SCIENCE
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Hurricane Hunter Flights Improve Hurricane Forecasts, But Trump Budget Cuts Could Threaten Them
Daring Hurricane Hunter Flights Make Forecasts More Accurate. But They Could Face Cuts NOAA’s Hurricane Hunter airplane missions significantly increase the accuracy of hurricane forecasts, but President Trump’s proposed budget cuts jeopardize the data-gathering efforts and other forecasting tools By Chelsea Harvey & E&E News Stickers of previous hurricane missions adorn the side as a crew member walks past “Kermit,”…
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Mysterious Link between Earth’s Magnetism and Oxygen Baffles Scientists
Mysterious Link between Earth’s Magnetism and Oxygen Baffles Scientists The strength of Earth’s magnetic field and the amount of oxygen in its atmosphere seem to be correlated—and scientists want to know why By Davide Castelvecchi & Nature magazine A group of Dimetrodon’s hunting in a Permian era environment. Stocktrek Images, Inc./Alamy Stock Photo The strength of Earth’s magnetic field seems…
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Could Iran Have Been Close to Making a Nuclear Weapon? Uranium Enrichment Explained
Could Iran Have Been Close to Making a Nuclear Weapon? Uranium Enrichment Explained When Israeli aircraft recently struck a uranium-enrichment complex in the nation, Iran could have been days away from achieving “breakout,” the ability to quickly turn “yellowcake” uranium into bomb-grade fuel, with its new high-speed centrifuges By Deni Ellis Béchard edited by Dean Visser Men work inside of…
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Brain Implant Lets Man with ALS Speak and Sing with His ‘Real Voice’
Brain Implant Lets Man with ALS Speak and Sing with His ‘Real Voice’ A new brain-computer interface turns thoughts into singing and expressive speech in real time By Miryam Naddaf & Nature magazine The motor cortex (orange, illustration). Electrodes implanted in this region helped to record the speech-related brain activity of a man who could not speak intelligibly. Kateryna Kon/Science…
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Milky Way–Andromeda Collision Is in Doubt, North Atlantic Ocean Heat Surged, and Worms Build Towers
New Doubts about Milky Way–Andromeda Collision, Explanation of 2023 Marine Heat Wave and Worms That Build Towers The Milky Way’s big crash with Andromeda might not be a sure thing. Plus, we discuss an overheated ocean, a giant planet circling a tiny star and worms that build living towers. By Rachel Feltman, Naeem Amarsy & Fonda Mwangi Anaissa Ruiz Tejada/Scientific…
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What Is the Analemma? | Scientific American
We’re all familiar with the sun’s daily motion in the sky. It rises in the east, gets higher in the sky until circa noon, then begins its hours-long descent to set on the western horizon. You may also know of our star’s more stately annual journey. For Northern Hemisphere dwellers, as summer approaches, it moves a tiny bit higher in…
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Bizarre Quantum Universe | Scientific American
Bizarre Quantum Universe Even how matter exists in the first place is a mystery to physicists By Andrea Gawrylewski In 2022 three scientists won the Nobel Prize in Physics for proving something astonishing: the universe is not locally real. In other words, particles don’t have fixed properties until they are measured. Although it seems to counter everything we perceive, the…
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Sahara Dust Clouds Are Heading to Florida and Beyond
Sahara Dust Clouds Are Heading to Florida and Beyond Clouds of dust blown off the Saharan Desert into the southeastern U.S. could affect local weather and make sunrises and sunsets particularly vivid By Meghan Bartels edited by Dean Visser Each year, seasonal winds carry tens of millions of tons of Saharan dust across the Atlantic and beyond. On February 18,…
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Upgraded Very Large Array Telescope Will Spot Baby Solar Systems—If It’s Funded
New Mexico’s Plains of San Agustin are otherworldly: Silence, sand and sharp plants reign on the valley floor. Knobbly volcanic rock rises above. Pronghorns’ legs and jackrabbits’ ears break up the landscape. And so, too, does one of the world’s largest telescopes. The plains house the aptly named Very Large Array (VLA)—a radio telescope made of 27 different antennas, each…
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New Infrared Contacts Let You See in the Dark
New Contacts Let You See Infrared Light—Even with Your Eyes Closed Straight out of science fiction, these contact lenses convert infrared light into visible light that humans can see By Elizabeth Gibney & Nature magazine People who tested a new type of designer contact lens could see flashing infrared signals from a light source. Humans have a new way of…
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