June 2019

World's Oldest Blue Bird Found via Fossil Feathers

Eocoracias brachyptera fossil sample. (Sven Traenkner/Senckenberg Research Institute and Nature Museum) For the first …

Researchers Discover Giant Freshwater Aquifer off U.S. East Coast

Scientists have mapped a huge aquifer off the US Northeast (hatched area). Solid yellow or white lines with triangles sho…

What is Hopper Crystal

A hopper crystal is a form of crystal characterized by its stepped or pyramidal shape, resembling a miniature staircase or …

Plate Tectonics May Have Driven 'Cambrian Explosion'

The Cambrian Explosion –“Supernova of Biology Detonated by Plate Tectonics” The quest to discover what drove one of th…

Fossil of a 15 Ton Sea Creature Found in Antarctica

A hungry Aristonectes plesiosaur eyes a squid in this illustration. The prehistoric plesiosaur — a four-flippered mari…

Giant Trilobite Fossil Found on Australia

A specimen of Redlichia rex from the Emu Bay Shale, Kangaroo Island, Australia. Image credit: Holmes et al, An artist’s i…

Fire Agate: Properties, Formation, Where to Find it

Fire agate is a type of chalcedony, a microcrystalline variety of quartz . It is characterized by its vibrant, iridescent co…

1.2 Billion-Year-Old Meteorite Crater Discovered in Scotland

Reddish-colored rocks of the Stac Fada deposit. Image: University of Oxford The biggest ever recorded meteorite …

What Jumpstarted Earth's Plate Tectonics?

What Jumpstarted Earth's Plate Tectonics? World Tectonic Plates and Their Movement - Earth's outer layer is c…

Study Confirms Banded Iron Formations Originated From Oxidized Iron

2.1 billion year old rock showing banded iron formation. Photo: André Karwath A new study by University of Alberta sci…

Iridescent Bones of a Lost Dinosaur Herd Discovered in an Opal Mine

Iridescent Bones of a Lost Dinosaur Herd Discovered in an Opal Mine. A fossil vertebrae of the newly discovered dinosaur …

Magnetism Discovered in the Earth's Mantle

The interior of the Earth and the experiment graphically illustrated. The blue dotted lines show the magnetic field surro…

New Mineral Classification System Captures Earth's Complex Past

Liddicoatite. Photo: Platonic Gems. The first minerals to form in the universe were nanocrystalline diamonds, which co…