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Categories: Paleontology: Climate, Space: Exploration
Published The planet that could end life on Earth


A terrestrial planet hovering between Mars and Jupiter would be able to push Earth out of the solar system and wipe out life on this planet, according to a recent experiment.
Published Can artificial intelligence help find life on Mars or icy worlds?


Researchers have mapped the sparse life hidden away in salt domes, rocks and crystals at Salar de Pajonales at the boundary of the Chilean Atacama Desert and Altiplano. Then they trained a machine learning model to recognize the patterns and rules associated with their distributions so it could learn to predict and find those same distributions in data on which it was not trained. In this case, by combining statistical ecology with AI/ML, the scientists could locate and detect biosignatures up to 87.5 percent of the time and decrease the area needed for search by up to 97 percent.
Published Most detailed geological model reveals Earth's past 100 million years


Previous models of Earth's recent (100 million years) geomorphology have been patchy at best. For the first time a detailed continuous model of the Earth's landscape evolution is presented, with potential for understanding long-term climate and biological development.
Published DART impact provided real-time data on evolution of asteroid's debris


When asteroids suffer natural impacts in space, debris flies off from the point of impact. The tail of particles that form can help determine the physical characteristics of the asteroid. NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission in September 2022 gave a team of scientists a unique opportunity -- to observe the evolution of an asteroid's ejecta as it happened.
Published Wisconsin cave holds tantalizing clues to ancient climate changes, future shifts


A newly published study of a stalagmite found in Cave of the Mounds reveals previously undetected history of the local climate going back thousands of years. Researchers describe evidence for an ice age punctuated by massive and abrupt warming events across much of the Northern Hemisphere.
Published Hansel and Gretel's breadcrumb trick inspires robotic exploration of caves on Mars and beyond


Future space missions likely will send robots to scout out underground habitats for astronauts. Engineers have now developed a system that would enable autonomous vehicles to explore caves, lava tubes and even oceans on other worlds on their own.
Published Hubble captures movie of DART asteroid impact debris


In 2022 NASA embarked on a bold experiment to see if they could change an asteroid's velocity by smacking it with a ballistic probe -- kind of like hitting it with a hammer. This experiment was to test a potential technique to someday deflect an asteroid on a collision course to Earth. Perhaps, for the first time in the history of the universe, an intelligent planetary species sought ways to avoid its own potential extinction by threats from outer space (something the dinosaurs, who were wiped out 65 million years ago by a rogue asteroid, never evolved to accomplish).
Published New NASA DART data prove viability of asteroid deflection as planetary defense strategy


Astronomers offer new insight into how deflection missions can protect the planet from future Earth-bound asteroids and comets.
Published Ice Age survivors


Large-scale genomic analysis documents the migrations of Ice Age hunter-gatherers over a period of 30,000 years -- they took shelter in Western Europe but died out on the Italian peninsula.
Published Oldest human genome from southern Spain


A new study reports on genomic data from a 23,000-year-old individual who lived in what was probably the warmest place of Europe at the peak of the last Ice Age. The oldest human genome recovered from the southern tip of Spain adds an important piece of the puzzle to the genetic history of Europe.
Published Reassessment of Storegga event: Second major landslide recognized


Submarine landslides have a large tsunami potential and occurred on the central Norwegian shelf more frequently in the past than previously thought. Scientists investigate the Nyegga landslide off the coast of Norway. The submarine landslide occurred in the same area as the well-known Storegga event 8,150 years ago. The new findings suggest that approximately one-third of the seafloor material missing -- previously attributed to the Storegga event -- was removed by the Nyegga event 20,000 years ago. This raises questions about the frequency of large submarine landslides and their associated tsunami hazard.
Published AI draws most accurate map of star birthplaces in the Galaxy


Scientists identified about 140,000 molecular clouds in the Milky Way Galaxy from large-scale data of carbon monoxide molecules, observed in detail by the Nobeyama 45-m radio telescope. Using artificial intelligence, the researchers estimated the distance of each of these molecular clouds to determine their size and mass, successfully mapping the distribution of the molecular clouds in the Galaxy in the most detailed manner to date.
Published Baby star near the black hole in the middle of our Milky Way: It exists after all


Scientists have detected the heaviest and youngest infant star ever discovered close to the black hole at the center of our Galaxy. They also identified the region where this 'impossible star' may have formed.
Published Liquid nitrogen spray could clean up stubborn moon dust


A liquid nitrogen spray can remove almost all of the simulated moon dust from a space suit, potentially solving what is a significant challenge for future moon-landing astronauts.
Published Galactic explosion offers astrophysicists new insight into the cosmos


Using data from the James Webb Space Telescope's first year of interstellar observation, an international team of researchers was able to serendipitously view an exploding supernova in a faraway spiral galaxy.
Published Astronomers discover metal-rich galaxies in early universe


While analyzing data from the first images of a well-known early galaxy taken by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), astronomers discovered a companion galaxy previously hidden behind the light of the foreground galaxy -- one that surprisingly seems to have already hosted multiple generations of stars despite its young age, estimated at 1.4 billion years old.
Published Climate trends in the west, today and 11,000 years ago


What we think of as the classic West Coast climate began just about 4,000 years ago, finds a study on climate trends of the Holocene era.
Published Clues about the Northeast's past and future climate from plant fossils


A team of researchers is working to understand the details of the climate for the eastern portion of the United States from the Miocene, which unfortunately is a blank spot on paleo-climate maps. New findings suggest the future climate will be very close to the warmer, wetter, and more homogeneous climate similar to conditions experienced 5 million years ago.
Published Discovery of massive early galaxies defies prior understanding of the universe


Six massive galaxies discovered in the early universe are upending what scientists previously understood about the origins of galaxies in the universe.
Published How one of Saturn's moons ejects particles from oceans beneath its surface


Enceladus, the sixth largest of Saturn's moons, is known for spraying out tiny icy silica particles -- so many of them that the particles are a key component of the second outermost ring around Saturn. Scientists have not known how that happens or how long the process takes. A study now shows that tidal heating in Enceladus' core creates currents that transport the silica, which is likely released by deep-sea hydrothermal vents, over the course of just a few months.