Cyber nuclear attack
A nuclear power plant was targeted by a cyberattack two to three years ago, according to the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency. Yukiya Amano did not give details, but told Reuters that the hack caused 鈥渟ome disruption鈥� and that the threat posed to nuclear facilities by cyberattacks was serious.
Opportunity鈥檚 new job
It鈥檚 a new mission for an old rover. Last week, NASA sent Opportunity into the Endeavour crater on Mars. There, it will explore a gully that may have been carved by water 鈥� a first for any Mars rover. Over the next two years, Opportunity will travel down the length of the gully and onto the crater floor.
Return of a goddess
A team of amateur conservationists in China say they have made a rare sighting of a baiji, or white dolphin, in the Yangtze river. Also known as the 鈥済oddess of the Yangtze鈥�, this dolphin species was declared functionally extinct 10 years ago, after inhabiting the river for 20 million years.
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Cancer decline
The proportion of children dying from cancer in the US is declining. According to a report from the US National Center for Health Statistics, deaths from childhood cancer fell by 20 per cent between 1999 and 2014. Leukaemia caused the most childhood cancer deaths in 1999, but brain cancer caused the most in 2014.
Hearts get started
When does the heart start beating? For the first time, researchers have seen heart muscle cells contracting in mouse embryos less than eight days after conception. This is equivalent to 16 days in human embryos 鈥� five days earlier than they were previously thought to spring into action (eLife, ).