Topic
Field that uses isotope ratios in rocks, fossils, water, gases, and meteorites to trace the origins, ages, and processes of Earth and the solar system.
Researchers at UCLA and UC Santa Barbara report in Science that the rare 15N15N form of nitrogen gas tracks how much nitrogen microbes convert to gas. Air dissolved in water normally hides that microbial gas, so the signal shows nitrogen removal that conventional methods obscure.
Reality
An ETH Zurich lab measured iron, titanium and chromium in its share of the OSIRIS-REx return and found the same dust reservoir that produced Ryugu and the rare CI meteorites, a composition matching neither the inner nor the outer solar system.
Reality
A simulation that was never tuned to the Tasman Sea, a 200-million-year plate reconstruction and a lead-isotope signature that takes over a billion years to form all point to the Lord Howe and Tasmantid seamount chains sharing one source.
Reality
Paolo Sossi and Dan Bower ran published meteorite data through ten isotope systems instead of the usual two, and found Earth's composition matches inner Solar System material alone, with under 2 percent from beyond Jupiter.
Reality
A team at Nanjing University read sulfur and molybdenum ratios in Conotubus, a 550-million-year-old tube from southern China, and inferred bacterial partners feeding on hydrogen sulfide: a metabolic signature, not a preserved body.
Reality