Editor’s note: A version of this story appeared in CNN’s science newsletter Wonder Theory. To get it in your inbox, register here for free.
CNN
—
About 67 million years ago, two dinosaurs competed in a showdown in what is now Montana before being buried together in a single grave.
It is unclear which dino won the fight. Both the Triceratops horridus and the Tyrannosaurus rex died with battle scars.
The Triceratops fossil first came to light when it eroded from the Hell Creek Formation rocks in 2006. The T. rex fossil was later discovered overlying it.
When commercial paleontologist Mark Eatman found the intertwined fossils, the discovery was like something from the Jurassic Park movies come to life.
The “dueling dinosaurs” were exhibited in April at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh.
And now Eatman has found dinosaur gold again.
Sergey Krasovskiy/Museum of Evolution
An artist’s impression shows what Lokiceratops might have looked like 78 million years ago when it lived in the swamps of what is now northern Montana.
This specimen could be the rock star among dinosaurs.
After being on display for more than a year at the Evolution Museum in Maribo, Denmark, the fossil of a horned dinosaur is finally being recognized as a previously unknown species.
Lokiceratops rangiformis, named in part after the Norse god of mischief, was a cousin of Triceratops and lived in a swampy environment along with other horned dinosaur species about 78 million years ago.
Lokiceratops had a striking, fierce appearance befitting a metalhead and helping it defend its territory and court mates: an ornate skull with a shield-like neck frill, horns above the eyes, and paddle-shaped horns on the back.
When NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams blasted off for a test flight of the Boeing Starliner capsule on June 5, they were expected to return from a visit to the International Space Station about eight days later.
According to the space agency, the duo is now likely aiming for a return sometime in July.
The return date is constantly being pushed back as Boeing and NASA work to understand the various problems encountered during the spacecraft’s first manned voyage, such as helium leaks and engine failures.
Since the capsule’s service module that experienced the problems will not return, engineers are trying to find out as much as possible before the Starliner’s departure.
M. Kornmesser/ESO
An artist’s illustration shows a supermassive black hole awakening at the center of a distant galaxy. The black hole attracts a growing disk of material while feeding on surrounding gas, causing the galaxy to brighten.
For the first time, astronomers observe the awakening of a supermassive black hole in the middle of a distant galaxy.
The discovery of an unusually bright glow by a telescope in 2019 gave scientists the first indication that something unusual was happening in the galaxy 300 million light-years away.
Now the international team has an unprecedented view of the sleeping giant coming to life and devouring as much cosmic material as it can.
Meanwhile, researchers searching for elusive direct evidence of missing matter in the universe may have discovered a primordial-type black hole, testing a popular theory put forward by the late British physicist Stephen Hawking.
A 246 million year old fossil found in an unexpected place shows what globetrotters some ancient creatures were.
The late paleontologist Robert Erwan Fordyce, professor emeritus at the University of Otago, first discovered the fossil, which belonged to a nothosaur, in New Zealand. The discovery was a rare occurrence in the excavation of this marine reptile in the Southern Hemisphere.
The astonishing discovery led researchers to wonder how the reptiles got from one side of the Earth, which was then dominated by a supercontinent called Pangaea, to the other.
It’s likely that nothosaurs, which paddled through the water with their limbs, swam around the entire Pangea, using the global ocean as a coastal highway, said Benjamin Kear, a paleontologist at the Evolution Museum at Uppsala University in Sweden.
Martin Bernetti/AFP/Getty Images
Giant stone statues, known as Moai in the indigenous Rapa Nui language, stand atop a hill on the Rano Raraku volcano on Easter Island in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Chile in 2005.
Mapping the remains of the rock gardens could help researchers figure out exactly what happened to the Polynesian sailors who originally inhabited Easter Island.
When studying the remote Pacific island, also known as Rapa Nui, which is dotted with hundreds of monumental stone heads called Moai, researchers are divided into two camps.
Some experts suggest that limited resources led to a catastrophic population decline. Others believe the isolated group lived a sustainable life until European settlers brought disease to the island in the 18th century.
New research based on satellite imagery and machine learning suggests that the island’s population was significantly smaller and more stable, and that islanders were able to survive on sweet potatoes and other crops grown using ancient agricultural techniques.
Dive into these insights:
– As Voyager 1 explores uncharted cosmic territory, the probe is sending valuable scientific data to Earth for the first time since a computer glitch disabled the spacecraft seven months ago.
— Scientists have discovered microplastics in human penises, adding to the growing list of potential health risks associated with these tiny particles.
— A 3,300-year-old ship containing hundreds of intact jars discovered on the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea is one of the oldest shipwrecks ever found.
– Meet Colombian marine biologist Fernando Trujillo, who ventured into the Amazon decades ago with a mission: to save the mysterious pink river dolphins.
— For years, astronomers thought Jupiter’s Great Red Spot was first observed on the planet more than 350 years ago. But a new analysis shows that the 1665 observations may have been attributed to something else.
Like what you read? Oh, but there’s more. Login here to get the next edition of Wonder Theory in your inbox, brought to you by CNN’s space and science writers Ashley Strickland And Katie HuntThey discover planets outside our solar system and discoveries from ancient times.