Gravitational waves hint at detection of black hole eating star

Gravitational waves may have just delivered the first sighting of a black hole devouring a neutron star. If confirmed, it would be the first evidence of the existence of such binary systems. The news comes just a day after astronomers had detected gravitational waves from a merger of two neutron stars for only the second time.

simulation of a black hole consuming a neutron star

Twenty-two-million-year-old bones reveal a meat-eater that ruled long before the big cats

The enormous predator, named Simbakubwa kutokaafrika — “big lion from Africa” in Swahili — roamed what is now Kenya around 22 million years ago and was probably larger than a polar bear.  However, Simbakubwa was not a cat, but one of a group of animals called hyaenodonts that includes some of the biggest predatory mammals ever to walk on Earth. Hyaenodonts were the top carnivores before hyaenas, cats, dogs and bears staged their global takeover.

Is the Newly Found Hominin, Homo Luzonensis, an Australopithecine?

The human family tree has grown another branch, after researchers unearthed remains of a previously unknown hominin species from a cave in the Philippines. They have named the new species, which was probably small-bodied, Homo luzonensis.

The shape of the H. luzonensis foot bones most resembles those of Australopithecus — primitive hominins, including the famous fossil Lucy, thought not to have ever left Africa.

Black hole pictured for first time

Astronomers have finally glimpsed the blackness of a black hole. By stringing together a global network of radio telescopes, they have for the first time produced a picture of an event horizon — a black hole’s perilous edge — against a backdrop of swirling light.

Mars Express confirms methane spike and narrows down location of its source

Fleeting spikes of methane have been detected in the Martian atmosphere several times over more than a decade, but none had been independently confirmed — until now.