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☆ Researchers think they have the key to why tardigrades can survive almost anything
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-05 | by ( Jenna Schnuer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

CNN —Tardigrades, also known as water bears, commonly survive in some of Earth’s most challenging environments. Under stress in extreme cold or other harsh environmental conditions, tardigrades’ bodies produce unstable free radicals of oxygen and an unpaired electron, aka a reactive oxygen species that can wreak havoc on the body’s proteins and DNA if they overaccumulate. The survival mechanism kicks off when cysteines, one of the amino acids that forms proteins in the body, come into contact with these oxygen free radicals and becomes oxidized, the researchers found. The free radicals become, so to speak, the hammer used to smash the glass on a fire alarm. “We came up with this idea (that) maybe it’s those species that are actually signaling to the tardigrades to enter their tun state,” she said.

Persons: CNN — Tardigrades, Amanda L, cysteines, ” Smythers, Smythers, Amanda Smythers Smythers, William R, Miller, ” Miller, Jenna Schnuer Organizations: CNN, International Space Station, Dana, Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School, Getty, University of North, Chapel, Marshall University, Baker University Locations: ”, Boston, Antarctica, University of North Carolina, Huntington , West Virginia, Baldwin City , Kansas, Anchorage , Alaska

☆ Migration of Alaska’s earliest people linked to woolly mammoth’s movements
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-18 | by ( Jenna Schnuer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

The tusk belonged to a woolly mammoth later named Élmayųujey’eh or, for short, Elma. Karen Spaleta, one of the new study's coauthors, takes a sample from a mammoth tusk found at Alaska's Swan Point archaeological site. Woolly mammoth tusks grew at a consistent daily rate, with the earliest days of the animal’s life recorded in the tip of the tusks. “The US Geological Survey has done a pretty darn good job mapping rocks in Alaska,” Rowe said. Changing the picture of hunter-gatherersThe new evidence advances more than an understanding of the early relationship between woolly mammoths and humans.

Persons: Audrey Rowe, Matthew Wooller, Wooller, Karen Spaleta, Rowe, ” Rowe, “, ” Wooller, ”, Love Dalén, Dalén, ” Dalén, Julius Csotonyi, Hunter, Jenna Schnuer Organizations: CNN, University of Alaska, university’s College of Fisheries, Ocean Sciences, Geological Survey, Palaeogenetics Locations: Alaska, Canada, United States, Elma, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Swan, Stockholm, Sweden, Anchorage , Alaska

☆ T. rex fossil is actually a species new to science, study says
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-12 | by ( Jenna Schnuer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —A formerly unknown relative of the most iconic of all dinosaurs, Tyrannosaurus rex, has been newly identified, according to a study released Thursday. Called Tyrannosaurus mcraeensis, the creature likely roamed Earth up to 7 million years before T. rex emerged. But Tyrannosaurus mcraeensis’ bones were discovered decades before the creature officially got its scientific name. “The lower jaw in a Tyrannosaurus rex is actually quite robust. “That set the table for when Sebastian started to look at our specimen and say, ‘Hey, these don’t actually look the same as the famous Tyrannosaurus rex specimens from places like Montana.’”

Persons: rex, mcraeensis, ”, Anthony R, Fiorillo, ” Fiorillo, Sebastian G, Spencer Lucas, Dalman, Kong ”, Sebastian, ’ Organizations: CNN, New, New Mexico Museum, Science, Springfield Science Museum, Cultural Affairs Locations: , New Mexico, New Mexico, Albuquerque, North America, Massachusetts, Montana

☆ Newly discovered pangolin species could aid in fight against extinction
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-27 | by ( Faye Chiu | Jenna Schnuer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

There are eight previously known species of pangolin — four found in Asia and four in Africa. Genomics can help protect threatened speciesThe scales’ form initially suggested they belonged to one of four species of pangolin found in Asia. But DNA analysis showed that their “genomic data provide robust and compelling evidence that it is a new pangolin species distinct from those previously recognized,” Hu said. An analysis of contraband pangolin scales revealed genetic markers not seen in known species, researchers said. “We also expect to find other pangolin species,” Hu said.

Persons: CNN —, —, ”, Jing, Yan Hu, pangolin, ” Hu, Aryn Wilder, Wilder, Manis mysteria, Feng Yang One, ” Wilder, “, Hu Organizations: CNN, State Key Laboratory for Conservation, Yunnan University, San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance Locations: Asia, Africa, Hong Kong, Yunnan

☆ Surprising jellyfish finding challenges what’s known about learning and memory
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-22 | by ( Jenna Schnuer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —Caribbean box jellyfish, animals that may appear to float through life aimlessly and don’t have a central brain, still have the ability to learn rapidly and retain information, new research has found. Caribbean box jellyfish, also known by the scientific name Tripedalia cystophora, have 24 eyes — six in each of four visual sensory centers called rhopalia. How jellyfish learnTo test the animals’ ability to learn, the researchers lined the inside of a round tank with gray and white stripes. The gray stripes would appear to the jellyfish’s 24 eyes as dark as a faraway mangrove root does in their natural habitat. “The scientists devised a very convincing experimental paradigm to quantify associative learning in this box jellyfish.

Persons: Anders Garm, “ We’ve, ”, Jan Bielecki, Bielecki, ” Bielecki, “, Michael Abrams, Abrams, ” Abrams Organizations: CNN, University of Copenhagen, Denmark —, Physiology, Kiel University, University of California, California Institute of Technology Locations: Denmark, Germany, Kiel, Caribbean, Berkeley

☆ Fossil discovery may be one of the oldest, smallest aquatic whales found in Africa, study finds
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-10 | by ( Jenna Schnuer Cnn | Jenna Schnuer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

The find is also the oldest fully aquatic whale found in Africa, according to a new study. Tutcetus rayanensis is a member of the extinct family of early whales known as basilosauridae — the first widespread group to become fully aquatic. The discovery of the whale fossil led to the establishment of a new genus within the basilosauridae family. The area is one of the world’s “most productive fossil whale sites,” according to the study. Tutcetus rayanensis is the second whale species, following Phiomicetus anubis, to be discovered, described, and named by Egyptian paleontologists,” Antar said via email.

Persons: Pharaoh Tutankhamen, rayanensis, ”, Mohammed S, Antar, ” Antar, paleobiologist Nicholas Pyenson, wasn’t, Abdullah Gohar, Mohamed Sameh, Hesham, Whales, Erik R, Seiffert, Carlos Mauricio Peredo, Hesham Sallam Organizations: CNN, Communications, Vertebrate Paleontology, Smithsonian National Museum of, Egypt's, University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine, Miami University in, American University Locations: Egypt, Africa, Washington , DC, Mansoura, Wadi, Miami University in Oxford , Ohio, Cairo

☆ Scientists identify which butterflies are most at risk as the climate warms
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-21 | by ( Jenna Schnuer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

But when things really heat up, they adjust their body temperature in relation to the air temperature through strategies called thermal buffering and thermal tolerance. Thermal buffering includes physical acts like moving into a cooler, shadier area or slanting wings out of the direct path of sunlight. “These are molecules that many animals, butterflies and humans included, produce to protect themselves from high temperatures,” Ashe-Jepson said. For the thermal buffering test, the researchers caught, tested and released 1,334 butterflies representing 54 species from six butterfly families. To test thermal tolerance, a smaller group of the captured butterflies was put to work one more time.

Persons: —, ”, Esme Ashe, Jepson, ” Ashe, “, Ashe, Akito Kawahara, they’ll, ” Kawahara Organizations: CNN, University of Cambridge, Smithsonian Tropical Research, McGuire, University of Florida Locations: United Kingdom, Panama, Biodiversity, Gainesville

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