Earth

Scientists are developing new methods to control mosquitoes as climate change lengthens mosquito season and expands the range of disease-carrying species. The mosquito kills more people than any other animal on earth, spreading diseases such as malaria and dengue, and longer warm seasons give the insects more time to transmit dangerous illnesses. Climate researchers warn the public health threat is growing.

Federal authorities have seized a 54-pound Martian meteorite that was sold at auction last year, with U.S. attorney Jeanine Pirro asserting that the space rock now belongs to the United States. The move raises questions about who holds legal title to meteorites found on Earth and traded through private auction houses, and it has drawn attention to the murky rules governing ownership of extraterrestrial material.

Google has unveiled Project Suncatcher, a research initiative to place machine learning infrastructure in space, using solar-powered satellites to scale AI compute beyond Earth. Google published details and early findings on its research blog. The proposal is drawing attention for its ambition and for questions about cost, thermal challenges, and whether orbital data centers are realistic.

Four environmental organizations filed a petition Thursday urging the Federal Communications Commission to reverse its approval of a startup's plan to beam on-demand sunlight from space to Earth. The groups argue the agency ignored the project's potential impacts on wildlife and astronomy, reigniting debate over regulating commercial space ventures and their environmental consequences.

Scientists may have misinterpreted a geological clue dating back roughly 2 billion years, according to a new report highlighted by ScienceDaily. The finding suggests that assumptions about Earth's ancient history could need revising, with potential implications for how researchers understand the planet's early environmental and climate conditions. Details of the specific evidence and the scientific debate remain limited.

Scientists report that dust levels in Earth's atmosphere have declined, reversing a long-running trend. The shift is described as mysterious because its cause is not yet understood. Dust in the atmosphere affects climate, air quality and ocean ecosystems, so the change could have far-reaching implications for climate modeling.

Researchers report the discovery of a microorganism nicknamed the "fire amoeba" that survives at temperatures far beyond what was thought possible for life. The finding challenges established assumptions about the upper heat limit for living cells and could reshape understanding of where life can exist, including in extreme environments on Earth and potentially elsewhere. Coverage is highlighting how the organism survives conditions that would destroy most known biology.

New research points to the Earth's crust actively stretching and tearing beneath the Pacific Northwest, the region sitting atop the Cascadia subduction zone. The finding has drawn attention from science readers concerned about earthquake risk in Oregon, Washington and British Columbia, and what deep tectonic activity could mean for future seismic hazards.

DARPA is developing a robotic spacecraft designed to service and repair satellites in geosynchronous orbit, roughly 36,000 kilometers above Earth. The program, profiled by IEEE Spectrum, would allow aging or malfunctioning satellites to be fixed or refueled in place, extending their working lives. Interest centers on the technical challenge of robotic operations at that altitude and what orbital servicing could mean for the satellite industry and space security.

A robotic submarine deployed beneath Antarctic ice mapped unusual structures on the seafloor before disappearing without a trace. The lost vehicle reportedly recorded strange formations under the ice shelf before contact was cut off. The disappearance has drawn attention because the sub was gathering rare data from one of the least explored environments on Earth, raising questions about what it found and why contact was lost.

Google is moving forward with its plan to test data centers in space, taking its unusual experiment beyond Earth. The idea is to run computing infrastructure on satellites, where solar power is more abundant and cooling is less constrained than on the ground. Commenters are treating it as one of the company's boldest infrastructure bets, with debate over whether orbital data centers can ever be practical or affordable.

Researchers analysing the evolutionary history of 163 ant genomes, spanning most extant ant subfamilies, found periods of rapid species diversification over the past 100 million years were associated with heightened activity of transposable elements — DNA sequences that move within the genome. The findings suggest genome dynamics played a role in the evolutionary success of ants, one of the most dominant insect groups on Earth.

Scientists are examining whether detonating a nuclear bomb could be used to deflect or destroy an asteroid on a collision course with Earth, an idea long explored in fiction now under serious study. French science media are discussing how such a planetary defence plan would work, the physics involved, and what testing it would actually entail.