Science

  SpaceX has finally confirmed what we all suspected — its Dragon II spacecraft was totally destroyed during a test late last month. The admission comes from the company’s vice president of mission assurance Hans Koenigsmann. During a recent press event, Koenigsmann addressed the loss of the capsule and provided …

A duo of researchers from the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University has made the first-ever measurements of ancient water contained in samples collected by JAXA’s Hayabusa mission from the peanut-shaped asteroid (25143) Itokawa. The results appear in the journal Science Advances. The S-type asteroid Itokawa. …

Giant pandas (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) feed almost exclusively on highly fibrous bamboo, yet they bear a mix of herbivore and carnivore traits. A new study published in the journal Current Biology shows that the macronutrient composition of the diet of giant pandas is similar to that of carnivore diets and unlike …

A team of planetary researchers from the United States, Canada and Italy has detected an ice-rich linear feature of bedrock in the tropical region of Saturn’s hazy moon Titan. A false-color view of Titan, a moon of Saturn surrounded by a thick orange haze. Image credit: NASA / JPL / …

Scientists say they have discovered an antidote to the sting delivered by the box jellyfish Chironex fleckeri, which is considered to be one of the most venomous animals on Earth. The antidote blocks the symptoms of a box jellyfish sting if administered to the skin within 15 minutes after contact; …

The elderberry (Sambucus nigra) is a small, antioxidant-rich fruit common to Europe and North America that is still commonly consumed as a jam or wine. According to a new study, published in the Journal of Functional Foods, compounds from elderberries exhibit multiple modes of therapeutic action against influenza infection. Compounds …

  The Earth-Moon system is one of the unique features of the solar system. Earth is the only rocky planet with such a large moon, and the only planet besides Pluto to have a moon so fundamentally similar to itself in composition. The Pluto-Charon system is considerably different otherwise from …

An international team of scientists has produced the high-quality genomic sequence for the cultivated peanut (Arachis hypogaea), an important grain legume and oilseed crop with an annual production of about 44 million tons. Leaves and freshly dug pods of Arachis hypogaea, Stuckey, South Carolina. Image credit: Dave, aka Pollinator / CC …

  Aluminum is found in everything from smartphones to rockets, but one of those applications is somewhat more demanding. NASA’s Office of the Inspector General (IOG) and the Department of Justice have announced the outcome of a years-long investigation of problems with aluminum rocket components. It turns out a company …

The banded tube-dwelling anemone (Isarachnanthus nocturnes), a sea creature that resembles a prehistoric flower, now holds the record for the largest mitochondrial genome reported to date: the animal has 80,923 base pairs, compared with humans’ 16,569 base pairs. Isarachnanthus nocturnes. Image credit: Stampar et al, doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-42621-z. Mitochondria are double-membraned …