Notebook
- Genetics
Wolves in jackals’ clothing
Africa’s golden jackals are really a species of wolf and deserve a name change, DNA evidence indicates.
- Astronomy
Distant star has northern lights–like display
A dim star shows signs of auroral lights, the first detected on a body that’s not a planet or moon.
- Animals
Toddler seahorses are bumbling and adorable
Rice-grain-sized youngsters can’t yet get a grasp with their tails.
- Planetary Science
First craters on Mars spotted 50 years ago
Fifty years ago, Mariner 4 revealed that the Red Planet was peppered with craters. Now we know pockmarks are common on many other planets and moons, too.
- Environment
Fracking doesn’t always go to great depths
Fracking at shallow depths is unexpectedly common in the United States and raises new concern for drinking water contamination.
- Health & Medicine
Bystanders deliver on CPR
People suffering from cardiac arrest are more likely to survive without brain damage if a bystander performs CPR, new studies suggest.
- Genetics
Melonomics: Sounds like a cancer, smells like a melon
The project that published the first melon genome dubbed itself melonomics.
- Climate
Wildfire seasons have gotten almost 20 percent longer
The average length of wildfire seasons has increased 18.7 percent since 1979, new research shows.
- Genetics
Enormous quantities may soon be called ‘genomical’
Genetic data may soon reach beyond astronomical proportions.
- Paleontology
50-million-year-old fossil sperm discovered
Ancient worm sperm preserved in 50-million-year-old cocoons from Antarctica set age record.
- Astronomy
Source of blazars’ super brightness comes into focus
Astronomers take a close look at a blazar, a galaxy whose central black hole emits gamma rays and other high-energy material toward Earth.
- Life
A downy killer wages chemical warfare
The common fungus Beauveria bassiana makes white downy corpses of its victims.
