Troy Oakes

Doomed Star in Milky Way Threatens Rare Gamma-Ray Burst

University of Sydney astronomers, working with international colleagues, have found a star system like none seen before in our galaxy. Scientists believe that one of the stars — about 8,000 light-years from Earth — is the first known candidate in the Milky Way to produce a dangerous gamma-ray burst, among the most energetic events in ...

Troy Oakes

Doomed star in the Milky Way.

Study Reveals Huge Amount of Water Dragged Into Earth’s Interior

Slow-motion collisions of tectonic plates under the ocean drag about three times more water down into the deep Earth than previously estimated, according to a first-of-its-kind seismic study that spans the Mariana Trench. The observations from the deepest ocean trench in the world have important implications for the global water cycle, according to researchers in ...

Troy Oakes

Ancient DNA Unlocks Secrets of Ice Age Tribes in the Americas

Scientists have sequenced 15 ancient DNA genomes spanning from Alaska to Patagonia and were able to track the movements of the first humans as they spread across the Americas at “astonishing” speed during the last Ice Age, and also how these Ice Age tribes interacted with each other in the following millennia. The results have ...

Troy Oakes

Skulls and other human remains from Lagoa Santa, Brazil.

NASA Learns More About Interstellar Visitor ‘Oumuamua

In November 2017, scientists pointed NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope toward the object known as ‘Oumuamua — the first known interstellar object to visit our solar system. The infrared Spitzer was one of many telescopes pointed at ‘Oumuamua in the weeks after its discovery that October. ‘Oumuamua was too faint for Spitzer to detect when it looked more ...

Troy Oakes

Crater Found in Greenland: Impact Rocked the Northern Hemisphere

A survey of ice in Greenland has uncovered evidence suggesting a kilometer-wide iron asteroid slammed into that island, perhaps as recently as 12,000 years ago during the end of the Pleistocene. The resulting 19-mile-wide impact crater has remained hidden under a half-mile-thick ice sheet until now. It recently was exposed by an ultra-wideband chirp radar ...

Troy Oakes

An asteroid heading to Earth.

Mental Health Disorders in Adolescence: The Risks and Resilience

A deeper understanding of the wiring and rewiring of the adolescent brain is helping scientists pinpoint why young people are especially vulnerable to mental health disorders in adolescence — and why some are resilient. When Charly Cox was diagnosed in her teenage years with depression and other mental health disorders, what lay ahead for her ...

Troy Oakes

310 Million-Year-Old Tiny Footprints Found in Grand Canyon

Hundreds of hikers each day pass by the fallen boulder along the Bright Angel Trail in Grand Canyon National Park. It might otherwise go unnoticed except for the 28 indentations — sloping tiny footprints left behind by a small, reptile-like creature about 310 million years ago — that cover the rock’s expansive surface. Steve Rowland, ...

Troy Oakes

Evidence of Outburst Flooding Indicates Plentiful Water on Early Mars

The presence of water on early Mars has been theorized for centuries. Early telescopes revealed ice caps, and early astronomers noted channels that were hypothesized to be natural rivers or creature-created canals. Over the past two decades, rovers Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity have sent back invaluable data to scientists who are trying to interpret ...

Troy Oakes

Astronomers Discover Giant That Shaped Our Milky Way

Some 10 billion years ago, the Milky Way merged with a large galaxy. The stars from this partner, named Gaia-Enceladus, make up most of the Milky Way’s halo and also shaped its thick disk, giving it its inflated form. A description of this mega-merger, discovered by an international team led by University of Groningen astronomer ...

Troy Oakes

Fracking Wastewater Found in Freshwater Mussel Shells

Elevated concentrations of strontium, an element associated with oil and gas fracking wastewater, have accumulated in the shells of freshwater mussels downstream from fracking wastewater disposal sites, according to researchers from Penn State and Union College. Nathaniel Warner, assistant professor of environmental engineering at Penn State, said: “Freshwater mussels filter water and when they grow ...

Troy Oakes

A freshwater mussel.