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The battle to save one of the planet’s best fossil preserves

 Naomi  0 448 

Kate Evans for Undark Kate Evans is a freelance science journalist and writer based in Raglan, New Zealand. Follow her on Twitter @kate_g_evans. This article was originally published on Undark. One of New Zealand’s most spectacular fossil sites originated 23.2 million years ago. It was formed in a valley dotted with small volcanoes, when rising magma deep below the Earth’s surface came into contact with groundwater. Lava and water don’t mix—they explode. The resulting detonation obliterated the surrounding forest and…

This incredibly rare orchid survives by making male beetles horny

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J Hardwick Plos OneBiologists thought Disa forficaria orchids went extinct twice. Once in 2018, when a single specimen was found after 52 years without a sighting, and again in 2019 when that one orchid seemingly disappeared. There have only been 11 plants ever found in the last 200 years.  But in 2020, when researchers in South Africa were conducting a field experiment at the last known location of the mysterious flower, three male longhorn beetles showed up carrying D. forficaria…

The next pandemic could be lurking anywhere. Can this wildlife-tracking app help prevent it?

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Oswaldo Cruz FoundationOne afternoon in 2018, Carlos Alberto Martins da Silva was hiking in Brazil’s Serra dos Órgãos National Park, a wonderland outside Rio de Janeiro where slender granite peaks rise through cloud forest mists, when he came across a dead monkey. The carcass was too decayed to identify the species or speculate about the cause of death, but da Silva, a professional hiking guide, had reason to be alarmed: Yellow fever has been on the rise in the cities of southeastern…

Seed banks are full of hidden fungi, and scientists love it

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Rowena HillRowena Hill is a PhD candidate in fungi at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and Queen Mary University of London. Ester Gaya is a senior research leader at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Simon Kallow is a PhD students at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. This story originally featured on The Conversation. This was the moment of truth. We’d spent countless hours meticulously sterilizing seeds (1,710, to be specific), filling the lab with a cacophony of rattling as we shook…

Solar panels and water canals could form a real power couple in California

 Naomi  0 499 

Solar Aqua Grid LLCCalifornia has around 4,000 miles of canals that shuttle clean water throughout the state. New research shows that these canals can do way more than bringing California’s residents with drinking water—paired with solar panels, these canals might also be a way to both generate solar power and save water. This new study presents an analysis from researchers at the University of California Merced and University of California Santa Cruz that quantifies the economic feasibility of building a…

Ask Us Anything: What would happen if you fell into a black hole?

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Katie Belloff/Popular ScienceIs your head constantly spinning with outlandish, mind-burning questions? If you’ve ever wondered what the universe is made of, what would happen if you fell into a black hole, or even why not everyone can touch their toes, then you should be sure to listen and subscribe to Ask Us Anything, a brand new podcast from the editors of Popular Science. Ask Us Anything hits Apple, Anchor, Spotify, and everywhere else you listen to podcasts every Tuesday and Thursday. Each episode…

Putting cows on a seaweed diet helps curb their methane burps

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Hugo Kruip for Unsplash Expanding a cow’s diet to include a pinch of seaweed could go a long way in helping tame their burps and farts—and protect the climate. A new study released last week led by scientists at the University of California at Davis showed that adding just a small amount of dried red seaweed to the feed of beef steers reduced their methane production during digestion by over 80 percent, which could have implications for global greenhouse gas…

Ask Us Anything: Can you survive on a single food forever?

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Katie Belloff/Popular ScienceIs your head constantly spinning with outlandish, mind-burning questions? If you’ve ever wondered what the universe is made of, what would happen if you fell into a black hole, or even why not everyone can touch their toes, then you should be sure to listen and subscribe to Ask Us Anything, a brand new podcast from the editors of Popular Science. Ask Us Anything hits Apple, Anchor, Spotify, and everywhere else you listen to podcasts every Tuesday and…

Researchers just measured Jupiter’s stratospheric winds for the first time—and they’re a doozy

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NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSSAn international team of astronomers just measured Jupiter’s raging stratospheric winds for the very first time—and they used a 27-year-old comet to do it. Scientists had already measured wind speeds down in Jupiter’s troposphere—where the planet’s iconic stripes lie—and way up in its ionosphere. But this new study was first to take wind speed measurements of Jupiter’s stratosphere using the incredibly sensitive Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA). They measured wind speeds near the equator and near the poles. Some results…

$1.9 Trillion COVID Relief Bill Passes | Who’s Eligible for Payments and How You Can Check Your Status

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What Happens Next? Now that the bill has passed both the Senate and the House, it will be sent to President Joe Biden to sign the measure. The legislation is expected to be on Biden’s desk by Friday, March 12th. $1,400 Stimulus Checks One key provision of the package is $1,400 stimulus checks for Americans whose income is below the qualifying threshold. Those receiving the full $1,400 benefit include individuals earning less than $75,000 (adjusted gross income), heads of households…

New Battery Tech Helps Solve Lithium-Ion’s Biggest Problem: Degradation

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But, thanks to a team of researchers from Japan, that seemingly quick loss of capacity may be a thing of the past. According to EurekaAlert via PCMag, a team of scientists from Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) have discovered a new material that helps a battery hold its capacity for five years and possibly longer, claims head researcher Professor Noriyoshi Matsumi. The material, bis-imino-acenaphthenequinone-paraphenylene (BP) copolymer, is a binder used on a lithium-ion battery’s negative terminal. Current…

AirPods Max Update 3C39 May Address Troubling Battery Drain Issue

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The issue appeared shortly after Apple released the AirPods Max in December 2020. One of the biggest complaints among new owners was an unexpected drop in power when the AirPods were left to sit idle. Most often, this battery drain occurred at night when the owner was not using their AirPods Max. Some people note that their AirPods were one percent in the morning even though they were fully charged the night before. A factory reset of the AirPods Max…