launched in October 2021, NASA’s Lucy mission is the first spacecraft set to explore the Trojan asteroids. This group of primitive space rocks is orbiting our solar system’s largest planet Jupiter. They orbit in two swarms, with one moving  ahead of Jupiter and the other lagging behind it. 

There are about 7,000 asteroids in this belt, with the largest asteroid estimated to be about 160 miles across. The asteroids are similar to fossils and represent the leftover material that is still hanging around after the giant planets including Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune formed.

Lucy will then travel into the leading Trojan asteroid swarm. After that, the spacecraft will fly past six Trojan asteroids, including binary asteroids like Dinkinesh: Eurybates and its satellite Queta, Polymele and its yet unnamed satellite, Leucus, and Orus. 

In 2030, Lucy will return to Earth for yet another bump that will gear it up for a rendezvous with the Patroclus-Menoetius binary asteroid pair in the trailing Trojan asteroid swarm. This mission is scheduled to conclude some time in 2033.

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Among domestic cats, feline obesity is the most frequent nutritional disorder veterinarians in the United States see. Defined as a body weight that is 20 percent or more above a normal weight of eight to 12 pounds, it can impact a cat’s longevity and lead to diabetes and chronic inflammation among other health problems. A study published in the Journal of Animal Science in September found that overeating has some observable effects on feline gut microbiota and digestive system. 

[Related: A new shot can be a safe and effective alternative to surgical spaying.]

According to study co-author and University of Illinois nutritional scientist Kelly Swanson, about 60 percent of cats in the US are considered overweight. 

“While many studies have investigated feline weight loss, there has been little focus on the opposite process, which is also important. In this study, we wanted to learn more about the metabolic and gastrointestinal changes that occur as a result of overeating and weight gain in cats,” Swanson said in a statement. 

Complex changes

In the study, 11 adult spayed female cats were fed a standard dry cat food for two weeks. Baseline body measurements were taken and they were then allowed to eat as much as they wanted. The researchers also collected blood and poop samples at regular intervals and monitored their physical activity. Weight gain was assessed using a body condition score (BCS), which is similar to the controversial body mass index (BMI) in humans. BCS is measured on a 9-point scale where anything 6 or above is considered overweight. Like in humans, BCS is a quantitative, but also subjective, method for evaluating body fat in pets.

The cats immediately increased their food intake when they were allowed to overeat and they began to gain weight. When the study began, their average BCS was 5.41. Their BCS increased to 8.27 after 18 weeks of overfeeding. This corresponds to the cats being about 30 percent overweight by body mass. 

The researchers also analyzed changes in how much the felines pooped, their gastrointestinal transit time, how well nutrients were being digested, and changes in the build up of their gut microbiome over the 20-week study.

“We found that as cats ate more and gained weight, gastrointestinal transit time was reduced, and so was digestive efficiency. When the body gets less food, it will be more efficient in extracting nutrients. But when the amount of food increases, it passes through the digestive system faster and fewer nutrients are extracted in the process,” Swanson explained.  

A cat-specific bacteria shift 

During the 18 weeks of weight gain, the composition of the cats’ gut microbiome also changed. An anti-microbial bacteria that helps stimulate the immune system and inhibits pathogens called Bifidobacterium increased. At the same time, a bacteria that degrades fiber and has been linked to pro-inflammatory disease called Collinsella decreased. According to Swanson, these results are the opposite of what has been measured in overweight humans and suggests that their association to weight gain is complicated.  

[Related: Your cat probably knows when you’re talking to it.]

“The change in the gastrointestinal transit time was a novel finding and a potential reason for the change in fecal microbiota. Future studies should consider measuring transit time to better explain modifications to the microbiome of pets,” Swanson added. 

The more the cats ate, the more they pooped. At the same time that the cats were putting on pounds, fecal pH decreased, meaning that their poop became more acidic. A low fecal pH in humans indicates that the body isn’t absorbing fat or carbohydrates well. It appears that a lower fecal pH with higher food intake also reduced digestibility for cats. 

To measure activity level, the team used special collars. The cats were kept in a group setting where they could interact with one another and play with toys, except on the days when stool samples were collected.

“We expected that weight gain might lead to decreased physical activity, but we did not observe any consistent changes in activity level. However, this could vary with individual cats and their environment, and how much their owners interact with them,” said Swanson.

At the end of the study, the cats were put on a restricted-feeding diet that helped them return to their previous weights. A better understanding of the gastrointestinal and metabolic changes that occur with obesity in domestic pets could help with future prevention and treatment plans. Another new study co-authored by Swanson, demonstrated that restricted feeding can promote safe weight and fat loss in cats. 

The team also suggests that pet parents encourage regular physical activity with their cats. They can make it fun for the cats by stimulating foraging by placing food around the house, or using food puzzles during mealtime. Both of these strategies promote engagement and mental enrichment, according to Swanson. 

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A team of scientists at Northwestern University have developed synthetic melanin that can accelerate healing in human skin. It is applied in a cream and can protect the skin from the sun and heal chemical burns, according to the team. The findings are described in a study published November 2 in the journal Nature npj Regenerative Medicine.

What is melanin?

Melanin is a pigment that is naturally produced in humans and animals. It provides pigmentation to the hair, eyes, and skin. It protects skin cells from sun damage by increasing pigmentation in response to the sun–a process commonly called tanning. 

“People don’t think of their everyday life as an injury to their skin,” study co-author and dermatologist Kurt Lu said in a statement. “If you walk barefaced every day in the sun, you suffer a low-grade, constant bombardment of ultraviolet light. This is worsened during peak mid-day hours and the summer season. We know sun-exposed skin ages versus skin protected by clothing, which doesn’t show age nearly as much.”

[Related: A new artificial skin could be more sensitive than the real thing.]

Aging in the skin is also due to simply getting older and external factors like environmental pollution. Sun damage, chronological aging, and environmental pollutants can create unstable oxygen molecules called free radicals. These molecules can then cause inflammation and break down the collagen in the skin. It is one of the reasons that older skin looks very different than younger skin. 

‘An efficient sponge’

In the study, the team used a synthetic melanin that was engineered with nanoparticles. They modified the melanin structure so that it has a higher free radical-scavenging capacity.

Researchers used a chemical to create a blistering reaction to a sample of human skin tissue in a dish. The blistering looked like a separation of the upper layers of the skin from each other and was similar to an inflamed reaction to poison ivy. 

They waited a few hours, then applied their topical melanin cream to the injured skin. The cream facilitated an immune response within the first few days, by initially helping the skin’s own free radical-scavenging enzymes recover. A cascade of responses followed where healing sped up, including the preservation of the healthy layers of skin underneath the top layers. The synthetic melanin cream soaked up the free radicals and quieted the immune system. By comparison, blistering persisted in the control samples that did not have the melanin cream treatment. 

“The synthetic melanin is capable of scavenging more radicals per gram compared to human melanin,” study co-author and chemist/biomedical engineer Nathan Gianneschi said in a statement.  “It’s like super melanin. It’s biocompatible, degradable,nontoxic and clear when rubbed onto the skin. In our studies, it acts as an efficient sponge, removing damaging factors and protecting the skin.”

According to the team, the super melanin sits on the surface of the skin once it is applied and isn’t absorbed into the layers below. It sets the skin on a cycle of healing and repair that is directed by the body’s immune system. 

[Related: The lowest-effort skincare routine that will still make your skin glow.]

Protection from nerve gas

Gianneschi and Lu are studying using melanin as a protective dye in clothing. The thought is the pigment could act as an absorbent for toxins, particularly nerve gas. 

“Although it [melanin] can act this way naturally, we have engineered it to optimize absorption of these toxic molecules with our synthetic version,” Gianneschi said in a statement

They are also pursuing more clinical trials for testing their synthetic melanin cream. In a first step, they recently completed a trial showing that the synthetic melanins do not irritate human skin. Since it protects tissue from high energy radiation, it could also be an effective treatment for burns cancer patients undergoing radiation therapy often experience. 

This research was funded by the United States Department of Defense and the National Institutes of Health.

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The ability to get lost in thoughts and use our imaginations to daydream might not be completely unique to humans. A study published November 2 in the journal Science found that rats can think about objects and places that are not right in front of them. 

[Related: How science came to rely on the humble lab rat.]

Imagining locations that are away from our current position is a component of both memory and conjuring up possible future scenarios. If animals have this ability, they could have a form of imagination that is similar to our species.

“The rat can indeed activate the representation of places in the environment without going there,” Chongxi Lai, a co-author of the study and engineer and neuroscientist at Howard Hughes Medical Institute, said in a statement. “Even if his physical body is fixed, his spatial thoughts can go to a very remote location.”

To learn more, Lai and a team at Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Maryland designed a series of experiments to see if rats can use their thoughts to imagine going towards a specific location or moving a remote object.

Reading a rat’s mind

When humans and rodents experience events or visit places, specific neural activity patterns are activated in their hippocampus. This area of the brain is responsible for spatial memory and stores mental maps of the rat’s world. It is also involved in recalling past events and imagining future situations. To recall memories, specific patterns related to places and events are generated in the hippocampus. Chimpanzees have been shown to have the ability to pretend, but scientists are still figuring out how chimps and other non-human animals think. 

To peer inside of a rat’s brain and look at these brain patterns, the team developed a real-time “thought detector.” This system measures neural activity and translates what it means using a brain-machine interface (BMI). 

The BMI produced a connection between the electrical activity occurring in the rat’s hippocampus and the animal’s position in a 360-degree virtual reality arena. It allowed the researchers to see if a rat can activate hippocampal activity to think about a location in the virtual arena without physically traveling there. 

A rat ‘thought dictionary’

With the BMI in place, the team worked to decode the brain signals in the rats. They built a “thought dictionary” of what the brain activity patterns looked like when the rat was traveling through the virtual arena in the experiment.

To do this, the rat was harnessed into a virtual reality system. As the rat walked on a spherical treadmill, its movements were translated onto a 360-degree screen. The rat was rewarded when it navigated towards its goal.

While the rat walked on the treadmill, the BMI system recorded the activity occurring in the hippocampus. The team saw which neurons were activated when the rat navigated the virtual arena to reach each goal. These signals provided them with the basis for a real-time translation of what was going on in the hippocampus.

With the thought dictionary set up, the team disconnected the treadmill. The rat was rewarded for the first step of reproducing the hippocampal activity pattern that was associated with walking towards a goal location.

The Jumper task and the Jedi task

Next, they designed two different tasks for the rats to perform–the Jumper task and the Jedi task.

In the Jumper task, the BMI translated the rat’s brain activity into motion on a screen. The animal was essentially using its thoughts to find a reward by thinking about where it needs to go to obtain it. This is a thought process similar to traveling to work or school and imagining the buildings and places we will pass along the way. 

[Related: We probably have big brains because we got lucky.]

The Jedi task had a rat hypothetically move an object to a location in its mind. The rat was fixed in a virtual place, but controlled its hippocampal activity to envision moving the object towards a goal. This is similar to how a person sitting on a couch imagining  getting up and refilling a water glass in a kitchen. The team then changed the location of the rat’s goal, which required it to produce activity patterns associated with the new location.

They found that the rats can precisely and flexibly control their hippocampal activity. Surprisingly, they could sustain this activity and hold their thoughts on a given location for many seconds. This time frame is similar to the amount of time humans can take to relive past events or imagine new scenarios.

“The stunning thing is how rats learn to think about that place, and no other place, for a very long period of time, based on our, perhaps naïve, notion of the attention span of a rat,” Tim Harris, a study co-author and biophysicist from Howard Hughes Medical Institute, said in a statement.

According to the team, this study shows how BMI can be used to probe hippocampal activity and could be a new way to study this critical region of the brain. BMI is increasingly used in prosthetics, and this new work could be used to develop devices based on these same principles.

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On November 1, NASA’s Lucy spacecraft successfully completed its first asteroid flyby. The 56 feet-long spacecraft came within 230 miles of the asteroid Dinkinesh aka “Dinky.” This fairly small space rock is in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. 

[Related: Meet Lucy: NASA’s new asteroid-hopping spacecraft.]

Dinkinesh is the first of 10 asteroids the probe will visit over the next 10 years. The asteroid is about 10 to 100 times smaller than the Jupiter Trojan asteroids that are the main target of the Lucy mission. Dinkinesh is another name for the Lucy fossil that this mission is named after. The 3.2 million-year-old skeletal remains of a human ancestor were found in Ethiopia in 1974.

Lucy zoomed by Dinkinesh at about 10,000 miles per hour.  This encounter was the first in-flight test of the spacecraft’s terminal tracking system. 

“The Lucy operations team has confirmed that NASA’s Lucy spacecraft has phoned home after its encounter with the small main belt asteroid, Dinkinesh,” NASA wrote in a blog post. “Based on the information received, the team has determined that the spacecraft is in good health and the team has commanded the spacecraft to start downlinking the data collected during the encounter.”

It will take NASA up to a week to download the data on how Lucy performed during this first in-flight test during the encounter. NASA planned for the high-resolution grayscale camera onboard Lucy to take a series of images every 15 minutes. Dinkinesh has been visible to Lucy’s Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (L’LORRI) as a single point of light since early September. The team began to use L’LORRI to assist with the navigation of the spacecraft. 

Lucy’s thermal infrared instrument (L’TES) should also begin to collect data. Since L’TES was not designed to observe an asteroid quite as small as Dinkinesh, the team is interested to see if it can detect the half-mile wide asteroid and measure its temperature during the encounter.

Astronomers plan to use the data from this approach to gain a better understanding of small near-Earth asteroids and if they originate from larger main belt asteroids. 

Launched in October 2021, NASA’s Lucy mission is the first spacecraft set to explore the Trojan asteroids. These are a group of primitive space rocks orbiting our solar system’s largest planet Jupiter. They orbit in two swarms, with one ahead of Jupiter and the other lagging behind it. Lucy is expected to provide the first high-resolution images of what these space rocks look like. 

There are about 7,000 asteroids in this belt with the largest about 160 miles across. The asteroids are similar to fossils and represent the leftover material that is still hanging around after the giant planets including Uranus, Neptune, Jupiter, and Saturn formed.

[Related: New image reveals a Jupiter-like world that may share its orbit with a ‘twin.’]

In 2024, Lucy will return towards Earth for a second gravity push that will give it the energy needed to cross the solar system’s main asteroid belt. It is expected to observe asteroid 52246 Donaldjohanson in 2025. This asteroid is named after American paleoanthropologist Donald Johnson, one the scientists who discovered the Lucy fossils.

It will then travel into the leading Trojan asteroid swarm. After that, the spacecraft will fly past six Trojan asteroids: Eurybates and its satellite Queta, Polymele and its yet unnamed satellite, Leucus, and Orus. 

In 2030, Lucy will return to Earth for yet another bump that will gear it up for a rendezvous with the Patroclus-Menoetius binary asteroid pair in the trailing Trojan asteroid swarm. This mission is scheduled to end some time in 2033.

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Scavenging has been maligned as a food gathering strategy and is generally associated with animals like vultures and hyenas. Millions of years ago, carnivorous dinosaurs may have evolved this technique of taking meat from dead carcasses too. The findings are described in a study published November 1 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE.

[Related: Dinosaur cannibalism was real, and Colorado paleontologists have the bones to prove it.]

Carnivorous dinosaurs like the cannibalistic Allosaurus were surrounded by both living and dead prey. The bodies of large sauropod dinosaurs, some of whom could weigh more than 500,000 pounds, could have provided an important food source for carnivores.

In this study, a team of researchers from Portland State University created a simplified computer simulation of a dinosaur ecosystem from the Jurassic age. They used the animals that have been found in the 163.5 to 145 million year-old Morrison Formation in the western United States as the basis. This enormous fossil formation was once home to a wide variety of plants and dinosaurs.

The model included large carnivores common to the area like Allosaurus, large sauropods and their carcasses, and a large group of living and huntable Stegosaurus’. The carnivores were assigned traits that would improve their hunting abilities with the energy from living meat sources or their scavenging abilities with the sustenance from the carcasses. The model then measured the evolutionary fitness of the simulated predators. 

The model found that when there were a large amount of sauropod carcasses around, scavenging was more profitable than hunting for the Allosaurus. Meat eaters in these kinds of ecosystems may have evolved specialized traits to help them detect and exploit these large carcasses.

“Our evolutionary model demonstrates that large theropods such as Allosaurus could have evolved to subsist on sauropod carrion as their primary resource,” the authors wrote in a statement. “Even when huntable prey was available to them, selection pressure favored the scavengers, while the predators suffered from lower fitness.”

[Related: This 30-pound eagle would take down 400-pound prey and dig through their organs.]

This model represents only a simplified depiction of a complex ecosystem, so more variables like additional dinosaur species may alter the results. While theoretical, using models like this one can help scientists better understand how the availability of meat from carcasses can influence how predators evolve. A September 2023 modeling study found that even early humans living in southern Europe roughly 1.2 to 0.8 million years ago were scavengers. They may have competed in groups of five or more to fight off extinct giant hyenas for the carcasses of animals that had been abandoned by larger predators like saber-toothed cats.

“We think allosaurs probably waited until a bunch of sauropods died in the dry season, feasted on their carcasses, stored the fat in their tails, then waited until the next season to repeat the process,” the authors wrote. “This makes sense logically too, because a single sauropod carcass had enough calories to sustain 25 or so allosaurs for weeks or even months, and sauropods were often the most abundant dinosaurs in the environment.”

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When looking at a sea star–or starfish–it’s not really clear which part of its identical five pointed body is considered its head. This question has puzzled biologists for decades, but some new research says that a starfish’s whole body could function like a head. The findings are described in a study published November 1 in the journal Nature and might have solved the mystery of how sea stars and other echinoderms evolved their distinctively shaped bodies.

[Related: This strange 500-million-year-old sea urchin relative lost its skeleton.]

Searching for heads and trunks 

Sea stars are invertebrates that belong to a group of animals called echinoderms.This group also includes sea urchins and sand dollars and they all have bodies that are arranged in five equal and symmetric sections. Early in their evolution, echinoderms had a bilaterally designed ancestor with two mirrored sides more like a human’s. 

“How the different body parts of the echinoderms relate to those we see in other animal groups has been a mystery to scientists for as long as we’ve been studying them,” Jeff Thompson, a co-author of the study and evolutionary biologist at the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom, said in a statement. “In their bilateral relatives, the body is divided into a head, trunk, and tail. But just looking at a starfish, it’s impossible to see how these sections relate to the bodies of bilateral animals.”

In the new study, an international team of scientists compared the molecular markers in sea stars with a wider group of animals called deuterostomes. This group includes echinoderms like sea star and bilateral animals including vertebrates. Deuterostomes all share a common ancestor, so comparing their development can offer clues into how echinoderms evolved their more unique five-pointed body plan.

They used multiple high-tech molecular and genomic techniques to see where different genes were expressed during a sea star’s development and growth. Micro-CT scanning also allowed the team to understand the shape and structure of the animals in closer detail.

Sea star mapping

Team members from Stanford University, the University of California, Berkeley, and Pacific BioSciences, used techniques called RNA tomography and in situ hybridization to build a three-dimensional map of a sea star’s gene expression to see where specific genes are being expressed during development. They specifically mapped the expression of the genes that control the growth of a sea star’s ectoderm, which includes its nervous system and skin. 

They found gene signatures associated with head development almost everywhere in juvenile sea stars. The expression of genes that code for an animal’s torso and tail sections were also largely missing.

[Related: What’s killing sea stars?]

“When we compared the expression of genes in a starfish to other groups of animals, like vertebrates, it appeared that a crucial part of the body plan was missing,” said Thompson. “The genes that are typically involved in the patterning of the trunk of the animal weren’t expressed in the ectoderm. It seems the whole echinoderm body plan is roughly equivalent to the head in other groups of animals.”

The molecular signatures that are typically associated with the front-most portion of an animal’s head were also localized towards the middle of each of the sea star’s five arms. 

“It’s as if the sea star is completely missing a trunk, and is best described as just a head crawling along the seafloor,” study co-author and Stanford University evolutionary biologist Laurent Formery said in a statement. “It’s not at all what scientists have assumed about these animals.” 

Sea stars and other echinoderms may have evolved their five-section body plan by losing the trunk region that their bilateral ancestors once had. This chance would have allowed them to move around and feed differently than animals with two symmetrical arms.

“Our research tells us the echinoderm body plan evolved in a more complex way than previously thought and there is still much to learn about these intriguing creatures,” said Thompson. “As someone who has studied them for the last ten years, these findings have radically changed how I think about this group of animals.”

This research was supported by the Leverhulme Trust, NASA, the NSF, and the Chan Zuckerberg BioHub.

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As Earth rotates and the sun moves across the sky from east to west, sunflowers turn their brilliant yellow faces to follow it. The mechanics behind this process, called heliotropism, is still a mystery to plant biologists. A study published October 31 in the journal PLOS Biology likely rules out that a sunflower’s ability to follow the sun is related to a more well-known response to light that all plants follow. Sunflowers probably rely on several more complicated processes to track the sun instead. 

[Related: The mathematical theory that connects swimming sperm, zebra stripes, and sunflower seeds.]

Since plants are rooted in one place, they can’t move if light they need to make food is blocked by a neighbor or if they are in a shady spot. They rely on growth or elongation to move towards the light and there are several molecular systems behind this. The best-known response is the phototropic response. Proteins called phototropins sense blue light falling unevenly on a seedling and the plant’s growth hormones are redistributed. This ultimately causes it to bend towards the light.

Plant biologists have long assumed that the sunflower’s ability to follow the sun would be based on the same mechanism as phototropism. To track the sun, the sunflower’s head leans slightly more on the eastern side of its stem. This positions their head towards the direction where the sun rises. It then shifts west as the sun moves across the sky. An earlier study showed that sunflowers have an internal circadian clock that anticipates the sunrise and coordinates the opening of its florets with the time when pollinating insects arrive in the morning. 

To investigate whether this sun-tracking ability is a shru, the team behind the new study used sunflowers grown in a laboratory and others grown outdoors in sunlight. They looked to see which genes were switched on when both sets of plants were exposed to their light sources. The indoor sunflowers grew straight towards their blue light source in the lab and activated the genes associated with phototropin. The flowers that were grown outdoors and swung their heads with the sun had a different pattern of gene expression. These sunflowers also didn’t have any apparent differences in phototropin molecules between one side of the stem and another. 

“We’ve been continually surprised by what we’ve found as we study how sunflowers follow the sun each day,” study co-author and University of California, Davis plant biologist Stacey Harmer said in a statement. “In this paper, we report that they use different molecular pathways to initiate and maintain tracking movements, and that the photoreceptors best known for causing plant bending seem to play a minor role in this remarkable process.”

The team also blocked blue, ultraviolet, red, or far-red light with shade boxes. The blinders didn’t have any effect on the heliotropism response. According to the team, this indicates that there are probably multiple pathways responding to different wavelengths of light to achieve the same goal of following the sun. 

[Related: Dying plants are ‘screaming’ at you.]

The genes involved in heliotropism have not yet been identified. “We seem to have ruled out the phototropin pathway, but we did not find a clear smoking gun,” Harmer said.

When the sunflowers grown in the lab were moved outside, they began to track the sun on their first day. They initially showed a huge burst of gene expression on the shaded side of the plant that did not happen on the following days. Harmer said this suggests some kind of “rewiring” is going on in the plant.

In addition to weeding out some of the process behind how sunflowers track the sun, this work also has relevance for designing future experiments with plants to understand their mechanisms.

“Things that you define in a controlled environment like a growth chamber may not work out in the real world,” Harmer said. 

The post We still don’t fully know how sunflowers turn toward the sun appeared first on Popular Science.

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Lampreys are the vampires of the ocean and the lakes they can invade. While these eel-like parasitic vertebrates don’t use two sharp fangs to suck blood, lampreys have a toothed oral sucker that latches onto their prey and feasts on their host’s blood. Modern day lampreys are found in temperate zones of most of the world’s oceans except in Africa. However, specimens of their extinct ancient ancestors are fairly rare in the fossil record, despite dating back roughly 360 million years. Now, paleontologists in northern China have found two unusually large fossilized lamprey species that fill a large evolutionary gap. The specimens are described in a study published October 31 in the journal Nature Communications.

[Related: Why sea lampreys are going to be a bigger problem for the Great Lakes.]

“We found the largest fossil lampreys ever found in the world,” study co-author and Chinese Academy of Sciences paleontologist Feixiang Wu tells PopSci. “Based on these fossils, our study assumed that the most recent common ancestor of modern lampreys was likely eating flesh rather than sucking blood as conventionally believed.”

The earliest known lampreys date back about 360 million years ago during the Paleozoic Era. These early species are believed to have been only a few inches long and had weak feeding structures. The 160 million-year-old fossils in this new study were discovered in the Lagerstätte Yanliao Biota in northeastern China and date back to the Jurassic. The longer of the two specimens is named Yanliaomyzon occisor. It is more than 23 inches long and is estimated to have had 16 teeth. The shorter 11 inch-long species is named Yanliaomyzon ingensdentes and had about 23 teeth. By comparison, modern lampreys range from six to 40 inches long.

Their well-preserved oral discs and “biting” structures indicate that these lamprey species had already evolved enhanced feeding structures, bigger body size, and were predators by the Jurassic period. It also appears that they had already evolved a three-phased life cycle by this point

Lampreys begin their lives as burrowing freshwater larvae called ammocetes. During this stage, they have rudimentary eyes and feed on microorganisms with their toothless mouths. They spend several years in this stage, before transforming into adults. Some move into saltwater, while others will remain in freshwater. As adults, they become parasites that attach to a fish with their mouths and feed on their blood and tissue. Lampreys eventually return to freshwater to reproduce, where they build a nest, then spawn, and then die.

It is still unclear when lampreys evolved this lifecycle and their more complex teeth for feeding. These new well-preserved fossils fill an important gap in the fossil record and give some insights into how its lifecycle and feeding originated. 

[Related: Evolution made mosquitos into stealthy, sensitive vampires.]

The study also pinpoints where and when today’s lamprey’s first appeared. “We put modern lampreys’ origin in the Southern Hemisphere of the Late Cretaceous,” says Wu. 

The Late Cretacous lasted from 100.5 million years ago to 66 million years ago and ended with the mass extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs. In future research, the team would like to search for specimens from the Cretaceous. According to Wu, this time period could be very important to their evolutionary history.

More fossilized specimens could also provide more accurate ideas of what kinds of flesh ancient lampreys feasted on with all those teeth and how that has evolved over time. 

“Living lampreys are always hailed as ‘water vampires,’ but their ancestor might be a flesh eater, their teeth tell,” says Wu. 

The post Giant prehistoric lamprey likely sucked blood—and ate flesh appeared first on Popular Science.

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