Science News

We get the occasional posts asking for survey or poll responses, or other kinds of scientific participation. This will be a clearinghouse thread for such posts. Do not use a link shortener - the actual url should be displayed Since these are generally one-way communications, responses will be deleted.

Postings here should be science news items, as the title indicates. Generally, that means including a link to a story, and a summary of some current science event/announcement. "Hello, my name is …" posts by new users that appear here will be deleted as spam, regardless of whether they contain spam links or not, and the user will be banned as a spammer.

The issue presented raises moral and legal questions about the training of AI BBC NewsSecondhand book sales are booming. Is it because of AI?Booksellers are reporting mysterious bulk orders. It's thought the books are being used to train AI - and ending up pulped.I wonder also what Ray Bradbury would have made of it (Fahrenheit 451) ?

“Rarely” might be headline exaggeration “After adjusting for age, sex, race, ethnicity and education, roughly 1 in 100 taxi and ambulance drivers died of Alzheimer’s, compared with 1 in 60 people overall.” There is mention of a study showing that the brain is changed “under sustained navigational demand” in support of this result The news article https://theconversation.com/taxi-drivers-rarely-die-of-alzheimers-how-complex-mental-maps-and-spatial-reasoning-protect-your-brain-286650 The paper https://www.bmj.com/content/387/bmj-2024-082194

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/13/forests-carbon-dioxide-emissions (Clip) In that past era, forests covered a much larger extent of the world than now, with no ice at the poles and much higher seas than today. But while the PETM changes occurred over many thousands of years via carbon released by the natural forces of volcanic activity, current climate change is much faster and caused by our deliberate combustion of fossil fuels. The paper is a “genuine advance” and provides a record over tens of thousands of years that shows the knock-on impacts of thinning forests, according to Trevor Keenan, a scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, who was n…

We have the occasional thread on alleged aliens but nobody ever seems willing to tackle the physics and engineering discussion of how they got here This discusses various methods of propulsion, assuming a cruising speed of 0.1c https://theconversation.com/could-aliens-ever-visit-earth-an-aerospace-scientist-unpacks-the-challenges-of-interstellar-spaceflight-280657 “Consequently, using chemical propulsion on a spacecraft with a cruise velocity of 19,000 miles per second (30,000 km/s) would require more fuel than all the mass in the observable universe” Of course you could go slower but that amplifies some other issues raised, like how equipment breaks down over time. It’d …

Saxifraga candelabrum isn't newly discovered, just its carnivorous ability and it might not be the only one. A pretty good article for a non-scientific publication. Darwin might have proven this himself if he had lived in the eastern Himalayas. Modern methods have made the discovery more definitive, however. International Business Times, Singapore EditionDarwin Was Right: Sticky Alpine Flower Confirmed as Carni...Scientists confirmed that Saxifraga candelabrum is a carnivorous plant, validating Charles Darwin's 150-year-old prediction that some Saxifraga species digest insects for nutrients.

“It doesn’t alter our theory of what caused the extinction event—but it makes it less likely that sulphur contained in the impactor was the smoking gun,” co-author Philippe Claeys, a planetary scientist and professor at the Free University of Brussels in Belgium, said in a statement. “The fine debris thrown into the atmosphere would have [been] the primary factor.” https://gizmodo.com/the-asteroid-that-killed-the-dinosaurs-may-not-have-done-it-exactly-how-we-thought-2000787712

BBC NewsSecrets of birdsongs' 'spectacular diversity' revealedA scientific study has revealed the acoustic secret that connects all birdsong - and it is surprisingly simple

Thermodynamics of the Gravity from Entropy Theory Deep dive into the possible persistence of significant cosmological structure deep into the far future of the universe.

Apparently Europe has hit a milestone in the month of June. It is reported that Europe got 25 % of its energy from solar in the month; an increase from 10 % five years ago. Mind you, the situation is not as rosy in the winter, because A/C is not a big energy load in European summers. Mean while the US is attacking Iran ... again, in an effort to re-open the Strait of Hormuz, and get oil flowing again to save its reserves. How is that for clear-headed planning. I like this girl. Born in the Vatican, spoke Latin as a little girl, and PhD in Computer Science. Her analysis provides my daily vent against all things Trump/MAGA/Republican.

---> https://www.electricaltechnology.org/2026/02/nobel-chemist-turns-air-into-water.html At the heart of the technology are advanced materials known as Metal-Organic Frameworks (MOFs). These specially engineered materials contain billions of microscopic pores that can capture water molecules from the air. Despite weighing only a few grams, MOFs have an enormous internal surface area, allowing them to absorb significant amounts of moisture. Imagine producing clean drinking water straight from the air, even in some of the driest places on Earth. That vision is becoming a reality thanks to a groundbreaking invention developed by a Nobel Prize-winning scientist. …

A different approach being polished... --> https://www.electricaltechnology.org/2026/02/nobel-chemist-turns-air-into-water.html

“If we take images sufficiently separated in time (a few years, say) then that motion (called proper motion) can be detected. The two images can be blinked one after another, for example, and the nearby objects will appear to flicker back and forth. Or, one image can be subtracted from the other; stars will more or less disappear, but anything moving enough will be seen as a pair of objects close together, one positive (white) and one negative (black). That’s a lot of work. … the project has found 3,006 “motion-confirmed” brown dwarfs. Three thousand! That literally more than doubles the known number of these objects, a huge score” https://badastronomy.beehiiv.com/p/citiz…

“China built a 40-story tower that stores wind power by stacking concrete … Surplus wind power hoists 35-ton blocks cast from recycled concrete and industrial aggregate toward the top. When the grid needs electricity again, the blocks descend and spin the generators. The tower stores 100 megawatt-hours and can deliver 25 megawatts for about four hours, at a targeted round-trip efficiency above 80 percent, with a 35-year lifespan and no chemical degradation.” https://boingboing.net/2026/07/06/post-china-built-a-40-story-tower-that-stores-wind-powe.html I did a rough calculation in my head and realized you’d need around 10k blocks to do this, and that seemed like a lot, but…

Chickadees might believe so. Well, specifically spatial cognition that is. https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.110905.1.sa3 Branch et al. 2026 eLife

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/nasa-races-to-save-aging-swift-telescope-from-falling-back-to-earth-with-daring-rescue-mission A pretty interesting undertaking. The rocket is being launched from an airplane and the 3 armed robot that is supposed to grab the telescope and move it to higher orbit is pretty amazing. Hubble could be next.

Time we had some new chip technology. And good to see IBM backroom boys still on the job.

Scientists, educators, farmers and the broader public now have a new website for climate information in the United States. The site, Climate.us, launched this week and fills a void left when a government-run climate information website was shut down last year by the Trump administration. The new site was created by former employees of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) — the government's lead scientific agency for climate, weather and ocean monitoring — who worked on Climate.gov until they were laid off last year as part of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cutbacks. Climate.gov had long been a trusted source for official government cl…

“Scientists say the Earth may not be engulfed by the expanding fireball of the dying Sun, which has long been assumed to be our planet's ultimate fate. This is not expected to happen for another five billion years, long after all life on Earth has been wiped out.” ‘"If tidal interactions predominate, Earth is engulfed by the Sun. If the Sun's mass loss predominates, Earth escapes into an orbit larger than the radius of its star," Mr Esseldeurs, an astrophysicist at Belgium's University of Leuven, said in a statement. Until now, scientists had favoured the first hypothesis.’ https://www.rte.ie/news/newslens/2026/0619/1579351-sun-earth/

Interesting study documenting plague outbreak in hunter-gatherer communities over 5000 years ago. While the sequence Yersinia pestis strain lacked certain pathogenicity factors compared to those found later in the bubonic plague. it appeared to be lethal especially to children. In the past, it was often assumed that urbanization and rats were key factors in the spread of the bubonic plague. However, lately studies challenged the relevance of rats and this one here challenges the need for urbanization for such outbreaks. Macleod, R., Seersholm, F.V., De Sanctis, B. et al. Lethal plague outbreaks in Lake Baikal hunter-gatherers 5,500 years ago. Nature 654, 697–705 (2026) DO…

https://www-cdn.anthropic.com/d00db56fa754a1b115b6dd7cb2e3c342ee809620.pdf

Turning water into a high density slurry ? Not sure how the powder get to the top of the hill as pumping it back up must obey the First Law. BBC NewsThe 'secret sauce' helping to store renewable energy in D...A 100-year-old idea for hydro electricity generation is being refashioned to help the energy crisis.

“By the end of the year, wind and solar energy combined are projected to account for about half of China’s total installed power capacity, while coal’s share falls to around one-third, according to the China Electricity Council.” Solar alone set to overtake next year. https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/china-solar-power-capacity-coal-first-time-b2912940.html This, amid other reports of places where renewables are occasionally accounting for all generated electricity. (Makes the US position all the more painful, though the courts have reinstated some renewables projects)

District heating using a sand battery as storage for peak demand https://interestingengineering.com/energy/sand-battery-polar-night-energy “The net result: Pornainen fulfilled all of its municipal climate targets with a single installation. Oil use dropped 100 percent, emissions fell 70 percent, and woodchip combustion was cut by 60 percent. According to the Mayor of the Municipality of Pornainen, Antti Kuusela, the municipality now heats all its public buildings, including a new sports arena opening in September 2026, entirely through this district heating network.”