Early primates evolved in cold climates, not tropical jungles — earth.com
Sixty-six million years ago, North America saw long, dark winters. Fossils now suggest tiny primates were already there, coping with ice and snow.
A new analysis turns the usual tropical origin story on its head. The research combines hundreds of fossils with climate models to track primate ancestors through time.
“Our findings flip that narrative entirely,” said Jorge Avaria-Llautureo, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Reading. His team traced the primate family tree back to chilly northern forests.
MIT Backs Away From Paper Claiming Scientists Make More Discoveries with AI — gizmodo
Last year, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was touting the research of a PhD student on the impact of AI on the workforce that “floored” professors in the field. Now the university is backing away from it and calling for it to no longer be published. On Friday, MIT announced that it reviewed the paper following concerns and determined that it should be “withdrawn from public discourse.”
The paper, titled “Artificial Intelligence, Scientific Discovery, and Product Innovation” snagged all sorts of attention and headlines for its finding that scientists aided by AI tools were considerably more productive than their peers working without the technological aid—but those same researchers making more discoveries were significantly less satisfied by their work. The work was considered a breakthrough, and Daron Acemoglu, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor who recently won the Nobel Prize in economics, described it as “fantastic.”
But the findings didn’t quite sit right with some … a computer scientist with experience in materials science approached MIT professors with questions about how the AI tool used in the experiment worked and just how big of a boost in innovation that it was actually responsible for … which started a review process that ultimately led to MIT stating that it “has no confidence in the provenance, reliability or validity of the data and has no confidence in the veracity of the research contained in the paper.”
This is an open thread where everyone is welcome, especially night owls and early birds, to share and discuss the happenings of the day. Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
Wildfire smoke far more dangerous to health than thought, say scientists — the guardian
Deaths from short-term exposure to fine particulates spewed by forest fires underestimated by 93%
The study comes as wildfires ravage southern Europe, and new data from EU fire monitors shows that 895,000 hectares (2.2m acres) have burned so far in 2025, breaking records for this time of year. They have pumped out more than twice the amount of PM2.5 that wildfires have generated on average by this point in the year over the last two decades.
“Previously, people assumed the same toxicity for wildfire particles and all particles,” said Prof Cathryn Tonne, an environmental epidemiologist at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal) and co-author of the study. […]
In December, a study attributed 1.53 million deaths around the world each year to short-term and long-term exposure to air pollution from wildfires.
These birds won’t stop singing, and it’s our fault — wapo paywall removed
Around the world, streetlights, store signs and skyscrapers are pouring artificial light into the night, and all that extra illumination is prompting birds to tweet for nearly an extra hour a day on average, according to a sweeping analysis of more than 4 million birdcall recordings.
The finding is another sign of how brightening the night is altering the health of both ecosystems and human beings. Light pollution is upending the lives of birds and other organisms that depend on the rhythms of the sun to find food and mates. […]
For their study, Gilbert and Brent Pease, an ecologist at Southern Illinois University, tapped into a library of bird vocalizations called BirdWeather, a platform that allows both amateur birders and professional ornithologists to place microphones in their backyards and record birdcalls.
The Plan to Turn the Caribbean’s Glut of Sargassum Into Biofuel — wired
For the past 15 years, large quantities of this brownish-colored seaweed [sargassum] have been invading beaches around the Gulf of Mexico every summer … this summer could be the worst on record, with up to 400,000 tons of sargassum predicted to wash up on Mexican coasts. As well as covering up the sand and spoiling the appearance of the country’s pristine beaches, the seaweed releases gases as it decomposes—toxic hydrogen sulfide, as well as the greenhouse gases methane and carbon dioxide.
For engineer Miguel Ángel Aké Madera, an expert in nonconventional energies, washed up sargassum needs to be processed in large quantities to stop it being a problem—and in his view, this can be achieved by using it to make biofuel. […]
“I believe that sargassum’s purpose is to produce energy, because when it decomposes, it releases many heavy metals such as arsenic, lead, and cadmium,” Amaro says. “Therefore it is better to produce biofuels or biogas than everyday products like clothing or shoes.”
Crack an egg in a pan, turn up the heat, and you can witness a kind of magic. In seconds, the viscous liquid solidifies. And despite the rising heat, it’s the opposite of melting that occurs. I was a teenager when a biology teacher explained this paradox to me: “The egg is full of proteins, and the heat has denatured them.”
Denatured. The word was new to me. Decades later, I find it is a fitting descriptor of more than just wayward proteins.
My teacher had explained that every protein has a temperature at which it functions best. Too hot or too cold, and the protein’s shape buckles or breaks. It can no longer bond with other chemicals. It ceases to work.
I think of that fried egg often when I consider what rising temperatures mean for our planet.
The proteins inside us and every other living thing vary greatly. Some tolerate heat better than others. Some destabilize with just a slight rise in temperature. The danger lies not in the average protein, but in the weaker links — those most likely to fail in extreme heat. As the world warms, what will happen to the millions of proteins across millions of species, from spores to sperm whales, soil bacteria to sunflowers?
This deadly bacteria was once an “only in New York” problem. Not anymore. — vox
Air conditioners have been working overtime this hot summer, from those tiny window units to the massive AC towers that serve the tightly packed apartment buildings in major cities. And while they bring the relief of cool air, these contraptions also create the conditions for dangerous bacteria to multiply and spread.
One particularly nasty bacteria-borne illness is currently spreading in New York City using those enormous cooling units as its vector: Legionnaire’s disease. The bacterial pneumonia, which usually recurs each summer in the US’s largest city, has sickened more than 100 people and killed five in a growing outbreak.
If you don’t live in New York City or the Northeast, you may never have heard of Legionnaire’s, but this niche public health threat may not be niche for much longer.
Uranus Was Hiding a Moon Outside Its Rings — nytimes paywall removed
The space around Uranus just got a bit more crowded.
On Tuesday, astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope announced the discovery of a moon orbiting around the pale blue ice giant, bringing its total number of satellites to 29. The latest addition, tentatively known as S/2025 U1, is tinier and fainter than any of the planet’s other known moons. That is the likely explanation for why it was missed in observations by previous telescopes or spacecraft. […]
The astronomers discovered S/2025 U1 in a series of images collected by the NIRCam in February. The moon was found lurking outside of the planet’s brightest ring, Epsilon, between two other satellites, Ophelia and Bianca.
This moon is not a shepherd moon for the Epsilon ring, as the astronomers expected. The team estimates that it is about six miles wide, and in a nearly circular orbit some 35,000 miles away from Uranus’s center. It is the 14th inner moon to be discovered orbiting the planet.
The Problem Is With Men’s Sperm -ny times paywall removed
I can’t remember when I learned that women’s fertility starts to wane in our 30s; it feels like I was born knowing that my eggs had a sell-by date. Men, conversely, are rarely encouraged to think about their ability to have children.
The discussion around healthy sperm seems confined to cloistered and strange subcultures, like natalist group chats and tech bro sperm races. The latter is a real thing in Los Angeles, where men raced their sperm against each other.
Male fertility deserves broader consideration outside these isolated spaces. Mounting evidence suggests that exposure to so-called endocrine-disrupting chemicals present in many products, from food and beverage containers to furniture and agricultural pesticides, may affect male potency from the very beginning of life…
…Dr. Swan thinks we may be underestimating how much the deterioration of sperm is influencing overall fertility. “The animal evidence is really important,” she told me. Studies have shown that endocrine-disrupting chemicals also affect the fertility of many different kinds of male wildlife, and it’s not as if fish are deciding to put off childbearing until they’re more financially stable.
Miracle Plant Used in Ancient Greece Rediscovered After 2,000 Years. — greek reporter
The “miracle” plant Silphium consumed by Ancient Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians, which was thought to have become extinct two thousand years ago, has recently been rediscovered in Turkey by a professor, who thinks he’s found a botanical survivor.
The plant, which the Ancient Greeks called silphion (silphium), was a golden-flowered plant. It was once the most sought-after product in the Mediterranean even before the rise of Athens and the Roman Empire.
It is believed that the plant with yellow flowers attached to a thick stalk was crushed, roasted, sauteed, and boiled for medicinal purposes, food, and even contraception. During the reign of Julius Caesar, more than a thousand pounds of the plant were stockpiled alongside gold in Rome’s imperial treasures, and silphion saplings were valued at the same price as silver.