The first radar images of asteroid 2004 BL86, which made its closest approach today at 8:19 a.m. PST - a distance of only 745,000 miles (3.1 times the distance from Earth to the moon) - reveal that it even has its own small moon.

The closeness did not take anyone by surprise. Asteroid 2004 BL86 was discovered on Jan. 30, 2004, by the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) survey in White Sands, New Mexico and its trajectory is well understood. Monday's flyby was the closest approach the asteroid will make to Earth for at least the next 200 year and is the closest a known asteroid this size will come to Earth until asteroid 1999 AN10 flies past us in 2027.

A new study finds that most climate models may have wiggles that undermine accuracy - but they are likely underestimating the degree of decade-to-decade variability occurring in mean surface temperatures as Earth's atmosphere warms.

The models also provide inconsistent explanations of why this variability occurs in the first place and such discrepancies undermine the models' reliability for projecting the short-term pace as well as the extent of future warming, the study's authors warn.

As such, we shouldn't over-interpret recent temperature trends, no matter what blizzard his New York City and leads to exploitation of climate science to generate media pageviews.

Opposing this law change is not anti-feminist. shutterstock

By Pam Lowe, Aston University

A campaign is underway in the United Kingdom to make it illegal to abort a child based on its gender.

Proponents say they are worried about women being coerced into terminating female fetuses and that action needs to be taken to stop discrimination against baby girls.

The largest genome-wide association study to date of the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum unveils a complex genetic architecture that enables the parasite to develop resistance to our most effective antimalarial drug, artemisinin. The results could help to improve early detection of emerging artemisinin resistance.

The global research collaboration analysed 1612 samples from 15 locations in Southeast Asia and Africa finding 20 mutations in the kelch13 gene, a known artemisinin resistance marker, that appear to work in concert with a set of background mutations in four other genes to support artemisinin resistance.

Researchers at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid have studied the stability of diverse arsenic species found in edible marine algae and have established the best conditions for their storage and preservation.

By developing a specific analytical method, members from the research group of Materials Technology and Environment (TEMATMA) of the School of Civil Engineering of Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) have studied the stability of diverse chemical species of arsenic found in the edible alga Hijiki (Hizikia fusiformis) both in the dry sample and in its water extracts.

Microscopic spheres of calcium phosphate have been linked to the development of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a major cause of blindness, in a new paper.

AMD affects 1 in 5 people over 75, causing their vision to slowly deteriorate, but the cause of the most common form of the disease remains a mystery. The ability to spot the disease early and reliably halt its progression would improve the lives of millions, but this is simply not possible with current knowledge and techniques.

The hundred trillion bacteria living in an adult human, mostly in the intestines, making up the gut microbiome, may have a significant impact on behavior and brain health, according to a new paper.

The many ways gut bacteria can impact normal brain activity and development, affect sleep and stress responses, play a role in a variety of diseases, and be modified through diet for therapeutic use are described in a review article ("The Gut Microbiome and the Brain") in Journal of Medicinal Food.

Lowering blood pressure and cholesterol saved 20,000 lives in England. The impact of statins, credit with 14 percent of the drop, was greatest among the most affluent in the population, suggesting that these drugs have helped maintain health inequalities between rich and poor, say the researchers.

The researchers wanted to quantify the contributions made by drug treatment (primary prevention) and changes in population risk factors (blood pressure and total cholesterol) to the falling rates of coronary heart disease deaths, stratified by socioeconomic background. They used trial data, analyses of published evidence, national surveys, and official statistics to calculate the number of deaths postponed or prevented across the population of England.

A multinational team of astronomers working on the High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) telescopes found three extremely luminous gamma-ray sources in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite dwarf galaxy of the Milky Way. These are objects of different types, namely the most powerful pulsar wind nebula; the most powerful supernova remnant; and a shell of 270 light years in diameter blown by multiple stars, and supernovae - a so-called superbubble.