Ancient warmth helped flowering plants dominate Earth, study finds - CGTN

MELBOURNE, Oct. 16 (Xinhua) -- Extreme global warmth drove both mass extinctions and explosions in plant diversity during two periods over the past 140 million years, offering new insights into how flowering plants became dominant on Earth, a new study has found. The study examined fossilized pollen and spores to show that the mid-Cretaceous and early Cenozoic periods of extreme global warmth were central to plant evolution, both for flowering plants and the other main types on Earth, according to a statement released Thursday by Australia's University of Tasmania (UTAS). Researchers said that land plants sustain almost all terrestrial animals, fungi and bacteria, while flowering plants are the most productive and diverse group, with about 400,000 species worldwide. The team examined more than 60,000 fossil occurrences and applied methods that overcome the major biases in the fossil record, generating revised estimates of fossil pollen and spore diversity over the past 130 million years, according to the study published in Nature Plants.

A complex winter season is on the way for folks across the eastern half of Canada as El Niño runs the table through the coming months. But don’t count out the country’s hallmark snow and cold just yet. Even the warmest winter can have quite a few tricks up its sleeve. WINTER SNEAK PEEK: El Niño puts record warmth in playEl Niño rules the roost this winterOne of the most powerful El Niño events on record continues to strengthen as it heads toward a likely peak early this winter. These historically warm Pacific waters have a profound effect on weather patterns from Cambodia to Canada. Past years dominated by strong El Niño events featured very warm winters as a whole. The winter of 2023-2024 holds the record for Canada’s warmest winter ever observed, after all. Above-seasonal temperatures are expected throughout almost all of Eastern Canada through the early winter months. Given current patterns and how previous years have unfolded, there’s high confidence in a very mild and potentially record-breaking December. The greatest opportunity for well-above normal temperatures exists over Ontario and southern Quebec. Content continues belowRELATED: El Niño vs.

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory researcher Isaiah Santistevan led the development of three-dimensional simulations exploring how a nuclear device could deflect or disrupt an asteroid threatening Earth. Credit: Blaise Douros/LLNL Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) researchers are developing three-dimensional simulations to examine how a nuclear device could be used to deflect or potentially disrupt an asteroid threatening Earth.

Milky Way’s first microblazar candidate sits 12,000 light-years away, offering a rare ground-level lab for studying relativistic jetsA black hole 12,000 light-years away is firing a jet of plasma almost directly toward Earth. At that distance, no known or expected danger to Earth has been identified by the researchers or the institutions involved. What astronomers have actually found is rarer and more interesting than a threat. Researchers have identified IRAS 18293-0941 as a compelling candidate for the Milky Way’s first microblazar, a class of object that gives astrophysicists a close-up laboratory for studying some of the most violent physics in the galaxy. What Astronomers FoundThe discovery centers on a binary system whose black hole expels plasma jets at close to three-quarters the speed of light, pointed almost directly toward Earth. The system pairs a hot, massive star with a black hole that completes a full orbit roughly every 11.38 days. Material drawn from the companion star feeds the black hole, and some of that matter gets expelled outward as opposing jets traveling at approximately three-quarters the speed of light. Terminology matters here.