Here are today’s most important updates from the realm of Science and Space.
SOUND ON. You’re hearing the first howl of a dire wolf in over 10,000 years. Meet Romulus and Remus—the world’s first de-extinct animals, born on October 1, 2024.
— Colossal Biosciences® (@colossal) April 7, 2025
The dire wolf has been extinct for over 10,000 years. These two wolves were brought back from extinction using… pic.twitter.com/wY4rdOVFRH
(Credit: X/@colossal)
Colossal Biosciences, the world’s only de-extinction company, announces the rebirth of the once extinct dire wolf, the world’s first successfully de-extincted animal. The dire wolf, largely assumed to be a legendary creature made famous from the HBO hit series Game of Thrones, was an American canid that had previously been extinct for over 12,500 years. The successful birth of three dire wolves is a revolutionary milestone of scientific progress that illustrates another leap forward in Colossal’s de-extinction technologies and is a critical step on the pathway to the de-extinction of other target species.
Human-level artificial intelligence (AI), popularly referred to as Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) could arrive by as early as 2030 and "permanently destroy humanity", a new research paper by Google DeepMind has predicted. While AI is task-specific, AGI aims to possess intelligence that can be applied across a wide range of tasks, similar to human intelligence. In essence, AGI would be a machine with the ability to understand, learn, and apply knowledge in diverse domains, much like a human being. “Given the massive potential impact of AGI, we expect that it too could pose potential risk of severe harm," the study highlighted.
The Sahara desert, once lush and green, during a time between 14,500 and 5,000 years ago, was also home to a mysterious human lineage, a new study has found. Researchers from Germany's Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology detailed in a study published in Nature this week their findings from the DNA of two 7,000-year-old naturally mummified individuals excavated from the Takarkori rock shelter in southwestern Libya. The humans lived during the "African Humid Period," when the Sahara desert was green and dotted with lakes and streams. Humans lived in the area, and pastoralism — or flock tending — was prevalent, researchers said.
NASA/ESA Huygens probe descending on the surface of the Titan, a moon of Saturn 😲
— Curiosity (@MAstronomers) February 8, 2025
It went offline shortly after touching down pic.twitter.com/waWAQHbJGA
(Credit: X/@MAstronomers)
Scientists have found that while Titan’s subsurface ocean could theoretically support microbial life through glycine fermentation, the availability and transport of organic material likely limit any potential biosphere to only a few kilograms of biomass. Using bioenergetic modelling, a method previously applied to Enceladus and early Earth ecosystems, the researchers found that Titan’s ocean may support heterotrophic life forms that consume organic material. However, only a limited fraction of Titan’s abundant surface organics appears suitable for microbial metabolism. Any potential biosphere in Titan’s ocean would be extremely sparse, with a total biomass ranging from just a few grams to a few kilograms of carbon—equivalent to fewer than one microbial cell per kilogram of water when diluted throughout the entire ocean.
