Science

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Scientists have spotted in rocks from northern China what may be the oldest fossils of a green plant ever found, tiny seaweed that carpeted areas of the seafloor roughly a billion years ago and were part of a primordial revolution among life on Earth. A green seaweed fossil from China dating back

(Reuters) – Katherine Johnson, the black woman whose mathematical genius took her from a behind-the-scenes job in a segregated NASA as portrayed in the film “Hidden Figures” to a key role in sending humans to the moon, died on Monday at the age of 101, NASA said. FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Barack Obama presents the

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – NASA’s robotic InSight lander has for the first time established that Mars is seismically active, but do not call the shaking, rattling and rolling taking place on the Red Planet earthquakes. The proper term, fittingly, is marsquakes. FILE PHOTO: A life-size model of the spaceship Insight, NASA’s first robotic lander dedicated to

TOKYO (Reuters) – Newly released data from a Japanese research institute appears to back the government’s case that its quarantine strategy for the Diamond Princess cruise ship was successful in stemming contagion of the coronavirus among passengers. Japan has been criticised for its handling of the quarantine, as more than 620 people on board have

LONDON (Reuters) – One scientific post suggests links between the new coronavirus and AIDS, a second says it may have passed to people via snakes, while a third claims it is a pathogen from outer space. The emergence in China of a new human coronavirus that is causing an epidemic of flu-like disease has sparked

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A Neanderthal skeleton unearthed in an Iraqi cave already famous for fossils of these extinct cousins of our species is providing fresh evidence that they buried their dead – and intriguing clues that flowers may have been used in such rituals. A view of the entrance to Shanidar Cave in the foothills

ATHENS (Reuters) – A humanoid figure dressed as a maid holds a jug in its right hand and, as hidden gears click and whirr, lifts it and pours wine into a cup a bystander has placed into the palm of its left. The automatic servant of Philon from the 3rd century BC, is seen at

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Scientists examining the genomes of West Africans have detected signs that a mysterious extinct human species interbred with our own species tens of thousands of years ago in Africa, the latest evidence of humankind’s complicated genetic ancestry. FILE PHOTO: Yinka Sotomi stands atop Oluma Rock, a spiritual site for the Yoruba tribe,

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A vaguely hourglass-shaped icy object called Arrokoth residing in the far reaches of the solar system – the most distant body ever explored by a spacecraft – is giving scientists intriguing clues about the formation of the planets including Earth. Scientists on Thursday offered the fullest description yet of the composition and

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – One of the largest turtles that ever lived prowled the lakes and rivers of northern South America from about 13 million years ago to 7 million years ago – and this car-sized freshwater beast was built for battle. The huge extinct freshwater turtle Stupendemys geographicus, that lived in lakes and rivers in

PARIS (Reuters) – Franco-British biotech company Novacyt (ALNOV.PA) says it can offer a coronavirus test that is faster than rival methods by focusing on a narrow sequence of DNA coding, as it fights stiff competition to turn the outbreak into a business opportunity. Police in protective gear wait to evacuate residents from a public housing

U.S. President Donald Trump makes remarks during the White House Business Session with the nation’s governors in the State Dining Room of the White House, Washington, DC, U.S., February 10, 2020. REUTERS/Mike Theiler WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House on Monday asked Congress for $25.2 billion for NASA in 2021, the agency’s biggest budget in

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A new probe built by NASA and the European Space Agency set off on a blazing hot journey to the sun on Sunday to take the first close-up look at the star’s polar regions, a mission expected to yield insight into how solar radiant energy affects Earth. The Solar Orbiter spacecraft lifted

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – NASA and the European Space Agency are gearing up to send a new probe toward the sun to take a unique look at its blazing poles, an unprecedented view expected to help researchers grasp how the star’s vast bubble of energy affects Earth and humans in space. The Solar Orbiter is due

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A new spacecraft built jointly by U.S. and European space agencies is ready for a blazing journey to the sun to capture an unprecedented view of its two poles, an angle that could help researchers understand how the star’s vast bubble of magnetic energy affects Earth. European Space Agency Solar Orbiter Project

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The world’s last woolly mammoths, sequestered on an Arctic Ocean island outpost, suffered from serious genetic defects caused by generations of inbreeding that may have hampered traits such as sense of smell and male fertility in the doomed population. FILE PHOTO: A visitor looks at a complete mammoth skeleton that is displayed