Science news this week: El Niño arrives, the Artemis III crew are revealed, a ‘cold blob’ expands across the Atlantic, and a forgotten note from Richard Feynman gets deciphered
This week’s science news was awash with alarming updates from the world’s oceans, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declaring the official onset of El Niño.
El Niño is the warm phase of a multiyear natural climate pattern in the Pacific Ocean that supercharges temperatures across the globe, and this one is looking to be particularly strong, earning it the unofficial moniker of a “super” El Niño. Just how intense is it? It will likely become the strongest in history, most climate models predict, and it may have profound effects on rainfall, wildfires and agricultural yields across the planet.
If all that seems a little grim, one story also reminded us that a marine death isn’t always the end; sometimes, it’s the beginning of a sea change, as evidenced by the discovery of a 5 million-year-old whale graveyard that stretches for hundreds of miles, making it a “megasite” for other life-forms in the Indian Ocean.
Artemis III crew revealed
The Artemis III crew from left to right: Andre Douglas, Luca Parmitano, Randy Bresnik, and Frank Rubio
(Image credit: NASA)
Less than two months after the triumphant splashdown of the Artemis II astronauts, NASA announced the crew for its next step toward the moon, which the agency is touting as one of its most complex yet.
NASA’s Randy Bresnik will serve as commander, the European Space Agency’s Luca Parmitano will be the pilot, and NASA’s Andre Douglas and Dr. Frank Rubio will be the crew’s mission specialists. They will launch into low Earth orbit in 2027 as part of a mission to test commercial lunar landers before 2028’s scheduled return to the moon.
Yet most of the drama of this mission is taking place before it has even launched, with the two private companies commissioned by NASA to develop a lander — SpaceX and Blue Origin — suffering some explosive setbacks in recent weeks. What that means for the mission remains up in the air.
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Discover more space news
—2 long-vanished ‘super Earths’ once orbited near Neptune in our outer solar system, new study hints
—‘Crystals’ of space-time could be the origins of certain rare black holes, theoretical study hints
—This ‘crawling’ robot rolled around the moon and took a historic photo
Life’s Little Mysteries
Was your water once peed out by an animal?
(Image credit: Monica Murphy via Getty Images)
Was your water once peed out by an animal?
(Image credit: Monica Murphy via Getty Images)
How much pee have you drunk in your lifetime? Your answer is almost certainly little to none, at least on purpose. But what if all the water you drink is the product of urination? It turns out this disturbing question is controversial even among scientists, Live Science’s deep dive reveals.
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Ancient corpse’s arms turned into tools
The inside of the skull of Individual 1 shows cut marks, possibly made during brain removal.
(Image credit: Castells Navarro et al. / Antiquity Publications Ltd.)
A new analysis this week revealed that a woman buried in the far North of Scotland had her brain scooped out and her arms whittled into tools.
Exactly what explains the unusual burial ritual remains unclear, according to the archaeologists who studied the remains. “However, the care with which she was reassembled and deposited in the cairn possibly suggests she commanded a level of reverence and respect by her community,” said Laura Castells Navarro, an archaeologist at the University of York in the U.K. and part of the team.
Beyond the baffling and grisly finding, the team conducted a DNA analysis that found connections with individuals buried at sites across ancient Scotland, suggesting the people maintained complex social relationships across vast distances.
Discover more archaeology news
—Complete skin of an adult horse found with 10th-century woman and newborn in rare Siberian burial
—Ditch full of 7,000-year-old headless human skeletons discovered in Slovakia, baffling archaeologists
—Thanks to natural selection, Indigenous Andeans may digest potatoes better than anyone else in the world, study finds
—In a first, scientists translated an entire viral genome so a quantum computer could read and analyze it
—Genetically modified worms can now produce and deliver drugs inside a living body, scientists say
—Diagnostic dilemma: Man who donated his body after death had rare ‘triple penis’
—China unveils first-of-its-kind ‘dual-core’ quantum computer — its makers say it improves stability and efficiency
—Physicist Richard Feynman’s forgotten notes on ‘the restaurant problem’ finally deciphered after 50 years
—World’s rarest great ape decimated by 4 days of extreme rain, with 7% of population lost to cyclone
Something for the weekend
If you’re looking for things to keep you busy over the weekend, here are some of the best news analyses, crosswords, interviews, opinion pieces and skywatching guides published this week.
—Artificial turf contains 400 chemicals tied to cancer and hormone disruption. But is it unsafe?[News analysis]
—Live Science crossword puzzle #47: The ‘unicorn of the sea’ — 9 across[Crossword]
—‘A disease anywhere can be a disease everywhere tomorrow morning’: Public health expert on Ebola and the threat of future outbreaks[Interview]
—Doctors need to understand patients’ lived experiences to treat them well — but medical schools may stop requiring that training[Opinion]
—The Milky Way returns: How to take breathtaking photos of our galaxy this summer[Skywatching]
Science news in pictures
A panorama image of the Milky Way captured in Catamarca, Argentina.
(Image credit: Daniel Viñé Garcia/Capture the Atlas.)
This stunning shot is one of the winners of the 2026 Milky Way Photographer of the Year contest, whose honorees captured the mixtures of gases and stars forming our home galaxy from vantages around the world.
This particular image is a long exposure captured by photographer Daniel Viñé Garcia over a salt flat in Argentina’s arid Catamarca province. The brightest stars can be seen reflected in the turquoise, briny pools at the bottom.
