Science

The Long March 5B carrier rocket takes off from Wenchang Space Launch Center in Wenchang, Hainan Province, China May 5, 2020. China Daily via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS – THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. CHINA OUT. SHANGHAI/BEIJING (Reuters) – China on Tuesday successfully launched its largest carrier rocket, which was carrying a new-generation

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Scientists have solved a lingering mystery about koala behavior – how these tree-dwelling marsupials native to Australia consume enough water to live. A female koala licks water off the smooth trunk of an eucalyptus tree after a rainfall in the You Yangs Regional Park, Little River, Victoria, Australia in this undated photo

TOKYO (Reuters) – Coronavirus patients with light symptoms arriving to stay at several Tokyo hotels are likely to get a lift from a pleasant surprise – a robot greeter in the lobby. Japan is now using hotels to house patients who have tested positive for the coronavirus but whose symptoms are too light to need

CHAMBLON, Switzerland (Reuters) – In the battle against coronavirus, Swiss soldiers are using smartphones to test a new contact tracing application that could prevent infections while also protecting users’ privacy. A Swiss soldier shows on a mobile device the contact tracking application created by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL), using Bluetooth and

The logo of Swiss pharmaceutical group Lonza is seen at its headquarters in Basel, Switzerland March 2, 2020. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann (Reuters) – Moderna Inc and Swiss contract drugmaker Lonza Group AG said on Friday they would accelerate the manufacturing of the U.S. drug developer’s potential coronavirus vaccine. The announcement comes at a time when drugmakers

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The sun appears to be far less active than similar stars in terms of brightness variations caused by sunspots and other phenomena – a “boring” personality, according to scientists, that may not be a bad thing for us Earthlings. FILE PHOTO: A medium-sized (M2) solar flare and a coronal mass ejection (CME)

ZURICH (Reuters) – Researchers in Switzerland have been able to detect the new corovarirus at even low concentrations in wastewater, offering a potential early warning system for flareups in infections as countries emerge from emergency lockdowns. Should the system work, sewage samples could let public health officials see a resurgence of COVID-19 infections earlier than

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The huge African predator ​Spinosaurus spent much of its life in the water, propelled by a paddle-like tail while hunting large fish – a “river monster,” according to scientists, that showed that some dinosaurs invaded the aquatic realm. Tools lie at the excavation site of Spinosauru in the Kem Kem region of

LONDON (Reuters) – One of the world’s largest lunar meteorites goes on private sale at Christie’s on Thursday, valued at 2 million pounds ($2.49 million). An undated picture shows a moon rock in unknown location. CHRISTIE’S IMAGES LTD/Handout via REUTERS The moon rock, weighing over 13.5 kg, was probably struck off the surface of the

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Scientists at New York City’s health department have begun to analyze the novel coronavirus’s genetic material to allow them to trace the origins of any future outbreaks in the coming months as they cautiously look to reopen the largely shuttered city. Their work joins similar efforts at scores of institutions around

TEL AVIV (Reuters) – Israeli cancer immunotherapy firm Compugen said on Monday it had positive initial results from an ongoing early-stage study of its COM701 therapy in patients with advanced solid tumours who have exhausted all standard treatments. COM701 was well-tolerated with no dose-limiting toxicities when administered alone and in combination with Bristol-Myers Squibb’s cancer

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – When paleontologist Thomas Mörs was peering into a microscope while sorting through tiny 40 million-year-old fossils unearthed on Seymour Island near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, he came across quite a surprise – hip and skull bones of a frog. Paleontologists working at the site on Antarctica’s Seymour Island where fossils

FILE PHOTO: A lander for China’s Mars mission is seen before a hovering-and-obstacle avoidance test at a test facility in Huailai, Hebei province, China November 14, 2019. REUTERS/Jason Lee BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s space agency on Friday unveiled the name of its first Mars exploration mission, coinciding with China’s annual Space Day and the 50th

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The world’s ants, bees, butterflies, grasshoppers, fireflies and other land-dwelling insects have been suffering population drops of about 9% per decade but freshwater bugs such as dragonflies and mosquitoes have been rallying, researchers said on Thursday. FILE PHOTO: A bee lands on a bluebell in a garden in West London, Britain, April

(Reuters) – Texas science teacher Avri DiPietro has a secret weapon in her tool kit to help keep her students engaged now that the coronavirus pandemic has forced them to stay home indefinitely. It’s a home experiment known as “the burping bag.” The assignment calls for her sixth graders to combine vinegar and baking soda

(Reuters) – From tinkling harmonies as the virus disarms cells to clashing and stormy as it replicates, U.S. scientists have translated the novel coronavirus’ spiked protein structure to music in an effort to better understand the pathogen. FILE PHOTO: The ultrastructural morphology exhibited by the 2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), which was identified as the cause