discoveries

Read the latest news stories about recent scientific discoveries on Newser.com

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Oldest Trees are Fastest Growers
 Oldest Trees 
 Grow at a 
 Scary Rate 
STUDY SAYS
Jan 16, 2014 7:03 AM CST

Oldest Trees Grow at a Scary Rate

They keep 'growing like crazy' as they age

(Newser) - Conventional wisdom about forestry has been chopped down and sent through the chipper by new research that shows large, old trees grow much faster than their younger counterparts—and speed up their growth as they age, becoming stronger as the years go by. Researchers studied measurements of more than 670,...

Fish Fossil Challenges Standard View on Evolution

Ancient creature suggests animals developed legs before moving to land

(Newser) - Conventional wisdom has it that the first creatures to emerge from the water eons ago did so without hind limbs. Conventional wisdom, meet Tiktaalik roseae. As the Boston Globe explains, Tiktaalik is a 375-million-year-old fish that swam in what is now the Canadian Arctic. Researchers already knew that the fish...

Even Deeper 'Grand Canyon' Found Under Antarctic Ice

It's almost 2 miles at its deepest

(Newser) - It looks like the Grand Canyon has some pretty stiff competition near both poles. In August, scientists announced they had found a Greenland canyon that dwarfs the famed one in Arizona. Now, researchers have repeated the feat—and then some—in the Antarctic. Phys.Org reports that a group of...

For Monkeys, Love Means Chucking Rocks

Female capuchins have a rather painful way of signaling mates

(Newser) - Good news for male capuchin monkeys wondering why females are always throwing rocks at them: They're actually attracted to you (the bad news probably goes unsaid here). Researchers studying the sex lives of monkeys in Brazil's Serra de Capivara national park found that amorous female capuchins whine and...

'Extinct' Shark Found —at Fish Market

Smoothtooth blacktip is alive and apparently tasty

(Newser) - The smoothtooth blacktip shark isn't quite as extinct as scientists had believed it to be, say researchers who found one for sale in a Kuwait fish market. Further research in the region turned up another 47 specimens of the shark, though the only one previously known to scientists was...

There Are Only 10 Asteroids Worth Mining
 There Are Only 10 
 Asteroids Worth Mining 
STUDY SAYS
Jan 14, 2014 6:40 AM CST

There Are Only 10 Asteroids Worth Mining

Mining company says that's way off

(Newser) - The burgeoning space mining industry might be short lived if Harvard astrophysicist Dr. Martin Elvis' calculations are correct. Elvis has just released a study estimating that just 10 near-Earth asteroids could be mined cost effectively, the BBC reports. Elvis assumed that miners would want to grab M-type rocks, the iron-nickel...

Dark Side of the Moon Is ... Turquoise?
 Dark Side of Moon 
 Is ... Turquoise 
new research
Jan 13, 2014 1:08 AM CST

Dark Side of Moon Is ... Turquoise

Astronomers say they've seen its true color for 1st time

(Newser) - Pink Floyd fans take note: The side of the moon referred to as the "dark side" is actually turquoise, astronomers say. Researchers found that the moon's far side is lit by faint blue light reflected from Earth that becomes turquoise as it is reflected back once again, the...

Coffee May Improve Long-Term Memory
 Coffee May Improve 
 Long-Term Memory 
study says
Jan 13, 2014 12:30 AM CST

Coffee May Improve Long-Term Memory

Plus: brain-training exercises offer new hope

(Newser) - Coffee may offer a boost to our long-term memory, according to a new study in Nature Neuroscience . The findings are based on test subjects' ability to remember patterns in pictures after taking a caffeine pill. Researchers showed 44 volunteers who hadn't had coffee for at least a day a...

Your Friends Change &mdash;But Not How Many You Have
Your Friends Change—but Not How Many You Have
study says
Jan 12, 2014 12:28 PM CST

Your Friends Change—but Not How Many You Have

Study finds we have finite capacity for close relationships

(Newser) - A new study offers a rather stark picture of how long-term friendships work: While we might not stay friends with the same people throughout our lives, we do tend to maintain the same number of friends, researchers say. In other words, "our capacity for maintaining emotionally close relationships is...

Why Victims of Racism May Age Faster
 Why Victims 
 of Racism May 
 Age Faster 
NEW STUDY
Jan 12, 2014 8:19 AM CST

Why Victims of Racism May Age Faster

Researchers raise concerns about internalized bias

(Newser) - Racism may take a clear physical toll on victims, causing their cells to age faster, scientists have found. Researchers conducted a study on blood samples from 92 black men in the Bay Area, investigating their DNA. Specifically, the Pacific Standard reports, they looked at the length of chunks of genetic...

New Pill Could Give Adults Perfect Pitch
 New Pill Could 
 Give Adults 
 Perfect Pitch 
in case you missed it
Jan 11, 2014 1:17 PM CST

New Pill Could Give Adults Perfect Pitch

And make adult brains more receptive to knowledge in general

(Newser) - Annoyed that your shower singing hasn't quite wowed the neighbors? One day you may be able to improve your pitch—and even acquire perfect pitch—with little more than a trip to the drugstore, NPR reports. That's because researchers are studying a "mood-stabilizing" drug that enables an...

5 Most Incredible Discoveries of the Week

Including long-lived sharks and the 'Hand of God'

(Newser) - Senior-citizen sharks and an amazing image from deep space make the list:
  • Sharks Live Longer Than We Thought : Great white sharks that manage to stay out of the soup pot can live to much greater ages than earlier realized, according to new research. In fact, they'd put a lot
...

NASA Finds the &#39;Hand of God&#39;
 NASA Finds the 'Hand of God' 
Jan 10, 2014 7:55 AM CST

NASA Finds the 'Hand of God'

Stunning image shows material from exploded star

(Newser) - A newly released NASA photo depicts what appears to be an enormous hand floating in space. The "Hand of God," as it's being called, actually consists of the remains of an exploded star, Space.com explains. It had been imaged in 2009 using NASA's Chandra X-ray...

Century-Old Tissue Unlocks Cholera's Genome

Research reveals link between disease's first 2 pandemics

(Newser) - Using a tiny scrap of long-preserved tissue, researchers from the Ancient DNA Centre at Ontario's McMaster University have managed to map out the genome of the cholera strain that ravaged the globe in the early 19th century, in the second of seven pandemics linked to the disease. The research...

Ancient Sea Beasts Were Dark as Night
 Ancient Sea Beasts 
 Were Dark as Night 
new study
Jan 9, 2014 10:01 AM CST

Ancient Sea Beasts Were Dark as Night

Sea beasts weren't so colorful

(Newser) - Ancient sea reptiles are finally showing their true colors. Researchers investigated skin remnants from ancient leatherback turtles and ichthyosaurs and mosasaurs, which resembled fish. The researchers found that all three creatures were covered in black skin or scales, with reason: The coloration may have helped camouflage them and protect them...

Sharks Live Longer Than We Thought

73-year-old great white identified

(Newser) - Great white sharks that manage to stay out of the soup pot can live to much greater ages than earlier realized, according to new research. Using tests that measure radiation from atmospheric nuclear tests, scientists identified a male great white that lived to be around 73 years old and a...

Saudi Arabia Milestone: Dinosaur Fossils

Scientists find first that can be identified in Arabian Peninsula

(Newser) - A new fossil discovery confirms that dinosaurs roamed present-day Saudi Arabia. Researchers report in PLoS One that they found bone fragments of two different dinosaurs that lived about 72 million years ago. One is a distant cousin of T-Rex, a meat-eating theropod. The other is a plant-eating titanosaur, reports LiveScience...

A First: Conjoined Gray Whales

But the underdeveloped calves don't survive birth

(Newser) - Mexican scientists have made a fascinating, if a little sad, discovery in a Baja California lagoon: conjoined gray whales. Unfortunately, the twin calves were dead, and scientists think they were miscarried before full term. While conjoined twins have been seen in other whale species, this is the first recorded case...

Look Out, Cancer Cells, Here Come 'Sticky Balls'

Cornell researchers develop promising technique to keep tumors from spreading

(Newser) - It sounds ingenious: Cornell researchers have created roving proteins whose sole purpose is to destroy cancer cells in the bloodstream. If further tests hold up, this could offer a way to keep cancers from metastasizing, or spreading, reports the BBC , which uses the phrase "cancer-killing sticky balls" to describe...

Stealth Carbs in Paleo Diet Rotted Ancients' Mouths

Acorns, pine nuts caused pus-filled gums, rotted teeth in Morocco

(Newser) - Ancient hunter-gatherers tended to have fine sets of teeth—at least, serious tooth decay was rare since people mainly munched on meat, tubers, and berries, and laid off the carbs, NPR reports. That's why a study from London's Natural History Museum is surprising—and pretty disgusting. Of the...

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