Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog – Page 2094

An experiment conducted in Italy, with theory support from Newcastle University, has produced the first experimental evidence of vacuum decay.

In , when a not-so-stable state transforms into the true stable state, it’s called “false .” This happens through the creation of small localized bubbles. While existing theoretical work can predict how often this bubble formation occurs, there hasn’t been much experimental evidence.

Now, an international research team involving Newcastle University scientists has for the first observed these bubbles forming in carefully controlled atomic systems. Published in the journal Nature Physics, the findings offer experimental evidence of bubble formation through false vacuum decay in a quantum system.

Read more | >

Low mental health associated with worse outcomes after total hip arthroplasty suggests a new study published in the Archives of Orthopaedic and Trauma Surgery.

Poor mental health is difficult to recognize and as a result, its association with recovery from total joint arthroplasty is difficult to assess. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between overall mental health scores and outcomes in the early postoperative period following unilateral total hip arthroplasty (THA). This is a retrospective review of prospectively collected data involving 142 patients who underwent primary unilateral THA. Independent variables included patient demographics and preoperative Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS), Global Physical Health (GPH) and Global Mental Health (GMH) and Hip Disability and Osteoarthritis Outcome Score, Joint Replacement (HOOS JR) scores as well as diagnoses of depression or anxiety.

Read more | >

In 1,827, botanist Robert Brown studied pollen particles’ motion as they were suspended in water. These little grains seemed to jitter around randomly. Brown performed as variety of tests on them and realized that all small particles, not just pollen, exhibited the same motion when suspended in water. Something other than the presence of life was causing these little particles to move around. Mathematicians took note and quickly developed a theory describing this process and named it Brownian Motion in his honor.

This theory has expanded well beyond its original context and become a beautiful subfield of mathematics called Stochastic Processes. Nowhere was this influence illustrated better than in 1905 when Albert Einstein used the theory of Brownian Motion to verify the existence of atoms. The makeup of our universe’s tiniest particles was highly debated at the time, and Einstein’s work helped solidify atomic theory.

Wow, that’s quite the leap! In order to understand how we got from pollen grains to confirming atomic theory, we’re going to have to learn some background about Brownian Motion. In this article, I’ll spend some time talking about the basics. This includes some cool videos that demonstrate the patterns of Brownian Motion and the statistics going on behind the scenes. We’ll then dive into Einstein’s version which came as one of his extremely influential series of papers in 1905. There’s a lot of ground to cover, so let’s get started!

Read more | >

A team of scientists at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light led by Dr. Birgit Stiller has succeeded in cooling traveling sound waves in waveguides considerably further than has previously been possible using laser light. This achievement represents a significant move towards the ultimate goal of reaching the quantum ground state of sound in waveguides.

Unwanted noise generated by the acoustic waves at can be eliminated. This experimental approach both provides a deeper understanding of the transition from classical to quantum phenomena of and is relevant to quantum communication systems and future quantum technologies.

The quantum ground state of an acoustic wave of a certain frequency can be reached by completely cooling the system. In this way, the number of quantum particles, the so-called acoustic phonons, which cause disturbance to , can be reduced to almost zero and the gap between classical and bridged.

Read more | >

A small asteroid entered Earth’s atmosphere Sunday morning and lit up the sky over eastern Germany. Videos of the incident have gone viral on social media, depicting a glowing object descending over Europe. Experts later confirmed that the light came from a disintegrating meteorite.

According to astronomers and observers, the 2024 BX1 asteroid, which was temporarily designated as Sar2736, landed outside Berlin near Nennhausen at around 1:30 am local time. Hungarian astronomer Krisztián Sárneczky was the first one to discover the approaching asteroid several hours before its impact, according to The International Astronomical Union.

Read more | >

Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), a common infection in children and senior adults, can also infect nerve cells and trigger inflammation leading to nerve damage, according to a new Tulane University study.

RSV can cause mild symptoms such as coughing, sneezing and fever or lead to more severe conditions such as pneumonia or bronchiolitis.

But since the disease was first discovered in 1956, it has been thought to only infect the respiratory tract.

Read more | >