ScienceDaily: Strange Science News

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• Giant sand worm discovery proves truth is stranger than fiction
• Spitting Cobra venom reveals how evolution often finds the same answer to a common problem
• Using VR training to boost our sense of agency and improve motor control
• Saturn's tilt caused by its moons, researchers say
• Butterfly wing clap explains mystery of flight
• What happens to your body during tailgating
• Oldest carbonates in the solar system: Flensburg meteorite
• Rocks show Mars once felt like Iceland
• Saturn's moon Titan: Largest sea is 1,000-feet deep
• Search for axions from nearby star Betelgeuse comes up empty
• Discovery of new praying mantis species from the time of the dinosaurs
• Could lab-grown plant tissue ease the environmental toll of logging and agriculture?
• New metamaterial offers reprogrammable properties
• Latch, load and release: Elastic motion makes click beetles click

Giant sand worm discovery proves truth is stranger than fiction Posted: 21 Jan 2021 01:31 PM PST Researchers have found evidence that large ambush-predatory worms -- some as long as two meters -- roamed the ocean floor near Taiwan over 20 million years ago.

Spitting Cobra venom reveals how evolution often finds the same answer to a common problem Posted: 21 Jan 2021 12:09 PM PST A study of spitting cobras reveals how a combination of venom components have evolved to create an instantly painful venom, not once, but on three separate occasions.

Using VR training to boost our sense of agency and improve motor control Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:21 AM PST Patients with motor dysfunctions are on the rise across Japan as its population continues to age. A researcher has developed a new method of rehabilitation using virtual reality to increase the sense of agency over our body and aid motor skills.

Saturn's tilt caused by its moons, researchers say Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:21 AM PST Scientists have just shown that the influence of Saturn's satellites can explain the tilt of the rotation axis of the gas giant. Their work also predicts that the tilt will increase even further over the next few billion years.

Butterfly wing clap explains mystery of flight Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:20 AM PST The fluttery flight of butterflies has so far been somewhat of a mystery to researchers, given their unusually large and broad wings relative to their body size. Now researchers have studied the aerodynamics of butterflies in a wind tunnel. The results suggest that butterflies use a highly effective clap technique, therefore making use of their unique wings. This helps them rapidly take off when escaping predators.

What happens to your body during tailgating Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:20 AM PST Researchers simulated a tailgating situation with a small group of overweight but healthy men and examined the impact of the eating and drinking on their livers using blood tests and a liver scan.

Oldest carbonates in the solar system: Flensburg meteorite Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:20 AM PST A meteorite that fell in northern Germany in 2019 contains carbonates which are among the oldest in the solar system; it also evidences the earliest presence of liquid water on a minute planet.

Rocks show Mars once felt like Iceland Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:19 AM PST A comparison of chemical and climate weathering of sedimentary rock in Mars' Gale Crater indicate the region's mean temperature billions of years ago was akin to current conditions on Iceland.

Saturn's moon Titan: Largest sea is 1,000-feet deep Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:19 AM PST Far below the gaseous atmospheric shroud on Saturn's largest moon, Titan, lies Kraken Mare, a sea of liquid methane. Astronomers have estimated that sea to be at least 1,000-feet deep near its center - enough room for a potential robotic submarine to explore.

Search for axions from nearby star Betelgeuse comes up empty Posted: 21 Jan 2021 10:13 AM PST A search for axions from nearby star Betelgeuse has come up empty, significantly narrowing the search for hypothetical dark matter particle.

Discovery of new praying mantis species from the time of the dinosaurs Posted: 21 Jan 2021 06:28 AM PST A research team has identified a new species of praying mantis thanks to imprints of its fossilized wings. It lived in Labrador, in the Canadian Subarctic around 100 million years ago, during the time of the dinosaurs, in the Late Cretaceous period. The researchers believe that the fossils of the new genus and species, Labradormantis guilbaulti, helps to establish evolutionary relationships between previously known species and advances the scientific understanding of the evolution of the most 'primitive' modern praying mantises.

Could lab-grown plant tissue ease the environmental toll of logging and agriculture? Posted: 21 Jan 2021 06:28 AM PST MIT researchers have proposed a method for growing plant-based materials, like wood and fiber, in a lab. The technology is still in early development but might one day help reduce the environmental footprint of some types of agriculture.

New metamaterial offers reprogrammable properties Posted: 20 Jan 2021 08:48 AM PST Scientists have developed a metamaterial whose mechanical properties can be reprogrammed on demand and whose internal structure can be modified by applying a magnetic field.

Latch, load and release: Elastic motion makes click beetles click Posted: 18 Jan 2021 01:11 PM PST Click beetles can propel themselves more than 20 body lengths into the air, and they do so without using their legs. While the jump's motion has been studied in depth, the physical mechanisms that enable the beetles' signature clicking maneuver have not. A new study examines the forces behind this super-fast energy release and provides guidelines for studying extreme motion, energy storage and energy release in other small animals like trap-jaw ants and mantis shrimps.

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