Science

The logo of Swiss pharmaceutical group Lonza is seen at its headquarters in Basel, Switzerland March 2, 2020. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann (Reuters) – Moderna Inc and Swiss contract drugmaker Lonza Group AG said on Friday they would accelerate the manufacturing of the U.S. drug developer’s potential coronavirus vaccine. The announcement comes at a time when drugmakers

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The sun appears to be far less active than similar stars in terms of brightness variations caused by sunspots and other phenomena – a “boring” personality, according to scientists, that may not be a bad thing for us Earthlings. FILE PHOTO: A medium-sized (M2) solar flare and a coronal mass ejection (CME)

ZURICH (Reuters) – Researchers in Switzerland have been able to detect the new corovarirus at even low concentrations in wastewater, offering a potential early warning system for flareups in infections as countries emerge from emergency lockdowns. Should the system work, sewage samples could let public health officials see a resurgence of COVID-19 infections earlier than

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The huge African predator ​Spinosaurus spent much of its life in the water, propelled by a paddle-like tail while hunting large fish – a “river monster,” according to scientists, that showed that some dinosaurs invaded the aquatic realm. Tools lie at the excavation site of Spinosauru in the Kem Kem region of

LONDON (Reuters) – One of the world’s largest lunar meteorites goes on private sale at Christie’s on Thursday, valued at 2 million pounds ($2.49 million). The moon rock, weighing over 13.5 kg, was probably struck off the surface of the moon by a collision with an asteroid or comet and then showered down on the

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A prehistoric opossum-sized critter dubbed the “crazy beast” that inhabited Madagascar at the end of the age of dinosaurs is providing scientists insight into early mammalian evolution even as they scratch their heads over its bewildering anatomy. Life-like reconstruction of the opossum-sized mammal Adalatherium hui that lived 66 million years ago alongside

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Scientists at New York City’s health department have begun to analyze the novel coronavirus’s genetic material to allow them to trace the origins of any future outbreaks in the coming months as they cautiously look to reopen the largely shuttered city. Their work joins similar efforts at scores of institutions around

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – When paleontologist Thomas Mörs was peering into a microscope while sorting through tiny 40 million-year-old fossils unearthed on Seymour Island near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, he came across quite a surprise – hip and skull bones of a frog. Paleontologists working at the site on Antarctica’s Seymour Island where fossils

FILE PHOTO: A lander for China’s Mars mission is seen before a hovering-and-obstacle avoidance test at a test facility in Huailai, Hebei province, China November 14, 2019. REUTERS/Jason Lee BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s space agency on Friday unveiled the name of its first Mars exploration mission, coinciding with China’s annual Space Day and the 50th

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The world’s ants, bees, butterflies, grasshoppers, fireflies and other land-dwelling insects have been suffering population drops of about 9% per decade but freshwater bugs such as dragonflies and mosquitoes have been rallying, researchers said on Thursday. FILE PHOTO: A bee lands on a bluebell in a garden in West London, Britain, April

(Reuters) – Texas science teacher Avri DiPietro has a secret weapon in her tool kit to help keep her students engaged now that the coronavirus pandemic has forced them to stay home indefinitely. It’s a home experiment known as “the burping bag.” The assignment calls for her sixth graders to combine vinegar and baking soda

(Reuters) – From tinkling harmonies as the virus disarms cells to clashing and stormy as it replicates, U.S. scientists have translated the novel coronavirus’ spiked protein structure to music in an effort to better understand the pathogen. FILE PHOTO: The ultrastructural morphology exhibited by the 2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), which was identified as the cause

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Scientists have observed what appears to be the aftermath of a violent collision between two planetary building blocks orbiting a large and luminous star, a glimpse of the type of carnage that may have been commonplace early in our solar system’s history. Artist’s Impression of a collision of two icy asteroid-sized bodies

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A wondrous lineage of crocodile relatives that developed into fast-swimming seagoing predators at a time when dinosaurs dominated the land adapted to life in the open ocean with a pivotal evolutionary modification also present in whales. A life reconstruction of the Jurassic Period marine crocodile relative Cricosaurus is seen in this image

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Scientists have discovered that a comet called 2I/Borisov – only the second interstellar object ever detected passing through the solar system – is surprisingly different in its composition from comets hailing from our celestial neighborhood. The interstellar comet 2I/Borisov travels through our solar system in an artist’s impression obtained by Reuters April

(Reuters) – NASA on Friday set a launch date of May 27 for its first astronaut mission from U.S. soil in nearly ten years.  FILE PHOTO: A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, carrying the Crew Dragon astronaut capsule, lifts off on an in-flight abort test , a key milestone before flying humans in 2020 under NASA’s commercial