|  Rare Case of Conjoined Lizard Twins Reported at Zoo  | In a first-of-its-kind case, a pair of conjoined lizards called Quince monitor lizards were discovered at a German zoo, according to a new report. The animals were found in June 2009 in a clutch deposited in a terrarium at the Cologne Zoo, in Germany.Other cases of conjoined twins have been reported in reptiles such as turtles, crocodiles and other lizard species, according to the report. "Interesting for us was that both clutches of the same pair comprised malformed offspring, which indicates that this probably did not happen coincidentally," said Mona van Schingen, a reptile expert at the University of Cologne in Germany and co-author of the report. All three were smaller than the typical size of hatchlings of this species, van Schingen said.
| Read More » Extinct Mega-Rodent Had Teeth Like Elephant Tusks  | The biggest rodent to ever stalk the Earth lived about 3 million years ago in what is now South Africa — and it used its large front teeth the way today's elephants use their tusks. The bull-size creature likely used its incisors to root around in the ground for food, possibly even fighting off predators with the sturdy teeth, according to a new study. These ancient overgrown rodents sported large front teeth, whose exact purpose had remained unclear. Past studies had suggested the beasts had fairly weak chewing muscles and small grinding teeth.
| Read More » The Microbes That Ride the NYC Subway with You  | For all the bizarre sights on the subway in New York, the tiny, unseen organisms lurking in the train stations might make up the city's most colorful freak show. A team of scientists collected cotton-swab samples from the turnstiles, emergency exits, MetroCard kiosks, benches, hand rails and trash cans in all 468 stations that make up New York City's sprawling subway system, which provides 1.7 billion rides every year.
| Read More » Cosmonaut Cuisine in Tubes: Real Russian Space Food on Sale in Moscow  | Move over astronaut ice cream, Russian space food tubes have arrived. As of Friday (Feb. 6), the All-Russian Exhibition Center in Moscow now sells authentic cosmonaut food to the public, the state-run Sputnik news service reported.
| Read More » Spectacular Milky Way Maps Show Our Galaxy in New Light  | The Milky Way galaxy is made up of more than just stars and a new series of galactic maps has captured that diversity of gas, dust, particles and magnetic fields in amazing detail. The new Milky Way galaxy maps are based on observations by the European Space Agency's prolific Planck space observatory. They show the Milky Way in four distinct color signals that, when combined into a single mosaic, create a hypnotic view of our home galaxy.The Planck satellite observed the oldest light in the universe during its mission. The Planck satellite was built to detect microwave light, which made it sensitive to something called the cosmic microwave background, or light left over from the big bang.
| Read More » SpaceX to Try Rocket Landing Again with DSCOVR Satellite Launch  | When SpaceX launches a long-delayed satellite to study space weather on Sunday, the private spaceflight company also hopes to do the amazing: return a rocket to Earth and land it on a floating platform in the Atlantic Ocean. SpaceX will attempt to land the first stage of its 14-story Falcon 9 rocket after launching the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR for short) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Base in Florida. It will be SpaceX's second try in two months to land a rocket on an ocean drone ship as part of company founder Elon Musk's dream of making reusable rocket technology a reality. The rocket stage slammed into SpaceX's drone ship and exploded.
| Read More » | |
