Medieval text family trees suggest 60% of works vanished over centuries
For every King Arthur or Roland, whose adventures readers can still enjoy today, another hero of ancient literature may have been lost forever. Before the printing press, texts were copied manually. This process introduced errors and innovations. Like mutations in the replication of DNA, these manuscript changes can be used to create evolutionary trees that philologists call stemmata. Since these trees are based on the extant copies, they do not reflect the full evolutionary history of texts and cannot account for those that are completely lost.
Rare color shifting discovered in iconic Australian frog
University of Newcastle researchers have documented one of the clearest examples of iridescence ever recorded in an amphibian, revealing that the endangered green and golden bell frog (Ranoidea aurea) possesses intricate color-shifting skin previously unseen in the species.
Beetroot juice is trending – its benefits go beyond the hype | New Scientist
Beetroot juice has been shown to improve stamina during exercise Westend61/Getty Images
My friend Lizzie, a very athletic doctor, recently showed me some concentrated beetroot shots she was planning to take before an upcoming marathon. I never run anywhere, but she let me try one anyway. I could only manage slow sips of the intensely beetroot-tasting purple liquid, but she assured me it has a raft of benefits for athletes and non-athletes alike. I decided to look into it.
Streetlights are trapping thousands of pill bugs in giant “death spirals”
Researchers have uncovered a surprising side effect of artificial lighting: ordinary streetlights can lure thousands of tiny land dwelling isopods into giant synchronized "death spirals." The newly documented behavior, observed in Israel, is the first of its kind and suggests that human made lighting can dramatically disrupt the instincts of small ground dwelling animals.
China's space probe reaches asteroid after 1-billion-kilometer chase for first sample return
China's Tianwen-2 space probe, which is set to bring back samples from an asteroid for research, has reached its target after traveling 1 billion kilometers (620 million miles) over more than a year, the Chinese space agency said Monday.
Astronomers witness the birth of a magnetar for the first time
Astronomers have, for the first time, observed the birth of a magnetar, an extremely magnetic, rapidly spinning type of neutron star. The breakthrough confirms that these exotic objects can power some of the brightest stellar explosions ever seen.
Euclid discovers the most ancient quasars in the universe
An island of calm at the violent heart of the galaxy
Where would you go to watch a star being born? Probably not the heart of the Milky Way, which is about the most violent neighborhood our galaxy has to offer, a maelstrom of gas churning so fast and so chaotically that you would think nothing could ever settle there long enough to collapse into a star. And yet stars do form in that turmoil, and astronomers have just begun to work out how by finding an unexpected pocket of calm in the chaos.
A strange LIGO signal could reveal the missing link behind dark matter
Primordial black holes have remained one of astronomy's most intriguing ideas for decades. Now, researchers at the University of Miami believe a recent gravitational wave detection may bring scientists closer to confirming that these ancient objects are real, a breakthrough that could also help solve the enduring mystery of dark matter.
Scientists stunned as bumble bees solve a classic intelligence test
Bumble bees have demonstrated an impressive ability that scientists once believed was limited to humans and other animals with much larger brains. In a new study, the insects successfully completed a completely unfamiliar object manipulation task despite never being taught how to solve it.