Child development specialists often evaluate a patient’s ability to complete tasks involving multiple steps. It turns out, many chimpanzees would pass these tests with flying colors, according to a report in the journal PeerJ.“We find objective evidence that wild chimpanzees break down technical tasks into manageable subtasks, and address these subtasks one-by-one, similarly to humans,” says Elliot Howard-Spink, an author of the study. He performed the research while at Oxford, but now is ...read more

Among all space mysteries, the creation of the universe’s grandest galaxies is among the most mystifying, but new research has brought astronomers one step closer to deciphering this phenomenon. A study published in Nature details the process that spawned immense galaxies, which could help unravel the evolution of the universe since the beginning of time. Exploring the Origins of Elliptical GalaxiesThe study — a collaboration between the University of Southampton, China’s Purple Mountain ...read more

The NASA project NEOWISE, which has given astronomers a detailed view of near-Earth objects – some of which could strike the Earth – ended its mission and burned on reentering the atmosphere after over a decade.On a clear night, the sky is full of bright objects – from stars, large planets, and galaxies to tiny asteroids flying near Earth. These asteroids are commonly known as near-Earth objects, and they come in a wide variety of sizes. Some are tens of kilometers across or larger, while ...read more

About 100 million years ago, a sparrow-sized microraptorian (a long-lost cousin of modern birds) sped across the landscape of modern-day South Korea, leaving behind a mysterious set of footprints with surprisingly long strides. Now, paleontologists suggest that the species used a unique type of aerial motion: flap-running. Published in a study in the journal PNAS in October, the findings may improve our understanding of the origins of flight.“It had only two toes on each foot, and that’s wha ...read more

Every galaxy has a supermassive black hole at its center, much like every egg has a yolk. But sometimes, hens lay eggs with two yolks. In a similar way, astrophysicists like uswho study supermassive black holes expect to find binary systems – two supermassive black holes orbiting each other – at the hearts of some galaxies.Black holes are regions of space where gravity is so strong that not even light can escape from their vicinity. They form when the core of a massive star collapses on itse ...read more

Asteroid impacts have changed Earth’s landscape time and time again. Some impacts caused great change to occur, like the Chicxulub Impactor, which led to the mass extinction of dinosaurs around 65 million years ago. While an impact like this caused severe changes to the climate and ended the lines of most non-avian dinosaurs, a new study published in Communications Earth & Environment found that massive asteroid hits may not have changed the planet’s climate in the long term. After anal ...read more

Although the contemporary Paleo Diet is trendy, there’s long been anthropological debate about what early man actually ate. Mostly fruit and berries, gathered from foraging? Small game? Or massive mammals?“That’s been quite a controversy in the last decade or so,” says James Chatters of McMaster University. Chatters and colleagues have attempted to end this debate with a report in Science Advances that says North American people 13,000 years ago dined primarily on large mammals — with ...read more

Scientists discovered evidence that North Americans tried to tame or domesticate canines 12,000 years ago.Analyzing biomarkers in a canine fossil found at an early human campsite revealed a significant signature for salmon. Since canines didn't pursue fish as their primary prey, the preponderance of isotopes in the canine bone signaling salmon presence suggests that humans fed the canine fish. This finding pushes back attempts to either tame or domesticate canines in North America about 2,000 ye ...read more

In all great writings, such as literature and song lyrics, the writer often associates certain emotions with body parts. If a person sees a crush, they may feel ”butterflies in their stomach.” If a person is experiencing a moment of pure happiness, they may say that their ”heart is full.” The same can be said if the person is experiencing heartbreak or a “churning in their stomach” if they’re feeling nervous or angry. But what if someone said that their “liver was full” or tha ...read more

Even though today we have seen the burial of ancient cities as a natural progression of time, there were actually a few ancient communities that were built underground from the beginning.An underground city offered several advantages over surface dwellings. The community would have been protected from the weather, and would be relatively easy to defend, depending on how the city was set up. Here are a few of the most prominent ancient underground cities in the world.1. Elengubu, Turkey(Credit: f ...read more