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To date, Earth is the only planet we know of that has continents.Exactly how they formed and evolved is unclear, but we do know – because the edges of continents thousands of miles apart match up – that, at one time long ago, Earth's landmass was concentrated in one big supercontinent.  Since that's not what the planet looks like today, something must have triggered that supercontinent to break apart. Now, we have new evidence to suggest that giant meteorite impacts played a significant role.The smoking gun consists of…

In a fascinating discovery, western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) at Zoo Atlanta have been caught summoning their keepers using a strange cough-sneeze hybrid.Only two other species have displayed this ability to create new vocalizations to attract our attention: zoo-housed chimpanzees and orangutans. Now, we can add gorillas to that list.  Below, 24-year-old female gorilla Sukari demonstrates this gorilla equivalent to a human 'ahem' which researchers have called a…

A common 'forever chemical' known as PFOS (perfluorooctanesulfonic acid) has been linked to liver cancer in humans in a worrying new study.Once a key ingredient in the water-repelling product commercially known as Scotchguard, PFOS was finally phased out soon after the turn of the century following concerns over its toxicity and environmental impact.  Still, it didn't earn its label of 'forever chemical' for nothing, with environmental levels of this and closely related substances remaining alarmingly high around the…

Sea sponges, among the oldest creatures in existence, let out what looks like a deep sea "sneeze" to filter out waste, researchers found in a new study.Using time-lapse video, researchers captured the behavior, which could help them better understand how sponges evolved.   "Our data suggest that sneezing is an adaptation that sponges evolved to keep themselves clean," Jasper de Goeij, a marine biologist at the University of Amsterdam and author of the new paper, said in a press…

The world's biggest ice sheet could cause "several meters" of sea-level rise over centuries if the global temperature rises more than 2 °C, according to a British study published Wednesday.  Researchers at Durham University concluded that if global greenhouse emissions remain high, the melting East Antarctica Ice Sheet (EAIS) could cause nearly half a meter of sea-level rise by 2100.Their analysis was published in the scientific journal Nature.If emissions remain high beyond that, the EAIS could contribute around 1 to 3…

Humans take a lot of pride in their brains. We like to think we are an intelligent species, and even though size isn't everything, our noggins are some of the largest nature has to offer.  The idea that our brains are shrinking is not one we like to consider. For more than four decades, experts have mostly ignored the hypothesis put forward time and time again by a close-knit group of paleontologists.Now, the brain shrinkage hypothesis is being put to the test once more, with a team from the University of Nevada, Las…

A new discovery about jumping spiders could challenge some pretty hefty human assumptions about the cognitive abilities of arthropods.According to a study that examined the motions of their eyes and bodies while they sleep, it's possible that these tiny spiders are not just resting, but dreaming – entering a sleep state fascinatingly similar to the rapid eye movement (REM) sleep observed in humans and other vertebrates.  This could expand our understanding of sleep and sleep states, and the role REM sleep plays in the…

Stingrays are no longer the silent residents of the sea scientists once thought them to be. Caught on camera, two different stingray species have been discovered making weird clicking sounds in a lucky discovery that has delighted marine ecologists – but also left them stumped.    "That we only just realized that these commonly encountered stingrays are making sounds demonstrates, once again, how little we know about the oceans," says marine ecologist Lachlan Fetterplace of the Swedish University of Agricultural…

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill was not a short-lived catastrophe. Over 10 years after one of the largest environmental disasters in human history, a sticky oil residue still coats some marshland in the Gulf of Mexico, a new report reveals. Its impacts are still not fully understood.  In the months following BP's 2010 Deepwater calamity, desperate attempts were made to clean up all the crude oil that had spilled into the environment.Some oil was directly recovered. Some was burned, some was skimmed. Some was chemically…

One of the most powerful and fascinating forces of nature is born of storms: great cracks of light that part the sky, flicking vast amounts of electricity into the surrounding atmosphere, cracking into the ground whenever it reaches it.  Or that's how we typically think of lightning.But the phenomenon has another manifestation, only relatively recently revealed: sometimes, it erupts upwards from the clouds, lashing into the stratosphere in a tremendous blue 'jet' of electricity.Little is known about this phenomenon; it's…