Science2Day

Scientists have produced amazing three-dimensional images of a prehistoric mite as it hitched a ride on the back of a 50 million-year-old spider.

At just 176 micrometres long and barely visible to the naked eye, University of Manchester researchers and colleagues in Berlin believe the mite, trapped inside Baltic amber (fossil tree resin), is the smallest arthropod fossil ever to be scanned using X-ray computed tomography (CT) scanning techniques.

They say their study - published in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters today (Wednesday, 9 November) - also sets a minimum age of almost 50 million years for the evolution among these mites of phoretic, or hitchhiking, behaviour using another animal species.

Scientists are in a race against time to help save the last remaining intact World War II German light bomber Dornier Do-17, known as The Flying Pencil (Fliegender Bleistift), which lies underwater in the English Channel off the Kentish coast in the UK.

The researchers, from Imperial College London, are donating their time and scientific expertise to help the Royal Air Force Museum rescue the submerged aircraft, which was discovered in the shallows off the Goodwin Sands in 2010. Shifting sands have uncovered the aircraft, which was previously protected by layers of sediment, exposing it to the corrosive effects of seawater and threatening to destroy the plane entirely.

Scientists co-funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC) have confirmed that taking a regular dose of aspirin reduces the long-term risk of developing cancer in people with a family history of the disease.

An international collaboration found that cancer risk can be cut by 60 per cent, but that the benefits only become obvious five years after taking the drug. They published the results today in The Lancet.

Astronomers at the University of Glamorgan have assisted in the discovery of a unique new comet, only months after a work experience student discovered a series of asteroids while working at the University in the summer.

Assisted by second year undergraduate student, Antos Kasprzyk, astronomers have discovered the new comet which shares Jupiter's orbit.

Scientists at Durham University will be part of a major new space mission to discover the nature of two mysterious substances believed to make up a large part of our Universe.

The Euclid project will aim to uncover the secrets of dark energy and dark matter using one of the largest optical digital cameras ever put into Space.

Researchers from Durham's Institute for Computational Cosmology will join colleagues from eight other UK universities in the project.