This week in science: The heat is on

Deep below our feet the fates of oceans and continents are decided in a titanic battle between heat and pressure. On the surface pressure usually wins, but not always. In some places heat prevails, causing islands like Hawaii or even massive hot spots that split landmasses and may have fueled the Permian-Triassic extinction. Scientists using a new technique may now be able to finally get details on these mammoth channels of flowing rock:

In the end, the researchers discovered finger-like channels of low-speed seismic waves flowing about 120 to 220 miles below the sea floor and stretching out in bands about 700 miles wide and 1,400 miles apart. ... "This global pattern of finger-like structures that we're seeing, which has not been documented before, appears to reflect interactions between the upwelling plumes and the motion of the overlying plates," said Lekic in a news release. "The deflection of the plumes into these finger-like channels represents an intermediate scale of convection in the mantle, between the large-scale circulation that drives plate motions and the smaller scale plumes, which we are now starting to image."

• A relatively nearby super-earth may be water rich or even an ocean world.
• Virgin Galatic's suborbital spaceplane breaks the sound barrier while passing an important test.
• Cute little panda! And speaking of cute, check out these stunning images of Bonobos, our closest living cousins.
• Remember the Heartland Institute? They're gearing up for another massive climate change misinformation campaign.