How Large Can A Flying Animal Be

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(CNN)Astronauts demand to exist in unparalleled physical and mental shape to handle the rigors of infinite -- writer Tom Wolfe famously described it as the "right stuff" in his 1979 book of the same proper name. NASA'due south latest class of would-exist space sailors is no exception.

Merely increasingly, you don't accept to be a professional astronaut to go to space (Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa soared into orbit this week) and space agencies are, in some cases, rethinking what astronaut grooming means.

The European Infinite Agency is, for case, exploring whether it's possible to train a person with physical disabilities. Here's to a futurity when us ordinary mortals tin can feel infinite travel.

This is Katie Hunt, filling in for Ashley Strickland, in this edition of Wonder Theory.

Trailblazers

See NASA's Artemis generation.

The latest batch of astronaut candidates are an impressive bunch -- the cream of some 12,000 applicants.

The six men and four women include a airplane pilot who led the first all-woman F-22 formation in combat, a erstwhile member of the national and Olympic cycling teams, and an emergency medicine physician who served equally a kickoff responder during the 2010 Republic of haiti earthquake.

The grueling two-twelvemonth training form includes developing robotics skills, flying NASA's T-38 grooming jets, and grooming underwater for spacewalks. Among those who pass may exist the next humans to lift off to the moon and, perhaps, the first to set foot on Mars.

The night sky

You don't have to be an astronaut to be awed by space. Find a dark corner of your neighborhood and look upwards.

December offers the last take chances to run across a new, ultrafast comet swing by Earth -- and it's the best and brightest of the year.

The comet was first discovered in January past astronomer Greg Leonard. The angelic object has probable spent the final 35,000 years traveling toward the dominicus. Once it makes a shut pass of our star on January iii, nosotros won't be seeing the comet ever again.

Every bit the comet nears the sun, information technology brightens, which is why the weeks leading upwardly to this event make the comet easier to see.

Mission critical

A hit steel box perched on a granite apparently in the Australian state of Tasmania will tell future civilizations how humankind created the climate crisis -- and whether we failed or succeeded to address it.

Designed to have thick steel walls, battery storage and solar panels, the bus-size structure will be indestructible and is meant to outlive humans, the developers of "Earth's Blackness Box" say. Information technology will collect and store climate research, data sets, news reports and interactions relating to the wellness of our planet -- even tweets.

While the box's structure won't be completed until adjacent year, difficult drives take been recording algorithm-based findings and conversations since the COP26 climate peak in Glasgow, Scotland, in November.

Other worlds

A planet has been establish orbiting in a double-star arrangement that is and then hot and massive that some astronomers didn't think a planet could exist effectually information technology.

10 times every bit big every bit Jupiter, it's i of the virtually enormous planets ever constitute, and the European Southern Observatory'due south Very Large Telescope in Chile was able to capture this image of it.

This exoplanet discovery is prompting a rethink of how planetary systems class. It turns out that our own solar system might not be that typical.

Fantastic creatures

With a massive wingspan nearing 40 feet (12 meters), the pterosaur Quetzalcoatlus is the largest known airborne animal to accept lived upon our planet.

Once memorably described to CNN every bit "behemothic flying murder heads," the aboriginal reptiles took to the sky like a fighter jet off an aircraft carrier -- punching 8 feet (2.four meters) off the ground before flapping huge wings.

But figuring out exactly how these creatures flew has taken almost a half century. Their calorie-free, hollow basic -- irish potato chip-like in texture -- are very hard to excavate without dissentious them.

The wonder

More stories that wowed us this calendar week:

-- An exceedingly rare sea turtle concluded up on a Welsh beach more than 4,700 miles (7,564 kilometers) from its home after getting caught in currents whipped up past Storm Arwen. It wasn't the only marine creature displaced past the storm.

-- A sleeping bag, developed in conjunction with outdoors outfitter REI, that pulls fluids away from the encephalon could aid with ane of the perils of long-haul infinite travel.

-- A skeleton with a nail though its heel is the beginning case unearthed in northern Europe of the Roman practice of crucifixion, according to archaeologists.

Similar what you've read? Oh, but there's more. Sign up hither to receive the next edition of Wonder Theory in your inbox. Say hello and tell united states of america what y'all'd like to see more of in the newsletter at sciencenewsletter@cnn.com.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/11/world/science-newsletter-pterosaur-largest-flying-animal-wt-scn/index.html

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