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Categories: Archaeology: General, Space: Exploration
Published The hidden role of the Milky Way in ancient Egyptian mythology



Astrophysicists shed light on the relationship between the Milky Way and the Egyptian sky-goddess Nut. The paper draws on ancient Egyptian texts and simulations to argue that the Milky Way might have shone a spotlight, as it were, on Nut's role as the sky. It proposes that in winter, the Milky Way highlighted Nut's outstretched arms, while in summer, it traced her backbone across the heavens.
Published Early medieval money mystery solved



Byzantine bullion fueled Europe's revolutionary adoption of silver coins in the mid-7th century, only to be overtaken by silver from a mine in Charlemagne's Francia a century later, new tests reveal. The findings could transform our understanding of Europe's economic and political development.
Published Inexplicable flying fox found in Hydra galaxy cluster



High sensitivity radio observations have discovered a cloud of magnetized plasma in the Hydra galaxy cluster. The odd location and shape of this plasma defy all conventional explanations. Dubbed the Flying Fox based on its silhouette, this plasma will remain a mystery until additional observations can provide more insight.
Published How the moon turned itself inside out



Linking analyses of the moon's gravity field with models of its earliest evolution, scientists tell a story of the moon turning itself inside out after it solidified from a primordial magma ocean. The process left behind a vestige of dense, titanium-rich material beneath its Earth-facing side that makes its presence known by gravity anomalies.
Published Telescope detects unprecedented behavior from nearby magnetar



Captured by cutting-edge radio telescope technology, a chance reactivation of a magnetar -- the Universe's most powerful magnets -- has revealed an unexpectedly complex environment.
Published In the evolution of walking, the hip bone connected to the rib bones



A new reconstruction of the 375-million-year-old fossil fish Tiktaalik -- a close relative of limbed vertebrates -- used micro-CT to reveal bones still embedded in matrix. The reconstruction shows that the fish's ribs likely attached to its pelvis, an innovation thought to be crucial to supporting the body and for the eventual evolution of walking.
Published CHEOPS detects a 'rainbow' on an exoplanet



The CHEOPS space telescope is providing new information on the mysterious exoplanet WASP-76b. This ultra-hot giant is characterized by an asymmetry between the amount of light observed on its eastern terminator -- the fictitious line that separates its night side from its day side -- and that observed on its western terminator. This peculiarity is thought to be due to a 'glory', a luminous phenomenon similar to a rainbow, which occurs if the light from the star -- the 'sun' around which the exoplanet orbits -- is reflected by clouds made up of a perfectly uniform substance. If this hypothesis is confirmed, this would be the first detection of this phenomenon outside our solar system.
Published First results from DESI make the most precise measurement of our expanding universe



Researchers have used the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument to make the largest 3D map of our universe and world-leading measurements of dark energy, the mysterious cause of its accelerating expansion.
Published NASA's Webb probes an extreme starburst galaxy



A team of astronomers has used NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to survey the starburst galaxy Messier 82 (M82). Located 12 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major, this galaxy is relatively compact in size but hosts a frenzy of star formation activity. For comparison, M82 is sprouting new stars 10 times faster than the Milky Way galaxy.
Published First results from BREAD experiment demonstrate a new approach to searching for dark matter



One of the great mysteries of modern science is dark matter. We know dark matter exists thanks to its effects on other objects in the cosmos, but we have never been able to directly see it. And it s no minor thing currently, scientists think it makes up about 85% of all the mass in the universe.
Published Last chance to record archaic Greek language 'heading for extinction'



A new data crowdsourcing platform aims to preserve the sound of Romeyka, an endangered millennia-old variety of Greek. Experts consider the language to be a linguistic goldmine and a living bridge to the ancient world.
Published When did the chicken cross the road? New evidence from Central Asia



An international team of scholars present the earliest clear archaeological and biomolecular evidence for the raising of chickens for egg production, based on material from 12 archaeological sites spanning one and a half millennia. The research indicates that the domestic chicken, now a staple in diets around the world, is not as ancient as previously thought.
Published Ancient DNA reveals the appearance of a 6th century Chinese emperor



What did an ancient Chinese emperor from 1,500 years ago look like? A team of researchers reconstructed the face of Chinese Emperor Wu of Northern Zhou using DNA extracted from his remains. The study suggests the emperor's death at the age of 36 might be linked to a stroke. It also sheds light on the origin and migration patterns of a nomadic empire that once ruled parts of northeastern Asia.
Published Unlocking supernova stardust secrets



New research has discovered a rare dust particle trapped in an ancient extra-terrestrial meteorite that was formed by a star other than our sun.
Published ALMA finds new molecular signposts in starburst galaxy



The ALMA radio telescope has detected more than 100 molecular species, including many indicative of different star formation and evolution processes, in a galaxy where stars are forming much more actively than in the Milky Way. This is far more molecules than were found in previous studies. Now the team will try to apply this knowledge to other galaxies.
Published Astronomers conduct first search for forming planets with new space telescope



Planets form in disks of dust and gas called protoplanetary disks that whirl around a central protostar during its final assembly.
Published Persistent hiccups in a far-off galaxy draw astronomers to new black hole behavior



Astronomers have found that a previously quiet black hole, which sits at the center of a galaxy about 800 million light years away, has suddenly erupted, giving off plumes of gas every 8.5 days before settling back to its normal, quiet state.
Published Astronomers unveil strong magnetic fields spiraling at the edge of Milky Way's central black hole



A new image from the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration has uncovered strong and organized magnetic fields spiraling from the edge of the supermassive black hole Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*). Seen in polarized light for the first time, this new view of the monster lurking at the heart of the Milky Way Galaxy has revealed a magnetic field structure strikingly similar to that of the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy, suggesting that strong magnetic fields may be common to all black holes.
Published Distant 'space snowman' unlocks mystery of how some dormant deep space objects become 'ice bombs'



Researchers found that the double-lobed object, which is officially named Kuiper Belt Object 486958 Arrokoth and resembles a snowman, may have ancient ices stored deep within it from when the object first formed billions of years ago.
Published Turbulence within solar transients imaged



Scientists captured images showing the development of turbulence as a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) interacted with the ambient solar wind in the circumsolar space.