Pluto's Strange Ridges Formed From Ancient Glaciers

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

Sputnik Planitia on Pluto, where strange ridges can be found. (Credit: NASA/Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute/O. White) Scientists have traced strange landforms on Pluto back to their ancient glacial origins. A letter by SETI Institute scientist Oliver White and colleagues shows how ridged landforms on Pluto provide evidence for glaciers on the dwarf planet some 4 billion years ago. Their research targeted the landscape that borders the ice-covered impact basin Sputn ...read more

The U.S. May Ban Kratom. But Are its Effects Deadly or Lifesaving?

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

Kratom is a drug popular in Southeast Asia that’s derived from the leaves of Mitragyna speciosa, a tree in the coffee family. Kratom’s pain relieving properties allowed it to surge in popularity in the United States in the wake of the opioid crisis. (Rattiya Thongdumhyu/shutterstock) Across America, thousands of people are throwing away their prescription drugs and picking up kratom, a plant-based drug from Southeast Asia usually brewed as a tea. Within the leaves of this tropical ...read more

The Birds and the Bees Reacted to the 2017 Great American Eclipse

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

This stunning view of the total solar eclipse in 2017 was made by combining seven exposures ranging from short to long. The surface of the Moon is visible in this image because it is illuminated by light reflected off Earth, called Earthshine. (Credit: Michael S. Adler) On August 21, 2017, over half of the population of United States took at least a few minutes out of their busy schedules to glimpse the first total solar eclipse to cross the continental U.S. in nearly 40 years. As many of us g ...read more

Antares Rocket Will Launch Cargo From Virginia This Friday

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

The Northrop Grumman Antares rocket, with Cygnus spacecraft aboard, is seen on Pad-0A, Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2018, at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. (Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky) An Impending Launch This week, Northrop Grumman’s Antares rocket will launch the Cygnus cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station. The craft will deliver supplies and scientific equipment to the astronauts on board as part of Northrop Grumman’s NG-10 mission. Originally scheduled to l ...read more

Predators Need A Lot Of Luck To Survive — And We're Rigging the Game Against Them

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

(Credit: Andre Marais/Shutterstock) Finding food is a risky undertaking for wild animals. But for some predators, the element of risk, and it’s twin, luck, is a much greater factor. Predators like the cheetah aren’t guaranteed meals when they set out to hunt, researchers find in a new study, and that puts them at risk in rapidly changing environments. Where they once could count on getting lucky often enough to survive, a scarcity of prey now makes predators susceptible to sta ...read more