When visiting the center of a galaxy nicknamed J0230, pack a sturdy windproof jacket. There, you will encounter a galactic hurricane with winds whipping at about 200 million kilometers per hour. At that speed, nearly 20 percent of the speed of light, a trip around Earth would take just 0.7 seconds. These are the fastest […]
Ant antennae don’t just receive chemical signals — they send them, too. Colonies of ants communicate through chemical cues produced all over their bodies. Studies have shown that ants use their antennae to identify their own nest-mates and potential invaders. But antennae also produce the key compounds that ants use to tell friend from foe, […]
Joni Mitchell was right: We are stardust. Another one of the essential ingredients for life as we know it might have formed in space and then rained down on a young Earth, researchers suggest in the April 8 Science. The simple sugar ribose — a crucial piece of the molecular machinery inside cells — can […]
Monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus) use their internal clock and the sun to guide them 4,000 kilometers south on their annual fall migration from eastern North America to central Mexico. Scientists have struggled to determine how butterfly brains combine visual cues from the sun with molecular timekeeping in their antennae to make the epic journey. A […]
SALT LAKE CITY — In the primeval universe, a violent event roiled a dwarf galaxy, leaving an indelible mark on the stars that formed there. Scientists reached that conclusion after finding traces of heavy elements produced by the cataclysm in the ancient dwarf galaxy Reticulum II. “It might be the first time where we can […]
An X-ray space telescope that went silent last month has been officially declared dead. The Japanese space agency, JAXA, announced April 28 that it has stopped trying to communicate with the orbiting observatory ASTRO-H (aka Hitomi) and will now focus on figuring out what went wrong. ASTRO-H launched on February 17 and seemed to be […]
Fossil discoveries in southern China point to an evolutionary crossroads around 34 million years ago that resulted in humans evolving in Africa rather than Asia, scientists say. A sharply cooler and drier climate at that time, combined with upheavals of landmasses that forged the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau, destroyed many tropical forests in Asia. […]
The Large Hadron Collider is back in business. On May 9, after its regular winter hiatus, CERN’s particle accelerator outside Geneva officially began taking data from protons smashing together at nearly the speed of light. Scientists hope the collisions will reveal new discoveries about the universe and unearth exotic elementary particles. In March, CERN physicists […]
Turns out, it is possible to be a lucky snakebite victim. Depending on the circumstances (and the snake’s mood, presumably), a timber rattlesnake may choose to strike its prey with only one fang and to pump out little or no venom when it does so. Far from being mindless, hair-triggered biting machines, timber rattlers don’t […]
Of the many disorders that can afflict the brain, schizophrenia and autism are among the most inscrutable. The long scientific searches to explain their causes have turned up many clues and inspired various theories. But no clear answers have emerged. A new way of thinking about these disorders has begun to show promise, Laura Sanders […]