Chinese giant salamanders are the largest in the world, with some in recent history growing as long as six feet. Lately, however, this unique amphibian has been driven toward extinction through loss of habitat and other factors. Fifteen of the few remaining specimens were recently lost at the World Expo 2010 in Shanghai, dampening hopes for recovery efforts.¹

The claim that all of today's animals came from one animal-like ancestor long ago seems wildly unreasonable. For this to happen, countless new and perfectly-fitted body parts, along with thousands of precisely structured biochemicals, would have to be invented through random natural processes.

A team of investigators led by University of Arizona graduate student Sarah Horst has approximated, in a French lab, atmospheric conditions on Saturn's moon Titan. Through a series of experiments, they bombarded the gases with radiation, producing a number of compounds, including amino acids.

Could these molecules be the basis for the development of life on Titan?

Paleontologists at the University of Texas at Austin and other institutions have investigated the fossil of a giant penguin found in Peru. At five feet tall, it would have dwarfed today's largest living penguins. A UT press release stated, "The fossil shows [that] the flipper and feather shapes that make penguins such powerful swimmers evolved early."¹

Scientists believed and taught for ages that only gene-coding DNA (which is a small fraction of DNA in human and other genomes) was functional. All other DNA was "junk" leftovers from a long evolutionary past. But recent studies have shown that non-coding DNA actually carries useful and vital coded instructions.¹