York Space unveils satellite bus for missions in very low orbit
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Around 1600, a pioneering English physician and natural philosopher invented versorium, the first electroscope, and detected the presence of static electric charges
Around 1600, William Gilbert invented the versorium, the first electroscope, to detect static electric charges. The English physician and natural philosopher studied electricity and magnetism through experiments. His work helped separate magnetism from static electricity. He also argued that Earth is a giant magnet and used a terrella to demonstrate how magnetic behavior works.
Ryan Breslow is raising up to $27M in pay-to-play bridge funding to save Bolt
Ryan Breslow, the controversial entrepreneur who returned as CEO of Bolt last year after years of legal battles and clashes with investors, refuses to give up on the checkout processing startup he co-founded in 2014.
The company, which hit an $11 billion valuation in early 2022 before plummeting 97% to $300 million, is now raising a bridge round of up to $27 million, Breslow told TechCrunch. Bridge rounds are short-term financings meant to tide a company over until its next major fundraise.
The capital is being raised from existing investors and structured as a convertible note, meaning it will turn into equity at a discount once Bolt closes a future funding round. It also includes a punitive “pay-to-play” provision, meaning backers who don’t participate will lose a large portion of their equity in the company.
A New Museum in Norway Is Bringing Visitors Into the World of WhalesFrom LifeSize Orcas to Immersive Underwater Exhibits
Opening in 2027, The Whale will explore the science, behavior, evolution and cultural history of whales through art, storytelling, sound and architecture
In 1990, NASA recovered tomato seeds after nearly 6 years on LDEF; classroom tests found space seeds germinated at 73.8% versus 70.3% for Earth controls
If you were in a classroom in the early 1990s, there is a real chance you planted a piece of space history without even realizing it. NASA sent Rutgers tomato seeds into space for nearly six years and then gave them to 3.3 million students across the country, according to NASA’s Technical Reports Server. Years before people started talking about growing food on Mars, this quiet classroom project was already testing whether seeds could survive years of space radiation and still grow.
Why NASA left seeds in orbit for six years
The seeds were never meant to stay in space that long. The project, called the Space Exposed Experiment Developed for Students, or SEEDS, was a collaboration between NASA Headquarters, NASA’s Langley Research Center, and the George W. Park Seed Company. Rutgers tomato seeds were loaded onto the Long Duration Exposure Facility, a satellite designed to see how materials and biological samples perform over periods in orbit. The Challenger disaster in January 1986 changed the timeline, grounding the shuttle program for about 32 months until it returned to flight in September 1988. The satellite stayed in space far longer than expected. When it finally returned to Earth in January 1990, the tomato seeds had been in orbit for nearly six years. They had been exposed to radiation and solar wind the entire time.
The neural basis of laughter
However, by looking at data from invasive brain monitoring—such as direct electrical stimulation used in medical treatments—researchers in this review paper have mapped out the brain’s “laughter engine.”
Not all laughter comes from pure humor. We often laugh politely at a boss’s joke, chuckle to smooth over a tense moment, or use a “polite giggle” to signal friendliness during everyday conversation.
Laughter is a universal social signal and a defining clinical sign of various neurological disorders. Yet, its neural orchestration remains elusive, due in part to the challenge of reproducing its spontaneous nature in the laboratory. In this review, we showcase how recent invasive investigations—from direct electrical stimulation to intracranial recordings—unveil the underlying circuitry. We propose a dual-system framework: an evolutionarily ancient cingulo-temporal network that acts as the gateway for spontaneous, involuntary outbursts; and a lateral motor-opercular system that co-opts speech-production networks for volitional, conversational laughter.
Why does LaSc${}_{2}$H${}_{24}$ exhibit superior superconductivity compared with LaH${}_{10}$?
Here, the authors indicate that scandium not only distorts the hydrogen cage structure but also creates MgB${}_{2}$-like Sc-H states at the Fermi level. This synergy enhances electron-phonon coupling, unifies strongly coupled H-H states with widely distributed Sc-H states on the Fermi surface, and leads to isotropic single-gap superconductivity with a higher superconductivity.