News about PaperPanda, Open Access, and Research
Director James Cameron had some legendary shoes to fill when he took on the daunting task of filming a sequel to Ridley Scott’s 1979 masterpiece “Alien.” But in 1986, Cameron rose to the occasion and crafted a cinematic juggernaut in “Aliens” that stands as one of the best follow-ups in Hollywood history and launched an … Read more
With NASA’s newest space observatory exactly on schedule in its commissioning phase, the science team outlined their plan to make the most of this $10 billion opportunity. The James Webb Space Telescope arrived days ago at its destination at the Earth-sun Lagrange Point 2 (L2), which is about 930,000 miles (1.5 million kilometers) away from our planet. … Read more
“How exactly does a spaceship get into space?” – Mathilde, age 5, Sydney Hello Mathilde, thanks for this great question! It isn’t easy to get to space, and there are a few steps to it. First, let’s think about where “space” itself actually begins. Well, some time ago, a number of experts decided on one … Read more
Thanks to a combination of sensing the Earth’s magnetic field through vision and an in-built compass that allows them to orient themselves according to magnetic intensity, migratory birds don’t have much trouble finding their way. Those biological gadgets, known as magnetoreception, allow birds to not only know which direction to head in on their first outbound migration but … Read more
Parasitic gall wasps don’t get out much. For the vast majority of their year-long lives, from eggs to larvae, pupae to adults, these tiny insects are entombed in cocoon-like crypts on the leaves, flowers, and stems of oak trees. When spring rolls around, there’s no time to waste, not even for food. The wasps … Read more
Our eyes are continuously bombarded by an enormous amount of visual information – millions of shapes, colors, and ever-changing motion all around us. For the brain, this is no easy feat. On the one hand, the visual world alters continuously because of changes in light, viewpoint, and other factors. On the other, our visual … Read more
SpaceX delayed two back-to-back rocket launches from Florida on Saturday (Jan. 29) due to bad weather that has already pushed back the missions in recent days. The private spaceflight company hoped to launch an Earth-observation satellite for Italy Saturday evening from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 6:11 p.m. EST (2311 GMT), but unacceptable … Read more
Ground squirrels spend the end of summer gorging on food, preparing for hibernation. They need to store a lot of energy as fat, which becomes their primary fuel source underground in their hibernation burrows all winter long. While hibernating, ground squirrels enter a state called torpor. Their metabolism drops to as low as just … Read more
Apart from fish, scientists have found only one other animal that can regulate its buoyancy in the water using swim bladders, and it’s probably not what you were expecting. The phantom midge is a type of lake fly (genus Chaoborus), but before it can take to the air, its larvae must first grow up in the … Read more
The search for life on Mars is not an easy one. Not only is the red planet difficult to get to, it’s deeply inhospitable to life as we know it. However, there are places on Earth that could show us how life may have been able to survive on Mars – if not now, then … Read more