Articles for author: Jan Otte

Orion Nebula

Did James Webb Spot Ghosts in Space? New Simulations Suggest These Mysterious ‘Rogue’ Objects May Not Exist

Jan Otte

Astronomers were confused when the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) first saw strange, free-floating pairs of Jupiter-sized objects in 2023. These strange cosmic objects, called “JuMBOs” (Jupiter-mass binary objects), seemed to go against the usual ideas about how planets form because they didn’t have a parent star and were drifting through space in tight gravitational ...

Gloved hands carefully handling a blood sample in a medical or laboratory environment.

Scientists Discover a Brand-New Blood Type Found in Only One Person on Earth

Jan Otte

French scientists have discovered a blood type so rare that just one living person on Earth is known to have it. This is a medical discovery that seems like something out of science fiction. This 48th recognized blood group system, called “Gwada negative,” was found in a 68-year-old lady from Guadeloupe, a French Caribbean island, ...

Black and white image of a woman patient in a hospital bed with a nasal cannula.

Why Are More Young People Getting Cancer? Scientists Investigate

Jan Otte

People thought for a long time that cancer was a disease that only older people got, mostly in their later years. But something troubling is happening: more adults under 50 are being diagnosed with cancer than ever before. Researchers are scrambling for answers as the number of early-onset cases of breast, colorectal, kidney, and uterine ...

star HD 100453

Alcohol Cloud in Deep Space May Be Key to Life on Earth, Say Scientists

Jan Otte

A young star is surrounded by a swirling disk of gas and dust in the depths of the cosmos. This disk is full of alcohol. Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have found methanol, an important organic molecule, in the protoplanetary disk of a star called HD 100453. This star is 330 light-years ...

a new device intended to detect disease biomarkers in air samples

Game-Changing Breath Sensor Could Detect Diabetes, Asthma and More

Jan Otte

Picture a time when you can figure out what’s wrong with you just by breathing into a small device. You could find out about your health in minutes without having to draw blood or take invasive tests. All you had to do was exhale. The Airborne Biomarker Localization Engine (ABLE) is a new device that ...

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter

NASA Finds Japan’s Crashed Moon Lander — Debris Scattered Across Lunar Surface

Jan Otte

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) took the first pictures of Japan’s doomed Resilience moon lander. The pictures show a grim scene: broken pieces of the lander spread out across the moon’s surface. The spacecraft, made by the Tokyo-based company ispace, was supposed to make a historic soft landing on June 5, but it didn’t and ...

Lepidophyma reticulatum

Tiny Lizards Survived the Asteroid That Killed the Dinosaurs

Jan Otte

The dinosaurs died when a huge asteroid hit Earth 66 million years ago. It caused firestorms, tsunamis, and a devastating “nuclear winter.” But, despite all chances, a population of little lizards barely bigger than a human finger lived near ground zero. These tough animals, called night lizards (family Xantusiidae), not only survived the disaster but ...

The Stone Age site of Fujia in eastern China produced two cemeteries and pottery

Stone Age China Was Ruled by Women, DNA Reveals

Jan Otte

Historians have thought for hundreds of years that ancient societies were mostly patriarchal, with men holding power and passing it down through their families. But a groundbreaking DNA study has turned that idea on its head. It shows that women ruled a Neolithic community in eastern China 4,500 years ago. Genetic testing on skeletons found ...