Tag Archives: Fossils

Ideas: Scientific American Magazine – October 2024

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Scientific American (September 16, 2024): The October 2024 issue features ‘How To Go Back To The Moon’ – Inside NASA’s ambitious, controversial Artemis mission; The science of Empathy and Hope for Sickle Cell Disease…

Ideas: Scientific American Magazine – September 2024

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Scientific American (August 21, 2024)The September 2024 issue featuresWhat Was It Like To Be A Dinosaur? – New insights into their senses, perceptions and behaviors…

What Was It Like to Be a Dinosaur?

Illustration depicting a t-rex

New fossils and analytical tools provide unprecedented insights into dinosaur sensory perception by Amy M. Balanoff, Daniel T. Ksepka

Alone Tyrannosaurus rexsniffs the humid Cretaceous air, scenting a herd of Triceratops grazing beyond the tree line. As the predator scans the floodplain, its vision suddenly snaps into focus. A single Triceratops has broken off from the herd and wandered within striking distance. Standing motionless, the T. rex formulates a plan of attack, anticipating the precise angle at which it must intersect its target before the Triceratops can regain the safety of the herd. The afternoon silence is shattered as the predator crashes though the low branches at the edge of the forest in hot pursuit.

T. rex has hunted Triceratops in so many books, games and movies that the encounter has become a cliché. But did a scene like this one ever unfold in real life? Would T. rex identify its prey by vision or by smell? Would the Triceratops be warned by a loudly cracking branch or remain oblivious because it was unable to locate the source of the sound? Could T. rex plan its attack like a cat, or would it lash out indiscriminately like a shark?

What If We Never Find Dark Matter?

The inside of a plant facility with gray and yellow equipment

Dark matter has turned out to be more elusive than physicists had hoped by Tracy R. Slatyer, Tim M. P. Tait

Can Pulling Carbon from Thin Air Slow Climate Change?

Alec Luhn

The End of the Lab Rat?

Rachel Nuwer

New Painkiller Could Bring Relief to Millions—Without Addiction Risk

Marla Broadfoot

Can Space and Time Exist as Two Shapes at Once? Mind-Bending Experiments Aim to Find Out

Nick Huggett, Carlo Rovelli

Research Preview: Nature Magazine – July 18, 2024

Volume 631 Issue 8021

Nature Magazine – July 17, 2024: The latest issue features ‘Long Reach’ – Salamander-like fossil expands geogrpahical range of early tetrapods…

AI tool can pinpoint dementia’s cause — from stroke to Alzheimer’s

Algorithm that distinguishes among a host of underlying causes of dementia could be used for diagnosis in hospitals and clinics.

Most accurate clock in history made by ‘quieting’ atoms

Strontium-based timepiece gains or loses only one second every 40 billion years.

Storm-chasing seabirds served supper by cyclones

The ocean-going Desertas petrel often follows storms for days over thousands of kilometres.

Wine grapes’ sweetness reveals Europe’s climate history

Records on the quality of the grape harvest sheds light on 600 years of weather.

Scientific American Magazine – July/Aug 2024

Scientific American Volume 331, Issue 1 | Scientific American

Scientific American (June 26, 2024)The July/August 2024 issue features The New Science of Health and Appetite – What humans really evolved to eat and how food affects our health today…

To Follow the Real Early Human Diet, Eat Everything

Nutrition influencers claim we should eat meat-heavy diets like our ancestors did. But our ancestors didn’t actually eat that way

People Who Are Fat and Healthy May Hold Keys to Understanding Obesity

“Heavy and healthy” can be a rare or common condition. But either way it may signal that some excess weight is just fine

Ozempic Quiets Food Noise in the Brain—But How?

Blockbuster weight-loss drugs are revealing how appetite, pleasure and addiction work in the brain

Scientific American Magazine – June 2024

Readers Respond to the February 2024 Issue | Scientific American

Scientific American (May 15, 2024)The June 2024 issue features:

Grizzly Bears Will Finally Return to Washington State. Humans Aren’t Sure How to Greet Them

BENJAMIN CASSIDY

Lifting the Veil on Near-Death Experiences

RACHEL NUWER

Scientific American Magazine – May 2024

Scientific American Volume 330, Issue 5 | Scientific American

Scientific American (April 17, 2024): The May 2024 issue features:

Fire Forged Humanity. Now It Threatens Everything

Ancient prophecies of worlds destroyed by fire are becoming realities. How will we respond?

The Secret to the Strongest Force in the Universe

New discoveries demystify the bizarre force that binds atomic nuclei together

Scientific American – February 2024 Preview

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Scientific American (January 16, 2024): The February 2024 issue features ‘The Milky Way’s Secret History’ – New star maps reveal our galaxy’s turbulent past; Why Aren’t We Made of Antimatter? – To understand why the universe is made of matter and not antimatter, physicists are looking for a tiny signal in the electron…

The New Story of the Milky Way’s Surprisingly Turbulent Past

The latest star maps are rewriting the story of our Milky Way, revealing a much more tumultuous history than astronomers suspected

Why Aren’t We Made of Antimatter?

To understand why the universe is made of matter and not antimatter, physicists are looking for a tiny signal in the electron

Tiny Fossils Reveal Dinosaurs’ Lost Worlds

Special assemblages of minuscule fossils bring dinosaur ecosystems to life

Museum Views: The Isle Of Wight – Dinosaur Island

Natural History Museum (August 8, 2023) – The Isle of Wight is a traditional British holiday resort. It’s well-known for its beautiful sandy beaches, dramatic cliffs, stunning countryside and many tourist attractions.

Video timeline: 0:00 A brief history of the Isle of Wight 1:13 Theo Vickers tells us about the geology of the island 1:35 Jack Wonfor talks about the diversity of fossil remains and how it is the best place in Europe for dinosaur discovery 2:02 Dr Susannah Maidment explains as to why the island is so good for dinosaur finds 2:35 Over 20 dinosaur species so far have been discovered on the Isle of Wight 2:52 Prof Paul Barrett tells us about the early palaeontologists, including William Fox and Sir Richard Owen 3:15 The Isle of Wight early dinosaur discoveries helped form much of what we know about dinosaurs today. 3:50 Original dinosaur discoveries are still relevant today. 4:15 New dinosaurs still being found today. 4:33 The dinosaurs found on the Isle of Wight. Iguanodon, Polacanthus, Omithopods, Sauropods, Neovenator and Eotyrannus. 5:26 How could you make your own discovery? 5:34 Techniques for finding dinosaur remains. 6:06 Dinosaur Island, the Isle of Wight’s excellent museum of geology, where there are many dinosaurs and fossils. 6:52 Why the Isle of Wight is a lovely place to visit. 7:08 how it is so easy to find a fossil on the beach.

But did you know that it is also the best place in Europe to find dinosaurs and the fossils of numerous other prehistoric animals, from ammonites to alligators?

Join our palaeontologists Dr Susannah Maidment and Professor Paul Barrett, as well as local experts, to discover what makes the Isle of Wight so special to them.

Research Preview: Science Magazine – July 7, 2023

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Science Magazine – July 7, 2023 issue:

The star watcher

Amateur astronomer Koichi Itagaki is one of the most prolific supernova hunters of all time

Rare fossil implies deep roots for vertebrates

Half-billion-year-old tunicate from western Utah “looks like it died yesterday”

Cover Preview: Scientific American – November 2022

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Antarctica’s Collapse Could Begin Even Sooner Than Anticipated

Two expeditions to the Thwaites Ice Shelf have revealed that it could splinter apart in less than a decade, hastening sea-level rise worldwide

Engineered Metamaterials Can Trick Light and Sound into Mind-Bending Behavior

Advanced materials can modify waves, creating optical illusions and useful technologies

Fossils Upend Conventional Wisdom about Evolution of Human Bipedalism

For most of human evolution, multiple species with different ways of walking upright coexisted