ScienceDaily: Top Science News

The Earth moves far under our feet: A new study shows the inner core oscillates

Posted: 10 Jun 2022 12:29 PM PDT

Scientists have found evidence that the Earth's inner core oscillates, contradicting previously accepted models that posited it consistently rotates at a faster rate than the planet's surface.

Astronomers may have detected a 'dark' free-floating black hole

Posted: 10 Jun 2022 09:02 AM PDT

Astronomers have discovered what may be a free-floating black hole by observing the brightening of a more distant star as its light was distorted by the object's strong gravitational field -- so-called gravitational microlensing.

Scientists release first analysis of rocks plucked from speeding asteroid

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 04:50 PM PDT

Scientists have now begun to announce the first results from the analysis of a handful of dirt that Hayabusa2 managed to scoop off the surface of a speeding asteroid. What they found suggests that this asteroid is a piece of the same stuff that coalesced into our sun four-and-a-half billion years ago.

Wreck of historic royal ship discovered off the English coast

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 04:50 PM PDT

A royal shipwreck has been discovered off the English coast. The wreck is of one of the most famous ships of the 17th century -- The Gloucester -- which sank 340 years ago while carrying the future King of England, James Stuart. Since running aground on a sandbank on May 6, 1682, the wreck has lain half-buried on the seabed, its exact whereabouts unknown. It has now been found.

Learning and remembering movement

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 02:36 PM PDT

Researchers examining the brain at a single-neuron level found that computation happens not just in the interaction between neurons, but within each individual neuron. Each of these cells, it turns out, is not a simple switch, but a complicated calculating machine. This discovery promises changes not only to our understanding of how the brain works, but better understanding of conditions ranging from Parkinson's disease to autism. The findings are also expected to advance machine learning, offering inspiration for new architectures.

Yellowstone's history of hydrothermal explosions over the past 14,000 years

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 12:58 PM PDT

While much of public attention on Yellowstone focuses on its potential to produce large supereruptions, the hazards that are much more likely to occur are smaller, violent hydrothermal explosions. Hydrothermal explosions occur when near-boiling water suddenly flashes into steam, releasing large amounts of energy. The energy release fractures the rock downward, often leaving behind a crater. The same sources that can produce these explosions are what give Yellowstone its well-known hot springs, geysers, and fumaroles.

As the ocean heats up hungrier predators take control

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 12:58 PM PDT

A hotter ocean is a hungrier ocean -- at least as far as fish predators are concerned. Scientists have discovered predator impacts in the Atlantic and Pacific peak at higher temperatures. The effects cascade down to transform other life in the ocean, potentially disrupting balances that have existed for millennia.

Ground-breaking number of brown dwarfs discovered

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 10:19 AM PDT

Brown dwarfs, mysterious objects that straddle the line between stars and planets, are essential to our understanding of both stellar and planetary populations. However, only 40 brown dwarfs could be imaged around stars in almost three decades of searches. An international team has directly imaged a remarkable four new brown dwarfs thanks to a new innovative search method.

Scientists craft living human skin for robots

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 10:19 AM PDT

From action heroes to villainous assassins, biohybrid robots made of both living and artificial materials have been at the center of many sci-fi fantasies, inspiring today's robotic innovations. It's still a long way until human-like robots walk among us in our daily lives, but scientists are bringing us one step closer by crafting living human skin on robots. The new method not only gave a robotic finger skin-like texture, but also water-repellent and self-healing functions.

'Fantastic giant tortoise,' believed extinct, confirmed alive in the Galápagos

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 10:19 AM PDT

A tortoise from a Galápagos species long believed extinct has been found alive. Fernanda, named after her Fernandina Island home, is the first of her species identified in more than a century. Geneticist successfully extracted DNA from a specimen collected from the same island more than a century ago and confirmed that Fernanda and the museum specimen are members of the same species and genetically distinct from all other Galápagos tortoises.

Antarctic glaciers losing ice at fastest rate for 5,500 years

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 10:18 AM PDT

New evidence suggests that two major glaciers in the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) are losing ice at the fastest rate for at least 5,500 years.

Europe's largest land predator unearthed on the Isle of Wight

Posted: 09 Jun 2022 05:22 AM PDT

Palaeontologists have identified the remains of one of Europe's largest ever land-based hunters: a dinosaur that measured over 10m long and lived around 125 million years ago.

Study identifies receptor that could alleviate need for chemo, radiation pre-T cell therapy

Posted: 08 Jun 2022 01:14 PM PDT

A research team has shown that a synthetic IL-9 receptor allows cancer-fighting T cells to do their work without the need for chemotherapy or radiation.

High optimism linked with longer life and living past 90 in women across racial, ethnic groups

Posted: 08 Jun 2022 01:14 PM PDT

Higher levels of optimism were associated with longer lifespan and living beyond age 90 in women across racial and ethnic groups.

Bizarre meat-eating dinosaur joins 'Rogues' Gallery' of giant predators from classic fossil site in Egypt's Sahara Desert

Posted: 08 Jun 2022 01:14 PM PDT

The fossil of a still-unnamed species provides the first known record of the abelisaurid group of theropods from a middle Cretaceous-aged (approximately 98 million years old) rock unit known as the Bahariya Formation, which is exposed in the Bahariya Oasis of the Western Desert of Egypt.

Rapid-fire fast radio burst shows hot space between galaxies

Posted: 08 Jun 2022 01:13 PM PDT

A recently discovered, rare and persistent rapid-fire fast radio burst source -- sending out an occasional and informative cosmic ping from more than 3.5 billion light years away -- helps to reveal the secrets of the broiling hot space between the galaxies.

Particle accelerator region revealed inside a solar flare

Posted: 08 Jun 2022 10:36 AM PDT

A new study offers direct evidence showing where near-light speed particle acceleration occurs inside the largest explosion known in the solar system, the solar flare.

Most 'silent' genetic mutations are harmful, not neutral -- a finding with broad implications

Posted: 08 Jun 2022 08:25 AM PDT

Occasionally, single-letter misspellings in the genetic code, known as point mutations, occur. Point mutations that alter the resulting protein sequences are called nonsynonymous mutations, while those that do not alter protein sequences are called silent or synonymous mutations. Between one-quarter and one-third of point mutations in protein-coding DNA sequences are synonymous. Those mutations have generally been assumed to be neutral, or nearly so. A new study involving the genetic manipulation of yeast cells shows that most synonymous mutations are strongly harmful.