science news 12.3.2020

Today's selection of science news. Links are normally to press releases on EurekAlert (at the bottom end I may also add a couple of newspaper stories). I include quotes from the summary in italics in cases where the title alone doesn't reveal what the story is about. My own thoughts appear without italics if I have any.


astrobiology

Observed: An exoplanet where it rains iron

Microbes far beneath the seafloor rely on recycling to survive



Detailed examination of rocks nestled thousands of feet beneath the ocean floor revealed life in plutonic rocks of the lower oceanic crust. Shown here is a thin section photomicrograph mosaic of one of the samples.
Credit: (Photo by Frieder Klein, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)



ecology

Coral reefs 'weathering' the pressure of globalization

The naming of the shrew
Researchers at Louisiana State University have discovered a new species of shrew, which they have named the hairy-tailed shrew, or Crocidura caudipilosa.


humans
Bronze Age diet and farming strategy reconstructed using integrative isotope analysis


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From the news media:

The New York Times about what that coronavirus does to your body.