174 articles from FRIDAY 1.5.2020

Window to another world: Life is bubbling up to seafloor with petroleum from deep below

The COVID-19 pandemic is a stark reminder that we move through a world shaped by unseen life. Bacteria, viruses, and other microscopic organisms regulate the Earth's vital functions and resources, from the air we breathe to all our food and most of our energy sources. An estimated one-third of the Earth's microbes are literally hidden, buried in sediments deep below the ocean floor. Now,...

NASA’s Biggest Space Launch in Years Is Coming Up — But It Wants You to Stay Home to Watch

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — NASA and SpaceX on Friday urged everyone to stay home for the first home launch of astronauts in nearly a decade because of the coronavirus pandemic. Top officials warned the public against traveling to Florida for the May 27 launch of two NASA astronauts aboard a SpaceX rocket to the International Space Station. It will be the first launch of astronauts from...

New timeline for ancient magnetic field on Mars

Mars had a global magnetic field much earlier -- and much later -- than previously known. Analysis of new satellite data found clear evidence of a magnetic field coming from a lava flow that formed less than 3.7 billion years ago, half a billion years after many people thought the Martian dynamo had ceased. The researchers also detected low-intensity magnetic fields over the Borealis Basin,...

Sustainable structural material for plastic substitute

Plastic gives us a lightweight, strong and inexpensive material to use, but it has also caused the plastic apocalypse. Much of the unrecycled plastic waste ends up in the ocean, Earth's last sink. Broken down by waves, sunlight and marine animals, a single plastic bag can become 1.75 million microplastic fragments. Those microplastics might finally end up in our bodies through the fish we eat or...