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Half-Ton Cattle Relatives Roamed Europe 4 Million Years Ago

5 June 2026 at 19:10
Paleoartistic reconstruction of the environment in the surrounding of Camp dels Ninots maar lake during the Early Pliocene. Image credit: Mauricio AntΓ³n.

Near-complete bovine skeletons unearthed the Early Pliocene site of Camp dels Ninots in northeastern Spain reveal that the ancestors of today’s buffalo and cattle were already growing to impressive sizes long before humans arrived on the continent.

The post Half-Ton Cattle Relatives Roamed Europe 4 Million Years Ago appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Webb Weighs Most Distant Inactive Black Hole Ever Found

5 June 2026 at 16:58
This Webb image shows the highly distorted red galaxy MRG-M0138 seen through a foreground cluster of galaxies (white sources). Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Webb.

A supermassive black hole 6 billion times the mass of the Sun lurks in MRG-M0138, a gravitationally lensed quiescent galaxy seen when the Universe was just 3 billion years old, according to an analysis of data collected by the NIRSpec Integral Field Spectrograph onboard the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope.

The post Webb Weighs Most Distant Inactive Black Hole Ever Found appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

When Food Runs Short, This Single-Celled Organism Turns into Giant Cannibal to Survive

3 June 2026 at 20:55
Euplotes gigatrox. Image credit: Ben Larson & Samuel Lord.

Euplotes gigatrox, a new species of ciliate collected from a seawater filtration system on the Caribbean Island of CuraΓ§ao, can transform into a cannibalistic β€˜supergiant,’ raising new questions about the complexity of life at the microscopic scale.

The post When Food Runs Short, This Single-Celled Organism Turns into Giant Cannibal to Survive appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Fungi Bloomed Twice around End-Cretaceous Mass Extinction

28 May 2026 at 22:01
The end-Cretaceous mass extinction was marked by both the Chicxulub asteroid impact and the ongoing eruptions of the Deccan Traps volcanoes.

By studying fungal microfossils in 66-million-year-old rock samples from the Denver Basin in Colorado, Johns Hopkins University microbiologists have confirmed that the dinosaur-killing asteroid impact triggered a worldwide fungal takeover, and uncovered a second, previously unknown ecological crisis just before it.

The post Fungi Bloomed Twice around End-Cretaceous Mass Extinction appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Study: Early Complex Life Forms Were Bottom-Dwellers

27 May 2026 at 21:54
Fossil eukaryotes from Northern Territory, Australia. Image credit: Lechte et al., doi: 10.1038/s41586-026-10533-4.

Analyzing 1.75-billion-year-old microfossils from ancient Australian seabeds, paleontologists say ancient eukaryotes -- the ancestors of every plant, animal and fungus -- huddled in oxygenated seafloor patches for over a billion years before breaking free into open water.

The post Study: Early Complex Life Forms Were Bottom-Dwellers appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Bioluminescent Deep-Sea Fish Use Crystal β€˜Prisms’ to Recycle Their Own Glow

27 May 2026 at 20:37
Sigmops gracilis. Image credit: Wu Quancheng / Fisheries Research Institute, Council of Agriculture, Taiwan.

A marine biologist studying the photophores of a bioluminescent fish species found needle-shaped guanine crystals that scatter and redirect light instead of merely reflecting it, a discovery that could inspire more efficient biomedical and optical devices.

The post Bioluminescent Deep-Sea Fish Use Crystal β€˜Prisms’ to Recycle Their Own Glow appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

CERN Physicists Observe New Exotic Particle

25 May 2026 at 22:15
An artist’s impression of the Bc*+ meson. Image credit: Daniel Dominguez / CERN.

Physicists with the ATLAS Collaboration at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) have observed the Bc*+ meson, an excited version of the Bc+ meson -- both consist of a charm quark and a bottom antiquark.

The post CERN Physicists Observe New Exotic Particle appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

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