NASA challenged the public and amateur scientists delivered, coming up with a software application that can help identify more asteroids, some of which endanger our planet.

The U.S. space agency issued a call to citizen scientists last year called "The Asteroid Data Hunter challenge" and offering a $55,000 prize.

The starving sea lion pup was so tiny that it looked like a rock at the base of the seaside cliff until it struggled to raise its head as humans approached.

It bleated weakly as volunteer Brennan Slavik eased it into a crate for transport to a rescue center, where it peered from a child's playpen with woeful eyes made enormous by an emaciated frame.

In the Virunga national park, Africa's oldest natural reserve and home to the mountain gorilla, the endangered great ape and its habitat face a new threat: oil exploration.

Even though the British petroleum company Soco says it has ended its project in the park, the government of Democratic Republic of Congo is not abandoning its plans to exploit potential oil reserves there.

"There she is, there she is!" In the distance beyond the outstretched finger of conservation biologist Daniel Ramp stood a rare white animal, rising slowly as her ears stiffened and eyes focused on him.

Nestled below her snowy chest was a brown joey, its head peaking out of a pouch.

Global carbon dioxide emissions from the energy sector stalled in 2014, the first time in 40 years during a period of economic growth, the International Energy Agency said Friday.

By far the main culprit in global warming, carbon dioxide emissions stood at 32.3 billion tonnes in 2014, unchanged from the previous year, the IEA said.

Poor weather has delayed Solar Impulse 2's departure from India on the next leg of its epic bid to become the first plane to fly around the world powered solely by the sun.

The aircraft had been due to leave Ahmedabad city in the western state of Gujarat on Sunday and travel on to Myanmar after a short stopover in the holy city of Varanasi in northern India.

A major Japanese machinery company said Friday that it has succeeded in transmitting energy wirelessly, marking a step toward making solar power generation in space a reality.

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries said it used microwave technology to send 10 kilowatts of power -- enough to run a set of conventional kitchen appliances -- through the air to a receiver 500 meters (1,640 feet) away.

Four identical satellites which will study the interactions between solar winds and the Earth's magnetic fields blasted off into Space on Thursday and settled into orbit begin a two-year study, NASA said.

The Delta V rocket of the United Launch Alliance lifted off from its launchpad from Cape Canaveral in Florida at 22:44 local time (2:44 GMT Friday) as planned at the beginning a 30-minute window of opportunity.

Fossils of a wacky-looking, 7-foot (2-meter)-long sea creature are providing new clues about how limbs developed in the family of animals that includes lobsters, crabs, scorpions and insects.

The fossils of the ancient sea creature were found in Morocco. Their discovery is reported by researchers at Yale and Oxford universities in a paper released Wednesday by the journal Nature.

Japanese scientists have succeeded in transmitting energy wirelessly, in a key step that could one day make solar power generation in space a possibility, an official said Thursday.

Researchers used microwaves to deliver 1.8 kilowatts of power -- enough to run an electric kettle -- through the air with pinpoint accuracy to a receiver 55 metres (170 feet) away.