Signs of the Times - Science & Technology

We used to make fun of Fool's Gold. Now, it might fuel the future. Fool's gold or iron pyrite — a common mineral that resembles its precious counterpart — may be more valuable than scientists...

https://www.sott.net/article/490828-Fools-Gold-may-be-valuable-after-all

Researchers from Max Planck Institute and Philipps University in Marburg have discovered the first fractal structure at the molecular scale. A fractal is a geometrical pattern that tends to repea...

https://www.sott.net/article/490798-Rare-discovery-First-fractal-molecule-identified-inside-bacteria

Interspecies competition in ancient humans saw an evolutionary trend that is the complete opposite of almost all other vertebrates, according to a new study. For years, scientists assumed the mai...

https://www.sott.net/article/490755-Ancient-human-evolution-is-unparalleled-and-almost-opposite-to-other-species-in-nature-new-study-reveals

Fiery pink towers could be seen erupting from the sun during the total solar eclipse on April 8. What are they? In this surprisingly colorful image, NASA photographer Keegan Barber captured the v...

https://www.sott.net/article/490733-Enormous-pink-flames-recorded-on-sun-during-total-solar-eclipse

A multi-institutional team of geneticists and genomic and genotyping specialists in Japan has sequenced the genomes of thousands of Japanese people from across the country, looking to settle the ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490730-Tri-ancestral-origins-for-Japanese-population-including-an-unidentified-NE-Asian-population-revealed-in-large-genomic-study

Forget approximate climate models, whose simulations are increasingly removed from reality. There's a far more scientific way of understanding the climate, and that involves observing the actual ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490713-Observation-of-the-Earth-shows-that-deforestation-and-urbanization-cause-three-times-more-warming-than-CO2

The 2,000-foot-wide asteroid 2013 NK4 just made its closest approach to Earth in recorded history, sailing by at about eight lunar distances. You can still see the massive rock with a backyard te...

https://www.sott.net/article/490688-2000-foot-wide-city-killer-asteroid-has-just-made-its-closest-approach-to-Earth

Perhaps the most fundamental distinction between naturalism and intelligent design is where each metaphysical framework draws the line at irreducibility. Leading intelligent design theorists Mich...

https://www.sott.net/article/490680-Is-Natural-Law-irreducible

Astronomers found the most massive stellar-mass black hole in the galaxy after spotting a star "wobbling" nearby. The baby monster is the 2nd-closest black hole to Earth ever detected. Astronomer...

https://www.sott.net/article/490673-Most-massive-stellar-black-hole-in-the-Milky-Way-discovered-extremely-close-to-Earth

A University of Melbourne expedition to the southernmost waters encircling Antarctica has discovered that wind drives the formation of colossal rogue waves, and that these unpredictable waves occ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490666-Rogue-waves-Southern-Ocean-expedition-reveals-wind-as-key-cause-phenomenon-occurs-more-frequently-than-thought

Military chiefs are to rush devastating laser guns into service to meet the threat posed by Russian drones and missiles. Comment: Meanwhile what's actually proving to be a problem for the UK is Y...

https://www.sott.net/article/490570-UK-scrambles-to-fit-DragonFire-laser-death-ray-onto-warships

Russian spacecraft: The close call had NASA officials tense. This was because of the potential danger posed by debris if the two crafts had collided. Such an eventuality could pose a threat to th...

https://www.sott.net/article/490534-Defunct-Russian-satellite-escapes-crash-with-US-Timed-satellite-by-just-10-metres

The Vanadis bristle worm has eyes as big as millstones - relatively speaking. Indeed, if our eyes were proportionally as big as the ones of this Mediterranean marine worm, we would need a big stu...

https://www.sott.net/article/490511-Mediterranean-marine-worm-has-developed-eyes-as-big-as-millstones

Less than twenty minutes after finishing this article, your brain will begin to store the information that you've just read in a coordinated burst of neuronal activity. Underpinning this process ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490510-New-analytic-technique-sheds-light-on-memory-and-learning

Every now and then, a giant of modern science should be allowed to express himself in language that we all understand. In the informative Climate: The Movie, the 2022 Nobel physics laureate Dr. J...

https://www.sott.net/article/490504-New-paper-finds-effect-of-human-caused-carbon-emissions-on-climate-is-non-discernible

There are hundreds and hundreds of studies showing that our wireless wonderland of EMF is not good for our health. But you might ask: Well, HOW? When we say "EMF", we're talking about many differ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490463-Is-your-DNA-an-EMF-antenna

Chemistry depends on heat. Atoms or molecules bounce around randomly, collide, and form other molecules. At higher temperatures, atoms collide more and the rate at which atoms become molecules in...

https://www.sott.net/article/490438-Inside-the-20-year-quest-to-unravel-the-bizarre-realm-of-quantum-superchemistry

A paper published in March of 2021 in the journal Science Advances reports on the discovery of evidence for a large airburst type impact within the SØr Rondane Mountains, Queen Maud Land, East A...

https://www.sott.net/article/490437-Airbursts-An-underappreciated-hazard

Transhumanism may lead to super-human capabilities for some & mind control for others: perspective The Internet of Bodies ecosystem may lead to the Internet of Brains sometime between 2035 and 20...

https://www.sott.net/article/490367-Internet-of-Bodies-may-lead-to-Internet-of-Brains-by-2050-RAND

Suddenly, amateur astronomers are seeing a naked-eye comet in the evening sky. It's Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks, also known as the 'devil comet'. Waiting for next Monday's solar eclipse in Mexico, Petr...

https://www.sott.net/article/490349-The-Devil-Comet-is-now-a-naked-eye-object

The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration, who produced the first ever image of our Milky Way black hole released in 2022, has captured a new view of the massive object at the center of our...

https://www.sott.net/article/490316-Event-Horizon-Telescope-reveals-strong-magnetic-fields-spiraling-at-the-edge-of-Milky-Ways-central-black-hole

Using a blink-and-you'll-miss-it experiment, researchers from Trinity College Dublin have discovered that individuals differ widely in the rate at which they perceive visual signals. Some people ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490287-Speed-of-visual-perception-ranges-widely-in-humans-new-study-reveals

Some physicists have long suspected that mysterious 'ghost' particles in the world around us could greatly advance our understanding of the true nature of the Universe. Now scientists think they'...

https://www.sott.net/article/490265-Scientists-search-for-mysterious-ghost-particles

NASA has announced it will fire three scientific sounding rockets into the moon's shadow on Monday, April 8 during a partial solar eclipse across North America. In what will be a total solar ecli...

https://www.sott.net/article/490263-Why-NASA-will-fire-three-rockets-at-the-solar-eclipse

A small-bird species, the Japanese tit (Parus minor), uses wing movements as a gesture to convey the message "after you," according to new research at the University of Tokyo. When a mating pair ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490245-Wild-bird-seen-to-gesture-after-you

The size of the human brain may be gradually increasing over time, and that could reduce the risk of dementia in younger generations, according to new research. The study imaged the brains of mor...

https://www.sott.net/article/490207-Younger-generations-have-larger-brains-but-is-that-healthier

Fifteen rare asteroids showcasing very unusual "active" properties have been detected as part of an ongoing international volunteer effort to unravel the mysteries of a peculiar variety of space ...

https://www.sott.net/article/490166-Rare-asteroids-showing-strange-activity-are-challenging-existing-theories-about-solar-system

The Moon influences life here on Earth more than you might realize - and that includes shifting the sounds coming from coral reefs, which indicates changes in ecosystem activity, according to a n...

https://www.sott.net/article/490165-Moonlight-found-to-have-a-curious-effect-on-coral-reef-activity

Two new studies on the mysterious 'Havana syndrome' found no physical cause, but they did suggest a possible link to mental health. Since 2016, more than 1,000 US government personnel stationed i...

https://www.sott.net/article/490043-Havana-syndrome-mystery-deepens-further-after-brain-scan-analysis

Using observations made with the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC) a study led from the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) and the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM) has confirmed that...

https://www.sott.net/article/489995-Astronomers-confirm-a-new-Trojan-asteroid-that-shares-an-orbit-with-Mars

A superfluid vortex controlled in a lab is helping physicists learn more about the behavior of black holes. A whirlpool generated in helium cooled to just a fraction above absolute zero mimics th...

https://www.sott.net/article/489979-First-of-its-kind-quantum-tornado-achieves-record-breaking-black-hole-mimicry

Nvidia, the tech company that has been shattering stock market records for fun, has announced a new project that will bring the world a step closer to humanoid robots. The project is called GR00T...

https://www.sott.net/article/489940-Nvidias-Project-GR00T-will-soon-make-the-era-of-humanoid-robots-a-reality

It's not every day that a giant volcano is discovered hiding in plain sight. By reviewing satellite imagery from many missions, scientists have spotted the remains of a colossal volcano on Mars. ...

https://www.sott.net/article/489928-Giant-ancient-volcano-discovered-on-Mars

Brave researchers have decided to save the world by pumping seawater onto ice sheets in the depths of winter. They are struggling through -30C windy conditions somewhere off the top end of Canada...

https://www.sott.net/article/489916-Climate-Superheroes-plan-to-rescue-Arctic-with-10-million-wind-powered-pumps

There's something peculiar about dying star Betelgeuse. Yeah, there was the whole sneeze thing. That's been pretty much resolved for now. But before the Great Dimming Debacle of 2019, scientists ...

https://www.sott.net/article/489903-Betelgeuses-wild-surface-may-be-reason-scientists-thought-it-was-spinning-twice-as-fast-as-it-should-be

China has a list of suspect journals and it's just been updated. Nature talks to the librarian behind China's Early Warning Journal List about how it is compiled each year. China has updated its ...

https://www.sott.net/article/489841-China-publishing-list-exposing-untrustworthy-scientific-journals

Depending on where we look, the universe is expanding at different rates. Now, scientists using the James Webb and Hubble space telescopes have confirmed that the observation is not down to a mea...

https://www.sott.net/article/489831-JWST-confirms-there-is-something-seriously-wrong-with-our-understanding-of-the-universe

A nova outburst visible to the naked eye is expected to decorate the night sky this year with a "new star" that will briefly become as bright as the North Star, offering a once-in-a-lifetime star...

https://www.sott.net/article/489816-New-star-as-bright-as-the-North-Star-will-ignite-in-the-sky-this-year

How did cells evolve a process to end their own lives? Recent research suggests that apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death, first arose billions of years ago in bacteria with a primitive soc...

https://www.sott.net/article/489770-The-process-of-cellular-self-destruction-may-be-ancient-But-why

In a new study, scientists suggest an impact with a giant icy object could explain the sizes and orbits of Mars's moons, Phobos and Deimos. The origin of Mars's two enigmatic moons, Phobos and De...

https://www.sott.net/article/489761-Icy-impactor-might-explain-the-formation-of-Mars-moons

Using the James Webb Space Telescope, an international team of astronomers led by the University of Cambridge have spotted a 'dead' galaxy when the universe was just 700 million years old, the ol...

https://www.sott.net/article/489760-Astronomers-spot-oldest-dead-galaxy-yet-observed

Scientists from the Universities of Sydney and Sorbonne University have used the geological record of the deep sea to discover a connection between the orbits of Earth and Mars, past global warmi...

https://www.sott.net/article/489721-Earths-interactions-with-Mars-may-drive-deep-sea-circulation-surprising-new-study-suggests

AI is all the rage. But with the recent Gemini disaster along with a lack of truly killer applications using AI, it doesn't seem like AI is really going anywhere. So, is it all just hype, or what...

https://www.sott.net/article/489713-AIs-Fatal-Flaw

Mainstream science has done its best to debunk the notion, but a belief in a world-changing series of prehistoric impacts continues to gain momentum. In 2007, a group of researchers, led by a nuc...

https://www.sott.net/article/489680-The-comet-strike-theory-that-just-wont-die

Last year, paleontologists discovered the fossil of a 39-million-year-old extinct whale in Peru that appeared to defy the limits of vertebrate size. The team behind the lucky find estimated Peruc...

https://www.sott.net/article/489664-39-million-year-old-extinct-whale-may-have-been-a-physical-impossibility

Nematodes found in the highly radioactive zone showed no signs of DNA damage A team of American researchers has found that the DNA of a common worm species appears to be immune to damage from chr...

https://www.sott.net/article/489655-Scientists-discover-Chernobyl-super-worms

It would be a game-changer if all members of a basketball team could see out of each other's eyes in addition to their own. A research duo at Columbia's Zuckerman Institute has found evidence tha...

https://www.sott.net/article/489652-Collective-sensing-may-enable-electric-fish-to-sense-beyond-their-own-perceptual-reach-first-time-documented-in-biology

A number of countries have been jostling to return humans to the Moon, with Moscow and Beijing teaming up in 2022 to sign a memorandum of understanding on joint exploration of the celestial body....

https://www.sott.net/article/489629-Russia-China-plan-to-build-nuclear-power-plant-on-moon

Astrophilosophy. Exotheology. Whitehead. Andrew Davis is the program director for the Center for Process Studies. A philosopher and theologian, his latest work is on the metaphysics of exo-life. ...

https://www.sott.net/article/489616-MindMatters-Its-Full-of-Life-Philosophy-of-ET-with-Andrew-Davis

It's been over 153 years since Darwin's "warm little pond" letter to Joseph Hooker, his tentative hope to close the final gap in his naturalistic origins story. Despite numerous well-funded appro...

https://www.sott.net/article/489596-From-Nature-a-devastating-critique-of-origin-of-life-research