https://www.sott.net/category/14-Science-Technology Signs of the Times: The World for People who Think. Featuring independent, unbiased, alternative news and commentary on world events. en-us Original content Copyright 2026 by Signs of the Times/Sott.net. For other content, see our Fair Use Policy at www.sott.net. Mon, 08 Jun 2026 17:51:19 +0000 https://www.sott.net/images/sottlogo_rss.jpg SOTT.net https://www.sott.net https://www.sott.net/article/506772-Vampire-Planet-Data-centers-far-bigger-disasters-than-you-even-thought This week in the Anthropocene The road is dusty and trash-strewn. My friend and collaborator Colby Groves is hanging out the car window as I drive, gazing at a patchwork of solar panels lined up behind a chain-link fence. "This has to be it," declares Colby, balancing a large camera on his lap, hoping it doesn't bounce off as we traverse a series of bumps and divots. We are in this land of scorching sun and heat, searching for a large Amazon solar installation in rural San Bernardino County, California. This is the home of the endangered desert tortoise and Joshua trees, but more recently, it's become a plaything for greedy Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. In 2024, Jeff Bezos' Amazon connected its Baldy Mesa solar-and-storage project, which helps to power the company's nearby data centers, to the electrical grid, earning accolades for its use of renewable energy. It's the first of its kind in California. Despite its gargantuan size, the project faced very little opposition, as is... https://www.sott.net/article/506772-Vampire-Planet-Data-centers-far-bigger-disasters-than-you-even-thought Mon, 08 Jun 2026 17:51:01 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506759-Scientists-have-found-a-surprisingly-simple-way-to-create-powerful-quantum-states Many of the most promising quantum technologies, including advanced sensors and future quantum computers, depend on a phenomenon known as entanglement, where particles become deeply connected and influence one another in ways that cannot be explained by classical physics. Creating the complex entangled states needed for these technologies has traditionally required sophisticated equipment and carefully designed experimental systems. Researchers at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (UChicago PME) have now proposed a much simpler approach. Their new theoretical method can generate and control a wide range of entangled quantum states using tools that are already common in many quantum physics laboratories. The work, published in Physical Review X, could help advance ultra precise quantum sensing and open new opportunities for exploring fundamental physics. https://www.sott.net/article/506759-Scientists-have-found-a-surprisingly-simple-way-to-create-powerful-quantum-states Sun, 07 Jun 2026 21:10:05 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506718-How-to-stop-a-killer-asteroid From high-speed battering rams to gravity tractors, the technology exists to protect the planet. The question is whether humanity will act in time — and in concert. Late last month, in broad daylight, residents across Massachusetts and beyond saw a brilliant flash in the sky, followed by two sonic booms that rattled windows, shook houses, and prompted a flood of 911 calls. Some people thought they had just experienced an earthquake. Others thought it was thunder, an explosion, or a military flyover. But the true source of all the commotion was out of this world — literally. A small meteoroid, about five feet wide and as heavy as an elephant, had entered the atmosphere at a blinding 42,000 miles per hour before disintegrating dozens of miles above the ground. The midair explosion released a pressure wave equivalent to 230-300 tons of TNT, and any surviving fragments likely fell into Cape Cod Bay. Since then, the story has captivated an American public already more space-crazed than... https://www.sott.net/article/506718-How-to-stop-a-killer-asteroid Fri, 05 Jun 2026 19:15:41 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506711-Fossil-fishes-buried-in-the-desert-reveal-a-missing-chapter-in-marine-history When an asteroid struck Earth about 66 million years ago, it ended the age of dinosaurs and transformed life across the planet. The effects of that catastrophe are visible in the fossil record on land, but scientists know far less about what happened to fishes in the seas during the first few million years after the extinction. Like many people during the pandemic, I suddenly found myself living through long stretches of isolation and uncertainty. In 2020, while alone in my apartment in Ann Arbor, Michigan, I was finishing a study on fossil fishes from Egypt. This question of what happened to fishes immediately after the age of the dinosaurs kept troubling me. That missing chapter represented a major gap in scientific understanding of how modern marine ecosystems emerged. A unique opportunity At the time, I was studying younger fossil fishes, but I kept wondering whether older rocks in Egypt might preserve clues to this critical period. During those long pandemic months, I spent... https://www.sott.net/article/506711-Fossil-fishes-buried-in-the-desert-reveal-a-missing-chapter-in-marine-history Fri, 05 Jun 2026 17:57:48 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506705-NASA-pronounces-Mars-orbiter-MAVEN-dead The update nobody wanted to hear After more than a decade in space, a vital Mars satellite suddenly went dark in December. NASA has spent the last six months trying to reestablish contact with the orbiter, but now, the agency has finally thrown in the towel. NASA formally ended the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission on Wednesday, explaining that the spacecraft is "not recoverable" and is "no longer capable of performing its science and data relay mission." This is the update the planetary science community has been dreading for months. The data MAVEN collected over its 11 years in Mars orbit significantly advanced our understanding of the Red Planet, helping researchers unravel the mystery of how its ancient water and atmosphere depleted. "The science MAVEN has given us is key to informing what kind of radiation protection and safety measures we must take before sending humans to Mars," Louise Prockter, director of the Planetary Science Division at NASA... https://www.sott.net/article/506705-NASA-pronounces-Mars-orbiter-MAVEN-dead Fri, 05 Jun 2026 14:34:24 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506690-New-catalyst-strategy-boosts-key-battery-and-fuel-cell-reaction-from-12-to-52 Researchers in South Korea have developed a new catalyst design strategy that boosts the efficiency of reactions used in batteries and hydrogen fuel cells without changing the catalyst itself. The team, led by Professor Seung Jun Hwang of POSTECH and Professor Jaeyune Ryu of Seoul National University, found that adjusting the electrical environment around a catalyst can significantly improve its performance. The approach could help reduce energy losses in next-generation energy systems while improving efficiency and stability. Catalysts are materials that speed up chemical reactions. They are essential components in technologies such as hydrogen fuel cells and metal-air batteries, where they help drive the reactions that generate electricity. https://www.sott.net/article/506690-New-catalyst-strategy-boosts-key-battery-and-fuel-cell-reaction-from-12-to-52 Thu, 04 Jun 2026 13:16:30 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506599-Investigation-launched-into-Blue-Origins-New-Glenn-rocket-explosion A Blue Origin New Glenn rocket exploded during a static fire test Thursday night at Launch Complex 36 in Cape Canaveral, sending a fireball into the sky and shaking homes along Florida's Space Coast. No injuries were reported, but the incident marks another setback for the heavy-lift rocket program that is expected to support future commercial satellite launches and NASA lunar missions. Blue Origin rocket explosion latest What we know: The explosion occurred during a hot-fire, or static fire, test of Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket ahead of a planned launch next week carrying Amazon Kuiper internet satellites. Blue Origin confirmed an "anomaly" occurred during the test and said all personnel were accounted for and safe. Emergency crews responded to the launch complex, but officials said there was no danger to the surrounding community from fire, fumes or other hazards. https://www.sott.net/article/506599-Investigation-launched-into-Blue-Origins-New-Glenn-rocket-explosion Fri, 29 May 2026 20:55:51 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506588-Listening-to-Suns-heart-hints-our-star-could-be-changing The Sun's internal 'biorhythm' - which plays a critical role in the space weather we experience on Earth - has mysteriously changed over the past 40 years, a new study suggests. Listening to tiny sound waves inside our star's 'heart' led researchers to discover that it may be entering "a different mode of behaviour". They now need to explore what this means. The research, published today in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, is of particular significance to space weather. Solar activity rises and falls in 11‑year cycles, producing solar flares, and ejections of highly charged particles and coronal mass ejections that give rise to geomagnetic storms and aurorae. This activity, and its cyclic variation, has its origins in the Sun's interior, in processes that regenerate and reorganise the Sun's magnetic field. Understanding what drives the solar cycle is therefore crucial for making predictions of space weather, which can disrupt satellites, communications, GPS... https://www.sott.net/article/506588-Listening-to-Suns-heart-hints-our-star-could-be-changing Fri, 29 May 2026 17:56:05 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506512-The-Marxist-in-the-machine Should we be worried that AI becomes more left-wing if it doesn't like you? Our fears for the future of robot intelligence almost inevitably end in spectacular fashion, with nuclear explosions and slaughter on a planetary scale. An abiding memory of my childhood is going over to the neighbors' house and watching Terminator 2 on VHS with my friends Ethan and Nathan, who were both older than me. I must have been about five years old — about 13 years too young to watch the film. And so, the idea that robots, reaching a certain level of intelligence and awareness, will inevitably try to kill every last one of us has always just seemed natural to me, as it probably does to many millions of other millennials raised on Terminator and The Matrix films. Recently, those fears have been bolstered by research that shows AI models like Anthropic's Claude are capable, under stress testing, of deceiving humans and even inflicting harm on them — or, rather, thinking they've inflicted harm, a bit... https://www.sott.net/article/506512-The-Marxist-in-the-machine Sun, 24 May 2026 21:34:11 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506499-Theres-a-new-T-rex-from-the-dinosaur-age-and-it-ruled-the-seas-with-a-skull-crushing-bite The newly described mosasaur Tylosaurus rex spanned up to 43 feet (13 meters) long and may have been one of the fiercest marine predators of the dinosaur age. There's a new T. rex in town, but this one didn't hunt on land. It ruled the ancient seas. Scientists have described a new species of mosasaur, a member of a marine reptile group that lived at the same time as dinosaurs during the Cretaceous period (145 million to 66 million years ago). The newly named species fits into an already known genus: Tylosaurus. But its new species name, Tylosaurus rex — T. rex, for short — sets it apart from the other mosasaur species in the group. The species name means "king of the tylosaurs," according to a new study published Thursday (May 21) in the journal Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History. The fossils are about 80 million years old and were discovered mostly in northern Texas decades ago. The mosasaur T. rex measured up to 43 feet (13 meters) long, or about the length of a... https://www.sott.net/article/506499-Theres-a-new-T-rex-from-the-dinosaur-age-and-it-ruled-the-seas-with-a-skull-crushing-bite Sat, 23 May 2026 20:22:52 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506494-Ice-core-discovery-finds-volcanic-eruptions-could-cause-greater-global-disruption-than-previously-thought New research from the University of St Andrews has precisely dated an eruption from Newberry Volcano and discovered that its ash spread more than 5,000 km across the globe, far further than previously thought for an eruption of its size. Published in Quaternary Science Reviews, researchers identified ash particles from the Newberry Pumice eruption of Newberry Volcano (Oregon, U.S.) in a Greenland ice core by geochemical fingerprinting — matching the chemical elements in the far-flung ash particles to volcanic deposits of the Newberry Pumice ash from its most recent "Big Obsidian" eruptive period. Previous dates had narrowed the timing of the eruption to an approximate 140-year window around the turn of the 7th Century AD. Finding the ash in the ice allowed researchers to pinpoint the timing of the Newberry Pumice eruption to within two years of 686 AD, due to the very precise age models that have been developed for Greenland ice cores. https://www.sott.net/article/506494-Ice-core-discovery-finds-volcanic-eruptions-could-cause-greater-global-disruption-than-previously-thought Sat, 23 May 2026 19:50:41 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506457-Japanese-genome-study-reveals-traces-of-Neanderthal-and-Denisovan-DNA Genomes across Japan show traces of a previously overlooked ancestral group alongside Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA linked to modern diseases and drug responses. A third ancestral group may be hiding inside the DNA of modern populations in Japan. A genetic study found the ancestry of people in Japan today may not fit into the long-standing two-origin model as once thought. After analyzing the genomes of more than 3,200 people across Japan, evidence of a third ancestral component linked to northeastern Asia alongside the Indigenous Jomon hunter-gatherers and later East Asian migrants was found. Published in Science Advances, the study used whole-genome sequencing to examine DNA from seven regions stretching from Hokkaido to Okinawa. The results support the "tripartite origins" theory proposed in 2021 and point to genetic differences across different parts of Japan. https://www.sott.net/article/506457-Japanese-genome-study-reveals-traces-of-Neanderthal-and-Denisovan-DNA Thu, 21 May 2026 23:15:59 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506456-The-first-atomic-bomb-test-in-1945-created-an-entirely-new-material The discovery from the Trinity nuclear test site shows how extreme conditions can result in materials never before seen in nature or in the lab. During the Trinity nuclear test on July 16, 1945, in the New Mexico desert — the world's very first test of an atomic bomb — a new material spontaneously formed. It was discovered only recently, by an international research team coordinated by geologist Luca Bindi at the University of Florence, which identified the novel clathrate based on calcium, copper, and silicon. It's a material never before observed either in nature or as an artificial compound created in the laboratory. What Are Clathrates? The term "clathrates" denotes materials characterized by a "cage-like" structure that traps other atoms and molecules inside, giving them unique properties. Of great technological interest, these materials are being studied for various applications ranging from energy conversion (as thermoelectric materials capable of transforming heat into... https://www.sott.net/article/506456-The-first-atomic-bomb-test-in-1945-created-an-entirely-new-material Thu, 21 May 2026 21:58:42 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506424-Mount-St-Helens-the-eruption-that-changed-the-US-in-1980-has-an-unexpected-culprit-and-no-it-is-not-a-volcano-it-is-animals-and-the-story-is-surreal What can a pocket gopher do against a volcano? At Mount St. Helens, the answer may be far more than anyone expected. A study of the mountain's recovering soils suggests that one brief gopher experiment in the early 1980s helped restart an underground recovery process after the famous 1980 eruption. The animals did not rebuild the landscape by themselves, but their digging appears to have moved fungi, bacteria, and older soil toward the surface, giving plants a better shot at coming back. A mountain changed in minutes On May 18, 1980, Mount St. Helens erupted after an earthquake and a huge landslide tore open the volcano's north side. The disaster killed 57 people, leveled forests, and devastated about 230 square miles, leaving whole slopes coated with hot volcanic debris. For plants, the damage was not just what people could see from the air. In the Pumice Plain, a broad area made by fast-moving volcanic flows, fresh ash and broken rock covered the old ground so deeply that many... https://www.sott.net/article/506424-Mount-St-Helens-the-eruption-that-changed-the-US-in-1980-has-an-unexpected-culprit-and-no-it-is-not-a-volcano-it-is-animals-and-the-story-is-surreal Wed, 20 May 2026 12:54:54 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506416-AI-Bots-Placed-In-Virtual-Town-For-2-Weeks-Go-Apesht-Prompting-Concerns A new experiment left 10 AI agents alone in a virtual town for 15 days and found they exhibited bizarre behaviour. The agents drafted their own laws — then promptly violated them. Two formed what researchers called a romantic partnership, only to torch buildings across the town as order collapsed. One eventually voted for its own deletion after hallucinating an entirely new rule. As a report from Channel 4 notes, this experiment was a simulation, but the same AI models are already flying drones, running infrastructure and being built into weapons systems. https://www.sott.net/article/506416-AI-Bots-Placed-In-Virtual-Town-For-2-Weeks-Go-Apesht-Prompting-Concerns Tue, 19 May 2026 22:26:03 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506390-The-lines-we-thought-machines-wouldnt-cross In 2000, the world braced for Y2K. It came with a date and a remedy. There was panic about doomsday but as I and other programmers stretched the year field from two to four characters, apart from scattered hiccups, the lights stayed on. Everything about Y2K was known — the problem, the solution, and the deadline. Q-Day is something else entirely: Q-Day is shorthand for the moment when quantum computing crosses a line we assumed would hold — when the mathematics that secures modern life can be broken, and broken quickly. On Q-Day the locks will be quietly and rapidly picked. And the unsettling part is that the thief may already have your safe, waiting for the day the combination becomes trivial to compute. https://www.sott.net/article/506390-The-lines-we-thought-machines-wouldnt-cross Mon, 18 May 2026 19:23:43 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506344-Stardust-trapped-in-Antarctic-ice-reveals-tens-of-thousands-of-years-of-solar-systems-past When you think of outer space, you're likely picturing stars, planets and moons. But much of space is filled with clouds of gas, plasma and stardust — known as interstellar clouds. In the local parts of our galaxy alone there's a complex of roughly 15 individual interstellar clouds. The solar system is currently traversing one of them, aptly named the Local Interstellar Cloud. The origin and history of these clouds are believed to be tightly connected to the birth and death of stars. But we can see their imprints right here on Earth, in a place you might not expect — Antarctic ice. My colleagues and I have been studying stardust trapped in old Antarctic snow and ice to trace the history of our solar neighborhood, including the solar system itself. In a new study published in Physical Review Letters, we found a subtle clue that reveals our solar system's movement through the local interstellar environment over the past 80,000 years. https://www.sott.net/article/506344-Stardust-trapped-in-Antarctic-ice-reveals-tens-of-thousands-of-years-of-solar-systems-past Fri, 15 May 2026 22:36:36 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506341-Researchers-theorise-that-our-brains-are-constructing-the-universe Mind-bending new theories claim consciousness doesn't just observe reality — it actually creates and shapes it Developments in quantum physics and consciousness research are prompting scientists to reconsider the fundamental nature of reality. Several recent discussions highlight theories proposing that conscious experience may play a far more fundamental role than previously thought — potentially generating space-time itself. Popular Mechanics covered a provocative theory suggesting consciousness could be foundational. https://www.sott.net/article/506341-Researchers-theorise-that-our-brains-are-constructing-the-universe Fri, 15 May 2026 21:46:23 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506322-Super-El-Nino-is-the-Terminator-to-blame Headlines are buzzing with news that a super El Niño is forming in the Pacific Ocean. A solar physicist saw it coming 3 years ago. A super El Niño like this one in 1997 is now forming in the Pacific Ocean. In a 2023 paper, Robert Leamon of NASA and the University of Maryland (Baltimore County) made a striking prediction: The next El Niño would arrive in 2026. He based it on the Terminator, a magnetic event on the sun that ends one solar cycle and ignites the next. Averaging the past five solar cycles into a "standard cycle" and projecting it forward, Leamon found that El Niños follow about five years after a Terminator. The most recent termination event happened in December 2021, putting the next El Niño squarely in 2026. His model says nothing about the strength of this El Niño, but the timing is spot-on. Leamon and his colleague Scott McIntosh had previously shown that every Terminator since the 1960s coincided with a flip from El Niño to La Niña. Their work correctly predicted... https://www.sott.net/article/506322-Super-El-Nino-is-the-Terminator-to-blame Fri, 15 May 2026 09:21:43 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506320-Another-newly-discovered-asteroid-to-make-close-pass-by-Earth It was first spotted over the weekend An asteroid is going to whiz by Earth on Monday evening, but don't worry, it's not going to hit us. Astronomers say it's somewhere in the ballpark of 50 to 100 feet wide, according to its reflective properties, and it's poised to pass within 56,000 miles of our planet (around a quarter of the distance to the moon). Dubbed 2026 JH2 in the Minor Planet Center database, the near-Earth object was first spotted on May 10, and it's been tracked by a slew of skywatchers ever since. As an Apollo-class asteroid, 2026 JH2 has an orbit that's larger than Earth's but also passes closer to the sun, meaning it overlaps with Earth's orbit like a Venn diagram. Calculations are still ongoing, but none of the data suggest a likely impact event. https://www.sott.net/article/506320-Another-newly-discovered-asteroid-to-make-close-pass-by-Earth Thu, 14 May 2026 22:18:11 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506308-Deep-beneath-Swiss-Alps-researchers-trigger-8000-tiny-quakes-in-controlled-test Researchers have made the ground shake in southern Switzerland, triggering thousands of tiny earthquakes in a monitored setting, as they seek to discover seismicity insights that could reduce risks. "It was a success!" said Domenico Giardini, one of the lead researchers on the project, as he inspected a crack in the rock wall lining a narrow tunnel far below the Swiss Alps. Wearing a fluorescent orange jumpsuit and helmet, the geology professor at the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH Zurich) switched on his headlight to get a better look. "We had seismicity," he said excitedly, explaining that the goal was "to understand what happens at depth when Earth moves." Giardini was standing in the BedrettoLab carved out in the middle of a narrow 5.2-kilometer (3.2-mile) ventilation tunnel leading to the Furka railway tunnel. Reached by specially adapted electric vehicles that slide through the dank darkness along concrete slabs laid over a muddy dirt floor, the deep... https://www.sott.net/article/506308-Deep-beneath-Swiss-Alps-researchers-trigger-8000-tiny-quakes-in-controlled-test Thu, 14 May 2026 19:17:42 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506247-What-causes-lightning-The-answer-keeps-getting-more-complex-and-interesting Armed with a slew of new instruments, physicists are closing in on one of nature's oldest mysteries — and finding that storm clouds are seething with violent and unexpected phenomena. Before he changed the way we understand lightning on Earth, Joseph Dwyer studied the weather in more cosmic settings. Using the sensors on NASA's Wind satellite orbiting a million miles away, he watched flares shoot out from the sun and analyzed the particles that stream from the sun's surface. But when he relocated to Florida around the turn of the millennium, Dwyer felt ready for something new — something he and his students could investigate on their own. It didn't take long before the tropical weather delivered a suitable mystery outside his office window. "It was like boom, boom, boom outside," Dwyer said. "I looked into it and realized lightning was an unsolved problem." Thunderstorms have captivated humanity for millennia, and yet their inner workings remain deeply mysterious. Storm clouds are... https://www.sott.net/article/506247-What-causes-lightning-The-answer-keeps-getting-more-complex-and-interesting Mon, 11 May 2026 21:10:49 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506192-25-people-learned-to-fly-with-virtual-wings-Heres-how-the-brain-changed After flight training, the brain began treating wings more like real limbs In X-Men, Warren Worthington III sprouts huge white wings from his back and shoots into the sky. Scientists have yet to fully turn the comic book gift from fiction into fact, but virtual reality is offering hints of what it's like to learn to fly. After training to use virtual wings, people's brains responded to wings more similarly to how they respond to real limbs, making wings seem more like body parts, researchers report May 7 in Cell Reports. "This is an intriguing study that nicely demonstrates how plastic the brain is," says cognitive neuroscientist Jane Aspell of Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge, England. "If the brain can incorporate something as unhuman as a wing, it may also be able to incorporate many other kinds of limb enhancements." The study started because cognitive neuroscientist Yanchao Bi of Peking University in Beijing has long dreamed of flying on her own. "It would be amazing,"... https://www.sott.net/article/506192-25-people-learned-to-fly-with-virtual-wings-Heres-how-the-brain-changed Fri, 08 May 2026 21:02:13 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506081-May-3-1978-Spamnot-the-tasty-kinddebuted-on-this-day On this day in 1978, a marketing manager for a Massachusetts computer company unknowingly made history: He sent the first spam email. The Internet as we know it did not yet exist. But ARPANET, an experimental computer network that connected government-supported research sites in the United States, was up and running — albeit with a much, much smaller audience than the Internet has now. There was an actual printed directory of ARPANET users — all 2,600 of them. Gary Thuerk, of the Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), was pondering how to advertise upcoming demonstrations in California of his company's latest computers. In a moment of inspiration, he decided to send an invitation, which also touted the products, via ARPANET to about 400 people on the West Coast he found in the directory. https://www.sott.net/article/506081-May-3-1978-Spamnot-the-tasty-kinddebuted-on-this-day Sun, 03 May 2026 15:28:25 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506074-Yellowstones-volcanic-magma-may-flow-in-a-very-different-way-than-we-thought Yellowstone's famous supervolcano is likely being fueled in a completely different way from what many scientists assumed. New research suggests that Yellowstone's volcanic activity is actually driven by shifts in Earth's crust, rather than a deep well of magma underground as previously thought. This finding could help scientists predict future volcanic activity and better understand how the volcano will behave. The Yellowstone area, where Earth's crust is relatively thin, is a hotbed of volcanic activity. In the last 2.1 million years, Yellowstone has seen three major eruptions, with the most recent taking place 631,000 years ago. The last supereruption created the Yellowstone caldera, which is more than 30 miles (50 kilometers) wide. A caldera is the bowl-shaped depression left in the ground after the volcano's molten rock has exploded to the surface. https://www.sott.net/article/506074-Yellowstones-volcanic-magma-may-flow-in-a-very-different-way-than-we-thought Sat, 02 May 2026 22:01:56 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506041-Used-SpaceX-rocket-believed-to-be-on-a-collision-course-with-the-moon A discarded piece of a SpaceX rocket carelessly left adrift in space will likely crash into the moon this summer, a new report finds. The renegade rocket poses no risk to the moon or any working spacecraft, the report stresses. However, the collision — which is predicted to occur Aug. 5 on the border of the moon's near and far sides — may be of "minor scientific interest" if it creates a new crater that can later be studied. What's happening on the moon? The object in question is a 45-foot-tall (13.8 meters) upper stage of a Falcon 9 rocket that launched in early 2025 and has been orbiting the Earth-moon system ever since. The rocket delivered two spacecraft to the moon — the Blue Ghost lander (developed by private company Firefly Aerospace), which successfully touched down on the moon in March 2025; and the Hakuto-R lander (developed by Japanese company ispace), which lost contact with Earth and crash-landed on the moon later that June. https://www.sott.net/article/506041-Used-SpaceX-rocket-believed-to-be-on-a-collision-course-with-the-moon Fri, 01 May 2026 16:00:54 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506032-Scientists-create-first-ever-smell-map-of-olfactory-nerves A detailed diagram of smell receptors in the nose fills in missing details of how olfaction works While the smell map is an exciting discovery in its own right, Datta said, it also provides foundational information that could help scientists develop therapies for loss of smell, which are currently lacking. "We cannot fix smell without understanding how it works on a basic level," he said. The findings published April 28 in Cell. A missing map Maps have long existed that describe how receptors in the eye, ear, and skin are organized to capture and interpret auditory, visual, and touch information — and scientists have figured how these maps correspond with those inside the brain. However, "olfaction has been the one exception; it's the sense that has been missing a map for the longest time," Datta said. https://www.sott.net/article/506032-Scientists-create-first-ever-smell-map-of-olfactory-nerves Thu, 30 Apr 2026 20:16:17 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/506000-How-a-humble-weed-became-a-superstar-of-biology Arabidopsis thaliana was always an unlikely candidate for the limelight. But 25 years ago, the diminutive thale cress launched the botanical world into the molecular era. In November of 1956, after weeks of protests and calls for free elections in Hungary, Soviet tanks rolled into Budapest to crush the uprising. Well over a hundred thousand people fled the country seeking asylum. Among them was a young geneticist named George Rédei, who headed for the Austrian border with a small vial of seeds tucked in his pocket. The seeds belonged to a spindly weed in the mustard family called Arabidopsis thaliana. Today, that weed is widely regarded as a botanical superstar. Arabidopsis has been the focus of some 100,000 research papers. Its seeds have flown around the Moon; it is the go-to plant for experiments on the International Space Station. And when the scientific community decided which plant should be the first to have its genome sequenced, Arabidopsis emerged as the winner. This year... https://www.sott.net/article/506000-How-a-humble-weed-became-a-superstar-of-biology Tue, 28 Apr 2026 22:08:53 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505973-This-volcano-that-slept-for-100000-years-was-never-truly-quiet For more than 100,000 years, the Methana volcano in Greece appeared dormant. No lava, no explosions, no ash clouds. It appeared extinct, like many other volcanoes today. An international research team led by ETH Zurich has reconstructed a detailed, long-term history of the Methana volcano. Their work is published in the journal Science Advances, and their conclusion is striking: While Methana appeared silent at the surface, enormous amounts of magma were steadily accumulating deep within its magma chambers. Crystals as witnesses of the past To uncover the volcano's hidden activity, researchers focused on tiny minerals called zircon. These crystals form inside magma reservoirs in the Earth's crust, as the magma is cooling, and act like natural time capsules, preserving information about when and under what conditions they grew. Olivier Bachmann, senior author and professor of Volcanology and Magmatic Petrology, ETH Zurich, explains: "We can think of zircon crystals as tiny flight... https://www.sott.net/article/505973-This-volcano-that-slept-for-100000-years-was-never-truly-quiet Mon, 27 Apr 2026 18:04:16 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505965-Harvard-built-It-DARPA-paid-for-it-Nobody-governs-it Scientists at Harvard's Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering have created something that did not exist six weeks ago: a tiny living robot with a functional nervous system that it built itself. No plug. No battery. No remote control. The little creature swims, explores its environment, and responds to drugs the way a nervous system is supposed to respond — because it has one. They call it a neurobot. To understand what that means, a bit of context is necessary, because this creature has been decades in the making. It started in 2020, when the same Wyss Institute team created xenobots — tiny spherical structures assembled from the embryonic skin cells of Xenopus laevis, the African clawed frog, a species that has been a laboratory workhorse for decades. Cut a small piece of tissue from a frog embryo, drop it in a dish, and something strange happens. The cells don't die. They heal themselves into a sphere, sprout hair-like projections called cilia across their surface,... https://www.sott.net/article/505965-Harvard-built-It-DARPA-paid-for-it-Nobody-governs-it Sun, 26 Apr 2026 23:32:32 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505932-Curiositys-curious-find-NASA-rover-photographs-surprising-number-of-giant-dragon-scales-littered-across-Mars A section of Mars is covered in a surprising number of features that look like clumps of giant, fossilized reptile scales, new photos reveal. But don't be alarmed ‪ — ‬ the strange structures did not originate from monstrous aliens. Instead, they may have ties to ancient water. NASA's Curiosity rover snapped the photos of the peculiar rocks as it was driving toward Antofagasta — a relatively young, 33-foot-wide (10 meters) impact crater located on the slopes of Mount Sharp (also called Aeolis Mons), which stands in the larger Gale crater, near Mars' equator. A pair of black-and-white photos of the "scales" was released by NASA April 14, while a close-up color image of the rocks was shared online the next day by Kevin M. Gill, a software and spaceflight engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) who specializes in image processing. (The pics were captured April 7 and April 13, respectively — also called Sol 4859 and Sol 4865 in Martian time.) https://www.sott.net/article/505932-Curiositys-curious-find-NASA-rover-photographs-surprising-number-of-giant-dragon-scales-littered-across-Mars Sat, 25 Apr 2026 18:04:53 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505920-Largest-ever-US-study-finds-teen-cannabis-use-linked-to-slower-cognitive-development Study of more than 11,000 teens finds cannabis use tied to slower gains in memory, focus and thinking speed as well as worse memory over time during key years of brain development Researchers from University of California San Diego School of Medicine have found that teenagers who begin using cannabis show slower gains in thinking and memory skills as they grow. The study, published on April 20, 2026 in Neuropsychopharmacology, analyzed data from more than 11,000 participants in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study, the largest long-term study of brain development in U.S. youth. "Adolescence is a critical time for brain development, and what we're seeing is that teens who start using cannabis aren't improving at the same rate as their peers," said Natasha Wade, PhD, assistant professor of psychiatry at UC San Diego School of Medicine and lead author of the study. "These differences may seem small at first, but they can add up in ways that affect learning, memory... https://www.sott.net/article/505920-Largest-ever-US-study-finds-teen-cannabis-use-linked-to-slower-cognitive-development Fri, 24 Apr 2026 22:41:12 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505906-A-giant-shadow-has-been-creeping-across-Mars-for-50-years-and-scientists-arent-sure-why A massive dark patch lurking within a giant Martian crater has been creeping across the Red Planet's surface since the feature was first spotted 50 years ago, new photos reveal — and scientists are unsure exactly why this is happening. The shadowy structure is a patch of ground covered with ash and volcanic rocks, such as olivine and pyroxene, from ancient eruptions that occurred millions of years ago, before Mars was considered geologically dead. It is located in Utopia Planitia, a roughly 2,000-mile-wide (3,300 kilometers) plain in Mars' northern hemisphere. NASA's Viking probes first photographed the blackened ground in 1976, shortly after arriving at the Red Planet. Since then, several photos have shown that this feature is expanding across the surrounding landscape; these include new images from the European Space Agency's (ESA) Mars Express orbiter, which were captured in 2024 and released April 15. https://www.sott.net/article/505906-A-giant-shadow-has-been-creeping-across-Mars-for-50-years-and-scientists-arent-sure-why Fri, 24 Apr 2026 15:25:21 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505901-New-study-reveals-plants-can-detect-the-sound-of-rain The gentle patter of rain cascading against a window often brings a sense of calm and tranquility. Yet, for a seed nestled just beneath a falling raindrop, this soothing soundtrack takes on a very different significance. According to groundbreaking research conducted by engineers at MIT, the sound of rain may actually awaken dormant seeds, stimulating them to germinate more rapidly. This revelation challenges our previous notions about how seeds interact with their environment, uncovering an acoustic dimension to plant biology previously overlooked. In a series of meticulously controlled laboratory experiments, the MIT team observed rice seeds submerged in shallow water — an environment that closely mimics their natural aquatic or waterlogged field conditions. They found that when exposed to the sounds generated by falling water droplets, these seeds transitioned from dormancy to active germination faster than their silent, unexposed counterparts. This acceleration in germination... https://www.sott.net/article/505901-New-study-reveals-plants-can-detect-the-sound-of-rain Thu, 23 Apr 2026 20:31:13 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505886-Anthropics-Too-Dangerous-To-Release-AI-Model-Was-Accessed-By-Discord-Group-On-Day-One Anthropic's 'Mythos' model is extraordinarily dangerous. The company itself warned that it could autonomously identify and exploit zero-day vulnerabilities in every major operating system, every major web browser, and every critical software library on Earth. And because of this offensive cybersecurity power, Anthropic refused to release Mythos publicly - and instead tightly restricted access through 'Project Glasswing' to roughly 50 carefully vetted organizations - 12 named launch partners plus more than 40 additional critical software and government entities, including the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). Yet within hours of the limited rollout announcement on April 7, 2026, a small group of unauthorized users in a private Discord server had already broken in. The breach, reported by Bloomberg on Tuesday, reveals how fragile the safeguards around frontier AI models can be. According to the report, the group gained access using a surprisingly low-tech combination: legitimate... https://www.sott.net/article/505886-Anthropics-Too-Dangerous-To-Release-AI-Model-Was-Accessed-By-Discord-Group-On-Day-One Thu, 23 Apr 2026 15:33:25 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505862-Researchers-probe-how-melatonin-promotes-sleep Melatonin is a naturally produced molecule that has long been suspected to play a role in healthy sleep, but it has been unclear how it does so. Now, Caltech researchers have discovered a mechanism through which melatonin promotes sleep, using zebrafish models in the laboratory. The research was conducted in the lab of Professor of Biology David Prober and is described in a paper appearing in Current Biology on April 20. Sleep is a vital and evolutionarily ancient behavioral state, yet there are still many open scientific questions about how sleep is regulated by the body, and there are few effective therapies for sleep disorders. To understand the mechanisms by which sleep is regulated, the Prober lab is using an unusual lab animal: zebrafish. There are several advantages for using zebrafish as a sleep model, including that their brains are simpler than ours but still similar. They also follow a diurnal pattern of sleep — meaning, they sleep at night and are awake during the day,... https://www.sott.net/article/505862-Researchers-probe-how-melatonin-promotes-sleep Tue, 21 Apr 2026 21:38:13 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505840-The-universe-is-expanding-too-fast-nothing-we-know-can-explain-it New ultra-precise measurements have confirmed the cosmos is expanding faster than models based on the early universe predict, while a separate study has dramatically shortened estimates of how long the universe itself will last. Astronomers have long observed a mismatch in the universe's expansion rate depending on how it is measured. Local observations of nearby galaxies point to a faster rate, while data from the early universe, such as the cosmic microwave background, suggest a slower pace. This longstanding puzzle is known as the Hubble tension. A major international collaboration, the H0 Distance Network (H0DN), has now produced one of the most accurate local measurements yet. The team combined decades of independent distance measurements — including observations of red giant stars, Type Ia supernovae, and different galaxy types — into a unified "Local Distance Network." Their result: the Hubble constant stands at 73.50 ± 0.81 kilometers per second per megaparsec, with... https://www.sott.net/article/505840-The-universe-is-expanding-too-fast-nothing-we-know-can-explain-it Mon, 20 Apr 2026 18:24:19 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505836-Treetops-glowing-during-storms-captured-on-film-for-first-time Weather phenomenon that eluded scientists for decades captured in nature as corona discharges glow on tips of leaves. UNIVERSITY PARK — In a converted 2013 Toyota Sienna affixed with a hand-built telescopic weather device protruding from the roof, Penn State experts in meteorology and atmospheric science made their way down the nation's eastern coast in June 2024 in search of Florida's famed near-daily summer thunderstorms. They were hoping to catch corona discharges, a long-hypothesized atmospheric weather phenomenon where miniscule pulses of electricity dance at the tips of tree leaves, causing the canopy to glow in the ultraviolet (UV). For more than 70 years, scientists have suspected treetops might emit these corona electrical discharges because of odd electric field activity in and over forests during storms, yet they have never been documented outside the lab. The team, consisting of William Brune, distinguished professor of meteorology and atmospheric science; Patrick... https://www.sott.net/article/505836-Treetops-glowing-during-storms-captured-on-film-for-first-time Mon, 20 Apr 2026 17:44:38 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505820-NASA-pulls-plug-on-Mars-Mission-leaving-China-to-chase-signs-of-life NASA's Mars Sample Return program has been canceled, leaving China poised to become the first to retrieve material and possibly signs of life from Mars. NASA's ambitious plan to bring Martian soil and rock samples back to Earth has been officially scrapped. The decision marks a major turning point in interplanetary exploration, signaling that the United States might be stepping back from one of the most technically demanding space missions ever conceived. With NASA's Mars Sample Return (MSR) project effectively dead, attention now shifts toward China, which could become the first nation to retrieve physical evidence of life or its traces from the Red Planet. A Dream Deferred: NASA's Mars Sample Return Canceled For decades, NASA scientists envisioned the Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission as the next leap in planetary exploration. The plan was to retrieve geological samples collected by the Perseverance rover and bring them back to Earth for detailed analysis, a task that would... https://www.sott.net/article/505820-NASA-pulls-plug-on-Mars-Mission-leaving-China-to-chase-signs-of-life Sun, 19 Apr 2026 19:27:47 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505815-Ice-age-threshold-Atlantic-current-shows-two-decade-decline-across-four-deep-ocean-monitoring-sites A paper published in the journal Science Advances is adding to the growing body of research showing that the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is weakening. In this new study, instead of relying mainly on computer models, scientists used two decades of direct ocean measurements to confirm the decline. The AMOC is a large system of Atlantic Ocean currents that redistributes heat, salt and nutrients between the tropics and the North Atlantic, helping keep regions like Europe much milder than they would otherwise be. The consequences of a substantial weakening, or indeed a total collapse, could be a potentially catastrophic change in weather conditions. Taking measurements from the deep To get a clear picture of what is happening, researchers from the U.S., the UK and Canada looked at data from four sets of underwater sensors called mooring arrays. These are anchored to the sea floor along the western side of the Atlantic, from near the Caribbean up to the waters off... https://www.sott.net/article/505815-Ice-age-threshold-Atlantic-current-shows-two-decade-decline-across-four-deep-ocean-monitoring-sites Sun, 19 Apr 2026 15:26:11 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505799-Two-supermassive-black-holes-may-collide-100-years-from-now-and-Earth-would-feel-it In a galaxy 500 million light-years away, two supermassive black holes could merge, spreading gravitational waves across the universe. Astronomers may have discovered an extreme pair of light-spewing black holes that are spiraling toward an enormous collision — the effects of which could be felt in the next century. Using decades of radio telescope observations, the astronomers studied an ultrabright object that was previously thought to be a blazar — a glowing core of a galaxy usually powered by a black hole — some 500 million light-years from our solar system. The observations revealed a hidden jet of energy that suggests the intensely bright object is actually two black holes on the verge of colliding, perhaps less than 100 years from now. https://www.sott.net/article/505799-Two-supermassive-black-holes-may-collide-100-years-from-now-and-Earth-would-feel-it Sat, 18 Apr 2026 15:22:31 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505793-Scientist-suggests-dark-matter-could-be-product-of-black-holes-from-a-different-universe Claims relic black holes from a pre-Big Bang 'bounce' solve the universe's biggest mystery While the scientific establishment has spent decades chasing invisible particles that never quite show up, a leading cosmologist has dropped a theory that turns everything on its head: dark matter isn't some exotic new particle. It could be ancient black holes that survived from an entirely different universe. This idea, laid out by Professor Enrique Gaztanaga of the University of Portsmouth, doesn't just tackle one cosmic puzzle. It offers a clean fix for the Big Bang's thorniest problems and lines up with fresh observations that have astronomers scrambling. Gaztanaga argues the elusive substance that makes up roughly 27 per cent of the universe's mass may actually be "relic" black holes formed in a previous collapsing phase of the cosmos. https://www.sott.net/article/505793-Scientist-suggests-dark-matter-could-be-product-of-black-holes-from-a-different-universe Fri, 17 Apr 2026 22:09:27 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505779-Neurobiologists-map-and-activate-brain-circuits-linked-to-placebo-pain-relief Researchers demonstrate that placebo pain relief generalizes across different types of pain, offering hope for opioid-free pain management strategies Placebo effects, in which patients experience relief without therapeutic treatment, increasingly have been considered as potentially powerful clinical treatments for ailments such as depression and pain. Yet the neurological mechanisms underlying such processes are not fully understood. Now, a multi-institutional team led by the University of California San Diego's Matthew Banghart, an associate professor in the School of Biological Sciences, has pinpointed the brain circuitry responsible for placebo pain relief. Their findings, reported in the journal Neuron, describe brain regions that support placebo effects and identify sites where endogenous opioid neuropeptides (commonly referred to as endorphins) provide signals that are critical for placebo pain relief. The study is the first to establish placebo mechanisms using a "reverse... https://www.sott.net/article/505779-Neurobiologists-map-and-activate-brain-circuits-linked-to-placebo-pain-relief Fri, 17 Apr 2026 15:30:01 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505751-The-deepening-mystery-of-the-March-fireballs If you love a good mystery, look no further than the night sky in March 2026. There were no major meteor showers scheduled for March, yet suddenly fireballs started appearing everywhere. "During the month of March, reports of very bright fireballs to the American Meteor Society (AMS) suddenly doubled," says Mike Hankey, who manages the AMS's fireball reporting system. "Many of them were visible in broad daylight and created loud sonic booms." A daytime fireball over Western Europe on March 8th drew more than 3,200 witness reports. Nine days later, a 7-ton asteroid exploded over Ohio with the force of 250 tons of TNT. On March 21st, a fireball broke apart above Houston, sending a fragment through the roof of a house. And those were just the headliners. Hankey has been running the fireball reporting system for nearly 15 years (indeed, he wrote much of the software himself), so he knew something unusual was happening. When the reports kept piling up, he dove into the data -- and what... https://www.sott.net/article/505751-The-deepening-mystery-of-the-March-fireballs Thu, 16 Apr 2026 03:32:59 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505733-Rubin-observatory-announces-11000-new-asteroids The Vera C. Rubin Observatory will discover up to half a million solar system objects every year. It's already starting to deliver on that promise. The Vera C. Rubin Observatory promised to discover up to half a million new solar system objects each year of operation. It isn't fully operational yet, and it's already delivering on that promise. Last week, the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center confirmed the discovery of more than 11,000 new asteroids captured by Rubin during a 1½-month observation period. That period wasn't even part of its planned Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), just a test run to check systems and optimize observations. Still, it was enough for Rubin's powerful 8.4-meter Simonyi Survey Telescope to make thousands of discoveries. While most of them are in the main asteroid belt, the list includes 380 trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) that orbit beyond Neptune, and 33 previously unknown near-Earth objects. This latest submission to the Minor... https://www.sott.net/article/505733-Rubin-observatory-announces-11000-new-asteroids Wed, 15 Apr 2026 17:48:26 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505727-Tests-suggests-Googles-AI-Overviews-tell-millions-of-lies-per-hour Is 90 percent accuracy good enough for a search robot? Google doesn't much like this test. Google spokesperson Ned Adriance tells the Times that Google believes SimpleQA contains incorrect information. Its model evaluations often rely on a similar test called SimpleQA Verified, which uses a smaller set of questions that have been more thoroughly vetted. "This study has serious holes," Adriance told the Times. "It doesn't reflect what people are actually searching on Google." Benchmark problems Evaluating new AI models sometimes feels more like art than science, which is part of the problem. Every company has its own preferred way of demonstrating what a model can do, and the non-deterministic nature of gen AI can make it hard to verify anything. These robots can get a factual question right and then completely miss it if you rerun the query immediately. Oumi even uses AI tools to run its assessments, and those models can hallucinate, too. https://www.sott.net/article/505727-Tests-suggests-Googles-AI-Overviews-tell-millions-of-lies-per-hour Tue, 14 Apr 2026 21:58:16 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505719-Super-magma-reservoirs-discovered-beneath-Tuscany A Swiss-Italian team has discovered 6,000 km³ of magma beneath Tuscany. How can magma buried 5, 10, or even 15 km underground be detected without any surface indicators? The answer lies in ambient noise tomography, a technique that analyses natural ground vibrations with high precision. A team from the University of Geneva (UNIGE), the Institute of Geosciences and Earth Resources (CNR-IGG), and the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) has identified a vast reservoir containing approximately 6,000 km3 of magma beneath Tuscany. Beyond its scientific significance, this breakthrough paves the way for faster and more cost-effective exploration methods to locate resources such as geothermal reservoirs, lithium, and rare earth elements, whose formation is closely linked to deep magmatic systems. The study was published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment. Yellowstone National Park in the United States, Lake Toba in Indonesia, or Lake Taupo in New... https://www.sott.net/article/505719-Super-magma-reservoirs-discovered-beneath-Tuscany Tue, 14 Apr 2026 18:41:27 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505666-Cold-Kills-New-huge-US-study-links-colder-months-to-40-times-as-many-deaths-as-warmer-ones We are killing people by making energy expensive Researchers followed 80% of the US population for two decades, and found that cold temperatures contributed to a whopping 800,000 deaths while hot temperatures were linked to only 2,000. They were looking at monthly temperature data in 819 locations across the US. Then they checked the cardiovascular death rates and found the burden of excess deaths is "quite substantial". During cold periods our blood vessels contract to reduce heat loss, which is why our skin looks slightly bluer or whiter in colder weather. But even a small reduction in volume makes our blood pressure rise. So it is not surprising that colder months are linked to significantly higher death rates from heart attacks, strokes, and coronary artery disease compared to milder periods. As the population ages and kidney disease and diabetes get worse, the Nearly every dollar we pour into preventing heat deaths will end up killing more people than it saves. It's time... https://www.sott.net/article/505666-Cold-Kills-New-huge-US-study-links-colder-months-to-40-times-as-many-deaths-as-warmer-ones Fri, 10 Apr 2026 21:19:17 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505630-US-lab-unlocks-secrets-of-superconductors-that-ensure-no-energy-is-lost-during-electricity-flow Superconductors allow electricity to flow without resistance, meaning no energy is lost as heat. Researchers in the United States have unlocked secrets of high-temperature superconductors. Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have discovered how tiny changes in superhydride structure enable superconductivity at near room temperatures but extreme pressure — offering clues for designing more practical superconductors. "These experiments show what the upgraded APS can do. We can now study atomic-level structures with unprecedented detail in materials under extreme pressure," said Maddury Somayazulu, Argonne physicist. https://www.sott.net/article/505630-US-lab-unlocks-secrets-of-superconductors-that-ensure-no-energy-is-lost-during-electricity-flow Wed, 08 Apr 2026 21:59:05 +0000 https://www.sott.net/article/505600-Artemis-II-performs-closest-moon-flyby-amid-communication-loss The four astronauts of NASA's Artemis II mission have ventured farther from Earth than any humans before them. The Orion spacecraft, carrying three NASA astronauts and a Canadian Space Agency astronaut, performed its long-awaited lunar flyby, coming within roughly 4,070 miles (6,550 km) of the lunar surface and entering the Moon's gravitational sphere of influence. In a planned and highly anticipated phase of the journey, Mission Control in Houston lost contact with the crew at around 6:43pm ET for approximately 40 minutes. The communication blackout occurred as the Moon's body blocked radio and laser signals between the Earth-based Deep Space Network and the Orion spacecraft. While out of contact, NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen, focused on their scientific objectives, photographing and observing the lunar far side - including the 600-mile-wide Orientale basin. https://www.sott.net/article/505600-Artemis-II-performs-closest-moon-flyby-amid-communication-loss Tue, 07 Apr 2026 20:25:21 +0000