Snowflakes on Mars are smaller than their Earth counterparts, having roughly the same diameter as a human red blood cell, a new study reports. Researchers analyzed observations made by two Mars-orbiting spacecraft to calculate the size of snowflakes on the Red Planet, which are composed of carbon dioxide rather than water. Snowflakes require a kernel…
Expanding waistlines are not just tipping scales but may also push the mercury higher around the world, according to a new study. As humanity becomes more rotund, more resources are needed to cool, nourish and transport the extra weight, a trend that can contribute to climate change by requiring the consumption of more fossil fuels…
It’s 20 million years ago in the forests of Argentina, and Homunculus patagonicus is on the move. The monkey travels quickly, swinging between tree branches as it goes. Scientists have a good idea of how Homunculus got around thanks to a new fossil analysis of its ear canals and those of 15 other ancient primates….
It might be possible for human-to-human airborne transmissible avian H5N1 influenza viruses to evolve in nature, new research has found. The findings, from research led by Professor Derek Smith and Dr Colin Russell at the University of Cambridge, were published in the journal Science. Currently, avian H5N1 influenza, also known as bird flu, can be…
Ethiopians’s long-ago genetic mixing with populations from Israel and Egypt is a legacy of the Queen of Sheba and her companions, say researchers.
The amount of water in places of the Martian mantle is vastly larger than previous estimates and is similar to that of Earth’s, scientists have found. The finding is based on the analysis of the water content of two Martian meteorites originating from inside the Red Planet. The results not only affect what we know…
Neuroscience is new enough, and our desire for brain facts is strong enough, that dubious claims about brain types circulate widely. Take, for example, the latest Neuroscience-of-Religion news item to make the rounds, this one claiming that critical thinking undermines religious belief. Based on two studies from The Journal of Experimental Psychologies and Science, it…
Voyager will soon become the first man-made object to leave the solar system, scientists from NASA say. Voyager 1, which was launched in 1977, is expected to exit the solar system much sooner than previously thought. Voyager 1 and 2 are currently in what is known as the “Heliosheath” – the outermost layer of heliosphere…
Thanks to modern science, we know that love lives in the brain, not in the heart. But where in the brain is it — and is it in the same place as sexual desire? A recent international study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine is the first to draw an exact map of these…
For the 50,000 visitors from 190 countries streaming in for the U.N. Conference on Sustainable Development, the welcome in Rio is a rank reminder of just how hard it will be to balance economic growth and environmental protection elsewhere across the globe. Rio, the host city, suffers from devastating and daunting air and water pollution.