Science news this week: The world’s oldest rock art, giant freshwater reservoir found off the East Coast, and the biggest solar radiation storm in decades
This week’s science news was filled with discoveries thought lost to time, including the the oldest known rock art in the world was discovered in Indonesia.
The approximately 70,000-year-old stencil of a human hand discovered in a Sulawesi cave promises to fill a major gap in scientists’ understanding of humanity’s migration across the islands of Southeast Asia to Australia, and was likely left behind by an ancestor of Indigenous Australians.
Giant freshwater reservoir beneath the seabed of the East Coast
An expedition off the coast of Massachusetts this week confirmed the existence of a giant underground reservoir that could supply a city the size of New York with fresh water for about 800 years.
The freshwater reservoir stretches from offshore New Jersey to northern Maine and may have formed 20,000 years ago during the last ice age, when rainwater was trapped underground before sea levels rose.
More definitive results on how and when the reservoir took shape, as well as its bacterial and mineral contents, are expected soon. The scientists who discovered it say this information could prove vital for those who want to access it in the future.
Discover more stories about planet Earth
—The Arctic Explosion Probably Won’t Explode Trees in Cold Weather, But Here’s What Will Happen If and When They Go Boom
—Californians use much less water than suppliers estimated. What does this mean for the state?
—“The scientific cost would be severe”: Trump takeover of Greenland would endanger climate research
The little mysteries of life
It’s a truism that we often forget what’s right under our noses, but what about our noses themselves? How is it that we go through life ignoring the fleshy prows perched on our faces, and seeing them only with conscious effort? The answer is not because they are out of our sight, but rather because of an ingenious a neurovisual sleight of hand that could be the key to our survival.
—If you liked this, sign up for our newsletter Life’s Little Mysteries
The biggest solar radiation storm in decades
The most powerful solar radiation storm Earth has seen in more than two decades struck Monday, January 19, sending curtains of aurora across the night sky as far as southern California, Arizona and New Mexico.
Although some publications reported that it was the largest geomagnetic storm since 2003, this was a slight exaggeration; The “Mother’s Day Storm” of 2024 was more powerful. However, the latest storm was one of the most powerful solar radiation storms on record, meaning the amount of radiation projected onto Earth was extraordinary.
Discover more space stories
—‘It’s like watching a cosmic volcano erupt’: Scientists see monster black hole ‘reborn’ after 100 million years
—An Arctic-sized ocean once covered half of Mars, new images show
—‘Goddess of Dawn’: James Webb Telescope Spys One of the Earliest Supernovas in the Early Universe
Also in science news this week
—A coyote rushes to Alcatraz Island after a perilous and unprecedented swim
—Diagnostic Dilemma: Woman Had Illusions of Communicating With Her Dead Brother After Late-Night Chatbot Sessions
—It was men, not glaciers, who transported the rocks to Stonehenge, study confirms
Spotlight on science
Not so long ago, astronomers thought they knew the history of how gigantic supermassive black holes formed. They thought it happened the same way ordinary black holes are born: by collapsing from large stars and slowly merging until they reach billions of times the mass of the sun.
But the James Webb Space Telescope appears to have turned that story on its head by finding enormous black holes in the early epochs of our universe that should not have had time to expand by merging or devouring matter.
So how did these behemoths get so huge? Live Science explored the explanations – and all their revolutionary potential – in this fascinating Spotlight on science.
Something for the weekend
If you’re looking for something a little longer to read over the weekend, here are some of the analysis, crosswords and opinion pieces published this week.
—Live Science Crossword #26: Nothing Can Travel Faster Than This – 12 in Diameter [Crossword]
—Indigenous TikTok star ‘Bush Legend’ is actually AI-generated, leading to accusations of ‘digital blackface’ [Opinion]
Science in motion
This week saw the release of a stunning time-lapse of the sun that could help solve one of the most enduring mysteries about our home star.
The images, taken by the European Space Agency’s Proba-3 mission, capture three major plumes of plasma erupting from the Sun’s surface. By studying it in more depth, astronomers want to understand why the Sun’s weak atmosphere, or corona, is hundreds of times hotter than its surface.
A better understanding of the warp and weft of the solar magnetic field lines could help researchers better predict when these lines break to trigger solar flares, some of which can have devastating consequences for Earth.
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