Hayabusa2 has blasted the surface of asteroid Ryugu to make a crater

Hayabusa2 has blasted the asteroid Ryugu with a projectile, probably adding a crater to the small world’s surface and stirring up dust that scientists hope to snag. The projectile, a two-kilogram copper cylinder, separated from the Hayabusa2 spacecraft at 9:56 p.m. EDT on April 4, JAXA, Japan’s space agency, reports. Hayabusa2 flew to the other ... Read more

A Greek skull may belong to the oldest human found outside of Africa

A skull found in a cliffside cave on Greece’s southern coast in 1978 represents the oldest Homo sapiens fossil outside Africa, scientists say. That skull, from an individual who lived at least 210,000 years ago, was encased in rock that also held a Neandertal skull dating to at least 170,000 years ago, contends a team ... Read more

How meningitis-causing bacteria invade the brain

Bacteria can slip into the brain by commandeering cells in the brain’s protective layers, a new study finds. The results hint at how a deadly infection called bacterial meningitis takes hold. In mice infected with meningitis-causing bacteria, the microbes exploit previously unknown communication between pain-sensing nerve cells and immune cells to slip by the brain’s ... Read more

The Milky Way may be spawning many more stars than astronomers had thought

The Milky Way is churning out far more stars than previously thought, according to a new estimate of its star formation rate. Gamma rays from aluminum-26, a radioactive isotope that arises primarily from massive stars, reveal that the Milky Way converts four to eight solar masses of interstellar gas and dust into new stars each ... Read more

Psychedelics may improve mental health by getting inside nerve cells

Psychedelics go beneath the cell surface to unleash their potentially therapeutic effects. These drugs are showing promise in clinical trials as treatments for mental health disorders (SN: 12/3/21). Now, scientists might know why. These substances can get inside nerve cells in the cortex — the brain region important for consciousness — and tell the neurons ... Read more

Hominids used stone tool kits to butcher animals earlier than once thought

Nearly 3 million years ago, hominids employed stone tool kits to butcher hippos and pound plants along what’s now the shores of Kenya’s Lake Victoria, researchers say. Evidence of those food preparation activities pushes back hominids’ use of these tool kits, known as Oldowan implements, by roughly 300,000 years, say paleoanthropologist Thomas Plummer of Queen’s ... Read more

Mosquitoes prefer dozing over dining when they are sleep-deprived

Turns out there is rest for the wicked: Sleepy mosquitoes are more likely to catch up on missed z’s than drink blood, a new study finds. Most people are familiar with the aftermath of a poor night’s sleep. Insects also suffer; for instance, drowsy honeybees struggle to perform their signature waggle dance, and weary fruit ... Read more

A pigment’s shift in chemistry robbed a painted yellow rose of its brilliance

The fading of a once-vibrant yellow rose reveals how the ravages of time and chemical alteration can dampen the visual power of a painting. Most of the flowers in Abraham Mignon’s 17th century painting Still Life with Flowers and a Watch seem to leap off the canvas. But one yellow rose, painted with arsenic sulfide–based ... Read more

How having health care workers handle nonviolent police calls may impact crime

For the last two years, a person acting erratically in downtown Denver has likely first encountered unarmed health care workers rather than police. That shift stems from the rollout of a program known as Support Team Assisted Response, or STAR, which sends a mental health clinician and paramedic to respond to certain 911 calls about ... Read more

How neutrinos could ensure a submarine’s nuclear fuel isn’t weaponized

Nuclear submarines might provide rogue nations with a path to nuclear weapons. But neutrinos could help reveal attempts to go from boats to bombs. Neutrinos, lightweight subatomic particles that are released from the reactors that power nuclear subs, could expose the alteration or removal of the nuclear fuel for nefarious purposes, physicists report in a ... Read more