Potential impacts of rise in vertical shear include longer, bumpier and dearer flights
The climate crisis could be making transatlantic flights more bumpy, according to research into the impact of global heating on the jet stream.
Jet streams are powerful currents of air at the altitudes which planes fly. . They result from the air temperature gradient between the poles and the tropics, and reach speeds of up to 250mph (400kmph). They also sometimes meander.
Continue reading...Alcohol is free of radioactivity and could help economic recovery in region
What do you call vodka produced from grain grown in the exclusion zone around Chernobyl, scene of the world’s worst nuclear disaster 33 years ago?
Atomik, of course.
Continue reading...Scientists have observed up to 10cm of salt falling to sea floor every year since 1979
Try swimming in the Dead Sea and you can’t help but float. This salt lake, bordered by Jordan, Israel and the West Bank, is nearly 10 times as salty as the oceans. In recent decades diversion of freshwater streams has made it even saltier, and since 1979 scientists have observed salt crystals “snowing” down, depositing up to 10cm on the sea floor every year. It’s the only place in the world where this happens and now scientists think they know why.
During summer the Dead Sea separates into two layers: a warm super-salty layer sitting above a cooler less-salty layer. The research, published in Water Resources Research , shows that when small waves break this boundary they encourage salty fingers to penetrate into the lower layer. Warm water holds more salt than cool water, so as the fingers cool they produce salt crystals which then rain down on the sea floor.
Continue reading...Scientists believe the Beresheet’s unusual cargo may be alive and well on the moon
The odds of finding life on the moon have suddenly rocketed skywards. But rather than elusive alien moonlings, the beings in question came from Earth and were spilled across the landscape when a spacecraft crashed into the surface.
The Israeli Beresheet probe was meant to be the first private lander to touch down on the moon. And all was going smoothly until mission controllers lost contact in April as the robotic craft made its way down. Beyond all the technology that was lost in the crash, Beresheet had an unusual cargo: a few thousand tiny tardigrades, the toughest animals on Earth.
Continue reading...The anti-medical dogma of Christian Science led my father to an agonising death. Now the church itself is in decline – and it can’t happen fast enough. By Caroline Fraser
When I was a baby, my grandfather delighted me by playing a game. He made a fist sandwich, fingers laced together and hidden in his palms, showing me his thumbs closed upon them. Slowly, he would say, “Here’s the church, and here’s the steeple,” raising his index fingers together to form a peak. Then, throwing his thumbs apart, he flipped his interlaced fingers over, wriggling them and crying out, “Open the doors and see all the people!”
My grandfather was a Christian Scientist. His mother had been a Scientist. His only child, my father, was a Scientist. I was raised to be a Scientist.
Continue reading...Operation could benefit thousands of women who experience serious health issues
A medical procedure that aims to allow women to delay the menopause for up to 20 years has been launched by IVF specialists in Britain.
Doctors claim the operation could benefit thousands of women who experience serious health problems, such as heart conditions and bone-weakening osteoporosis, that are brought on by the menopause.
Continue reading...Scientists in Geneva warn that cutting carbon emissions from cars and factories is not enough
Attempts to solve the climate crisis by cutting carbon emissions from only cars, factories and power plants are doomed to failure, scientists will warn this week.
A leaked draft of a report on climate change and land use, which is now being debated in Geneva by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), states that it will be impossible to keep global temperatures at safe levels unless there is also a transformation in the way the world produces food and manages land.
Continue reading...Researchers reprogrammed human cells before injecting them in the monkey embryo
Efforts to create human-animal chimeras have rebooted an ethical debate after reports emerged that scientists have produced monkey embryos containing human cells.
A chimera is an organism whose cells come from two or more “individuals”, with recent work looking at combinations from different species. The word comes from a beast from Greek mythology which was said to be part lion, part goat and part snake.
Continue reading...Teeth sized between 0.1mm to 3mm discovered in lower jaw of boy during surgery in Chennai
A seven-year-old boy who had suffered occasional toothache was found to have 526 teeth inside his jaw, according to surgeons in India.
The hundreds of teeth were found inside a sac that was nestled in the molar region of his lower jaw, following surgery carried out at the Saveetha dental college and hospital in Chennai.
Continue reading...Scientists say July at least equalled and may have beaten hottest month on record
The record-breaking heatwave that roasted Europe last month was a one-in-a-thousand-year event made up to 100 times more likely by human-driven climate change, scientists have calculated.
Around the globe, July at least equalled and may have surpassed the hottest month on record, according to data from the World Meteorological Organization. This followed the warmest June on record.
Continue reading...US scientists say their blood test can be 94% effective in spotting those at risk of the illness
A blood test that can detect signs of Alzheimer’s as much as 20 years before the disease begins to have a debilitating effect has been developed by researchers in the US.
Scientists at the Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis in Missouri believe the test can identify changes in the brain suggestive of Alzheimer’s with 94% accuracy, while being much cheaper and simpler than a PET brain scan.
Continue reading...Our galaxy is like a distorted disc, study based on Cepheid stars confirms
The most detailed three-dimensional map yet of the Milky Way has been revealed, showing that our galaxy is not a flat disc but has a “warped” shape like a fascinator hat or a vinyl record that has been left in the sun.
“The stars 60,000 light years away from the Milky Way’s centre are as far as 4,500 [light years] above or below the galactic plane – this is a big percentage,” said Dr Dorota Skowron of the University of Warsaw, first author of the latest research.
Continue reading...Study funded by Facebook aims to improve communication with paralysed patients
Doctors have turned the brain signals for speech into written sentences in a research project that aims to transform how patients with severe disabilities communicate in the future.
The breakthrough is the first to demonstrate how the intention to say specific words can be extracted from brain activity and converted into text rapidly enough to keep pace with natural conversation.
Continue reading...Authors call for cognitive behavioural therapy to be offered through GPs
Forget counting sheep and drinking warm milk, an effective way to tackle chronic insomnia is cognitive behavioural therapy, researchers have confirmed.
The authors of a new study say that although the therapy is effective, it is not being used widely enough, with doctors having limited knowledge about it and patients lacking access.
Continue reading...National ‘green legacy’ initiative aims to reduce environmental degradation
About 350m trees have been planted in a single day in Ethiopia, according to a government minister.
The planting is part of a national “green legacy” initiative to grow 4bn trees in the country this summer by encouraging every citizen to plant at least 40 seedlings. Public offices have reportedly been shut down in order for civil servants to take part.
Continue reading...Huge blazes in Greenland, Siberia and Alaska are producing plumes of smoke that can be seen from space
The Arctic is suffering its worst wildfire season on record, with huge blazes in Greenland, Siberia and Alaska producing plumes of smoke that can be seen from space.
The Arctic region has recorded its hottest June ever. Since the start of that month, more than 100 wildfires have burned in the Arctic circle. In Russia, 11 of 49 regions are experiencing wildfires.
Continue reading...Diplomats had reported falling ill after what was thought to be ‘acoustic attack’
Brain scans of US embassy staff who became ill in mysterious circumstances while serving in Cuba have found potential abnormalities that may be related to their symptoms.
The scans taken from 40 US government workers who suffered strange concussion-like symptoms during their deployment to Havana revealed that particular brain features looked different to those in healthy volunteers.
Continue reading...With first mission to land on lunar south pole, India aims to join club comprising Russia, US and China
India’s mission to the moon has blasted into space one week after a technical glitch forced scientists to abruptly halt its scheduled launch.
Thousands gathered to watch Chandrayaan-2 take off at 2.43pm local time (0913 GMT) on Monday from Satish Dhawan space centre in Sriharikota, north of Chennai.
Continue reading...As Donald Trump reiterated his determination that Americans should walk on Mars, Mike Pence marked the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing at the Apollo 11 launch site in Florida on Saturday.
Related: Trump revives the idea of a ‘white man’s country’, America’s original sin | Nell Painter
Continue reading...The Apollo 11 mission inspired the world. What has happened in the ensuing half-century?
When Neil Armstrong stepped on to the moon 50 years ago, it was down to a giant leap of political and scientific imagination. His footprints on the powdery lunar surface changed the way we saw ourselves, confirming that humanity could escape its earthly coils. The mission unleashed a dream of what we as a species might do. Yet only a dozen people have walked on the moon, all between the summer of 1969 and the end of 1972.
Did we lose our primordial urge to explore? Almost certainly not – though Buzz Aldrin this week decried “50 years of non-progress”, probes have travelled to Pluto and beyond. But times have changed. The cold war rivalry that catalysed the space race vanished. The Soviet Union was first with a satellite, dog and astronaut in space. Today Washington and Moscow play the great game in the Middle East, not the heavens, although both are now contemplating a return to the moon: Donald Trump wants to make America great again by putting astronauts there by 2024, though some think China may get there first; Russia talks of landing cosmonauts by 2030.
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