Tibet storms

US scientists have found that thunderstorms over Tibet provide the main pathway for water vapour and chemicals to travel into the stratosphere, home of the ozone layer. The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could help improve climate prediction models. The team also found that even though more thunderstorms occurred over India, the storms over Tibet transported nearly three times more water vapour into the lower stratosphere. “Tibet is at a much higher elevation than India (and therefore) the storms over Tibet are stronger and penetrate very high,” the researchers said.

Moon capture

Triton, unique among the large moons in the solar system because it orbits Neptune in a direction opposite to the planet’s rotation, may have abandoned an earlier partner to arrive in its unusual orbit, say US astronomers. According to a new model for the capture of planetary satellites, Triton was originally a member of a binary pair of objects orbiting the Sun. Gravitational interactions during a close approach to Neptune then pulled Triton away from its binary companion to become a satellite of Neptune, according to a report in the journal Nature.

New monkey

Thanks to a globe-spanning collaboration and an animal found in a farmer’s cornfield in Tanzania, a new genus of living monkey has been characterised, marking the first such discovery in 83 years, according to a report in the journal Science. The new monkey, Rungwecebus kipunji, has only been found in two remote locations in Africa. The DNA of this monkey suggests that its closest relatives are the widespread savannah baboons in the genus Papio.