14 Most Bizarre Scientific Discoveries of 2018
Adam Mann
Whoa, that's weird science
Credit: LiveScience.com
There's no question that science is full of explanations that defy our commonsense expectations. And every year, researchers find ever more mystifying discoveries about the universe we live in. From disgusting medical anomalies to blueberry planets to giant tadpoles, here are the 14 most bizarre findings of 2018.
Karate-kicking cockroaches avoid zombification
Ain't that a kick in the head? Roaches protect themselves from zombifying wasps by using their legs. Original Image
Credit: Catania Lab, Vanderbilt University
Parasitic wasps are among the most diverse of all animals, with nearly one species for every other known insect, according to research published this year in BMC Ecology. One particular fiend, known as the emerald jewel wasp, preys on cockroaches. After delivering a paralyzing sting to the victim's legs, the wasp then stings its brain and floods it with neurotoxins that hijack the cockroach's nervous system, turning the lowly crawler in a mind-controlled zombie. The cockroaches were once thought to have no defense against this gruesome attack, but new research shows that the prey can knock away their parasitic predator with a karate kick to the head that sends the wasps searching for an easier target.
A long-standing lump in the throat
For a year, a man in China went about his business with a steel spoon embedded in his gullet. Original Image
Credit: Xinjiang Meikuang General Hospital
Some people are born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Others swallow them on a dare. That was the case for a patient known only as "Mr. Zhang" who arrived at Xinjiang Meikuang General Hospital in China in October. The spoon — which was actually made of steel — had become lodged in the man's esophagus a year earlier and was apparently not causing him much suffering until he began having pains after being punched in the chest. (Mr. Zhang sounds like he lives an interesting life.) Three doctors removed the 8-inch (20 centimeters) object during a procedure that lasted 2 hours. "I was very surprised," Dr. Xiwu, the hospital's director of ear, nose and throat ailments, said in a statement. "I have never encountered a similar patient."
The hexagon, the dodecahedron, the...scutoid?
Two scutoids tightly packed together. Original Image
Credit: University of Seville
Triangles and squares are so passé. Geometry enthusiasts will be thrilled to learn that there's a new shape around, the scutoid. Looking like a strange, 3D crystal, the scutoid was named after a roughly triangle-shaped part of a beetle's thorax. The newly discovered form has actually been around in nature for a long time. Epithelial cells found on the surface of animals' bodies, are often packed together into scutoid-al shapes, which minimizes their energy usage and maximizes their stability.
What if Earth became blueberries?
Credit: LiveScience.com
It's not a question most people think about, but one computational neuroscientist wondered what would happen if the entire Earth were suddenly transformed into a bunch of blueberries. Anders Sandberg, who works at the University of Oxford's Future of Humanity Institute, wrote about this fanciful idea in a paper published to the preprint server arXiv (whose articles have not yet passed through peer review) in July . The first thing that would apparently happen is a drastic reduction in the force of gravity, since blueberries are less dense than the rocky substrate of our planet. The crushing force of the outer-edge blueberries would then compress and heat up the inner ones into a thick jam that would generate rollicking earthquakes. At blueberry Earth's center would be a hot core of blueberry "granita" ice, smushed into a solid by the extreme pressure. It can only be assumed that any intelligent beings evolving on such a planet would likely invent the pancake before the wheel.
A tadpole as long as your face
So, so thicc. Original Image
Credit: Earyn McGee/SWRS/The Frog Conservation Project
At first, they thought it was a fish. But once volunteers aiming to remove invasive bullfrogs (Lithobates catesbeianus) from Arizona looked closer, they realized they'd come across a monstrous pollywog. In a blog post, herpetologist Earyn McGee described the discovery, naming it Goliath, and speculating that the tadpole, which is much larger than the average bullfrog young, was suffering some kind of hormonal imbalance, as Live Science previously reported. Goliath is larger than a soda can, nearly as long as a banana, and definitely big enough to rest comfortably across a human face. Oh, yes, he's still alive and growing.
Dog licks man, man requires amputation
Credit: Shutterstock
Dog owners tell themselves their pets would never do anything to intentionally harm them. Unfortunately, a Wisconsin man named Greg Manteufel learned the hard way that he probably shouldn't have let his best friend lick him too much. After being admitted to a hospital, Manteufel was found to be suffering from an infection by a bacteria called Capnocytophaga, which led to the amputation of his legs and parts of his arms. The bacteria live in most household pets without causing problems, but if they get passed to a human via a bite or scratch and spread through a person's bloodstream, they can cause deadly consequences. Dr. Silvia Munoz-Price, an infectious-disease specialist told Live Science that the case is extremely rare. "More than 99 percent of the people that have dogs will never have this issue. It's just chance," she said.
Ancient Chinese tomb contains extinct gibbon bones
Junzi imperialis, a previously unknown genus and species of extinct gibbon, in an ancient Chinese tomb. " style="display: block; position: relative; overflow: hidden !important;">
Archaeologists discovered the skull of Junzi imperialis, a previously unknown genus and species of extinct gibbon, in an ancient Chinese tomb. Original Image
Credit: Camuel Turvey/Zoological Society of London
In 2004, archaeologists excavated the tomb of Lady Xia, grandmother to the Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang, who lived between 259 B.C. and 210 B.C. The burial site contained a number of objects and animal bones, which may have been the royal woman's pets. One of these skeletons turned out not to match that of any known species and, in July, researchers announced that they had discovered a previously unidentified gibbon that went extinct sometime since the last ice age, naming it Junzi imperialis. When it was alive, the ape probably weighed about 13 lbs. (6 kilograms) and ate a mix of fruits and leaves, as well as the occasional insect or bird's egg, Helen Chatterjee, a professor of biology at University College London, told Live Science
Eye lump is actually skin-crawling worm
A woman in Russia found a lump on her face that turned out to be a parasitic worm crawling under her skin. The lump first appeared under the woman's eye (Panel A), and then moved above her eye (Panel B), before migrating to her upper lip (Panel C). Doctors surgically removed the worm (Panel D). Original Image
Credit: The New England Journal of Medicine ©2018
Even horror movies aren't this gross. When a Russian woman found a small lump below her left eye, she didn't think it was particularly concerning. But after the lump began to move above her eye and then into her lip, she sought medical attention. Doctors removed a thread-like worm known as Dirofilaria repens, which naturally infects dogs, cats, foxes and other wild mammals . The worms spread through mosquito bites and typically live in the tissue under the skin. Humans, it turns out, are just accidental hosts that the worm had no intention of defiling. Small comfort to those who will now suffer nightmares about this incident.
Adam Mann
Whoa, that's weird science
Credit: LiveScience.com
There's no question that science is full of explanations that defy our commonsense expectations. And every year, researchers find ever more mystifying discoveries about the universe we live in. From disgusting medical anomalies to blueberry planets to giant tadpoles, here are the 14 most bizarre findings of 2018.
Karate-kicking cockroaches avoid zombification
Ain't that a kick in the head? Roaches protect themselves from zombifying wasps by using their legs. Original Image
Credit: Catania Lab, Vanderbilt University
Parasitic wasps are among the most diverse of all animals, with nearly one species for every other known insect, according to research published this year in BMC Ecology. One particular fiend, known as the emerald jewel wasp, preys on cockroaches. After delivering a paralyzing sting to the victim's legs, the wasp then stings its brain and floods it with neurotoxins that hijack the cockroach's nervous system, turning the lowly crawler in a mind-controlled zombie. The cockroaches were once thought to have no defense against this gruesome attack, but new research shows that the prey can knock away their parasitic predator with a karate kick to the head that sends the wasps searching for an easier target.
A long-standing lump in the throat
For a year, a man in China went about his business with a steel spoon embedded in his gullet. Original Image
Credit: Xinjiang Meikuang General Hospital
Some people are born with a silver spoon in their mouth. Others swallow them on a dare. That was the case for a patient known only as "Mr. Zhang" who arrived at Xinjiang Meikuang General Hospital in China in October. The spoon — which was actually made of steel — had become lodged in the man's esophagus a year earlier and was apparently not causing him much suffering until he began having pains after being punched in the chest. (Mr. Zhang sounds like he lives an interesting life.) Three doctors removed the 8-inch (20 centimeters) object during a procedure that lasted 2 hours. "I was very surprised," Dr. Xiwu, the hospital's director of ear, nose and throat ailments, said in a statement. "I have never encountered a similar patient."
The hexagon, the dodecahedron, the...scutoid?
Two scutoids tightly packed together. Original Image
Credit: University of Seville
Triangles and squares are so passé. Geometry enthusiasts will be thrilled to learn that there's a new shape around, the scutoid. Looking like a strange, 3D crystal, the scutoid was named after a roughly triangle-shaped part of a beetle's thorax. The newly discovered form has actually been around in nature for a long time. Epithelial cells found on the surface of animals' bodies, are often packed together into scutoid-al shapes, which minimizes their energy usage and maximizes their stability.
What if Earth became blueberries?
Credit: LiveScience.com
It's not a question most people think about, but one computational neuroscientist wondered what would happen if the entire Earth were suddenly transformed into a bunch of blueberries. Anders Sandberg, who works at the University of Oxford's Future of Humanity Institute, wrote about this fanciful idea in a paper published to the preprint server arXiv (whose articles have not yet passed through peer review) in July . The first thing that would apparently happen is a drastic reduction in the force of gravity, since blueberries are less dense than the rocky substrate of our planet. The crushing force of the outer-edge blueberries would then compress and heat up the inner ones into a thick jam that would generate rollicking earthquakes. At blueberry Earth's center would be a hot core of blueberry "granita" ice, smushed into a solid by the extreme pressure. It can only be assumed that any intelligent beings evolving on such a planet would likely invent the pancake before the wheel.
A tadpole as long as your face
So, so thicc. Original Image
Credit: Earyn McGee/SWRS/The Frog Conservation Project
At first, they thought it was a fish. But once volunteers aiming to remove invasive bullfrogs (Lithobates catesbeianus) from Arizona looked closer, they realized they'd come across a monstrous pollywog. In a blog post, herpetologist Earyn McGee described the discovery, naming it Goliath, and speculating that the tadpole, which is much larger than the average bullfrog young, was suffering some kind of hormonal imbalance, as Live Science previously reported. Goliath is larger than a soda can, nearly as long as a banana, and definitely big enough to rest comfortably across a human face. Oh, yes, he's still alive and growing.
Dog licks man, man requires amputation
Credit: Shutterstock
Dog owners tell themselves their pets would never do anything to intentionally harm them. Unfortunately, a Wisconsin man named Greg Manteufel learned the hard way that he probably shouldn't have let his best friend lick him too much. After being admitted to a hospital, Manteufel was found to be suffering from an infection by a bacteria called Capnocytophaga, which led to the amputation of his legs and parts of his arms. The bacteria live in most household pets without causing problems, but if they get passed to a human via a bite or scratch and spread through a person's bloodstream, they can cause deadly consequences. Dr. Silvia Munoz-Price, an infectious-disease specialist told Live Science that the case is extremely rare. "More than 99 percent of the people that have dogs will never have this issue. It's just chance," she said.
Ancient Chinese tomb contains extinct gibbon bones
Junzi imperialis, a previously unknown genus and species of extinct gibbon, in an ancient Chinese tomb. " style="display: block; position: relative; overflow: hidden !important;">
Archaeologists discovered the skull of Junzi imperialis, a previously unknown genus and species of extinct gibbon, in an ancient Chinese tomb. Original Image
Credit: Camuel Turvey/Zoological Society of London
In 2004, archaeologists excavated the tomb of Lady Xia, grandmother to the Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang, who lived between 259 B.C. and 210 B.C. The burial site contained a number of objects and animal bones, which may have been the royal woman's pets. One of these skeletons turned out not to match that of any known species and, in July, researchers announced that they had discovered a previously unidentified gibbon that went extinct sometime since the last ice age, naming it Junzi imperialis. When it was alive, the ape probably weighed about 13 lbs. (6 kilograms) and ate a mix of fruits and leaves, as well as the occasional insect or bird's egg, Helen Chatterjee, a professor of biology at University College London, told Live Science
Eye lump is actually skin-crawling worm
A woman in Russia found a lump on her face that turned out to be a parasitic worm crawling under her skin. The lump first appeared under the woman's eye (Panel A), and then moved above her eye (Panel B), before migrating to her upper lip (Panel C). Doctors surgically removed the worm (Panel D). Original Image
Credit: The New England Journal of Medicine ©2018
Even horror movies aren't this gross. When a Russian woman found a small lump below her left eye, she didn't think it was particularly concerning. But after the lump began to move above her eye and then into her lip, she sought medical attention. Doctors removed a thread-like worm known as Dirofilaria repens, which naturally infects dogs, cats, foxes and other wild mammals . The worms spread through mosquito bites and typically live in the tissue under the skin. Humans, it turns out, are just accidental hosts that the worm had no intention of defiling. Small comfort to those who will now suffer nightmares about this incident.
