Toggle light / dark theme

Panama canal to reduce shipping as El Niño strikes vital route

Nine of 10 ships using the canal do so with a reservation, and the remaining slots are auctioned off.

Before the Iran war the average winning bid in these auctions was $135,000. But in April one shipping company eager to use the canal paid a whopping $4m.

The operator said it does not rule out further restrictions on shipping depending on how much it rains in the coming weeks.

RNA droplets may have helped start life on Earth

It’s one of the origins-of-life chicken-or-egg problems: How could RNA have helped give rise to the first cells before there were cells to contain it?

Without the compartmentalization of a cell, it would have been extremely difficult for these vulnerable molecules to have found enough of each other in the proverbial primordial soup, let alone survive the harsh conditions of the early Earth.

The answer could lie in RNA’s ability to assemble into liquid-like droplets, or condensates. These membraneless compartments could have concentrated RNA molecules, increasing opportunities for them to interact and potentially sheltering them from a hot and acidic environment.

/* */