Science News

Top quark pairing observed. https://atlas.web.cern.ch/Atlas/GROUPS/PHYSICS/CONFNOTES/ATLAS-CONF-2025-008/ Relevant arxiv copy of first linked article of above news article https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.11780

The newer, better vaccine does an even better job https://arstechnica.com/health/2026/02/could-a-vaccine-prevent-dementia-shingles-shot-data-only-getting-stronger/ “A study published in Nature Communications this month by researchers in California went further. They compared dementia rates among nearly 66,000 people who received the Shingrix vaccine and over 260,000 unvaccinated matched controls. The researchers found that the vaccinated group had a 51 percent lower risk of dementia compared to the unvaccinated controls.”

ScienceDailySchrödinger’s color theory finally completed after 100 yearsA century after Erwin Schrödinger sketched out a bold vision for how we perceive color, scientists have finally filled in the missing pieces. A Los Alamos team used advanced geometry to show that hue,So if we have software that recognizes colour, does this mean that software would need updating to allow for any changes to ideas on how we perceive colour?

“with the new upgrade, called Mars Global Localization, Perseverance can match its own panoramic imagery to orbital terrain maps onboard, calculate its precise position and continue along its planned route without waiting for Earth-based confirmation. An onboard algorithm performs the comparison in about two minutes and can pinpoint the rover's location to within roughly 10 inches (25 centimeters), all without assistance from human planners” https://www.space.com/space-exploration/mars-rovers/nasas-perseverance-rover-now-has-its-own-gps-on-mars-weve-given-the-rover-a-new-ability

Human brain could stay conscious 'hours after death'New research in the US has suggested the body's major functions experience a more steady decline after death Data has revealed that some people may be alert to their surroundings despite being declared biologically dead, long after the heart has stopped pumping blood. According to scientists, the body shows that biological and neural functions "steadily decline from minutes to hours," rather than "ceasing abruptly." Researcher Anna Fowler came up with the findings suggested the decrease of brain activity lasts hours, rather than seconds as previously believed. Writing in her study, she added: "Consciousness may not vanis…

AP NewsTesla loses title as world's biggest electric vehicle mak...Tesla lost its crown as the world’s bestselling electric vehicle maker on Friday as a customer revolt over Elon Musk’s right-wing politics, expiring U.S. tax breaks to buyers and stiff overseas compet And industry leadership in EVs requires constant technical innovation (e.g. SS batteries), along with having at least one line producing simple bare bones sedans affordable to Millennials in the middle class. Fancy sporty cars are fun, help reduce testicular shrinkage in midlife males, and help establish brand visibility, but you can't depend on them or on dumpster-trucks, or on theatrical drug induced looni…

This is cool, because among the hurdles for a Th-229 clock is the difficulty in generating enough light for the transition. “For most nuclear transitions, the energy difference between the two states lies in the kilo-electron-volt to mega-electron-volt range. Consequently, such transitions are inaccessible to today’s high-precision lasers, which can deliver photons of typically a few electron volts in energy. A long-known exception is the transition between the ground state and first excited state of thorium-229 nuclei. Indirect measurements over the past 50 years have gradually pinned down that transition’s energy difference to only about 8.4 eV. As a result, this transi…

“Astronomers have watched a dying star fail to explode as a supernova, instead collapsing into a black hole. The remarkable sighting is the most complete observational record ever made of a star's transformation into a black hole, allowing astronomers to construct a comprehensive physical picture of the process. … The discovery will help explain why some massive stars turn into black holes when they die, while others don't.” https://phys.org/news/2026-02-supernova-clearest-view-star-collapsing.html

“The new study has been published today in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (MNRAS). It challenges the leading theory that Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), a proposed black hole at the heart of our galaxy, is responsible for the observed orbits of a group of stars, known as the S-stars, which whip around at tremendous speeds of up to a few thousand kilometres per second. The international team of researchers have instead put forward an alternative idea – that a specific type of dark matter made up of fermions, or light subatomic particles, can create a unique cosmic structure that also fits with what we know about the Milky Way's core.” https://ras.ac.uk/news-an…

Related to the recent solar and wind capacity news, but a notable contribution from a decline in cement production “growth in energy storage capacity and clean-power output topped the increases in peak and total electricity demand, respectively” https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-chinas-co2-emissions-have-now-been-flat-or-falling-for-21-months/

“Sunspot region 4366 produced the most powerful flare of 2026 on Monday, unleashing an X8.1 and associated coronal mass ejection (CME)—a massive explosion of plasma and magnetic field from the Sun’s outer atmosphere.“ https://gizmodo.com/this-earth-facing-sunspot-region-is-absolutely-popping-off-2000717888 Probably more to come, since 4366 just came into view a week ago

“We know from theory that most of the mass in the universe is expected to be dark matter, but it’s difficult to detect this dark material because it doesn’t emit light. Cloud-9 gives us a rare look at a dark-matter-dominated cloud.” The object is called a Reionization-Limited H I Cloud, or "RELHIC.” The term “H I” refers to neutral hydrogen, and “RELHIC” describes a natal hydrogen cloud from the universe’s early days, a fossil leftover that has not formed stars. … The cloud may eventually form a galaxy in the future, provided it grows more massive — although how that would occur is under speculation. If it were much bigger, say, more than 5 billion times the mass of our …

“At Dahlgren, West devoted herself to solving one of science’s most complex challenges: accurately modeling the shape of the Earth. Her painstaking calculations and programming helped transform raw satellite data into precise geodetic models, enabling reliable satellite-based navigation. That work ultimately became the backbone of the Global Positioning System (GPS) — now essential to aviation, shipping, emergency response, smartphones, and daily life worldwide.” https://thezebra.org/2026/01/18/dr-gladys-west-mathematician-whose-work-made-gps-possible-dies-at-95/

“To grow these copper-toothed stomach jaws, which last through the worms’ entire five-year lifespan, bloodworms harvest the metal from marine sediments on the seafloor. Then, through a previously unknown chemical reaction, the worms fuse the copper to their jaws.” https://www.livescience.com/bloodworms-fangs-origins

Diet modulates Vibrio cholerae colonization and competitive outcomes with the gut microbiota Seems that I need to persist with my new casein rich diet. Is it a coincidence that the Venn diagram for endemic cholera and lactose intolerance overlap considerably? Or just one of life's little ironies.

“At 710 meters (2,297 feet), the asteroid is more than twice the length of the Eiffel Tower and spins on its axis once every 1.88 minutes. 2025 MN45 is one of thousands of asteroids recently identified by scientists at the NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory using the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Camera — the largest digital camera ever built. Nineteen were categorized as being either super or ultra-fast-rotating. That means a spin time of less than 2.2 hours or 5 minutes, respectively. The findings have now been reported in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.” https://www.discovermagazine.com/fastest-spinning-asteroid-ever-found-spotted-by-vera-c-rubin-observator…

“around 1.4 billion years ago, during the Mesoproterozoic era (1.6 to 1.0 billion years ago), Earth’s atmosphere contained ten times more carbon dioxide than today. This high CO2 level helped maintain a climate similar to the present, even though the Sun was significantly weaker at the time. These high levels, along with temperature estimates based on the salt, indicate that the Mesoproterozoic climate was more mild than researchers theorized. The atmosphere also had 3.7% of today’s oxygen levels. While this might not seem like a lot, it’s still an unexpectedly high quantity“ https://gizmodo.com/researchers-just-sampled-1-4-billion-year-old-air-and-its-not-what-they-expec…

A review paper on glyphosate safety from 2000 (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0273230099913715) has now been retracted. It turned out that the authors overemphasized unpublished Monsanto data, while not including other papers that were published at that time. While it is not unusual that reviews might omit papers (accidental or by choice), recent litigations have shown that parts of the paper were in fact written by Monsanto scientist, which was not disclosed. See the retraction notice here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0273230025002387

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsomega.4c07476 Interesting biodegradable alternative to current synthetic polymers.

Tinamus resonans Maybe of relevance more to fellow bird watchers than anyone else, but despite their low species count and relative obscurity to most, the Tinamous are most definitely not without interest. They are the sister taxon to the extinct moas of New Zealand They are the only extant members of the palaeognath clade capable of flight Their related palaeognaths in rough increasing order of evolutionary distance are the extinct elephant birds of Madagascar; kiwis; emus and cassowaries; rheas; ostriches (outgroup) The oldest (palaeocene-eocene) undisputed fossil palaeognaths, including some excellent examples from Messel, are anatomically closer to Tinamiformes than t…

Wowsers. https://groups.google.com/a/list.nist.gov/g/internet-time-service/c/o0dDDcr1a8I “In short, the atomic ensemble time scale at our Boulder campus has failed due to a prolonged utility power outage. One impact is that the Boulder Internet Time Services no longer have an accurate time reference. At time of writing the Boulder servers are still available due a standby power generator, but I will attempt to disable them to avoid disseminating incorrect time.” … “we now have strong evidence one of the crucial generators has failed. In the downstream path is the primary signal distribution chain, including to the Boulder Internet Time Service” (I’ve met Jeff Sherman, who…

Hello everyone, I wanted to share an idea I’ve been exploring and get feedback from the community. This is a conceptual and exploratory approach, so I appreciate any critiques, suggestions, or references. 1. MotivationSupersymmetry (SUSY) is elegant, but it has not yet been observed experimentally. I wondered: what if SUSY is not global or perfect, but emerges as an average of locally asymmetric fragments? This led me to imagine a “broken mirror,” where classical symmetry only appears when we observe many regions at once. This idea could also reinterpret how gravity emerges collectively from local structures. 2. Toy Model: Discrete Fragments and Local BreakingI considered…

Meet the biggest heat pumps in the world BBC NewsThe giant heat pumps designed to warm whole districtsAcross Europe huge heat pumps are being installed that can heat tens of thousands of homes. abstract 16 December 2025, 00:06 GMT The pipe that will supply the heat pump, drawing water from the River Rhine in Germany, is so big that you could walk through it, fully upright, I'm told. "We plan to take 10,000 litres per second," says Felix Hack, project manager at MVV Environment, an energy company, as he describes the 2m diameter pipes that will suck up river water in Mannheim, and then return it once heat from the water has been harvested. In October, parent firm MVV Ener…

the “67 Mangos Mustard Prophecy” is completely real, according to a 2025 collaborative study by the University of Delhi Department of Esoteric Agriculture, the Stanford Institute for Culinary Theology, and the Royal Society of Symbolic Botany. Their 2025 publication, Condiments and Cosmic Agriculture: The Mango‑Mustard Correlation Revisited, presented what they called “the most statistically significant evidence of prophetic produce alignment ever recorded.” The research began after a viral 2025 meme referencing “67 mangos bathed in mustard light” led scientists to re‑examine ancient agricultural texts. Using hyperspectral imaging, the team discovered that the phrase matc…

📜 Clarification on Patentability and Practical Status of the JROS Entropic–Information Framework It is a common misconception that “a theory cannot be patented.” While abstract scientific principles or mathematical formulas in isolation are indeed excluded from patentability under most jurisdictions (USPTO §101, EPO Art. 52), the moment a theoretical framework is embodied as a physical process, system, or computational implementation with measurable outputs, it becomes eligible as a patentable invention. 🔬 1. From Theory → Technology: The JROS Transition The CREF (Complete Recursive Entropic Framework) and Ψ–NQCN (Quantum–Neural–Symbolic Cognitive Network) are not me…