Stronger global governance is needed to mitigate human impact on the earth’s climate and to ensure sustainable development, according to 32 scientists who published a paper in the journal Science. In “Navigating the Anthropocene: Improving Earth System Governance,” the scholars argue that current institutions, including the United Nations, have shown themselves inadequate to the necessities…
The early Earth flipped back and forth between a hydrocarbon-free atmosphere and a hydrocarbon-rich one similar to that of Saturn’s moon, Titan. This ‘see-sawing’ atmosphere over 2.5 billion years ago was the result of intense microbial activity, say Newcastle University scientists, and would have had a profound effect on the climate of the Earth system….
The Hubble Space Telescope is taking advantage of a naturally occurring lens in space to extend its range even more. Scientists report this week that Hubble has found several bright quasars — galaxies that are home to supermassive black holes — which are strategically positioned so that that are warping the light from even more…
Ancient blades made of volcanic rock that were discovered at what may be the world’s oldest temple suggest that the site in Turkey was the hub of a pilgrimage that attracted a cosmopolitan group of people some 11,000 years ago. Researchers matched up about 130 of the blades, which would have been used as tools,…
Richard Pell, who teaches electronic media at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh has a new museum, the Center for PostNatural History. With it, Pell endeavors to create a curiosity cabinet from the Anthropocene period – the age of man. The only criteria for inclusion in Pell’s Wunderkammer are that the organisms have been intentionally altered…
Astronomers using U.S. and European telescopes say they’ve obtained a first tantalizing look at a crucial early stage in star formation. The new observations using radio and infrared telescopes will help scientists understand the early stages of a sequence of events through which a giant cloud of gas and dust collapses into dense cores that,…
Given the same raw materials, Mars would have been a better host for life to arise than Earth, which some scientists believe was too flooded for the chemistry of life to gain a toehold. Without at least occasional dry land, the chemistry needed to get life started doesn’t work very well because the molecules to…
In celebration of 1,000 days in orbit, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter team released two beautiful videos of our moon, one a fiery drama showing the moon’s tough evolution and another touring its most interesting sites. The historical montage takes you from the moon’s earliest days, through the massive south pole splat that formed the South…
What are the options when a scientist faces a problem with no obvious solution? That is the dilemma astronomers have faced over the last few decades as they took a census of cosmic matter and motion. Mapping the beautiful pinwheel arcs of spiral galaxies, they found the constituent stars moving far too fast to be…
Scientists in China have found what may be a new species of human. Fossils show a group of people with similarities to and differences from modern humans.