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Volcanic activity in 2005 accompanied the formation of a deep, wide rift in Ethiopia on part of the 4,000-mile-long north-to-south trending Great Rift Valley fault. Studies show that the injection of mantle material that “unzipped” the earth along the fault operated the same way as similar material does in less-accessible undersea rifts. Scientists knew that rifts were formed in this manner, but the suddenness of this one’s formation astonished them...

NASA scientists studying the origin of life have reproduced uracil, a key component of our hereditary material, in the laboratory. They discovered that an ice sample containing pyrimidine exposed to ultraviolet radiation under space-like conditions produces this essential ingredient of life. Pyrimidine is a ring-shaped molecule made up of carbon and nitrogen and is the basic structure for uracil, part of a genetic code found in ribonucleic acid (RNA). RNA is central to protein synthesis, but has many other roles. "We have demonstrated for the first time that we can make uracil, a component of RNA, non-biologically in a laboratory...

ScienceDaily (Nov. 10, 2009) — Penguins that died 44,000 years ago in Antarctica have provided extraordinary frozen DNA samples that challenge the accuracy of traditional genetic aging measurements, and suggest those approaches have been routinely underestimating the age of many specimens by 200 to 600 percent.

Falkland Wolf (added by Pharmboy) UCLA biologists, colleagues solve mystery contemplated by Charles Darwin When Charles Darwin visited the Falkland Islands during the voyage of the Beagle in 1835, he saw a wolf-like species, wrote about it in his diaries and correctly commented that it was being hunted in such large numbers that it would soon become extinct. Darwin was baffled by how this animal got on the islands, and it figured heavily in the formation of his ideas on evolution by natural selection. Now, UCLA biologists and colleagues have analyzed DNA from museum specimens, including one collected by Darwin,...