Rotting fish experiments have helped to create picture of our early ancestors, says a study from the University of Leicester.fossils from the early phase of vertebrate evolution are very rare because being completely soft-bodied they normally rotted away completely after death leaving nothing behind. But very occasionally their remains became preserved as fossils giving us a tantalising glimpse of our early vertebrate relatives.

You may not know the name of the Uffington White Horse but you have likely seen it.   It's carved into the Oxfordshire hillside (Brits love to carve things into hillsides) and looks like a horse.Except apparently there has been a recent to-do because the mystery critter might not be a horse at all, but instead a rather less majestic dog, says retired vet Olaf Swarbrick.

Anyone who has seen "Back To The Future" (and who on a science site hasn't?) knows that Michael J. Fox owns the role of Marty McFly but older fans ... or recent devoted ones ... know he was not the first choice.  Instead, they were a few weeks into shooting and Robert Zemeckis felt it wasn't going to be funny enough with his current actor.Back then, Stoltz was regarded as an up-and-coming, quality actor whereas Fox was a guy on a TV show, so it wasn't without risk to make that change.  But executive producer Steven Spielberg agreed and Zemeckis got the studio to let him reshoot five weeks worth of footage.For the first time, people who purchase the 25th anniversary DVD will get to see footage of Stoltz as Marty McFly.  Check out some clips below:

A Russian archaeologist says he has discovered remains of a Bronze Age civilization in Russia's North Caucasus.  The North Caucasus is one of the world's most ethnically diverse regions, located between the Caspian and Black seas.  The discovery was in the mountains between the Kuban River and the site where the city of Kislovodsk stands today. Andrey Belinskiy says the settlements had carefully designed houses and oval courtyards and the mountain people later merged with the so-called Kuban culture, known for exquisite bronze artifacts.

Science projects ain't what they used to be. Forget the potato clock and papier-mache volcano. From "smart rockets" to LEGO robots, and plastic-eating microbes to nuclear detectors, here are nine recent science fair winners that’ll make you say "wow."Fox News has the scoop.

The ingredients may be tough to find, .e.g, one universe, but worth a shot:Someone already corrected his quote on 'invent' the universe rather than 'create' it, but that is a pretty funny mistake to make, given the whole creationism debate.

I'll be honest, this article came as a surprise to me.   Not that Linux was making inroads against Microsoft, but that anyone actually used Microsoft to run a server.   I never have.  I never would.  It seems absolutely maddening to even try.The NY Times has the scoop and says there is a cost issue:

Aaron Sorkin responded to a commenter on the blog of Ken Levine who basically blamed Sorkin for the groupie-esque portrayal of women in the film - as if that was Sorkin rather than his take on what he saw in the origins of Facebook.Facebook was born during a night of incredibly misogyny. The idea of comparing women to farm animals, and then to each other, based on their looks and then publicly ranking them. It was a revenge stunt, aimed first at the woman who'd most recently broke his heart (who should get some kind of medal for not breaking his head) and then at the entire female population of Harvard.

Researchers from Office of Naval Research Global (ONR Global), MERSTech, and the Tokyo Institute of Technology, say they have designed a switch that can recycle electric power. The switch called the Magnetic Energy Recovery Switch, can save 39% of electricity at peak power, according to recent tests. 

The Houston Museum of Natural Science has unveiled their Real Pirates exhibition.    You can also see privateer models Tuesday through Saturday from 9 am – 4:30 pm at the Houston Maritime Museum.But to get you in the right piratitude, their site has a discussion on how nations without large navies got some work done against their enemies - by legalizing piracy and creating what are called privateers or privately owned ships that are willing to fight for you.Sometimes it takes a pirate to defeat a pirate.