Atlas Obscura introduces us to Enhydriodon omoensis, a newly classified prehistoric otter that roamed the Omo river valley of Ethiopia, hunting its prey and weighing more than 400 pounds… Read the rest “Otters as big as lions, there were. As big as grizzly bears.”
NASA reports that the DART mission was a success. For the first time ever, human beings have changed the course of a celestial object:
… Read the rest “NASA moved an asteroid.”Analysis of data obtained over the past two weeks by NASA’s
This is nerd humor from the dawn of the electric age. The “Phoney Patent Offizz” was apparently a regular column in Hugo Gernsback’s The Electrical Experimenter, a … Read the rest “Science Art: Reducing Apparatus, in “Phoney Patent Offizz,” The Electrical Experimenter, April 1917.”
The first time I heard about fishers was when I was discussing a little-known Florida cryptid, the “cracker dog-killer,” with a friend from Vermont. They seemed like they … Read the rest “The fishers are back, in Washington at least.”
Science magazine reports on a bit of Indigenous philosophy that’s become a legal strategy for environmental protection. After nearly 640,000 citizens signed a petition supporting… Read the rest “Legally, this Spanish lagoon is now a person, with all the rights a person has.”
Reuters reports on a painstaking headcount that proves that for every one of the nearly 8 billion humans on Earth, there are 2.5 million ants:
… Read the rest “In case you ever wondered, there are 20 quadrillion ants in the world. And that makes them important.”“Ants certainly play a very central role
According to the accompanying text, this illustration depicts a baboon species “easily distinguished by its tail, which is four inches long, slender, and exactly like a pig’s.”… Read the rest “Science Art: Pigtailed Baboon, 1811.”
Live Science considers the fate of the shovel lizard Lystrosaurus, a plant-eating creature from 251 million years ago who survived the Permian-Triassic mass extinction, but then was … Read the rest “Mammal ancestors survived a mass extinction – but got killed off by drought.”
Science News looks gas flares, the open flames used to burn off leaking natural gas and to convert methane to CO2 directly at oil fields. They find that they’re less effective than … Read the rest “Gas flares don’t burn off as much methane as they should – to the tune of 3 million cars’ worth of pollution.”
The flame from a Bunsen burner (a standard piece of chemistry equipment; you might have used one in high school) can change color and height depending on how much air flows into the jet of fuel.… Read the rest “Science Art: Bunsen burner flame types, by Arthur Jan Fijałkowski (WarX).”
PsyPost reports on a study of social isolation – “the objective state of having limited social relationships or contact with others” – that found the problem… Read the rest “Boys (and men) are more socially isolated than girls (and women), study finds.”
Science News reports on the discovery of charred dung in Syria that has rewritten history, pushing back the date of the oldest domesticated animals by 2,000 years:
… Read the rest “Humans domesticated animals way earlier than we thought – about 13,000 years ago at least.”“We know today that dung
Science News winds back the astronomical clock to the early days of Planet Earth, when waves of comet collisions seem to have slammed the planet’s solid crust into shape in a regularly… Read the rest “Comets from the Milky Way’s other arms helped form Earth’s continents.”
Here’s a picture of a distinctive bit of geography. There are hobbits down there, and members of Split Enz and The Chills, and some of Taika Waititi’s relatives too. Here’s… Read the rest “Science Art: New Zealand’s South Island, by Samantha Cristoforetti, 2022.”
The Payload newsletter reports on a new law being debated by American legislators. The ORBITS act is intended to create new technologies for ADR – active debris removal – from… Read the rest “U.S. Senate is doing something to try to clean up space junk.”
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