Sorting out the roots of the sweet potato and other members of the morning glory family, researchers compared a fossil leaf of Ipomoea meghalayensis (B) with a leaf of the modern Ipomoea eriocarpa, a close relative of the tasty tuber. (Credit Indiana University) What’s the story, morning glory? Well, let me tell you: the sweet potato and other morning glory family members may have been around millions of years earlier than believed — after first sprouting thousands of miles fro ...read more

New research suggests the asteroid 2015 BZ509 may have originally traveled to the solar system from another star. (Credit: NASA/JPL) Less than a year ago, astronomers discovered ‘Oumuamua, the first known object from another star system to pass through our own. Now, in a new study published today in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters, astronomers announced the discovery of the first interstellar object known to have taken up permanent residence around the Sun. ...read more

With photosynthesis, scientists show for the first time that there are quantum effects in living systems. This could lead to better solar panels, energy storage or even quantum computers.  (Credit: Shutterstock) We all probably learned about photosynthesis, how plants turn sunlight into energy, in school. It might seem, therefore, that we figured out this bit of the world. But scientists are still learning new things about even the most basic stuff (see also the sun and moon), and pho ...read more

Lava flows from fissures 16-20 moving across the landscape on May 19, 2018. USGS/HVO. The eruption at Kīlauea had a number of firsts over the weekend, some of them quite significant. The style of eruption continued much the same as we’ve been seeing: lava flows, fountaining and spatter in the lower East Rift zone near Leilani Estates and intermittent explosions from the summit caldera. However, the nature of the former has changed over the last few days. Lava reaches the ocean For the ...read more

It has been called “the world’s most dangerous meal,” a fish whose internal organs are laced with one of the deadliest toxins on Earth. Specialized restaurants in Japan and a few other places serve carefully prepared fugu flesh as an expensive delicacy, in part because of this risky thrill. But Byrappa Venkatesh was drawn to the fugu for an entirely different reason: It has the smallest genome of any vertebrate. That quality was gold back in the 1990s, when geneticists were sti ...read more

A study claiming that a “memory” could be transferred from one animal to another in form of an injection has caused a lot of excitement. The Futurist said that Scientists Transferred Memories From One Snail to Another. Someday, They Could Do The Same in Humans. But I have to say I’m not convinced. In the paper, published in eNeuro, UCLA researchers Alexis Bédécarrats and collagues report that they extracted RNA from the neurons of sea slugs (Aplysia) after traini ...read more

Lava flows from Fissure 17, seen on May 17, 2018. USGS/HVO The eruption at Kīlauea is still captivating the nation, as it should because this volcano hasn’t behaving like this in almost a century. I thought I’d take a moment to step back and review of the main events so far and what it might all mean for Kīlauea and the people who live around the volcano. These eruptions are separated by a long way if you look at the satellite data and should almost be treated at two d ...read more

The biggest explosion yet from the Kilauea volcano propelled 1,000-pound rocks into the air, and sent ash rocketing 30,000 feet high A timelapse video from a camera on the Gemini Observatory on the Big Island of Hawaii captured the ash cloud exploding high in the atmosphere from the Kilauea volcano just before dawn on May 17, 2018. The plume explodes above the cloud deck shortly after four minutes into the video. Lightning and meteors streaking across the sky are also visible. (Source: Gem ...read more