https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Rhinos that flourished across much of North America 12 million years ago gathered in huge herds, according to a new study by the University of Cincinnati. https://phys.org/news/2025-04-evidence-prehistoric-rhinos-huge-herds.html Ecology Tue, 08 Apr 2025 14:37:03 EDT news663341821 An international team of scientists has made a discovery that could reshape our understanding of how global biodiversity evolved. By reconstructing the evolution of species over the past 45 million years, researchers found that the geographic origins of many plants, insects and mammals are more closely linked than previously thought. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-evolutionary-biodiversity.html Evolution Wed, 25 Sep 2024 10:28:03 EDT news646478881 Scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) have been monitoring groundwater quality in wells across the country for more than three decades, looking for harmful chemicals or residual substances that may cause harm to ecosystems or humans. In all, they have measured up to 500 chemical constituents, including major ions, metals, pesticides, volatile organic compounds, fertilizers, and radionuclides. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-groundwater-saltierwhat-infrastructure-ecosystems-human.html Earth Sciences Tue, 17 Oct 2023 10:37:50 EDT news616757754 One of the most exciting findings from NASA's Dawn mission is that Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt that lies between Mars and Jupiter, hosts complex organics. The discovery of aliphatic molecules, which consist of carbon and hydrogen chains, in conjunction with evidence that Ceres has abundant water ice and may have been an ocean world, means this dwarf planet might have once harbored the main ingredients associated with life as we know it. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-hypervelocity-impact-probe-dwarf-planet.html Astrobiology Mon, 16 Oct 2023 12:07:46 EDT news616676863 An eruption of Old Faithful Geyser in Yellowstone National Park is a sight to behold. Indeed, millions of tourists flock to the park each year to see it. Hot water and steam are ejected in the air to a height of 100–180 feet approximately every 90 minutes. Many adjectives come to mind to describe it: powerful, mesmerizing, unique, otherworldly . . . homey? Not so much. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-extreme-habitats-microbial-life-faithful.html Ecology Thu, 12 Oct 2023 10:58:33 EDT news616327109 Portland, Ore., USA: Coastal regions and small ocean islands face significant risks from rising sea levels due to climate change, because waters can flood and inundate low-lying land surfaces. "Climate change has become a more critical issue recently, especially for island countries and island provinces like the Bahamas. They are not only facing a water shortage problem because of the limitations of the islands, but also they are facing a coastal inundation problem due to sea level rise caused by climate change," said Yipeng Zhang, a postdoctoral associate at the University of Texas at El Paso. https://phys.org/news/2021-10-lake-formation-expansion-due-sea-level.html Earth Sciences Tue, 12 Oct 2021 12:31:20 EDT news553260678 The source of marble for a statue of Apollo on the Greek island of Delos has been a mystery to art historians and archaeologists for decades. The stone's chemistry pointed geochemists to the southern end of the nearby island of Naxos, but no one thought there were ancient marble quarries there. A geoarchaeologist believes he found the source. https://phys.org/news/2021-10-tucked-away-marble-quarries-source-archaic.html Archaeology Tue, 12 Oct 2021 11:52:02 EDT news553258319 When it comes to climate change, relationships are everything. That's a key takeaway of a new UO study that examines the interaction between plants, atmospheric carbon dioxide and rising water levels in the Mississippi River. https://phys.org/news/2020-10-atmospheric-carbon-rivers-adding.html Earth Sciences Fri, 02 Oct 2020 10:28:53 EDT news520853330 Researchers propose an ammonia-water slurry as the basis for Pluto's newly discovered geologic activity and possible volcanism, and offer a new method to predict planetary vigor. https://phys.org/news/2015-11-ammonia-water-slurry-swirl-pluto-icy.html Space Exploration Mon, 09 Nov 2015 17:10:19 EST news366311397 For life as we know it to develop on other planets, those planets would need liquid water, or oceans. Geologic evidence suggests that Earth's oceans have existed for nearly the entire history of our world. But would that be true of other planets, particularly super-Earths? New research suggests the answer is yes and that oceans on super-Earths, once established, can last for billions of years. https://phys.org/news/2015-01-super-earths-long-lasting-oceans.html Astronomy Mon, 05 Jan 2015 13:10:03 EST news339663633 A new analysis of geologic history may help solve the riddle of the "Cambrian explosion," the rapid diversification of animal life in the fossil record 530 million years ago that has puzzled scientists since the time of Charles Darwin. https://phys.org/news/2014-10-massive-geographic-triggered-explosion-animal.html Earth Sciences Fri, 31 Oct 2014 19:33:15 EDT news334002788 (Phys.org) —The way continents are formed can be far more complicated than previously understood, according to researchers at the University of Aberdeen. https://phys.org/news/2014-10-continental-formation-complicated-previously-understood.html Earth Sciences Fri, 24 Oct 2014 07:33:50 EDT news333354821 Stegosaurs might be portrayed as lumbering plant eaters, but they were lethal fighters when necessary, according to paleontologists who have uncovered new evidence of a casualty of stegosaurian combat. The evidence is a fatal stab wound in the pubis bone of a predatory allosaur. The wound – in the conical shape of a stegosaur tail spike – would have required great dexterity to inflict and shows clear signs of having cut short the allosaur's life. https://phys.org/news/2014-10-kung-fu-stegosaur.html Archaeology Tue, 21 Oct 2014 12:19:01 EDT news333112720 (Phys.org)—It weighed about 155 pounds and had a 34-foot wingspan, close to the size of an F-16 fighter jet. A five-foot-long skull looked down from a standing height similar to that of a modern giraffe. By all measures, the ancient pterosaur Quetzalcoatlus was a Texas-sized giant of the air and created a frightening shadow as it soared across the sky. https://phys.org/news/2012-11-giant-pterosaur-cliffs-downward-sloping-runways.html Archaeology Wed, 07 Nov 2012 13:31:30 EST news271517458 The 2011 Mineral, Virginia M-5.8 earthquake was felt over an extraordinarily large area. A new study details landslides triggered by the earthquake at distances four times greater and over an area 20 times larger than previously documented for M-5.8 earthquakes worldwide. https://phys.org/news/2012-11-virginia-quake-triggered-landslides-extraordinary.html Earth Sciences Tue, 06 Nov 2012 08:32:49 EST news271413147 Researchers have discovered why plants and animals had a hard time recovering from the largest mass extinction in Earth's history 250 million years ago. https://phys.org/news/2012-11-long-ago-mass-extinction-global-hindered.html Earth Sciences Mon, 05 Nov 2012 09:30:47 EST news271330238 (Phys.org) -- Moqui marbles, unusual balls of rock that can be found rolling around the southwestern U.S. sandstone regions, were formed roughly 2 million years ago with the help of microorganisms. This discovery by a University of Nebraska-Lincoln research team has implications for finding life on Mars and for better understanding Earth's past. https://phys.org/news/2012-08-unl-discovery-implications-life-earth.html Earth Sciences Thu, 16 Aug 2012 06:56:59 EDT news264319002 (Phys.org) -- Around 450 million years ago, shallow seas covered the Cincinnati region and harbored one very large and now very mysterious organism. Despite its size, no one has ever found a fossil of this "monster" until its discovery by an amateur paleontologist last year. https://phys.org/news/2012-04-mysterious-monster-amateur-paleontologist.html Archaeology Tue, 24 Apr 2012 10:23:04 EDT news254481763 A painstakingly detailed investigation shows that mass extinctions need not be sudden events. The deadliest mass extinction of all took a long time to kill 90 percent of Earth's marine life, and it killed in stages, according to a newly published report. https://phys.org/news/2012-02-global-extinction-gradual-doom-bad.html Earth Sciences Fri, 03 Feb 2012 11:17:45 EST news247490252 (PhysOrg.com) -- A team comprised of geological and environmental science researchers from Stanford University has been studying the impact that early European exploration had on the New World and have found evidence that they say suggests the European cold period from 1500 to 1750, commonly known as the Little Ice Age, was due to the rapid decline in native human populations shortly after early explorers arrived. https://phys.org/news/2011-10-team-european-ice-age-due.html Earth Sciences Mon, 17 Oct 2011 09:33:47 EDT news238062584 The "super-eruption" of a major volcanic system occurs about every 100,000 years and is considered one of the most catastrophic natural events on Earth, yet scientists have long been unsure about what triggers these violent explosions. https://phys.org/news/2011-10-trigger-volcanic-super-eruptions.html Earth Sciences Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:00:02 EDT news237637518 Moths dead for 47 million years are again showing their true colors. For the first time, scientists have reconstructed the colors of an ancient fossil moth. The findings detailed not just a few spots of color, but the appearance of the entire organism. https://phys.org/news/2011-10-fossil-moths-reveal-true.html Archaeology Wed, 12 Oct 2011 10:05:48 EDT news237632720 A new study of sediments laid down shortly after an asteroid plowed into the Gulf of Mexico 65.5 million years ago, an event that is linked to widespread global extinctions including the demise of big dinosaurs, suggests that lowly worms may have been the first fauna to show themselves following the global catastrophe. https://phys.org/news/2011-10-worms-animals-surface-k-t-extinction.html Archaeology Tue, 11 Oct 2011 10:33:00 EDT news237547959 (PhysOrg.com) -- A new image from NASA's Dawn spacecraft shows a mountain three times as high as Mt. Everest, amidst the topography in the south polar region of the giant asteroid Vesta. https://phys.org/news/2011-10-view-vesta-mountain-dawn-mission.html Space Exploration Tue, 11 Oct 2011 04:19:00 EDT news237525502 Long before whales, the oceans of Earth were roamed by a very different kind of air-breathing leviathan. Snaggle-toothed ichthyosaurs larger than school buses swam at the top of the Triassic Period ocean food chain, or so it seemed before Mount Holyoke College paleontologist Mark McMenamin took a look at some of their remains in Nevada. Now he thinks there was an even larger and more cunning sea monster that preyed on ichthyosaurs: a kraken of such mythological proportions it would have sent Captain Nemo running for dry land. McMenamin will be presenting the results of his work on Monday, 10 October at the Annual Meeting of The Geological Society of America in Minneapolis. https://phys.org/news/2011-10-giant-kraken-lair.html Earth Sciences Mon, 10 Oct 2011 03:32:09 EDT news237436311 While the cause of the mass extinction that occurred between the Permian and Triassic periods is still uncertain, two University of Rhode Island researchers collected data that show that terrestrial biodiversity recovered much faster than previously thought, potentially contradicting several theories for the cause of the extinction. https://phys.org/news/2011-10-terrestrial-biodiversity-recovered-faster-permo-triassic.html Earth Sciences Mon, 10 Oct 2011 03:30:09 EDT news237436169 (PhysOrg.com) -- About 3.8 billion years ago, Earth was teeming with unicellular life. A little more than 4.5 billion years ago, the Earth was a ball of vaporous rock. And somewhere in between, the first organisms spontaneously arose. Pinpointing exactly when and how that shift happened has proven a difficult bit of interdisciplinary detective work. https://phys.org/news/2011-09-life-arisen-serpentine.html Earth Sciences Fri, 23 Sep 2011 05:58:58 EDT news235976216 The demise of the world's forests some 250 million years ago likely was accelerated by aggressive tree-killing fungi triggered by global climate change, according to a new study by a University of California, Berkeley, scientist and her Dutch and British colleagues. https://phys.org/news/2011-08-climate-tree-killing-fungi.html Cell & Microbiology Sat, 06 Aug 2011 02:10:57 EDT news231812559