The Milky Way is apparently a hotspot for stars immigrating from other galaxies. In a new study published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, a trio of astronomers set out to find hypervelocity stars fleeing our galaxy, but surprisingly discovered most of the rapidly moving stars are actually barreling into the Milky Way from galaxies beyond. "Rather than flying away from the [Milky Way's] Galactic Center, most of the high velocity stars we spotted seem to be racing ...read more

Arguments with loved ones or a stressful conversation with the boss can bring you down. Now, new research provides scientific evidence that getting a hug on the same day you’ve had a conflict can lift your spirits. The finding suggests hugs are a simple yet effective way to relieve relationship stress, romantic or not. People commonly communicate affection by hugging, holding hands, or even a pat on the back. And past research shows physical contact has psychological and physical hea ...read more

The MASCOT has landed. As of two weeks ago, humans had never put a single robotic explorer on an asteroid. Now we have three of them hopping about on Ryugu, a 900-meter-wide object currently orbiting on the other side of the Sun. On September 20, Japan's Hayabusa2 probe dropped two little landers, MINERVA II-1a and II-1b. They promptly sent back dizzying images from the surface. Then last night (October 3), the mothership deployed MASCOT, a much larger rover that is now performing a batte ...read more

Astronomers say they may have found the first confirmed exomoon, or moon orbiting a planet outside of our solar system. However, the pair of astronomers behind the find say it's much too soon to completely prove the exomoon’s presence. After looking through recent data from NASA’s Kepler space telescope, Alex Teachey, a graduate researcher in the department of astronomy at Columbia University, and David M. Kipping, an assistant professor in the same department, spotted evidence that ...read more

As humans, sexually-transmitted microbes worry us. They can cause some pretty nasty diseases, and we've learned to take precautions. But, some creatures actually welcome the tiny hitchhikers that can jump ship during mating. For dung beetles, the act of procreation can sometimes come with an extra benefit: Nematode worms. Just as there are countless species of bacteria living on and in us that help our bodies out, not every sexually-transmitted creature is out to cause harm. For the dung ...read more

(Inside Science) -- The 2018 Nobel Prize in chemistry has been awarded to three scientists who have used evolution to incite a chemical revolution, with the hopes of improving drug discovery and reducing the use of harsh chemicals in industrial processes. Half of the prize goes to Frances H. Arnold from the California Institute of Technology and the other half is shared between George P. Smith from the University of Missouri and Sir Gregory P. Winter from the University of Cambridge in th ...read more

A community of frogs in Panama may have built up resistance to a deadly fungus that has imperiled one third of the amphibian population around the world, according to a paper published Wednesday [Oct. 3] in Ecological Applications. The fungus is called Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, or Bd. It's also commonly referred to as chytrid fungus. In 1999, researchers linked amphibian deaths, mostly frogs, to specific strains of the fungus, which attacks the animals’ skin. Frogs use their skin fo ...read more

The earthquake and tsunami that happened last week on Sulawesi in Indonesia has been more devastating than anyone expected. The number of deaths in and around Palu has topped 1,400 and aid has been slow to reach the survivors due to the damage to infrastructure in the area. It is still unclear exactly what triggered the tsunami that followed the M7.5 earthquake -- there is speculation it was an undersea landslide that followed the temblor. What is known is that this earthquake ruptured a lon ...read more

If you watched or read “The Martian,” and wanted to try your hand at living on Mars or becoming a Martian farmer like Mark Watney, then today is your lucky day. Astrophysicists at the University of Central Florida have developed a scientific, standardized method to create soil like future space colonies might encounter on Mars. They’re selling it for about $10 per pound (or $20 per kilogram) plus shipping. This soil, also called simulant, is designed and created to mimic the r ...read more

We’ve long thought that planets formed solely from the dust and gas that surrounds their young host stars, but that theory is now being challenged. A new study published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics found that, more often than not, planetary systems actually outweigh the protoplanetary disks that they formed in — suggesting a severe lack of dust and gas around infant stars. The findings are causing researchers to question how planets accumulate so much mass, and wonde ...read more