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Categories: Offbeat: Plants and Animals, Space: Astrophysics

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Engineers have invented a fabric that concludes the 80-year quest to make a synthetic textile modeled on polar bear fur. The results are already being developed into commercially available products.

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The explosion of a star is a dramatic event, but the remains the star leaves behind can be even more dramatic. A new mid-infrared image from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope provides one stunning example. It shows the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A (Cas A), created by a stellar explosion seen from Earth 340 years ago. Cas A is the youngest known remnant from an exploding, massive star in our galaxy, which makes it a unique opportunity to learn more about how such supernovae occur.

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Astrophysicists have measured a value for the 'clumpiness' of the universe's dark matter (known to cosmologists as 'S8') of 0.776, which does not align with the value derived from the Cosmic Microwave Background, which dates back to the universe's origins. This has intriguing implications for the standard cosmological model.

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There's an invisible monster on the loose, barreling through intergalactic space so fast that if it were in our solar system, it could travel from Earth to the Moon in 14 minutes. This supermassive black hole, weighing as much as 20 million Suns, has left behind a never-before-seen 200,000-light-year-long 'contrail' of newborn stars, twice the diameter of our Milky Way galaxy. It's likely the result of a rare, bizarre game of galactic billiards among three massive black holes.

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Human embryo development and early organ formation remain largely unexplored due to ethical issues surrounding the use of embryos for research as well as limited availability of materials to study. Investigators now report on the creation of embryo-like structures from monkey embryonic stem cells. The investigators also transferred these embryo-like structures into the uteruses of female monkeys and determined that the structures were able to implant and elicit a hormonal response similar to pregnancy.

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Of the many different kinds of stars, asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars, usually slightly larger and older than our own sun, are known producers of interstellar dust. Dusty AGBs are particularly prominent producers of dust, and the light they shine happens to vary widely. For the first time, a long-period survey has found the variable intensity of dusty AGBs coincides with variations in the amount of dust these stars produce. As this dust can lead to the creation of planets, its study can shed light on our own origins.

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The early universe was a rambunctious place where galaxies often bumped into each other and even merged together. Using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and other space and ground-based observatories, astronomers investigating these developments have made an unexpected and rare discovery: a pair of gravitationally bound quasars, both blazing away inside two merging galaxies. They existed when the universe was just 3 billion years old.

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The amino acid abundances of two Ryugu particles were measured and compared with their rocky components. The results demonstrate the important role that water plays in the formation of amino acids on the giant precursors of asteroids like Ryugu. Our solar system formed from a molecular cloud, which was composed of gas and dust that was emitted into the interstellar medium (ISM), a vast space between stars. On collapse of the molecular cloud, the early sun was formed, with a large disk of gas and dust orbiting it. The dusty material collided to produce rocky material that would eventually grow in size to give large bodies called planetesimals.

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Earth's magnetic field does more than keep everyone's compass needles pointed in the same direction. It also helps preserve Earth's sliver of life-sustaining atmosphere by deflecting high energy particles and plasma regularly blasted out of the sun. Researchers have now identified a prospective Earth-sized planet in another solar system as a prime candidate for also having a magnetic field -- YZ Ceti b, a rocky planet orbiting a star about 12 light-years away from Earth.

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A team has induced stem cells to emulate the development of the human heart. The result is a sort of 'mini-heart' known as an organoid. It will permit the study of the earliest development phase of our heart and facilitate research on diseases.

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An illusion involving a hidden thumb confounds capuchin and squirrel monkeys for the same reason it does humans -- it misdirects expected outcomes of actions they can carry out. However, marmosets have five equidistant digits, and were rarely fooled by the magician. The research adds to evidence that animals struggle to predict movements outside of their own 'biomechanical ability'.

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When it comes to measuring how fast the Universe is expanding, the result depends on which side of the Universe you start from. A recent study has calibrated the best cosmic yardsticks to unprecedented accuracy, shedding new light on what's known as the Hubble tension.

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A new study probing the structure and evolution of galaxy clusters shows good agreement with the predictions of standard cosmological models.

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A study has detected the presence of large quantities of complex organic molecules in one of the nearest star forming regions to the solar system.

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An expedition into the jungle of New Guinea has resulted in the discovery of two new species of poisonous birds. Genetic changes in these bird species have allowed them to carry a powerful neurotoxin.

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Astronomers have observed an explosion 180 million light years away which challenges our current understanding of explosions in space, that appeared much flatter than ever thought possible.

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A new study suggests that predatory dinosaurs, such as Tyrannosaurus rex, did not have permanently exposed teeth as depicted in films such as Jurassic Park, but instead had scaly, lizard-like lips covering and sealing their mouths.

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Researchers have recorded and analyzed sounds distinctly emitted by plants. The click-like sounds, similar to the popping of popcorn, are emitted at a volume similar to human speech, but at high frequencies, beyond the hearing range of the human ear.

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The Gemini North telescope, one half of the International Gemini Observatory, operated by NSF's NOIRLab, captured a dazzling image of UGC 12914 and UGC 12915, which are nicknamed the Taffy Galaxies. Their twisted shape is the result of a head-on collision that occurred about 25 million years prior to their appearance in the image. A bridge of highly turbulent gas devoid of significant star formation spans the gap between the two galaxies.

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Astronomers have discovered a large reservoir of hot gas in the still-forming galaxy cluster around the Spiderweb galaxy -- the most distant detection of such hot gas yet. Galaxy clusters are some of the largest objects known in the Universe and this result further reveals just how early these structures begin to form.