Fossils are typically bones or teeth that have been preserved for many years in various forms of sediment. When silica or calcite in groundwater seeps into the bone spaces, calcium phosphate of the bone is preserved. These artifacts, often studied by paleontologists, give us a glimpse into the natural past. Fossils show us what type …
Carnegie’s Scott Sheppard and his colleagues—Northern Arizona University’s Chad Trujillo, and the University of Hawaii’s David Tholen—are once again redefining our Solar System’s edge. They discovered a new extremely distant object far beyond Pluto with an orbit that supports the presence of an even-farther-out, Super-Earth or larger Planet X. The newly found object, called 2015 TG387, was announced …
New extremely distant Solar System object found during hunt for Planet X Read More »
How and when did early humans start walking upright? For clues, researchers have been looking at feet—and, more specifically, at toes. Bipedalism was a critical step in human evolution, and one that affected so many subsequent evolutionary changes in our lineage, from social behavior to the development of material culture, says Sergio Almécija, a senior research …
The Alps are on the go: The mountain range drifts northwards an average of one-half millimeter every year and rises 1.8 millimeters. However, there are strong regional variances. In order to follow these movements, researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have evaluated measurements made by more than 300 GPS antennas over a period …
A new study could help explain the driving force behind the largest mass extinction in the history of earth, known as the End-Permian Extinction. The event, also known as the Great Dying, occurred around 250 million years ago when a massive volcanic eruption in what is today the Russian province of Siberia sent nearly 90 …
Geologists uncover new clues about largest Mass Extinction ever Read More »
A new study led by scientists from the University of Bristol has used a combination of genomic and fossil data to explain the history of life on Earth, from its origin to the present day. Palaeontologists have long sought to understand ancient life and the shared evolutionary history of life as a whole. However, the …
A timescale for the origin and evolution of all of life on Earth Read More »
A quick look at the fossil record shows that no species lasts forever. On average, most species exist for around a million years, although some species persist for much longer. A new study published in Scientific Reports from paleontologists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama shows that young species can take advantage of new opportunities …
Scientists believe the solar system was formed some 4.6 billion years ago when a cloud of gas and dust collapsed under gravity, possibly triggered by a cataclysmic explosion from a nearby massive star or supernova. As this cloud collapsed, it formed a spinning disk with the sun in the center. Piece by piece, scientists have …
Oldest-ever Igneous Meteorite Contains Clues to Planet Building Blocks Read More »
Twelve new moons orbiting Jupiter have been found—11 “normal” outer moons, and one that they’re calling an “oddball.” This brings Jupiter’s total number of known moons to a whopping 79—the most of any planet in our Solar System. A team led by Carnegie’s Scott S. Sheppard first spotted the moons in the spring of 2017 while they …
A dozen new moons of Jupiter discovered, including one “oddball” Read More »
Increased water vapor in Earth’s atmosphere due to human activities is making shimmering high-altitude clouds more visible, a new study finds. The results suggest these strange but increasingly common clouds seen only on summer nights are an indicator of human-caused climate change, according to the study’s authors. Noctilucent, or night-shining, clouds are the highest clouds …
CLIMATE CHANGE IS MAKING NIGHT-SHINING CLOUDS MORE VISIBLE Read More »