Science News

Satellite imagery from NASA and the European Space Agency reveal 13 years of melt on the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Dec. 20, 2024: Our weekly roundup of the latest science in the news, as well as a few fascinating articles to keep you entertained over the weekend.

Bacteria that are mirror images of existing ones could evade our immune systems, causing serious illness.

Astronomers have discovered a pair of young stars near the supermassive black hole at the heart of our galaxy. Studying them can offer a rare glimpse into how stars can endure — at least briefly — the immense gravity exerted by such cosmic behemoths.

Paleogenomics has finally solved a question that has puzzled researchers for decades: Where did syphilis come from?

An initially "unknown" illness affecting hundreds in the Democratic Republic of the Congo may be attributable to malaria, malnutrition and a viral infection. But investigations are ongoing.

Researchers believe dark rocks at the site of a future Mars rover landing mission may be left over from ancient volcanic eruptions, and may be protecting signs of life — if there ever was life on Mars.

A silver amulet found next to a skeleton in a 1,800-year-old grave in Germany speaks to the importance — and the risk — of being Christian in Roman times.

Archaeologists have found 188 medieval reliquaries during excavations at a square in Berlin. Some of them still contain human bones of people considered to be saints or holy.

Officials say they've eradicated northern giant hornets, nicknamed "murder hornets," after years of tracking the invasive giant wasps in Washington state.

Scientists investigating the frozen Lake Enigma in Antarctica discovered an ecosystem teeming with strange microbial communities.

The Denmark Strait cataract is a sloping portion of the seafloor between Iceland and Greenland that funnels cold water from the Nordic Seas into the Irminger Sea, fueling Atlantic Ocean currents.

The declaration of a state of emergency in California over avian influenza comes within days of the first severe human case of bird flu in the U.S.

A new magnetic survey of the ancient Assyrian capital of Khorsabad has revealed several structures, including a villa, buried underground.

A Japanese astronomer captured several impacts on the moon during the Geminid meteor shower.

With legs and wings, the RAVEN can take off with no runway, and even hop along the ground.

The sacrifices could be an early form of a Scythian burial tradition that lasted for hundreds of years.

Researchers detected flame retardants in household items made from recycled black plastic. The study later received a correction — but regardless of this paper, the chemicals' health effects remain unclear.

Scientists at CERN's ALICE detector are replicating conditions found during the Big Bang, attempting to get to the bottom of how matter came to dominate over antimatter.

Galaxies in the early universe tend to be clumpy, but the new JWST discovery of a "grand design" spiral galaxy just 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang has scientists stumped.