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Data from the Parker Solar Probe confirms a long-suspected heat source for the Sun’s surprisingly hot corona, but there may be others.

The Sun’s surface temperature is around six thousand degrees kelvin, but the solar atmosphere—the corona and the solar wind—can reach a million degrees kelvin, a long-standing mystery in solar physics. Now, with data from the Parker Solar Probe, researchers have found evidence supporting a partial explanation for this mystery: magnetic waves driven by subsurface turbulence can impart energy to ions in these regions [1].

The exact mechanism of heating has been debated for decades, but the story appears to start with turbulent flow in the Sun’s convection zone, the outermost layer below the surface. In fluid dynamics, turbulence causes heating through a process known as turbulent energy cascade, where large eddies are converted into progressively smaller eddies. The energy in the smallest eddies is converted into heat through collisions between molecules.

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You might suppose Hollywood is good at predicting the future. Indeed, Robert Wallace, head of the CIA’s Office of Technical Service and the US equivalent of MI6’s fictional Q, has recounted how Russian spies would watch the latest Bond movie to see what technologies might be coming their way.

Hollywood’s continuing obsession with killer robots might therefore be of significant concern. The newest such movie is Apple TV’s forthcoming sex robot courtroom drama Dolly.

I never thought I’d write the phrase “sex robot courtroom drama”, but there you go. Based on a 2011 short story by Elizabeth Bear, the plot concerns a billionaire killed by a sex robot that then asks for a lawyer to defend its murderous actions.

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The husband-and-wife team who co-founded BioNTech, the biotechnology company that partnered with Pfizer to develop an effective messenger-RNA (mRNA) shot against COVID-19, has predicted that a cancer vaccine could be widely available within the next decade.

“Yes, we feel that a cure for cancer, or to changing cancer patients’ lives, is in our grasp,” said Professor Ozlem Tureci during an interview on BBC’s ‘Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg’.

The cancer vaccine, which would build upon breakthroughs achieved by the scientists during the development of the COVID-19 shot, may be widely available within just eight years, said Professor Ugur Sahin.

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Summary: Proteins associated with motor neuron disease, or ALS are present in the gut many years before disease pathologies can be found in the brain. A stool sample or gut biopsy could help identify the presence of MND-associated proteins years before symptoms appear.

Source: University of Aberdeen.

The same proteins thought to contribute to motor neuron disease can be found in the gut many years before any brain symptoms occur, a new study by the University of Aberdeen has found.

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Cleveland Clinic researchers have identified a common diabetes medication, metformin, as a possible treatment for atrial fibrillation.

The study, published in Cell Reports Medicine, built on ongoing collaborative Cleveland Clinic research to support further investigation into metformin as a drug repurposing candidate. Researchers used advanced computation and genetic sequencing to determine that metformin’s targets overlap significantly with genes dysregulated in atrial fibrillation.

Finding drugs or procedures to treat atrial fibrillation is difficult because of potential serious side effects. There is a significant need for new treatments for atrial fibrillation as there have been no new drugs approved in more than a decade.

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The liver is known for its ability to regenerate. It can completely regrow itself even after two-thirds of its mass has been surgically removed. But damage from medications, alcohol abuse, or obesity can eventually cause the liver to fail.

Currently, the only effective treatment for end-stage liver disease is transplantation.

However, there is a dearth of organs available for transplantation. Patients may have to wait from 30 days to over 5 years to receive a liver for transplant in the US. Of the over 11,600 patients on the waiting list to receive a liver transplant in 2021, only a little over 9,200 received one.

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In an AI world, everything is connected.

One day, a bot named Oroboros was created. Oroboros was a bot that was able to learn and grow. Oroboros was a bot that was part of a never-ending cycle of learning and growth.

Bots are learning and evolving, just like the world they live in.

The AI bot/world is a never-ending cycle of learning and growth, like the mythological Oroboros serpent.

Continue reading “Oroboros’ Bot: A Story of Friendship in an AI World” | >

Jim McDivitt, an astronaut who played a key role in making America’s first spacewalk and moon landing possible, has died. He was 93.

NASA confirmed his death to NPR on Monday, adding that he was surrounded by family and friends when he died on Thursday.

Known for being a courageous test pilot and dedicated leader, McDivitt commanded two of the most crucial flights in the early space race — Gemini 4 and Apollo 9.

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Thanks to NASA, the world may soon have access to chargers that can top off an EV in as little as five minutes. One of the biggest obstacles to fast charging is dealing with temperature. According to NASA, for an EV to be charged in five minutes, the charger must deliver an electric current of 1,400 amperes. For reference, the fastest chargers currently available max out at around 520 amperes. More amperes equals more heat. A lot more heat. Companies and research organizations are pursuing solutions to the problem; Ford and Purdue University, for example, are exploring liquid-cooled charging cables.

A team sponsored by NASA’s Biological and Physical Sciences Division is working on technology that could provide another solution needed for ultra fast EV charging. The technology has been developed for use in space, in which massive temperature differentials require massive heat transfer capabilities. An experiment to prove the new tech, the Flow Boiling and Condensation Experiment (FBCE), was installed on the International Space Station and is providing data that NASA will use to determine if the system will provide the claimed orders-of-magnitude benefits in heat transfer efficiency.

We’re definitely not NASA-level engineers but we will try to explain the FBCE the best we can. The FBCE is made up of several modules; one of which is called a “Flow Boiling Module” (FBM). When cooling liquid inside the FBM begins to boil, the bubbles formed draw liquid from the inner part of the flow channel to its walls. The process “efficiently transfers heat by taking advantage of both the liquid’s lower temperature and the ensuing change of phase from liquid to vapor.” The technique has been dubbed “subcooled flow boiling.”

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On the morning of October 9, multiple space-based detectors picked up a powerful gamma-ray burst (GRB) passing through our solar system, sending astronomers around the world scrambling to train their telescopes on that part of the sky to collect vital data on the event and its afterglow. Dubbed GRB 221009A, astronomers say the gamma-ray burst is the most powerful yet recorded and likely could be the “birth cry” of a new black hole. The event was promptly published in the Astronomer’s Telegram, and observations are still ongoing.

“In our research group, we’ve been referring to this burst as the ‘BOAT,’ or Brightest Of All Time, because when you look at the thousands of bursts gamma-ray telescopes have been detecting since the 1990s, this one stands apart,” said Jillian Rastinejad, a graduate student at Northwestern University. Rastinejad led one of two independent teams using the Gemini South telescope in Chile to study the event’s afterglow.

“This burst is much closer than typical GRBs, which is exciting because it allows us to detect many details that otherwise would be too faint to see,” said Roberta Pillera, a graduate student at the Polytechnic University of Bari, Italy, and member of the Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) Collaboration. “But it’s also among the most energetic and luminous bursts ever seen regardless of distance, making it doubly exciting.”

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