A few years ago, geologist Abderrazak El Albani and his team at the Institut de chimie des milieux et matériaux de Poitiers (CNRS/Université de Poitiers) discovered the oldest existing fossils […]
CNRS
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Press Release
Could Mini-Neptunes Be Irradiated Ocean Planets?
Many exoplanets known today are “super-Earths”, with a radius 1.3 times that of Earth, and “mini-Neptunes”, with 2.4 Earth radii. Mini-Neptunes, which are less dense, were long thought to be […]
Posted inFossils & Paleontology, Press Release
There Was Collective Animal Behavior On Earth 480 Million Years Ago
Though our understanding of the anatomy of the earliest animals is growing ever more precise, we know next to nothing about their behaviour. Did group behaviour arise recently or is […]
Posted inAstrochemistry, Atmospheres, Climate, Weather, Comets and Asteroids, Press Release
A Family Of Comets Reopens The Debate About the Origin Of Earth's Water
Where did the Earth’s water come from? Although comets, with their icy nuclei, seem like ideal candidates, analyses have so far shown that their water differs from that in our […]
Posted inMicrobiology & Virology, Press Release
Slime Mold Absorbs Substances To Memorize Them
Physarum polycephalum is a complex single-cell organism that has no nervous system. It can learn and transfer its knowledge to its fellow slime moulds via fusion. How it did so […]
Posted inOrigin & Evolution of Life, Press Release
Discovery Of The Oldest Evidence Of Mobility On Earth
An international and multi-disciplinary team coordinated by Abderrazak El Albani at the Institut de chimie des milieux et matériaux de Poitiers (CNRS/Université de Poitiers) has uncovered the oldest fossilised traces […]
Posted inGravitational Biology, Press Release
Why Plants Are So Sensitive To Gravity
If you tilt a plant, it will alter its growth to bend back upwards. But how does it detect the inclination? With cellular clinometers: cells filled with microscopic grains of […]
Posted inAstrochemistry, Comets and Asteroids, Press Release
Does the Organic Material of Comets Predate our Solar System?
The Rosetta space probe discovered a large amount of organic material in the nucleus of comet “Chury.” In an article published by MNRAS on August 31, 2017, two French researchers […]
Posted inHabitable Zones, Press Release
Will Earth Exist in 5 Billion Years?
What will happen to Earth when, in a few billion years’ time, the Sun is a hundred times bigger than it is today? Using the most powerful radio telescope in […]
Posted inAstrochemistry, Comets and Asteroids
Artificial Comet Suggests Ribose Could Form in Cometary Ice
Researchers have for the first time shown that ribose, a sugar that is one of the building blocks of genetic material in living organisms, may have formed in cometary ices. […]