[url=https://phys.org/news/2017-04-ancient-stone-pillars-clues-comet.html]Ancient stone pillars offer clues of comet strike that changed human history[/url] | PhysOrg

And an in-depth article from 1997 on what may have been a similarly-dated comet strike (or extremely close near-miss) in what is now the Carolinas:

[url=cosmictusk.com/the-carolina-bays-george-howards-orignal-essay-1997/]The Carolina Bays: George Howard's Original 1997 Web Essay[/url] - The Cosmic Tusk

VISTA peeks through the Small Magellanic Cloud's dusty veil
 

VISTA, the Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope, was designed to image [URL="https://phys.org/tags/infrared+radiation/"]infrared radiation[/URL].
[url]https://phys.org/news/2017-05-vista-peeks-small-magellanic-cloud.html#nRlv[/url]
[QUOTE]The SMC (Small Magellanic Cloud) is full of dust, and the visible light emitted by its stars suffers significant extinction. Fortunately, not all electromagnetic radiation is equally affected by dust. Infrared radiation passes through interstellar dust much more easily than visible light, so by looking at the infrared light from a galaxy we can learn about the new stars forming within the clouds of dust and gas.[/QUOTE]
[URL="https://www.eso.org/public/images/eso1714a/zoomable/"]Zoomable version[/URL] of the 1.6 gigapixel image. :w00t:

[QUOTE=kladner;458313][URL="https://www.eso.org/public/images/eso1714a/zoomable/"]Zoomable version[/URL] of the 1.6 gigapixel image. :w00t:[/QUOTE]

Wow! That is really neat.

[URL]http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-39922998[/URL][QUOTE]They know now the energy that went into making the crater when the 15km-wide asteroid struck - equivalent to 10 billion Hiroshima A-bombs.[/QUOTE]

[url]http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-39931042[/url][QUOTE]The joint Australian and British study said the rubbish amounted to 671 items per square metre and a total of 17 tonnes.[/QUOTE]

[url=http://m.digitaljournal.com/science/40-000-year-old-bracelet-from-extinct-human-species-discovered/article/432798]40,000-year-old bracelet made by extinct human species found[/url]

Typically, the article is full of quotes from professional researchers who confirm that the persistent trend of us moderns to underestimate our forebears is alive and well. 'Thought to be primitive', '30,000 years ahead of its time', etc.

It seems even that august science journal, [i]Nature[/i], is getting into the fake-news business:

"Global optimum attained in coordination tasks by centrally placed agents making a few mistakes."

abstract: [url]http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v545/n7654/full/545297a.html[/url]
article: [url]http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v545/n7654/full/nature22332.html[/url]
[i]
The underlying message is: when nobody is able to see the big picture then it is better for the whole that well connected individuals take deviant decisions a few times in their localized -small picture- part of the world. The fundamental reason for this result (as shown in Fig. 1 of the first link) is that when a few local mistakes occur in a well connected node then other individuals in the vicinity react to correct those mistakes thus incidentally solving some intractable intractable coordination hurdles that when everybody act optimally (locally) will not be resolved.
[/i]
"Fake news" here in the sense that this is not news - these kinds of algorithms go back nearly 40 years, and are collected under the rubric [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_Annealing]Simulated Annealing[/url]. Now new and improved with social-media connectivity-graph flummery!

In other tech news, autonomous-vehicle startup GriftMo granted patent for "High-efficiency locomotion system based on circular road-contacting disc rotating about a central axis". Disruptive!

[URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KIC_8462852"]Tabby's star[/URL] has started dipping again.

[QUOTE=xilman;459359][URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KIC_8462852"]Tabby's star[/URL] has started dipping again.[/QUOTE]
Cool! There will probably be a natural exaplanation found eventually, but I like to think aliens are constructing a Dyson sphere :).

[url]https://www.theverge.com/2017/5/19/15664298/svalbard-global-seed-vault-norway-doomsday-climate-change[/url][QUOTE]The seed bank designed to preserve the world’s crops and plants in the event of global disaster isn’t prepared to withstand the greatest global disaster facing our planet: global warming.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=VictordeHolland;459386]Cool! There will probably be a natural exaplanation found eventually, but I like to think aliens are constructing a Dyson sphere :).[/QUOTE]People are really paying attention now. Beautiful spectra already been tweeted.