Kids News - Articles for Grades 9-10

On April 29, 2020, Earth will get an intimidating visitor — a massive asteroid called 1998 OR2. Fortunately for us, the space rock, which experts believe will be the largest one to fly by our planet this year, will be following the strict COVID-19 pandemic regulations. 1998 OR2 will not only be zooming past Earth at a safe "social" space of about 3.9 million miles (6.3 million km), or about 16 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon, but it will also be wearing a "face mask."...

Researchers have long believed that all four-limbed animals or tetrapods, a group that includes amphibians, reptiles, and mammals, evolved from an ancient group of fish known as Elpistostege watsoni, which lived between 416 million and 358 million years ago, during the Devonian Period....

While the novel coronavirus is dangerous for everyone, it is particularly so for the first responders who are being exposed to the illness daily. In the US alone, almost 5,500 nurses, doctors, and other healthcare professionals have been infected with COVID-19. Of these, dozens have succumbed to the disease. Now, hospital workers worldwide may get some reprieve thanks to Spot, a semi-autonomous four-legged robot developed by Waltham, Massachusetts-based robotics company, Boston Dynamics....

NASA's ambitious plans to land humans on the Moon by 2024 just got one step closer to becoming a reality thanks to the first comprehensive map of our satellite's surface. Unveiled on April 23, 2020, the colorful 1:5,000,000-scale "Unified Geologic Map of the Moon" is the result of decades of painstaking work by scientists from the United States Geological Survey (USGS), NASA, and the Lunar and Planetary Institute....

Though considered a waste of time by some, sleep is essential for the health and wellbeing of humans. Over the years, researchers have found sleeping allows the body to repair and restore cells, get rid of irrelevant memories, and even help kids grow taller and obtain better grades. Now, it appears that snoozing for an average of 8 hours daily enables the brain to cleanse itself and get rid of harmful toxins....

When Robert Sullivan, a research associate at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science in Albuquerque, found some dinosaur bones in 67-million year-old Cretaceous rocks in New Mexico's San Juan Basin, in 2008, he had little idea they belonged to a new raptor species. More significantly, the feathered dinosaur roamed southern North America just prior to the mass extinction event, when most raptors had already disappeared from the fossil record....

Earth Day, which is celebrated annually on April 22, is usually commemorated with outdoor activities demonstrating support for environmental protection. These include planting trees, collecting roadside or beach trash, and conducting, or participating in, recycling and conservation programs....

Over the years, paleontologists have been able to uncover many mysteries about human ancestors from unearthed skeletal remains. However, not much is known about their development and growth. because most hominin fossils are those of adults, and remains of developmentally young hominins are uncommon. Now, a perfectly-preserved partial skeleton of a Homo Naledi juvenile, who lived on Earth between 335,000 and 226,000 years ago, ​ is providing insights into how our ancient relatives may have aged....

The search for an Earth-like planet that can support life has led to the discovery of many strange worlds, including one with two suns, a lava land, and a shimmering "sapphire" planet. However, none are as extreme or as bizarre as WASP-76b, which boasts 4,352-degree Fahrenheit (2,400-degree Celsius) temperatures, wind gusts of over 10,000 mph, and a steady pelting of iron rain!...