Reuters Science News Summary

Following is a summary of current science news briefs.

Otter-like critter swam lakes and rivers ​in the age of dinosaurs

About 165 million years ago, ​a furry critter that swam like a platypus, ‌hunted ​like an otter and had a tail similar to a beaver's frolicked in the lakes and rivers of what is now China pursuing fish and salamanders, the oldest-known example of a semiaquatic ‌lifestyle in mammalian evolutionary history. Researchers are describing a fossil unearthed in the Inner Mongolia region of a mammalian species named Megacauda sungei that lived during the Jurassic Period in the age of dinosaurs.

A 194-year-old tortoise, world's oldest land animal, may hold clues to longer life

The ‌world's oldest-known terrestrial animal, an Aldabra giant tortoise named Jonathan and estimated to be about 194 years old, may owe his ‌extraordinary longevity to a combination of genetic traits and an ability to keep key cellular systems functioning in a more youthful way, according to scientists. Members of this species are known to live more than 100 years, but Jonathan has far exceeded that. Brought to the remote South Atlantic island of St Helena as a ⁠fully ​grown animal in 1882, likely from the ⁠Aldabra Atoll or the Granitic Seychelles, the tortoise now resides in a paddock at Plantation House, the governor's residence.

Inside the deadlock at the world's top climate ⁠science body

The decision was expected to take minutes. But after nearly three years of debate, members of the world’s leading authority on climate change still ​can’t agree on a timeline to publish its next review of the latest science on the warming planet. Such assessments ⁠from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have informed every major United Nations climate agreement for three decades. But the impasse over publication dates could leave countries to decide ⁠the ​next phase of action without consensus on critical issues – including the extent to which some global warming might be reversible – according to interviews with more than a dozen current and former IPCC scientists, government negotiators and meeting observers.

Russian satellite activity raises concerns for ⁠Starlink, German space commander says

The shadowing of a Western satellite supporting Ukraine by a cluster of Russian military satellites earlier this year demonstrates ⁠capabilities that could threaten commercial constellations ⁠such as Elon Musk's Starlink, Germany’s space commander told Reuters. In May, Russia manoeuvred four military satellites, known as Cosmos 2610 through 2613, close to a commercial radar-imaging satellite, according to the US Space Force. ‌Finland's ICEYE, which supplies ‌data to the US and its allies, confirmed to Reuters that ​it was one of their satellites.