Category: 7. Science

  • James Webb Space Telescope discovers evidence of a new planet

    James Webb Space Telescope discovers evidence of a new planet

    Peering deep into the heart of our Milky Way galaxy, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope reveals a rich tapestry of more than half a million stars. Scientists announced Thursday evidence of a new planet. NASA via Hubble Space Telescope

    Aug. 7 (UPI) — NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has discovered evidence of a giant planet orbiting a star in the solar system closest to Earth, the administration announced Thursday.

    The Alpha Centauri triple star system, four light-years from Earth, has long been at the center of scientists’ search for life on other planets. This discovery was an important step forward in that search, they said.

    “While there are three confirmed plants orbiting Proxima Centauri, the presence of other worlds surrounding Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B has proved challenging to confirm,” a release from NASA said.

    Alpha Centauri A, Alpha Centauri B and the faint red dwarf star Proxima Centauri comprise the bigger Alpha Centauri, which is visible in the far southern sky.

    The discovery announced Thursday provides the strongest evidence yet of a gas giant orbiting Alpha Centauri A, and has been accepted for publication by the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

    “If confirmed, the planet would be the closest to Earth that orbits the habitable zone of a Sun-like star,” the NASA release continued. “However, because the planet candidate is a gas giant, scientists say it would not support life as we know it.”

    The James Webb Space Telescope was designed to find the most distant galaxies in the universe, but the operations had to customize the device’s “observation sequence” to search for the gas giant.

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  • A formal analysis of Listeria monocytogenes cross-contamination dynamics in multi-species biofilms

    A formal analysis of Listeria monocytogenes cross-contamination dynamics in multi-species biofilms

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  • Researchers say they have identified the mysterious killer of more than 5 billion sea stars

    Researchers say they have identified the mysterious killer of more than 5 billion sea stars

    WASHINGTON (AP) — Scientists say they have at last solved the mystery of what killed more than 5 billion sea stars off the Pacific coast of North America in a decade-long epidemic.

    Sea stars – often known as starfish – typically have five arms and some species sport up to 24 arms. They range in color from solid orange to tapestries of orange, purple, brown and green.

    Starting in 2013, a mysterious sea star wasting disease sparked a mass die-off from Mexico to Alaska. The epidemic has devastated more than 20 species and continues today. Worst hit was a species called the sunflower sea star, which lost around 90% of its population in the outbreak’s first five years.

    READ MORE: After shocking die-off, Oregon sea stars stage an epic comeback

    “It’s really quite gruesome,” said marine disease ecologist Alyssa Gehman at the Hakai Institute in British Columbia, Canada, who helped pinpoint the cause.

    Healthy sea stars have “puffy arms sticking straight out,” she said. But the wasting disease causes them to grow lesions and “then their arms actually fall off.”

    The culprit? Bacteria that has also infected shellfish, according to a study published Monday in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.

    The findings “solve a long-standing question about a very serious disease in the ocean,” said Rebecca Vega Thurber, a marine microbiologist at University of California, Santa Barbara, who was not involved in the study.

    It took more than a decade for researchers to identify the cause of the disease, with many false leads and twists and turns along the way.

    Early research hinted the cause might be a virus, but it turned out the densovirus that scientists initially focused on was actually a normal resident inside healthy sea stars and not associated with disease, said Melanie Prentice of the Hakai Institute, co-author of the new study.

    Other efforts missed the real killer because researchers studied tissue samples of dead sea stars that no longer contained the bodily fluid that surrounds the organs.

    But the latest study includes detailed analysis of this fluid, called coelomic fluid, where the bacteria Vibrio pectenicida were found.

    “It’s incredibly difficult to trace the source of so many environmental diseases, especially underwater,” said microbiologist Blake Ushijima of the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, who was not involved in the research. He said the detective work by this team was “really smart and significant.”

    Now that scientists know the cause, they have a better shot at intervening to help sea stars.

    Prentice said that scientists could potentially now test which of the remaining sea stars are still healthy — and consider whether to relocate them, or breed them in captivity to later transplant them to areas that have lost almost all their sunflower sea stars.

    Scientists may also test if some populations have natural immunity, and if treatments like probiotics may help boost immunity to the disease.

    Such recovery work is not only important for sea stars, but for entire Pacific ecosystems because healthy starfish gobble up excess sea urchins, researchers say.

    Sunflower sea stars “look sort of innocent when you see them, but they eat almost everything that lives on the bottom of the ocean,” said Gehman. “They’re voracious eaters.”

    With many fewer sea stars, the sea urchins that they usually munch on exploded in population – and in turn gobbled up around 95% of the kelp forest s in Northern California within a decade. These kelp forests provide food and habitat for a wide variety of animals including fish, sea otters and seals.

    Researchers hope the new findings will allow them to restore sea star populations — and regrow the kelp forests that Thurber compares to “the rainforests of the ocean.”

    The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • Scientists Create Evolution Engine to Reprogram Proteins

    Scientists Create Evolution Engine to Reprogram Proteins

    LA JOLLA, CA—In medicine and biotechnology, the ability to evolve proteins with new or improved functions is crucial, but current methods are often slow and laborious. Now, Scripps Research scientists have developed a synthetic biology platform that accelerates evolution itself—enabling researchers to evolve proteins with useful, new properties thousands of times faster than nature. The system, named T7-ORACLE, was described in Science on August 7, 2025, and represents a breakthrough in how researchers can engineer therapeutic proteins for cancer, neurodegeneration and essentially any other disease area.

    “This is like giving evolution a fast-forward button,” says co-senior author Pete Schultz , the President and CEO of Scripps Research, where he also holds the L.S. “Sam” Skaggs Presidential Chair. “You can now evolve proteins continuously and precisely inside cells without damaging the cell’s genome or requiring labor-intensive steps.”

    Directed evolution is a laboratory process that involves introducing mutations and selecting variants with improved function over multiple cycles. It’s used to tailor proteins with desired properties, such as highly selective, high-affinity antibodies, enzymes with new specificities or catalytic properties, or to investigate the emergence of resistance mutations in drug targets. However, traditional methods often require repeated rounds of DNA manipulation and testing with each round taking a week or more. Systems for continuous evolution—where proteins evolve inside living cells without manual intervention—aim to streamline this process by enabling simultaneous mutation and selection with each round of cell division (roughly 20 minutes for bacteria). But existing approaches have been limited by technical complexity or modest mutation rates.

    T7-ORACLE circumvents these bottlenecks by engineering E. coli bacteria—a standard model organism in molecular biology—to host a second, artificial DNA replication system derived from bacteriophage T7, a virus that infects bacteria and has been widely studied for its simple, efficient replication system. T7-ORACLE enables continuous hypermutation and accelerated evolution of biomacromolecules, and is designed to be broadly applicable to many protein targets and biological challenges. Conceptually, T7-ORACLE builds on and extends efforts on existing orthogonal replication systems—meaning they operate separately from the cell’s own machinery—such as OrthoRep in Saccharomyces cerevisiae (baker’s yeast) and EcORep in E. coli. In comparison to these systems, T7-ORACLE benefits from the combination of high mutagenesis, fast growth, high transformation efficiency, and the ease with which both the E. coli host and the circular replicon plasmid can be integrated into standard molecular biology workflows.

    The T-7 ORACLE orthogonal system targets only plasmid DNA (small, circular pieces of genetic material), leaving the cell’s host genome untouched. By engineering T7 DNA polymerase (a viral enzyme that replicates DNA) to be error-prone, the researchers introduced mutations into target genes at a rate 100,000 times higher than normal without damaging the host cells.

    “This system represents a major advance in continuous evolution,” says co-senior author Christian Diercks , an assistant professor of chemistry at Scripps Research. “Instead of one round of evolution per week, you get a round each time the cell divides—so it really accelerates the process.”

    To demonstrate the power of T7-ORACLE, the research team inserted a common antibiotic resistance gene, TEM-1 β-lactamase, into the system and exposed the E. coli cells to escalating doses of various antibiotics. In less than a week, the system evolved versions of the enzyme that could resist antibiotic levels up to 5,000 times higher than the original. This proof-of-concept demonstrated not only T7-ORACLE’s speed and precision, but also its real-world relevance by replicating how resistance develops in response to antibiotics.

    “The surprising part was how closely the mutations we saw matched real-world resistance mutations found in clinical settings,” notes Diercks. “In some cases, we saw new combinations that worked even better than those you would see in a clinic.”

    But Diercks emphasizes that the study isn’t focused on antibiotic resistance per se.

    “This isn’t a paper about TEM-1 β-lactamase,” he explains. “That gene was just a well-characterized benchmark to show how the system works. What matters is that we can now evolve virtually any protein, like cancer drug targets and therapeutic enzymes, in days instead of months.”

    The broader potential of T7-ORACLE lies in its adaptability as a platform for protein engineering. Although the system is built into E. coli, the bacterium serves primarily as a vessel for continuous evolution. Scientists can insert genes from humans, viruses or other sources into plasmids, which are then introduced into E. coli cells. T7-ORACLE mutates these genes, generating variant proteins that can be screened or selected for improved function. Because E. coli is easy to grow and widely used in labs, it provides a convenient, scalable system for evolving virtually any protein of interest.

    This could help scientists more rapidly evolve antibodies to target specific cancers, evolve more effective therapeutic enzymes, and design proteases that target proteins involved in cancer and neurodegenerative disease.

    “What’s exciting is that it’s not limited to one disease or one kind of protein,” says Diercks. “Because the system is customizable, you can drop in any gene and evolve it toward whatever function you need.”

    Moreover, T7-ORACLE works with standard E. coli cultures and widely used lab workflows, avoiding the complex protocols required by other continuous evolution systems.

    “The main thing that sets this apart is how easy it is to implement,” adds Diercks. “There’s no specialized equipment or expertise required. If you already work with E. coli, you can probably use this system with minimal adjustments.”

    T7-ORACLE reflects Schultz’s broader goal: to rebuild key biological processes—such as DNA replication, RNA transcription and protein translation—so they function independently of the host cell. This separation allows scientists to reprogram these processes without disrupting normal cellular activity. By decoupling fundamental processes from the genome, tools like T7-ORACLE help advance synthetic biology.

    “In the future, we’re interested in using this system to evolve polymerases that can replicate entirely unnatural nucleic acids: synthetic molecules that resemble DNA and RNA but with novel chemical properties,” says Diercks. “That would open up possibilities in synthetic genomics that we’re just beginning to explore.”

    Currently, the research team is focused on evolving human-derived enzymes for therapeutic use, and on tailoring proteases to recognize specific cancer-related protein sequences.

    “The T7-ORACLE approach merges the best of both worlds,” says Schultz. “We can now combine rational protein design with continuous evolution to discover functional molecules more efficiently than ever.”

    In addition to Diercks and Schultz, authors of the study, ” An orthogonal T7 replisome for continuous hypermutation and accelerated evolution in E. coli ,” are Philipp Sondermann, Cynthia Rong, Thomas G. Gillis, Yahui Ban, Celine Wang and David A. Dik of Scripps Research.

    This work was supported by funding from the National Institutes of Health (grant RGM145323A).

    About Scripps Research

    Scripps Research is an independent, nonprofit biomedical research institute ranked one of the most influential in the world for its impact on innovation by Nature Index. We are advancing human health through profound discoveries that address pressing medical concerns around the globe. Our drug discovery and development division, Calibr-Skaggs, works hand-in-hand with scientists across disciplines to bring new medicines to patients as quickly and efficiently as possible, while teams at Scripps Research Translational Institute harness genomics, digital medicine and cutting-edge informatics to understand individual health and render more effective healthcare. Scripps Research also trains the next generation of leading scientists at our Skaggs Graduate School, consistently named among the top 10 US programs for chemistry and biological sciences. Learn more at www.scripps.edu .

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  • Mosasaur, Ghost-Maker Megaripples and the Age of Mammals

    Mosasaur, Ghost-Maker Megaripples and the Age of Mammals

    Newswise — DALLAS (SMU) – Millions of years before jazz filled New Orleans streets or fishing boats were harvesting shrimp in the Gulf, Louisiana was home to terrifying sea monsters, a tenacious mammal and a seismic cataclysm that reshaped life on Earth.

    With fossils and seismic images, a team led by SMU paleontology researchers has chronicled the history of Louisiana in the interval leading up to, during and soon after the dinosaur-killing asteroid hit Earth roughly 66 million years ago. 

    Fossils found show evidence of a thriving marine ecosystem during the last stages of the Late Cretaceous, abruptly terminated by the Chicxulub asteroid strike. Also presented is the serendipitous recovery of a mammal skull from an oil well core, providing a striking bookend to the extinction event and heralding the early phases of the Age of Mammals. And using seismic images, researchers in Louisiana have discovered massive “ghost-maker megaripples” buried underground ​​— likely the largest ever found ​— formed by the powerful tsunami triggered by the asteroid impact.

    The findings were published in LSU Museum of Natural Science’s “Vertebrate Fossils of Louisiana” in a tribute to the late paleontologist Judith A. Schiebout. 

    Michael J. Polcyn, research associate in the Huffington Department of Earth Sciences and senior research fellow, ISEM at SMU, led the research team. 

    Louisiana’s lost sea monsters

    About 66 million years ago, Louisiana was submerged under a warm, shallow Gulf. The dominant hunters in this aquatic environment were mosasaurs ​— massive marine reptiles that could reach lengths of nearly 50 feet. With powerful jaws and serpentine bodies, these “sea lizards” ruled the marine ecosystem, much like orcas today.

    While the longest continuous fossil record of mosasaurs in the U.S. come from Texas, Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee, few have turned up in Louisiana ​— namely in Bienville Parish, where salt domes have pushed Cretaceous-aged rock to the surface. These rare finds include a mosasaur tooth, likely from the genus Prognathodon, SMU researchers and others found. 

    “Louisiana is not known for having a great fossil record,” said SMU paleontologist Louis L. Jacobs, who was part of the research team. “But when you put it all together, it has a pretty interesting and valuable fossil record.”

    Polcyn added, “The contribution of this work reports the first Cretaceous marine reptile fossils known from Louisiana, putting them in a broader geographic and temporal context in the Gulf region.”  

    The same genus discovered in Angola by researchers led by Jacobs and Polcyn shows these marine reptiles flourished in the ecosystems across both Louisiana and the newly formed South Atlantic Ocean basin.

    Many Angolan fossils were displayed in the Smithsonian Museum’s “Sea Monsters Unearthed: Life in the Angola’s Ancient Seas” exhibit, co-produced with SMU. That exhibit is now being prepared to travel to other cities. 

    Then came the asteroid

    The reign of the mosasaurs – and countless other species – ended abruptly when a 6-mile-wide asteroid struck the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico, triggering the fifth mass extinction in Earth’s history. The impact of the Chicxulub asteroid unleashed fireballs, tsunamis, and earthquakes worldwide. 

    In Louisiana, evidence of this chaos remains hidden underground. Seismic imaging recently discovered massive underwater ripples known as “ghost-maker megaripples” that reach 16 meters (over 52 feet) high and are over a half a kilometer apart, formed by the post-impact tsunami.

    “The seismic image showing the megaripples on the ancient sea floor is a wonderful illustration of the tremendous amount of energy introduced into the area by the impact tsunami in a very short period of time,” Polcyn said.

    The megaripples, found by co-researcher Gary L. Kinsland and his team, are likely the largest ones ever found, researchers said. Kinsland is a coastal land loss and Louisiana geology expert at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.   

    Prehistoric mammals emerge

    When the dust settled and the Cretaceous Period ended, mammals stepped into the spotlight. From an oil well in Louisiana at about 2,460 feet, a single Paleocene mammal fossil – Anisonchus fortunatus – was recovered.  

    It may not be a dramatic skeleton or towering beast. But researchers said this tiny fossil of a primitive hoofed animal from 63 to 62 million years ago represents a turning point in Earth’s history: the impressive rise of mammals after the dinosaurs’ downfall.

    Polcyn said their findings go beyond promoting Louisiana paleontology, a lifelong goal of Schiebout.   

    “The story we tell of the end of the Cretaceous Period, the asteroid impact and the resulting reorganization of ecosystems are global in nature and provides a reference for anyone interested in that interval of Earth history,” he said. 

    SMU is the nationally ranked global research university in the dynamic city of Dallas. SMU’s alumni, faculty and more than 12,000 students in eight degree-granting schools demonstrate an entrepreneurial spirit as they lead change in their professions, communities and the world.

     


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  • Hubble Captures Most Detailed Images Yet of Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS

    Hubble Captures Most Detailed Images Yet of Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS

    According to an analysis of the new images from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, the nucleus of 3I/ATLAS is between 320 m (1,000 feet) and 5.6 km (3.5 miles) across.

    Hubble captured this image of 3I/ATLAS on July 21, 2025, when the comet was 446 million km (277 million miles) from Earth. Image credit: NASA / ESA / David Jewitt, UCLA / Joseph DePasquale, STScI.

    3I/ATLAS was discovered by the NASA-funded Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) on July 1, 2025.

    Its orbit is the most dynamically extreme of any object yet recorded in the Solar System.

    The new Hubble observations allowed astronomers to more accurately estimate the size of the comet’s solid, icy nucleus.

    “The upper limit on the diameter of the nucleus is 5.6 km, though it could be as small as 320 m across,” University of California, Los Angeles astronomer David Jewitt and his colleagues said in a statement.

    “Though the Hubble images put tighter constraints on the size of the nucleus compared to previous ground-based estimates, the solid heart of the comet presently cannot be directly seen, even by Hubble.”

    “Observations from other NASA missions including Webb, TESS, and the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, as well as W.M. Keck Observatory, will help further refine our knowledge about the comet, including its chemical makeup.”

    Hubble also captured a dust plume ejected from the Sun-warmed side of the comet, and the hint of a dust tail streaming away from the nucleus.

    The new data yield a dust-loss rate consistent with comets that are first detected around 480 million km (300 million miles) from the Sun.

    This behavior is much like the signature of previously seen Sun-bound comets originating within our Solar System.

    The big difference is that this interstellar visitor originated in a planetary system elsewhere in our Milky Way Galaxy.

    3I/ATLAS is traveling through our Solar System at a staggering 209,000 km (130,000 miles) per hour, the highest velocity ever recorded for a solar system visitor.

    This breathtaking sprint is evidence that the comet has been drifting through interstellar space for many billions of years.

    The gravitational slingshot effect from innumerable stars and nebulae the comet passed added momentum, ratcheting up its speed.

    The longer 3I/ATLAS was out in space, the higher its speed grew.

    “No one knows where the comet came from. It’s like glimpsing a rifle bullet for a thousandth of a second,” Dr. Jewitt said.

    “You can’t project that back with any accuracy to figure out where it started on its path.”

    “This latest interstellar tourist is one of a previously undetected population of objects bursting onto the scene that will gradually emerge.”

    “This is now possible because we have powerful sky survey capabilities that we didn’t have before. We’ve crossed a threshold.”

    The team’s paper will be published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

    _____

    David Jewitt et al. 2025. Hubble Space Telescope Observations of the Interstellar Interloper 3I/ATLAS. ApJL, in press; arXiv: 2508.02934

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  • Perseverance Takes a new Panoramic Image of Mars on a Clear Day

    Perseverance Takes a new Panoramic Image of Mars on a Clear Day

    On May 26th, 2025, the skies were clear on Mars above the Jezero Crater, where the Perseverance rover is exploring the planet’s past. The rover’s imaging team took advantage of these conditions to capture the 360-degree panoramic photo shown above, which was stitched together from 96 images taken by the rover’s Mastcam-Z camera. The photo shows a location called “Falbreen,” which shows the rover’s tracks (right side) reaching into the far distance towards its previous stop – a rock outcropping named “Kenmore.” Also visible are rocks and a sand ripple strewn with hills in the distance that are up to 65 km (40 mi) away.

    The enhanced-color version (shown below) shows how clear the Martian sky was when the images were taken, though the true-color version shows the actual color of the atmosphere (red, no blue). “The relatively dust-free skies provide a clear view of the surrounding terrain,” said Jim Bell, Mastcam-Z’s principal investigator at Arizona State University. “And in this particular mosaic, we have enhanced the color contrast, which accentuates the differences in the terrain and sky.”

    About 4.5 meters (14 feet) away, a large black rock sits on top of a dark, crescent-shaped sand ripple to the right of the rover. Geologists call this type of rock a “float rock” because it likely formed somewhere else and was deposited to its current location, possibly via a landslide, water, wind, or erosion. Regardless, the science team believes it reached its current position before the sand ripple formed, which was likely deposited by wind around it. The bright white circle visible just to the left of the center and near the bottom is an abrasion patch measuring 5 cm (2 inches) wide left by the rover’s drill.

    Captured at a location called “Falbreen,” this enhanced-color mosaic features deceptively blue skies and the 43rd rock abrasion (the white patch at center-left) of the NASA Perseverance rover’s mission at Mars. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS

    This was the 43rd rock abraded by Perseverance since it landed on Mars, which was performed on May 22nd. This process allows the science team to analyze material just below the wind-swept surface of Mars, which is followed by core sample drilling. These samples are then stowed in titanium tubes and left on the surface for future retrieval by astronaut crews or a sample-return mission. The science team is studying the Falbreen site because it is located within terrain that may predate the Jezero Crater itself, potentially making it the oldest terrain Perseverance has ever explored.

    Across the entire panorama, roughly halfway in the distance, is the boundary line (contact) between two geologic units, indicated by the transition between lighter-toned and darker-toned rocks. The near, light-colored rocks are rich in olivine, a major component in Earth’s upper mantle, while the more distant, darker rocks are believed to be much older clay-bearing rocks. Said Sean Duffy, acting NASA administrator:

    Our bold push for human space exploration will send astronauts back to the Moon. Stunning vistas like that of Falbreen, captured by our Perseverance rover, are just a glimpse of what we’ll soon witness with our own eyes. NASA’s groundbreaking missions, starting with Artemis, will propel our unstoppable journey to take human space exploration to the Martian surface. NASA is continuing to get bolder and stronger.

    Further Reading: NASA

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  • The biggest black hole ever seen? Scientists find one with mass of 36 billion suns

    The biggest black hole ever seen? Scientists find one with mass of 36 billion suns

    About 5 billion light-years away from where you’re sitting, in one of the most massive galaxies on record, there exists an astonishing black hole. It was only just measured by scientists who managed to peer through the fabric of warped space-time — and it appears to hold a mass equivalent to that of 36 billion suns.

    Yes, billion.

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  • 3D image reveals atomic dance moments before molecule explosion

    3D image reveals atomic dance moments before molecule explosion

    Atoms never stay still. Even in their lowest energy state, they vibrate due to quantum effects.

    Now, for the first time, scientists have directly observed this jittery movement in a complex molecule—just moments before it exploded into fragments under a powerful X-ray beam.

    At the European XFEL near Hamburg, researchers used high-intensity, ultrashort X-ray pulses to hit a molecule called 2-iodopyridine.

    The energy stripped away electrons and transformed the molecule into a highly charged system that immediately repelled itself and shattered.

    By tracking the ejected fragments, the scientists were able to reconstruct the shape and internal movement of the molecule at the exact instant of breakup.

    Zero-point motion mapped in 3D

    “The molecule is not rigid, but in constant motion due to quantum fluctuations,” said Markus Ilchen, a lead author of the study. “We were able to image this motion by blowing the molecule apart and analysing the fragments’ directions.”

    To do this, the researchers used a reaction microscope known as COLTRIMS, which can track charged particles at femtosecond timescales—one quadrillionth of a second.

    The device records multiple fragments simultaneously and helps generate a full three-dimensional map of the molecular structure right before disintegration.

    The team noticed that the fragments did not fly apart in directions that matched the expected flat geometry of the molecule. Instead, they showed signs of subtle distortion—signs of movement frozen in time.

    Rebecca Boll at the COLTRIMS (REMI) reaction microscope of SQS instrument of European XFEL, where the experiment was carried out. Credit-European XFEL.

    “We are looking at the quantum zero-point motion, which is always present even at absolute zero temperature,” said Till Jahnke, senior scientist at European XFEL. “It is the smallest possible motion a system can have.”

    This movement was not random. It showed a coordinated trembling of atoms—typical of coherent quantum motion rather than thermal vibrations. “This motion is not random but coordinated, which is characteristic of quantum mechanics,” said Stefan Pabst from DESY, who led the theoretical modeling for the experiment.

    Classical models fall short

    To verify what they saw, the researchers compared their results with computer simulations.

    Classical physics alone could not reproduce the observations. Only when quantum effects were included did the models align with the experimental data.

    Because not all fragments could be measured in each event, the team relied on a statistical method that allowed them to reconstruct the full molecular geometry and motion from partial data.

    This technique made it possible to capture a complete and accurate picture of what was happening inside the molecule at the moment of breakup.

    “This is a major breakthrough in molecular imaging,” said Arnaud Rouzée from the Max Born Institute. “We can now observe quantum motion in complex molecules in real time.”

    The experiment helps deepen the understanding of how matter behaves at quantum scales and could inform future research in chemistry, physics, and quantum modeling.

    “Quantum mechanics governs the fundamental behavior of matter,” said Pabst. “Seeing its fingerprints in such a direct way is both exciting and essential for advancing science.”

    The findings of the study appear in the journal Science.

    FAQs:

    1. What is the European XFEL?
    It’s a powerful X-ray laser facility in Germany that helps scientists capture atomic-level details of molecules.

    2. What are X-ray free-electron lasers used for?
    X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs) allow scientists to see extremely fast processes, like chemical reactions or viral infections, at atomic scales.

    3. Can scientists really film molecules in motion?
    Yes. Using ultrafast X-ray pulses, researchers can create “movies” showing how molecules behave during reactions.

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  • Research Links Online Language to Self-Harm Risk

    Research Links Online Language to Self-Harm Risk

    Signs that an individual might be on the verge of self-harm are often found in their online actions, but can word choices in posts indicate who is at particular risk and when?

    A new study published July 8 in the Nature journal npj Mental Health Research provides insights into the discussion and course of self-harm online. Led by Dr. Ryan L. Boyd , assistant professor of psychology in the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences at The University of Texas at Dallas, and Dr. Charlotte Entwistle of the University of Liverpool, the research demonstrates that online support community posts indicating decreased social connectedness and heightened negative emotions can predict self-harm behaviors, like suicidal thoughts and self-injurious behavior, weeks before their occurrence.

    The results also highlight how these communities might unintentionally reinforce harmful patterns of thinking and behavior through social media engagement with “likes” or “upvotes.”

    “Our research highlights not only early linguistic predictors of self-harm, but also how online interactions may unintentionally reinforce harmful thoughts and behaviors,” said Boyd, the senior author of the paper. “This has profound implications for community-driven mental health interventions and highlights the need for thoughtful moderation of online support communities.”

    Entwistle, the corresponding author of the study, said the researchers set out to understand the dynamics surrounding self-harm in natural online settings, including how personality, emotions and social factors interact with self-harm behaviors.

    Using a form of artificial intelligence called natural language processing, in which computers analyze and interpret human language, the researchers analyzed more than 66,000 posts by nearly 1,000 Reddit users who self-identified as being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD).

    “One of the main reasons we focus on BPD is that it’s very strongly associated with self-harm and suicidality,” Entwistle said. “Sometimes self-harm behavior is even used among the criteria for a BPD diagnosis. It’s an extremely high-risk community with alarmingly high suicide rates.”

    Boyd described the work as a rare combination of theory, computational language analysis and social feedback.

    “While there has been work in each of these domains, nothing I’m aware of has put it together in this way to look at self-harm in the population with BPD,” he said.

    Distinctive Focus

    Entwistle said the new study differs from other studies in that it focuses on both nonsuicidal self-injury and suicidality simultaneously, specifically in those with BPD.

    “We’ve looked at patterns and changes that led up to and followed self-harm events, whereas most previous work aimed to predict suicidality or suicidal ideation without examining the weeks that follow,” she said.

    In Reddit’s BPD communities, users share experiences and seek connections and support just like people in forums for other health conditions, such as insomnia or hearing loss. Users are encouraged to upvote posts they agree with or find valuable or relevant to the conversation. The researchers noted that, in the BPD forums, more negative, hostile and extreme posts attract the most community engagement and favorable responses.

    “Posts about suicide were upvoted more than average,” Entwistle said. “Posts that contained more negative emotions — using words that indicated anger, sadness and anxiety — were upvoted more as well, as were posts with swear words.”

    Boyd said the online behavior reflects the traditional view that humans are wired for social connection and interaction and find it rewarding.

    “Getting more social interaction around topics of harm can reinforce users focusing on harmful behaviors,” he said. “There’s something of a social contagion effect. If you see other people talking about self-harm and getting more engagement than you, it might — without intending to do so — lead you to focus more on self-harm in order to get the same compassion and care from the community.”

    Negative Language and Higher Risk

    The researchers also found that posters who used hostile and negative emotive language were more at risk for imminent self-harm. The question remains as to whether the dynamic of rewarding negative posts constitutes reinforcement of negative behaviors and if it is specific to BPD communities.

    “A similar study examining suicidality in a more general population Reddit sample came to the opposite conclusions. That community was in fact unsupportive of negative and hostile posts,” Entwistle said. “Although this effect may be specific to the BPD communities in our research, the consequences warrant further attention on possible negative effects of informal online support communities more broadly.”

    Boyd said that while online communities can have immensely positive effects in giving a person access to people around the world who are dealing with similar problems, they are not without risk.

    “Members of these communities have to be mindful about where, and how, they’re stepping in, because it’s possible to provide support in a way that might not be as helpful as we’re intending,” he said. “One can contribute to a downward spiral by engaging. I think that there’s a larger conversation to be had in these communities about what types of things need to be supported and in what ways.”

    Boyd emphasized, though, that members of these communities aren’t doing anything wrong per se.

    “Helping others who are struggling with harmful thoughts and behaviors can be incredibly validating and valuable,” he said. “However, what our findings do suggest is that — as members of support communities — we may need to rethink how social media frames engagement. The ways that we interact online, especially around distressing content, might be unintentionally causing harm.”

    Entwistle said that the study also has implications for clinical practice by revealing emotional and social problems as the main triggers of suicidal thoughts and self-harm behaviors.

    “Our findings have identified several important precursors to self-harm in high-risk individuals, which therefore highlight the most critical areas to target through clinical intervention,” she said. “Our study has uncovered key linguistic predictors of self-harm, laying the groundwork for more advanced predictive models that could aid in early intervention.”

    Other authors of the paper included researchers from Lancaster University in England and The University of Kansas. The research was supported in part by grants from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism ( R01 AA028032 ) and the National Institute of Mental Health ( R01 MH125702 ), both components of the National Institutes of Health. The content of this document is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the funding agencies listed.

    /Public Release. This material from the originating organization/author(s) might be of the point-in-time nature, and edited for clarity, style and length. Mirage.News does not take institutional positions or sides, and all views, positions, and conclusions expressed herein are solely those of the author(s).View in full here.

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