Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Blog – Page 18

When people think of black holes, they imagine something dramatic: a star exploding in space, collapsing in on itself, and forming a cosmic monster that eats everything around it. But what if black holes didn’t always begin with a bang? What if, instead, they started quietly—growing inside stars, which still appear alive from the outside, without anyone noticing?

Our recent astrophysical research, published in Physical Review D, suggests this could be happening—and the story is far stranger and more fascinating than we imagined.

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A gene that regulates the development of roots in vascular plants is also involved in the organ development of liverworts—land plants so old they don’t even have proper roots. The Kobe University discovery, published in New Phytologist, highlights the fundamental evolutionary dynamic of co-opting, evolving a mechanism first and adopting it for a different purpose later.

When scientists discover that a gene is necessary for the of a trait, they are quick to ask since when this gene has been involved in this and how the evolution of the gene has contributed to the evolution of the trait.

Kobe University plant biologist Fukaki Hidehiro says, “My group previously discovered that a gene called RLF is necessary for lateral development in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana, but it was completely new that the group of genes RLF belongs to is involved in plant organ development. So we wanted to know whether the equivalent of this gene in other plants is also involved in similar processes.”

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The Gs/Gd lineage of highly pathogenic H5 avian influenza viruses—including H5N1—has rapidly evolved, spreading globally and infecting a growing range of birds, mammals, and occasionally humans. This review highlights the expanding risks, the challenges of cross-species transmission, and urgent needs for surveillance, vaccination, and a unified One Health response.

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What if black holes weren’t the only things slowly vanishing from existence? Scientists have now shown that all dense cosmic bodies—from neutron stars to white dwarfs—might eventually evaporate via Hawking-like radiation.

Even more shocking, the end of the universe could come far sooner than expected, “only” 1078 years from now, not the impossibly long 101100 years once predicted. In an ambitious blend of astrophysics, quantum theory, and math, this playful yet serious study also computes the eventual fates of the Moon—and even a human.

Black Holes Aren’t Alone

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