Science

Next time you pass a roadside farm, don’t hold your nose. The source of that smell could fuel your car someday. Scientists have found out how to harness the power of fungi from the guts of horses, goats and sheep to break down biomass that can be used as fuel. Scientists report in the journal Science on February 18 that …

Sound of deep-water animal migration revealed. Small deep-water marine animals communicate through sound indecipherable to the human ear while traveling up and down from the depths of ocean to feed and protect themselves, a new study has found.

Monkeys may not be native to central Florida, but a colony of rhesus macaques has turned these wetlands into its home. A study released this week in the journal Primates by anthropologists at San Diego State University has found that the park’s macaque population is smaller than many previous estimates and that the vast majority of the monkeys’ diets come …

Limacina helicina looks like most any other sea snail — until it beats what look like delicate wings and “flies” through the water. A newly published study in the Journal of Experimental Biology says the tiny species of sea snail moves through water using the same kind of motion that an insect uses to fly. “Snails evolutionarily diverged from flying …

There are thousands of migrating sharks swarming just off Florida’s coastline, which in 2015 became the “shark attack capitol” of the US. This new aerial footage has revealed the sheer scale of the predator population. Florida Atlantic University biologist Dr. Stephen Kajiura studies the blacktips and their migration patterns down the Atlantic Coast. He shot this video after waiting weeks …

Virgin Galactic has unveiled a new commercial spaceship more than a year after its predecessor crashed and killed one of its pilots. Friday, Virgin Galactic unveiled its new spaceship to replace the one that crashed during testing a year and a half ago. This is hopeful news for New Mexico, because the state and its $220 million spaceport have a …

A Japanese rocket carrying the astronomy observation satellite ‘Hitomi’ launched from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan on Wednesday. The satellite, also known as ‘ASTRO-H’ of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), is designed to detect a wide range of wavelengths, such as X-rays and gamma rays. Hitomi is to study the structure and evolution of the universe, as …

Neanderthals and modern humans were interbreeding much earlier than was previously thought, scientists say. Traces of human DNA found in a Neanderthal genome suggest that we started mixing with our now-extinct relatives 100,000 years ago. Antonio Rosas from the Spanish Natural Science Museum said: “Over 100,000 years ago, anatomically modern humans ventured out of Africa for the first time. These …

Tardigrades (water bears) were successfully revived and reproduced after having been frozen for over 30 years. A moss sample collected in Antarctica in November 1983, stored at -20°C, was thawed in May 2014. Two individuals and a separate egg retrieved from the thawed sample were revived, thereby providing the longest record of survival for tardigrades as animals or eggs. Subsequently, …

Tens of thousands of sharks have taken a break from their serious shark studies to congregate off the coast of Florida this week. The blacktip sharks are being spotted in far greater numbers than usual, clogging the coastline around Palm Beach. Thankfully nobody has been bitten by the sharks yet and as they are considerably smaller than Great Whites, attacks …

For the first time astronomers were able to analyse the atmosphere of an exoplanet in the class known as super-Earths. The exotic exoplanet, 55 Cancri e, is over eight times the mass of Earth and has previously been dubbed the ‘diamond planet’ because models based on its mass and radius have led some astronomers to speculate that its interior is …