discovery

Physicists Nima Arkani-Hamed and Jaroslav Trnka recently published a significant advance in the study of Scattering Amplitudes. These are formulas that physicists use to calculate everything from the chance an unstable particle will decay to the probability of new discoveries at the Large Hadron Collider. The two reformulated scattering amplitudes within a popular framework called N=4 super Yang-Mills, treating them as properties of abstract geometrical objects. In doing so, Arkani-Hamed and Trnka hope to gain a deeper understanding of the nature of quantum field theory.

A new planet was discovered that is similar to Earth in size and composition, meaning it has a rocky surface and an iron core. But that is where similarities end. This twin, named Kepler-78b, has an orbit so close to its parent star, that the surface is about 2,000 degrees hotter than Earth's. The planet's orbit around the star takes only 8.5 hours, instead Earth's 12 month orbit. Located 400 light years away from Earth in the constellation Cyngus, this hellish Earth shouldn't exist. For a planet only 20% larger than Earth with such a small orbit, astronomers can't figure out how it was formed.

Scanning the heavens, you might very well miss the star Kepler-62. It's a rather typical star, slightly smaller, cooler, and more orange than the Sun, much like tens of billions of other stars in our galaxy. But it holds a surprise: It's orbited by at least five planets… and two of them are Earth-sized and orbit the star in its habitable zone!

In a very rare find, a new Mammal species called the 'olinguito' has been discovered. Even the researcher who discovered it had to admit it's darn cute, saying, "it looks kind of like a fuzzball."

It's native to South America and is something of a "cross between a teddy bear and a house cat." Other notable features of the olinguito include a tiny, pink button nose, long sharp claws, and beautiful golden and mahogany fur.

Read more about this little cutie on Smithsonian Science.

Most geneticists agree that Native Americans are descended from Siberians who crossed into America 26,000 to 18,000 years ago via a land bridge over the Bering Strait. But while genetic analysis of modern Native Americans lends support to this idea, strong fossil evidence has been lacking.

Now a nearly complete skeleton of a prehistoric teenage girl, newly discovered in an underwater cave in the Yucatán Peninsula, establishes a clear link between the ancient and modern peoples, scientists say.

These are the photographs and journal of George Murray Levick, who traveled with Captain Robert Falcon Scott (greatest name ever) on the ill-fated south pole expedition.



Via Discovery:

Levick was one of six men in Scott's Northern Party, who summered (1911-1912) at Cape Adare and survived the winter of 1912 in a snow cave when their ship was unable to reach them. Levick was not part of the team that accompanied Scott on his doomed quest to be the first to reach the South Pole.

After an arduous two-and-a-half month trek, Scott and his crew did make it to the South Pole on Jan. 17, 1912. But they discovered that the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen had beat them to it. Scott and his team died on the way back to their base, faced with a blizzard and dwindling supplies.