Categories

Many space missions are searching for life beyond Earth, but are we prepared for the fallout if they succeed?

Microbes from space have fueled the plots of science fiction mainstays like “Project Hail Mary” and “The Andromeda Strain.” But with more space missions launching each year, finding extraterrestrial life in a microbial form is becoming more plausible. What will the response be back here on Earth if—or when—scientists discover extraterrestrial microbes? Will the international policy and security communities be prepared for the fallout?

Go to Source

Giant impact could have formed an intact moon within five hours, simulations suggest

New Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) modeling, conducted in collaboration with scientists at the University of Arizona, shows fundamental differences in how the moon may have formed from the giant impact that created the Earth–moon system. The new results used state-of-the-art computational techniques that factor in the material strength of the two colliding planets. These impact simulations could change how researchers understand moon formation and may help constrain the timing of the event. The research is published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Go to Source

Pa. officer charged with voluntary manslaughter in fatal OIS

The Upper Pottsgrove Police corporal was responding to the scene after college student Glenwood Earl Pysher IV approached the wrong house and startled residents

Go to Source

Saturn encounter may have set distant centaur on path to becoming a comet

More than 3 billion miles (4.8 billion kilometers) from Earth, an ancient icy object is slowly awakening. As it drifts inward through the solar system, the frozen body known as Centaur 450P/LONEOS has begun releasing gas and dust—behavior more commonly associated with comets than with centaurs, the small icy objects that typically orbit between Jupiter and Neptune.

Go to Source

Precision optics to make plant health visible from space

When the ESA Earth observation mission FLEX launches into space on September 15, 2026, as scheduled, it will carry high-precision optical components from Jena, Germany. Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering IOF have developed and manufactured a silicon-based double-slit assembly as well as two high-precision mirrors for the spectrometer on board the satellite. The spectrometer is designed to detect the fluorescence of plants excited by sunlight from Earth’s orbit. The data is expected to provide new insights into the photosynthetic activity, health, and stress levels of vegetation.

Go to Source

BWC: Driver hits Baltimore bike officer twice before fleeing

Video shows a woman in a white Tesla hitting an officer on a bicycle head on, before backing into him moments later and fleeing the scene

Go to Source

Martian astronomy: Percy sees a ‘Phobos eclipse’ from Mars

What’s so special about spotting Phobos crossing in front of the sun? Sure. It’s just another image of Phobos crossing the disk of the sun, as seen from the surface of Mars. Like so much of the modern space era, these images, once amazing, are now almost routine. But there’s some real science behind tasking the Mars rovers to conduct a little “Martian astronomy.”

Go to Source

MeerKAT directly detects faint hydrogen signal from the distant universe

Astronomers from the University of Manchester and the University of the Western Cape have directly detected an extremely faint radio signal from hydrogen gas billions of light-years away, opening a powerful new way to map the large-scale structure of the universe. Using South Africa’s MeerKAT radio telescope, the international team measured radio emissions from neutral hydrogen dating back to a time when the universe was several billion years younger than it is today.

Go to Source

First measurement of low-energy solar neutrinos scattering off electrons

Every second, tens of billions of neutrinos produced by nuclear fusion in the sun pass through every square centimeter of Earth—and through our bodies—almost without interacting. Although they are among the most abundant particles emitted by the sun, their extremely weak interactions make detecting these elusive particles one of the greatest experimental challenges in particle physics. A number of specialized neutrino detectors are in operation around the world, exploiting the unique properties of neutrinos to investigate astrophysical phenomena.

Go to Source

Former LAPD officer indicted again in 2015 fatal OIS

Former officer Clifford Proctor has been indicted again on a murder charge in the death of Brendon Glenn months after a judge dismissed an earlier indictment

Go to Source

Former LAPD officer indicted again in 2015 fatal OIS

Former officer Clifford Proctor has been indicted again on a murder charge in the death of Brendon Glenn months after a judge dismissed an earlier indictment

Go to Source

AI tool detects unusual satellite behavior to improve space safety

A new AI model can monitor satellites and spot anomalies in their behavior, reducing the risk of in-orbit collisions, according to new research published in the journal Expert Systems.

Go to Source

Ten-channel photonic interface links neutral-atom qubits in parallel

A research group in Japan has demonstrated a world-record 10-channel multiplexed quantum photonic interface based on an integrated waveguide array, a key technology for optically interconnecting multiple quantum computers. The study is published in the journal Optica.

Go to Source

Experiment sees surprising result in search for dark matter

For the better part of a century, people have been trying to understand dark matter. This invisible substance makes up roughly 85% of the mass in the universe but has never been directly detected. Determining exactly what it is remains one of the biggest questions about our world.

Go to Source

Ultrafast snapshots reveal the first moments on the way from light to electricity

Physicists at the University of Graz (Austria), in collaboration with colleagues from Marburg University and Forschungszentrum Jülich (Germany), have achieved a scientific breakthrough. For the first time, the generation of electrical energy from light has been filmed and described theoretically.

Go to Source