The SpaceX Inspiration4 mission provided a unique opportunity to study the impact of spaceflight on the human body.
Temperatures of several thousand degrees Celsius and pressures of millions of atmospheres: superionic water only forms under extreme conditions. These conditions transform water into an unusual state in which hydrogen […]
South Africa is home to some of the oldest evidence of life on Earth, contained in rocky, often layered outcroppings called microbialites. Like coral reefs, these complex “living rocks” are […]
Blooms of dark pigmented microalgae accelerate glacier and ice sheet melting by reducing the surface albedo.
Analysis of fossilised rocks known as stromatolites from more than two-and-a-half billion years ago has provided new insights into the conditions on Earth before the evolution of oxygen.
Depth degradation is a problem biologists know all too well: The deeper you look into a sample, the fuzzier the image becomes. A worm embryo or a piece of tissue […]
D-amino acids, found in excess in a minority of organisms and crucial for marine invertebrates, contrast with the more common L-amino acids in most life forms.
Modern Mars is bipolar, cold, and oxidizing, while early Mars was characterized by icy highlands, episodic warmth and reducing atmosphere. The timing and association of the climate and redox transitions […]
The relative roles of protoplanetary differentiation versus late accretion in establishing Earth’s life-essential volatile element inventory are being hotly debated.
Evidence from the International Space Station suggests microbial populations are rapidly adapting to the spacecraft environment; however, the mechanism of this adaptation is not understood. Bacteriophages are prolific mediators of […]
