New Scientist
New Scientist
The best place to find out what’s new in science – and why it matters
0 Les gens qui ont lié ça
531 Articles
2 Photos
0 Vidéos
0 Aperçu
Mises à jour récentes
  • Dancing turtles help us understand how they navigate around the world
    www.newscientist.com
    Some turtles flap about when a magnetic field suggests they are about to be fedGoforth et al., Nature (2025)Baby loggerhead turtles dance when they are expecting food, a behaviour that researchers have used to investigate their navigation abilities. By learning to associate a magnetic field with a food, this cute display has helped indicate that the sea turtles have two distinct geomagnetic senses to help them navigate during their epic ocean journeys.The turtle dance is a strange pattern of behaviour that emerges quickly in young captive sea turtles when they figure out that food comes from above, says Ken Lohmann at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. They would get very excited and raise their heads up out of the water and come swimming over, and often if the food wasnt dropped in immediately, they would begin to flap their flippers and spin around. AdvertisementLohmann and his colleagues realised that there might be a way to use this behaviour to reveal how turtle navigation works. They put juvenile loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta) in tanks surrounded by coil systems that created magnetic fields in the water, replicating those in their natural habitats.The juveniles spent an equal amount of time in two magnetic fields, but were only fed in one of them. Soon, when they were in a magnetic field they associated with food, the turtles started to dance in anticipation, a learned behaviour reminiscent of Ivan Pavlovs famous dog experiment. We demonstrated that the turtles can learn to recognise magnetic fields, says team member Kayla Goforth at Texas A&M University. The latest science news delivered to your inbox, every day.Sign up to newsletterThe researchers then reproduced a magnetic field near the Cape Verde islands, an area where loggerheads tend to turn south-west when migrating. The team demonstrated that the juvenile turtles also did this. Then the researchers trained other turtles to associate the Cape Verde field with food.One of the ideas about how some animals sense magnetic fields is that there is a complex set of chemical reactions, possibly taking place in the eye, that are influenced by Earths magnetic field.To try to affect any such system, the team used an additional magnetic field that oscillates at a radio wave frequency, which should interfere with that cascade of chemical reactions.Regardless of whether the oscillating field was turned on, the turtles could detect the underlying Cape Verde magnetic signature and would dance, which suggests their map sense isnt dependent on this chemical reception mechanism. But the oscillating field did make them turn in random directions, rather than south-west.Scientists tested for this behaviour via a series of experiments in tanksGoforth et al., Nature (2025)This is good evidence that there are actually two different magnetic senses in the turtles: one that is used for the map sense, one that is used for the compass sense, says Lohmann. The simplest explanation would be that the magnetic map sense does not depend on this chemical magnetoreception process, but the magnetic compass sense does.The magnetic map sense is a positional sense, kind of like a GPS, and their compass sense tells them which way to go, says Goforth. This is probably how theyre getting back to important ecological locations such as feeding grounds and nesting areas.Its a new way of thinking about how turtles are using the magnetic field to navigate, says Katrina Phillips at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Whats really fascinating is we still dont understand how theyre even perceiving the magnetic field. So, this is getting at what is going on mechanistically.Journal reference:Nature DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-08554-yTopics:animal behaviour
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·8 Vue
  • Strongest evidence yet that Ozempic and Wegovy reduce alcohol intake
    www.newscientist.com
    People report lower alcohol cravings when on semaglutideShutterstock/David MGSemaglutide really does seem to help people who are addicted to alcohol reduce their intake, according to the first randomised clinical trial of the drug for this purpose.Sold under brand names including Wegovy and Ozempic, semaglutide works by mimicking a gut hormone called glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), hence the technical term for it is a GLP-1 receptor agonist. The drug was first used to treat type 2 diabetes, but because it reduces appetite, Wegovy has now also been licensed for weight loss in eight countries. Semaglutide has also shown hints of helping an extraordinary number of medical conditions. AdvertisementWhen it comes to alcohol use, a 2024 study of 84,000 people linked injecting Ozempic or Wegovy with a lower risk of alcoholism. Promising as that result was, it showed correlation rather than causation.But now, Christian Hendershot at the University of Southern California and his colleagues have completed the first randomised clinical trial of semaglutides effect on alcohol use disorder, a type of study that can tease out causation.Their trial involved 48 people in the US who had been diagnosed with the condition, of whom 34 were women and 14 were men. Half received weekly low-dose injections of semaglutide for nine weeks and the rest had placebo injections. Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterThose on semaglutide consumed fewer drinks per drinking session and had reduced weekly alcohol cravings compared with those on placebo.We didnt have any evidence of significant adverse effects or safety concerns with the medication in this population and we found overall that across several different drinking outcomes it reduced the quantity of alcohol that people consumed, says Hendershot.The results are promising, says Rong Xu at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Ohio. Despite the small sample size, this randomised clinical trial highlights the therapeutic potential of semaglutide in treating alcohol use disorder.Ziyad Al-Aly at Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, says the study adds yet another piece of evidence that GLP-1RAs [GLP-1 receptor agonists] may be helpful in addiction disorders.Larger studies are needed to corroborate the work, he says, and to answer questions about whether people increase their drinking if they come off semaglutide and what its longer-term effects might be, especially given concerns around loss of bone and muscle mass.The study should be treated as promising initial evidence, says Hendershot, but more research is needed. People shouldnt start taking semaglutide for alcohol problems, he says.This is the first study like this and people are excited about it, but we do have approved and effective medication for alcohol use disorder, so until more research has been done, people are advised to pursue existing medications that are out there and approved right now, says Hendershot.Journal reference:JAMA Psychiatry DOI: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2024.4789 Topics:
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·8 Vue
  • 'Sexome' microbes swapped during sex could aid forensic investigations
    www.newscientist.com
    Male and female genitals offer distinct environments for microbesArtur Plawgo/Getty ImagesSexual partners transfer their distinctive genital microbiome to each other during intercourse, a finding that could have implications for forensic investigations of sexual assault.Brendan Chapman at Murdoch University in Perth, Western Australia, and his colleagues collected swabs from the genitals of 12 monogamous, heterosexual couples, then used RNA gene sequencing to identify microbial signatures for each participant. The researchers asked the couples to abstain from sex for between two days and two weeks, and took follow-up samples a few hours after intercourse. AdvertisementWe found that those genetic signatures from the females bacteria were detectable in their male partners and vice versa, says Chapman. This change in a persons sexome, as the team has dubbed it, could prove useful in criminal investigations, he says.The amount of transfer varied from couple to couple, and the team also found that not even condom use completely prevented the movement of the sexome from one partner to another. However, one major limitation of the results was that the female sexome changed significantly during a period.Chapman says that even though there may be some homogenisation of the microbiomes of long-term, monogamous couples, the bacterial populations clearly differ between the sexes. Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterThe great benefit we have with the penile and vaginal microbiomes is that because of the vast difference in the two environments, we observe very different bacteria types on each, says Chapman. For example, the penis is mostly a skin-like surface and thus reflects similarities with the skin microbiome. We see anaerobic bacteria types in the vagina and aerobic types on the penis.As such, many of these bacteria cant persist indefinitely in the opposite environment, he says. Its a bit like comparing land and sea animals there are some that exclusively live in one or the other location and would die if removed, but also some that happily move between and persist.Having established the transfer of bacteria during intercourse, the team is now hoping to prove that an individuals sexome is unique, like a fingerprint or DNA. I think theres enough diversity and uniqueness contained within everyones sexome, but theres still a bit of work to do in order for us to demonstrate that with a technique that is robust enough to meet the challenges of forensic science, says Chapman.If the researchers are able to prove this, it could aid in sexual assault investigations, particularly ones in which a male suspect doesnt ejaculate, has had a vasectomy or uses a condom. Bacterial genetic profiles might be able to corroborate or oppose propositions or testimonies about what happened in alleged sexual assault cases, says Dennis McNevin at the University of Technology Sydney, Australia.Standard profiles of human DNA will always be prioritised in such cases because of their great power to differentiate between individuals, he says, but the sexome could offer a useful alternative. Bacterial genetic profiles may one day complement DNA evidence or may even help point to a perpetrator of a sexual assault in the rare cases where DNA profiles are not available, says McNevin.Topics:
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·20 Vue
  • Why AI firms should follow the example of quantum computing research
    www.newscientist.com
    Leader and TechnologyWhile artificial intelligence and quantum computing insiders have both been guilty of hyping up their products, only the latter group appears to still be applying proper scientific rigour to their field 12 February 2025 David Parker/Science Photo LibraryWhat is the difference between artificial intelligence and quantum computing? One is a sci-fi-sounding technology that has long promised to revolutionise our world, providing researchers can sort out a few technical wrinkles like the tendency to make errors. Actually, so is the other.And yet, while AI appears to have breathlessly and inescapably taken over, well, everything, the average person has had no experience with quantum computing. Does this matter?Practitioners in both fields are certainly guilty of hyping up their wares, but part of the problem for would-be quantum proponents is that the current generation of quantum computers is essentially useless. As we detail in our special report on the state of the industry (see Quantum computers have finally arrived, but will they ever be useful?), the race is now on to build a machine that can actually do useful computations of a kind not possible on regular computers.AdvertisementThe lack of a clear use case hasnt prevented tech giants from forcibly injecting AI into the software we use every day, but bringing quantum computing to the masses in the same way is much more difficult due to the finicky nature of this hardware. You will probably never own a personal quantum computer instead, the industry is targeting businesses and governments.Practitioners in both the AI and quantum computing fields are guilty of hyping up their waresPerhaps that is why quantum computer builders seem to be retaining a foot in science, publishing peer-reviewed research while also drumming up business. The big AI firms seem to have all but given up the publishing part why bother, when you can simply charge people a monthly fee to use your tech, whether or not it actually works?The quantum approach is the right one. If you are promising a technology that will transform research, industry and society, explaining how it works in the most open way possible is the only means of actually convincing people to believe the hype.It may not be showy, but in the long run it is substance, not style, that really matters. So, by all means, aim to revolutionise the world but please, do show your working.Topics:
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·22 Vue
  • Waste surveillance at just 20 airports could spot the next pandemic
    www.newscientist.com
    A network of airports like Hong Kong International Airport could effectively detect disease outbreaksYuen Man Cheung / AlamyA global early-warning system for disease outbreaks and even future pandemics is possible with minimal monitoring: testing the waste water from a fraction of international flight arrivals at just 20 airports around the world.When passengers fly while infected with bacteria or viruses, they can leave traces of these pathogens in their waste, which airports collect from a plane after the flight lands. If youre going to the bathroom on an aircraft, and if you blow your nose and put that in the toilet or if you do whatever you have to do theres some chance that some of the genetic material from the pathogen is going into the waste water, says Guillaume St-Onge at Northeastern University in Massachusetts. AdvertisementSt-Onge and his colleagues used a simulator called the Global Epidemic and Mobility model to analyse how airport waste-water surveillance networks could detect emerging variants of a virus like the one that causes covid-19. By testing the model using different numbers and locations of airports, they showed that 20 strategically placed sentinel airports worldwide could detect outbreaks nearly as quickly and efficiently as a network involving thousands of airports. The larger network was just 20 per cent faster but cost much more.To detect emerging threats from anywhere in the world, the network should include major international airports in cities such as London, Paris, Dubai and Singapore. But the team also showed how networks involving a different set of airports could provide more targeted detection of disease outbreaks that were likely to originate in certain continents.This modelling study is the first to provide the actual number of sentinel airports required to support effective global surveillance while optimising resource use, says Jiaying Li at the University of Sydney in Australia. Receive a weekly dose of discovery in your inbox.Sign up to newsletterAirport-based networks could also provide useful information about disease outbreaks early on during an epidemic, including estimates of how quickly the disease can spread from person to person and how many people are likely to be infected from exposure to a single case, says St-Onge.Such waste-water surveillance could provide early warning for known diseases and possibly track new emerging threats too if the bacteriums or viruss genomic data is available. I dont think wed be able to look in the waste water and say: There is a new pathogen thats out there, says Temi Ibitoye at Brown University in Rhode Island. But when a new pathogen is announced, you can very quickly look at that previous waste-water data and say: Is this present in our sample?A map of sentinel airports, with colours indicating how long this network would take to detect a disease outbreak at various sites around the worldNortheastern UniversityThere are still some nuances to work out, such as how often to take waste-water samples to track different pathogens. Other challenges include figuring out the most efficient ways to sample waste water from aircraft and evaluating the systems real-world effectiveness, says Li.A long-term monitoring programme would also require cooperation from airlines and airports, along with a consistent source of funding, she says.Individual airports could hesitate to participate because of perceived risk to their operations if infectious disease statistics are made widely available unless data-handling agreements could assuage such concerns, says Trevor Charles at the University of Waterloo in Canada. He emphasised the importance of coordinated international funding to offset local political considerations.But even coordination through an international body like the World Health Organization carries its own political complications, given that President Donald Trump has initiated the USs withdrawal from the organisation, says Ibitoye. Still, research such as this contributes towards making [the monitoring network] a reality sooner rather than later, she says.Journal referenceNature Medicine DOI: 10.1038/s41591-025-03501-4Topics:
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·30 Vue
  • Older people in England are more satisfied after covid-19 pandemic
    www.newscientist.com
    The pandemic may have changed peoples outlook on lifeDisobeyArt / AlamyThe covid-19 pandemic gave older people in England a stronger sense of purpose and greater life satisfaction, possibly because it deepened their appreciation for the simple things in life.We already knew that some peoples well-being and life satisfaction dipped during the early years of the pandemic, but what happened later on, after most restrictions had been lifted, is less well understood. Unfortunately, most of the studies that were carried out did not continue [in the later years of] the pandemic, so there was a big gap in the research, says Paola Zaninotto at University College London. AdvertisementTo address this, Zaninotto and her colleagues analysed data from surveys on the well-being and depressive symptoms of nearly 4000, mainly white, people in England, all of whom were aged 50 or older at the time of the study.Each participant completed a survey in the two years running up to the pandemic, a second one in the first year of the pandemic in 2020 and a final one between the end of 2021 and early 2023. More than 85 per cent of participants filled in this last survey in 2022, after most infection-control measures in England had ended.The team found that, before the pandemic, the participants rated their sense of purpose in life with an average score of 7.5 out of 10. This dropped to 7.2 in 2020, before rising to 7.6 above pre-pandemic levels in the final survey. Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterSimilarly, the participants reported an average life satisfaction score of 7.3 before the pandemic, and although this dipped to 6.9 early in the pandemic, it rose to 7.5 in the final survey.While these are small shifts in well-being at a population level, some individuals will have experienced larger changes that affect their work and relationships, says Rebecca Pearson at the University of Bristol, UK.It may be that the global outbreak reminded people of what is important in life, says Zaninotto. The pandemic brought some challenges, but also a more broad appreciation for our lives maybe for social connections and other meaningful activities, she says.The team also found that average rates of depression defined as having at least four depressive symptoms, such as feeling lonely more than doubled from the first period to the second one. Rates fell in the final survey, but remained above pre-pandemic levels.People may feel we got through it, Ive gone back to work, Ive been able to see my family again and all that stuff, which is purposeful and satisfying, but, at the same time, you might find yourself low at times, you might not be able to feel pleasure in the same way, says Pearson. Further studies should explore what exactly is driving these increased rates of depression, she says.Additional research should also explore how the results translate to people elsewhere, says Kelsey OConnor at the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies in Luxembourg. The pandemic policies and severity of the pandemic was so dramatically different in other countries, he says. You cant really generalise to younger people, ethnic minority or marginalised groups either.Journal reference:Aging & Mental Health DOI: 10.1080/13607863.2025.2450260Topics:pandemic
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·78 Vue
  • How the megaquop machine could usher in a new era of quantum computing
    www.newscientist.com
    TechnologyJohn Preskill has been guiding the growing quantum computing industry for decades, and now he has set a new challenge to build a device capable of a million quantum operations per second, or a megaquop 11 February 2025 John Preskill has set a challenge for the quantum computing industryGregg SegalThe past decade has seen significant advances and investment in quantum computing, and yet the devices we have today essentially have no practical purpose. That is down to two main reasons the first being that the qubits, or quantum bits, that make up todays machines still struggle with noise, or errors, that we are only just learning to correct. The second is that devices that could solve practical problems are expected to require many more qubits than even the biggest quantum computers currently have.In 2018,
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·79 Vue
  • Maybe NASAs SLS should be cancelled but not by Elon Musk
    www.newscientist.com
    The Space Launch System at Kennedy Space Center in Florida in 2022NASA/Joel KowskyNASAs enormous rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), seems to be in danger. It has been controversial for decades thanks to its high cost and many delays, but now there are hints that it may finally be on the chopping block. The trouble is, there arent any comparable alternatives no other rockets can carry as much mass as SLS can into space and the only operational backup is built by Elon Musks firm SpaceX. Given Musks current position embedded within the US
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·61 Vue
  • Why quantum computers are being held back by geopolitical tussles
    www.newscientist.com
    Both China and the US are aiming to pull ahead with quantum computingShutterstock/Niphon SubsriQuantum computers were once nothing more than a plaything for physicists, but as their capabilities have grown, so too has the attention from governments. The US, China and European nations are all racing to develop these exotic machines, while carefully balancing national security needs with commercial opportunities. But have they got the balance right?The first nation to develop a sufficiently powerful quantum computer will be able to crack many encryption algorithms in use today and gain access to the rest of the worlds
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·80 Vue
  • Fossil proteins may soon reveal how we're related to Australopithecus
    www.newscientist.com
    Reconstruction of Lucy, the most famous skeleton of Australopithecus afarensisMLouisphotography/AlamyThis is an extract from Our Human Story, our newsletter about the revolution in archaeology.Sign up to receive it in your inbox every month.Whenever we think about the process of evolution, theres a risk of falling into the trap of telling stories. Human minds are prone to interpret the world in terms of stories: its just one of our biases, along with the one that causes us to see faces in clouds and on pieces of toast. So we always have to be
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·79 Vue
  • How studying babies' minds is prompting us to rethink consciousness
    www.newscientist.com
    MindThe debate over when consciousness arises has been revitalised by new tests of awareness in infants raising the possibility that it emerges just before birth 11 February 2025 Peter ReynoldsMy first memory is of my family moving house when I was 3 years old. I can picture the removal van at the gate with my brother in the front seat, and I remember worrying about how his pet rabbit would fare on the journey.Before this moment, my autobiography is a blank page. At some point between my conception and that morning we moved house, I must have gained the ability to think, with an awareness of my body and its surroundings all knitted together into something we loosely call consciousness but I have no idea when that occurred.Most parents would assume that their newborn is conscious from the moment they hold them in their arms, but how do we really know? It is a problem that has been troubling philosophers for decades. Theres this general issue of, when did we begin? When did this stream of consciousness first emerge, if I cant remember it? says Tim Bayne at Monash University, Australia.The answers, however, havent been forthcoming, with some researchers claiming it is already present at birth and others arguing it arises after our first year or later. Now, improvements to infant brain imaging are bringing clarity to the debate suggesting an early origin of consciousness, perhaps even emerging just before birth.Besides helping us imagine what life is like during those first moments of infant awareness, these insights help us to understand what consciousness is. If you know when consciousness emerges, you can know what type of brain structures are necessary and sufficient, says Claudia
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·75 Vue
  • Cybersecurity experts fear Elon Musk's DOGE may enable quantum hackers
    www.newscientist.com
    Elon Musk heads the Trump administrations government efficiency task force, DOGEKen Cedeno/UPI/ShutterstockCybersecurity experts are racing to preserve vital documents produced by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), a government agency charged with developing standards for a range of fields including quantum-proof encryption, after fears they could be lost as part of Elon Musks government efficiency drive.Musk heads a task force called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which is not a government department but was created by an executive order from US President Donald Trump with the stated aim of modernizing Federal technology
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·77 Vue
  • How PsiQuantum plans to build world's largest quantum computer by 2027
    www.newscientist.com
    TechnologyWith an investment of AU$1 billion, PsiQuantum is planning to build a photonic quantum computer with a million qubits, far larger than any in existence today - and the firm says it will be ready in just two years 11 February 2025 A PsiQuantum silicon wafer containing thousands of quantum devicesPsiQuantumOn a large table in front of me is some of the worlds most advanced photonic hardware, which may soon drive one of the great technological revolutions of our time. I can see tiny microchips that look like precious jewels, with nanoscale patterns that make them glow like rainbows, along with detectors, filters and switches connected by fibre-optic cables, laid out on smartphone-sized circuit boards. These are the fundamental components of a massive photonic quantum computer that could be up and running in just a few years though to
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·70 Vue
  • Quantum computers have finally arrived, but will they ever be useful?
    www.newscientist.com
    TechnologyHundreds of quantum computing firms around the world are racing to commercialise these once-exotic devices, but the jury is still out on who is going to pull ahead and produce a machine that actually does something useful 11 February 2025 The race is on to build a useful quantum computerThere has never been a better time to be in the quantum computing business. Some 10 years ago, it was not obvious that quantum computing was more than an interesting lab experiment. Since then, an entire globalised ecosystem has emerged, says Laurent Prost at French quantum computing start-up Alice & Bob, one of hundreds of firms in the sector. Krysta Svore at Microsoft puts it even more succinctly: Quantum computers are working.But working on what? Practical uses for quantum computers remain limited, with no sign yet of the long-promised ability
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·87 Vue
  • People are starting to trust AI more and view it as more human-like
    www.newscientist.com
    People are trusting AI more and moreJ Studios/Getty ImagesPeople are becoming more trusting of and warm towards AI models, according to a year-long survey of those living in the US.Myra Cheng at Stanford University in California and her colleagues gathered this information on the crowdsourcing platform Prolific. Between May 2023 and August 2024, roughly 1000 participants a month completed the researchers questionnaire, although due to technical issues with the platform only 12 months of data was collected over the 16-month period surveyed.The participants, who
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·72 Vue
  • UK facility starts sucking CO2 out of seawater to help the climate
    www.newscientist.com
    EnvironmentStripping carbon dioxide out of the ocean could be much more efficient than capturing it from the air. Researchers are hoping to show its potential at a pilot plant in Weymouth 11 February 2025 Weymouth Bay on Englands south coast, where SeaCURE is sucking carbon dioxide out of seawaterHeidi Stewart/AlamyAt the back of the Sea Life aquarium in Weymouth on Englands south coast, a hangar resounds with the rush of water into tanks. Three reef sharks and a nurse shark are cruising around in one. A stingray is hiding somewhere in another. But a closed rectangular tank of stainless steel holds an entirely different beast: carbon dioxide bubbling out of seawater as part of a process scientists hope could someday help reverse climate change. A red line on a computer screen shows
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·83 Vue
  • CAR T-cell therapy could help prevent clogged arteries
    www.newscientist.com
    A build-up of plaque in arteries can lead to cardiovascular conditionsSEBASTIAN KAULITZKI/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARYGenetically engineered immune cells could help reduce the clogging of arteries, potentially lowering the risk of heart attack or stroke in people who dont respond to common treatments.Doctors often treat those at high risk of these conditions using drugs called statins, but they dont protect everyone. If statins were perfect we wouldnt have such an issue with cardiovascular disease its still the leading cause of death worldwide, says Robert Schwab at the University of Pennsylvania.
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·82 Vue
  • How the XB-1 aircraft went supersonic without a sonic boom
    www.newscientist.com
    The experimental supersonic aircraft XB-1Boom SupersonicWhen the experimental XB-1 aircraft broke the sound barrier three times during its first supersonic flight on 28 January, it did not produce a sonic boom audible from the ground, according to US company Boom Supersonic.This confirms what weve long believed: supersonic travel can be affordable, sustainable and friendly to those onboard and on the ground, said Blake Scholl, Founder and CEO of Boom Supersonic, in a press release. AdvertisementAs an aircraft pushes through the atmosphere at high speeds, it changes the air pressure around it, creating sound waves. And when a supersonic flight surpasses the speed of sound Mach 1, or about 1224 kilometres per hour these sound waves combine to form a shock wave that spreads away from the flight path. This sonic boom can travel far enough to reach the ground, where it produces an extremely loud noise, rattles buildings and even breaks glass.Sonic booms over land are so disruptive that they contributed to the retirement of fabled commercial airliner Concorde in 2003 and spurred many countries to prohibit commercial supersonic aircraft. Since then, aerospace engineers have been trying to develop aircraft designs that can go supersonic without the boom.In this case, the XB-1 took advantage of a physics phenomenon called the Mach cutoff. Because sound moves more slowly at higher altitudes, an aircraft breaching the sound barrier at those heights will produce a boom that cannot reach the ground if the boom moves downward, the increasing speed of sound will deflect it, pushing its shockwaves upward instead. Receive a weekly dose of discovery in your inbox.Sign up to newsletterThe trick is that temperature and wind also affect sound speeds, so the ideal altitude and speed for the supersonic aircraft will depend on atmospheric conditions. The actual challenge is getting very accurate atmospheric forecasts on temperature and on wind computing the practical Mach-cutoff flight speed is pretty straightforward from there, says Bernd Liebhardt at the German Aerospace Center in Germany.Boom Supersonic says that XB-1s most recent and final test flight, on 10 February, also reached supersonic speeds without the boom. Now the company is using what it learned from the test flights to help its future commercial airliner, called Overture, achieve the same feat. Supersonic overland flights would be up to 50 per cent faster than todays commercial airliners. That could make the travel time from New York to Los Angeles 90 minutes shorter.Flying at supersonic speeds during shorter overland routes could also burn less fuel than flying at the aerodynamically worst speed right below the sound barrier says Liebhardt. But he cautioned that taking advantage of Mach cutoff is probably more of a niche use case for supersonic business jet users. It would deliver less of an economic payoff for a commercial airline service.Topics:transport/aviation/flight
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·90 Vue
  • How cosmic stasis may drastically rewrite the history of the universe
    www.newscientist.com
    PhysicsUnexpected epochs of stillness that punctuate the cosmic timeline could offer a natural explanation for dark matter and many other unsolved astronomical mysteries 10 February 2025 NASAAsk someone how the universe began and they will probably reply with those three familiar words: the big bang. But as recently as the 1960s, cosmologists hotly debated this matter. On the other side of the argument to the big bang was the idea of an unchanging steady state universe, the density of which was kept the same by continually adding new matter as it expanded.In the end, observations ruled out the idea of a steady state universe and cemented the place of the big bang in the canon of cosmology. That primordial explosion started a process of continual expansion, and today cosmologists view the universe as a place of constant flux.But now a bold group of cosmologists is questioning all that. To be clear, this isnt a return to the steady state universe, but something altogether more intriguing. The researchers are proposing that the universes history may have been punctuated by spells of eerie stillness. These periods of cosmic stasis could arise in such a way that they replace whole epochs of conventional cosmic history or become spliced within that timeline.Bold is certainly the word for this hypothesis. Its pointing to a whole different family of possibilities that before this we didnt realise could happen, says Adrienne Erickcek at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who wasnt involved in the work. But if these static periods do exist, they could solve all manner of conundrums, including what dark matter is made of. Even more exciting, these ideas may soon be testable.
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·85 Vue
  • Theres a tiny chance the asteroid headed for Earth could hit the moon
    www.newscientist.com
    Artists impression of an asteroid nearing the moonNASA/JPL-CaltechAsteroid 2024 YR4 is on a potential crash course with Earth, but theres a very slight chance the moon could take the hit.Based on current observations, there is a 2.1 per cent chance that the asteroid about as long as the Leaning Tower of Pisa is tall will crash into our planet on 22 December 2032. Although it is very likely to miss, a direct strike on a populated area would be catastrophic. But if it is in fact heading directly our way, new calculations show that there
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·84 Vue
  • Forces deep underground seem to be deforming Earth's inner core
    www.newscientist.com
    An illustration showing Earths inner structureRostislav Zatonskiy/AlamyEarths solid inner core appears to have changed shape in the past 20 years or so, according to seismic wave measurements but the behaviour of these waves could also be explained by other shifts at the centre of the planet.Since the 1990s, models and seismic measurements have indicated that Earths iron-nickel inner core moves at its own pace. Over decades, the rotation of the inner core speeds up and slows down relative to the rest of the planet, affecting things such as the length of a day. AdvertisementThose changes in rotation are mainly due to magnetic forces generated by convection in Earths liquid outer core, says John Vidale at the University of Southern California. That flow is continually torquing the inner core.Those magnetic forces, or related processes, could change the shape of the inner core as well as its rotation in fact, some previous measurements of seismic waves passing through the planets centre seemed to indicate just that. But uncertainty about the cores rotation made it impossible to distinguish between a change in rotation and a change in shape.Now, Vidale and his colleagues have analysed seismic waves generated by 128 earthquakes off the coast of South America between 1991 and 2023. The waves were all measured by instruments in Alaska after passing through the planet. Unmissable news about our planet delivered straight to your inbox every month.Sign up to newsletterFrom these, the researchers identified 168 pairs of seismic waves that passed through or near the same area of the inner core but years apart. Identifying these matches was only possible due to recent work better constraining the changes in rotation of the inner core, says Vidale.Both waves in each pair that didnt pass through the inner core shared a similar pattern, suggesting nothing had changed in those areas within our planet between the first and second quake. But the waves in pairs that did intersect with the inner core didnt match, indicating something about the core had changed beyond what could be explained by differences in rotation.The researchers say this suggests the inner core not only slows down or speeds up its rotation over decades, but it also changes shape. They say these changes would most likely be caused by convection in the outer core pulling magnetically at the less viscous edge of the solid inner core, or by interactions between the inner core and structures in the lower mantle, the layer between our planets core and its crust.Hrvoje Tkali at Australian National University, who wasnt involved with the research, says this is a step forward towards resolving changes in the inner core beyond rotation. But he says a change in shape isnt the only explanation for the mismatched seismic waves.As Vidale and his colleagues acknowledge, those differences could also be caused by unrelated changes in the outer core, convection within the inner core itself or even eruptions of melted material from the inner core. Its really hard to tell, says Vidale. He suggests that studying more repeat earthquakes in the future will help identify changes in more detail.Tkali says more seismological measurements in remote places, like the ocean floor, would also help. This is critical to understanding the evolution of the Earths deepest interior, from the time of the planetary formation to the present day, he says.Journal referenceNature Geoscience DOI: 10.1038/s41561-025-01642-2Topics:
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·99 Vue
  • Have we already breached the 1.5C global warming target?
    www.newscientist.com
    A climate protesters flag in Dsseldorf, GermanyYing Tang/NurPhoto/ShutterstockLast month, researchers confirmed that 2024 was the first year to see global average temperatures rise more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. It was a symbolic moment, given the worlds collective goal, set in 2015 under the Paris Agreement, to keep long-term warming to a 1.5C threshold. But scientists were quick to stress that this goal is based on a 20-year average temperature, so global efforts to deliver on it are still technically at least in play.Yet experts are increasingly asking whether shorter periods of high temperatures could be a sign that the world has already breached 1.5C. Can we conclude that this target has bitten the dust? AdvertisementEmanuele Bevacqua at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental ResearchUFZ in Germany and his colleagues set out to investigate whether a single warm year above 1.5C could be a signal that long-term warming will soon reach that level.Using a combination of real-world observations and climate models, Bevacqua and his team studied warming thresholds already breached between 1981 and 2014. They found that the first single year exceeding 0.6C, 0.7C, 0.8C, 0.9C and 1C above the pre-industrial benchmark has consistently fallen within the first 20-year period in which the average temperature reached the same thresholds.By that measure, the first single year above 1.5C puts the world within the 20-year period scientists use to define 1.5C of long-term warming, the team concludes. It is highly probable that we are already within the 20-year period, says Bevacqua. We are most likely within the first 10 years [of the period]. Unmissable news about our planet delivered straight to your inbox every month.Sign up to newsletterThe findings chime with most predictions that long-term warming will reach 1.5C by the late 2020s or early 2030s. It is a confirmatory result of what researchers are already predicting, says Paulo Ceppi at Imperial College London.But monthly temperature data may tell a different, more concerning, story. June 2024 was the 12th month in a row with average global temperatures at least 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. In a separate study, Alex Cannon at Environment and Climate Change Canada used a climate model to compare the first time global temperatures reach 1.5C for 12 consecutive months with the time when the 20-year temperature average crosses 1.5C.He found that, in climate model simulations, a run of 12 consecutive months above 1.5C indicates an 80 per cent likelihood that long-term warming of 1.5C has already been reached, even when natural variability such as El Nio phases are accounted for. If you shift back into the real world, that would imply that theres a good probability we have already passed the long-term threshold [for 1.5C], he says.However, the conclusions are based on a climate model that assumes Earths atmosphere is very responsive to changes in CO2 concentrations. The model is also running a high emissions scenario, notes Duo Chan at the University of Southampton, UK. I will interpret the result with caution, he says. Cannon notes this limitation in the study and suggests that if the models climate sensitivity is tempered and run on a medium emissions scenario, the long-term crossing of the 1.5C threshold would probably occur before 2029, in line with estimates from the wider community.The conclusions also rely on models being able to accurately represent all drivers of warming and predict year-to-year variability in the global temperature. If the models underestimate this variability, then they would overestimate the probability of having exceeded 1.5C for a given number of months above the threshold, says Ceppi. More research is needed to verify how well climate models are simulating short-term variability, he says, particularly given uncertainties about effects such as the reduction in atmospheric aerosols from shipping. Aerosols reflect sunlight out of Earths atmosphere, and so using cleaner shipping fuels can paradoxically lead to increased warming.Such uncertainties mean we should be cautious about over-interpreting results from single studies. After all, the Paris Agreement is a major political treaty, and declaring one of its key goals dead and buried would have seismic consequences. [To answer] the question of whether or not we have exceeded the temperature levels referred to in the Paris Agreement, we would need to have very high scientific certainty, and we do not have that, says Carl-Friedrich Schleussner at the research institute Climate Analytics in Berlin, who contributed to Bevacquas study.Cannon says even with the results of his research, I dont have sufficient information to say that [the 1.5C goal has been breached] with any certainty. The problem, he says, is that climate models predicting this scenario didnt expect the recent run of record-breaking temperatures. Theres an inconsistency between the timing in the models and what weve actually observed.This implies the models are missing something that explains the recent surge of real-world warming. Most climate models dont take into account the reduction in aerosols from shipping, which is one possible explanation. Cannon says his work is unearthing warning flags that we need to understand things better.Yet even if it is too early to say whether the Paris goal has already been reached, to some extent this is splitting hairs. We are entering a 1.5C world, says Schleussner, with warming levels now very close to this critical threshold. The impacts that scientists told us will happen around 1.5C [of warming] are going to materialise.The truth of the matter is that the goals of the Paris Agreement hang in the balance, he stresses. If we continue on the current track, we will fail.Journal reference:Nature Climate Change DOI: 10.1038/s41558-025-02246-9Journal reference:Nature Climate Change DOI: 10.1038/s41558-025-02247-8Topics:climate change
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·95 Vue
  • How meteorites are rewriting the history of the solar system
    www.newscientist.com
    SpaceThere are many theories about how dynamics in the early solar system led to the cosmic neighbourhood we now inhabit, but beyond computer simulations, direct evidence to support them is hard to come by that's where meteorites come in 10 February 2025 What can extraterrestrial stones reveal?Shutterstock/Swill KlitchThe following is an extract from our monthly Launchpad newsletter, which explores the solar system and beyond. You can sign up for Launchpad for free here.There is no better place to start explaining what so fascinates me about meteorites than Winston Churchills fish pond. Churchill lived for many years at a grand old house called Chartwell, which happens to be close to my home. The property and its elegant grounds are now open to the public, so I often take my children there for a run around, and we always
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·92 Vue
  • Distant exoplanet may be the most volcanic world ever found
    www.newscientist.com
    Illustration of the volcanic exoplanet L 98-59 bNASAs Goddard Space Flight CenterAn alien world with a seemingly sulphur-filled atmosphere may be the most volcanic planet astronomers have ever spotted.We have never directly detected volcanic activity outside our solar system, in part because current telescopes arent powerful enough to take images of exoplanets surfaces. We might be able to spot alien volcanoes by measuring the gases they pump into a planets atmosphere, but this is also at the very limit of what current telescopes can do there have been tantalising hints of atmospheres on rocky
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·77 Vue
  • Stunning image shows the closest ever Einstein ring
    www.newscientist.com
    The closest ever Einstein ring, picked up by the European Space Agencys Euclid space telescopeESAAstronomers have identified the closest ever Einstein ring, a rare phenomenon where light from a further-off galaxy is bent by the gravity of a galaxy closer to Earth. The ring was previously thought to be one galaxy and was identified more than 100 years ago.Galactic lenses like this one, which is the closest astronomers have ever found, were predicted by Albert Einstein in 1936 from his theory of general relativity. At the time, he thought such an effect would be impossible to observe. In fact, he would have been able to see one if he had just had a powerful enough telescope. It was there all along, but we had no idea, says Thomas Collett at the University of Portsmouth, UK. AdvertisementCollett and his team realised that the oval-shaped galaxy NGC 6505, which is about 600 million light years from Earth and was first spotted in 1884, was actually bending the light of a second galaxy behind it, about 6 billion light years from Earth.A close-up of the Einstein ringESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre, T. LiTeam member Bruno Altieri at the European Space Agency observed the Einstein ring while he was validating early testing data from the Euclid telescope, which has recently started scanning billions of galaxies over an area that will eventually span a third of the night sky. There was this abundantly obvious Einstein ring. Theres not that many things in the universe that can produce a ring like this, says Collett. Untangle the weirdness of reality with our subscriber-only, monthly newsletter.Sign up to newsletterWe would have expected about a 1 in 3 chance of finding something as spectacular as this over the whole survey, he says. To find it in essentially the first, earliest data is spectacularly lucky. This is probably the prettiest lens we will find in the mission.The ring itself is exceptionally bright compared with most Einstein rings that we know of, says Collett, in part because it is very close to us, but also due to Euclids imaging capabilities. Its like someone with bad eyesight putting their glasses on, says Collett. This makes it easier to see the four images of the faraway galaxy. The faint orange light surrounding the bright ring is the lensing galaxy.Having an Einstein ring so close to Earth will let us test relativity in ways we cant with other faraway lenses, says Collett, because they can measure the galaxys mass in two ways: using the amount the light bends and the speed of the stars, which are often too distant to accurately measure. Einsteins general relativity says these masses should be the same, so any difference might suggest our theory of gravity needs to be modified.When Collett and his colleagues measured the mass of the lensed galaxy, they also found a slightly higher number than should be possible from just the estimated number of stars in the galaxy. This could be due to dark matter clumping together in the galaxys centre, says Frdric Dux at the European Southern Observatory, though we will need to find many more Einstein lenses to confirm, he says.Journal reference:Astronomy & Astrophysics DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/202453014Topics:galaxies
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·92 Vue
  • Engineered bacteria could break down unrecyclable nylon in clothes
    www.newscientist.com
    Clothes are often made of nylonanna.spoka/ShutterstockA genetically modified bacterium can break down chemicals in nylon and turn them into useful products, which could one day help us recycle clothes and fishing nets.Nylons, or aliphatic polyamides, are plastics that are widely used due to their high durability and tensile strength, but their recycling rate is below 5 per cent. AdvertisementProduction is around 10 million tonnes per year, but at the moment theres basically no recycling, says Nick Wierckx at the Jlich Research Centre in Germany. Even incineration is difficult because you get cyanides when you burn them. The vast majority ends up in landfill.Nylon can be dissolved in a strong acid solution, but the mix of chemicals generated isnt valuable enough to make this commercially useful.Now, Wierckx and his colleagues have used a combination of genetic engineering and laboratory evolution to create a strain of the bacterium Pseudomonas putida that can break down the various compounds that are produced once nylon has been dissolved and turn them into something useful. The latest science news delivered to your inbox, every day.Sign up to newsletterThe bacterium is already known for degrading oil-based materials and breaking down oil in spills. It is also showing promise at breaking down plastics.Wierckz and his colleagues took a strain known as P. putida KT2440 and gave it genes to help it metabolise various chemicals in dissolved nylon. They then cultured bacteria in the lab on these chemicals again and again until they found a strain that thrived. The researchers continued to modify and culture it until they had bacteria that could use the compounds in nylon to create useful products, such as polyhydroxybutyrate a biodegradable plastic that isnt harmful to living tissues.The Pseudomonas consumes almost all the pre-treated plastic, says Wierckx. What we can measure is that about 80 to 90 per cent is being consumed, but I think that is an analytical limitation, and its actually consuming almost everything because we dont see anything left there.But improvements are needed before this technique could be used commercially, says Wierckx. For example, the amount of useful product is still only about 7 per cent of the dry bacterial biomass at the end.Improving that will require further modification of bacteria and adjusting the chemicals used to tweak what is fed to the microorganisms, he says. Its probably going to be 10, 20, 30 years until we see this happening.We dont need to worry that the bacteria will one day dissolve our underwear, though, says Wierckx. Its not going to eat all the plastics in our clothing and cars. We need to pre-treat the plastic so it becomes digestible.This also means we cant yet use the bacteria to clean up old fishing nets in oceans. But Wierckx hopes that having this recycling process will encourage the future collection of old nets, clothing and car engines, which contain heat-resistant plastics, so they can be recycled.Journal reference:Nature Microbiology DOI: 10.1038/s41564-025-01929-5
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·90 Vue
  • Barcodes: How they could be your latest mathematical party trick
    www.newscientist.com
    MathematicsBarcodes contain a checksum an ingenious use of mathematics that even lends itself to a fun way to surprise your friends, says Katie Steckles 5 February 2025 Shutterstock/Scott RothsteinSometimes there are hidden patterns in numbers you might not immediately notice. One example of this is in barcodes, the sequences of digits we use to identify products.Try it yourself find an object with a 13-digit barcode. (If you are in the US, a 12-digit barcode will also work, if you imagine an extra 0 on the front of it.) Books wont work, since they use a slightly different system, but magazines do, so you can use a copy of New Scientist. Add together the first, third, and fifth digits and so on, to get the sum of
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·77 Vue
  • What the new field of womens neuroscience reveals about female brains
    www.newscientist.com
    MindNeuroscientist-turned-entrepreneur Emil Radyt is using brain stimulation to explore how things like premenstrual syndrome and period pain impact the brain 5 February 2025 Becki GillThere is a huge hole in our understanding of the brain. A gaping, woman-shaped hole. While neuroscience has given us countless insights into how our minds work, history reveals a major oversight: most of those studies were performed on both men and women without considering that there might be differences between their brains. Only recently have we begun to realise the impact of this blind spot. For example, research has now shown that the brain is dramatically remodelled after giving birth, while another study found that the fluctuations of the menstrual cycle affect how the brain works.This oversight not only leaves us in the dark about how reproductive stages affect the brain, but calls into question many other, broader conclusions in neuroscience. It is also what inspired neuroscientist-turned-entrepreneur Emil Radyt to co-found a start-up called Samphire Neuroscience, where she is using non-invasive brain stimulation to transform our understanding of conditions that predominantly affect women, from premenstrual syndrome and period pain to postpartum depression. New Scientist asked Radyt how a better understanding of womens neuroscience could change the way we treat mental health issues and about the implications of this emerging field for everything we previously thought we knew about the human brain.Helen Thomson: You trained as a neuroscientist. How did you come to use that expertise to develop a brain stimulation device?Emil Radyt: Throughout my undergraduate degree, I worked as an emergency medic. I realised that about 50 per cent of our cases were actually psychiatric emergencies. You think about paramedics helping someone who is bleeding or having a heart attack, but I was seeing addiction, suicide,
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·99 Vue
  • Would we recognise alien intelligence, asks Adrian Tchaikovsky novel
    www.newscientist.com
    SpaceIn Shroud, Adrian Tchaikovsky's intriguing new novel, two women marooned on a strange moon encounter alien life and struggle to recognise intelligence in other beings, finds Emily H. Wilson 5 February 2025 What might be lurking on the surface of the unusual moon Shroud?Shutterstock/IuriiShroudAdrian Tchaikovsky (Tor)The latest novel by Adrian Tchaikovsky, Shroud, examines the question of whether, faced with an alien intelligence, we would actually perceive it as intelligent. That and whether the aliens would recognise us as anything above pond life.The setting is the far future and a foray by a commercial vessel into a new star system. The ships culture is cruel, petty and highly corporate that is, entirely recognisable to humans alive today. The crew are unfrozen, used as needed, then summarily refrozen.
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·104 Vue
  • Is Elon Musk's DOGE going to break decades-old US government software?
    www.newscientist.com
    Elon Musk is a close associate of US president Donald TrumpK C Alfred/San Diego U-T/ZUMA Press Wire/ShutterstockIs a team led by Elon Musk going to crash US government computer systems? In recent weeks, there have been numerous reports of Musk and his associates gaining access to servers at departments ranging from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the US Treasury. It isnt clear if these complex, sensitive and ageing computer systems are being updated, or if private data is being accessed, but there are fears of serious harm being caused.Musks staff are operating under a task force called the Department
    0 Commentaires ·0 Parts ·99 Vue
Plus de lecture