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Categories: Paleontology: General, Space: Structures and Features

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Europasaurus is a long-necked, herbivorous dinosaur that lived in the Late Jurassic, about 154 million years ago, on a small island in modern-day Germany. Recently, scientists examined fossil braincase material of Europasaurus with the aid of micro-computed tomography (micro-CT). The digital reconstruction of the inner ear of Europasaurus gave the researchers new insights not only into its hearing ability, but also into its reproductive and social behavior.

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Scientists have discovered that the atmosphere contained far less CO2 than previously thought when forests emerged on our planet, the new study has important implications for understanding how land plants affect the climate.

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When stars die out, they emit gamma-ray bursts. Although scientist can calculate the explosion energy from dying stars, it is difficult to do when the conversion efficiency is low or unknown. Using light polarization, a research group has found a workaround for this, enabling astronomers to calculate the hidden energy of gamma-ray bursts.

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An international research team examines a rich fossil bed in the renowned Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park in Nevada's Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest, where many 50-foot-long ichthyosaurs (Shonisaurus popularis) lay petrified in stone. The study offers a plausible explanation as to how at least 37 of these marine reptiles came to meet their ends in the same locality -- a question that has vexed paleontologists for more than half a century. The research presents evidence that these ichthyosaurs died at the site in large numbers because they were migrating to this area to give birth for many generations across hundreds of thousands of years.

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The condemned planet could help answer questions about the fate of other worlds as their solar systems evolve.

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Astronomers took a 'deep dive' into one of the first images from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope and were rewarded with a surprising discovery: telltale signs of two dozen previously unseen young stars about 7,500 light years from Earth.

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The earliest dinosaurs included carnivorous, omnivorous and herbivorous species, according to a team of palaeobiologists.

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Fossilized microbial skins can give us a glimpse of how the climate was in the deep geological past. By discovering the 'missing link' between such fossil skins and the skins of living bacteria, researchers have greatly improved the accuracy of climate reconstructions and predictions.

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Climate change, rather than competition, played a key role in the ascendancy of dinosaurs through the Late Triassic and Early Jurassic periods.

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Astronomers have found evidence that two exoplanets orbiting a red dwarf star are 'water worlds,' planets where water makes up a large fraction of the volume.

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Black holes are surrounded by an invisible layer that swallows every bit of evidence about their past. Researchers are now using machine learning and supercomputers to reconstruct the growth histories of black holes.

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Researchers have discovered the presence of two planets with Earth-like masses in orbit around the star GJ 1002, a red dwarf not far from our solar system. Both planets are in the habitability zone of the star.

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Sediment cores obtained from Eifel maar sites provide insight into the presence of large Ice Age mammals in Central Europe over the past 60,000 years: Overkill hypothesis not confirmed. Herds of megafauna, such as mammoth and bison, have roamed the prehistoric plains in what is today's Central Europe for several tens of thousands of years. As woodland expanded at the end of the last Ice Age, the numbers of these animals declined and by roughly 11,000 years ago, they had completely vanished from this region. Thus, the growth of forests was the main factor that determined the extinction of such megafauna in Central Europe.

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Changes in Earth's orbit that favored hotter conditions may have helped trigger a rapid global warming event 56 million years ago. Researchers found the shape of Earth's orbit, or eccentricity, and the wobble in its rotation, or precession, favored hotter conditions at the onset of the PETM and that these orbital configurations together may have played a role in triggering the event.

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Morphology of galaxies contain important information about the process of galaxy formation and evolution. With its state-of-the-art resolution, NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has now captured several red spiral galaxies in its first image at an unprecedented resolution. Researchers have now analyzed these galaxies, revealing that these are among the furthest known spiral galaxies till date. The analysis further detected a passive red spiral galaxy in the early universe, a surprising discovery.

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Discoveries at a major new fossil site in Morocco suggest giant arthropods -- relatives of modern creatures including shrimps, insects and spiders -- dominated the seas 470 million years ago.

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Analysis of teeth of extinct lemurs has revealed fascinating clues to the evolution of humans, a new study has found.

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While the Diprotodon -- the extinct megafauna species that is distantly related to wombats but was the size of a small car -- is commonly (but incorrectly) thought of as Australia's 'giant wombat', researchers have shed light on a large species that does belong in the modern-day wombat family. The complete skull of this true fossil giant wombat, found in a Rockhampton cave in Queensland, Australia and estimated to be around 80,000 years old, has been described for the first time.

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How are galaxies born, and what holds them together? Astronomers assume that dark matter plays an essential role. However, as yet it has not been possible to prove directly that dark matter exists. A research team has now measured the survival rate of antihelium nuclei from the depths of the galaxy -- a necessary prerequisite for the indirect search for Dark Matter.

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A study finds that, for now, the catalog of known black hole binaries does not reveal anything fundamental about how black holes form. More data will be needed to determine whether the invisible giants arose from a quiet galactic disk or a more dynamic cluster of stars.