In a new study on the UK Biobank cohort, habitual coffee or caffeine consumption, especially at a moderate level, was associated with a lower risk of new-onset cardiometabolic multimorbidity, which refers to the coexistence of at least two cardiometabolic diseases. Lu et al. found that regular coffee or caffeine intake, especially at moderate levels, was
The Horned Serpent panel at La Belle France in the Free State province of South Africa was painted by the San people at least two hundred years ago. It pictures, among many other elements, a tusked animal with a head that resembles that of a dicynodont, the fossils of which are abundant and conspicuous in
Breakup of an asteroid passing within Earth’s Roche limit likely formed the debris ring during the middle Ordovician period, according to new research from Monash University. Tomkins et al. suggest that a large chondrite asteroid had a near miss encounter with Earth 466 million years ago, which caused it to break up as it passed
In the Standard Model of particle physics, the masses of the carriers of the weak interaction, the W and Z bosons, are uniquely related. Physics beyond the Standard Model can change this relationship through the effects of virtual particle quantum loops, thus making it of paramount importance to measure these masses with the highest possible
Primordial black holes are one of the strongest candidates for the Universe’s dark matter. In this scenario, their abundance would be large enough for at least one object to cross through the inner Solar System per decade. A flyby like this would introduce a wobble into Mars’ orbit, to a degree that today’s technology could
Bubble use evolved in many small invertebrates to enable underwater breathing, but, until recently, there has been no evidence that vertebrate animals use bubbles in a similar manner. Only one group of vertebrates, semi-aquatic Anolis lizards, may be an exception: these lizards dive underwater when threatened and, while underwater, rebreathe a bubble of air over
Paleontologists have described a new species of fossil comma shrimp based on a well-preserved specimen found in the Japanese prefecture of Shizuoka. Makrokylindrus itoi. Image credit: Javier Luque & Sarah Gerken, doi: 10.1111/ivb.12440. “Comma shrimp, or cumaceans, are a group of small peracarid crustaceans with over 1,900 living species currently described worldwide,” said Dr. Javier
Archaeologists have unearthed hundreds of Clovis stone tools at the 13,000-year-old campsite of Belson in southwest Michigan; Clovis people traveled to this site annually, probably in the summer, for at least three but likely up to five consecutive years; the stone artifacts also show evidence that the settlers’ diets included a wide variety of animals