The 1,100-year-old steel sword is nearly 3 feet long. Archaeologists in Norway have unearthed the 1,100-year-old grave of a Viking warrior, whose steel sword was placed in an unusual spot: on his left side. Though the sword’s sinistral position is still somewhat perplexing, one theory is that the Vikings perceivedContinue Reading
Parenting is tough work for freshwater gharials. Picking the kids up from school takes on a different meaning for crocodylian parents. In this photo, taken by India-based photographer Dhritiman Mukherjee, a male freshwater gharial shows us why. Bobbing in the waters of northern India’s National Chambal Sanctuary, the croc waitsContinue Reading
The bizarre geometry of this system is the first known of its kind In one of the most complex cosmic dances astronomers have yet spotted, three rings of gas and dust circle a trio of stars. The star system GW Orionis, located about 1,300 light-years away in the constellation Orion,Continue Reading
The blast was more powerful than 50 million tons of TNT, and was felt hundreds of miles away. In October 1961, the Soviet Union dropped the most powerful nuclear bomb in history over a remote island north of the Arctic Circle. Though the bomb detonated nearly 2.5 miles (4 kilometers)Continue Reading
A new study suggests hibernation is an ancient adaptation to harsh winters. Some 250 million years ago, a Seussian-looking beast with clawed digits, a turtle-like beak and two tusks may have survived Antarctica’s chilly winters not by fruitlessly foraging for food, but by curling up into a sleep-like state, meaningContinue Reading
Meteorites suggest that H2O in the mantle comes from local origins, contrary to expectations Earth’s deep stores of water may have been locally sourced rather than trucked in from far-flung regions of the solar system. A new analysis of meteorites from the inner solar system — home to the fourContinue Reading
The practicality of quantum computing hangs on the integrity of the quantum bit, or qubit. Qubits, the logic elements of quantum computers, are coherent two-level systems that represent quantum information. Each qubit has the strange ability to be in a quantum superposition, carrying aspects of both states simultaneously, enabling aContinue Reading
Obesity is the main cause of type 2 diabetes and related chronic illnesses that together will kill more people around the globe this year than the Covid-19 coronavirus. Scientists at Joslin Diabetes Center have delivered a proof of concept for a novel cell-based therapy against this dangerous condition. The potentialContinue Reading
The mummy had an undigested piece of woolly rhino in its stomach. Just before a tiny pup died during the last ice age, it ate a piece of meat from one of Earth’s last woolly rhinos. Researchers made this discovery while doing a necropsy (an animal autopsy) on the mummifiedContinue Reading
Future telescopes could make similar maps to predict solar eruptions The sun’s wispy upper atmosphere, called the corona, is an ever-changing jungle of sizzling plasma. But mapping the strength of the magnetic fields that largely control that behavior has proved elusive. The fields are weak and the brightness of theContinue Reading