Sulfur was key to the first water on Earth
A chemical element that’s not even in H2O — sulfur — is the reason Earth first got its water, a new study finds, bolstering a similar claim made a year …
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Jupiter’s Great Red Spot may be less than 200 years old
Jupiter’s signature feature — its Great Red Spot — might not be the same dark spot seen on the giant planet more than three centuries ago. From 1665 to 1713, …
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A planet needs to start with a lot of water to become like Earth
In planet formation, as in poker, you have to play the hand you’re dealt. If an Earthlike planet is the goal, the best starting hand might contain three to eight …
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The North Star is much heavier than previously thought
The star marking true north is a good deal heavier than we thought. The North Star is 5.1 times as massive as the sun, astronomers report in work submitted July …
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NASA’s Perseverance finds its first possible hint of ancient Mars life
NASA’s Perseverance rover has bagged its first hint of ancient microbes on Mars. “We’re not able to say that this is a sign of life,” says Perseverance deputy project scientist …
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Moonquakes are much more common than thought, Apollo data suggest
A new look at decades-old data from the Apollo missions has uncovered evidence of tens of thousands of previously unrecognized moonquakes. The results could reveal details about the moon’s inner …
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Scientists are getting serious about UFOs. Here’s why
For millennia, humans have seen inexplicable things in the sky. Some have been beautiful, some have been terrifying, and some — like auroras and solar eclipses before they were understood …
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Some meteors leave trails lasting up to an hour. Now we may know why
To leave a lasting trail, meteors need to aim low. A new survey of shooting stars shows that meteors that blaze through 90 kilometers up in the sky leave a …
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Astronauts actually get stuck in space all the time
Imagine going on a weeklong business trip and not coming home until the following year. That may be the situation for U.S. astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore, whose eight-day …
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Scientists want to send endangered species to the moon
As more and more species near extinction, scientists have been collecting samples from animals, plants and other creatures and storing them in biorepositories across the globe (SN: 5/8/19). But climate …
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