An international research team led by the Institut Català de Paleontologia Miquel Crusafont (ICP) and the Museu Balear de Ciències Naturals (MUCBO | MBCN) have described a fossil animal that lived between 270 and 280 million years ago in present-day Mallorca. The discovery is exceptional, not only because of the number of fossil remains found, but also because it is the oldest known gorgonopsian on the planet, the lineage of saber-toothed predators that would eventually give rise to mammals. The research has been published in the journal journal Nature Communications.

Scientists have discovered the oldest known animal with saber teeth: a predator that lived 270 million years ago. This animal, from before the age of the dinosaurs, was a dog-like creature that was related to the ancestors of mammals.

Researchers at University of Tsukuba assessed the effects of a large-scale wildfire in April 2020 within the Chornobyl exclusion zone in Ukraine—a radiologically contaminated region—on the redistribution of radionuclides. Their study used leaching tests and long-term river observation data to analyze these effects. The findings revealed that wildfires increase the mobility of ¹³⁷Cs and ⁹⁰Sr in rivers.

In a study published in Science China Earth Sciences, researchers present findings showing that plant DNA metabarcoding from lake sediments provides a higher resolution and more accurate depiction of local vegetation on the Tibetan Plateau than traditional pollen analysis, with a broader range of species detected.

Achieving net-zero CO₂ emissions is the current main focus of China’s carbon neutrality goal. However, non-CO₂ greenhouse gases (GHGs) are more powerful climate forcers, making their emission reduction an opportunity to rapidly mitigate future warming. This study evaluates non-CO₂ mitigation potentials, costs and climate benefits in the context of China’s carbon neutrality goals. The findings indicate that mitigation technologies can largely reduce fluorinated gas emissions from industrial sectors, but long-term non-CO₂ reductions of energy sector activities rely heavily on fuel switching. Furthermore, the cumulative costs of deploying non-CO₂ mitigation technologies are projected to be less than 10% of the total costs of achieving carbon neutrality from 2020 to 2060. If non-CO₂ mitigation measures are included in the overall mitigation portfolio, the benefits of avoided warming would by far outweigh the total mitigation cost increase.

A new study by researchers from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and University of Cincinnati and published in Science has mapped 35 years of river changes on a global scale for the first time. The work has revealed significant effects on both downstream (44% decrease in water flow) and upstream (17% flow increase) rivers, including flooding, ecosystem disruption, hydropower development interference and insufficient fresh water supplies.