Rare earth elements are everywhere - in your smartphone screen, in the MRI machine at the hospital, in the battery of an electric vehicle, and even in oil and gas refining. They are a key ingredient of modern life.



As global tensions rise, so does the competition for access to these minerals. Recent headlines show the stakes: China has halted rare earth exports to the United States, and a deal was just signed to secure U.S. access to Ukraine’s mineral resources.



Despite their name, rare earth elements aren’t actually scarce; what’s rare is finding them in high enough concentrations to mine economically. These deposits are scattered unevenly across the globe and often buried deep underground, shaping who controls their production and the global supply chain.



Scientists at <a href="https://www.tufts.edu/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Tufts University</a> are trying to better understand how and why rare earth minerals ended up where they did. Their research reveals how the movement of continents over billions of years helped form - and hide - these valuable deposits.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-supercontinents-shaped-rare-deposits">Supercontinents shaped rare deposits</h2>



To explain how this mineral drama began, we need to go back in time. Way back. Earth's surface is always on the move. Over millions of years, massive landmasses shift, collide, and break apart, reshaping the planet in the process.



"Most of us are familiar with <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthpedia-articles/supercontinents-101-pannotia-gondwana-and-pangea/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Pangea</a> - the supercontinent that formed about 300 million years ago and that the current seven continents broke off from to form their present-day arrangement," said Jill VanTongeren, professor and chair of the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences.



"But Pangea is only the most recent supercontinent. Throughout Earth history, there have been at least five major <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/australia-north-america-supercontinent/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">supercontinent</a> cycles - periods when continents all come together and then spread back out again into different pieces. We think this process happens roughly every 500 million years."



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-where-minerals-begin">Where minerals begin</h2>



As these continents drifted apart, they created rifts - places where the Earth's tectonic plates pulled away from each other. These rifting zones became birthplaces for rare earth element-rich magmas.



"As the rocks are pushed apart, they decompress, causing melting. It's kind of like taking the lid off a soda bottle, and the bubbles rise to the surface," said VanTongeren.



"Those early magmas contain the highest abundance of rare earth and other incompatible elements that then enter the crust, either erupting in volcanic centers or solidifying at depth."



Some of these mineral-rich magmas cooled and stayed near the surface. Others got dragged back down into the mantle or remain buried too deep to mine with today’s technology.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-a-race-for-control-resources">A race for control resources</h2>



Today, the number of economically viable rare earth deposits is limited. China dominates the market, with nearly 70% of global production coming from its Bayan Obo mine. The <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/crucial-rare-earth-elements-discovered-coal-mines-united-states/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">U.S.</a> has a smaller operation at Mountain Pass in California, and a few other countries have scattered deposits.



In the late 1990s and early 2000s, China flooded the market with rare earth minerals, driving down prices and shutting down other global producers. That move reshaped global dependence.



In response, the U.S. government took steps to re-establish a domestic supply. Recent investments from the 2021 Infrastructure and Jobs Act and the Department of Defense aim to restart full operations at the Mountain Pass mine, though it could take up to a decade.



There’s also hope that Ukraine's <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/nasa-is-on-a-mission-to-map-americas-mineral-wealth/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">mineral deposits</a> could help diversify supply. But for now, their potential remains unclear.



"Political boundaries and the desire to obtain access to mineral resources have been the source of economic and military conflicts throughout human history," said VanTongeren. "This is likely to continue as the world shifts toward green energy and a greater dependence on rare earth elements in the future."



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-hunting-for-mineral-deposits">Hunting for mineral deposits</h2>



VanTongeren’s work tracks these mineral stories from source to surface. Her fieldwork has taken her from a ship near Antarctica to platinum mines in South Africa, Morocco’s mountains, and even a <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/huge-lithium-deposit-from-volanic-ash-found-in-pennsylvania/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">lithium</a> discovery in Maine.



"It's a fascinating area of study partly because it lies at the intersection of science, economics, and politics," she said. Back on the Tufts campus, this intersection takes a more visual form.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-tufts-secret-mineral-vault">Tufts' secret mineral vault</h2>



Tucked into the basement of Lane Hall, the P.T. Barnum Mineral Collection offers a glimpse into the Earth’s treasures. It includes thousands of mineral specimens, some collected by Barnum himself. He was an early supporter of Tufts and a major collector of natural history in the 1800s.



"In the late 1800s, it was considered fashionable for many prominent individuals to accumulate their own natural history collections," noted VanTongeren.



"P.T. Barnum was one of the biggest collectors of the time. His collection of animals, plants, and minerals was among the first gifts to Tufts University and part of an endowment to establish Tufts as one of the major natural history museums in the country."



After a fire destroyed the Barnum Museum in 1975, the mineral collection moved to Lane Hall. Now, it’s about to move again - this time to Bacon Hall, the new home for the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-global-hunt-for-rare-earth-elements">Global hunt for rare earth elements</h2>



VanTongeren hopes this new home will be more than just a storage site. She wants it to become a space that encourages curiosity and exploration, not just for scientists, but for everyone.



"My pie-in-the-sky vision is to set up a mineral gallery with both a permanent exhibit as well as pop-up exhibitions every semester highlighting minerals important for technology, related to other research at the university, or to global events," said VanTongeren.



"I'd like to help bring back Barnum's vision of bringing the beauty of, and an appreciation for, the natural world to campus."



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Global hunt for rare earth elements is underway

Rare earth elements are everywhere - in your smartphone screen, in the MRI machine at the hospital, in the battery of an electric vehicle, and even in oil and gas refining. They are a key ingredient of modern life. As global tensions rise, so does the competition for access to these minerals. Recent headlines show the stakes: China has halted rare earth exports to the United States, and a deal was just signed to secure U.S. access to Ukraine’s mineral resources. Despite their name, rare earth elements...

A new study led by the <a href="https://www.arizona.edu/">University of Arizona</a> has found that a community’s <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/deep-sleep-helps-us-process-our-emotions/">sleep</a> health is the most significant health predictor of children’s opportunities for positive growth and success. These results suggest that promoting sleep health at a neighborhood level may be a highly efficient way of promoting overall health and well-being.



The scientists merged neighborhood sleep health data collected by the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/">Centers for Disease Control and Prevention</a> (CDC) with data from the <a href="https://www.diversitydatakids.org/child-opportunity-index">Child Opportunity Index</a> (COI) – a database providing indices for education, health, environment, and social and economic factors which impact child development.&nbsp;



Their analysis revealed that sleep health was the strongest predictor of the opportunities for children in a neighborhood, accounting for 57.2 percent of the variance in the COI global score. Moreover, community-level sleep health was also the most significant predictor of each individual component of the COI, including the “education,” “health and environment,” and “social and economic” scores.&nbsp;



“The most surprising thing we discovered in this study was that not only was a neighborhood’s sleep health a strong predictor of every element that makes up the Child Opportunity Index, but that it was the most important predictor when compared to other metrics of community health,” said study lead author Suzanne Gorovoy, a postdoctoral researcher in Behavioral Sleep Medicine at the University of Arizona.



“When neighborhoods were examined relative to the percent that get the recommended amount of sleep, as well as the levels of a wide range of other metrics [including access to health insurance, routine medical checkups, older adult preventive care, leisure-time activity, or prevalence of medical conditions and behaviors such as hypertension and smoking], it was sleep that outperformed them all in terms of ability to predict that neighborhood’s Child Opportunity Index,” Dr. Gorovoy explained.&nbsp;



“In fact, sleep health alone overlapped with the overall index by over 50 percent. That means that a neighborhood’s sleep health is an extremely powerful indicator of that neighborhood’s ability to provide good educational experiences, healthy and safe environments, and social supports.”



These findings suggest that public health efforts targeting sleep health at the community level could have major benefits in helping the community’s children develop in a healthy, successful way.



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://academic.oup.com/sleep/article/45/Supplement_1/A34/6592439?login=false">Sleep</a>.



---



By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Community sleep health predicts success among children

A new study led by the University of Arizona has...

New research led by the <a href="https://www.univr.it/en/home">University of Verona</a> and presented at the European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology (<a href="https://congress.eular.org/">EULAR</a>) Congress 2022 has investigated the association between long-term exposure to air <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/severity-of-covid-symptoms-linked-to-air-pollution/">pollution</a> and immune-mediated diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA) or inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). The experts found that people exposed to high levels of air pollution for long periods of time are at a significantly higher risk of developing autoimmune diseases.  



Particulate matter (PM) is a mixture of solid and liquid particles in the air, consisting of a variety of chemicals and materials, some of which are highly toxic (particularly the so-called <a href="https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/resources/inhalable-particulate-matter-and-health">PM10 and PM2.5</a>). By analyzing data from over 80,000 people in Italy, the scientists found a positive association between PM levels measured at local air-quality stations and the risk of developing autoimmune diseases.&nbsp;



The results revealed that exposure to PM10 above 30 µg/ m³ and PM2.5 above 20 µg/ m³ was associated with 12 percent and 13 percent higher risks of autoimmune disease. While exposure to PM10 was linked to an increased risk of RA but no other autoimmune disease, exposure to high levels of PM2.5 led to higher risk of both RA and IBD. Overall, chronic exposure to particulate matter was associated with a 10 percent higher risk of developing immune-mediated diseases.



The same research team has also investigated the link between long-term exposure to PM and osteoporosis - which although is not an autoimmune disease, it seems to be caused by a malfunctioning immune system - in a cohort of 60,000 women at high risk of fracture. They found that chronic exposure above 25 μg/m³ for PM2.5 and 30 μg/m³ for PM10 was associated with a 16 percent and 15 percent higher risk of having osteoporotic bone mass scores at any site.



A related study has discovered that a leading cause for the development of RA is exposure to crystalline silica, a substance released during cleaning activities that include the handling of dusty clothes or talcum powder. Such findings suggest that cleaning activities are underestimated sources of silica exposure that are overrepresented in women with RA compared to the general population, and may significantly contribute to the pathogenesis of the disease.



Further research is needed to clarify the connections between air pollution and immune-mediated diseases, and to properly map the intricate relationships between environmental factors, gender, occupation, and disease risks.&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Air pollution increases the risk of autoimmune disease

New research led by the University of Verona and presented...

Elasmosaurus,,Group,Of,Long-necked,Plesiosaurs,From,The,Late,Cretaceous,Period,

A recent study published in the journal <a href="https://peerj.com/articles/13342/">PeerJ</a> has found that plesiosaurs – a group of saurians that lived about 210 million years ago in the late Triassic and became extinct at the end of the Cretaceous – adapted to life <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/can-humans-hear-as-well-as-seals-underwater/">underwater</a> in a unique way: their front and hind limbs evolved to form four uniform, wing-like flippers which they twisted in order to swim efficiently.



Plesiosaurs belonged to group of saurians called Sauropterygia (“paddle lizards”) that, over the course of evolution, re-adapted to living in the oceans. While most of them had extremely long necks and small heads, evidence of some predatory specimens with short necks and huge skulls has also emerged. However, what made plesiosaurs so unusual were their four uniform wing-like flippers.



“Having the front legs transformed into wing-like flippers is relatively common in evolution, for instance in sea turtles. Never again, however, did the hind legs evolve into an almost identical-looking airfoil-like wing,” said study lead author Anna Krahl, a paleontologist at the <a href="https://uni-tuebingen.de/">University of Tübingen</a>.



For over 120 years, experts in vertebrate paleontology have wondered how plesiosaurs might have swum with these four flippers. While some scientists argued that they rowed like freshwater turtles or ducks, and others that they flew underwater like sea turtles or penguins, some researchers believed that they actually combined underwater flight and rowing as modern-day sea lions or pig-nosed turtles do.



By analyzing the body structure of several plesiosaur fossils, Dr. Krahl has found that these creatures had stiffened elbows, knees, hands, and ankle joints, but functioning hip, shoulder, and finger joints. “Analysis comparing them to modern-day sea turtles, and based on what is known about their swimming process, indicated that plesiosaurs were probably not able to rotate their flippers as much as would be necessary for rowing,” she explained.&nbsp;



However, plesiosaurs could ultimately twist their flippers to place them in a hydrodynamically favorable position and produce lift without rotating their upper arms and thighs. “This could work by means of twisting the flippers around their long axis,” Dr. Krahl said. “Other vertebrates, such as the leatherback turtle, have also been shown to use this movement to generate propulsion through lift.”&nbsp;Twisting most probably involved bending their first finger far downward and their last finger far upward, with the remaining fingers bridging these extreme positions, so that the flipper tip was almost vertical without requiring any real rotation in the shoulders or wrists.



By calculating the forces for the individual muscles that generated the upstroke and downstroke, Dr. Krahl and her colleagues discovered that the downstroke of both pairs of flippers was more powerful than the upstroke – similarly with today’s sea turtles, and differently from other aquatic creatures such as penguins or whales.



“Plesiosaurs adapted to life in water in a very different way than whales, for example. This unique path of evolution exemplifies the importance of paleontological research because it’s the only way we can appreciate the full range of what evolution can bring about,” Dr. Krahl concluded.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

How did the plesiosaurs swim?

A recent study published in the journal PeerJ has found...

Nocturnal tobacco hawkmoths (Manduca sexta) use their keen sense of smell to find nectar rich flowers or <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/plants-adapt-to-altitude-by-sensing-oxygen-levels/">plants</a> on which to lay their eggs. Now, researchers at the&nbsp; <a href="https://www.ice.mpg.de/">Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology</a> are looking to answer the question of how the moths distinguish between different smells.&nbsp;



With so many smells in the world, how can moths pick out those that are essential for their lives from those unnecessary whiffs?&nbsp;&nbsp;



"Our question is based on the fact that the plants that are vital for the tobacco hawkmoth, that is nectar sources and suitable host plants for their offspring, are very sparse in their natural habitat. Apparently, however, these plants are nevertheless found by the moths. We wanted to know whether the olfactory system can also filter out weak odor signals if they provide the moths with clues that lead them to food sources or oviposition sites," said Sonja Bisch-Knaden, lead author of the study.



To carry out the research, the scientists collected scents from 17 different plants in Arizona. These plants were reported to be important to the moths and the scents were carefully collected at night, when the hawkmoths are active.&nbsp;



As the moths were exposed to different scents, the researchers observed their antennae and brain activity. The researchers compared virgin female moths and mated female hawkmoths to see if there was a difference in scent sensitivity. Calcium imaging was used to visualize the neuron activity as moths were exposed to smells.&nbsp;



“The most important nectar sources, such as agave and datura flowers, give off a strong odor to which the antennae and brain of a female tobacco hawkmoth also respond more strongly than to any other odor. Here, identification of the floral scent appears to be straightforward. This applies to both virgin and mated females, as the few host plants of the larvae are widely scattered throughout the habitat, and the egg-laying female must therefore travel long distances and refill her energy reserves constantly," said Bisch-Knaden.



"In contrast, host plants as oviposition sites have only a very weak odor, but individual odor components are nevertheless recognized by the antennae. The activity patterns that these odors evoke in the brain are very different from the activity patterns of other plant odors."&nbsp;



"This difference becomes even greater after mating, as the female is then virtually unaware of the odor of the other plants that are not candidates for egg-laying. It is still difficult to explain how the moths find these plants in nature on the basis of their odor alone, since the plant odors cannot be perceived individually, as in our study, but always in a mixture."



The research published in the journal <a href="https://elifesciences.org/">eLife</a>, is just the beginning. The scientists hope to next compare their results to those with related species of moths.&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:zachfitzner@yahoo.com">Zach Fitzner</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Tobacco hawkmoths are incredibly sensitive to important smells

Nocturnal tobacco hawkmoths (Manduca sexta) use their keen sense of...

Mosquito <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/cuttlefish-camouflage-more-than-meets-the-eye/">fish</a> and guppies are sometimes cannibalistic when held in captivity, but a new study shows that this is not common behavior in the wild.&nbsp;According to the study authors, rare instances of cannibalism among fish are likely due to intense competition for food. The research has implications not only for aquarists but also for our understanding of evolution.



To investigate how common cannibalism is, Professor Brian Langerhans at <a href="https://www.ncsu.edu/">North Carolina State University</a> analyzed years of data covering almost 12,000 fish from 17 species in the wild.



“These are data accumulated from several different projects over the years,” said Professor Langerhans, the study’s senior author. “To identify the mechanisms responsible for this sort of phenomenon in the wild, we needed really large sample sizes. So, we accumulated the data for this work while also doing other projects.”



The scientists looked at the stomach contents of 11,946 fishes, either by x-ray or dissection. Of all the examinations, they found only 35 cannibalism cases, accounting for less than 0.3 percent. Furthermore, the cases of cannibalism were found in only three species of mosquito fish.   



Study co-author Rüdiger Riesch of the Royal Holloway University of London began the project while a postdoctoral researcher in Langerhans’ lab between 2010 and 2012.



“In captivity, mosquitofish and guppies will practice cannibalism commonly enough that there are protocols in place in research labs and aquaculture to quickly separate offspring from the larger fish,” said Riesch. “But when you look at the diets of fish in the wild, you really don’t find much evidence of it. We wanted to find out whether and why cannibalism occurs in nature.”



The scientists found that the rare cases of cannibalism were not just opportunistic but caused by extreme food competition. Cannibalism only happened in cases where there were few predators on the fish, which caused their populations to grow too high.&nbsp;&nbsp;



“Resource competition seems to be the main predictor of cannibalism,” said Professor Langerhans. “We also saw that a lack of predation has an indirect effect on cannibalism: Release from predation allows population density to skyrocket, which decreases resources. This same driving factor may be responsible for many cases of cannibalism across the animal kingdom in natural settings.”



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/20457758">Ecology &amp; Evolution</a>.&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:zachfitzner@yahoo.com">Zach Fitzner</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Cannibalism is rare among wild fish

Mosquito fish and guppies are sometimes cannibalistic when held in...

Mosquitoes need <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/sleep-deprivation-may-become-a-side-effect-of-climate-change/">sleep</a> in order to function well, just like we do. In fact, mosquitoes in the lab sleep between 16 and 19 hours a day, depending on the species and the levels of activity going on around them.&nbsp;



Sleep in humans is important in maintaining the immune system and in restorative functions such as tissue repair and protein synthesis. It has also been demonstrated that sleep is vital for peak memory and brain function. Sleep deprivation, on the other hand, can blur cognitive function and is associated with the development of numerous ill health conditions.



In a recent study from the <a href="https://www.uc.edu/">University of Cincinnati</a>, researchers demonstrated the importance of sleep to mosquitoes. The study revealed that mosquitoes whose slumber was disturbed the night before were more likely to spend the next day catching up on rest rather than seeking out a host on which to feed. The research highlights how vital this biological function is, even in insects.



“It was a bit surprising. Sleep deprived or not, a blood meal should appeal to them,” said UC doctoral student and study lead author Oluwaseun Ajayi.



Sleep is an evolutionarily conserved process that has been observed and described in different animal systems, including insects. But sleep in mosquitoes, which are important vectors of disease-causing pathogens, has not been directly examined. This is surprising as circadian rhythms, which have been well studied in mosquitoes, influence sleep in other systems. In addition, the phenomenon of catching up on missed sleep, called sleep rebound, has been observed in other insects such as honeybees and fruit flies, and is also well known in humans.



The researchers from UC’s College of Arts and Sciences and Virginia Tech’s Department of Biochemistry, found it challenging to study sleep patterns in mosquitoes. They spent more than a year developing protocols to study the phenomenon effectively – mosquitoes are easily disturbed by the presence of an observer, whom they detect as a potential host. This means that any experiments on mosquito sleep are likely to be confounded by the presence of the observer – a phenomenon called the observer effect – according to UC biologist Joshua Benoit.



“It’s really hard to quantify sleep in mosquitoes when, as soon as you walk in the room, you’re considered their Thanksgiving dinner,” Benoit said.



Mosquitoes detect the presence of potential hosts through their body heat, odors, movement, vibrations and the carbon dioxide they exhale from their lungs and emit from their skin. Because of this sensitivity, the researchers had to install the mosquitoes in rooms isolated within other rooms, and make use of cameras and infrared sensors that could record when the mosquitoes were moving around, without disturbing them. Virginia Tech researcher and study co-author Clément Vinauger used these video observations to document mosquito behavior.



In this way, the researchers studied the sleeping and feeding behavior of three species of mosquitoes for about a week, once they were acclimatized to their laboratory homes. Mosquitoes spend a lot of time perching between activities, in order to conserve energy, and it is not easy to detect when they are actually sleeping. However, the scientists identified a subtle postural change that occurs when a mosquito falls asleep.&nbsp;



“When mosquitoes enter a sleep-like state, their hind legs droop and their body comes closer to the surface,” Ajayi said.



Using this knowledge, the researchers were able to establish from the video footage how much time mosquitoes spent asleep.&nbsp;The three species under investigation slept at different times of the 24 hour cycle – Aedes aegypti, a “day biter,” slept mostly at night while Anopheles stephensi, which is most active at night, slept during the daytime. Culex pipiens, which seeks a meal at dusk, could be found sleeping during the daytime and the night.



In a second experiment, researchers subjected the mosquitoes to sleep deprivation during their normal sleep time by vibrating their enclosures at regular intervals during.&nbsp;



The results of the experiments, published in the <a href="https://journals.biologists.com/jeb">Journal of Experimental Biology</a>, showed that, while more than 75 percent of mosquitoes fly around actively seeking a blood meal when they are not subjected to sleep deprivation, less than one-quarter of them had any interest in food after a sleepless night. This represented a 54 percent decrease in the propensity to feed among sleep-deprived mosquitoes.



“What’s surprising to me is that as much as mosquitoes need blood to produce eggs, they will give it up to recover the sleep they lost,” Benoit said. “They might not be aroused as much because of the need to catch up on sleep.”



The overtired mosquitoes were also less likely to land on a host in both laboratory and field settings, suggesting that the same behaviors would occur in natural settings like your back yard. Tiredness also impaired blood feeding on a human host at times when mosquitoes would normally be active.&nbsp;



Lucas&nbsp;Gleitz&nbsp;participated in the research project as a&nbsp;UC&nbsp;undergraduate biology student. In his opinion, the study’s findings are&nbsp;relatable&nbsp;to the lives of college students, given the sleepless nights most of them endure.



Mosquitoes cause more human suffering than any other animal, according to the World Health Organization. Malaria alone kills more than 400,000 people annually. And mosquitoes carry pathogens for other deadly diseases such as dengue and yellow fever. By understanding the mosquitoes’ circadian rhythms, researchers hope to find better ways to prevent infection.



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Sleep-deprived mosquitoes are less interested in feeding

Mosquitoes need sleep in order to function well, just like...

A new species of dinosaur has been described by scientists from Japan and the USA. First found in 2008 in the Osoushinai Formation, a fossil-rich geological feature in Nakagawa, Hokkaido, the fossil remains include a partial vertebra, a partial wrist and a front foot with some large claws.&nbsp;At the time of discovery, the specimen was thought to be from a maniraptoran theropod <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/most-of-the-dinosaurs-were-warm-blooded/">dinosaur</a>, possibly therizinosaur, but not enough evidence existed to confirm this and so its taxonomic status remained unresolved.&nbsp;&nbsp;



In the current study, led by Professor Yoshitsugu Kobayashi at the <a href="https://www.museum.hokudai.ac.jp/english/">Hokkaido University Museum</a> and Anthony R. Fiorillo at Southern Methodist University (SMU), the fossil remains have been revisited and analyzed in the light of more recent evidence and knowledge of the therizinosaurid family of dinosaurs. The findings are published in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-11063-5">Scientific Reports</a>.



The therizinosauridae (a name meaning ‘scythe lizards’) is a family of theropod dinosaurs characterized by having long necks, thick hind limbs with four-toed feet, large, keratinous beaks and forelimbs with unusually long, curved claws or unguals. It is this last feature that gives the group its name. Their fossils have been found in deposits dated from the Early to the Late Cretaceous Period, distributed widely in Asia and North America. This group of therapods is considered to be herbivorous and closely related to birds.



Asian therizinosaurs have been found mainly from the Cretaceous deposits in Mongolia and China. Japan, which was located at the eastern edge of the Asian continent during the Cretaceous, before the opening of the Japan Sea during the Miocene, has produced two therizinosaur specimens from the Lower and Upper Cretaceous deposits, but neither one has been named because of the difficulty in identifying the fragmentary specimens.&nbsp;The new fossil analyzed in this study is the third, and youngest specimen discovered in Japan.



Asian therizinosaurs had enormous claws on their hands and, based on the morphology of these claws (their length, width at the base, and strength), they are divided into basal therizinosaurs and derived (advanced) therizinosaurs. The basal species have claws that are shorter, stronger and more generalized, implying that they were all-purpose structures not specialized for any particular use. Derived species, in contrast, have some of the longest claws ever recorded in any animals (some measuring 50 cm in length) and these are thought to have specialized functions such as raking taller vegetation towards the mouth as the animal browsed.



The fossil under investigation showed a unique combination of traits in the metacarpal I bone, as well as in the claws, which led the researchers to identify it as a new species of therizinosaur. They named it Paralitherizinosaurus japonicas, which means reaper reptile by the sea from Japan, as its fossilized remains were found in sediments of marine origin. The morphology of its strongly curved claws was compared with that of many other therizinosaur species and the results placed it among the derived therizinosaurs, based on four shared, derived characteristics.&nbsp;



Paralitherizinosaurus japonicus&nbsp;represents the youngest occurrence of therizinosaur remains in Japan. Its discovery indicates that therizinosaurs in Asia existed over a much longer time period, and a much larger geographical area, than previously known. It is also the first therizinosaur record from marine sediments in Asia. Along with a fossil from Utah, USA, this suggests that some of the derived therizinosaurs were adapted to life in coastal environments.&nbsp;



“This study also tells us how much more we still have to learn about the incredible history of life on Earth,” said Fiorillo, a research professor in&nbsp;<a href="https://www.smu.edu/Dedman/Academics/Departments/Earth-Sciences">SMU’s Roy M. Huffington Department of Earth Sciences</a>.



Co-authors of the study include Ryuji Takasaki of Okayama University of Science, Tsogtbaatar Chinzorig of North Carolina State University and Mongolian Academy of Sciences, and Yoshinori Hikida of Nakagawa Museum of Natural History.&nbsp;



Image Credit: Masato Hattori



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

New dinosaur species distinguished by its fearsome claws

A new species of dinosaur has been described by scientists...

Many studies have shown that tiny plastic particles are now spread everywhere on Earth – in the water, food, and air, and even inside the human body, in our blood, lung tissue, and stool. According to a recent cover story published in <a href="https://cen.acs.org/">Chemical &amp; Engineering News</a>, an independent news outlet of the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> (ACS), scientists are just beginning to investigate the health and environmental risks of <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/study-confirms-microplastics-have-entered-our-food-chain/">microplastics</a> and nanoplastics, by using lessons learned from nanotoxicology.&nbsp;



Microplastics (plastic particles smaller than five millimeters in diameter) and nanoplastics (particles smaller than one µm) can be made of a variety of materials, and are of different sizes and shapes. Due to their diversity, a proper investigation of their health and environmental effects is a complicated matter.&nbsp;



So far, scientists have mostly used polystyrene beads in their experiments since they are easily accessible. However, these beads are far from being representative of the diversity of microplastics found in the environment: most of these particles are irregular fragments rather than spheres, and environmental factors such as ultraviolet light can change their properties after they are released in the environment. Moreover, polystyrene is not the only polymer found in the environment; fragments of polyethylene, polypropylene, and polyamide are also abundant in our surroundings.



Since there is limited data regarding the effects of exposure to microplastics, making regulatory decisions is challenging. This is a problem that the toxicology community has also faced over the past decade when trying to assess the risks of nanoparticles, so scientists hope that lessons from nanotoxicology could be applied to our understanding and assessment of micro- and nanoplastics.&nbsp;



Currently, researchers are beginning to standardize the various microplastics used in studies, in order to be able to reproduce results and better replicate real-world situations. Moreover, laboratory systems simulating bodily functions are increasingly used to investigate how ingested or inhaled plastic particles could affect human gut and lung cells.



“We really need to launch a micro- and nanoplastic safety consortium similar to what we did with nanomaterials and bring a lot of groups and scientists together to address these fundamental questions,” said Philip Demokritou, an expert in Nanoscience and Environmental Bioengineering at <a href="https://www.rutgers.edu/">Rutgers University</a>. “Because right now, with a little bit of funding here and a little bit there, we won’t be able to generate the data that risk assessors need.”&nbsp;



The full cover story - written by senior correspondent Britt Erikson - can be accessed <a href="https://cen.acs.org/biological-chemistry/toxicology/Microplastics-health-risk-toxicology-particle-characterization-nanomaterials/100/i19">here</a>.



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Nanotoxicology could help assess the risks of microplastics

Many studies have shown that tiny plastic particles are now...

A rare, spectacular <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/aprils-night-sky-is-set-for-a-spectacular-planetary-alignment/">planetary alignment</a> will be visible starting in the early morning hours of Friday, June 3, 2022, when Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn will line up in order of their distance from the Sun across the pre-dawn sky. While it is quite common to see two or three planets close together, seeing all these five planets aligned is an infrequent event that has not occurred since December 2004.



“This is really cool,” said Prof Beth Biller, an expert in exoplanet characterization at the <a href="https://www.ed.ac.uk/">University of Edinburgh</a>. “We now know of many other stars hosting multiple planets. This is a rare opportunity to see the same thing closer to home, with all five ‘naked eye’ planets in our solar system visible at once.”



According to Dr. Greg Brown, the public astronomy officer at <a href="https://www.rmg.co.uk/">Royal Museums Greenwich</a>, Venus and Jupiter will be the easiest to see since they will appear first in the night sky, while Mercury will be rather hard to spot because it will only rise later, just before dawn.&nbsp;



“Your only chance to see all five planets at the same time is during a very narrow window after Mercury has risen but before the sun has,” Dr. Brown said. “A pair of binoculars or a telescope may well be enough to overcome the twilight in the case of the fainter planets, but do be very careful when trying to observe particularly Mercury in this way. Ensure that the sun is below the horizon to avoid accidentally looking directly at it, which would be very dangerous for your eyes.”



However, Mercury will become easier to spot later in June, as it rises in the sky and brightens. In addition, on June 24, the five planets will be joined by a crescent moon between Venus and Mars, making for an “extraordinary scene” – as Dr. Samantha Rolfe, the principal technical officer at the <a href="https://www.herts.ac.uk/">University of Hertfordshire</a>’s observatory put it.



“You do not need binoculars or a telescope if you don’t have them – just enjoy the sight from wherever you can, even if you can’t see all five from your location,” Dr. Rolfe said. “This is a rare spectacle that can help us feel connected to nature and the world around us, and enjoying the night sky in general is a great wellbeing exercise.”



“Knowing that so many people are looking up at the same sky, as our ancestors did, and our descendants will, is something to behold. Check the weather forecast for clear or even partially clear skies, and set an alarm – it will be worth getting up for.”&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:andrei.ionescu5891@gmail.com">Andrei Ionescu</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Rare planetary alignment will be visible during June

A rare, spectacular planetary alignment will be visible starting in...

To discern evolutionary relationships and family trees, biologists focus on physical characteristics (morphology), but this can be tricky. For example, the wings of birds, bats and <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/light-pollution-disorients-monarch-butterflies/">butterflies</a> may look superficially similar, yet it is not a sign of close relatedness.  



Now, scientists at the <a href="https://www.bath.ac.uk/">University of Bath</a> have managed to use molecular data to reconstruct family trees and to examine the relatedness of organisms. The study, published in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/commsbio/">Communications Biology</a>, compares the older method with the molecular method for building family trees.&nbsp;



Interestingly, the research shows that family trees of organisms built by molecular methods are more closely grouped together geographically than those in evolutionary trees based on morphology.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



“It turns out that we’ve got lots of our evolutionary trees wrong," said Matthew Wills, professor of Evolutionary Paleobiology at the <a href="https://www.bath.ac.uk/research-centres/milner-centre-for-evolution/">Milner Centre for Evolution</a>. “For over a hundred years, we’ve been classifying organisms according to how they look and are put together anatomically, but molecular data often tells us a rather different story."



“Our study proves statistically that if you build an evolutionary tree of animals based on their molecular data, it often fits much better with their geographical distribution."



“Where things live – their biogeography – is an important source of evolutionary evidence that was familiar to Darwin and his contemporaries. For example, tiny elephant shrews, aardvarks, elephants, golden moles and swimming manatees have all come from the same big branch of mammal evolution - despite the fact that they look completely different from one another (and live in very different ways)."



“Molecular trees have put them all together in a group called Afrotheria, so-called because they all come from the African continent, so the group matches the biogeography.”



It makes sense that biogeography might be more important than morphology as something pointing towards relatedness. Similar body parts might develop independently, something called convergent evolution, and a huge red herring in the search for a tree of life.



“We already have lots of famous examples of convergent evolution, such as flight evolving separately in birds, bats and insects, or complex camera eyes evolving separately in squid and humans," explained Professor Wills.



"But now with molecular data, we can see that convergent evolution happens all the time – things we thought were closely related often turn out to be far apart on the tree of life."



"People who make a living as lookalikes aren’t usually related to the celebrity they’re impersonating, and individuals within a family don’t always look similar - it’s the same with evolutionary trees too."



"It proves that evolution just keeps on re-inventing things, coming up with a similar solution each time the problem is encountered in a different branch of the evolutionary tree. It means that convergent evolution has been fooling us - even the cleverest evolutionary biologists and anatomists - for over 100 years!”



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By <a href="mailto:zachfitzner@yahoo.com">Zach Fitzner</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

We may have family trees all wrong

To discern evolutionary relationships and family trees, biologists focus on...

According to previous research, cuttlefish transformation is a relatively simple <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/traffic-noise-in-school-linked-to-slower-cognitive-development/">cognitive</a> process involving one of three body patterns to help the animals blend in with their background. Still, scientists have yet to explain how these stunning masters of disguise can express approximately 30 different body pattern components.&nbsp;



Like other cephalopods (i.e., octopi), cuttlefish are able to camouflage themselves by using their brains to control chromatophores - special cells all over their body surface. A new study led by <a href="https://www.city.ac.uk/">City University London</a> has shown that European cuttlefish (sepia officinalis) camouflage may be more complex than previously thought.&nbsp;



"To examine how cuttlefish deploy this vast potential, we recorded cuttlefish on seven experimental backgrounds, each designed to resemble a pattern component, and then compared their responses to predictions of two models of sensory control of component expression," wrote the study authors.



The scientists observed and analyzed 15 European cuttlefish and found that the patterns displayed by cuttlefish could only be explained by the involvement of more than one distinct neural system. These systems are activated selectively and process features from the cuttlefish’s immediate environment and the overall background, which allow the cuttlefish to camouflage themselves on the ocean floor.&nbsp;



“The cuttlefish provides a fascinating window into perceptual processing of such an alien species by expressing its perception of the surroundings on the dynamic canvas of its skin surface," said study co-author Professor Christopher Tyler.



The research supports the findings of a previous study, which suggests that cuttlefish have the cognitive ability to process specific and background features. Furthermore, the results support another model suggesting that cuttlefish only employ these cognitive skills when they deem them necessary to improve their camouflage.&nbsp;



“The findings also lay the groundwork for further study to investigate which specific aspects of the patterned features used here are responsible for activating distinct groups of body components in cuttlefish, and indeed, whether these artificial visual cues are reflective of what is encountered in the animal’s natural environment," concluded Professor Tyler.&nbsp;



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://www.cell.com/current-biology/home">Current Biology</a>.



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By <a href="mailto:nire518@gmail.com">Erin Moody </a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Cuttlefish camouflage: more than meets the eye

According to previous research, cuttlefish transformation is a relatively simple...

Rudyard Kipling might very well have chosen to write a "Just So" story about how the giraffe got its long neck. It would probably have been about how the leaves of the tall Acacia trees are preferred food for giraffes but only those with the longest necks could reach them. For although there have been many different views about the exact evolutionary process of giraffe neck elongation, scientists have never doubted that the impetus for neck elongation was high <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/plants-adapt-to-altitude-by-sensing-oxygen-levels/">altitude</a> foliage.



However, the analysis of a strange new fossil by researchers from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the <a href="https://english.cas.cn/">Chinese Academy of Sciences</a> may cast new light on this age-old story. The fossil is a type of early giraffoid known as Discokeryx xiezhi, and among the fossilized remains are a well preserved skull and four neck vertebrae. The remains were found in early Miocene strata, dated at about 17 million years ago, on the northern margin of the Junggar Basin, Xinjiang.&nbsp;



Details of the study, published today in the journal <a href="https://www.science.org/">Science</a>, point to some unusual morphological adaptations in this ancient species. Although it is a giraffoid and possible precursor to modern giraffes, it did not have a long neck. It did, however, have a most unusual bony pad right in the middle of its forehead, and its cervical vertebrae showed unique connections that hint the animal was adapted to survive the heavy impacts associated with head-butting.&nbsp;



“Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;featured many unique characteristics among mammals, including the development of a disc-like large ossicone in the middle of its head,” said study co-author Professor Deng Tao. He noted that the single ossicone resembles that of the&nbsp;xiezhi, a one-horned creature from ancient Chinese mythology – thus giving the fossil its name.



As far as the neck vertebrae are concerned, the researchers report that these were very stout and strong, and the animal had the most complex joints between head and neck and between adjacent cervical vertebrae of any mammal. The team demonstrated that the complex articulations between the skull and cervical vertebrae of&nbsp;Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;were particularly adapted to high-speed head-to-head impact, a behavior often associated with conflict between rival males during breeding time.



They researchers found that the large, bony pad (or ossicone) of&nbsp;Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;was far more effective than that of extant animals, such as musk oxen, that are also adapted to tolerate severe head impacts. In fact,&nbsp;Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;may have been the best adapted head-butting vertebrate ever.



Interestingly, modern giraffes also show butting behavior. Male giraffes compete for females by fighting with other males. During this fighting, a male swings his heavy skull, armed with bony ossicones and osteomas, into his opponent’s vulnerable soft tissues. The authors of the study propose that this aspect of giraffe behavior would conceivably also favor the possession of a long neck. The longer the neck, the greater the momentum of the swing and the more damage done.



“Both living giraffes and&nbsp;Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;belong to the Giraffoidea, a superfamily. Although their skull and neck morphologies differ greatly, both are associated with male courtship struggles and both have evolved in an extreme direction,”&nbsp;said WANG Shiqi, first author of the study.



The experts state that this unusual fossil giraffoid helps to understand how the modern giraffe's long neck may have evolved as well as to appreciate the extensive integration of courtship struggles and feeding pressure. In fact, they propose that the neck size of male giraffes is directly related to social hierarchy, and that courtship competition is the driving force behind the evolution of long necks.



When the research team compared the horn morphology of several groups of ruminants, including giraffoids, cattle, sheep, deer and pronghorns, they found that horn diversity in giraffes is much greater than in other groups. In addition, the horns of giraffes tend toward extreme differences in morphology, indicating that courtship struggles are more intense and diverse in giraffes than in other ruminants.



Furthermore, the ecological environment that Discokeryx xiezhi occupied was most probably fairly dry, barren grassland, which would not necessarily have contained an abundance of available food. The Earth was in a warm period and generally densely forested at that time, but the Xinjiang region, where&nbsp;Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;lived, was somewhat drier than other areas because the Tibetan Plateau to the south had been rising dramatically, thus blocking the transfer of water vapor.



“Stable isotopes of tooth enamel have indicated that&nbsp;Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;was living in open grasslands and may have migrated seasonally,”&nbsp;said study co-author Meng Jin. For animals of the time, the grassland environment was more barren and less comfortable than the forest environment, which may have led to the violent fighting behavior of&nbsp;Discokeryx xiezhi&nbsp;as it competed to survive in this more stressful landscape.&nbsp;



Around seven million years ago, when the genus Giraffa first emerged on the East African Plateau, the environment was also undergoing a change from forest to open grassland, and the direct ancestors of giraffes had to adapt to these changes. It is possible that, among giraffe ancestors during this period, mating males developed a way of attacking their competitors by swinging their necks and heads. This extreme struggle, supported by sexual selection, could thus have led to the rapid elongation of the giraffe's neck.



Thus, the researchers propose, the original purpose of a long neck in early Giraffa species was to compete successfully with other males for access to females. However, having a long neck would also have predisposed these animals for the niche of feeding on high altitude foliage. Furthermore, occupying a marginal ecological niche may have led to more extreme intraspecific courtship competition, which in turn may have promoted even more extreme morphological evolution.



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By <a href="mailto:bosman@truewan.co.za">Alison Bosman</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Strange fossil suggests giraffes evolved long necks for courtship

Rudyard Kipling might very well have chosen to write a...

Scientists are transforming chocolate into a functional food by infusing it with probiotics and prebiotics, aiming to create a treat that satisfies cravings while supporting gut health. 



The challenge lies in maintaining chocolate's beloved texture and flavor while adding health benefits.



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Probiotics - beneficial microbes that balance gut bacteria and aid digestion - are typically fragile and can be destroyed by stomach acid or processing. 



Prebiotics act as food for these microbes, helping them thrive. Together, they form "synbiotics," a powerful health combination.



Researchers Smriti Gaur and Shubhi Singh from India's Jaypee Institute of Information Technology took an innovative approach, using natural prebiotics like corn and honey instead of complex processing methods. 



They created five chocolate varieties: a control and four synbiotic versions containing different combinations of prebiotics, probiotics (Lactobacillus strains), and flavor enhancers (cinnamon or orange).



Laboratory simulations of human digestion showed the probiotics remained viable for over five hours, suggesting they could survive long enough to benefit gut health.



Taste tests were positive, with researchers particularly enjoying the orange-flavored variety, describing it as having "vibrant citrus notes" complementing the "rich cocoa" with a "luxurious" texture.



This research represents just the beginning. With further refinement of strains, textures, and flavors, chocolate could evolve beyond mere indulgence to become a functional food that nourishes while it delights.



The study is published in the journal <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsfoodscitech.4c00741" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ACS Food Science &amp; Technology</a>.

Is chocolate the next nutritional powerhouse?

Scientists are transforming chocolate into a functional food by infusing...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Nushagak Bay, a large estuary in southwest Alaska. Nushagak runs mainly north to south and exits in Bristol Bay, a large body of water in the Bering Sea.



"The bay is primarily fed by the Nushagak River, which begins in the Alaska Range and flows southwest approximately 450 km. The bay is also fed by several additional rivers including the Wood, Igushik, Snake and Weary rivers," says ESA.



"The dark colors of the Nushagak River are most likely due to tannins or lignins (chemical substances found in plants). Tannins and lignins from roots, leaves, seeds, bark and soil can leach into the water and give it a brown or even black colour. The sediments then flow southwards where it is mixed with the bluer waters of the bay."



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Nushagak Bay in southwest Alaska

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> (ACS) reveals that proteins on flu viruses are actually flexible, tilting and waving in a “breath-like” motion. According to the experts, these proteins could be used to better defend against the flu.



"The main antigenic targets of influenza virus are two surface glycoproteins, hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA). Whereas the structural and dynamical properties of both glycoproteins have been studied previously, the understanding of their plasticity in the whole-virion context is fragmented," wrote the researchers.



To investigate, the team conducted detailed simulations of the influenza A H1N1 virion, or the swine flu. The experts concluded that the visualizations show many new vulnerable states of flu viruses, which could improve future vaccines and antiviral drugs.



Video/ Image Credit: American Chemical Society&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Flu viruses are more flexible than expected

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Lake Trasimeno, which is located west of Perugia in central Italy. It is the fourth largest lake in the country. While Trasimeno’s water level varies, it has a maximum depth of approximately six meters.&nbsp;



"In this Copernicus Sentinel-2 image, captured on 6 August 2022, the lake’s emerald green colour is likely due to the presence of phytoplankton. Streaks in the water, particularly visible in the west, indicate the presence of soil and sediments which have been stirred up by winds. Dark colored waters in the southern part of the lake indicate a presence of submerged and floating macrophytes (aquatic plants) as well as algae," says ESA.



"Surrounded by hills on three sides, Trasimeno is subject to heavy storms created by winds, especially from the north and west. There are three islets in the lake: Maggiore, Minore and Polvese (the largest). The lake’s shores are sparsely inhabited with only two popular villages: Castiglione del Lago and Passignano sul Trasimeno."



"Italy is experiencing its worst drought in 70 years which has affected drinking water supplies, hydroelectric power and agricultural production. High temperatures, hot winds and lack of rainfall are the main causes of drought in the Umbrian region which saw Lake Trasimeno’s drop 1.3 m, reaching the limit of the hydrometric zero in July 2022."



Video/Image Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Lake Trasimeno in Central Italy

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> describes a new self-powered nanosensor that can instantly detect mercury contamination with the tap of a finger.&nbsp;



The oxidized form of mercury can be harmful when it is ingested through contaminated water or food. This makes it necessary for experts to develop sensors that can quickly and accurately detect the presence of mercury.&nbsp;



Zong-Hong Lin and colleagues have now created a triboelectric nanosensor (TENS) that can detect mercury by simply by touching a sample. According to the researchers, their TENS could serve as the basis for similar devices to safely and remotely monitor other pollutants.



Video Credit: American Chemical Society&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Detecting mercury contamination with the tap of a finger

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Kainji Lake, a reservoir on the Niger River.



In 1968, Kainji Lake was created by the construction of the Kainji Dam. The Niger River, the third longest in Africa, enters the lake in the north.&nbsp;



According to <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/rivers-in-the-american-west-are-a-lifesaving-resource-for-birds/">ESA</a>, the creation of the lake submerged Foge Island and the town of Bussa and permanently flooded other riverine settlements, leaving around 50,000 people displaced.&nbsp;



Large parts of Foge Island are temporarily exposed during low water tides, and the land is often used by migrating fishermen. Kainji Dam is a dam across the Niger River in Niger State of Central Nigeria. 



Wild mammals occur at relatively low densities due to illegal hunting. Lake Kainji has suffered a dramatic decline as a fishery due to the high numbers of artisanal and subsistence fisherfolk using the lake. It has been suggested that a period of closure, together with controlled fishing rights may help improve fish stocks.



Kainji Lake National Park is the oldest of its kind in Nigeria. The park contains three distinct areas: a part of the Kainji Lake, the Borgu Game Reserve to the west of the lake, and the Zugurma Game Reserve to the southeast. The park is home to around 65 mammal species, 350 bird species, and 30 species of reptiles and amphibians. 



Video/ Image Credit: European Space Agency&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Kainji Lake in north central Nigeria

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.igb.illinois.edu/">Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology</a> reveals how scientists can modify common crops like soybean, rice, and wheat to protect them from heat stress.



“We need to double crop production by 2050 to feed a growing global population, and not only are we not on track to do that, but climate change is further complicating things,” said Amanda Cavanagh, a lecturer at the University of Essex. 



The study is part of Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE), an international research project that aims to develop food crops that turn the sun’s energy into food more efficiently.



“Using an engineering approach we designed multiple alternative metabolic pathways to photorespiration. Testing them in the field showed increases in productivity which led Amanda to significantly move the project forward by showing our engineered plants can withstand pretty extreme temperature stress,” said study co-author and RIPE researcher Paul South.&nbsp;



“As the climate changes and temperature stresses increase the pressure on our global food supply, farmers will need every tool available including engineering approaches like the synthetic biology used here to maintain safe and productive harvests.”



The experts tested plants modified to have more efficient photorespiration to see if they were better adapted to warmer temperatures.&nbsp;



The team found that the engineered plants produced 26 percent more biomass than the wild-type plants exposed to the same temperatures, and had 15 percent less yield loss under the higher temperatures.



Video Credit: Amanda Nguyen/University of Illinois



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Designing crops that can beat the heat

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> explores the ability of salt to transform the way that foods and beverages taste. Salt is known to cover up undesirable flavors, such as bitterness in coffee or beer, but how exactly does sodium chloride change the taste of other compounds?



One previous study showed that, not only does salt suppress bitterness, but also enhances sweetness and sourness. Another study revealed that bitterness reduction by salt seems to be happening at the tongue receptor level as well as in the brain.&nbsp;



While it is known that salt taste is mediated by the presence of sodium channels in the form of taste buds, experts believe that there is also an unknown receptor responsible for how we taste salt that has not yet been identified.&nbsp;



Video Credit: ACS Reactions



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

How does salt makes things taste better?

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Santiago, the capital city of Chile. The city is located in the center of the Santiago Metropolitan Region, which has a population of about eight million people.&nbsp;



'The weather of Santiago resembles the Mediterranean climate with dry and warm summers with temperatures reaching up to 35°C (from October to March) and cool and humid winters that can drop to 0°C (from April to September)."



"The city lies in the centre of the country’s central valley around 80 km from the Pacific Ocean to the west and borders Argentina to the east. A tiny part of Argentina is visible in the top-right corner of the image where the mountain crest of the Andes Mountains acts as a divider between the two countries," says ESA.



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Santiago, Chile in South America

[sendtonews key="JRaP49ISmm-2357509-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

Spiral,Galaxy,,Illustration,Of,Milky,Way

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Astronomers at <a href="https://www.jhu.edu/">Johns Hopkins University</a> have created an interactive map of the universe, including the actual position and real colors of 200,000 galaxies. The map allows the public to access data that was previously only available to scientists.



The map was developed using data collected by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. For over two decades, a telescope in New Mexico was aimed at slightly different locations to capture the night sky.&nbsp;



"Growing up I was very inspired by astronomy pictures, stars, nebulae and galaxies, and now it's our time to create a new type of picture to inspire people," said map creator Brice Ménard, a professor at Johns Hopkins. "Astrophysicists around the world have been analyzing this data for years, leading to thousands of scientific papers and discoveries. But nobody took the time to create a map that is beautiful, scientifically accurate, and accessible to people who are not scientists. Our goal here is to show everybody what the universe really looks like."



"In this map, we are just a speck at the very bottom, just one pixel. And when I say we, I mean our galaxy, the Milky Way which has billions of stars and planets. We are used to seeing astronomical pictures showing one galaxy here, one galaxy there or perhaps a group of galaxies. But what this map shows is a very, very different scale."



"From this speck at the bottom, we are able to map out galaxies across the entire universe, and that says something about the power of science."



The <a href="https://mapoftheuniverse.net/">interactive map</a> is available online, where it can be downloaded for free.



Video Credit: Johns Hopkins&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Interactive map of the universe includes 200,000 galaxies

[sendtonews key="e4ZG0Jawp3-2374785-12187" type="single"] Astronomers at Johns Hopkins University have created...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes the first comprehensive estimate of carbon density in the Saharan, Sahel, and Sudanian zones of Africa. In an effort to measure the amount of carbon stored across these drylands, a team of scientists used high-resolution satellite images and artificial intelligence to map nearly 10 billion individual trees. 



"The high spatial resolution (50 cm) combined with AI and field measurements used in this study is key to improving tree inventories in drylands," said Pierre Hiernaux, a French researcher working for NASA. "The ever-increasing availability of very high-resolution satellite imagery will make it possible to assess carbon pools and their dynamics at the individual tree level on a global scale."



"This study is exceptional because it is pioneering a type of approach that will revolutionize the monitoring of trees and forests on a global scale: in the short term, it will be possible to map the world's trees from the centre of the Amazon to our schoolyards," said <a href="https://www.inrae.fr/en">INRAE</a> researcher Jean-Pierre Wigneron.



"Many fields of application will become much more efficient and accurate, such as tracking carbon stocks, biodiversity, monitoring logging and protection against illegal forest degradation, in near real time.”



Video Credit: NASA Goddard&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Remote sensing will revolutionize the way we monitor trees

[sendtonews key="EjmSP20gQK-2593093-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Dublin, the capital and largest city of Ireland. Beyond its pub culture, Dublin is known as a modern culinary destination and a UNESCO City of Literature.



"Dublin is located near the midpoint of Ireland’s east coast in the province of Leinster. The city, which covers an area of around 115 square kilometers, is bordered by the Dublin Mountains, a low mountain range to the south, and is surrounded by flat farmland to the north and west," says ESA.



"The city straddles the River Liffey, which rises in the Wicklow Mountains and flows around 80 kilometers eastwards through the city of Dublin, in which it is canalised and bordered with quays. It then empties into Dublin Bay, an arm of the Irish Sea."



Dublin has an abundance of green spaces, including one of the largest enclosed public parks in any European capital city. Phoenix Park, which was originally formed as a royal hunting park in the 1660s, includes 707 hectares of green space.



Video Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The city of Dublin on Ireland's east coast

[sendtonews key="qjvhBOBnY8-2426650-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features the province of Zaragoza in northeast Spain. The image was captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission.



"Together with the provinces of Huesca and Teruel, Zaragoza formed the old kingdom of Aragon. Its capital, also called Zaragoza (not visible in this image) is home to around half of Aragon’s population," says ESA.



"The Ebro River can be seen winding its way through the province from west to east in this image. Between its source in the Cantabrian Mountains in the northwest and its delta on the Mediterranean coast, the Ebro River is fed by more than 200 tributaries as it flows 910 km across much of northern Spain."



Since rainfall is very scarce in this region, irrigation in the Ebro basin is critically important. In the valleys surrounding the Ebro River, many fields are used for growing crops such as corn, wheat, and barley.



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The province of Zaragoza in northeast Spain

[sendtonews key="oL4FnPTGCV-2384527-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from the...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> features a visual dataset of.methane emissions from wetlands across the globe. Atmospheric methane levels have reached record highs in recent years, and wetlands are a major source of these emissions.&nbsp;



"Methane is an important greenhouse gas that contributes substantially to global warming. On a molecule by molecule basis, methane is much more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, the main driver of warming," says NASA.



"Though human activities, including agriculture, oil and natural gas production and use, and waste disposal, collectively contribute the majority of methane to the atmosphere, about a third of total methane emissions comes from wetlands."&nbsp;



According to NASA, understanding methane emissions from wetlands and other natural sources is critically important for scientists and policymakers who are working to combat climate change by reducing emissions from human activities.



Video Credit: NASA Goddard



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Wetlands are a major source of methane emissions

[sendtonews key="f8fukm28Vz-2491833-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> reveals the evolution of the Columbia Glacier in southeastern Alaska. Columbia is among the fastest shrinking glaciers in the world, and the video documents its rapid retreat over the years.&nbsp;



Columbia Glacier is a large, multi-branched calving glacier that flows out of the Chugach Mountains to the Prince William Sound.&nbsp;



According to USGS, Columbia had a long history of stability prior to 1980, with a length 41 miles, and small, short-lived advances or retreats.



In the years since 1980, however, satellite images have captured Columbia’s alarming retreat. By using false-color images, scientists can distinguish between snow and ice, open water, vegetation, and rocky debris on the glacier’s surface.



The series of false-color images featured in today's video were acquired over the span of 35 years. You can see that by 2021, the glacier’s main branch had retreated about 15 miles from its initial position.



The Columbia Glacier has also lost more than 50 percent of its volume, mostly due to calving. <a href="https://www.earth.com/video/nasa-reveals-3d-visual-of-an-atmospheric-river/">NASA</a> reports that while climate change likely started the retreat, mechanical processes kept the disintegration going.



The NASA images are provided by Jesse Allen, Robert Simmon, Joshua Stevens, and Lauren Dauphin using data from Landsat satellites, from the U.S. Geological Survey, and data from MODIS on NASA’s Terra satellite. The structure of Columbia’s moraine played a large role in the stability of the glacier before 1980. 



Like other tidewater glaciers, the Columbia built up a moraine over time, and the mixture of ice and rock functioned like a dam keeping out the sea. It was supported on one end by the shoreline and by the underwater terminal moraine at the other.



Video Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/&nbsp; NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The rapid retreat of the Columbia Glacier

[sendtonews key="0879czfG3k-1785905-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features the Pyrenees Mountains, which form a natural boundary between France and Spain in southwest Europe.



The mountain range is 430 kilometers in length. It stretches from the Mediterranean Sea on the east to the Atlantic Ocean on the west.



At an elevation of 3404 meters, Pico de Aneto is the highest mountain peak in the Pyrenees, and the third-highest peak in Spain. Pico de Aneto is located in the Posets-Maladeta Natural Park, which spans more than 82,000 acres.&nbsp;



"Geological studies have revealed that the Pyrenees Mountains have been around for longer than the Alps, with their sediments first deposited in coastal basins during the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras," reports ESA.



"The entire mountain range formed due to the upwelling of large sedimentary rocks by the collision of the Iberian and the Eurasian plate around 100 to 150 million years ago, followed by intense erosion from ice and water."



The western Pyrenees receive more precipitation due to moisture blowing in from the Atlantic Ocean. The mountain range contains many lakes, several small glaciers, and some of the highest waterfalls in Europe.



Video &amp; Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

The Pyrenees Mountains in southwest Europe

[sendtonews key="6HyfrAJTBI-1831843-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from the...

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.stowers.org/">Stowers Institute for Medical Research</a> describes why experts are studying zebrafish to gain a better understanding of how the immune system responds to injury. Zebrafish have the ability to repair and regenerate organs.



“Organ regeneration offers an exciting opportunity for studying the immune system and to inquire why some species can regenerate organs like the heart or missing limbs while others like humans cannot,” explained Dr. Tatjana Piotrowski.



Zebrafish sensory organ hair cells are an ideal system to investigate the pathways and cell types involved in regeneration since they are easily destroyed with antibiotics and begin regenerating within five hours. This enabled the researchers to identify the exact timing and genetic programs for each anti-inflammatory macrophage activation state.&nbsp;



“Our hypothesis is that human macrophages do not receive the proper chemical activation 'cocktail' to instruct pro-regenerative processes,” said Dr. Nicolas Denans. “Identifying the molecular recipe of macrophage activation in zebrafish may one day enable us to design regenerative immunotherapies in humans.”&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



“The new evidence is a valuable resource for comparative studies on the genetic programs involved in macrophage-mediated repair and regeneration. In other words, different types of injuries may induce different kinds of inflammatory responses. We want to decipher whether this 'language' is universal or if there are a variety of dialects."



Video Credit: Stowers Institute for Medical Research&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

How the immune system responds to injury

[sendtonews key="0dEcERCq61-2283382-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from Stowers...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes how record-breaking heat expressed itself around the world in 2022.



Scientists have determined that 2022 was the 5th warmest year since 1880. Furthermore, the last nine consecutive years have been the warmest on record.



From devastating floods and wildfires to natural disasters like Hurricane Ian, 2022 showed us yet again how a warming climate affects people across the globe.&nbsp;



"As we look back at 20:22 and years past, we see that each year we better understand the challenges we face and how important it is to meet them," says NASA.



Video/ Image Credit: NASA Goddard



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

2022 illustrated the consequences of a warming climate

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Earth,Like,Exoplanet,3d,Render

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes two exoplanets that are orbiting a star 218 light-years away. A team of researchers led by the University of Montreal has found evidence that these planets are "water worlds."



The experts used data from NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes. They discovered that exoplanets Kepler-138 c and Kepler-138 could be composed largely of water.



"We previously thought that planets that were a bit larger than Earth were big balls of metal and rock, like scaled-up versions of Earth, and that's why we called them super-Earths," explained study co-author Björn Benneke.&nbsp;



"However, we have now shown that these two planets, Kepler-138 c and d, are quite different in nature and that a big fraction of their entire volume is likely composed of water. It is the best evidence yet for water worlds, a type of planet that was theorized by astronomers to exist for a long time."



Video Credit: NASA Goddard



Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and Leah Hustak (STScI)



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Two distant planets may be "water worlds"

[sendtonews key="QIoVYJqRBi-2434608-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes Earth’s interconnected systems, and how this network is affected by rising temperatures.&nbsp;



During 2020, average global temperatures matched the hottest year on record. The hurricane season was also record-breaking, with many of the storms intensifying at extraordinary speeds. Hot water in the ocean is fuel for hurricanes. The satellite data shows that it's all one interconnected system showing how Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected.



According to NASA, dust swept up from Northern Africa plays a major role in the formation of hurricanes, and is also a key source of fertilization in the Amazon rainforest. As a result of<a href="https://www.earth.com/news/seagrass-wasting-disease-is-fueled-by-climate-change/"> climate</a> change, dust plumes are expected to decline, which will have an effect on vegetation far away.&nbsp;



Images from Earth-observing satellites show how the world’s plant life is affected by natural disasters, fires, and deforestation. Satellites also reveal how widespread changes in vegetation impact waterways,&nbsp; the climate, air quality. Satellites communicate by using radio waves to send signals to the antennas on the Earth. "Earth From Space" is a groundbreaking two-hour special that reveals a spectacular new space-based vision of our planet. 



Video Credit: NASA Goddard&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected

[sendtonews key="JbW4VsY53O-1632195-12187" type="single"] Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected...

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