This week’s science news has been out of this world, with NASA’s announcement that speckled rocks found on Mars may be the clearest sign yet that life once existed on the Red Planet.
The rocks all contain flecks of leopard-like spots that, on Earth at least, are telltale signs of chemical reactions that microbes use for energy. This, alongside the presence of organic compounds and evidence of water once flowing through the rocks, has gotten scientists seriously excited.
But keep the Champagne corked, because it’s still possible that the marks may have been left by inorganic processes, meaning we’ll have to wait for the politically endangered Mars Sample Return mission before we know for sure.
This week also thankfully brought us more conclusive news from the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO). By detecting faint ripples in space-time released by the merger of two distant black holes, the detector finally confirmed a decades-old theory by Stephen Hawking that the cosmic monsters link general relativity to quantum mechanics.
Tying these two threads together into a theory of everything could be achieved with just one trip to a black hole. But making that trip would require some serious cellular engineering — if news of human stem cells experiencing accelerated aging in space is anything to go by. In the meantime, our planet has a close flyby by the asteroid Apophis and some strange-looking solar eruptions to get through.
LA’s ‘halo’ barrel mystery begins to unravel
They appeared under the lights of deep-sea survey robots working off the coast of Los Angeles in 2020 — a graveyard of 27,000 barrels encircled by haloes of whitish, toxic sediment many at the time believed to be the banned pesticide DDT. Yet the exact quantity of the barrels, who put them there, and what they may contain remain unknown to this day.
However, a new study has shed some light into the murky situation. Analyzing samples collected from five of the barrels, researchers found that they didn’t contain DDT after all, but caustic alkaline waste capable of killing most of the marine life in the vicinity. They also discovered the chemical reactions that form the haloes themselves, which they will use to identify the overall extent of the toxic spill.
Discover more planet Earth news
—‘New’ island emerges from melting ice in Alaska
—‘Serious adverse and unintended consequences’: Polar geoengineering isn’t the answer to climate change
—Action on climate change faces new threat: The doomers who think it’s too late to act
Life’s Little Mysteries
Humans and chimpanzees share nearly 99% of their genetic material: It’s a frequently repeated truism about us and one of our closest-living relatives, but is it even true? It turns out not really, and even the comparison itself obscures a deeper truth about how DNA makes humans and chimps in the first place.
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Visible time crystals created
Only theorized in 2012, time crystals have been captivating us since they were first created in 2016. Since those early years, scientists have replicated the fascinating phenomenon in a variety of systems, but none of them can be seen directly.
That’s now changed, with the announcement that scientists have made visible time crystals out of the liquid crystals typically found inside LCD screens. These aren’t just an intriguing demonstration of the bizarre quantum workings of time crystals, they could have practical applications too — possibly appearing on future high-denomination bills as anti-counterfeiting designs.
Discover more physics and mathematics news
—Scientists watch a single electron move during a chemical reaction for first time ever
—Meet the ‘neglectons’: Previously overlooked particles that could revolutionize quantum computing
—Lightning on Earth is sparked by a powerful chain reaction from outer space, simulations show
Also in science news this week
—New reconstructions show piercing eyes of men who lived 2,500 years ago in mysterious Indian civilization
—‘Our hearts stopped’: Scientists find baby pterosaurs died in violent Jurassic storm 150 million years ago
—Microsoft’s new light-based computer is inspired by 80-year-old technology — it could make AI 100 times more efficient
—Diagnostic dilemma: A woman kept tasting bleach — and doctors found a hidden cause in her blood
Science Long Read
Just past midnight, in the silence and dark of Chile’s far South Patagonia region, a camera trap picked up something inexplicable: Across three photos, intense lights danced downward in front of the lens.
Could they have been a camera artifact, ball lightning, or even UFOs? Live Science reported on the hunt for answers.
Something for the weekend
If you’re looking for something to do over the weekend, here are some of the best polls, skywatching guides and crosswords published this week.
—‘We have basically destroyed what capacity we had to respond to a pandemic,’ says leading epidemiologist Michael Osterholm [Interview]
—Live Science crossword puzzle #9: A ‘royal’ snake that wears a hood — 14 across [Crossword]
— Have you gotten this year’s COVID vaccine? [Poll]
Science in pictures
New photos of the comet 3I/ATLAS captured during the recent “blood moon” total eclipse appeared to show a surprising development — the comet, an interloper from beyond our solar system, may be turning green.
The most common explanation for this strange change (and no, it’s not little green men) is the presence of diatomic carbon in the comet’s coma, its fuzzy, temporary atmosphere. Yet with no diatomic carbon yet to be detected by spectroscopic observations, the jury is still out. Astronomers will need to take follow-up photos to confirm the effect and investigate its cause.
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