Science & TechnologyS


Brain

Brain cells once thought to disappear during development were just found in adults

They've been there the whole time.
brain cells
© Rockefeller U
Scientists have thought for decades that one area of the brain simply disappears during human development. Now, genetic similarities between cells in the subplate and neurons linked to autism suggest a different scenario.

In a new paper, researchers demonstrate that subplate neurons survive, and in fact become part of the adult cerebral cortex, a brain area involved in complex cognitive functions.

Blackbox

Consciously quantum: Do we create our own reality?

youniverse abstract
© Natalie Nicklin

The idea that we create reality seems absurd. But an audacious new take on quantum theory suggests the fundamental laws of nature emerge from our own experiences


Does reality exist without us? Albert Einstein appeared to be in no doubt: surely the moon doesn't vanish when we aren't looking, he once asked incredulously. He had been provoked by the proposition, from quantum theory, that things only become real when we observe them. But it is not such a daft idea, and even Einstein kept an open mind. "It is basic for physics that one assumes a real world existing independently from any act of perception," he wrote in a 1955 letter. "But this we do not know."

In the decades since, physicists have found it maddeningly difficult to write the observer out of quantum theory. Now some are contemplating a mind-boggling alternative: that a coherent description of reality, with all its quantum quirks, can arise from nothing more than random subjective experiences. It looks like the "perspective of a madman", says the author of this bold new theory, because it compels us to abandon any notion of fundamental physical laws. But if it stands up, it would not only resolve some deep puzzles about quantum mechanics, it would turn our deepest preconceptions about reality itself inside out.

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Grey Alien

Energy-hungry aliens are snatching stars and storing them in mega-structures, says new study

Dyson sphere
© Marc Ward / Stocktrek Images / Getty ImagesAn artists depiction of a theoretical Dyson sphere.
Alien civilizations may be forced to capture stars and harness their energy using ginormous structures - all to keep themselves alive in the cold, ever-expanding vastness of universe, a Fermilab cosmologist believes.

Expansion of the universe, thought to be further accelerated by dark energy, is flinging matter apart, while galaxies are being pushed away from each other. This is a challenge alien technologies will have to deal with in order for them to survive, Dan Hooper, a senior Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory scientist, writes in a new study.

The paper looks at the use of megastructures, popularly known as Dyson spheres, which may theoretically be built around stars to harvest their energy. But it goes further than that, arguing that the huge balls of gas will also have to be shifted in their course so as not to escape the energy-hungry aliens.

"In order to maximise its access to useable energy, a sufficiently advanced civilisation would chose to expand rapidly outward, build Dyson Spheres or similar structures around encountered stars, and use the energy that is harnessed to accelerate those stars away from the approaching horizon and toward the centre of the civilization," Hooper, who is also a professor of astronomy at the University of Chicago, writes.

Robot

New IBM computer makes its debut in public debate

Dan Zafrir
© Ted Chin / IBMRenowned Israeli debater Dan Zafrir takes on IBM Research's experimental AI system, Project Debater, in San Francisco on Monday.
The human brain may be the ultimate super computer, but artificial intelligence is catching up so fast that it can now hold a substantive debate with a human.

IBM's Project Debater made its public debut in San Francisco Monday afternoon, where it squared off against Noa Ovadia, the 2016 Israeli debate champion, and in a second debate against Dan Zafrir, a nationally renowned debater in Israel. The new AI system is the latest grand challenge from IBM, which previously created Deep Blue, the program that beat chess champion Garry Kasparov, and Watson, which bested humans on the game show Jeopardy.

In its first public outing, Project Debater turned out to be a formidable opponent, scanning the hundreds of millions of newspaper and journal articles in its memory to quickly synthesize an argument on a topic and position it was assigned on the spot. The skinny, black, rectangular screen stands about five and a half feet tall, putting it around the same height as a human opponent.

"Project Debater could be the ultimate fact-based sounding board without the bias that often comes from humans," said Arvind Krishna, director of IBM Research.

Mars

'Once in a blue dune': NASA shares striking image of Mars' Loyt crater

Blue dune, Mars
© JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizon / NASA
NASA has shared a stunning image of a field of finely-marked turquoise sand dunes smeared across the floor of a Martian crater.

The eye-catching snap, captured by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, shows an accumulation of 'barchan' (or crescent-shaped) sand dunes on the Lyot Crater -a large crater in the Vastitas Borealis region of the Red Planet.

Just to the south of the group of barchan dunes lies a large dune with a stranger and more complex structure, depicted in a striking blue shade in the enhanced color image. According to NASA, this formation is made of finer material and may have "a different composition than the surrounding" dunes.

Comment: See also: Epic dust storm on Mars now engulfs entire planet


People

New algorithm can predict who will win a debate

trump hillary debate
© NBC
Northeastern professor Lu Wang believes that the right mix of linguistic analysis, artificial intelligence, and data visualization can produce more meaningful debates. Understanding what makes a persuasive argument is at the heart of an interdisciplinary project she is leading.

Ideally, debates are like fuel for the engine of democracy. But in their current form on social media, are they really getting us anywhere?

The ultimate goal is to help social media platforms evolve from echo chambers full of hate speech to places where constructive conversations flourish.

"Debates should be mechanisms for discovering something new about the world," said Nick Beauchamp, assistant professor of political science at Northeastern and a collaborator on the project. "The hope is that you would come away from a debate not with just a set of new facts you learned, but also with a better way of thinking about the problem."

With this goal in mind, Wang and Beauchamp designed an algorithm that identifies features of a strong argument. Using a dataset of 118 Oxford-style debates--in which the winner is whomever can sway more of the audience to their side--the algorithm was able to predict debate winners 74 percent of the time.

Mars

Epic dust storm on Mars now engulfs entire planet

NASA's Curiosity on Mars
© NASA and JPL-CaltechA self-portrait taken by NASA's Curiosity mission on June 15, 2018 shows the rover surrounded by a darkened landscape beneath a dust-shrouded sky.
On Mars, the sky is dust.

A massive dust storm on Mars that covered one-fourth of the planet just a week ago has grown into a global weather event, NASA officials said Wednesday (June 20).

The dust storm has knocked NASA's Opportunity rover offline for want of sunlight. The agency's nuclear-powered Curiosity, meanwhile, is snapping photos of the ever-darkening Martian sky. The two rovers are on opposite sides of Mars.

"The Martian dust storm has grown in size and is now officially a 'planet-encircling' (or 'global') dust event," NASA officials said in a statement. [The Mars Dust Storm of 2018 Explained]

The last dust storm on Mars to go global occurred in 2007, five years before the Curiosity rover landed at its Gale Crater site, according to officials with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. The Opportunity rover has been exploring the plains of Meridiani Planum on the opposite side of Mars since 2004. During that 2007 Martian dust storm, NASA also lost contact with Opportunity for days due to low power levels from the lack of sunlight.


Beaker

Interfacial water can be very dead, electrically speaking

Water electrically dead
Research shows that water is electrically dead at interfaces
In a study published in Science this week, the researchers describe the dielectric properties of water that is only a few molecules thick. Such water was previously predicted to exhibit a reduced electric response but it remained unknown by how much. The new study shows that atomically thin layers of water near solid surfaces do not respond to an electric field, a finding that has very important implications for understanding of many phenomena where water is involved, including life of course.

Water molecules are small and seemingly simple but nonetheless exhibit rather complex properties, many of which remain poorly understood. Among them is the ability of water to dissolve substances much better than any other solvent. Water is therefore known as the "universal" solvent.

Behind this solvation ability is the fact that water molecules behave like tiny dipoles with two opposite charges placed at the ends of the molecule. This makes it easy for water to dissolve salts and sugars whereas substances like oils are repelled. The dipolar properties of water - or, as scientists call it, the polarizability - also play an important role in the structuring of the molecules of life, proteins and nucleic acids. Therefore, it is hardly surprising that for many decades scientists tried to figure out how water behaves on a microscopic scale, in the immediate vicinity of other substances, solid surfaces and macromolecules.

Info

Genomes help to resolve the mystery of syphilis

Syphilis
© Fototeca Gilardi/Getty ImagesA 1926 woodcut warning of the disfiguring effects of syphilis.
A new report in the snappily titled journal PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases presents, for the first time, the sequenced and reconstructed genomes of historic Treponema pallidum subspecies - the bacteria responsible for syphilis and three other related diseases. This promises to help solve the mystery of the origin of one of humanity's most feared diseases.

Syphilis is a gruesome malady. The causative agent, a corkscrew shaped bacterium, is sexually transmitted. It initially produces pustules which turn to ulcers, then a raft of other symptoms in its secondary phase, most notably a widespread and unsightly rash of varying severity.

In its tertiary stage, which can appear many years after initial infection, it can produce gross deformations of flesh and bone, or attack the central nervous system or heart. It can also be passed from mother to unborn child.

The variety of symptoms syphilis can present has led to the disease being known as the Great Imitator, as it can masquerade as a host of other illnesses and is often therefore misdiagnosed.

But it was not always thus. The modern disease is a very different beast than the monstrosity which first appeared in Europe at the end of the fifteenth century.

Cassiopaea

Oxygen gas filaments identified as the universe's missing matter

universal matter
© Illustris Collaboration/CU BoulderAn illustration imagines the filaments of gas that make up the cosmic web that connects galaxies across the universe.
Until now, scientists had only found roughly two-thirds of the cosmos' ordinary matter. But astronomers have solved the so-called "missing baryon problem," locating the last reservoir of missing ordinary matter.

Scientists found the missing matter in the form of oxygen gas. The gas filaments were found in intergalactic space, registering temperatures of around 1 million degrees Celsius.

Astronomers found the elusive matter with the help of the radiation from a distant quasar, a super luminous black hole.

As scientists worked out the chemistry of the Big Bang, they were able to estimate the amount of ordinary matter in the universe -- the matter you can see. Over the last few decades, scientists found 10 percent of the ordinary locked up inside galaxies and roughly 60 percent in intergalactic clouds of diffuse gas.