At Long Last, the James Webb Space Telescope Is Ready for Launch

As a NASA photographer, Chris Gunn has been documenting the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) from its early days. Since 2009 he has captured every milestone and witnessed nearly all the pieces of the spacecraft being put together and tested. The telescope is scheduled to reach space in December, and in the months that follow … Read more

Newly Discovered Transparent Cave Snail Has Long Rows of Intimidatingly Spikey Teeth

When you think of snails, sharp jagged teeth are not usually what comes to mind. But you might have to reconsider because these squishy mollusks have terrifying lickity-bits when you look close enough under the microscope.   Snails use their weird-as-heck toothed-tongues called a radula to lick through all sorts of surfaces to feed, including grinding through … Read more

First-Ever ‘True’ Millipede With 1,306 Legs Discovered Deep Underground in Australia

Although the name millipede comes from Latin for “thousand feet”, before now no species has been found with more than 750 legs. After the discovery of a new millipede with 1,306 legs however, this arthropod is finally living up to its name.   The new species is Eumillipes persephone – emillipes translating as “true-thousand-foot”, with … Read more

Why will it take China’s Yutu 2 moon rover so long to reach lunar ‘mystery hut’?

China’s Yutu 2 lunar rover recently spotted something intriguing on the far side of the moon, but it’ll take the vehicle a few months to reach the object for a closer look. Yutu 2 photographed a strangely cube-shaped rock last month, during the robot’s 36th lunar day of activities. The rover drive team estimates that … Read more

Our Extinct Cousins Reached ‘The Roof of The World’ a Long Time Before Homo Sapiens

If it wasn’t for an extinct relative of modern humans known as the Denisovans, some researchers suspect our own species might never have made their home on the highest and largest plateau in the world.   The Tibetan Plateau, sometimes called the Himalayan Plateau, is nicknamed ‘the roof of the world’ because it sits, on … Read more