Sauropods were previously thought to have had their heyday in the Late Jurassic period. Recent fossil evidence says it was probably much earlier than that.
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A software program builds alternative DNA molecules
Scientists are using computer programs to understand our early beginnings. Click on the link to see how they are doing…
Medicine
Telling people they’re getting a placebo does not stop it from working
Does giving a placebo require lying to a patient? This study concludes...no! Placebos still work even when the patient knows, at least for emotional distress.
Horseshoe crabs are critical to the biotech industry
Did you know that the modern US biomedical industry is built around the baby blue blood of horseshoe crabs? Come find out what scientists are doing to help…
Diet and exercise can shape how your mind ages
Dementia is a condition that many of us are all too familiar with within friends and family. Dementia itself is a blanket term that describes several conditions…
Can a Chinese medicinal herb Psoralea fructus build healthy bones?
Osteoblasts are cells that are responsible for bone formation. A lack of osteoblasts will cause osteoporosis – a disease that occurs when the body has too…
When did simple life become more complex, such as the modern animals we see today? A recent study may have uncovered evidence for one of these turning points. At Nilpena National Heritage Site, South Australia, scientists discovered new fossils that have never been seen before.
Scientists study organic material from the Chicxulub crater to identify the microbes that lived within it, to understand what happened to the Earth when that giant asteroid killed all the dinosaurs.
Two new species of cave dwelling cockroaches have been discovered from a cave in Myanmar. They have been dated to be 99 million years old making them the oldest cave animals known to date.
The Mars 2020 mission involves sending a rover, named Perseverance, to Mars to look for evidence of past life on that planet. Perseverance will collect samples of 3 billion year old rocks that scientists on Earth think might contain signs of ancient life on Mars. Later, NASA will launch a mission to retrieve those…
When scientists think of a very early Earth, they think of a hot, hostile place not too long after the birth of the solar system more than 4 billion years ago. This time in the Earth’s history is called the Hadean Eon, named after the ancient Greek God of the Underworld Hades, and would have been just about when the…
The one of the largest land predators to have ever lived, the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex, just crowned a new king. On March 21st, a team of University of Alberta scientists described the oldest and largest T. rex ever found. Scotty’s unearthed fossils reveals a fairly complete set of bones including a hips, limbs, and…
Sexually reproducing animals have their sex determined through many mechanisms. Sex in reptiles such as alligators is determined by egg temperature during incubation. Some species, like the clownfish, can be hermaphroditic, shifting from one gender to another depending on the environmental conditions. However, most…
During the last days of the summer of 1991, tourists hiking in the Ötztal Alps near the Italy – Austria border found the remains of an incredibly well-preserved man. This man, dubbed Ötzi, was dated back to the “Copper Age”: an informal name given to the transitional period between stone and iron working,…
In 1870, parts of a fossilized bird were found in Kansas and then described by the American paleontologist Othniel Marsh. This new bird, dubbed Ichthyornis dispar, was one of the first fossil birds found in North America, and there was something special about it. It was recognized as a scientifically important specimen…