Welcome to the Saturday Science Edition of Overnight News Digest
Overnight News Digest is a regular daily feature which provides noteworthy news items and commentary from around the world. The editorial staff includes side pocket, maggiejean, wader, Doctor RJ, rfall, and JML9999.
Neon Vincent is our editor-in-chief.
Special thanks go to Magnifico for starting this venerable series.
Astronomy
Hubble Observes One-Of-A-Kind Star Nicknamed “Nasty”
Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have uncovered surprising new clues about a hefty, rapidly aging star whose behavior has never been seen before in our Milky Way Galaxy. In fact, the star is so weird that astronomers have nicknamed it “Nasty 1,” a play on its catalog name of NaSt1. The star may represent a brief transitory stage in the evolution of extremely massive stars. First discovered several decades ago, Nasty 1 was identified as a Wolf-Rayet star, a rapidly evolving star that is much more massive than our Sun. The star loses its hydrogen-filled outer layers quickly, exposing its super-hot and extremely bright helium-burning core. But Nasty 1 doesn’t look like a typical Wolf-Rayet star. The astronomers using Hubble had expected to see twin lobes of gas flowing from opposite sides of the star, perhaps similar to those emanating from the massive star Eta Carinae, which is a Wolf-Rayet candidate. Instead, Hubble revealed a pancake-shaped disk of gas encircling the star. The vast disk is nearly 2 trillion miles wide and may have formed from an unseen companion star that snacked on the outer envelope of the newly formed Wolf-Rayet. Based on current estimates, the nebula surrounding the stars is just a few thousand years old and as close as 3,000 light-years from Earth.
“We were excited to see this disk-like structure because it may be evidence for a Wolf-Rayet star forming from a binary interaction,” said Jon Mauerhan of the University of California, Berkeley. “There are very few examples in the galaxy of this process in action because this phase is short-lived, perhaps lasting only a hundred thousand years, while the timescale over which a resulting disk is visible could be only 10 thousand years or less.”
astronomy.com
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NASA Spacecraft Now Closer To Moon Than Ever
A NASA probe has dipped closer to the moon than ever before, perhaps setting the stage for a new round of discoveries about Earth's nearest neighbor. On May 4, NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) performed two engine burns, changing its orbit to one that gets within 12 miles (20 kilometers) of the moon's south pole and 103 miles (165 km) of the north pole. (LRO had been on a path that brought it within about 19 miles, or 30 km, of the south pole.) "We're taking LRO closer to the moon than we've ever done before, but the maneuver is similar to all other station-keeping maneuvers, so the mission operations team knows exactly what to do," Steve Odendahl, LRO mission manager from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, said in a statement. Lowering LRO's orbit essentially magnifies the sensitivity of LRO's six science instruments, giving scientists a chance to learn more about how water and other compounds could be trapped at the moon's poles, said LRO project scientist John Keller, also of NASA Goddard. space.com
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Opportunity Rover Team Honors Pioneering Lindbergh Flight At Mars Mountaintop Crater
The science team leading NASA’s long-lived Opportunity rover mission is honoring the pioneering solo nonstop trans-Atlantic flight of aviator Charles Lindbergh by assigning key features of the Mars mountain top crater area the rover is now exploring with names related to the historic flight. Opportunity is now studying an elongated crater called “Spirit of St. Louis” and a unparalleled rock spire within the crater called “Lindbergh Mound” which are named in honor of Lindbergh himself and his plane – the Spirit of Saint Louis. “Spirit of Saint Louis” crater is quite special in many ways related not just to history but also to science and exploration – that very reasons behind Lindbergh’s flight and Opportunity’s astounding mission to the Red Planet. The team is ecstatic that the 11 year old rover Opportunity has reached “Spirit of St. Louis Crater” because its serves as the gateway to the alien terrain of “Marathon Valley” holding caches of water altered minerals that formed under environmental conditions conducive to support Martian microbial life forms, if they ever existed. universetoday.com
Biology
Tara Oceans Expedition Yields Treasure Trove Of Plankton Data
Following perhaps the largest DNA sequencing effort ever undertaken for ocean science, a multinational team of scientists now reports that plankton life in the seas is far more diverse than suspected. The researchers, who spent more than three years sampling plankton on the research schooner Tara, have unveiled the first global analyses from the Tara Oceans consortium in five reports in the 22 May issue of Science. Plankton include all the microscopic beings that drift on the upper layer of the oceans, including tiny crustaceans, squid, and mollusks. Previously, the ocean's numerous planktonic organisms have largely been uncharacterized. "The results represent a one thousand-fold increase in data over previous attempts to characterize ocean microbial biodiversity," said a senior author on one of the papers, Peer Bork, during a teleconference for reporters on 19 May, "and yet, this is still the tip of the iceberg." Bork is a senior group leader in bioinformatics at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL). aaas.org
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From Chicken To Dinosaur: Scientists Experimentally 'Reverse Evolution' Of Perching Toe
A unique adaptation in the foot of birds is the presence of a thumb-like opposable toe, which allows them to grasp and perch. However, in their dinosaur ancestors, this toe was small and non- opposable, and did not even touch the ground, resembling the dewclaws of dogs and cats. Remarkably, the embryonic development of birds provides a parallel of this evolutionary history: The toe starts out like their dinosaur ancestors, but then its base (the metatarsal) becomes twisted, making it opposable. Brazilian researcher Joâo Botelho, working at the lab of Alexander Vargas at the University of Chile, decided to study the underlying mechanisms. Botelho observed that the twisting occurred shortly after the embryonic musculature of this toe was in place. [...] Bird embryos move a lot inside the egg during development, and the onset of movement at this toe coincided with the twisting of its base. Botelho also demonstrated that in this toe, genes of cartilage maturation were expressed at a much later stage than other digits: It retains many rapidly dividing stem cells for a much longer period. Such immature cartilage is highly plastic and easily transformed by muscular activity. These observations suggested the toe is twisted as a result of mechanical forces imposed on it by the embryonic musculature. Definitive proof, however, would come from experiments. When Botelho applied Decamethonium bromide, a pharmacological agent capable of paralyzing embryonic musculature, the result was a non-opposable toe with a straight, non-twisted base identical to that of their dinosaur ancestors. Only a few experiments are known to recover dinosaur traits in birds (such as a dinosaur-like shank and tooth-like structures). sciencedaily.com
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Taxonomy Experts Announce Top 10 New Species Discovered In 2014
A feathered dinosaur from North and South Dakota, a species of pufferfish from Japan, a cartwheeling spider from Morocco, a ‘walking stick’ from Vietnam, and a photogenic sea slug, are among the species identified by taxonomy experts from the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF) as the top 10 new creatures described in 2014. ESF scientists release the top 10 list each year in conjunction with the May 23 birthday of Carolus Linnaeus, the ‘Father of Taxonomy.’ His work in the mid-18th century was the beginning point for “modern” naming and classification of plants and animals. The honorees are chosen from among an estimated 18,000 species described for the first time each year. The purpose of the list is to draw attention to biodiversity and the science and institutions engaged in its exploration. (Good pics & vids - Editor) sci-news.com
Chemistry
Studies: Science-Based Response Lacking In Chemical Disasters
Three new studies suggest that when communities are hit with disasters that contaminate drinking water the official decision-making and response often lack scientific basis. The result has been an inability to fully anticipate public health risks and effectively rid plumbing systems of contaminants, sometimes exposing residents to toxic chemicals, said Andrew Whelton, an assistant professor in Purdue University's Division of Environmental and Ecological Engineering and Lyles School of Civil Engineering. Since 2014 more than 1.5 million people across the nation have received drinking water tainted with crude oil, diesel fuel, algal toxins and coal-washing chemicals. "Numerous contamination incidents have been caused by chemical spills from storage tank ruptures, pipeline breaks, rail car and truck accidents, as well as algal blooms," Whelton said. purdue.edu
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Organic Chemistry’s Complexity Conundrum
Organic synthesis is often heralded as more art than science. An organic chemist’s eye for complexity, breaking down structures into simpler forms, is honed and nurtured over decades. But, is it possible to take this seemingly intangible skill and quantify it, putting a simple number on how complex a chemical structure actually is? Process chemists Martin Eastgate and Jun Li, at Bristol-Myers Squibb (B-MS) in the US have developed a tool to do just that, generating a unique index they have termed a molecule’s ‘current complexity’, which also accounts for changes over time due to the impact of new technologies.1 According to Eastgate, the idea for the tool was born out of their recent attempts to synthesise JAK2 inhibitor BMS-911543. A new transformation radically changed their ability to prepare the compound, enabling an eight rather than 19 step synthesis.2 ‘When I reflected on what we had achieved, the molecule no longer looked as tough as it once had,’ says Eastgate. ‘The beauty of the structure remained, but my perception of the challenge it posed had altered.’ This led to an interest in understanding how the process of making molecules at B-MS had evolved and how process advances had made structures simpler. ‘It was clear that no one could address these questions accurately, so we decided to approach this problem ourselves,’ says Eastgate. The ensuing research resulted in the current complexity index, which was based on an analysis of collective intelligence from a group of 18 synthetic chemists asked to rank 40 molecules in terms of their perceived complexity. The data obtained from the chemist’s intuition was then refined by considering a large series of intrinsic and extrinsic factors and applying a Bayesian regression model to determine the five major factors that impacted the complexity of a structure the most. These are as follows: (i) the structure’s molecular topological index (as proposed by Randić);3 (ii) the number of stereogenic centres established in the synthesis; (iii) the number of heteroatoms on and in aromatic rings; (iv) the number of steps and (v) ideality of the route (as defined by Philip Baran in 2010).4 (i) and (iii) are intrinsic and unchangeable, whereas the others are extrinsic variables reflecting advances that occur over time. From this was established an easily comprehensible 1–10 rating scale, with 1 being the most complex and 10 being least complex. rsc.org
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The Seashell-Inspired Material Inspiring A New Wave Of Safety Gear In Sport
The risk of injury in professional sport has been a central feature in recent debates about how well protected our stars are. Only recently, Argentine football player Emanuel Ortega died of a fatal head injury after hitting a concrete wall during a game. One solution is to increase the use of protective wear and to improve existing designs. The Australian Cricket Board inquiry into the death of cricketer Phillip Hughes, two days after he was struck on the neck where his helmet offered no protection, could result in newly-designed safety helmets being made mandatory. At Sheffield Hallam University we've been developing improved materials for impact protection in sports. The materials have the fascinating and unusual "auxetic" property that can be used in helmets, pads, guards, gloves, mats and barriers. What are auxetic materials? Put simply, instead of becoming thinner when stretched (how we usually expect materials to behave), an auxetic material actually gets fatter. When compressed, the material becomes thinner. At first glance this fascinating property to auxetic materials may appear highly unusual, but is actually being discovered to be a key feature of a growing number of natural materials. Examples include certain forms of skin and other soft biomaterials, and inorganic silicates such as quartz and cristobalite. Man-made auxetics now include honeycombs and foams, fibres and fabrics, carbon fibre-reinforced composites, microporous polymers, metals and ceramics. phys.org
Earth Science
Can Ice Loss Affect Gravity?
A group of scientists, led by a team from the University of Bristol, has observed a sudden increase of ice loss in a previously stable region of Antarctica. The research is published today in Science. Using measurements of the elevation of the Antarctic ice sheet made by a suite of satellites, the researchers found that the Southern Antarctic Peninsula showed no signs of change up to 2009. Around 2009, multiple glaciers along a vast coastal expanse, measuring some 750km in length, suddenly started to shed ice into the ocean at a nearly constant rate of 60 cubic km, or about 55 trillion litres of water, each year. [...] Dr Bert Wouters, a Marie Curie Fellow at the University of Bristol, who lead the study said: “To date, the glaciers added roughly 300 cubic km of water to the ocean. That's the equivalent of the volume of nearly 350,000 Empire State Buildings combined.” The changes were observed using the CryoSat-2 satellite, a mission of the European Space Agency dedicated to remote-sensing of ice. From an altitude of about 700km, the satellite sends a radar pulse to Earth, which is reflected by the ice and subsequently received back at the satellite. From the time the pulse takes to travel, the elevation of the ice surface can retrieved with incredible accuracy. By analysing roughly 5 years of the data, the researchers found that the ice surface of some of the glaciers is currently going down by as much as 4m each year. The ice loss in the region is so large that it causes small changes in the gravity field of the Earth, which can be detected by another satellite mission, the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE). enn.com
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Arctic Ice Reaches A Low Winter Maximum
The winter ice covering the Arctic Ocean has reached its annual peak, but the extent of sea ice cover this winter is smaller than it has been at the end of any winter since 1978, when scientists began keeping consistent satellite records. The vast amount of sea ice covering the Arctic fluctuates on a seasonal basis, and the winter peak marks a turning point before a melting period during the warmer spring and summer months. Arctic sea ice typically expands to a maximum in March and shrinks to a minimum in September each year. The National Snow & Ice Data Center said on Thursday that this year’s maximum occurred on Feb. 25, about two weeks earlier than the average, barring any unlikely additional growth of ice late in the season. The center said that recent weather patterns partly explain why the maximum this year is smaller than in previous winters. The North Pacific was warm this year because the atmospheric jet stream of cold air looped farther north in that region than is typical. The jet stream also plunged farther south than usual near the United States, bringing cooling temperatures and triggering heavy snows in much of the country. nytimes.com
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Santa Barbara Oil Spill Reopens Fierce Environmental Debate
The long-term environmental impacts of this week's oil spill in California may not be clear for some time. Meantime, the spill has reignited a fierce local debate over off-shore oil drilling.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST: Some dramatic images coming out of Santa Barbara Country, Calif., this week - crude oil spilling onto a pristine stretch of Pacific coastline and rescuers working to save oil wildlife. We likely won't know the full extent of the environmental damage from Tuesday's spill for several months. But as NPR's Kirk Siegler reports, the accident has already reopened a fierce debate over oil drilling. KIRK SIEGLER, BYLINE: Ahead of a holiday weekend, Refigio State Beach should be bustling with surfers, campers and wildlife watchers, instead it's all cleanup workers in protective Tyvek suits. They're combing the rocky, oil-coated shores, pulling up contaminated plants and tossing small, dead fish into plastic bags. Every now and then you see a much more troubling site - pelicans nose-diving into the oily waves, fishing. Linda Krop, chief counsel for the Santa Barbara-based Environmental Defense Center, says sea birds are usually the hardest to account for after spills because they fly off and potentially die somewhere else. LINDA KROP: Any oil spill can have a devastating impact. And this oil spill occurred in the Santa Barbara Channel, which is known as the North Galapagos. It's one of the most biologically rich places on the planet.
npr.org
Physics
Large Hadron Collider Sets Smashing Record, Ready To Delve Into Mysteries Of The Universe
Researchers at the Large Hadron Collider have smashed particles together harder than ever before, ahead of its plans to solve some of the deepest mysteries of the universe when it starts collecting data next month. The scientists managed to slam protons together at 13 tera-electron volts for the first time. The LHC, which is the most powerful atom smasher ever built, was restarted in April and is getting ready to harvest data that might solve the mysteries of dark matter, among other questions. Until then it had been switched off for an upgrade that took two years. Two beams of particles travelling a whisker below the speed of light were sent flying in opposite directions through 27 kilometres (16.7 miles) of circular underground tunnels straddling the Swiss-French border. But the beam energy has only now been ramped up to its operating level of 13 TeV, almost twice the power used to uncover the Higgs boson two years ago. independent.co.uk
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Extraordinary Magnetic Shield Could Reveal Neutron's Electric Dipole Moment
One of the "quietest" magnetic environments in the Milky Way has been unveiled at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). Built by physicists based in Germany, the US and Switzerland, the shielded chamber is claimed to be the most effective for its size, and is able to reduce magnetic fields by a factor of more than one million. It could be used to measure the charge distribution within the neutron and, ultimately, determine whether the particle has an electric dipole moment (EDM). The shield could also be used in biomedical applications such as brain scanning and treating cancer using magnetic nanoparticles. Lab-based tests of fundamental physical parameters often require the near-total exclusion of electromagnetic disturbances. Some of the main customers of shielding apparatus are those who make high-precision measurements based on a particle's intrinsic angular momentum, or "spin", because this is highly influenced by stray magnetic fields. By measuring spin precession – the cycling orientation of spin in an applied magnetic field – researchers can, for example, test whether the neutron has an EDM. The Standard Model of particle physics allows the neutron to have a tiny EDM as a result of the violation of charge–parity (CP) symmetry. However, measuring a larger EDM could point to new physics that explains why there is much more matter than antimatter in the universe. physicsworld.com
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Focus: Atom-Scale Ohmmeter
A scanning tunneling microscope (STM) can make an image of individual atoms on a surface or move single atoms around. Now researchers have pushed the device’s precision and used it to measure the differences in electrical conductance between different locations around a single atom on a lead surface. The results could help elucidate the properties of metals and superconductors and might one day find use in nanotechnology fabrication. An STM brings a needle-like probe—the tip of which is a single atom—extremely close to a sample surface in a vacuum. When voltage is applied, electrons can jump, or “tunnel,” across the gap, and measuring the resulting current while moving the tip across the surface leads to an image. In another STM technique, the probe tip touches the sample, allowing atoms to chemically bond with it. Researchers have used this method, known as point contact, to move atoms around like toy blocks. The point contact technique would also be appropriate for measuring electrical conductance of a material at the atomic scale, to learn how current flows in the quantum regime, where the classical Ohm’s law fails. The problem is that when the tip touches the surface, it may rearrange or damage the sample, or even drop nanometer-sized chunks onto it. These effects make it impossible to maintain the consistent tip and surface needed to image a region of atoms and keep track of the tip’s location with the necessary accuracy. Now Yukio Hasegawa and Howon Kim of the University of Tokyo have managed to avoid this so-called “tip crash” by reducing mechanical vibrations and electronic noise and by using an extremely stable tip made of lead. This system allowed the team to directly measure the electrical conductance of lead at precise locations in the atomic structure. physics.aps.org