The egg or the chicken? An ancient unicellular says egg

Chromosphaera perkinsii is a single-celled species discovered in 2017 in marine sediments around Hawaii. The first signs of its presence on Earth have been dated at over a billion years, well before the appearance of the first animals. A team has observed that this species forms multicellular structures that bear striking similarities to animal embryos. These observations suggest that the genetic programs responsible for embryonic development were already present before the emergence of animal life, or that C. perkinsii evolved independently to develop similar processes. Nature would therefore have possessed the genetic tools to 'create eggs' long before it 'invented chickens'.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/hoSnDEr

Interstellar methane as progenitor of amino acids?

Gamma radiation can convert methane into a wide variety of products at room temperature, including hydrocarbons, oxygen-containing molecules, and amino acids, reports a research team. This type of reaction probably plays an important role in the formation of complex organic molecules in the universe -- and possibly in the origin of life. They also open up new strategies for the industrial conversion of methane into high value-added products under mild conditions.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/pexf3D5

Asteroid grains shed light on the outer solar system's origins

Tiny grains from asteroid Ryugu are revealing clues to the magnetic forces that shaped the far reaches of the solar system over 4.6 billion years ago. The findings suggest the distal solar system harbored a weak magnetic field, which could have played a role in forming the giant planets and other objects.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/6xzuPtY

Mighty radio bursts linked to massive galaxies

Researchers have uncovered where FRBs are more likely to occur in the universe -- massive star-forming galaxies rather than low - mass ones.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/JNks693

Groundbreaking study provides new evidence of when Earth was slushy

At the end of the last global ice age, the deep-frozen Earth reached a built-in limit of climate change and thawed into a slushy planet. Results provide the first direct geochemical evidence of the slushy planet -- otherwise known as the 'plume-world ocean' era -- when sky-high carbon dioxide levels forced the frozen Earth into a massive, rapid melting period.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/2T8PNLj

Towards a hydrogen-powered future: Highly sensitive hydrogen detection system

Hydrogen, a promising fuel, has extensive applications in many sectors. However, its safe and widespread use necessitates reliable sensing methods. While tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy (TDLAS) has proved to be an effective gas sensing method, detecting hydrogen using TDLAS is difficult due to its weak light absorption property in the infrared region. Addressing this issue, researchers developed an innovative calibration-free technique that significantly enhances the accuracy and detection limits for sensing hydrogen using TDLAS.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/Bg4JDFj

Deaf male mosquitoes don't mate

Romance is a complex affair in humans. There's personality, appearance, seduction, all manner of physical and social cues. Mosquitoes are much more blunt. Mating occurs for a few seconds in midair. And all it takes to woo a male is the sound of a female's wingbeats. Imagine researchers' surprise when a single change completely killed the mosquitoes' libidos.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/opjmsOq

New trigger proposed for record-smashing 2022 Tonga eruption

Fifteen minutes before the massive January 2022 eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano, a seismic wave was recorded by two distant seismic stations. The researchers propose that the seismic wave was caused by a fracture in a weak area of oceanic crust beneath the volcano's caldera wall. That fracture allowed seawater and magma to pour into and mix together in the space above the volcano's subsurface magma chamber, explosively kickstarting the eruption.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/AGgIcus

The secrets of baseball's magic mud

The unique properties of baseball's famed 'magic' mud, which MLB equipment managers applied to every ball in the World Series, have never been scientifically quantified -- until now. Researchers now reveal what makes the magic mud so special.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/9xUv2Ff

Synthetic genes engineered to mimic how cells build tissues and structures

Researchers have developed synthetic genes that function like the genes in living cells. The artificial genes can build intracellular structures through a cascading sequence that builds self-assembling structures piece by piece. The discovery offers a path toward using a suite of simple building blocks that can be programmed to make complex biomolecular materials, such as nanoscale tubes from DNA tiles. The same components can also be programmed to break up the design for different materials.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/auUmEhe

Fossil of huge terror bird offers new information about wildlife in South America 12 million years ago

Evolutionary biologists report they have analyzed a fossil of an extinct giant meat-eating bird -- which they say could be the largest known member of its kind -- providing new information about animal life in northern South America millions of years ago.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/JUr40YA

Astronomers discover the fastest-feeding black hole in the early universe

Astronomers have discovered a supermassive black hole at the center of a galaxy just 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang that is consuming matter at a phenomenal rate -- over 40 times the theoretical limit. While short lived, this black hole's 'feast' could help astronomers explain how supermassive black holes grew so quickly in the early Universe.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/xhRBTfK

Indigenous cultural burning has protected Australia's landscape for millennia, study finds

Ancient cultural burning practices carried out by Indigenous Australians limited fuel availability and prevented high intensity fires in southeastern Australia for thousands of years, according to new research.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/HJAtoYL

Revolutionary high-speed 3D bioprinter hailed a game changer for drug discovery

Biomedical engineers have invented a 3D printing system, or bioprinter, capable of fabricating structures that closely mimic the diverse tissues in the human body, from soft brain tissue to harder materials like cartilage and bone.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/jTsVEGA

Violating Bredt's rule: Chemists just broke a 100-year-old rule and say it's time to rewrite the textbooks

According to Bredt's rule, double bonds cannot exist at certain positions on organic molecules if the molecule's geometry deviates too far from what we learn in textbooks. This rule has constrained chemists for a century. Chemists have now shown how to make molecules that violate Bredt's rule, allowing chemists to find practical ways to make and use them in reactions.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/N712M5F

Echolocating bats use an acoustic cognitive map for navigation

Echolocating bats have been found to possess an acoustic cognitive map of their home range, enabling them to navigate over kilometer-scale distances using echolocation alone.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/6GW2Xuj

NASA's Hubble, Webb probe surprisingly smooth disk around Vega

Teams of astronomers used the combined power of NASA's Hubble and James Webb space telescopes to revisit the legendary Vega disk.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/7IOpbRc

Combining VR and non-invasive brain stimulation: A neurotechnology that boosts spatial memory without surgery

Researchers have joined forces to give a boost to spatial memory by creating a unique experimental setup that combines non-invasive deep-brain stimulation, virtual reality training, and fMRI imaging. The study demonstrates that targeted, painless electric impulses to the hippocampus and adjacent structures, a deep brain region implied in memory and spatial navigation, can improve the brain's ability to recall locations and navigate more effectively.

from All Top News -- ScienceDaily https://ift.tt/VeSz6qd