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Human-Dog Bond is Ancient, Universal and Strikingly the Same Everywhere: Study

23 June 2026 at 21:47

Testing situation and hunters with their dogs -- examples from each of the four non-WEIRD societies: (a) pointing test in Mongolia, (b) unsolvable problem test in Vanuatu, (c) showing test in Mongolia, (d) Vanuatu, (e) Mongolia, (f) Madagascar, (g) Peru. Image credit: Bräuer et al., doi: 10.1038/s41598-026-57657-1.

New research spanning five continents and vastly different cultures -- from the steppes of Mongolia to the rainforests of the Pacific -- shows that hunting dogs and their owners cooperate, communicate and rely on each other in nearly identical ways, suggesting the relationship was forged in deep evolutionary time, perhaps 30,000 years ago.

The post Human-Dog Bond is Ancient, Universal and Strikingly the Same Everywhere: Study appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Domestic Cats Age Like Humans, New Study Shows

23 June 2026 at 20:02

Lauren Scott & Brittany Florkiewicz show that cat facial signals correspond to different social functions, which have likely been influenced by domestication. Image credit: Sci.News / Makieni777 / Rise-a-mui / Alexas_Fotos / Dorothe / Vaclav Zavada / Artem Makarov / Daga Roszkowska / Birgit / Pasi Mammela.

Domestic cats (Felis catus) develop the same patterns of brain shrinkage and neurological decline as aging humans, and scientists think that makes them an ideal window into dementia and aging.

The post Domestic Cats Age Like Humans, New Study Shows appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Formed Up To 12 Billion Years Ago, New Observations Suggest

23 June 2026 at 00:11

Hubble captured this image of 3I/ATLAS on July 21, 2025, when the comet was 446 million km (277 million miles) from Earth. Image credit: NASA / ESA / David Jewitt, UCLA / Joseph DePasquale, STScI.

The interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS carries a chemical fingerprint unlike anything in our Solar System, and it may have formed 10 to 12 billion years ago, before our Sun even existed, according to two papers published in the journal Nature.

The post Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Formed Up To 12 Billion Years Ago, New Observations Suggest appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Secret to Heliconius Butterflies’ Longevity May Be Hidden in Pollen

22 June 2026 at 20:11

Heliconius hecale. Image credit: Robert Lawton / CC BY-SA 2.5.

Entomologists have compiled decades of data from butterfly houses, wild field studies, and lab experiments to build the most comprehensive picture yet of how long Heliconius butterflies live and how slowly they age.

The post Secret to Heliconius Butterflies’ Longevity May Be Hidden in Pollen appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Asteroid Donaldjohanson is Wobbly, Peanut-Shaped Object with Watery Past, Scientists Say

22 June 2026 at 17:26

The asteroid Donaldjohanson is composed of two heavily cratered lobes, connected by a smoother neck, with overall dimensions 8.8 km by 4.4 km by 3.1 km. Image credit: NASA / Goddard / SwRI / Dan Gallagher.

The main-belt asteroid Donaldjohanson, a heavily cratered fragment born from a catastrophic breakup 155 million years ago, appears to wobble through space while preserving clues to the migration of water-rich worlds in the early Solar System, according to a new analysis of images and data from NASA’s Lucy spacecraft.

The post Asteroid Donaldjohanson is Wobbly, Peanut-Shaped Object with Watery Past, Scientists Say appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Webb Sees Jupiter-Size Exoplanet Being Roasted by Its Star

22 June 2026 at 16:05

An artist’s impression of the hot-Jupiter exoplanet HD 80606b. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Joseph Olmsted, STScI.

HD 80606b has one of the most extreme orbits of any known exoplanet and the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope just caught it getting flash-fried as it whipped past its star.

The post Webb Sees Jupiter-Size Exoplanet Being Roasted by Its Star appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Earth’s First Land Animals May Never Have Been Amphibian-Like After All

19 June 2026 at 20:47

New fossil evidence suggests that embolomeres did not undergo a metamorphosis the way that modern amphibians do when growing up, which challenges a long-standing scientific belief that amphibians, reptiles, and mammals evolved from animals that had a tadpole stage. Image credit: Berit Godring.

Paleontologists from the Field Museum of Natural History have described the fossilized remains of baby embolomeres, crocodile-like predators that prowled ancient rivers and swamps between 350 and 280 million years ago.

The post Earth’s First Land Animals May Never Have Been Amphibian-Like After All appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

CERN Physicists Discover Third and Final Member of Doubly Charmed Baryon Family

18 June 2026 at 19:13

An artist’s impression of the doubly charmed Ωcc⁺ baryon. Image credit: Daniel Dominguez / CERN.

Physicists with LHCb Collaboration at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) have detected the elusive Ωcc⁺ baryon, a particle containing two charm quarks and one strange quark, completing a long-sought family of doubly charmed baryons first predicted over half a century ago.

The post CERN Physicists Discover Third and Final Member of Doubly Charmed Baryon Family appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Scientists Use Math to Solve Viral Word Game ‘Wordle’ with 99% Success Rate

18 June 2026 at 18:09

Wordle, a popular word-guessing game, challenges players to identify a five-letter secret word through iterative guesses and feedback on letter placement. The players must figure out the secret word within six guesses. After each guess, the letters will be color-coded based on different criteria. Optimizing the choice of guesses is critical for maximizing success within the limited attempts allowed. Image credit: Aladaileh et al., doi: 10.63562/2577-8439.1146.

Researchers at Binghamton University have applied a 70-year-old theory of information to the viral word game Wordle, revealing how a carefully chosen first guess can dramatically improve a player’s chances of solving the puzzle.

The post Scientists Use Math to Solve Viral Word Game ‘Wordle’ with 99% Success Rate appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Astronomers Find Four Separate Generations of Stars in ‘Globular Cluster’ Terzan 5

17 June 2026 at 23:08

This Webb/NIRCam image shows the star cluster Terzan 5. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Webb.

New Webb and Hubble data not only confirm the existence of two distinct populations of stars in the ancient stellar system Terzan 5, once classified as a globular cluster, but also provides evidence for two more recent rounds of star formation.

The post Astronomers Find Four Separate Generations of Stars in ‘Globular Cluster’ Terzan 5 appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Astronomers Trace Elusive High-Energy Neutrino to Star-Forming Galaxy in Early Universe

17 June 2026 at 20:48

The origin of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos remains unresolved, and secure electromagnetic counterparts to individual events are rare despite rapid follow-up. Dusty star-forming galaxies at cosmic noon (redshift of z ≈ 1-4) are natural cosmic-ray calorimeters, yet observational links between these galaxies and neutrinos have remained unknown. Urata et al. report a compact-core, dusty star-forming galaxy within an IceCube localization, JCMT0402-0424, a quadruply lensed galaxy at z = 2.988 located inside the 90% containment region of the IceCube event IC 210922A. Image credit: International Gemini Observatory / NOIRLab / NSF / AURA / ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / T.A. Rector, University of Alaska Anchorage & NSF’s NOIRLab / D. de Martin & M. Zamani, NSF’s NOIRLab / Yuji Urata. MITOS Science Co., LTD.

JCMT0402-0424, a dusty starburst galaxy around 11 billion light-years away, is the strongest candidate yet for the source of the high-energy neutrino event IC 210922A, according to a team of astronomer led by Yuji Urata of MITOS Science Co.

The post Astronomers Trace Elusive High-Energy Neutrino to Star-Forming Galaxy in Early Universe appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Radar Observations Reveal New Clues about Europa’s Hidden Interior

17 June 2026 at 19:57

This artist’s impression shows radar waves from NASA’s Goldstone Solar System Radar pinging Europa; the radar waves penetrate Europa’s icy surface before bouncing back to be collected by NSF’s Green Bank Telescope on Earth. Image credit: NSF / AUI / NSF’s NRAO / P.Vosteen.

Using NASA’s Goldstone Solar System Radar and NSF’s Green Bank Telescope, astronomers from the University of California, Los Angeles, confirmed that the icy surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa scatters radio energy in an unusually strong and complex way not seen on rocky worlds.

The post Radar Observations Reveal New Clues about Europa’s Hidden Interior appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

New Supernova Study Confirms Universe’s Expansion is Still Accelerating

17 June 2026 at 17:04

This is an artist’s concept of a Type Ia supernova exploding in the intergalactic space between galaxies within a galactic cluster. Image credit: Alex Parker / NASA / SDSS.

A fresh analysis of Type Ia supernovae overturns a controversial 2025 claim that cosmic expansion is slowing.

The post New Supernova Study Confirms Universe’s Expansion is Still Accelerating appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Experimental Copper-Based Drug Clears Alzheimer’s Plaques and Boosts Memory in Mice

15 June 2026 at 19:53

Using the APP/PS1 mouse model of familial Alzheimer’s disease, Pyun et al. investigated the effect of Cu(ATSM) on brain microvascular abundance and function of P-glycoprotein and the associated effects on exogenous amyloid-beta clearance, brain amyloid burden, and cognitive function. Image credit: Pyun et al., doi: 10.1021/acschemneuro.6c00252.

Copper diacetyl bis(4-methyl-3-thiosemicarbazone), or Cu(ATSM), restored a key waste-removal system in the brain, reducing toxic amyloid-beta buildup and improving spatial memory in lab models of Alzheimer’s disease, according to a team of researchers at Monash University.

The post Experimental Copper-Based Drug Clears Alzheimer’s Plaques and Boosts Memory in Mice appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Eliminating Sucrose from Low-Fat Diet Alters Gut Microbiome, Animal Study Suggests

15 June 2026 at 16:49

Rasheed Ahmad & Fatemah Bahman revealed that a sucrose-free low-fat diet notably disrupted gut microbial diversity and composition, leading to a depletion of short-chain fatty acid-producing commensal bacteria -- such as Lactobacillus murinus and Lachnospiraceae -- and an enrichment of pro-inflammatory or stress-adapted species, including Helicobacter ganmani, Odoribacter splanchnicus, and Alistipes spp. Image credit: Lourdes Alvarez.

In a mouse study conducted by scientists at the Dasman Diabetes Institute in Kuwait, rodents fed a sucrose-free diet developed insulin resistance, gut microbial imbalances and signs of fatty liver disease despite maintaining similar body weight.

The post Eliminating Sucrose from Low-Fat Diet Alters Gut Microbiome, Animal Study Suggests appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Astronomers May Have Found Supernova Remnant near Milky Way’s Central Black Hole

12 June 2026 at 16:43

This composite image contains X-rays from Chandra and XMM-Newton missions (shown in blue) as well as radio data from the MeerKAT telescope (shown in red) in South Africa. These have been combined with an optical image from the Pan-STARRS telescopes in Hawai’i (red, green, and blue). Image credit: NASA / CXC / UCLA / Zhu et al. / ESA / XMM-Newton / PanSTARRS / MeerKAT / CSA / STScI / SAO / L. Frattare & P. Edmonds.

Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and ESA’s XMM-Newton satellite, astronomers identified a possible remnant of ancient stellar explosion just a few dozen light-years from Sagittarius A*, a supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way Galaxy.

The post Astronomers May Have Found Supernova Remnant near Milky Way’s Central Black Hole appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Schrödinger’s Cat Gets Stranger: Physicists Demonstrate Quantum States No One Has Seen Before

10 June 2026 at 21:54

Quantum mechanics defies classical intuition, most famously through Schrödinger’s cat, where systems exist in superpositions of opposing states. Such superpositions are central to quantum technologies. Quantum ‘cat’ states have been realized in harmonic oscillators, but implementations were largely limited to Fock, displaced, or Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill states. A different class of macroscopic superpositions, where an oscillator is squeezed along orthogonal axes so that its positional variance is simultaneously larger and smaller than the Heisenberg limit, was proposed previously but remained unrealized. Saner et al. introduce a trapped-ion hybrid spin-oscillator system enabling an experimental realization of these ‘siblings’ of Schrödinger’s cat. Image credit: Saner et al., doi: 10.1103/k1xk-yt42.

Physicists at the University of Oxford have engineered a new class of ‘cat states’ -- quantum superpositions constructed not from ordinary wave packets, but from deeply exotic, nonclassical components -- opening unexpected paths toward more resilient quantum computers.

The post Schrödinger’s Cat Gets Stranger: Physicists Demonstrate Quantum States No One Has Seen Before appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Earth’s Earliest Animals May Have Thrived Too Easily to Evolve

10 June 2026 at 20:25

Artist’s reconstruction of the Fractofusus community: the bottom right features a large Fractofusus around which there are 5 to 8 medium specimens clustered; each of the medium specimens also has small specimens clustered around them; the small specimens therefore form an independent double cluster pattern, namely clusters of clusters. Image credit: C.G. Kenchington.

Fossils from some of the oldest-known animals on Earth, dating from 574 million years ago (Ediacaran period), suggest that cloning, not competition, dominated the Ediacaran seas, slowing evolution until environmental stress helped drive the rise of sexual reproduction and a burst of biodiversity.

The post Earth’s Earliest Animals May Have Thrived Too Easily to Evolve appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Lunar Meteorite Preserves Evidence of Colossal Asteroid Strike

10 June 2026 at 18:36

XRF map of 7.53 g slice of NWA 12593: calcium (Ca) and iron (Fe) illustrate the location and diversity of clasts; sulfur (S) highlights the location of cracks and terrestrial weathering. Image credit: Crow et al., doi: 10.1130/G54386.1.

Planetary scientists analyzing a lunar meteorite known as Northwest Africa (NWA) 12593 have uncovered evidence of an asteroid impact that occurred 3.5 billion years ago on the Moon, helping to reconstruct a period of intense bombardment that left lasting marks across the inner Solar System.

The post Lunar Meteorite Preserves Evidence of Colossal Asteroid Strike appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.

Secret to Sloths’ Slow Life May Lie in Ancient ‘Jumping Genes’

10 June 2026 at 16:13

The Linnaeus’s two-toed sloth (Choloepus didactylus) at London Zoo. Image credit: Dick Culbert / CC BY 2.0.

In new research, scientists sequenced and analyzed chromosome-level genomes of the Linnaeus’s two-toed sloth (Choloepus didactylus) and the southern anteater (Tamandua tetradactyla).

The post Secret to Sloths’ Slow Life May Lie in Ancient ‘Jumping Genes’ appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.