Paleontologists describe the oldest known members of Haidomyrmecinae – An extinct subfamily of ants that were only during the Cretaceous period – preserved as an impression of limestone rocks in the Krato Formation in northeastern Brazil.
Vulcanidris cratensisholotype. Scale bar – 2 mm. Image credit: Lepeco et al. , doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2025.03.023.
It has been named Vulcanidris cratensisthe new ant species lived 113 million years ago (early Cretaceous period).
This species represents the oldest and most definitive ant known in science, and is also the most complete evidence of the early evolution of ants in the fossil record.
“Vulcanidris cratensis The author, Dr. Anson Lepeco, a paleontologist at Dr. Zloria da Universad de Sao Paulo, stated:
“What makes this discovery particularly interesting is its belong to an extinct “hell ant”, known for its strange predatory adaptation. ”
“Even though it is part of an ancient lineage, the species already exhibits highly specialized anatomical features, suggesting unique hunting behaviors.”
The oldest previous ants were found in France and Myanmar and were preserved in amber instead of limestone.
The presence of hell ants in Brazil indicates that ants are already widely distributed and diversified early in their evolution.
“There was an hell ants explained by Amber, and this was the first time I could visualize them in a rock fossil,” Dr. Lepeco said.
Dr. Lepeco and his colleagues discovered a very well-preserved Ant specimen and systematically examined one of the world’s largest collections of fossil insects from. Krato Layera deposit known for its exceptional fossil preservation.
“When we encountered this extraordinary specimen, we quickly recognized its importance not only as a new species, but also as a potentially conclusive evidence of ants in the Krato Formation,” Dr. Lepeco said.
“The finding highlights the importance of a thorough investigation of existing collections either privately or in museums, and highlights the fauna of Brazilian paleontology and the country’s unexposed fossil insects.”
Using microcomputed tomography imaging, paleontologists discovered it Vulcanidris cratensis It was previously closely related to hell ants, known only from specimens preserved in Burma mber, Myanmar.
This finding shows that ants must have been widely distributed worldwide and repeatedly crossed Cretaceous lands.
But what surprised them most was the professional traits of Hell’s Ants.
“We were hoping to find the features of the hellish ant, but we were shocked by the features of the feeding device,” Dr. Lepeco said.
“Unlike modern ants with laterally moving mandibles, this species had a mandible with face and face projections running forward in front of their head and eyes.”
“Finding such anatomically specialized ants for 113 million years ago challenges our assumptions about how quickly and complex adaptations these insects have developed.”
“The complex forms suggest that even these early ants had evolved sophisticated plundering strategies that were already very different from their modern counterparts.”
“The discovery of this new ant specimen raises broader questions about the evolutionary pressures that have led to the unique adaptation of hell’s ants.”
“Advanced imaging tools allow us to explore these fossil specimens in greater detail than ever before.”
Discovery of Vulcanidris cratensis Reported in a paper It’s published in the journal today Current Biology.
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Anderson Repeco et al. Ants from Hell from the Lower Cretaceous period in Brazil. Current BiologyPublished online on April 24, 2025. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2025.03.023
A quiet honor
Veer Chetal, a recent graduate of Immaculate High School in Danbury, was about to begin his studies at Rutgers University in New Jersey. In 2022, he completed the “Future Lawyers” program, and the story on the pure white website of the year showed a photo of a smiling child wearing glasses wearing a Tommy Hilfiger windbreaker over a Red Polo.
Classmates remember Cetal as a shy and car fan. “He’s staying on his own for a bit,” says Marcodias, who has become friends with Cethal Junior Year. According to another classmate named Nick Paris, this was true for Cetal up until the day in the middle of his fourth graders who appeared at school driving a Corvette. “He just parked a lot. It was 7:30am and everyone was like that. what?” Paris quickly rolled up with BMW, and then he began wearing Louis Vuitton shirts and Gucci shoes.
Chethal said he made a code to trade money. Diaz said Chethal showed him a phone transaction as proof one morning during his homeroom class. Once, Chethal rented a large house in Stamford, Connecticut, and held a three-day gathering with friends. “I was in the basement at some point. I was just messing around with my friends. I was looking at him like his cell phone, like he was, avoiding everyone at the party,” Diaz says. “And, oh, I thought it was a bit strange.” Paris remembers during a school parade, police stopped his Lamborghini Ursu Cetal for a traffic violation. “He literally called his lawyer out there before answering the police question. Everyone was. Wow, this guy is doing something for him.
Independent investigators say that Chetal is a secretly member of COM, an online network of chat groups with roots in the 1980s hacking underground, and an online network of chat groups that act as a social network for cybercrime or ambitious things. In an affidavit from an unrelated case, FBI agents described COM as “a geographically diverse group of individuals organized in various subgroups, all engaged in different types of criminal activity through online communications applications such as Discord and Telegram.” According to FBI affidavits and experts studying COM, activities of various subgroups include making false reports to agencies such as emergency services or schools to trigger police responses. Once the hacker takes over the target phone number, the Sim exchange is made by tricking the customer and service representative. Ransomware attacks using malware that deny users or organizers access to computer files. Cryptocurrency theft; and corporate intrusions.
Allison Nixon, chief research officer of Unit 221B, a group of cybersecurity experts, has been following this growing corner of the Internet since 2011 and is widely considered to be a distinguished expert at COM. She says that most COM members are young men from Western countries. In group chat, many people talk about universities and take cybersecurity classes. For many, the gateway is through video games such as Runescape, Roblox, and Grand Theft Auto.
Research has revealed a significant decline in the use of evidence-based language in American political speeches since the 1970s.
Findings published in the journal Natural human behavior stemmed from an analysis of over 8 million speeches delivered in the US Congress over the last 140 years.
“We wanted to understand why some politicians who frequently lie are perceived as honest,” stated Dr. Segun Aroyehun, the lead author of the study and a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Constance in Germany, as quoted in BBC Science Focus. “Often, it is because they speak about their beliefs and come across as genuine.”
Earlier research by Aroyehun and colleagues highlighted a shift in language usage among US Congress members towards belief-driven and intuitive language, departing from evidence-based language.
“There is a clear distinction between evidence-based truth and intuitive truth, where emotions play a crucial role,” Aroyehun explained.
To delve deeper, the team probed historical records to ascertain if this shift was a recent occurrence.
Utilizing machine learning models, the researchers combed through almost 150 years of Congress speeches, establishing a scoring system based on keywords signifying evidence-based or intuition-based language.
While evidence-based keywords comprised terms like “analysis”, “data”, “study results”, and “study”, intuition-based language included phrases such as “perspective”, “common sense”, “prediction”, and “believe”.
Both Republicans and Democrats have exhibited similar language changes in their political speeches over the past 140 years. – Getty
Each speech was assessed based on the evidence-intuition language ratio.
The results were striking. While the ratio fluctuated over the 140-year period, evidence-based language predominated until the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s before a shift took place. Since the 1970s, intuition-based language has gradually gained prominence.
Aroyehun noted that this trend applied to both Democratic and Republican politicians, with a recent uptick observed in evidence-based language among Democrats.
He underscored that the ratio does not determine the veracity of the speech content.
Nonetheless, these linguistic shifts have had repercussions. The team juxtaposed these changes with measures of legislative polarization and income inequality, observing a simultaneous decline in parliamentary productivity—measured by statute quantity and quality—over this period.
“The core message here is the significance of rhetoric,” Aroyehun emphasized. “The nature of truth pursuit reflected in US Congress language is integral to gauging social and political well-being.”
The team aims to employ similar methodologies to analyze speeches in Germany and Italy, tracking trends across diverse democracies.
About our experts
Segun Aroyehun is a postdoctoral researcher affiliated with the Social Data Science Group at the University of Constance. He holds a PhD from Centro derestigación Computación, IPN, focusing on devising robust strategies to combat offensive content on social media. His research has been featured in publications like Natural human behavior and Natural Communication.
The fossil record of freshwater crayfish is surprisingly sparse, mainly containing trace fossils, some body fossils, and rarely gastroscopy. Paleontologists from Flinders University, the University of New South Wales, the Canterbury Museum and the University of Canterbury have discovered that the small molars (jaws) of the lower jaw of Gondwannan freshwater crayfish have a stiff, robust apatite layer. They discovered eight jaw fragments of a fossil freshwater crayfish that lived in New Zealand during the early Miocene period.
Prehistoric freshwater crayfish grew to about 25 cm long compared to about 8 cm of today’s New Zealand species.
“Crayfish were important creatures in ancient settings,” says Dr. Paul Scofield, senior curator at the Canterbury Museum.
“The crayfish’s body does not fossil because it is made from the wrong chemical elements. However, the molars in the jaw are made of different materials, like mammalian teeth, so they do fossil because they are made from different materials.”
“This means that we can clearly say where freshwater crayfish lived in prehistoric times. It will speak more about prehistoric ecosystems and how they worked.”
Dr. Scofield and his colleagues sifted through hundreds of thousands of small fossil fragments found near St. Batan in central Otago and used microscopes to identify prehistoric crayfish to identify each piece.
Crayfish were identified from eight jaw fragments each, about 4 mm in length.
An exciting observation was to show that the three lower jaws showed that the three types lived together.
There are currently only two species in New Zealand and live in different parts of the country.
Fragments are very rare. One distance of the 100 kg fossil fragments recovered from St. Batan produced only one fragment.
“We also identified the first fossilized Yabby buttons, which are calcium deposits that form in the stomachs of crayfish,” said Dr. Trevor Worthy, a paleontologist at Flinders University.
“Historically, paleontologists have often misidentified Yabby buttons as fossilized fish teeth.”
“Several fragments like these are sitting in boxes of museum collections around the world and are marked with question marks. Now we can say what they are.”
“Small fossils can reveal a lot about prehistoric life,” said Dr Vanessa de Petri, a paleontologist at the University of Canterbury.
“It’s not just about big sexy bones, it’s about the little things. Every piece has a story to tell.”
Team’s result It was published in Alcheringa, Australian Journal of Palaeontology.
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Trevor H. Worthy et al. Decapoda, Parastacidae, of the fossil mandible from the early Miocene of New Zealand. AlcheringaPublished online on April 13th, 2025. doi:10.1080/03115518.2025.2488056
It will be assigned to a new ICHNOSPECIES Ruopodasaurus clava the footprints of these dinosaurs found in northeastern British Columbia and northwest Alberta confirm the presence of antirosaurus antirosaurus during the Middle North American period.
Cast specimen of Ruopodasaurus clava From the Murray River, British Columbia, Canada. Image credits: Arbor et al. , doi: 10.1080/02724634.2025.2451319.
“There are two major groups in Ankylosaurus,” says Dr. Victoria Arbor, an evolutionary biologist and vertebrate paleontologist at the Royal BC Museum and the University of Victoria.
“The Nodosaurid Ankylosaurs have a flexible tail and four toes, while the Ankylosaurs have a tail club like the Sledgehammer, with only three legs.”
“Unlike the well-known Ichnospecies of the Ankylosaurus. Tetrapodosaurus borealis These new tracks found in North America with four toes – Name Ruopodasaurus clava – There are only three, so anywhere in the world makes the first known example of antirosaurus footprints.”
“Ruopodasaurus clava means “falling lizards with clubs/maces,” referring to both the mountainous areas where these tracks were discovered and the distinctive tail clubs of these dinosaurs.
They don’t know exactly what the dinosaurs made, but Ruopodasaurus clava Although it looks like a footprint, paleontologists know it was about 5-6m long, thorny, armored, and had a stiff or full tail club.
“Ankylosaurus is my favorite group of dinosaurs, so it’s really exciting for me to be able to identify new examples of these dinosaurs in British Columbia,” Dr. Arbor said.
Newly discovered Ruopodasaurus clava The footprint dates back to the mid-Cretaceous period, approximately 100 million to 94 million years ago.
No bones of Ankilosauride were found in North America about 100-84 million years ago, leading to speculation that antirosauride disappeared from North America at this time.
These footprints show that during this gap in the skeletal fossil record, tailed ankylosauruses were alive and well in North America.
This finding also shows that two major ankylosaurus of Nodosaurus – Nodosaurus and Ankylosaurus groups coexist in the same region during this time, including this new three indirect species.
“We’ve seen a lot of experience in the world,” said Dr. Charles Helm, scientific advisor at the Tumbler Ridge Museum.
“It’s really exciting to know that through this research there are two types of Ankylosaurus that call this area home. Ruopodasaurus clava It has been identified only in this region of Canada.”
“The study also highlights how important the Peace Region in northeastern British Columbia is to understand the evolution of dinosaurs in North America.
“This discovery gives us a new part of the puzzle about ancient creatures that once roamed Canadian stuff.”
Findings are reported in a paper in Journal of VertebratePaleontology.
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Victoria M. Arbor et al. Ichnotaxon, a new tyrophoran from British Columbia, Canada, confirms the existence of antirosaurus dinosaurs in the central Cretaceous period of North America. Journal of VertebratePaleontologyPublished online on April 14th, 2025. doi:10.1080/02724634.2025.2451319
The Sakhallo-Arabian desert is one of the largest biogeographical barriers on Earth, hindering the dispersion between Africa and Eurasia, including human movements in the past. Recent research suggests that this barrier has been in place for at least 11 million years. However, a new Griffith University-led study shows that numerous humidity intervals have occurred in the Sakhallo-Arabian desert over the past 8 million years.
Marcouska et al. It shows wet intervals that have recurred inside Central Arabia over the past 8 million years. Image credit: Paul Breeze.
Arabia is at the heart of the largest near-continuous chain of arid lands on the planet. A harsh and often highly dry belt that stretches from the Sahara to the Tar Desert.
Sakhallo-Arabian desert barriers limit animal dispersion and divide Africa and Eurasia into areas of Afrotropic, palate, and Indomalaya biogeography, each characterized by a distinct assemblage of plants, animal species and communities.
While the persistence of this desert barrier serves as a major control over the depiction of these biogeographical regions, improvements in climate throughout the Sakhallo-Arabian region allow for dispersion among them.
As a result, the region is a “transition zone” and hosts a complex fauna mixture with characteristics of Africa, Eurasia and South Asia.
Recent research suggests that a dry beyond this desert barrier and that it has begun to be highly aridity and highly dry on the edge of northern Arabia 9 million years ago in the completely arid state of the Sahara at least 11 million years ago.
“However, fossil evidence from the late Miocene (marked by rising earth temperatures) and the Pleistocene (including multiple ice ages) suggests the existence of an episode within the interior of the water-dependent animal Sakhallo-Arabian desert.”
“It is possible that animals such as crocodiles, quids, cobopotamids, and absoscideans were supported by rivers and lakes that are almost nonexistent from today’s arid landscape.”
“These wet conditions could promote the dispersion of these mammals between Africa and Eurasia, and Arabia serves as an important crossroads in continental-scale biogeographic exchange.”
In the new study, Professor Petraglia and colleagues analyzed a set of osteoscopic electrons (mineral deposits such as bulls and stellates) from a series of caves from within Arabia.
It is one of the longest aleoclimatic records available in Arabia today, and represents one of the longest space paleoclimatic records in the world.
“Little was known about Arabian paleoclimate before this time,” said Dr. Monica Markowska of Northumbria University.
“The findings highlight that the effects of monsoons have been weakened and polar ice coverings in the Pleistocene during the Pleistocene have been strengthened, reducing precipitation during humidity intervals and changing over time.”
“Although Arabia has traditionally been overlooked in the dispersion of Africa and Yolasia, research like ours is increasingly revealing the central location of mammal and human migration,” added Dr Faisal Al-Jiblin, who led Saudi archaeologists on the Heritage Committee.
result It will be displayed in the journal Nature.
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M. Markouska et al. The recurrence of humidity in Arabia over the past 8 million years. NaturePublished online on April 9, 2025. doi:10.1038/s41586-025-08859-6
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt has purchased a mansion in Holland Park for nearly £42 million, joining a string of significant transactions in London’s prime real estate markets.
As reported by the Financial Times, Schmidt, who led Google from 2001 to 2011, acquired a two-level stucco apartment in west London last May.
The Grade II listed building, as per official Land Registry records, includes a MEWS house at the back and was last sold in 2022 for £36.2 million. This sale follows other notable deals in London’s real estate market, including the recent £139 million sale of a 40-bedroom mansion in Regent Park.
Schmidt, now planning to rent out the property, is part of a trend where wealthy Americans are investing in luxury London real estate. In 2020, Americans surpassed Chinese buyers in the capital, accounting for 9.3% of foreign buyers compared to 5.6% in 2019, according to Knight Frank.
The interest in British citizenship among Americans has also seen a sharp increase, with over 6,100 US citizens applying for UK citizenship – a 26% rise from 2023 and the highest number since data collection began in 2004.
While there have been large transactions at the top end of the London market, overall activity has slowed. In 2021, there were 443 London homes sold for over £5 million, up from 308 in 2019 pre-pandemic levels, as per Savilles.
London’s capital price growth has been modest, recording its lowest annual price growth in the UK at 1.9% compared to the national rate of 3.9% in February. Northern Ireland saw the highest growth at 13.5%, followed by Scotland at 3.9% and Wales at 3.6%. London remains the most expensive location to buy a home, with an average price of £529,369.
A representative for Schmidt declined to comment. A spokesperson informed the FT: “Eric is making investments in luxury real estate properties worldwide.”
Paleontologists have discovered 131 large theropods and sauropods in the formations of the central Jurassic Kirmalag at Prince Charles’s point, located on the northwest coast of the Troternas Peninsula in Sky.
A 167 million-year-old dinosaur trackway located at Prince Charles’s point on the Isle of Skye. Image credit: Blakesley et al. , doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0319862.
The rocks of Isle of Skye are rich in dinosaur footprints, providing insight into the distribution and behavior of dinosaurs at critical times of evolution.
The newly discovered footprint was left in the wavy sands of an ancient subtropical lagoon dating back to the mid-Jurassic period about 167 million years ago.
The footprint is 25-60 cm long and comes in two types. This is a round “Tyre-Size” track, made by three untidy trucks left by Bipedal: a carnivorous theropod, a tetrapod, and a long-necked sauropod.
Based on comparisons with previous fossil discoveries, the most likely truck maker is Megalosaurus Similar to early branching members of the Neosauropod group CethiosaurusBoth are known from British skeletal ruins.
According to paleontologists, many of these footprints occur together in successive steps.
The longest of these trackways is over 12m, among the longest known examples from the Isle of Skye.
The spacing and orientation of these trackways represent slow walking without consistent orientation or interaction with each other, and what is probably left by the dinosaurs is casually crushed at slightly different times.
The site at Prince Charles’s point supports previous evidence that the Jurassic Sauropod frequently visited Scottish lagoons.
However, this site contains a higher percentage of theropod tracks than similar locales, perhaps indicating differences in the environment between these ancient lagoons.
The site also does not have footprints from other dinosaurs such as Stegosaurus and Ornithopods, but it remains unclear whether these animals really do not exist in this environment or simply did not leave a mark on this site.
“Prince Charles’s footprint at points provides fascinating insight into the behavior and environmental distribution of meat-eating theropods and plant-eating long-necked sauropods during key periods of evolution.”
“In Sky, these dinosaurs obviously preferred shallow, submerged lagoon environments to muddy air exposed.”
“Interestingly, this site also has historical significance as a location for Skye, where Prince Bonnie landed and hidden while flying through Scotland following the Battle of Culloden.”
Discoveries are reported in a paper Published online in the journal PLOS 1.
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T. Blakely et al. 2025. A new central Jurassic Lagoon margin assembly of theropod and sauropod dinosaur trajectories from the Isle of Skye, Scotland. PLOS 1 20(4): E0319862; doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0319862
NASA’s funding cuts have already impacted US research and education programs
dcstockphotography/shutterstock
NASA has cancelled contracts and grants worth up to $420 million, following guidance from the Trump administration’s government efficiency (DOGE). The reductions will impact research projects and education programs in the United States, but NASA says it’s perfect for checking exactly which organizations are affected.
After Doge, an independent task force led by tech billionaire Elon Musk, NASA confirmed the amount but refused to specify which programs were cancelled. Casey Drier The Planetary Association, a California-based nonprofit organization, list of a program that has recently lost funds using the agency’s public grant database. NASA has since deleted the database and did not respond to questions about the accuracy of the list.
Much of the cuts on Dreyer’s list coincides with President Donald Trump’s skepticism about climate science and his administration’s active targets regarding his interpretation of the Diversity, Equality and Inclusion (DEI) program.
Climate-related cancellations include a Massachusetts Institute of Technology project that uses satellite sensors to map the impacts of extreme heat, air pollution and flooding. Another target was a University of Oklahoma study to develop digital twin simulations that predict the impact of flooding on tribal lands.
However, it is unclear why NASA has ended support for other research, such as using bioengineering cells to investigate how spaceflight affects the human body and modelling how lunar dust can contaminate future lunar missions.
NASA spokesman Bethany Stevens said New Scientist The agency is “to work with the Ministry of Government Efficiency initiative to optimize the workforce and resources.” Doge urged agencies across the US government to cut funding or shut down altogether.
But it says that ongoing grants and contract cancellations will fly in the face of a “strict” review process that selected them in the first place as “the most scientifically appropriate proposal.” Michael Batario At Yale University. “Politics cannot and should not define what is scientifically worth studying at the level of individual grants,” says Batario, who is studying the atmosphere of Mars and Titan in preparation for future missions.
“DEI related cuts get me the most out of the way.” Bruce Jacoski He was the lead scientist at NASA’s Maven Mission to Mars at the University of Colorado, Boulder. “These grants are about reaching out to underrepresented groups and making people accessible to training and education. None of them appears to promote people who are less qualified than more qualified.”
For example, NASA cut funding for a conference hosted by the National Association of Black Physicists, a longtime nonprofit that promotes the professional well-being of African-American physicists and physics students. “We were told that the reason for cancelling the contract is to comply with the president’s executive order regarding the DEI,” he said. Stephen Robersonpresident of the National Association of Black Physics. “We would like to appeal this decision and explain further why an annual conference, in which people of all races and academic levels present scientific research, is considered a DEI.”
New Scientist They reached out to researchers and organizations that they thought were affected, but few responded to the National Association of Black Physicists. The San Diego Aerospace Museum, featured on Drayer’s list, said NASA’s funding for educational events appears to be still intact, despite the NASA database indicating changes to the grant’s end date. NASA did not respond to requests to verify the status of this fund.
A team of paleontologists from Lake Forest College, Stellenbosch University, University of Minnesota, and North Carolina State University described a new population of fossil eggshells, members of the formation of cedar mountains, a well-known unit among scientists studying early lobular epochs.
A 100 million-year-old dinosaur eggshell fragment from a Mussantit member of Cedar Mountain Formation. Image credit: Lake Forest College.
The first fossil eggshells from Mussantit members of Cedar Mountain Formation were described over 50 years ago.
Since then, in half a century, the diversity of fossil eggshells in this rock unit has been limited to only one egg type.
However, Dr. Josh Hedge and his colleagues at Lake Forest College revealed another story.
“We found new dinosaur egg types here and here, which we didn’t see before,” Dr. Hedge said.
“When previous research explained one type, we found five types of eggshells in this area.”
“Three eggshell fragments belonging to the feathered bipedal dinosaur, two types of dinosaurs with dinosaurs with ornitopod ducks, and a truly funky discovery: some crocodile eggshells.”
These new discoveries challenge the traditional view of one of the different types of dinosaurs that live in ecosystems.
“You can see patterns of coexisting dinosaurs,” Dr. Hedge said.
“Just as multiple big cat-loving animals coexist in Africa’s savanna, we can see the co-occurrence of similar types of dinosaurs in one geographical area.”
Researchers hope to uncover information that will lead to a better understanding of ecosystems 100 million years ago.
They are currently researching ways to better understand these oviraptorosaur eggs.
“We found so many eggshells, so we hope that we can distinguish between individuals who share a single nest, not just the species, for example, because we have sample sizes large enough to interpret them at a higher resolution,” Dr. Hedge said.
Team’s paper Published online in the journal PLOS 1.
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J. Hedge et al. 2025. Diversity of fossil eggshells from Mussentuchit members of Cedar Mountain Formation, Utah. PLOS 1 20(2): E0314689; doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0314689
Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings is hoping to encourage more researchers and students to delve into the impact of artificial intelligence on human norms. To support this cause, Hastings made a generous donation of $50 million to his alma mater, Boudine College, establishing a research initiative on “AI and Humanity,” the largest gift the liberal arts college has received since its founding in 1794.
The ultimate goal of the program, according to Hastings and school officials, is to transform Boudine into a hub for investigating the risks and consequences of AI. It also aims to equip students to address emerging technologies that are capable of producing human-like text and creating formulas for potential new medications.
The concept for this initiative stemmed from conversations between Hastings and President Boudin over recent months. They see it as an opportunity to enhance the academic experience by incorporating AI into education and research. Some of the funds will be used to hire 10 new faculty members to support professors looking to integrate AI into their teaching and research.
In a recent interview, Hastings emphasized the importance of researchers addressing these critical questions given the rapid advancements in AI and the potential disruptions it could bring to various aspects of human life, such as work and relationships.
He stressed the urgency of preparing for the transformative impact of AI, comparing it to the rapid growth of social networks that initially caught many off guard with their societal implications.
Dr. Zaki, a cognitive scientist and President of Boudin, expressed his hope that Bowdoin faculty and students will develop an ethical framework for exploring and utilizing AI technology to address fundamental questions.
He posed thought-provoking questions about the ethical dimensions of AI and stressed the moral duty of educators to engage with these issues.
As AI becomes more pervasive in daily life, millions of people are utilizing it for tasks ranging from information retrieval to generating computer code. The creators of these tools predict that even more advanced AI systems will significantly alter our daily routines.
While some tech leaders in Silicon Valley paint a positive image of an AI-driven future, the new initiative at Boudin College seeks to critically examine how AI is reshaping society for better or for worse. Hastings hopes this program will ensure that technological advancements are aligned with benefiting people and society.
Expressing his optimistic view on technology, Hastings believes that human progress is closely tied to our moral and ethical systems. He highlights the importance of strengthening these systems to guide technological development for the betterment of humanity.
Paleontologists discovered and described the new ctenochasmatid pterosaurian mandible from the late Jurassic Portland limestone formations in southern England.
Reconstruction of the life of ctenochasmatid pterosaur Gladocephaloideus jingangshanensis. Image credit: Zhao Chuang.
“In the Upper Jurassic Formation of England, poverty is rare and consists primarily of isolated bones and bone fragments,” said Roy Smith and David Martill, paleontologists at Portsmouth.
“Many records of the late Jurassic Palace in England are merely historical interests, and now contain species named. Nomina Dubeer. ”
“Nevertheless, some materials are diagnostic and some species stand the test of time.”
“Most of the Upper Jurassic palaces in England come from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation in southern England, with events from the Oxford portion of Oxford clay formation in southern and eastern England, and one event from the Kinmeridge Clay Formation in Scotland.”
“In spite of this lack of material, there was a near-complete skull with some of the associated materials. Cuspicephalus scarfi In areas of the Kimmeridgian stage type. ”
The new Pterosaurus specimen is the mandible with at least two, perhaps three teeth.
The fossils date back to the Titonian period, in the late Jurassic period, about 147 million years ago.
It represents the youngest geologically in the UK Jurassic palace.
“The specimen is an isolated mandible that lacks most of the post-Simfisil section of the lam,” the paleontologist said.
“Because of the mandible, which is very thin and compact and elongated, it has been identified as Pterosaurus.”
This represents the first pterocortic material documented, described and proposed from this layer.
“The specimens are likely first discovered when the stones were divided using a standard “feather and wedge” procedure,” the researchers said.
“This caused damage to the central part of the specimen, but the jaw split along its length also damaged the specimen. It appears that the counterpart has not been recovered.”
The lack of diagnostic function prevents introduction to known or new species of fossils, but it can be confidently assigned to the Pterosaur clade Ctenochasmatoidea.
“The ctenochasmatoids are a diverse group of pterosaurs with prominent, most genus, as they are prominent in long, sometimes dorsal curved jaws and elongated, thin teeth,” the scientist said.
“It’s true, one form, South America Pterodaustrois in the longest teeth in terms of the diameter length ratio of the tetrapod. ”
“Basal anthelminthus bacterium” Pterodactylus antiquus and ctenochasmatoid Ardeadactylus longicolumBoth have short conical teeth with wider alveolar spacing than the Titonian period. ”
“The elongated, thin mandible bone and numerous closely spaced alveoli suggest that it is a member of Ctenochasmatidae.”
“The faint central ridge of the occlusal surface between the two grooves converges to the anterior groove, and the lack of a distinct anterior chamber suggests that the specimen is part of the mandibular intermembranes.”
“This is the first documented record of the wing glands from the Portland group in England.”
Survey results It was released this month Proceedings of the Geologists Association.
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Roy E. Smith and David M. Martill. ctenochasmatid pterosaur from the Portland Limestone Formation (Late Jurassic, Titonian) in southern England. Proceedings of the Geologists Associationpublished online 20255l doi: 10.1016/j.pgeola.2025.101100
Galactic sea photographed by the Euclidean Space Telescope
ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, J.-C. Image processing by Cuillandre, E. Bertin, G. Anselmi
The extraordinary image from the Euclidean Space Telescope has acquired 26 million galaxies.
Euclid was launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) in July 2023, and in November of that year it sent its first image back. The six-year mission will image about a third of the sky and build the most detailed 3D map of Cosmos ever created. Once completed, this investigation will help to lighten how dark matter and dark energy behave on a cosmic scale.
ESA is currently being released The first large data on this missionstarts with three “deep fields.” This is an area where the telescope becomes a more detailed peer than the rest of the study area. These three spots represent 63 squares of sky, which corresponds to an area where the full moon is covered 300 times. Over the next few years, Euclide will pass these regions 30-52 times to build more detailed images.
It'll be Percival The University of Waterloo in Canada says that current batches of images are less than 50% of what gather on missions, but there is already plenty of researchers to collaborate. “There's so much you can do about many individual galaxies and their properties because it's not something that's done in space-based research with nearby infrared light or optics like this,” he says. “It's not exactly the same quality as HST [the Hubble Space Telescope]but it's so close that it doesn't just point to individual objects and shoot. We are conducting an investigation. ”
Researchers have already used Euclidean data to find hundreds of powerful gravity lenses. These phenomena are formed when the gravity of an object in the foreground distorts light from a distant galaxy, creating an arc shape or a complete ring. Previously, scientists had to hunt these individually, point them to the HST, and collect more images. Currently, astronomers can search for survey data from Euclidean and find more at once. This helps to gather insights into the evolution of galaxies and the universe.
Using AI models, researchers were able to find and catalog 500 galaxies with powerful gravity lenses with this first data alone, doubling the total seen to date. “The statistics are incredible,” Percival says. “Euclidean ultimately gets this amount of data 200 times.”
The data released so far represents only one week of images from Euclidean, but up to 35 terabytes. This is equivalent to 200 days of high quality video streaming. The next batch of data is expected to be released later next year, and will be a year's worth of images covering 2,000 square degrees and over 2,000 terabytes of storage space.
It can take over 100 years to view each galaxy manually, so AI is used to dramatically speed up the process, he says. Mike Walmsley At the University of Toronto. “We can ask new questions in weeks, not years, but in weeks,” he says.
Google has agreed to pay $28 million (£22 million) to settle class action lawsuits by compensating white and Asian employees more and providing them with a higher career track compared to other employees.
The settlement with Alphabet’s Google was preliminarily approved by Judge Charles Adams of Santa Clara County Superior Court in California last week.
Judge Adams described it as “a positive outcome for the class” consisting of at least 6,632 Google employees in California from February 15, 2018 to December 31, 2024.
A Google spokesperson confirmed the settlement, stating, “We refute the allegations of differential treatment and are committed to compensating, hiring, and promoting all our employees fairly.”
The lawsuit was spearheaded by Ana Cantu, who identifies as Mexican and indigenous, on behalf of minority employees at Google from Hispanic, Latino, Indigenous, Native American, and other backgrounds.
Cantu claimed that despite performing exemplary work in Google’s People’s Business and Cloud sector for seven years, she was not compensated or promoted on par with her white and Asian counterparts.
She alleged that Google favored white and Asian employees, placing them in higher “levels” within the company even when performing similar roles as minority employees.
Cantu argued that Google’s actions violated California’s Equal Pay Act, and she left the company in September 2021.
The final settlement amount will be $20 million after deducting legal costs, penalties related to Cantu’s claims under California’s General Civil Attorneys Act, and other expenses totaling $7 million.
Judge Adams has scheduled a hearing in September to review and approve the final settlement. Cantu’s legal representatives have not yet responded to requests for comment.
Who were the first inhabitants of Western Europe, what their physical characteristics were, and where they lived are some of the pending questions in the study of Eurasian settlements during the early Pleistocene epoch. Information on ancient humanity available from Western Europe is limited and limited to the Iberian Peninsula. Now, paleontologists have discovered a fragment of the midface of humanity at the site of the Sima del Elephante in Sierra de Atapuerc, Spain. Fossils, which were 1.4 million to 1.1 million years ago, represent the earliest human faces of Western Europe ever identified.
Archaeological excavations at the Sima del Elephante in Sierra de Atapuerc, Spain. Image credits: Maria D. Guillen/Iphes-Cerca.
“It is suggested that Eurasia was first settled by Hymonin at least 1.8 million years ago,” he said, institut Catetut Catetut Catetut Catetut de Paleoecologia Humana IEvolucióSocial, Rovira I Virgili, and Museo nacional de Ciencias natures, and colleagues
“Evidence of early human settlements in Western Europe is limited to highly fragmented fossil samples from the Iberian Peninsula, with few clues as to the appearance and classification of these human beings.”
“The fossils from the Spanish site, about 850,000 years ago, are Homo Alivisora species of early people with thin midfaces that resemble modern humans. ”
“In 2007, a Hominin Joborne (ATE9-1) was found at the Simadel Elephante site in northern Spain, between 12 and 1.1 million years ago, but it was not a definitive allocation. Homo Alivisor. ”
In the new study, the authors examined the fossil ruins of Hominin Midface from the Sima Del Elefante site.
The fragment labeled ATE7-1 consists of a substantial portion of the maxilla and zygote bone from the left side of an adult.
Using both physical evidence and 3D imaging techniques, the researchers reconstructed the fossil fragments, estimated to be between 1.4 million and 1.1 million.
They also discovered additional archaeological sites: stone tools and ruins of slaughtered animals.
“These practices demonstrate that the first Europeans had a close understanding of available animal resources and knew how to systematically utilize them,” Dr. Huguett said.
According to scientists, the ATE7-1 fossil does not display the “modern” midface features found in Homo Alivisor Fossils, but there are some similarities Homo Erectus system.
They tentatively allocated fossils Homo aff. Erectusshows affinity for Homo Erectuswithholding further evidence.
This finding may suggest that at least two people live in Western Europe Homo Early Pleistocene species: Homo aff. Erectusand later Homo Alivisor.
“The evidence is why it was assigned to the ''because it is still insufficient for a definitive classification. Homo aff. Erectus“Dr. Maria Martinon Torres, a researcher at the Centro Nacional de Investigation, said he is a researcher at Evolcion Humana in London and University College London.
“This designation recognizes the affinity of ATE7-1 Homo Erectus While it leaves the possibility that it belongs to another species open. ”
“Our findings demonstrate at least two different human invasions of Western Europe during the Pleistocene era, providing fascinating insights into the evolution of the genus. Homo. ”
“While their size is small, pioneering analysis of facial fragments greatly enriched our understanding of the origins and dynamics of the earliest Europeans on the continent.”
“More research and fossil samples are needed to investigate the relationships between these populations and further improve their classification,” the researchers concluded.
Their paper It was published in the journal this month Nature.
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R. Huguett et al. The oldest human face in Western Europe. NaturePublished online on March 12, 2025. doi:10.1038/s41586-025-08681-0
Paleontologists have studied and described three surfaces, including previously unknown dinosaur tracks, from an area near Biloella in Queensland, Australia.
Surface containing dinosaur tracks from the sandstone Duncreek mine area in the Kalido Basin, Queensland, Australia. Image credits: Romilio et al. , doi: 10.1080/08912963.2025.2472153.
University of Queensland researcher Dr. Anthony Romilio and his colleagues discovered footprints of early Jurassic dinosaurs preserved in three separate rocks in the Kalido Basin.
“One of the surfaces contains a single track, the other has a single trackway consisting of two tracks, and the third has a large concentration of 66 footprints,” they said.
“This is the highest concentration known from the area, with a density of 71 tracks per metre.2and only to specimens of the same age from the Carnarvon Valley, the second highest in Australia. ”
Each footprint has three toes, indicating that it belongs to the dinosaur Ichnospecy anomoepus scambus.
“The Ichnospecies, also discovered at the early Jurassic track sites in Carnarvon Valley and Mount Morgan, shows the prevalence of Ornishikian dinosaurs throughout the region,” the researchers said.
Small filled circular traces, possibly invertebrate burrows Scoritusthe surface is rich and, if correct, indicates that the tracks were formed under sub-light blue to medium energy conditions.
ICHNOSPECIES' Ornithischian Track Maker anomoepus scambus. Image credit: University of Queensland.
“The footprint comes from 47 individual dinosaurs that have passed through patches of wet white clay, and they probably walked or crossed the waterways,” Dr. Romilio said.
“These dinosaurs were small, with legs ranging from 15-50 cm long, and when they left these marks they were moving below 6 km/h.”
“Evidence from skeletal fossils abroad says that dinosaurs with legs like these were herbivores that had long legs, thick bodies, short arms and small heads with beaks.”
Scientists say the newly discovered footprint is about 200 million years old (early Jurassic epoch).
“These footprints provide valuable insight into the abundance and behavior of dinosaurs in an age where body fossils are not present in Australia,” they said.
Their paper It was published in the journal on March 10th, 2025 Historical Biology.
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Anthony Romillio et al. Dinosaur footprints from sandstones in the Lower Jurassic (Hetangian-Cinemurian), the Kalido Basin, Queensland, Australia. Historical BiologyPublished online on March 10th, 2025. doi:10.1080/08912963.2025.2472153
The new NASA Observatory was launched into space on Tuesday with a mission that would help scientists unravel what happened in the first fraction one second after the Big Bang.
The Spherex mission (short for Universe History, Reionization Epoch, Ice Explorer’s Spectroscopic Optical Meter) is designed to map the entire sky, study millions of galaxies, and stitch together how the universe has formed and evolved.
According to NASA, it has been postponed several times since late February to help engineers evaluate the rocket and its components recently due to bad weather at launch sites.
The cone-shaped spacecraft ended Tuesday at approximately 8:10pm above the Space Sex Falcon 9 rocket from Van Denburg Space Force Base in California. Also, to get into orbit there were four suitcase-sized satellites deployed on another mission by NASA to study the sun.
The $488 million Spherex Observatory will investigate the entire sky four times over a two-year mission. Spacecraft instruments observe the universe in 102 different colors or wavelengths.
The Spherex Observatory, located horizontally, allows you to see all three layers of photon shields and telescopes. BAE System / NASA
Colors in the infrared range have longer wavelengths than what the eye sees, so they are essentially invisible to humans. However, in the universe, infrared light from stars, galaxies and other celestial bodies contains important information about composition, density, temperature and chemical composition.
A technique known as spectroscopy allows scientists to analyze infrared light and divide it into different colors, just like the way prisms divide sunlight into colorful rainbows. Therefore, data collected by the Spherex Observatory gives researchers insight into the chemistry and other properties of hundreds of millions of galaxies in the universe.
NASA said these observations would help scientists study how galaxies are formed, trace the origins of Milky Way waters, and connect what happened later. The Big Bang that Created the Universe Approximately 13.8 billion years ago.
It is explained in the paper published today journal Natural Astronomy the discovery means that habitable deplanets may have begun to form much earlier, before they were formed billions of years ago.
This artist's impression shows the evolution of the universe, beginning with the Big Bang on the left. After that, you will see the microwave background of the universe. The formation of the first stars ends the dark ages of the universe, followed by the formation of galaxies. Image credit: M. Weiss/Harvard – Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.
“We had no oxygen before the first star exploded, so there was no water in space,” said Daniel Warren, an astronomer at the University of Portsmouth.
“Only a very simple nucleus survived the Big Bang: hydrogen, helium, lithium, trace amounts of barium and boron.”
According to Dr. Whalen and his colleagues, water molecules began to form shortly after the first supernova explosion known as the Population III Supernova.
These cosmic events that occurred on first generation stars were essential to creating the heavy elements (such as oxygen) needed for water to exist.
“The oxygen forged in the hearts of these supernovas combines with hydrogen to form water, paving the way for the creation of the essential elements needed for life,” Dr. Whalen said.
In their study, researchers looked at two types of supernovae. This produces corecrolaps supernovae, which produces a modest amount of heavy elements, and more energetic POP III supernovae.
They discovered that both types of supernovae form dense masses of rich gas in water.
The overall amount of water produced by these early supernovae was modest, but was highly concentrated in a gas-dense area called the cloud core, which is thought to be the birthplace of stars and planets.
These early, water-rich regions may have sown planetary formations at the dawn of space long before the first galaxy took shape.
“A significant discovery is that the primitive supernova formed water in the universe ahead of the first galaxy,” Dr. Hualen said.
“So water was already an important component of the first galaxy.”
“This means that the conditions necessary for the formation of life were in place faster than we could have imagined, meaning it was an important step in our early understanding of the universe.”
“The total water mass was modest, but it was very concentrated on the only structures that could form stars and planets.”
“And that suggests that before the first galaxy, a water-rich planetary disc could form at the dawn of space.”
Paleontologists describe new genus and species of extinct scorpions from the early Cretaceous Ixia Formation in China.
Jeholia Longkengi It is China's first Mesozoic scorpion. Image credit: Jie Sun/Xuan et al. , doi: 10.1016/j.scib.2025.01.035.
It has been named Jeholia LongkengiThe new species lived around 125 million years ago (early Cretaceous period).
The fossilized scorpion ruins are Yixian Layer In the village of Heishangou in Chifen City, Nei Mongolia, China.
“Scorpions belong to the Arachnida class within the arthropod and have a relatively small number of fossil records,” said Dr. Qiang Xuan, a researcher at the Institute of Geology and Paleontology and a researcher of excellence for the excellence of life and paleoenvironment at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
“Early scorpions came from the Midsilurian era, and at least some of them are interpreted as transient forms from sea to land.”
“Even though they are among the early terrestrial arthropods, fossils and living scorpions retain mostly conservative body plans.”
“Mesozoic scorpions are primarily from the Burmese system in the Middle Cretaceous, but compressed scorpion fossils that usually accumulate in the hierarchy are relatively rare, except for late Triassic Cuper sandstone formation in England and late Cretaceous Krato formation in Brazil.”
“Three fossil scorpions, including the Miocene scorpion, have been reported from China Sinoscorpius Shandongensis From Devonian Scorpion, County Chandon Hubeiscorpio gracilitarsis From Hubei Province and Permian Scorpion Eoscorpius sp. From Uda, Nei Mongol. ”
Jeholia Longkengi He was a member of the early Cretaceous terrestrial ecosystem known as Jehoru Biotait is internationally renowned for the discovery of exceptional fossils, including feathered dinosaurs, early birds, diverse mammals, pterosaurs, and several arthropod fossils.
“The Jehol Biota is one of the most important and prolific fossil sites for studying early Cretaceous life,” the paleontologist said.
“No previous fossil scorpions have been recorded despite many fossil species being reported.”
The full length of Jeholia Longkengi It was about 10 cm (4 inches). It is larger than other Mesozoic scorpions and considerably larger than many living scorpions.
“Jeholia Longkengi They may feed primarily a variety of insects, including herbivorous, omnivorous, corrosive, fungal and predatory species that are common in gel biotas, and perhaps spiders, frogs, small salamanders, lizards and mammals,” the researchers said.
“We recommend that potential natural enemies of this Cretaceous scorpion include dinosaurs, birds and mammals, according to previously reported Jehol Biota food web model.”
“However, there is no fossil record for the oral sector, so speculation about their feeding habits is in the preliminary stage.”
“Middle centrality is a metric that quantifies the importance of a node in connecting other nodes in the network,” they added.
“It plays a pivotal role in assessing the extent to which a node acts as a bridge and linking other nodes in the network.”
“In Jehor's Biota Food Network, large scorpions exhibit the highest intermediate centrality of all guilds, highlighting the possibility that fossil scorpions had extensive ecological interactions with other species of early terrestrial ecosystems.”
“Our findings contribute to new insights into the complexity of Yel Biota's food web,” they concluded.
Team's paper Published in the journal Science news.
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Qiang Xuan et al. The first Mesozoic scorpion from China and its ecological meaning. Science newsPublished online on January 24th, 2025. doi: 10.1016/j.scib.2025.01.035
Paleontologists have documented a collection of bone tools from one horizon, 1.5 million years ago, in Tanzania’s All-Bai Valley. These bone tools preceded more than a million years ago other evidence of systematic bone tool production, shedding new light on the almost unknown world of early human bone technology.
The elephant’s humerus, which was 1.5 million years ago, has soaked into the tool. Image credit: CSIC.
Early humans had already made stone tools with some capacity for at least a million years, but there was little evidence of widespread adoption from bones about 500,000 years ago.
Humanity, who shaped the newly discovered bone tools, did it in the same way they created stone tools by shaving small flakes and creating sharp edges.
The transfer of this technology from one medium to another shows that the human race who made bone tools had a high understanding of tool creation, and that they can adapt their technology to different materials, important intellectual leaps.
It could be that human ancestors at the time had higher levels of cognitive skills and brain development than scientists thought.
“The discovery envisages that early humans will greatly expand their technical options, previously limited to stone tools production, and now allow new raw materials to be incorporated into a repertoire of potential artifacts.”
“At the same time, this expansion of technological potential demonstrates the advances in the cognitive and mental structures of these humans, who knew how to incorporate innovation by adapting knowledge of stone work to manipulation of bones.”
“The tool provides evidence that their creators work carefully on the bones, shatter the flakes and create useful shapes,” says Dr. Renata Peters, a researcher at the University of London.
“We were excited to find these bone tools from these early time frames.”
“It means that human ancestors were able to transfer skills from stones to bones, a level of complex cognition that we have not seen elsewhere in a million years.”
The 1.5 million-year-old bone tool was discovered at the T69 complex site in Friedalie Ki Collongo West Gully in the All-By Valley in northern Tanzania.
The research authors discovered a collection of 27 bones shaped into the site’s tools. The bones mostly came from large mammals, mostly elephants and hippopotamus.
The tool is made only from the bones of the animal’s limbs. These are because they are the most dense and strong.
Very early stone tools have come from the All Old One era, which grew from about 2.7 million to 1.5 million years ago. It employs a simple method of making stone tools by shaving one or several flakes from the stone core using hammer stones.
The bone tool reported in the current study was a time when ancient human ancestors began in the Akeirian era, when they began around 1.7 million years ago.
Acheulean technology is best characterized by using more complex hand axes carefully shaped by napping.
Bone tools show that these more advanced techniques have been carried over and adopted for use in bone.
Prior to this discovery, bones shaped into tools were only sporadically identified in rare and isolated cases of the fossil record, not a way to imply that human ancestors systematically produced them.
Due to the overall shape, size and sharp edges, exactly what the tool was used is unknown, but it may have been used to deal with animal corpses in food.
It is also unknown that human ancestor species created the tool.
Alongside the collection of bone artifacts, no relics of humanity were found, but they are known at the time, Homo Erectus and Paranthropus Boisei He was a resident of this area.
“These tools were such an unexpected discovery, so we hope that our findings will encourage archaeologists to reconsider bone discoveries around the world in case other evidence of bone tools is missed,” the researchers said.
Their paper Today I’ll be appearing in the journal Nature.
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I. de la Torr et al. Systematic bone tool production 1.5 million years ago. NaturePublished online on March 5th, 2025. doi:10.1038/s41586-025-08652-5
Washington – Early Man utilized animal bones to create cutting tools 1.5 million years ago on a regular basis.
A recent discovery of 27 sculptures and sharp bones from elephants and hippos in Tanzania’s All-Bai Valley site has extended the timeline for the use of ancient bones by around a million years. Researchers already knew that early individuals crafted simple tools from stones as long ago as 3.3 million years.
New discoveries of ancient humans published in Nature on Wednesday have shown that they had a more sophisticated toolkit, incorporating various materials, according to William Harcourt Smith, a paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History. He was not involved in the study.
A well-preserved bone tool measuring up to 16 inches (40 cm) may have been created by fracturing the bulky ends of leg bones and chipping off the flakes from the remaining bone shaft using stones. Research co-author Ignacio de la Torre, a researcher at the Spanish National Research Council, explained that this technique was used to produce one sharp edge and one tip.
The bone tools were likely used as hand axes, handheld blades not attached to a handle, for the purpose of butchering animal carcasses.
These blades were ideal for removing flesh from elephant and hippo carcasses but were not utilized as spears or projectiles. “I don’t believe they were hunting these animals. They were likely scavenging,” he stated.
Numerous artifacts exhibit signs of being struck in order to remove more than dozens of flakes, indicating a sustained level of craftsmanship.
The consistent choice of bones – specifically large, heavy leg bones from a particular animal – and a pattern of uniform modifications suggest that early humans deliberately selected and crafted these bones, as noted by paleobiologist Milia Pacheco from the Federal University of San Carlos in Brazil, who was not part of the study.
The bones show minimal signs of erosion, trampling, or gnawing by other animals, ruling out the possibility of natural factors shaping the tools.
These bone tools date back over a million years, predating the emergence of our species, Homo Sapiens, by approximately 300,000 years.
According to Brianna Poviner, a paleontologist with the Smithsonian Human Origins program, when the tools were created, three types of human ancestors coexisted in the same East African region.
This tool could have been created and used by Homo Erectus, Homo Habilis, or Paranthropus Boisei. “It could have been any of these three, but it’s nearly impossible to determine which one,” Poviner mentioned.
The new NASA Space Observatory is set to launch into orbit on Thursday with a crucial mission to map over 450 million galaxies.
The Spherex mission, short for the spectrophoton meter of space history, reionization epoch, and Ice Explorer history, will map the entire sky four times over two years, giving scientists the chance to study galaxy formation and uncover insights into the universe’s evolution.
“That’s going to answer the fundamental question: how did we get here?” Shawn Domagal-Goldman, acting director of the Astrophysics Division at NASA headquarters, stated in a recent news briefing.
Spherex is scheduled to be launched from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 10:09 pm on Thursday.
The cone-shaped spacecraft will be launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket along with four suitcase-sized satellites deployed simultaneously for another NASA mission to study the sun.
A spacecraft preliminary design that includes a hexagonal solar shield to help keep your instrument cool. NASA / JPL-Caltech
The $488 million Spherex mission has been in development for approximately 10 years. According to NASA, it aims to map objects using 102 infrared colors and light.
Infrared technology allows scientists to see through dust and gas, observing some of the oldest stars and galaxies in the universe. By utilizing spectroscopy, scientists can analyze the composition, density, temperature, and movement of celestial objects.
The Spherex Observatory employs spectrometers to explore the sky in three dimensions and study hundreds of millions of galaxies’ properties, as stated by Jamie Bock, a lead investigator at the Spherex mission and a physics professor at the California Institute of Technology.
Bock mentioned that these observations could provide insights into galaxy formation and allow researchers to examine the origins of water and other organic materials in the Milky Way galaxy.
“When you dissect light, you can determine the galaxy’s distance, construct a three-dimensional map, and identify the water fingerprint,” Bock explained.
Unraveling the origins of water can enhance scientific understanding of life’s evolution on Earth and possibly reveal clues about vital life components elsewhere in the galaxy.
“This new capability can lead to discoveries or surprises,” Bock added.
By mapping the celestial sky, the Spherex mission addresses one of astronomy’s enduring mysteries: The Big Bang that Created the Universe approximately 13.8 billion years ago.
One theory proposed in the late 1970s and early 1980s suggests the universe experienced a staggering trillion-fold expansion in the first fraction of a second post-big bang. Known as cosmic inflation, this theory aims to explain the universe’s curved geometry, structure formation, and rapid expansion.
However, astronomers have grappled with connecting the driving force behind this cosmic inflation and why it occurred. By meticulously mapping hundreds of millions of galaxies, the Spherex mission can test theories in new ways, aiding scientists in refining the physics underlying the universe’s inflation and rapid expansion.
“What Spherex does is test specific inflation models by tracking hundreds of millions of galaxies in three dimensions,” Brock noted.
Domagal-Goldman expressed that the Spherex Mission’s exploration of galaxies, cosmic inflation, and the universe’s origins could deepen human comprehension of basic physics.
“We are fortunate to live in an era where we can uncover answers about the universe’s long narrative of human existence on this planet,” he remarked.
Tribal palm trees Trachycarpeae Fossilization analysis shows that it once flourished in Axiang Canada Phytris – Microscopic siliceous structures produced in specific tissues in many plant families – from the territory of the northwestern Canada.
Palm plant stones from the Eocene Giraffe Region (AQ) and modern plant stones extracted from Coryphoid Palm leaves Trachycarpus Fortunei. Image credit: Siver et al. , doi: 10.1093/aob/mcaf021.
“The palm is a monocot flowering plant of the Arecaceae family distributed primarily to tropical and subtropical regions around the world,” the University of Connecticut said. Professor Peter Siver And his colleague.
“It's a large family, with a particularly high variety of species, especially in Central and South America and Southeast Asia.”
“In general, the palms thrive in warm, wet conditions, so the majority of the species are found in rainforests.”
“There are significantly fewer species found in both Southern Europe and the southern regions of the United States, and families are completely lacking in more north latitudes.”
“In the southeastern US subtropical area, the palm is largely restricted to state coastal areas along the Gulf of Mexico, and some inland along the Atlantic coast that stretches north along Florida. It's growing to Tennessee.”
“The majority of the palms are found in climates marked with both high average annual temperatures and high average annual rainfall, but several species can be found under cool, dry conditions.”
Professor Siver and co-authors discovered fossilized plant matter from a tree in Trachycarpeae in ancient lakebed sediments extracted from the area of the Giraffin Balite Pipe in Canada's northwest territory.
Four aquatic organisms, largely restricted to today's warm subtropical and tropical regions, were also found in the same sediments.
These 48 million years ago (early Eocene) fossils exhibit much warmer climates than previously thought, challenging the challenge of ice that first formed in the Northern Hemisphere.
“This discovery of palm fossils in the north provides clear evidence that the Arctic Circle was once iceless and has a climate similar to today's subtropical climate,” Professor Shiver said.
“These findings provide a window into past greenhouse conditions and help refine models to predict future climate change.”
In addition to confirming records of the northernmost palms during this period, the authors established that this evolutionary characteristic appeared in the early Eocene: linear arrays of plant matter in palm leaves., Fossilized Stegmata – Fossilized Stegmata were also recorded.
The presence of multiple warm, adaptive aquatic species further strengthens the support of this prehistoric Arctic region's lush, temperate ecosystem.
“Our research contributes to a broader understanding of the extent and timing of ice formation in the Earth's climate history, particularly during the Cenozoic era,” the researchers said.
“Restructuring these past environments will give scientists valuable insight into how ecosystems respond to long-term climate change.”
Survey results It will be displayed in the journal The Anniversary of Botany.
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Peter A. Shiver et al. Palmphytris in sub-Western Canada means ice-free winter in the late Eocene period 48 million years ago. The Anniversary of BotanyPublished online on February 10th, 2025. doi:10.1093/aob/mcaf021
This supernova event may have occurred at the Upper Centaurus Lupus Society. This is a group of giant stars about 457 light years away from Earth.
Illustration of an exoplanet like Earth after X-ray radiation exposure. Image credit: NASA/CXC/M. Weiss.
Life on Earth is constantly evolving under continuous exposure to ionizing radiation from both terrestrial and cosmic origins.
The radioactivity in the bedrock gradually decreases over timescales of billions of years, but the level of cosmic radiation fluctuates as the solar system moves through the Milky Way.
Nearby supernova activity could increase the level of radiation on the Earth’s surface by several orders of magnitude, which is expected to have a major impact on the evolution of life.
In particular, radiation levels improve as the solar system passes near a large group of stars known as the OB Association.
The winds associated with these large star factories are expected to inflate the super bubbles of high temperature plasma first. This could be the birthplace of most of the Core Collapse explosions taking place within the AB Association.
The solar system entered such a super bubble, commonly known as the local bubble, about 6 million years ago, and is now close to its centre.
“The Earth entered the local bubble and passed its stardust-rich appearance about 6.5 million years ago, sowing the planet with old iron 60, the radioactive iron of iron produced by the exploding stars. did it,” astronomer Santa Cruz, and colleagues at the University of California.
“Then, 20-3 million years ago, one of our neighboring stars exploded with incredible force, providing another cohort of radioactive iron to the planet.”
When Nojiri and her co-authors simulated what the supernova looked like, they discovered that it hammered the Earth with cosmic rays for 100,000 years of explosion.
This model perfectly described previously recorded spikes of radiation that shocked the Earth around that time.
“We’ve seen from other papers that radiation can damage DNA,” Nojiri said.
“It could be an evolutionary change in the cell or an accelerated mutation.”
Meanwhile, the author came across research into viral diversity in one of the Rift Valley Lakes in Africa.
“I can’t say they’re connected, but there are similar time frames,” Nojiri said.
“We found it interesting that the virus’s diversification is increasing.”
study It was published in Astrophysics Journal Letter.
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Caitlyn Nojiri et al. 2025. Bubble Life: How nearby supernova left short-lived marks on the cosmic ray spectrum, leaving an indelible trace of life. apjl 979, L18; doi: 10.3847/2041-8213/ADA27A
Paleontologists at American universities in Cairo and elsewhere say they found the almost perfect skull of Hyaenodont Bust Don Siltos in the lower part of the Ebel Catrani Formation in Egypt.
Bust Don Siltos. Image credit: Ahmad Morsi.
Bust Don Siltos lived in Egypt’s lush forests around 30 million years ago during the Oligocene era. Egypt is now home to the desert.
It is also known as Pterodon syrtos, the ancient species had the weight of hyenas or leopards (27 kg).
The animal had sharp teeth and strong jaw muscles, suggesting a strong bite.
It had a highly carnivorous diet that likely preyed on primates, early hippos, early elephants, and other large mammals.
“Bust Don Siltos belongs to a species of extinct group of carnivorous mammals known as hyaenodonts,” Dr. Shoruk al Ashkar, a paleontologist at Mansora University, American University in Cairo and colleagues, said.
“Hyenodons evolved before modern carnivorous animals such as cats, dogs and hyenas.”
“After the extinction of dinosaurs, these predators with hyena-like teeth hunted in African ecosystems.”
The skull of Bust Don Siltos was excavated in the Jebel Catlany Formation in the Faium depression.
“For several days, our team excavated a densely packed layer of rock dating back about 30 million years,” said Dr. Al Ashkar.
“As we were about to wrap up, our team members found something amazing. A large set of teeth sticking out from the ground.”
“His excited cry united the team and marked the beginning of an extraordinary discovery. The almost complete skull of an ancient apex carnivorous animal – a dream for a vertebrate paleontologist.”
“Faium is one of Africa’s most important fossil regions,” added Dr. Matt Bose, fossil curator at the Duke University Museum of Natural History.
“Without it, we would know little about the origins of African ecosystems and the evolution of African mammals like elephants, primates, and hyenodon.”
“Discovering Bustodon is an important achievement in understanding the diversity and evolution of Hyaenodonts and its global distribution,” said Dr. Al-Ashqar.
“We want to continue our research to unravel the complex relationships between these ancient predators and their environments across time and the continent.”
In their study, the authors also reevaluated a group of lion-sized hyanodons discovered in the rocks of Faium over 120 years ago.
They established a new genus of hyaenodont, sekhmetops, and reanalyzed materials from 33.8 million years ago.
They demonstrated that both Bustodon and sekhmetops actually belonged to the Hyaenodont group, which originated in Africa.
“Relatives of Bustodon and sekhmetops spread across multiple waves from Africa and eventually reached Asia, Europe, India, and North America,” they said.
“18 million years ago, some relatives of these Hyaenodonts were among the largest mammalian meat eaters to walk the planet.”
“However, radical changes in Africa’s global climate and geological shifts opened the continent to modern cats, dogs, and hyena ancestors.”
“As the environment and prey changed, the specialized and carnivorous hyaenodonts became less diverse and eventually became extinct, bringing primate relatives face to face with new adversaries.”
Survey results will be published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.
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Shorouq F. al-ashqar et al. Cranial anatomy of hypercarnivore Bust Don Siltos Gen. November. (hyaenodonta, hyainailourinae) and reevaluation of Pterodon in Africa. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology Published online on February 16th, 2025. doi:10.1080/02724634.2024.2442472
In May 2024, a Fantastic ads Going viral on social media, “There are real cases of fraud and abuse across the country. [election] “The system that erodes our trust.” advertisement The “whistleblower” who shared evidence of election fraud has vowed that he will “reward on payments from the $5 million fund.”
This reward was courtesy of the group that had just been announced. Fair Election Funddocumented documents show that there is a deep connection to Elon Musk’s political network.
The fair election fund “emphasis on these cases” to share their stories with “a large portion of the group’s budget is dedicated to whistleblower payments” and “affective pay and earned.” We have pledged to launch a “media campaign.”
It followed after that Another ad It was run in swing states during the Olympics, telling viewers to share evidence of election fraud, saying, “You might qualify for compensation.”
Despite the group’s high-profile, deep pocket supporters and favorable bounty offers, no evidence of voters or election fraud was revealed. Instead, the group incorporates a series of unrelated detours into tangential areas like third-party voting access, and efforts to reveal fraud have concluded that many research, court decisions, and bipartisan investigations have concluded. I’ve reaffirmed that I’m there. Voter fraud is extremely rare.
The Fair Election Fund is now radio silent. SiteMap data shows that the website has not been updated since October and that the group’s X/Twitter account has not been posted since November. Group’s SpokesmanFormer national team member Doug Collins has appeared. Trump’s Veterans Secretaryand still is Leading the government’s ethics bureau.
Close relationship with the world’s wealthiest man
The Fair Election Fund is the fictitious name of another 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization, and the documented documentation is revealed and operated within a network run by Musk’s top political advisors. You can do it. The group received funds from the same dark money vehicle that Musk used to guide his political spending, and also routed the funds to another musk-backed nonprofit.
The group is now housed in a nonprofit organization called the Interstate, and previously known as the fund. It was formed on January 3, 2023, a nonprofit organization. We raised $8,226,000 from a single donation in 2023.
The naming of two sax-led groups, and naming them for the Republic and it’s for funding – and the timing of their creation in January 2023 was originally the group currently housed a fair election fund. It suggests that it was intended to support operations. Mask was the first to support him.
Sachs’ involvement continues until 2024, and her name will appear on record This was accompanied by the purchase of the Fair Election Fund’s broadcast.
Musk has been like that since 2022 Secretly channel his political spending Through a dark money nonprofit organization called Building America’s Future. The group is run by General and Phil Cox, two Republican operatives involved in the failed presidential bid for DeSantis. I’ll give advice to Musk now. Building the future of America It is reportedly In 2024, we supported the Fair Election Fund. That too Half provided of Republic’s comprehensive funding in 2023.
Ron DeSantis, whose presidential bid for the Florida Governor, was endorsed by the Republic Group. Photo: Cristóbal Herrera/EPA
The Fair Election Fund/Interstate Priorities also served as a conduit to support other musk-backed groups. Group’s 2023 Tax Return It shows that he has won a $1,550,000 grant to citizens for his sanity. Masks were funded in 2022 by building the future of Americaand aired racist and transphobic ads of that election cycle. The grant created almost entire citizens for sanity Funding for 2023.
During the 2024 election cycle, Musk released at least $277 million in political contributions to the super PACs he worked to elect President Trump and other Republicans. I don’t know how much he gave to other politically active groups disguised as donors.
Detours to third-party voting access
The fair election fund’s goal of exposing election fraud at first glance seemed to have no significance.
Of the $5 million fund, the group announced $75,000 in payments of “prizes” and released it $50,000 July 2024 and $25,000 September 2024. Fair Election Fund It was promised While we will not “emphasis” the narratives of election fraud collected through these payments via “active payments and acquired media campaigns,” we suggest that any evidence generated is consequential or reliable. Not there.
Instead, the group detoured in July 2024: $175,000 advertisement “Blitz” targeting North Carolina Election Commission (NCSBE) members delay Third-party presidential candidates Cornell West and Robert F. Kennedy JR will be on the poll. Back then, Republicans and their allies believed West and Kennedy would do. I’ll act as a spoiler to help Trumpby sucking up left-leaning votes away from the Democratic presidential candidate.
Ironically, the NCSBE delayed decisions regarding Western and Kennedy’s eligibility and is based on evidence. The petition was obtained through fraudulent means – Concerns that appear to coincide with the Fair Election Fund’s mission to expose election fraud.
Fair Election Fund advertisement NCSBE Democrats declared “threatening your right to vote” and provided compensation for evidence of members’ “shady backroom deals.” The group too Projected image I drove next to the NCSBE building. Mobile sign Around the agency’s headquarters.
Mark Elias, a Democratic lawyer who tried to stay west of votes in North Carolina and elsewhere, was a frequent target for the group. October 2024, Group announcement Performing six-figure ad purchases to “troll” Elias. The ads included mobile billboards around Elias Law Group Office and full-page ads for the Washington Post. “We’ve broken Mark Elias and his racist voter suppression lawsuit. Cornell West, but the fair election fund has stopped him.”
The fair election fund was then directed towards a series of efforts to chase other trending right-wing conspiracy theories.
For example, fair election funds over the summer are Online Funding Platform ActBlueclaiming he found it.”60,000 potential contradictionsIn ActBlue Facilitation’s contribution to the Biden-Harris campaign, based on a survey conducted “from late July to early August.” The group is “I spent $250,000 About these initial findings” – Amazing
The US State Department has allocated $400 million to purchase new Tesla armored vehicles, despite Tesla CEO Elon Musk leading efforts to reduce government spending during Donald Trump’s term.
Sector-generated procurement forecasts indicate a proposed expenditure of $400 million (£320 million) for “armored Teslas (production units).” These vehicles could potentially be the Cybertrucks, Tesla’s latest electric pickup model, touted by Musk as being bulletproof.
This revelation raises concerns about a possible conflict of interest for Musk, who is a major beneficiary of US government contracts through his various companies.
While Musk’s wealth primarily comes from Tesla, his rocket company SpaceX is a key contractor providing space launch services to the US government.
Despite Musk’s efforts to streamline government spending, particularly through his initiative named Doge, Trump has also involved him in government efficiency efforts. These actions have been criticized for potentially violating the US Constitution.
State Department documents suggest that the Tesla contract will be finalized by the end of September.
The department’s website originally included a forecast document dated December 13, 2024, showing the Tesla procurement plan. However, a later version corrected this entry after it was reported by Drop Site News, replacing “Tesla” with “armored electric vehicles” (EVs) without specifying the brand.
In addition to Tesla, the US government also procures armored vehicles from other manufacturers, as indicated in the procurement documents.
American and Australian paleontologists have discovered and explained the new, almost complete skull of Vegavis Iaai, a diver bird species in Footpro, which lived in Antarctica during the latest Cretaceous period between 69.2 and 68.4 million years ago. New fossils provide insight into bird feeding ecology and show morphology that supports placement among waterfowls in Crown Group (modern) birds.
Vegavis Iaai. Image credit: Mark Whitton.
Vegavis Iaai was first discovered 20 years ago by a research team led by Austin paleontologists, led by the University of Texas.
At the time, the species was proposed as an early member of the crown bird, which evolved into nests among waterfowls.
However, crown birds are very rare before end extinction, and more recent research has raised questions about the evolutionary position of Vegavis Iaai.
“There are few birds who are likely to start as many arguments as paleontologists do. Vegavis,” said Professor Christopher Torres of the University of the Pacific.
“This new fossil will help resolve many of these debates. Chief among them: Where are you? Vegavis Iaai Are you sitting on the bird of life tree?”
Professor Torres and his colleagues produced an almost complete three-dimensional reconstruction of the new specimen.
Team analysis reveals typical bird brain shapes and supports the placement of Vegavis Iaai among the waterfowl family, and as relatives of ducks and geese.
However, in this study, the birds had elongated, pointed beaks that drive the strengthened jaw muscles.
“The fossil highlights that Antarctica has a lot to say to us about the early stages of modern bird evolution,” said Professor Patrick O’Connor of Ohio University.
“A bird known almost simultaneously from other parts of the globe is barely recognizable by modern bird standards.”
Furthermore, most of the few sites that have even preserved delicate bird fossils produce incomplete specimens that are so incomplete that they don’t only give hints to their identities. Vegavis until now.
“And some places with substantial fossil records of late Cretaceous birds like Madagascar and Argentina are the strange birds with teeth and long bone tails that are only associated with modern birds. It reveals birds.”
“It seems that something very different is happening in the distance in the Southern Hemisphere, especially in the Antarctic.”
Cr Torres et al. 2025. The skulls of Cretaceous Antarctic birds elucidate the ecological diversity of early birds. Nature 638, 146-151; doi:10.1038/s41586-024-08390-0
Understanding food chains in ancient ecosystems is one of the goals of paleoecology. Direct evidence of these interactions is rare and includes fossils with stomach contents and bite/teeth marks. A rare occurrence of bite marks on the neck vertebrae of a giant azhdarchyd goat larval vertebral column specimen from the Greater Sublineage of Alberta, Canada. was recorded. Approximately 76 million years ago. Based on the size and shape of the tooth marks and comparisons with modern animals, the authors suggest that crocodiles bite pterosaurs, but it is unclear whether this is active predation or scavenging. I couldn’t do it. Signs of giant pterosaurs are rare, so this provides novel details about how they fit into this ancient ecosystem.
Fossilized neck bones of a young boy Cryodrakon Boreas It shows signs (right part of specimens 2 and 8) that do not indicate that it was bitten by a crocodile-like creature 76 million years ago. Image credit: Brown et al. , doi:10.1017/jpa.2024.12.
The 76-million-year-old neck vertebrae were excavated in July 2023 in the Dinosaur Park Formation in Alberta, Canada.
The preserved (i.e. incomplete) length of the specimen is 5.8 cm. The estimated total length of the vertebrae is 9.4 cm.
The specimen has a circular puncture mark 4 mm wide from a crocodile tooth.
“Peterosaurus bones are very delicate, so it's very unusual to find fossils that were clearly chewed by another animal,” said Dr Caleb Brown, a palaeontologist at the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology. states.
“This specimen is even rarer because it is a juvenile.”
The punctured vertebrae belong to a larva (estimated wingspan 2 m) Cryodrakon Boreasa species of giant azhdarchid pterosaur that lived during the Late Cretaceous in what is now Canada.
Adults of this species will be as tall as a giraffe with a wingspan in an area of 10 m.
“With an estimated wingspan comparable to some of the largest azhdarchids, creedracon And other large azhdarchids were probably significant terrestrial foragers,” said the paleontologist.
“Bite marks, implanted teeth, and stomach contents indicate that the azhdarchid pterosaurs were fed by velociraptrines and crocodiles.”
Cryodrakon Boreas. Image credit: David Maas.
In this study, they used micro-CT scans and comparisons with other pterygoid bones to confirm that they were the result of an actual crocodile bite, rather than fossilization or damage during excavation. I did.
“It helps document species interactions from this time,” said Dr. Brian Pickles, a paleontologist at Reading College.
“While we can't say whether the palace was alive or dead when it was bitten, the specimen is a juvenile that crocodiles sometimes preyed on in prehistoric Alberta more than 700 million years ago, or removed.” It shows that it shows a pterosaur.”
study Published online today Journal of Paleontology.
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Caleb M. Brown et al. Larval vertebral vertebrae with putative crocodile bites from a Campanian in Alberta, Canada. Journal of Paleontologypublished online on January 23, 2025. doi:10.1017/jpa.2024.12
A massive flood called the Zanclean Flood ended the Messinian salinity crisis that lasted from 5.97 million to 5.33 million years ago, according to a new study led by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI).
One of the scenarios being discussed for ending the Messinian Salinity Crisis 5.33 million years ago is the catastrophic backfilling of the Mediterranean Sea by the Zanclean Flood. Micallef others. They present clear onshore and offshore evidence that this deluge spilled over a shallow marine corridor in southeastern Sicily into the nearby underwater Noto Gorge. This aerial photo shows a ridge eroded by a major flood, located northeast of Masseria del Volpe, in southeastern Sicily. Image credit: Kevin Sciberras and Neil Petroni.
“The Zanclean Flood is an awe-inspiring natural phenomenon, with flows and velocities that seem dwarfed by any other known flood in Earth’s history,” said the study’s lead author, C.A. said Dr. Aaron Micallef, a research scientist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute.
“Our study provides the most convincing evidence yet of this unusual event.”
During the Messinian salinity crisis, the Mediterranean Sea was isolated from the Atlantic Ocean and evaporated, creating vast salt deposits that transformed the region’s landscape.
Scientists have long believed that this dry period would gradually end and that the Mediterranean Sea would be reclaimed over 10,000 years.
However, the discovery in 2009 of an eroded channel stretching from the Gulf of Cadiz to the Alboran Sea called this idea into question.
The discovery points to a single major flooding event lasting between two and 16 years, which became known as the Zanclean Flood.
Estimates indicate that the outflow of this megaflood was between 68 and 100 Sverdraps (Sv), where 1 sievert is equivalent to 1 million cubic meters per second.
In their research, Dr. Micallef and his colleagues combined newly discovered geological features with geophysical data and numerical modeling to provide the most comprehensive picture of the megaflood to date. did.
The researchers investigated more than 300 asymmetric streamlined ridges in the corridor across the Sicilian Sil, a submerged land bridge that once separated the western and eastern Mediterranean basins.
“The morphology of these ridges corresponds to erosion by large-scale turbulence, mainly in a north-easterly direction,” said Professor Paul Carling from the University of Southampton.
“They reveal the immense power of the Zanclean Flood and how it changed the landscape and left a lasting mark on the geological record.”
Scientists sampled the ridge and found that it was overlain by a layer of rock debris containing material eroded from the sides of the ridge and surrounding areas. This indicates that it was deposited there rapidly and with great force.
This layer lies right on the boundary between the Messinian and Zanclean periods, where the Great Flood is thought to have occurred.
Using seismic reflection data, a type of geological ultrasound that allows scientists to see layers of rock and sediment beneath the Earth’s surface, the authors found a “W-shaped” shape on the continental shelf east of Sicily’s Sill. discovered a waterway.
This channel, dug into the ocean floor, connects the ridge to the Noto Gorge, a deep underwater canyon located in the eastern Mediterranean.
The shape and location of the channel suggest that it functioned like a giant funnel.
When the mega-flood flowed into Sicily’s Sill, this channel is thought to have carried the water towards the Noto Valley and into the eastern Mediterranean.
The research team developed a computer model of the flood to simulate how the water behaved.
The model shows that floodwaters change direction and increase their strength over time, reaching speeds of up to 32 meters per second (72 miles per hour), carving deeper channels, eroding more material, and increasing their length. This suggests that they may have been transported over long distances.
“These discoveries not only reveal a critical moment in Earth’s geological history, but also prove that landforms persist for five million years,” Dr. Micallef said.
“This opens the door to further research on the Mediterranean coast.”
of study Published in a magazine Communication Earth and Environment.
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A. Micallef others. 2024. Land-to-sea indicators of the Zanclean Flood. common global environment 5,794;doi: 10.1038/s43247-024-01972-w
homo erectusan early member of the genus homoA new study shows that a new study shows that the astronauts were able to successfully navigate longer, harsher and drier terrain in eastern Africa than previously thought.
archaic humans. Image credit: Ninara / CC BY 2.0.
For a long time, debate has centered on when this genus originated. homo They have acquired the adaptability to survive even in extreme environments such as deserts and tropical rainforests.
Traditionally, homo sapiens Archaic humans were thought to be able to sustainably occupy such ecosystems, and ancient hominids were thought to be confined to smaller ranges.
However, evidence suggests that at an early stage homo Two million years ago, they had the ability to adapt to diverse and unstable environments.
“It’s extinct now, but homo erectus Professor Michael Petraglia of Griffith University said: “Humans have existed for an estimated 1.5 million years or more, marking the successful survival of the species in our evolutionary history.” Compared to that, it is about 300,000 years until now.
Professor Julio Mercader of the University of Calgary added, “Their success is due to their ability to survive over long periods of time characterized by many changes in environment and climate.”
Investigate how climate change has affected ecological ranges, dispersal patterns, and technology. homo erectusThe authors conducted an interdisciplinary study at Engazi Nayori in Oldupai Gorge, an important early human settlement on the equator in Tanzania.
They discovered that between about 1.2 million and 1 million years ago, the region remained semi-desert, with distinctive plant life.
Archaeological data suggests the existence of the following groups: homo erectus They repeatedly settled in areas where fresh water was available, such as ponds, and adapted to local conditions by developing specialized stone tools such as scrapers and jagged tools (known as denticles).
The researchers suggest that, taken together, these findings demonstrate that: homo erectus Their ability to survive in extreme environments was far greater than previously thought.
“This adaptive profile, characterized by resilience in arid regions, challenges assumptions about the dispersal limits and location of early humans.” homo erectus As a versatile generalist and the first human to transcend environmental boundaries on a global scale,” Professor Petraglia said.
“This adaptability is probably due to homo erectus They invaded the arid regions of Africa and Eurasia and redefined their role as ecological generalists, thriving in some of the most difficult landscapes of the Middle Pleistocene,” added Professor Paul Durkin of the University of Manitoba. .
of findings Posted in today's diary Nature Communication Earth and Environment.
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J. Mercader others. 2025. homo erectus One million years ago, they adapted to the extreme climates of grasslands and deserts. common global environment 6, 1; doi: 10.1038/s43247-024-01919-1
Google and Microsoft each contributed $1 million to President Donald Trump’s Inaugural Fund, along with companies like Amazon, Meta, OpenAI, and Uber.
“Google is supporting the 2025 Inauguration with a live stream on YouTube and a direct link to the homepage. We are also donating to the inaugural committee,” said Google Government Affairs & Public Policy global head Karan Bhatia in a statement to the Guardian on Thursday.
Google made the donation on Monday, as reported by CNBC. Google spokesperson Jose Castaneda mentioned that the company had previously donated to the Inauguration Fund and hosted a livestream of the inauguration.
Microsoft confirmed its $1 million donation to President Trump’s inaugural fund in a statement to Bloomberg on Thursday. The company had also donated to Trump’s 2017 inauguration and Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration.
Many other major companies made significant donations to President Trump’s inaugural fund last month, including Toyota, Uber, Amazon, Meta, and OpenAI.
These donations helped raise funds for President Trump’s inaugural committee, which received a $170 million donation. This appears to be an attempt by tech giants to gain favor with President Trump for his second term in office.
President Trump’s relationship with big tech companies has been contentious, but as his inauguration approaches, there seems to be a shift in tone from both parties.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai criticized the January 6 riot and praised President Trump’s victory. President Trump also noted a change in attitude towards him from various tech companies.
Mark Zuckerberg of Meta Inc. announced changes in the company’s approach to fact-checking and censorship, aiming to reduce censorship and recommend more political content across their platforms.
Experts believe that contributing to Trump’s inauguration is a way for tech companies to gain support from the new administration and avoid being targeted by President Trump in the future.
Analysis shows that since 2016, Elon Musk’s electric car company has received approximately £200m in subsidies from the UK government.
Tesla, led by a tech billionaire who is actively engaging with the UK government, has been granted £191m in funds from Westminster, as reported by Tassel, a public contract data analysis company.
The majority of this funding, £188m, came from the Department for Transport (DfT) over the specified period.
These subsidies were primarily related to the Plug-in car subsidy aimed at encouraging the adoption of electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids. Initially introduced in 2011, this subsidy provided a discount on the purchase price of new plug-in cars, starting at £5,000, until its conclusion in June 2022.
Recent figures from DfT reveal that transportation subsidies peaked at £61.6m in 2020 and have since decreased, with Tesla receiving £49,000 in the first half of the previous year.
Additional grants for Tesla in the UK were provided by entities such as Stirling Council, South Central NHS Trust, and the Scottish Government.
The fact that Tesla has benefited from British government subsidies contrasts with Elon Musk’s statements about reducing government intervention and expenditure.
Musk was appointed by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump to co-lead the Office of Government Efficiency, with plans to streamline federal operations. He also mentioned plans to streamline X’s workforce after acquiring the company in 2022 and reducing the number of federal agencies in the U.S.
Tesla recently reported a decline in annual deliveries for the first time, as incentives failed to drive demand for its older models, missing quarterly targets several times in 2024.
As the world’s wealthiest individual, Musk has utilized X to criticize politicians such as Keir Starmer regarding recent scandals.
During his time as owner of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, Nick Clegg reportedly made around $19 million from the sale of Meta shares. Filings show that before stepping down as president of Global Affairs and Communications, Clegg had sold shares worth $18.4 million.
Although his total salary at Meta has not been disclosed, he still owns approximately 39,000 shares of the company, valued at around $21 million at current prices. Joel Kaplan will succeed him as deputy, known for his conservative views and previous role in the George W. Bush administration.
Speculation surrounds Clegg’s next move after leaving Meta, with potential for a return to politics. He is considering opportunities in artificial intelligence, having criticized Rishi Sunak’s approach to AI regulation and aligning more with Tony Blair’s optimistic views on the technology’s potential.
Open to work opportunities in both public and private sectors, Clegg aims to return to London and remain in Europe in 2022. His wife, Miriam, has her own political ambitions and recently established a think tank in Spain.
Knighted in 2018 for his public service, Clegg faced criticism for joining Facebook later that year. Despite his previous advocacy against Brexit, Clegg’s tenure at Meta saw success amidst challenges of fake news and data protection.
In his Facebook post, Clegg reflects on his time at Meta, expressing pride in his work and the innovative approach he brought to the role. Despite his past political achievements and setbacks, Clegg remains optimistic about the future.
Looking ahead, Clegg’s next steps are uncertain, with possibilities in various sectors on the horizon. His departure from Meta marks a new chapter in his career, leaving a legacy of experience and impact in the digital landscape.
Apple has agreed to pay $95 million in cash to settle a class action lawsuit alleging that its voice assistant, Siri, violated users’ privacy and listened to them without their consent.
iPhone owners complained that Apple routinely recorded private conversations after users unintentionally activated Siri and made those conversations available to third parties, including advertisers. The preliminary settlement was filed Tuesday night in federal court in Oakland, California, and must be approved by U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White.
Voice assistants typically respond when you use a “hotword” such as “Hey, Siri.” The two plaintiffs said references to Air Jordan sneakers and Olive Garden restaurants prompted advertisements for those products. One person said he received an advertisement for a well-known surgical treatment after a personal discussion with his doctor. The plaintiffs argued that Apple did not receive consent before recording their conversations and, in fact, could not have obtained consent because one of the plaintiffs was a minor and did not have an Apple account at the time of the recording.
The complaint alleges that the violations continued from September 17, 2014 to December 31, 2024. The violation allegedly began with the addition of a “Hey, Siri” function to Siri, which led to unauthorized recordings. Estimated tens of millions of class participants can receive up to $20 per Siri-enabled device, such as an iPhone or Apple Watch.
Apple denied any wrongdoing in the settlement agreement. The company has consistently emphasized the importance of privacy. In 2018, Apple CEO Tim Cook criticized other technology companies for their surveillance, saying: ‘[t]His desire to prioritize profit over privacy is nothing new.” The company further countered in a letter to Congress. 2018 Apple’s iPhone devices do not “listen” to you, other than detecting the audio trigger “Hey Siri.”
But in a 2019 Guardian report cited in the original complaint, an Apple whistleblower revealed that contractors regularly listen to users’ private conversations when performing quality assurance on Siri. He said that he had done so. These conversations included confidential medical information, drug deals, and recordings of couples having sex. Some of these conversations were recorded by mistake, the whistleblower said, because Siri can mistake things like the “zip sound” as a wake word.
At the time, Apple said that only a “small percentage” of Siri requests are evaluated for quality, and those requests are not tied to a user’s Apple ID. “Siri responses are analyzed in a secure facility, and all reviewers are obligated to comply with Apple’s requests.” Strict confidentiality requirements. “The company then paused A quality improvement program has been installed to stop audio recording by default.
The Cupertino, Calif.-based company and its lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday. Lawyers for the plaintiffs did not immediately respond to a similar request. They could seek $1.1 million in fees and costs, up to $28.5 million in a settlement fund.
For Apple, whose net income was $93.74 billion in its most recent fiscal year, $95 million is equivalent to about nine hours of profit.
A similar lawsuit on behalf of users of Google’s voice assistant is pending in federal court in San Jose, California, which is in the same district as the Oakland court. The plaintiffs are represented by the same law firm that worked on the Apple case.
Workers excavating clay at a limestone quarry in southern England stumbled upon a unique bump, leading to the discovery of a “dinosaur highway” and approximately 200 tracks dating back 166 million years, as revealed by researchers on Thursday.
Researchers from the University of Oxford and the University of Birmingham unveiled this groundbreaking find after a team of over 100 individuals excavated the Dewars Farm quarry in Oxfordshire in June. This discovery is said to revolutionize previous paleontological research in the area and provide deeper insights into the Middle Jurassic era.
Kirsty Edgar, a professor of micropalaeontology at the University of Birmingham, expressed, “These footprints offer a unique glimpse into the lives of dinosaurs, providing details about their movements, interactions, and the tropical habitats they inhabited.”
Among the series of tracks forming the “dinosaur highway,” four tracks trace the path of sauropods, giant, long-necked herbivorous dinosaurs that reached lengths of nearly 60 feet. The fifth set belonged to Megalosaurus, a fierce 30-foot-long predator with distinctive three-clawed markings, which was the first dinosaur to be scientifically named over two centuries ago.
Workers survey five vast tracks that formed part of the “Dinosaur Highway.” University of Birmingham (via AP)
Crossing sections where the tracks intersect raised queries about potential encounters between carnivores and herbivores.
Emma Nichols, a vertebrate paleontologist at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, acknowledged, “Scientists have long studied megalosaurs, but this discovery evidences the existence of further insights into these creatures that are yet to be uncovered.”
Nearly three decades ago, 40 pairs of footprints discovered in a local limestone quarry were deemed among the most significant dinosaur footprints globally. However, as the region is now largely inaccessible, evidence is limited due to the absence of digital cameras and drones during that period.
During the recent excavation, the team captured over 20,000 digital images and utilized a drone to create 3D models of the prints. This extensive documentation could prove valuable for future studies, revealing aspects like the size of the dinosaurs, their gait, and speed.
Duncan Murdoch, a geoscientist at the Oxford Museum, noted, “The preservation of these tracks is so detailed that the deformation of the mud by the dinosaurs’ feet can be observed. Together with other fossils present, such as burrows, shells, and plants, these tracks can reconstruct the muddy lagoon environments the dinosaurs traversed.”
These findings will be showcased in a new exhibit at the museum and will be featured on the BBC’s Digging for Britain next week.
Paleontologists discovered hundreds of different dinosaur footprints, including one left by a ferocious 9-meter (29.5-foot) predator megalosaurus Dewar’s Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England, by a herbivorous dinosaur up to twice its size.
Footprints of carnivorous and herbivorous dinosaurs at Dewar’s Farm Quarry in Oxfordshire, England. Image credit: University of Birmingham.
Professor Kirsty Edgar from the University of Birmingham said: “These footprints provide a special window into the lives of dinosaurs, revealing details about their movements, interactions and the tropical environments they lived in. ” he said.
Professor Edgar and colleagues have unearthed five vast dinosaur footprints dating back to the mid-Jurassic period, some 166 million years ago.
The longest continuous track was over 150 m (492 ft) long.
Four of the orbits were created by giant, long-necked herbivorous dinosaurs called sauropods. cetiosaurusa cousin of the famous brassica, which can grow up to 18 meters (59 ft) in length. diplodocus.
The fifth orbit was created by a carnivorous theropod dinosaur megalosaurusit was characterized by large three-toed feet with claws.
Parts of the site show intersecting carnivore and herbivore tracks, raising questions about whether and how the two were interacting.
“Scientists know about it and have studied it. megalosaurus Dr Emma Nicholls, a vertebrate paleontologist at Oxford University’s Natural History Museum, said: “They lived longer than any other dinosaur on Earth, but recent discoveries show that new evidence of these animals still exists and discoveries It proves that we are waiting for the future.”
Paleontologists worked together to discover around 200 footprints and used aerial drone photography to build a detailed 3D model of the site.
Professor Richard Butler, from the University of Birmingham, said: “There is much more we can learn from this site. It is an important part of our global heritage.”
“Our 3D model will allow researchers to continue their studies and make this fascinating part of our past accessible for generations to come.”
During the excavation, researchers took more than 20,000 images of the footprints.
These provide a wealth of material for further research and education, providing valuable information about how these dinosaurs walked, their speed, size, whether they interacted, and how they interacted. May provide insight.
Dr Duncan Murdoch, a researcher at Oxford University’s Natural History Museum, said: “The preservation is very detailed and you can see how the mud deformed as the dinosaur’s feet moved in and out.”
“Together with other fossils such as burrows, shells and plants, they can bring to life the muddy lagoon environment that the dinosaurs walked through.”
Uber and its CEO have donated $1 million to Donald Trump’s inaugural fund, joining a growing list of technology companies and executives seeking to build good relations with the incoming administration.
This donation was announced by a spokesperson for Uber Technologies. The Wall Street Journal reported that on Tuesday, Uber and its CEO Dara Khosrowshahi each donated $1 million to Trump’s fund. Uber did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Guardian.
Uber had previously donated $1 million to President Biden’s 2021 inauguration, but Khosrowshahi did not donate to that event, according to the Wall Street Journal. The $1 million donation to Trump’s fund is said to be Khosrowshahi’s largest contribution to a political candidate or presidential inaugural fund.
The donations from Uber and Khosrowshahi add to a growing list of tech companies and executives who have pledged to donate $1 million to the president-elect’s inaugural fund.
Mehta, CEO of OpenAI, confirmed last week that he had donated $1 million to the foundation. CEO Sam Altman of OpenAI also planned to make a $1 million personal donation to the foundation. Amazon is also preparing to donate $1 million to Trump’s fund.
Unlike companies and executives like Mark Zuckerberg, Mehta, and Jeff Bezos, Uber and Khosrowshahi do not have a historically strained relationship with President Trump, making their donations especially significant.
Notably, Tony West, Uber’s chief legal officer, is the brother-in-law of Vice President and former Democratic candidate Kamala Harris. Mr. West took time off to volunteer with Mr. Harris’ presidential campaign before returning to his role at Uber.
Donations to inaugural committees are common among large companies looking to establish better relations with the new administration.
According to Amazon, the company donated $57,746 to President Trump’s first inaugural fund in 2017. Open Secrets reported that other companies such as Google and Microsoft also made donations. Mehta confirmed to the Guardian that he did not donate in 2017.
Recent donations from tech companies and executives come amidst reports of perks being offered to top donors to the president-elect’s inaugural fund. Since Trump’s election win, he has dined with several technology company executives.
In the past month, Trump has dined with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg at his Mar-a-Lago mansion. Apple CEO Tim Cook; as well as Google’s Sundar Pichai and Sergey Brin; are among those who have had dinners with Trump. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is scheduled to have dinner with Trump this week.
The newly described species lived in what is now Europe during the early Eocene, about 55 million years ago.
with scientific name Apachius Madsenithe ancient insect was about 1.9 centimeters (0.75 inches) long.
belongs to the genus Apacius in the family Apacidaeis part of a larger insect order Dermatoptera (commonly known as earwig).
Currently, extant species of this family are found only in south-central Africa, India, Southeast Asia, and Australia.
They are generally characterized by relatively large, flat bodies and often bright colors.
“Today, the Apaceae family consists of 15 living species in two genera, 13 of which are Apacius And in two Dendroiketes) similarly Apachius Madseni'' said paleontologist Jan Audun Rasmussen of the Mors Museum.
“The current species are distributed in Central Africa (three species) and from India to the Philippines and Australia (the remaining species).”
The discovery of Apachius Madseni Therefore, we show that the range of Apacidae has expanded considerably, indicating that the current distribution of this family is not necessarily indicative of its past distribution or biogeographic origin. ”
almost completed single Apachius Madseni The fossil was discovered in a fur layer in Mors, northwestern Denmark.
“This fossil is the second species of Dermatoptera to be described from the fur layer, and the first representative of the enigmatic Apacidae,” the paleontologists said.
According to the authors, this formation's diatomaceous clay deposits formed the seafloor of northwestern Denmark during the early Eocene, when Denmark was completely covered by sea.
Because modern members of the Apaceae family live under the bark of trees, they believe that: Apachius Madseni It was carried to the sea covered in the bark of a tree trunk that is thought to have drifted ashore from Sweden or Norway about 55 million years ago.
“It's no surprise that we found the ancestor of this tropical and subtropical earwig family so far north as Denmark,” Dr. Rasmussen said.
“55 million years ago, the ocean that covered what is now Denmark was subtropical to almost tropical, as evidenced by the fish, bird, insect, and plant fossils found in ancient seafloor deposits on the islands of Mors and Fir. It is reflected.”
Thomas J. Simonsen others. 2024. Apachius Madseni (Dermoptera: Apacidae) sp. November discovery in the Ypresian fur layer in Denmark: the first fossil record of the mysterious earwig family Apacidae. paleoentomology 007 (5): 638-644;doi: 10.11646/Paleoentomology.7.5.7
The earliest known sabertooths hunted large prey 270 million years ago. The newly discovered remains could help explain how early mammal relatives became warm-blooded animals.
The first land predators usually hunted relatively small prey. But things changed about 273 million years ago, when an event known as the Olson extinction shook ecosystems around the world. Then, much larger terrestrial herbivores began to appear, and predators needed new weapons to dispatch such large prey. Josep Fortuny At the Miquel Cursafont Catalan Institute of Paleontology, Barcelona, Spain.
This may help explain why the fossilized partial skeleton of an ancient predator that Fortuny and his colleagues just discovered on the Spanish island of Mallorca had saber-shaped teeth. These fangs are better suited for injuring larger prey than for grabbing and holding small animals. “This was the first time we had access to this kind of tool for preying on herbivores,” Fortuny said.
Dating back an estimated 270 million years, this predator is the oldest known member of a group of carnivores known as gorgonopsians, all of whom had saber-shaped teeth. The largest gorgonopsids grew to several meters in length, with canine teeth reaching 15 centimeters in length. The Mallorca gorgonopsian was smaller, measuring about 1 meter long and its canine teeth only 5 centimeters long. Fortuny said researchers are waiting to name the new gorgonopsian until they have analyzed the bones and teeth in more detail.
Ancient predators are important not only because of their age. At the time they roamed Mallorca, the island was part of a tropical supercontinent called Pangea, but all known fossils of gorgonopsids date back 270 million years. They come from areas of the world that were at high latitudes. The new discovery suggests that the gorgonopsian actually originated near the equator.
Perhaps adaptations developed there, such as the ability to efficiently hunt large prey, may have allowed them to regulate their body temperature in order to spread into cooler habitats away from the equator.
Fortuny says it’s important to better understand this process because gorgonopsids belonged to the therapsids, a group of animals that also includes mammals. “There’s a lot of debate about the first steps in thermoregulation in this group,” he says.
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