Science Stories: Asteroid Secrets, Spider Tricks, and Spinal Cord Repair

Our resident science guy Joe Johnson is back with three stories from space, nature, and medicine.

Asteroid Bennu’s Building Blocks of Life
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission returned samples from asteroid Bennu in 2023, and scientists now confirm they contain amino acids, nucleobases, ammonia, and water-formed minerals. In short: Bennu is packed with the ingredients for life. Researchers say it may be a fragment of a long-lost “ocean world.”

Meanwhile, interstellar visitor 3I Atlas—only the third object of its kind ever detected—is racing through our solar system at 130,000 mph. Its chemistry is unlike anything seen in local comets, with high carbon dioxide, almost no water, and nickel without iron.

Spiders Turn Fireflies Into Lures
New studies reveal spiders use fireflies as glowing bait. Sheet web spiders keep fireflies alive in their webs to attract more insects, while orb spiders use venom to force male fireflies to flash like females—tricking other males straight into the web.

Hope for Spinal Cord Repair
At the University of Minnesota, scientists have 3D-printed a tiny silicone scaffold filled with stem cells that helped rats with severed spinal cords regain function. It’s early research, but the breakthrough could open the door to treatments for hundreds of thousands living with paralysis.

Image: An orb-weaver spider wraps a male firefly in silk while it flashes from its lanterns. (Credit: Xinhua Fu)