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2025-11-24T18:34:42.495Z
How Antarctica’s melting creates a carbon sink
East Antarctica’s ice sheet, once thought by scientists to be stable despite human-induced climate change, is melting during warm Southern Hemisphere summers.
But here’s the good news. When ice sheets melt and mountain peaks are exposed, iron-rich minerals will be carried into the surrounding ocean, a study published today in the journal Nature Communications found.
“Our findings show that exposed Antarctic rock can act like a steel mill,” study lead author Kate Winter, professor of geography at Northumbria University, said in a statement.
This surge in iron-rich minerals in the ocean could help absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, the study authors suggest, but they say it could take thousands of years for that to happen.
Tia Gorse
Chief Editor (Premium)
2025-11-24T17:03:27.900Z
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That concludes our message from the UK side. But, as always, our North American colleagues will keep you updated on the latest developments. Please keep checking back for the latest information.
2025-11-24T17:01:05.165Z
Could an Arctic “methane bomb” fail?
It’s hard to find good news about climate change these days, so this next study is a welcome rarity.
If you’re a regular reader of Live Science, the news that microorganisms trapped in permafrost could one day accelerate greenhouse gas emissions is probably not news to you. However, new research has revealed that such “methane bombs” could hopefully fail to explode.
That’s because, under some conditions, there may be more methane-eating microorganisms than the methane-producing microorganisms released by the melts, potentially turning Arctic soils into carbon sinks, a new study claims.
Could it be a lifeline for humanity’s future in a warming world, or is this discovery just hot air?
For more information, check out the full article here.
2025-11-24T16:17:23.943Z
You’re much nicer when Batman is watching, scientists confirm
Have you ever felt like you could have been more kind to your fellow travelers, especially when using public transport?
Well, if he had known Batman was watching, he might have done that.
One of the strangest behavioral studies we’ve seen in a while showed that train passengers were more than twice as likely to offer their seat to a pregnant woman when a person dressed as Batman (a member of the research team, oh my goodness) came in through a different door.
The researchers suggest that it may have been the unexpected nature of Batman’s appearance, rather than his crime-fighting reputation, that fostered subconscious prosociality among train passengers.
However, before we can confirm that, we’ll have to wait for a follow-up investigation by a researcher disguised as the Joker.
2025-11-24T16:15:36.391Z
Wallonia Bone Saw Massacre
Discoveries from a cave in southern Belgium have revealed a horrifying prehistoric secret: Around 45,000 years ago, a group of six Neanderthals, all women and children, were eaten by a group of unknown cannibals, writes Live Science’s Christina Killgrove.
The exact reason for this tragic event, or whether the perpetrators were Neanderthals or an outgroup of early Homo sapiens, all remain unknown. (Although researchers believe that traces of cannibalism at other Neanderthal sites in France and Croatia suggest the former).
Researchers argue that the deaths may have been caused by deadly intergroup tensions that occurred during a period marked by a decline in Neanderthal cultural diversity.
You can read the full text here.
2025-11-24T15:44:40.955Z
Hurricane Melissa breaks wind speed records
Climate change is making hurricanes more powerful, faster and more dangerous than before, and some scientists are considering introducing additional Category 6 storms to capture the destructive power of these superstorms.
And newly released data showing that Hurricane Melissa, already one of the most powerful Atlantic storms, broke the record for the most powerful wind gusts ever recorded for a tropical cyclone, with winds as high as 252 miles per hour (402 kilometers per hour), the case for the new category could become clearer.
You can read more at Scientific American.
2025-11-24T14:43:32.769Z
Chimpanzee baby boom after deadly conflict (hooray)
Sophie is Live Science’s resident chimpanzee enthusiast. News has been in the news that Uganda’s Ngogo chimpanzees have experienced a massive baby boom after they successfully invaded the territory of a neighboring community.
Now, I don’t mean to speak ill of our closest living relatives. Chimpanzees and bonobos are usually very cooperative towards members of their group. However, chimpanzees in particular do not get along very well with individuals outside their group.
Study co-author Brian Wood told Live Science contributor Chris Sims that the new findings shed light on the evolution of violence in humans. It is very common for biological anthropologists to use chimpanzee behavior as a window into our own evolutionary past. Humans share a lot of DNA with chimpanzees, and our ancestors likely looked and acted exactly like modern chimpanzees.
However, it is worth bearing in mind that the amount of lethal aggression in chimpanzees varies widely across Africa and is largely determined by the social structure of local communities.
East African chimpanzees are also known to be more aggressive than their West African counterparts, and the Ngogo community is the largest chimpanzee community in the world. Personally, I would like to see if we see this post-conflict birthrate spike in any region. We will then know whether this is a species-wide trend (which would lend more support to the idea of a common evolutionary good) or whether it is unique to Ngogo.
You can read the full text here.
Sophie Verdugo
staff writer
2025-11-24T14:28:05.975Z
History of Science: Lucy’s Discovery
On this day in 1974, Tear writes, two anthropologists were digging in Hadar, Ethiopia, and discovered something that would change the story of human evolution.
The glowing object they discovered in the ditch was the fossilized remains of a 3.2 million-year-old human ancestor. As they discussed the find, the Beatles song “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” played in the background, and one of the excavators suggested naming the find “Lucy.”
Lucy’s species later became known as Australopithecus afarensis and was the oldest and most complete skeleton of a human ancestor ever discovered. And her discoveries sparked a recognition among anthropologists that the history of human evolution resembles a web rather than a family tree.
You can read the full text here.
2025-11-24T13:23:07.676Z
Live Science Summary
ben turner
Trend News Deputy Editor
2025-11-24T12:55:20.747Z
Why cat siblings don’t look alike
When we adopted our cat “Scallop” from the ASPCA as a kitten, she left behind her younger brother “Krum” who we picked up from the same kitten. Scallop looked like an adorable blue-point Siamese, while Krum was a (also adorable) gray domestic shorthair with white socks.
I’ve always wondered, why aren’t these two similar?
Now, a story from former (and much missed) content manager Marilyn Perkins explains why feline siblings can look so different from each other.
You can read the full text here.
Tia Gorse
Chief Editor (Premium)
2025-11-24T12:27:41.926Z
Man infected with H5N5 avian influenza strain dies
A Washington state man who was infected with the H5N5 avian influenza virus for the first time has died from complications caused by the virus, CNN reports.
The patient was an elderly man with underlying health conditions and had a mixed flock of birds in his backyard, making this the likely source of infection, state health officials said.
While this initial infection with H5N5 is noteworthy, it is not considered to be as much of a threat to human health as the H5N1 virus, which caused a wave of about 70 reported human infections in the United States in 2024 and 2025, most of them in poultry and dairy farm workers who suffered mild symptoms.
Here are some stories about how best to avoid bird flu infection and what you can do to prevent the virus from spreading from person to person.
2025-11-24T12:21:10.069Z
“Other” Comet Atlas Collapse
Good morning, science fans. And welcome back. We bring you new science news and lots of images showing the “other” Comet Atlas (C/2025 K1) breaking apart.
Scientists initially thought the comet was unrelated to interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS and had survived its recent approach to the Sun. But images from the Virtual Telescope Project revealed its tragic end.
The comet’s disintegration was likely the result of the sun’s powerful gravitational pull, which split the comet into three bright pieces, photographer Michael Yeager said.
ben turner
Trend News Deputy Editor
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