Science

The impact that formed Mercury’s spectacular 100-km (62-mile) wide Hokusai crater, named after the famous Japanese artist, who created the Great Wave off Kanagawa, could have delivered the billions of tonnes of water ice stored at its poles. That’s according to a new study, which could also help explain why, …

After nearly ten years and 2,681 planets, it’s time to say good-bye to the Kepler space telescope. NASA has announced that the mission has ended. Unlike more open-ended missions like Curiosity or Opportunity, Kepler always had a definitive shelf-life. In order to detect the minute variations around distant stars that …

A team of researchers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology has developed a novel approach for eradicating methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Pseudomonas aeruginosa from wounds, using a combination of antibiotics and alginate-encapsulated probiotics. The team’s work appears in the journal Advanced Materials. Li et al devised a way to encapsulate …

Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologists have uncovered a 1,700-year-old floor mosaic at the city of Lod (ancient Lydda). The newly-discovered mosaic floor of a Roman-era villa. Image credit: Niki Davidov, Israel Antiquities Authority. In 1996, a routine archaeological inspection carried out in Lod and the subsequent rescue excavations, directed by the …

Microbial communities associated with indoor dust abound in the built environment. The transmission of sunlight through windows is a key building design consideration, but the effects of light exposure on dust communities remain unclear. In a new study published in the journal Microbiome, scientists found that in dark rooms 12% …

Today, fewer than 4,000 free-ranging tigers survive in the wild, covering only 7% of their historical range. Efforts to protect these animals have been stymied by uncertainty about whether they comprise six, five, or two subspecies. Now, researchers who’ve analyzed the complete genomes of 32 representative specimens confirm that tigers …

The Milky Way is not hanging alone in space — several dwarf galaxies are hovering nearby, and one of them has been a particular target of study for astronomers. Using a new space telescope, researchers from the University of Michigan have determined that the Small Magellanic Cloud is flying apart …

According to a new study published in the journal Scientific Reports, habitually tool-using New Caledonian crows (Corvus moneduloides) are able to create tools by combining two or more otherwise non-functional elements, an ability so far observed only in humans and great apes. New Caledonian crow with a stick tool. Image …

Since September 13, 2018, ESA’s Mars Express spacecraft has been observing the evolution of a water ice cloud formation hovering in the vicinity of Arsia Mons, the southernmost in a trio of giant Martian volcanoes known collectively as Tharsis Montes. The white, elongated cloud in the vicinity of the Arsia …

The Solar System is full of some really weird stuff. Venus, despite being farther from the Sun than Mercury, has a considerably higher surface temperature. Uranus is tilted on its side and rotates in one direction, while its moons orbit it normally. Jupiter’s moon Io is the most volcanically active …