A record-breaking cosmic signal has offered a rare glimpse of the early Universe as astronomers have detected and traced the most distant fast radio burst ever recorded, a powerful flash of radio waves that travelled for more than 10 billion years across the cosmos before reaching Earth.

The European Space Agency-led Solar Orbiter spacecraft has flown through an S-shaped kink known as a ‘switchback’ in the solar wind’s magnetic field. By fingerprinting the elusive particles within the switchback, Solar Orbiter has traced its origin back to the Sun’s surface and revealed more about solar magnetism – the unruly instigator of dangerous solar storms.

A comprehensive model of the Cambrian explosion featuring "multi-factors coupling and multi-sphere driving". Supercontinent breakup and mantle plume activity served as the initial trigger of environmental change in the Neoproterozoic, the orogenic belts and subduction zones under the modern plate tectonic regime during Gondwanan assembly served as the long-term sustained driving force, and the extreme geomagnetic field served as an important environmental stressor. The coupling of these three factors jointly provided the genetic and environmental triggers, material basis, and ecological space required for the Cambrian explosion, and together they drove the milestone evolution of Earth's habitability.

A new study has revealed how some plants are so small and pack the same structures as larger species into a tiny space, making them ideal possible crops for the future.

The only known supernova remnant of its kind in the Milky Way has an unexpectedly intricate structure: chains of gas knots resembling pearls on a string, each wide enough to fit the solar system multiple times. Using the Gemini North telescope, an international team co-led by Ilaria Caiazzo, assistant professor at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), captured the most detailed view yet of Pa 30, revealing striking new features of the remnant associated with a historical supernova witnessed nearly 850 years ago. The findings were published in The Astrophysical Journal.