by Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on exciting discoveries, scientific advances and more
What lies beneath the waves is one of the world’s greatest mysteries.
About half of the Earth’s surface is still unknown and unexplored. That’s because only a quarter of the seabed, which covers about 70% of the planet, has been mapped by humans to a high resolution.
But how do you get what you can’t see? Technology including sonar, which uses sound waves to identify objects in water, and remote-controlled vehicles have explored the depths of the dark ocean, revealing unknown species, geological features and mysterious phenomena.
Oceanographers aim to have a definitive map of the ocean floor by 2030, and an exciting underwater discovery announced this week brings that goal closer to reality.
Secrets of the sea
Many of the world’s highest mountains are not visible from the ground – they rise thousands of meters from the sea floor.
An expedition to the Nazca Ridge, 900 miles off the coast of Chile, has mapped and explored a newly discovered sea four times taller than the world’s tallest building.
In addition, the peaks, rocks and ridges of the mountain have underwater coral gardens with deep-dwelling octopus, squid and creatures known as flying spaghetti monsters, some of which had been little documented before this research.
The Nazca Ridge is one of several oceanic regions being considered as a high seas marine protected area, a designation made possible by a newly adopted United Nations treaty.
Defying gravity
Polaris Dawn, the ambitious mission that aimed to send four civilians soaring in a SpaceX capsule to attempt the world’s first commercial spacewalk, failed to take off this week.
It was initially delayed 24 hours due to equipment issues at the launch pad at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. There was soon another scrub due to unfavorable weather forecast for the splash.
Earlier in the week, a Federal Aviation Authority investigation into SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, which will power the first part of the Polaris Dawn crew’s journey to orbit, added another layer of uncertainty. Another rocket from the same family failed to land upright and exploded Wednesday after the launch of a Starlink satellite, prompting the FAA to ground the vehicle.
The Falcon 9 has since been cleared to fly again, but it remains unclear when the Polaris mission will take off. So far, all four team members, including billionaire Jared Isaacman, remain in quarantine.
Dino-mite
Paleontologists have found matching dinosaur footprints on different continents 3,700 miles – and oceans – apart.
Preserved in mud and silt in what is now Brazil and Cameroon, the 260 footprints are similar in age, shape and geological context, although it is impossible to know for sure whether they were made by the same species.
Most of the fossilized prints were created by three-toed theropod dinosaurs, some of which probably belonged to four-legged sauropods with long necks and tails or ornithischians, which had bird-like pelvic structures.
The discovery is vivid evidence of how 120 million years ago the world was called Gondwana, which created suitable conditions for dinosaurs before supercontinents broke apart and moved into the seven continents we know today.
Another life
The James Webb Space Telescope spotted six rogue worlds, larger in size than Jupiter, that do not orbit a star.
Astronomers discovered the celestial objects in a star-forming nebula, or cloud of gas and dust, called NGC 1333. The nebula is located 960 light-years away within a larger region of gas and dust called the Perseus molecular cloud.
Observations made with the telescope will help astronomers understand how these free-floating worlds evolve.
The planet-like bodies may first form around and orbit stars but are swept away by gravitational interactions with other objects.
A long time ago
Paleontologists have solved a prehistoric cold case, piecing together how a manatee-like manatee-like manatee came to an extremely violent end about 15 million years ago.
Bite marks on the unusual fossil discovered in what is now Venezuela show the ancient marine mammal was killed by a croc that sank into the manatee’s snout before pulling it down into a death spiral — a tactic used by modern-day crocodiles also to control their prey.
Then, according to the paleontologists, a shark was eating the remains of the manatee. The smoking gun? A tooth belonging to a tiger shark, a total scavenger, was found in the neck of the fossils.
Explorations
Check out these mind-expanding stories:
— NASA’s DART mission may have created the first man-made meteor shower. However, it will take years to know for sure.
— A sunken bridge may reveal when islands in the Mediterranean were first settled by ancient people.
— Marmosets use names to communicate, and link to a short list of species that exhibit such complex behavior.
— Boeing’s troubled Starliner spacecraft finally has a return date. But he will come back to Earth without his crew.
Like what you’ve read? Oh, but there is more. Register here to get the next issue of Wonder Theory in your inbox, brought to you by the writers of CNN Space and Science Ashley Strickland and Katie Hunt. They discover the wonders of planets outside our solar system and discoveries from the ancient world.
For more CNN news and newsletters create an account at CNN.com
