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May 15, 2021

Astronomers Measure the Background Brightness of the Night sky Across the World. Canary Islands are the Darkest in the Survey

Posted by in category: space

Universe Today.


Being able to look up at a clear, dark sky is becoming more and more rare in the rich world. Authors, artists, and even scientists have started to express concern about what our lack of daily exposure to a dark night time sky might mean for our psyche and our sense of place in the universe. Now a team has collected photometric data at 44 sites around the world in an attempt to quantify how dark the night sky actually is at different places on the globe. So where was the darkest place surveyed? The Canary Islands.

It just so happens that the lead researcher on the project, Dr. Miguel Alarcón is from that set of islands off the west coast of Africa. The paper he and his colleagues wrote, soon to be published in The Astronomical Journal, used a series of photometers, confusing called TESS (not to be confused with the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite) to try to get a baseline of how dark the night sky is throughout the world.

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May 15, 2021

Quantum Leap for Quantum Computing: Ion Beams Create Chains of Closely Coupled Qubits

Posted by in categories: computing, quantum physics

A new way to form self-aligned ‘color centers’ promises scalability to over 10000 qubits for applications in quantum sensing and quantum computing.

Achieving the immense promise of quantum computing requires new developments at every level, including the computing hardware itself. A Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab)-led international team of researchers has discovered a way to use ion beams to create long strings of “color center” qubits in diamond. Their work is detailed in the journal Applied Physics Letters.

The authors includes several from Berkeley Lab: Arun Persaud, who led the study, and Thomas Schenkel, head of the Accelerator Technology and Applied Physics (ATAP) Division’s Fusion Science & Ion Beam Technology Program, as well as Casey Christian (now with Berkeley Lab’s Physics Division), Edward Barnard of Berkeley Lab’s Molecular Foundry, and ATAP affiliate Russell E. Lake.

May 15, 2021

The chip shortage is driving up tech prices–starting with TVs

Posted by in categories: computing, electronics

Some high-end televisions already cost 30% more than they did last summer.

May 15, 2021

In the Search to Stall Aging, Biotech Startups Are Out for Blood

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension

A handful of companies are trying vastly different approaches to spin animal studies into the next big anti-aging therapy.

May 15, 2021

Riding bosonic qubits towards fault-tolerant quantum computation

Posted by in categories: entertainment, quantum physics

A guide to bosonic codes and error correction in a photonic platform.


Ilan Tzitrin, J. Eli Bourassa, and Krishna Kumar Sabapathy

You and two of your friends, Judit and Gary, are on a long-awaited trip in southern India. On a leg of your journey, you find yourselves on a luxurious train ride through the Deccan Plateau, about to meander through the breathtaking Western Ghats. Before the scenery captures your attention, your friends decide to entertain themselves with a game of chess, while you continue to devour Carl Sagan’s Contact.

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May 15, 2021

Freshly Made Plutonium From Outer Space Found On Ocean Floor

Posted by in category: space

Something went boom in outer space and sent radioactive stardust our way, and it’s just been found at the bottom of the ocean.

May 15, 2021

Deep-sea snailfish repairs its DNA to survive 7 km below the surface

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

To survive 7000 metres below the surface of the sea, the Yap hadal snailfish has evolved advanced mechanisms for repairing its DNA and safeguarding its proteins.

May 15, 2021

China’s Zhurong vs. NASA’s Perseverance: Rover Tech in Mars Space Race | WSJ

Posted by in category: space

The U.S. and China are locked in a fierce battle in the race for Mars. China’s Zhurong rover is circling Mars as the country attempts to land a spacecraft on the red planet for the first time, just months after NASA landed its Perseverance rover. Photos: NASA; CCTV

More from the Wall Street Journal:
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May 15, 2021

Improving touch screens with AI

Posted by in categories: mobile phones, robotics/AI

ETH Computer scientists have developed a new AI solution that enables touchscreens to sense with eight times higher resolution than current devices. Thanks to AI, their solution can infer much more precisely where fingers touch the screen.

Quickly typing a message on a smartphone sometimes results in hitting the wrong letters on the small keyboard or on other input buttons in an app. The touch that detect finger input on the have not changed much since they were first released in mobile phones in the mid-2000s.

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May 15, 2021

China’s 1st Mars rover ‘Zhurong’ lands on the Red Planet

Posted by in category: space

China just successfully landed its first rover on Mars, becoming only the second nation to do so.

The Tianwen-1 mission, China’s first interplanetary endeavor, reached the surface of the Red Planet Friday (May 14) at approximately 7:11 p.m. EDT (2311 GMT), though Chinese space officials have not yet confirmed the exact time and location of touchdown. Tianwen-1 (which translates to “Heavenly Questions”) arrived in Mars’ orbit in February after launching to the Red Planet on a Long March 5 rocket in July 2020.