Scientists have given a familiar name to a newly discovered species of parasitic wasp that they say could be instrumental in keeping an invasive stink bug population in check. Say hello to Idris elba. The wasp — which belongs to a genus (Idris) containing more than 300 species — made its debut in the Journal of Hymenoptera Research, after scientists discovered it in Guanajuato, Mexico. The insect may share a name with a movie star, but it could have its own a blockbuster effect. Researchers say that Idris elba has been found to lay its eggs inside the eggs of an invasive stink bug called the bagrada bug.
The star that was tossed out of Milky Way
There are fastballs, and then there are cosmic fastballs. Now it seems that the strongest arm in our galaxy might belong to a supermassive black hole whizzing out of the center of our Milky Way at 4 million mph. The star, S5-HVS1, is about 29,000 light-years from Earth. Astronomers traced it back to the galactic center, the home of a black hole known as Sagittarius A*, a gravitational monster with the mass of 4 million suns. They hypothesize that the runaway star was once part of a double-star system that came too close to the black hole. One of the pair fell in, and the other was sling-shotted away at hyperspeed.
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