Perseverance rover’s Mars rock sample may contain best evidence of possible ancient life
– The lead scientist for NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover is excited about a rock sample called “Lefroy Bay” that has been collected and stored in the rover’s sample tubes. – Lefroy Bay contains hydrated silica, which on Earth is known to best preserve signs of ancient life. This raises the possibility that it may contain […]
Scientists use rare metal to set new record in effort to produce limitless energy: ‘It was a pretty remarkable result’
– Scientists in France set a new record by sustaining a nuclear fusion reaction for six minutes, injecting over a billion joules of energy. This was done using a tokamak reactor to heat hydrogen plasma to 50 million degrees Celsius. – The researchers used tungsten as the inner wall material of the tokamak reactor, instead […]
Korean researchers develop battery that could eliminate major issue with electric cars: ‘A new era where rapid charging becomes a reality’
– Korean researchers from KAIST have developed a new type of sodium-ion battery that is capable of rapid charging in just seconds. – If widely adopted, this technology could help address a major limitation of electric vehicles by eliminating long charging times which have prevented some from switching to EVs. – The new battery incorporates […]
Intel next-generation Lunar Lake CPUs launching in Q3, Arrow Lake in Q4 — mobile chips claimed to be 1.4x faster than Qualcomm’s X Elite processors
– Intel announced details of its next-generation Lunar Lake processors which are set to launch in laptops in Q3 2024. Arrow Lake desktop CPUs will follow in Q4 2024. – Lunar Lake will feature new Lion Cove performance cores and Skymont efficiency cores. One configuration tested had 4P+4E cores. It also includes an improved neural […]
Aurora moves into next design phase for DARPA vertical takeoff X-plane
– Aurora Flight Sciences has completed the conceptual design phase for its vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft for DARPA’s SPRINT program. – SPRINT stands for Speed and Range Independent Technologies and aims to develop an experimental VTOL aircraft that can fly much faster than current VTOL aircraft like the V-22 Osprey. – Aurora’s design […]
Dogecoin dog Kabosu dies after 14 years as meme
– Kabosu, a Japanese shiba inu dog known as the face of the Dogecoin cryptocurrency and inspiration for the “doge” meme, has died at age 18. – In 2010, her owner Atsuko Sato took a picture of Kabosu sitting on the couch with her paws crossed, which spread online and became a viral meme. – […]
A comet approaching Earth could become brighter than the stars this fall
– A newly discovered comet called C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) could potentially become bright enough to see with the naked eye in the night sky this fall. – It was discovered in February 2023 and is approaching the sun. On September 27th it will make its closest approach to the sun at a distance of 36 […]
James Webb telescope spots 2 monster black holes merging at the dawn of time, challenging our understanding of the universe
Astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope to detect the most distant pair of colliding black holes ever observed, located over 13 billion light-years away. The black holes were detected during the early universe known as the cosmic dawn, around 740 million years after the Big Bang. Each black hole is estimated to be around […]
Earth-size planet found orbiting nearby star that will outlive the sun by 100 billion years
Astronomers have discovered an Earth-size exoplanet orbiting a nearby red dwarf star located around 55 light-years from Earth. Designated SPECULOOS-3 b, the planet is a rocky world that completes an orbit every 17 hours, indicating it is tidally locked to its star like the Moon is to Earth. The planet is too close to its […]
NASA-funded pulsed plasma rocket concept aims to send astronauts to Mars in 2 months
NASA is funding development of a new rocket called the Pulsed Plasma Rocket (PPR) that could drastically reduce travel time to Mars. The PPR uses nuclear power to generate high-impulse plasma thrust. This would make it far more efficient than current chemical rockets. Developers claim the PPR could cut a round-trip journey between Earth and […]