First known Neanderthal family discovered in Siberian cave

For the first time, researchers have identified a set of closely related Neanderthals: a father, his teenage daughter and two other more distant relatives. The discovery of the family and seven more individuals in Chagyrskaya Cave in southern Siberia, along with two more from a nearby site, nearly doubles the number of known Neanderthal genomes. Genetic clues found in the individuals’ DNA hint that the population of breeding adults was low, and that there was more diversity in maternally inherited mitochondrial genomes — suggesting that mothers left their communities to build new families.

Oldest known star map found hidden in sacred text

A mediæval parchment from a monastery in Egypt has yielded a surprising treasure. Hidden beneath a religious text, scholars have discovered what seems to be part of the long-lost star catalogue of the astronomer Hipparchus — thought to be the earliest known attempt to map the entire sky. Scholars have been searching for Hipparchus’s catalogue for centuries. The extract illuminates a crucial moment in the birth of science, when astronomers shifted from simply describing the patterns they saw in the sky to measuring and predicting them.

Optical clocks could redefine the second

Physicists have devised a way to synchronise the ticking of two clocks through the air with extreme precision, across a record distance of 113 kilometres, using precise pulses of laser light. The feat is a step towards redefining the second using optical clocks — timekeepers that are 100 times more precise than atomic clocks. Hyper-precise clocks could have a role in testing the general theory of relativity and revealing subtle changes in gravitational fields.

Neurones in a dish learn to play computer game

Hundreds of thousands of human neurones growing in a dish coated with electrodes have been taught to play a version of the classic computer game Pong. In doing so, the cells join a growing pantheon of Pong players, including pigs taught to manipulate joysticks with their snout and monkeys wired to control the game with their minds. The gamer cells respond to electrical signals from the electrodes, which both stimulate the cells and record changes in neuronal activity. Researchers then converted the stimulation signals and the cellular responses into a visual depiction of the game.

Asteroid diverted for the first time

NASA has announced that the spacecraft it slammed into an asteroid on 26 September succeeded in altering the space rock’s movement by even more than expected. The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft nudged the asteroid Dimorphos closer to its partner, Didymos, and cut its orbit time around that rock by 32 minutes.

Underground microbes may have swarmed ancient Mars

Ancient Mars might have been capable of nurturing hydrogen-eating, methane-producing microbes. Although similar creatures helped to make the environment on Earth more conducive to life, they would have done the opposite on Mars. Computer models show that methane produced by Martian microbial life would have cooled the planet and made it uninhabitable.

Evidence of dinosaur-killing asteroid impact found on the moon

Researchers studying tiny glass beads in lunar soil samples brought back by China’s Chang’e-5 mission have reconstructed a timeline of asteroid strikes on the Moon — and found that they mirrored impacts on Earth. The finding suggests that asteroid strikes on our planet, including the one that killed the dinosaurs some 66 million years ago, were accompanied by a series of smaller collisions both here and on the Moon. This should make the history of Earth’s bombardment in some ways easier to study: the glass beads, formed by the heat and pressure generated during an asteroid strike, are common on the Moon but harder to find on Earth.