All posts tagged: Science

Galaxy-killing wind may explain why giant galaxies died so early

Galaxy-killing wind may explain why giant galaxies died so early

Published by Jenni Sidey

A massive galaxy in the early universe seems to be growing itself toward ruin. While it churns out new stars at a furious pace, it is also blasting away the cold gas that makes those stars possible. This is a self-defeating process that may help explain why so many big galaxies died young. The system, called CRISTAL-02, appears just 1 billion years after the Big Bang. This is a time when astronomers did not expect to find large numbers of massive, quiescent galaxies. Those are galaxies that had already stopped forming stars. Yet the James Webb Space Telescope has revealed many of them. Their existence has become one of the biggest puzzles in modern astrophysics. Now a team led by Dr Rebecca Davies of Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne says CRISTAL-02 offers a simpler answer than some of the more exotic ideas proposed in recent years. Rather than needing changes to dark energy or some other revision to cosmic history, the evidence points to a violent but familiar process. In this process galaxies collide, …

This evolutionary biologist fuses art into her science

This evolutionary biologist fuses art into her science

Published by skeptic

academic: Relating to school, classes or things taught by teachers in formal institutes of learning (such as a college). biology: The study of living things. The scientists who study them are known as biologists. coral: Marine animals that often produce a hard and stony exoskeleton and tend to live on reefs (the exoskeletons of dead ancestor corals). curriculum: (plural: curricula) The official classroom materials (often readings) used to lead students through a course of study on a particular topic. DNA: (short for deoxyribonucleic acid) A long, double-stranded and spiral-shaped molecule inside most living cells that carries genetic instructions. It is built on a backbone of phosphorus, oxygen, and carbon atoms. In all living things, from plants and animals to microbes, these instructions tell cells which molecules to make. environment: The sum of all of the things that exist around some organism or the process and the condition those things create. Environment may refer to the weather and ecosystem in which some animal lives, or, perhaps, the temperature and humidity (or even the placement of things …

Atomic clocks may be powerful enough to detect the quantum fabric of time

Atomic clocks may be powerful enough to detect the quantum fabric of time

Published by Jenni Sidey

Time feels familiar. It marks every moment of daily life, from the ticking of a wall clock to the changing numbers on a smartphone screen. Yet despite its constant presence, time remains one of the deepest mysteries in science. For more than a century, physicists have known that time is not fixed. Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity showed that time can speed up or slow down depending on motion and gravity. The faster an object moves, or the closer it is to a massive object, the more differently it experiences time. But another revolution in physics, quantum mechanics, introduced an even stranger possibility. At the quantum level, particles can exist in multiple states at once through a phenomenon called superposition. If motion can exist in a superposition, then time itself may also flow in multiple ways simultaneously. Scientists have long wondered whether this bizarre idea is real. Until now, no experiment has been capable of testing it. Illustration of classical, semiclassical, and quantum proper time dynamics of a trapped-ion atomic clock that we consider. (CREDIT: …

Worker bees help choose the next queen in bumble bee colonies

Worker bees help choose the next queen in bumble bee colonies

Published by Jenni Sidey

A baby bumble bee can end up on one of two very different paths. It can grow into a small worker that never reproduces, or become a large future queen built to survive winter and start a colony of her own. New research suggests that split is not dictated mainly by the queen. Instead, it is dictated by the workers doing the feeding. In Bombus impatiens, a common North American bumble bee, Penn State researchers found that worker bees help determine larval fate by passing along juvenile hormone in the food they make from nectar and pollen. In particular, larvae that received enough of that hormone during a narrow window late in development were far more likely to become queens. The finding shifts the picture of colony life. Rather than a top-down social order controlled by a single monarch, the study points to a more distributed system. In this system, caregivers can shape the colony’s future. “Since all these females share the same DNA, it’s a striking example of how the same genotype can produce …

Should baseball hitters with two strikes change their swing?

Should baseball hitters with two strikes change their swing?

Published by Jenni Sidey

Baseball’s newest tracking tools have given one old dugout argument a faster swing. When a hitter comes up with two strikes, fans, coaches and former players often call for the same adjustment: cut down the swing, make contact, keep the at-bat alive. It sounds like common sense. The harder question is whether it actually helps a batter produce better results, or simply trades one kind of failure for another. A new study in The American Statistician finds that the old advice contains some truth, but not the whole truth. Hitters who shorten and slow their swings with more strikes do make contact more often. They also give up power, and in the data that tradeoff mostly cancels itself out. “What we found is that there’s really a tradeoff,” said Scott Powers, assistant professor of sport analytics and statistics at Rice University and a co-author of the paper with Ron Yurko of Carnegie Mellon University. “When players slow down their swings, they do make more contact, but they also sacrifice power.” Distribution of bat speed relative …

ETH Zurich scientists developed a new drug to slow Alzheimer’s development

ETH Zurich scientists developed a new drug to slow Alzheimer’s development

Published by Jenni Sidey

Alzheimer’s disease slowly strips brain cells of the energy they need to survive. However, one damaged enzyme may be doing more of that work than anyone realized. At ETH Zurich, a team led by molecular pharmacologist Ursula Quitterer says it has identified a new protein target linked to the disease’s progression. They also designed an experimental compound that interrupts the process in mice. The compound, known as CPD10 or “compound 10,” did not cure the disease. Nevertheless, it slowed nerve-cell loss, reduced key signs of damage in the brain, and helped the animals live longer. The work points to a different way of thinking about Alzheimer’s treatment. This approach focuses less on clearing debris after damage has piled up. Instead, it aims to stabilize a protective system inside cells before the damage spirals. Graphical abstract of the study. The G-protein-coupled receptor kinase 2 (GRK2) exerts essential functions in cell growth and survival. (CREDIT: Cell Reports Medicine) When a protective enzyme turns harmful The central player is an enzyme called GRK2, a regulatory protein active in …

MIT astronomers detect oldest known flickering quasar from the cosmic dawn

MIT astronomers detect oldest known flickering quasar from the cosmic dawn

Published by Jenni Sidey

A quasar from the universe’s first 850 million years has started to look less like a distant pinprick and more like a real physical system. By catching it flickering over time, astronomers have traced the structure of matter swirling around one of the earliest known supermassive black holes. What they found deepens one of cosmology’s biggest puzzles. The object, known as J0439+1634, sits at a redshift of 6.51. This means its light comes from a time just 850 million years after the Big Bang. Quasars are among the brightest objects in the universe, powered by supermassive black holes pulling in gas and dust. As that material spirals inward, it heats up and radiates enormous amounts of energy. Sometimes, it outshines the galaxy around it. Many quasars have already been found from this early era, often called the cosmic dawn. What makes this one stand out is not just its age, but its variability. Astronomers at MIT and elsewhere have detected a quasar flickering from the very early universe. This artist’s concept illustrates a quasar accretion …

Lunar meteorite discovery reveals violent chapter in the inner solar system 3.5 billion years ago

Lunar meteorite discovery reveals violent chapter in the inner solar system 3.5 billion years ago

Published by Jenni Sidey

Earth’s earliest chapter is mostly gone. Rocks from the planet’s first few billion years have been eroded, buried, recycled, or dragged back into the mantle. This has left only scattered traces of the world in which life first appeared. Therefore, every surviving clue is unusually valuable, especially when scientists are trying to answer a basic question. How often did giant impacts strike the young inner solar system while life was beginning on Earth? A lunar meteorite recovered in northwest Africa is now offering one of those clues. In a study published in Geology, researchers report that the rock records a major impact on the Moon about 3.486 billion years ago. The age closely matches evidence of ancient impacts preserved on Earth. It also matches impact ages tied to 4 Vesta, the fourth-largest object in the asteroid belt. That rare overlap, the team says, helps connect the histories of three different bodies at a time when the inner solar system was still getting hammered. This happened long after the most chaotic phase of planet formation had …

Oxford physicists create a new kind of Schrödinger’s cat

Oxford physicists create a new kind of Schrödinger’s cat

Published by Jenni Sidey

Quantum mechanics is full of states that seem to defy ordinary sense, but one of its strangest ideas has usually been built from fairly familiar pieces. At the University of Oxford, physicists have now shown they can assemble Schrödinger’s cat-like superpositions from far more exotic quantum ingredients. This produces a new class of states in the motion of a single trapped ion. That matters because the usual picture of a quantum superposition, a qubit that is both 0 and 1, is only the beginning. Many quantum systems are not limited to two possibilities. A harmonic oscillator is the mathematical model used for systems such as light, vibrations, and the motion of trapped particles. It can occupy many energy levels and support much richer forms of quantum behavior. The Oxford team used that larger playground to build superpositions that go beyond the standard “cat state,” where two coherent wave packets sit in opposition. Instead, they made superpositions from components that were already strongly nonclassical. These included squeezed, trisqueezed, and quadsqueezed motional states. “This approach gave us …

New reversible conductive glue could revolutionize electronic recycling

New reversible conductive glue could revolutionize electronic recycling

Published by Jenni Sidey

Every year, people throw away billions of kilograms of old electronics. Broken phones, outdated laptops, damaged televisions and discarded appliances continue piling up around the world. Much of this waste contains valuable materials, including silver and critical minerals, but recovering those resources remains difficult because electronic components are designed to stay permanently attached. Now, engineers at Newcastle University have developed a new kind of electrically conductive glue that could change how electronics are built, repaired and recycled. The adhesive conducts electricity like solder, but unlike traditional bonding methods, it can later be safely separated using simple solutions such as acetone or alkaline water. The researchers believe the technology could help industries recover valuable materials more easily while reducing the environmental burden of electronic waste. “Electrically conductive adhesives have been around for a long time, and making them reversible provides the solution to a very real problem that urgently needs addressing,” said Bassam Aljohani, a PhD student at Newcastle University and first author of the paper. Study authors Bassam Aljohani and Dr Ama Asiedu-Asante pictured in …