Spindle-shaped inclusions in 3 billion-year-old rocks are microfossils of plankton probably inhabited the oceans around the globe during that time - but these inclusions in the rocks were not only biological in origin, they were also likely planktonic autotrophs - free-floating, tiny ocean organisms that produce energy from their environment. 

"I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics," spoke American physicist, educator and quote machine Richard Feynman — underlining the idea that even leading scientists struggle to develop an intuitive feeling for quantum mechanics. 

One reason for this is that quantum phenomena often have no counterpart in classical physics, as we see in quantum entanglement: Entangled particles seem to directly influence one another, no matter how widely separated they are. It looks as if the particles can 'communicate' with one another across arbitrary distances. Albert Einstein, famously, called this seemingly paradoxical behavior "spooky action at a distance."

In animals that reproduce by internal fertilization, as humans do, the penis is invaluable, from an evolutionary point of view. 

Yet birds have evolved to not need them. Developmentally speaking, birds' penises have gone. Land fowl, which have only rudimentary penises as adults, have normally developing penises as early embryos. Later in development, however, the birds turn on a genetic program that leads their budding penises to stop growing and then wither away.

Astronomers can look back in time by gathering light from distant stars that was sent billions of years ago. Another way to learn about the past is to study similar stars to our own, but at a much younger age.

New work  studying the young star TW Hydrae, located about 190 light-years from Earth in the southern constellation Hydra the Water Snake, suggests that our Sun was both active and "feisty" in its infancy, growing in fits and starts while burping out bursts of X-rays.

Studies have shown that religious people are actually helped by faith in stressful situations.

Oxford University psychologists suggest atheists are also helped by belief during times of crisis; the explanatory and revealing power of science increases in the face of stress or anxiety, they have found.

The social psychologists argue that a 'belief in science' may help non-religious people deal with adversity by offering similar comfort and reassurance that religious people get from spirituality.

Karlsruhe's Institute of Technology, Freie Universität Berlin and the University of Geneva set out to determine whether and how far laser light and plasma can influence cloud formation.