BREAKTHROUGHS (^) | EXPLORE
DISPATCHES
FROM THE FRONT LINES
OF SCIENCE
AND INNOVATION
PHOTOS (CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT): TONY WATSON, ALAMY STOCK PHOTO; NOAA FISHERIES; C. O’SHEA
ARCHAEOLOGY
‘Spines on
sticks’ honor
Andean dead
Human vertebrae
threaded on sticks
may have been
Indigenous people’s
attempts to recon-
struct ancestors’
bodies after graves
were looted during
Spanish rule in Peru
some 500 years
ago. Archaeologist
Jacob Bongers stud-
ied 192 sets of the
spine bones; he says
dating shows they
were first buried in
the early 1500s and
threaded on sticks
about 40 years
later. Descendants
likely were “pick-
ing up the pieces
of their dead and
trying to put them
back together”
to restore the integ-
rity of burials or
bodies, he says.
—TOM METCALFE
At up to 10 feet in diameter, the floating leaves of giant water lilies
(genus Victoria) are the largest on Earth. They are found in South
American waterways, where they thrive and crowd out other plants.
Some are sturdy enough to support the weight of a small child—a
concept that a new paper in Science Advances illustrates literally,
with a photo of a tot curled up on a colossal leaf.
The species V. cruziana, though long known to be strong, was
little understood until this study analyzed the underside of its
leaf, where veins branch from one artery to the next in a geometric
pattern. The rigid vascular architecture lets the plant spend less
energy maintaining its size than other water lilies do; it provides,
in the lead author’s words, “high strength at low cost.” The leaves’
design could be adapted for other applications, such as floating
platforms of solar panels in the ocean. —HICKS WOGAN
PLANT SCIENCE
THE HIDDEN STRENGTH
OF GIANT WATER LILIES
THEY LOOK LIKE THE STUFF OF FAIRY TALES,
BUT THEY’RE AS SOLID AS THE WORK OF ENGINEERS.
Call it a net win for marine life
Attaching green-colored LEDs to fish-
ing nets called gill nets greatly reduces
the amount of marine life caught in
them by accident, recent tests showed.
Illuminated nets need less repairing
because sea turtles, sharks, and other
species can see and avoid them. The
lights reduce bycatch deaths and don’t
hurt hauls of targeted fish. —HW
maropa
(Maropa)
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