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It’s mini yet mighty.

An autonomous ground robot was developed by researchers at Universidad Rey Juan Carlos and Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. It could help firefighters deal with situations in enclosed spaces.

Undoubtedly, firefighters would profit from the assistance of trustworthy mobile robots in their high-danger duties. Regarding this, researchers led a study called “HelpResponder” in 2021, which aims to reduce accident rates and mission times of intervention teams, as reported by Tech Xplore.


This innovative startup is revolutionizing architecture — with building panels made out of fastest-growing perennial grass on Earth.

With housing shortages in need of quick fixes, the manufacturing industry is facing a conundrum: how to source materials and build structures while cutting down on emissions. The answer lies with sustainable construction — not only could it help reduce our environmental impact, but it also keeps costs low during implementation.

Recently, a new startup named Plantd achieved a milestone of building ultra-strong building panels out of the fastest-growing perennial grass on Earth — the best sustainable alternative to construction.


Building materials stronger than wood

The observation reveals high-energy X-rays that could help solve a mystery regarding the Sun’s corona.

As a new series of NASA observations show, there’s a lot more to sunlight than meets the eye.

This hidden light could help solve a mystery related to our host star’s incredibly hot outer atmosphere, the corona.


NASA / JPL-Caltech / JAXA

Traditionally we’ve been taught the Earth has four primary layers. Though, a distinct change at depth suggests there’s another.

Fresh evidence concerning the possibility that Earth’s inner core has a separate inner core of its own was published in Nature Communications.

In the new study, Thanh-Son Phạm and Hrvoje Tkalčić from the Australian National University collated data from existing probes.


Rost-9D/iStock.

Ever wondered what our solar system might be like with an earthlike planet —- or one even five or six times larger —- orbiting between Mars and Jupiter?

Conventional theory has long held that the gravitational influence of Jupiter would have ripped any terrestrial mass planet to shreds or never allowed it to form there at all. But a new paper just accepted for publication in The Planetary Science Journal argues that a “hypothetical planet” ranging from one to ten earth masses located between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter would wreak havoc on our inner solar system within a timeframe of only a few million years.

There’s been much speculation about whether the solar system could safely harbor an additional planet between Mars and Jupiter where most of our asteroids are located, Stephen Kane, a planetary astrophysicist at the University of California in Riverside and the paper’s lead author, told me via email. This study shows how such a planet would destabilize planetary orbits, he says.

The fungal pathogen that wipes out much of humanity in HBO’s latest series The Last of Us is real, but can the cordyceps fungus actually turn humans into zombies one day?

“It’s highly unlikely because these are organisms that have become really well adapted to infecting ants,” Rebecca Shapiro, assistant professor at University of Guelph’s department of molecular and cellular biology, told Craig Norris, host of CBC Kitchener-Waterloo’s The Morning Edition.

In the television series, the fungus infects the brain of humans and turns them into zombies. In real life, it can only infect ants and other insects in this manner.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is still doing its job — and doing it very well. Released today, this image shows the arms of barred spiral galaxy NGC 1,433 teeming with young stars that can be seen affecting the clouds of gas and dust around them. The image was taken as part of the Physics at High Angular resolution in Nearby Galaxies (PHANGS) collaboration, of which more than 100 researchers around the world are a part.

One of the James Webb Space Telescope’s first science programs is to image 19 spiral galaxies for PHANGS with its Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), which is capable of seeing through gas and dust clouds that are impenetrable with other types of imaging.