Category: 7. Science

Why not try your luck in late August and try to spot a rare Aurigid shooting star as the shower comes to a peak later this weekend?

The Aurigid meteor shower takes place each year as Earth travels through the tenuous debris trail shed by the long-period comet C/1911 N1 Kiess, which is thought to have last travelled through the inner solar system some 2,000 years ago.

All (or at least most) astronomical eyes are on 3I/ATLAS, our most recent interstellar visitor that was discovered in early July. Given its relatively short observational window in our solar system, and especially its impending perihelion in October, a lot of observational power has been directed towards it. That includes the most powerful space telescope of them all – and a recent paper pre-printed on arXiv describes what the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) discovered in the comet’s coma. It wasn’t like any other it had seen before.

3I/ATLAS’s coma, which is the material surrounding its nucleus, is primarily made up of carbon dioxide (CO2), according to the paper first authored by Martin Cordiner of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and the Catholic University of America. It also contains water, carbon monoxide and carbonyl sulfide, all of which are expected to be in a comet’s coma. But the ratio of carbon dioxide to water is 8 to 1, the highest ever seen in a comet, and six standard deviations above the typical value. Strangely, the carbon monoxide (CO) ratio with water is more in line with previous observations, at 1.4.

To detect these chemicals, JWST used its NIRSpec infrared camera to observe 3I/ATLAS on August 6th, when it was 3.32 AU from the Sun. Other indications, which weren’t quite as surprising, include that the coma does have a bunch of water and dust scattered around it, as well as a higher dust concentration facing the Sun, which is typically for higher outgassing on the side the Sun heats.

NASA Explains what we know about 3I/ATLAS so far.

Another finding was that the ratio of two types of carbon isotopes, Carbon-12 and Carbon-13, was broadly similar to that found on Earth, suggesting the material was created in an environment with similar carbon species. However, there are a couple of features of 3I/ATLAS’s creation that could have caused the lopsided CO2/H2O ratio.

One is extremely high levels of ultraviolet radiation in the host star system the object was created it. Another could be that is was created beyond the CO2 “ice line”, where carbon dioxide ice is relatively abundant compared to water. Other explanations have to do with how heat from the Sun is able to affect the nucleus – if it is harder to heat up, then CO2, which has a lower melting point than water, would be sublimated first, accounting for the lopsided ratio despite having plenty of water stored in the nucleus waiting to be released as it gets closer to the Sun.

Either way, more observations are needed. This is only the third interstellar visitor we have confirmed, and the first (‘Oumuamua) wasn’t bright enough to capture its coma’s spectra, though even if it was it didn’t appear to have a coma anyway. That leaves the second interstellar visitor 2I/Borisov, as our only other point of comparison for the coma spectra of an interstellar comet. It actually had a higher carbon monoxide to water ratio, even as compared to 3I/ATLAS’s, so it seems of the two we have collected so far, each interstellar visitor’s coma hide new insights.

Fraser discusses how 3I/ATLAS is actively releasing water.

This undoubtedly won’t be the last paper examining 3I/ATLAS’s coma – it probably won’t even be the last one from JWST. We still have a few weeks of observational time before it passes too close to the Sun to be detectable, and then reaches its perihelion in early October, which it is still obscured from our view, though there is a chance some probes at Mars might be able to catch a glimpse of it during that time. When it finally becomes visible again in December, it will already be on its way out of our solar system, and likely would have shed most of the material it was going to. Sometimes astronomical events are fleetings, and astronomers have to try to capture them as they’re happening. At least with this one they’ll have a little bit of warning – we’ll see what they find as they continue to observe our newest interstellar visitor.

Learn More:

M. A. Cordiner et al – JWST detection of a carbon dioxide dominated gas coma surrounding interstellar object 3I/ATLAS

UT – 3I/ATLAS Is Very Actively Releasing Water

UT – Hubble Captures Stunning View of Third Interstellar Visitor

UT – Gemini North Sees Brightening Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS in Detail

The story of how horses became calm enough to carry people is written in their DNA. A new study tracked ancient horse genomes across thousands of years and connected specific genetic changes to behavior and body shape.

The work shows that early breeders first favored temperament, then selected for bodies that could handle speed, weight, and long travel.

The research also pinpoints one region in the genome that appears to have tipped the balance toward rideability.

Horses changed human life

Xuexue Liu led the project at the Institute of Animal Science, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS), working with collaborators in France and Switzerland.

Horses reshaped how people moved, traded, and fought. Archaeology and genetics place the successful spread of modern domestic horses in the Western Eurasian steppes a little over 4,000 years ago.

A 2021 study linked the rise of horse domestication to new ways of moving across land using chariots and horseback.

Before engines, horses were the fastest way to move people and goods. They also pulled plows and carried messages over long distances, which pushed cultures into closer contact.

Those changes relied on animals that would accept a rider and keep pace without breaking down. The new genetic timeline helps explain how that happened step by step.

Scanning horse DNA

The researchers built a time series of horse DNA and scanned 266 trait linked markers tied to behavior and body conformation. They watched how those markers rose or fell in frequency as humans started managing horse breeding.

They found clear signals that early selection focused on behavior. That pattern fits the simple idea that a trainable, steady animal is easier to handle before people attempt fast travel or combat.

The team also defined several key terms that matter for reading the data. Ancient DNA refers to genetic material recovered from archaeological remains, and a genome is the full set of genetic instructions in an organism.

A genetic locus is a specific location on a chromosome, and an allele is a version of a gene at that location. When an allele becomes more common because it helps survival or success under human choice, that rise is called positive selection.

Gene linked to rideability

One region named GSDMC stood out as the strongest candidate for rideability. The team reports that selection at this locus started about 4,750 years ago, with the period known as a domestication bottleneck marking a sharp shift in breeding.

By about 4,150 years ago, variants in GSDMC had become very common in managed horse populations. The study links GSDMC genotypes to skeletal conformation in horses and to spinal anatomy, motor coordination, and muscular strength in mice.

Those traits align with the demands of carrying a human across uneven ground for many miles. A stiffer, stronger back, coordinated movement, and adequate muscle power would all contribute to a safe, steady ride.

The authors argue that selection on existing variation, not a brand new mutation popping up out of nowhere, likely fueled the rapid rise. That interpretation matches how breeders often work, choosing among the animals already in their herds.

Calm horses chosen first

The scan also flagged ZFPM1, a gene known to modulate behavior in mice, as showing positive selection roughly 5,000 years ago.

The timing hints that calm temperament and tractability came before the body tweaks that made sustained riding possible.

Taming an animal that is large, fast, and easily spooked would be the first hurdle. Once that gate is opened, people can begin to select for efficient movement and strength under load.

Bronze to Iron Age changes

The data suggest a shift in emphasis after the earliest phase of domestication. From the Iron Age onward, breeding leaned harder into larger body size and greater tameness to meet the demands of transport and warfare.

That pattern mirrors the archaeological record that shows more widespread cavalry and heavier equipment later in time. Stronger, bigger horses would be better suited for those roles.

Horse DNA shows change

Time series genetics works because DNA from different ages acts like snapshots, and many snapshots form a timeline.

With enough samples, researchers can watch allele frequencies move, which tells a story about selection pressure over centuries.

The team cross-referenced genetic markers for behavior and body plan with known timelines for human mobility. That combination helps separate changes driven by people from natural drift, and it points to windows when breeding priorities changed.

Why horse DNA gene matters

GSDMC is a plausible hub because it influences how the spine and muscles develop and function. A back that holds form under a rider without undue flexion would reduce pain and injury risk for the animal.

Coupled with better coordination and strength, the same horses could cross long distances at sustained paces. That capacity would give groups who bred and used them a real advantage in moving, trading, and waging war.

Many questions remain

The exact group or culture that first pushed rideability to center stage remains uncertain. The genetic clock narrows the window, yet it does not name the horse herders who made those early choices.

Future work could refine which specific variants in GSDMC matter most and test how they affect motion in living horses.

Ethical breeding today also has to balance performance with welfare, since back health is central to a horse’s quality of life.

The study is published in the journal Science.

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Evolution does not only respond to rivals, predators, or mates that bump into each other. It can also respond and evolve when ripples move through the environment and reach species that never cross paths, as shown in a new study.

Researchers tracked a simple question with big consequences: Could one species change the evolution of another without ever meeting it face to face?

The team studied indirect ecological effects, where one species influences another through a third species or by altering the environment rather than through direct contact. These effects can even cross habitat boundaries – as when land insects shape aquatic grazers – and, unlike obvious interactions such as predation or competition, they often go unnoticed.

The study was led by Shuqing Xu at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and follows a long tradition of testing evolution in near-natural settings rather than only in small lab containers.

Experimental ponds track evolution

The researchers set up large outdoor mesocosms, which are controlled experimental ponds that mimic nature while allowing careful measurements. These systems were large enough to include many natural processes but controlled enough for clear tests.

Each pond held about 4,000 gallons of water, plus aquatic plants, algae, and the tiny crustacean Daphnia. The researchers added aphids that feed on duckweed to some ponds and kept other ponds as controls without aphids.

That created two worlds that never connected directly, since the aphids lived on floating macrophytes (larger aquatic plants like duckweed) while zooplankton and Daphnia (small drifting animals) as well as phytoplankton (microscopic algae) swam below.

“We showed that land-based aphids influenced the evolution of Daphnia, a tiny aquatic crustacean, even though the two species never come into contact,” said Xu.

The researchers carefully tracked environmental change and genetic change at the same time. The ponds allowed the team to connect cause to effect without guessing.

Nutrients and heat shift

When aphids heavily consumed duckweed, the floating plant thinned out. With less cover, more light penetrated the water, and pond phytoplankton flourished – providing extra food for Daphnia.

The result was a sustained increase in Daphnia numbers in aphid ponds compared to controls, along with measurable shifts in nutrients and water temperature.

For example, there was a roughly 71.5 percent jump in total phosphorus, plus higher underwater light and a small temperature rise.

Species evolve under pressure

Evolution leaves fingerprints in DNA. Whole genome sequencing showed that Daphnia in aphid ponds and Daphnia in control ponds diverged at many genomic sites, and the fraction of significantly different SNPs grew from one year to the next.

Population divergence increased across the experiment, and the team identified more than one hundred variants with strong treatment differences.

These genome-wide signals track with well-known resistance loci in Daphnia and support adaptive change in response to the altered environment.

Adaptation came with a cost

Transplant tests provided the decisive check on whether the observed genetic change was beneficial or just random drift.

Daphnia that evolved in aphid ponds performed better back in aphid ponds than in control ponds.

There was a trade-off: the same aphid-pond lineages performed worse when moved into control conditions, a classic cost of specialization that often follows rapid adaptation.

Species shifts spark ripples

The quality of algal food matters as much as the quantity. Some cyanobacteria provide poor nutrition – or are even harmful – for Daphnia, and their abundance shifted during the experiment.

Independent studies explain why this matters: cyanobacteria are difficult for Daphnia to process and lack the key lipids the crustaceans need.

These changes in the water column did not stop with Daphnia. They rippled outward, altering duckweed and boosting the growth of aphids, which thrived in ponds shaped by earlier herbivory.

Such two-step echoes match ecological theory and show how evolutionary shifts in one part of an ecosystem can reverberate through others without direct contact.

Species evolve across communities

Ecologists have long suspected that networks of interaction, not just pairwise encounters, shape evolution.

Past research shows that even species that do not interact directly can drive traits to evolve across mutualistic networks.

Experiments with guppies offered early proof that adaptation changes whole ecosystems, not only the fish themselves – locally adapted fish altered nutrient cycling, algae, and other organisms around them.

Daphnia add another layer to this picture. Far from being slow, they can respond to environmental change within just a few generations, and their genetic shifts ripple through communities.

Modern genomics reveal how quickly Daphnia adapt to strong pressures, confirming that rapid evolution is not rare noise but a common feature of freshwater systems.

The study is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story:

• Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity, an immensely important update to Newton’s Law of Universal Gravitation, is currently our best approximation of how the universe ticks.

• But there are some holes in Einstein’s theory, including some gravitational weirdness around low acceleration “wide binary” stars.

• A study claims that the behavior of these slow-moving celestial objects can’t be explained by a Newton-Einstein theory, which relies on dark matter, but could be explained with an idea known as Modified Newtonian Dynamics, or MOND.

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In 1687, English physicist Isaac Newton published his famous Law of Universal Gravitation. The idea that all objects attract in proportion to their mass was a revolutionary idea that became a huge boon for understanding the ways of the universe. But even Newton’s influential work had its limitations—specifically, it couldn’t explain gravitational phenomena such as black holes and gravitational waves.

Thankfully, Albert Einstein came around in the early 20th century to help patch things up a bit with his Theory of General Relativity.

But space is a big place, and even Einsteins sometimes meet their limit. One of the most well-known of these limits is a black hole’s center, or singularity, where Einstein’s famous theory appears to break down completely. Now, a study from scientists at South Korea’s Sejong University suggests that another limit to Newton and Einstein’s conception of gravity can be found in the orbital motions of long-period, widely separated, binary stars—also known simply as “wide binaries.” The results of this study were published this month in The Astrophysical Journal.

After analyzing 26,500 wide binaries within 650 lightyears captured by the European Space Agency’s Gaia space observatory, co-author Kyu-Hyun Chae discovered something strange—when these celestial objects achieved extremely low orbital accelerations around 0.1 nanometers per second squared, the observed accelerations were nearly 30 to 40 percent higher than Newton-Einstein models would predict. However, if these accelerations were above 10 nanometers per second squared, they followed the Newton-Einstein theory as predicted. Something weird is happening specifically at these ultra-low accelerations.

In the standard model of gravity, this is where concepts of dark matter become vitally important. Because scientists don’t know anything about this hypothetical form of matter and energy that supposedly makes up a majority of the universe, it’s possible that dark matter is influencing this strange gravitational interaction. However, Chae argues that Modified Newtonian Dynamics, or MOND—first proposed by Israeli scientist Mordehai Milgrom in 1983—could explain (among other galactic anomalies) these low acceleration deviations.

The most surprising element is that a MOND-influenced theory of gravity—also co-authored by Milgrom—explains this unexpected 1.4 times acceleration boost. This theory is called a A Quadratic Lagrangian, or AQUAL, and Chae says his work “represents a direct evidence for the breakdown of standard gravity at weak acceleration.”

“This systematic deviation agrees with the boost factor that the AQUAL theory predicts for kinematic accelerations in circular orbits under the Galactic external field,” Chae says in the paper.

Similar to how the Newton-Einstein theory relies on the ever-elusive particle known as dark matter, MOND contains its own limitations and challenges. Chae’s study appears to be a big +1 in the pro column for Modified Newtonian Dynamics, but the theory is still just that—a theory. It will need much more observational support before it upends our modern understanding of gravity and the universe we inhabit.

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Scientists have just made a fascinating discovery on Mars: a new mineral called ferric hydroxysulfate. The name is a mouthful, but the implications it brings are exciting. This particular mineral hints at a watery, chemically active past on the Red Planet. And this time, it wasn’t the rover that made the discovery, but a team of researchers from the SETI Institute who analyzed the data gathered by the Mars Orbiter (which celebrated 15 years of accomplishments a few years back) high above Mars.

Once the data from the Mars Orbiter was gathered, scientists used a technique to analyze the light reflecting off the planet’s surface. This technique, called spectroscopy, helps us identify the chemical makeup of minerals from far away. That’s one of the methods used to estimate what distant planets are made of. That said, once the results were in, the scientists realized they were looking at something new: ferric hydroxysulfate, a mineral never seen on Mars before. So, why does this matter? This particular mineral forms in the presence of water, iron, and sulfur. All these ingredients suggest that Mars once had the right conditions for chemical processes similar to those on the early days of Earth. That means that perhaps Mars was once capable of sustaining life.

Read more: How Many Meteors Actually Hit Earth Every Year?

The Mystery

The discovery of the ferric hydroxysulfate (Fe3+SO4OH) on Mars was the result of years of detailed research led by Dr. Janice Bishop and her team at the SETI Institute. Their work focused on analyzing a complex and geologically rich part of the planet, known as the Valles Marineris, a network of canyons and valleys near the Martian equator. The team used an instrument called CRISM (Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars), which analyzes how sunlight reflects off the planet’s surface.

While examining the data gathered by CRISM, the scientists noticed unique light signatures in two particular regions of the canyon system: the Juventae Chasma and Aram Chaos. To better understand what they were looking at, the SETI researchers compared the data from Mars with minerals on Earth that form in acidic, water-rich environments. This comparison helped them identify the match. They were looking at a previously undetected mineral on Mars, ferric hydroxysulfate.

The common sulfates found on Mars typically form when minerals interact with sulfur (and sometimes water) under acidic conditions. However, ferric hydroxysulfate also requires oxygen and temperatures above 100 degrees Celsius, which is much hotter than the surface of Mars. That means that the main culprits for the sulfates’ development are volcanic and geothermal activity on the planet. That leads to the conclusion that the alteration in Mars’ minerals happened within the last 3 billion years, in the so-called Amazonian period. The research was published in the science journal Nature on August 5, 2025.

Mars May Have Been More Like Earth

In March 2025, Roger Wiens, a Mars exploration expert from Purdue University in Indiana, used NASA’s Perseverance rover to do more than look for signs of ancient life and studied some unusually pale rocks on Mars’ surface. He discovered unusually high levels of aluminum that possibly originated from the mineral kaolinite. This particular mineral, just like ferric hydroxysulfate, demands a very warm and wet environment to be formed. The presence of ferric hydroxysulfate and kaolinite indicates that Mars was once much warmer, wetter, and more complex than scientists previously thought. At one point in its history, it could have been much more similar to Earth.

NASA has long been looking for signs of possible life on Mars, and it seems that with the discovery of this new mineral, we are one step closer to proving that the Red Planet once sustained life. However, it’s also possible for Mars to sustain life in the future, thanks to more and more discoveries about water being present on the planet. It could even support human life at some point, but for now, the scientists focus on understanding Mars’ environmental history. The regions like Juventae Chasma and Aram Chaos, where the new mineral was found, could now potentially be high-priority targets for in-depth surface exploration. In short, ferric hydroxysulfate is a new piece of the puzzle in the ongoing quest to understand the Red Planet.

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Launched in 1977, the Voyager twins are the farthest human-made objects from Earth. Voyager 1 is now more than 24 billion kilometres away, officially in interstellar space. Each carries the famous Golden Record, a time capsule of Earth’s sounds, music, and greetings in 55 languages, meant to tell aliens who we are. They’re still sending faint signals, though their power is running out.

During the wee hours of this morning (Aug. 31), a boxy spacecraft with solar wings in the shape of crosses flew right by Venus — if all went according to plan.

That probe is the European Space Agency’s (ESA) JUICE (“Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer”), which is on its way to do just what you might expect after hearing its name.

Momentum for space development is growing on a global scale.

The rocket company SpaceX, led by CEO Elon Musk, has been carrying out numerous missions since putting its partially reusable Falcon 9 rocket into service. The company now boasts the highest launch frequency in the world, and this has helped boost the number of rocket launches worldwide to 254 last year. This is a dramatic increase of more than 20 percent compared to the previous year.

In Japan, Honda has begun developing a reusable rocket, and it was reported just this June that it had successfully taken off and landed in its first launch test. However, despite Japan being described as a suitable location for rocket launch tests due to its geography, there were only five launches in Japan last year, far behind the number of launches by nations with advanced space programs like the United States, China, and Russia.

The Japanese company &Space Project aims to reverse this trend and expand the base of Japan’s space industry. The company has launched a new initiative in cooperation with Noon by Material Record, a research and development project led by the Nomura Corporation Group, which produces acoustic devices using sustainable materials.

This partnership has given birth to Debris, a speaker fashioned out of the tank of a space rocket. The design incorporates scrap parts from the test fuel tanks of the commercial rockets produced in the town of Taiki in Hokkaido.

A release party for Debris was held this past June at CITAN in Nihonbashi.

PHOTOGRAPH: MASASHI URA

Taiki is is a hub for Japan’s space industry and home to the Hokkaido Space Port, which is used by private companies and university research institutes around the world involved in space development. It’s also used by Honda for its reusable rocket takeoff and landing tests.

The final full moon of the Northern Hemisphere’s summer will occur on Sunday, Sept. 7, and the best time to see it will be later that day as it rises in the east at dusk.

Although it’s often called the Harvest Moon, September’s full moon is named the Corn Moon this year. That’s because the closest full moon to the equinox on Sept. 22 is traditionally called the Harvest Moon, and this year, that’s October’s full moon (rising Oct 6). This switch-up happens every three years, according to Time and Date.