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A fruit fly genome is not a just made up of fruit fly DNA—at least for one fruit fly species. New research from the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s (UMSOM) Institute for Genome Sciences (IGS) shows that one fruit fly species contains whole genomes of a kind of bacteria, making this finding the largest bacteria-to-animal transfer of genetic material ever discovered. The new research also sheds light on how this happens.

The IGS researchers, led by Julie Dunning Hotopp, Ph.D., Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at UMSOM and IGS, used new genetic long-read sequencing technology to show how genes from the bacteria Wolbachia incorporated themselves into the fly genome up to 8,000 years ago.

The researchers say their findings show that unlike Darwin’s finches or Mendel’s peas, isn’t always small, incremental, and predictable.

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Motors are ubiquitous in our everyday lives — from cars to washing machines, even if we rarely notice them. A futuristic scientific field is working on the development tiny motors that could power a network of nanomachines and replace some of the power sources we currently use in electronic devices.

Researchers from the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin created the first ever solid-state optical nanomotor. All previous iterations of these light-driven motors reside in a solution of some sort, which limited their potential for the majority of real-world applications. This new research was published recently in the journal ACS Nano.

“Life started in the water and eventually moved on land,” said Yuebing Zheng, an associate professor in the Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering. “We’ve made these micro nanomotors that have always lived in solution work on land, in a solid state.”

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Once upon a time, the only world known to have an ocean of water was Earth. Now, planetary scientists think there are many ocean worlds – albeit with their oceans covered by deep layers of ice, rather than hanging out on the surface like ours.

Top on the list is Jupiter’s moon Europa, believed to have a 100-kilometre-deep ocean beneath perhaps 10–30 km of ice. But Saturn’s moons Enceladus, Titan, and Dione are also thought to have oceans, as is Pluto.

And those may just be the tip of the iceberg. Other moons in the outer solar system are also believed or suspected to have frozen-over oceans. Still more aren’t well studied enough for scientists to be sure, but could be capable of hosting water.

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The vehicles we’ll see on the roads in a decade’s time will be radically different from what we have at present. Design language will change a lot, as hinted by the concepts and prototypes put together by big names and budding automotive designers.

The focus definitely will be on personal mobility in the most sustainable manner possible. Compact vehicles that will trade off the greatest of luxuries for a more sensible method of commuting will be the norm. This boomerang-shaped two-seater vehicle with multiple use-case scenarios is different from what we’ve seen so far. Even in the automotive landscape dominated by some really bizarre vehicle concepts.

Designer: Artem Smirnov

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You’ve likely heard the story by now: As the Sun grows old, it will swell up into a red giant. And as it expands, it will certainly swallow Mercury and Venus — and potentially Earth and even Mars — along the way.

This process, called planetary engulfment, is likely common across the galaxy, as aging stars eat up their own planets (and even companion stars or brown dwarfs). But astronomers still don’t understand exactly what happens to an unlucky planet that suddenly finds itself inside its parent star. Now, complex models called hydrodynamical simulations are shedding some light on the phenomenon, showing that factors such as a planet’s mass and the age of its star when it’s engulfed can have profound effects on what happens as the world is overtaken.

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The biggest geomagnetic storm in recorded history happened more than 150 years ago. Now, we’re entering yet another period of solar maximum.

It was just another September night in 1,859 when Richard Carrington and Richard Hodgson witnessed a remarkable event. The British astronomers weren’t together, but both happened to be peering at the Sun through telescopes at the precise moment that a massive ejection spewed from the fiery star. Within a few days, others on Earth noticed colorful aurora streaking across the skies and telegraph lines — the advanced technology of the day in Europe and North America — erupting in sparks.

The solar flare came to be known as the Carrington Event, named after one of the two astronomers who first described it. Despite occurring more than 150 years ago, it still stands as the strongest known geomagnetic storm (though we lack measurements to say precisely how big it was).

Earth has felt the effects of a few significant geomagnetic storms since then, all of which caused power blackouts and satellite damage. As a result, power companies and satellite manufacturers have built resistance into our technology. But what would happen if another Carrington Event-level solar flare occurred today? Would we be ready for it?

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