A tiny asteroid no wider than a football pitch has been quietly puzzling astronomers for years, and a Chinese spacecraft is now closing in on the answer. The asteroid, called Kamo’oalewa, is one of only a handful of objects known as Earth’s quasi moons, small bodies that circle the sun in near lockstep with our…
In the early years of the 20th century, conservation in the United States was still taking shape as a profession rather than a philosophy. Forests were being mapped, species counted, land divided into managed zones with a confidence that nature could be organised if only enough data were gathered. Among the young men entering that…
During the mid-20th century, large areas of Israel were transformed by one of the country’s most ambitious reforestation programmes. Millions of pine trees were planted to stabilise soils, combat erosion and create forests on previously open landscapes. At first, the initiative appeared to be an environmental success, with barren hillsides becoming green woodlands. However, decades…
Nearly four decades after the Chornobyl nuclear disaster, the abandoned reactor remains one of the most hostile places on Earth. Radiation levels that would prove lethal to most forms of life still linger in parts of the exclusion zone, making it an unlikely setting for biological discovery. Yet among cracked concrete, rusting steel and contaminated…
While early birds existed in a time period when dinosaurs dominated, they were feathered, capable of gliding or flying, but looked nothing like the birds we have today. Unlike birds like pigeons, robins and eagles, which have short fan-shaped tails, these ancient birds possessed long, bony tails inherited from their dinosaur ancestors. The transition from…
Freshwater ecosystems have spent years under growing pressure from pollution, changing weather patterns and rising temperatures. Rivers and lakes in many parts of the world have been losing dissolved oxygen, placing fish, aquatic plants and countless smaller organisms under increasing strain. That broader pattern has often been presented as one of the more difficult environmental…
A new species of spider from the Ecuadorian Amazon: Taczanowskia waska. Credit: David Diaz-Guevarra Researchers exploring Ecuador’s Amazon rainforest thought they had spotted a small mushroom clinging to the underside of a leaf during a night survey. A closer look revealed something far stranger. It was a spider that had disguised itself so convincingly as…
A white dwarf is usually thought of as the quiet remnant left behind after a star has exhausted its fuel and shed much of itself into space. By that stage, any worlds that once orbited nearby are expected to have faced a violent fate. Yet one planetary system roughly 80 light-years from Earth appears to…
Studies show that the ancient timber circle, dubbed “Seahenge,” was built in 2049 B.C. It was excavated from a salt marsh near a beach on England’s east coast in 1999. (Image credit: Holmes Garden Photos/Alamy) A mysterious wooden monument buried beneath the Norfolk coast may have been built more than 4,000 years ago in an…
Scientists Thought Ravens Followed Wolves for Food. They Were Wrong. Ravens Predict Them For decades, biologists believed ravens found their next meal by shadowing wolves across the landscape until the predators made a kill. A new study in and around Yellowstone National Park suggests the birds are using a far more sophisticated strategy.Instead of constantly…