Scientists contribute to observation of closest tidal disruption in nearly a decade

When a star comes too close to a black hole, the intense gravity of the black hole results in tidal forces that can rip the star apart. In these events, called tidal disruptions, some of the stellar debris is flung outward at high speeds, while the rest falls toward the black hole. This causes a distinct X-ray flare that can last for years.

A team of astronomers, including several from the University of Maryland, has observed a tidal disruption event in a galaxy that lies about 290 million light years from Earth. The event is the closest tidal disruption discovered in about a decade, and is described in a paper published in the October 22, 2015 issue of the journal Nature.

Have you ever wondered why we don't use light to transmit messages? Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, but while we use light to carry signals along fiber optic cables, we use electrons to process sound and information in our phones and computers. The reason has always been because light particles - photons—are extremely difficult to manipulate, whereas electrons can be manipulated relatively easily.

But now a group of Harvard physicists has taken a major step toward solving that puzzle, and have brought us one step closer to ultra-fast, light-based computers.

The physicists, led by Professor Eric Mazur, have created a material where the phase velocity of light is infinite. Their results were published in Nature Photonics on Oct. 19th.

Biologists at UC San Diego have discovered that bacteria--often viewed as lowly, solitary creatures--are actually quite sophisticated in their social interactions and communicate with one another through similar electrical signaling mechanisms as neurons in the human brain.

In a study published in this week's advance online publication of Nature, the scientists detail the manner by which bacteria living in communities communicate with one another electrically through proteins called "ion channels."

"Our discovery not only changes the way we think about bacteria, but also how we think about our brain," said Gürol Süel, an associate professor of molecular biology at UC San Diego who headed the research project. "All of our senses, behavior and intelligence emerge from electrical communications among neurons in the brain mediated by ion channels. Now we find that bacteria use similar ion channels to communicate and resolve metabolic stress. Our discovery suggests that neurological disorders that are triggered by metabolic stress may have ancient bacterial origins, and could thus provide a new perspective on how to treat such conditions."

"Much of our understanding of electrical signaling in our brains is based on structural studies of bacterial ion channels" said Süel. But how bacteria use those ion channels remained a mystery until Süel and his colleagues embarked on an effort to examine long-range communication within biofilms--organized communities containing millions of densely packed bacterial cells. These communities of bacteria can form thin structures on surfaces--such as the tartar that develops on teeth--that are highly resistant to chemicals and antibiotics.

The biological superhighway linking the plant kingdom

Hidden beneath the surface and entangled in the roots of Earth's astonishing and diverse plant life, there exists a biological superhighway linking together the members of the plant kingdom in what researchers call the "wood wide web". This organic network operates much like our internet, allowing plants to communicate, bestow nutrition, or even harm one another.

The network is comprised of thin threads of fungus known as mycelium that grow outwards underground up to a few meters from its partnering plant, meaning that all of the plant life within a region is likely tapped into the network and connected to one another. The partnership of the roots of plants and the fungi is known as mycorrhiza and is beneficial for both parties involved; plants provide carbohydrates to the fungi and in exchange, the fungi aids in gathering water and providing nutrients such as phosphorus and nitrogen to its partnering plant.

Flowers are not enough, it seems. For the first time, bees have been discovered farming fungus to provide extra food for their larvae.

Though farming is well known in many social insects, such as ants and termites, bees have always been thought to depend solely on pollen and nectar for sustenance.

But for the Brazilian stingless bee, Scaptotrigona depilis, fungus may mean the difference between life and death.

What's more, if other bees also depend on fungus for survival, the discovery has serious implications for the use of fungicides in agriculture.

Cristiano Menezes of the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation, was studying the bees in the lab and originally mistook the white Monascus fungus growing in their hive for contamination.

Just in time for Halloween, gore-resistant scientists are swinging frozen human cadaver arms like battering rams — in the name of science, of course.

The researchers say their macabre experiments support the hotly debated idea that human hands evolved not only for manual dexterity, but also for fistfights.

However, some scientists vehemently argue that the new research does little to support this notion.

David Carrier, a comparative biomechanist at the University of Utah, and his colleagues have controversially suggested that fist fighting might have helped to drive the evolution of not only the human hand, but also the human face and the human propensity to walk upright.

Humans possess shorter palms and fingers, as well as longer, stronger and more flexible thumbs, than their ape relatives. Scientists have long thought that these features evolved to help give humans the manual dexterity to make and use tools.

When NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory determined a 99.9 percent likelihood for a magnitude 5.0 earthquake or higher within Los Angeles before April 2018, the US Geological Survey stepped in saying NASA wasn't "clear" about the science behind its finding.

There will be an earthquake in Los Angeles - that much is certain - although it's impossible to be certain about exactly when, where, and how powerful it will be. However, using methods doubted by some seismologists, scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) seem to be convinced that they have a pretty good idea. On October 7, the peer-reviewed Earth and Space Science journal published the group's shocking findings.

JPL based its incredible 99.9 percent figure on previous quakes, including last year's M5.1 earthquake in La Habra, located 21 miles east of Los Angeles; GPS data, and aerial radar. The USGS, using what it considers the true scientific process, swooped in to more or less correct the record with their own figure - an 85 percent likelihood of such an event.

"As scientists, we were not putting out an official forecast. We are putting out something in a paper to test," said Andrea Donnellan, a JPL research scientist, to the Los Angeles Times. "If an earthquake happens in three years, we're both right." Others aren't as convinced, however.

"As far as I'm concerned, there has never been a successful earthquake prediction and a scientific breakthrough would be required for us to make a scientifically based prediction," Thomas Heaton, an engineering seismology professor and director of the Earthquake Engineering Research Laboratory at Caltech, said in an interview with the San Gabriel Valley Tribune. "While the authors are credible scientists, this paper does not meet my definition of science," said Heaton, who is unaffiliated with either finding, while commenting on the JPL study.

Co-author of the JPL study and UC Davis physics and geology professor John Rundle told the LA Times, "once you get to 1,000 magnitude 3 earthquakes, you expect a magnitude 6," referencing what is known as the Gutenberg-Richter relationship. It states that for every 1,000 M3 earthquakes, there are 100 M4's, 10 M5's, and one M6.

If life on comets was possible, Lovejoy would be a popular destination - scientists have found it releases alcohol and sugar in crazy amounts. But jokes aside, the finding is important as it backs the idea that comets could have seeded life on Earth.

This is the first discovery that has witnessed a comet releasing ethyl alcohol in such amounts - 500 bottles of wine every second.

"We found that comet Lovejoy was releasing as much alcohol as in at least 500 bottles of wine every second during its peak activity," the paper's lead author, Nicolas Biver of the Paris Observatory in France, said in a paper published October 23 in Science Advances.

People are not generally great at detecting deception, but new research shows that discussing with others makes a big difference.

The official board game of my house is One Night: Ultimate Werewolf, and whenever we play, the unspoken (or, more often, spoken) assumption is that my roommate Adam is always the werewolf. To be fair, he is often the werewolf. And he has a habit of saying "I'm the werewolf," right at the beginning of the game, essentially short-circuiting everyone's thought processes, because the point of the game is to lie, and to find the liars. Admitting upfront to being a werewolf just does not compute. Unless, of course, he's lying. But what if he isn't?

If you've ever played Mafia at camp, this is a similar sort of game. Everyone is assigned a role, and is either on Team Villager or Team Werewolf. There's one quick round of play that leaves no one sure who anyone else is, or even who they themselves are (though the werewolves know who each other are, for cahooting purposes).

Physicists from Cornell University have proved the peculiar quantum theory which states that a system cannot change while you are watching it, according to a study published this month in the journal Physical Review Letters.

Researchers suspended ultracold atoms of Rubidium between laser beams inside a vacuum chamber. In that state the atoms arrange in an orderly lattice just as they would in a crystalline solid. But at such low temperatures, the atoms can "tunnel" from place to place in the lattice.

The researchers demonstrated that they were able to suppress quantum tunneling merely by observing the atoms - the "Quantum Zeno effect," so named for a Greek philosopher.