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Near-Earth Asteroid 2025 OW close encounter: an image – 27 July 2025

We captured the near-Earth Asteroid 2025 OW while it was safely approaching for its 28 July 2025 flyby with the Earth. It will come as close as 633.000 km from the center of the Earth, 1.6X times the average distance of the Moon.

Near-Earth Asteroid 2025 OW: 27 July 2025.

The image above comes from a single 300-second exposure, remotely taken with the “Elena” (PlaneWave 17″ + Paramount MEII + SBIG STL-6303E) robotic unit available as part of the Virtual Telescope Project and installed in Manciano, under the darkest skies of the Italian peninsula. The telescope tracked the fast apparent motion of the asteroid, this is why it looks like a sharp dot of light in the center (indicated by an arrow), with stars leaving long, bright streaks on the background.

At the observing time, asteroid 2025 OW was at about 1.9 million km from our telescope, still safely approaching to the Earth.

This (51 – 110) meters asteroid will reach its minimum distance (about 633.000 km from the center of the Earth.) from us on 28 July 2025, at 19:44 UTC (source: Nasa/JPL). Of course, there were no risks at all for our planet.

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July 28, 2025

Fossil teeth reveal dinosaur diet clues

You are what you eat, it turns out—even if your last meal was 150 million years ago, according to new research.

While the grub itself may be long gone, a record of dinosaurs’ favorite foods has been stowed away in their ancient tooth enamel over the last eon.

“It’s really just more proof that this ecosystem was as spectacular as we thought it was.”

When researchers at The University of Texas at Austin took a close look, they discovered that some dinosaurs were discerning eaters, with different species preferring different plant parts.

Tooth enamel contains calcium isotopes that reflect the range of foods the dinosaurs ate; different types of plants have different chemical signatures, and discrete parts of trees—from buds to bark—can also have unique signatures.

According to the study’s lead author Liam Norris, the results help explain how so many behemoth creatures all lived together in the same area at the same time.

“The ecosystem that I studied has been a mystery for a long time because it has these giant herbivores all coexisting,” says Norris, a recent doctoral graduate at UT’s Jackson School of Geosciences.

“The idea is that they were all eating different things, and now we have found proof of that.”

The findings appear in Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology.

Norris inspected teeth from four dinosaur species and one crocodyliform, both herbivores and carnivores, that roamed the Western US during the Late Jurassic. The plant-eaters are the long-necked Camarasaurus; the short-armed Camptosaurus; and the trunk-legged Diplodocus. The meat-eaters are the bipedal Allosaurus and the comparatively small, crocodile-like Eutretauranosuchus.

The bones and teeth of these ancient creatures were all found in the Carnegie Quarry deposit in northeast Utah, which is thought to have formed during an extreme drought in as little as six months to a few thousand years.

“We were very lucky to be able to study fossils of dinosaurs that lived together and were all rapidly preserved in a single deposit,” says Rowan Martindale, an associate professor at the Jackson School’s earth and planetary sciences department.

“The Jurassic tomb preserved a unique paleontological gem and these skeletons are beautifully displayed at Dinosaur National Monument.”

Norris, who now works at the Texas Science & Natural History Museum, studied teeth from 17 individual animals across these five species. The specimens were loaned by the Utah Field House of Natural History State Park Museum or accessed in the field at Dinosaur National Monument. He shaved off a dusting of their enamel, which he took back to the Jackson School for calcium isotope analysis. Jackson School Professor John Lassiter and Radiogenic Isotope Laboratory Manager Aaron Satkoski, both coauthors on the paper, helped to analyze and interpret these data.

Previously, scientists believed that large herbivorous dinosaurs coexisted by munching on different levels of the tree canopy according to height. However, Norris’s research shows that plant height wasn’t the only factor driving the differentiation of their diets—instead, it was specific plant parts.

For example, Norris found that the Camptosaurus was a rather discerning eater, preferring softer, more nutritious plant parts such as leaves and buds. The Camarasaurus ate mostly conifers, with a preference for woody plant tissues. The Diplodocus ate more of a mixed diet that included soft ferns and horsetail plants lower to the ground, as well as tougher plant parts.

“This differentiation in diet makes sense with what we see from the morphology of these animals: the different height, the different snout shape. Then, we bring in this geochemical data, which is a very concrete piece of evidence to add to that pot,” Norris says.

This research also provides interesting food for thought to a theory about long-necked dinosaurs having flexible necks that could be used to reach many areas of vegetation without having to expend the energy to move the rest of their body. This research, which shows that the dinosaurs ate from different levels of the tree canopy, furthers that line of thinking.

The carnivores in the study—the Allosaurus and Eutretauranosuchus—had an overlap in calcium isotope values, which could mean that they ate some of the same things. However, the results also showed that the Eutretauranosuchus is more likely to have eaten fish, while the Allosaurus primarily ate herbivorous dinosaurs—possibly including the three other dinosaur species mentioned in this study.

For this ancient ecosystem to have supported so many enormous dinosaurs with such specific dietary proclivities helps to paint a picture of the vegetation and plant productivity of the time.

“It’s really just more proof that this ecosystem was as spectacular as we thought it was,” Norris says.

Henry Fricke of Colorado College also coauthored the study.

Source: UT Austin

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July 28, 2025

What if 10,000 steps per day was never the magic number? Bombshell scientific study says you need far less for health benefits

Are you a step-checker? Do you look at your phone, watch, or other activity tracker a few times a day, to see if you’ve hit the 10,000 steps mark yet? Do you feel guilty if your step count doesn’t ever get over, say, 7,000?

What if the 10,000-steps-per-day mark was just a publicity campaign from the 1960s that caught the public’s attention, and recent science indicates that 7,000 is the true mark that carries a health benefit with it? That is exactly the scenario that’s playing out.

The latest large-scale analysis, published in The Lancet Public Health and drawing from over 160,000 adults across 57 studies worldwide, challenges the fabled 10,000-step mark. Researchers not only concluded that walking 7,000 steps per day was in fact linked to dramatic improvements in longevity and protection against a wide array of diseases, but that going the extra 3,000 steps didn’t make that much of a difference after all.

Why 10,000 steps became ‘the goal’

For years, “10,000 steps” has been consecrated as the gold standard of daily fitness. But the origin of that benchmark wasn’t medical—it was marketing. Ahead of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, a Japanese pedometer called the “manpo-kei,” which translates to “10,000-step meter,” launched a global fitness trend. That catchy round number stuck, becoming the default goal for millions using wearable trackers.

The 10,000 steps benchmark just seems to be one of those things that lodges in your head. Popular YouTubers and fitness influencers run “10,000 step challenges” encouraging followers to meet or exceed the daily target, often featuring “walk with me” workout sessions. It’s been granted official status by digital apps, with the number “10,000” now a default setting on devices such as Fitbit. Corporate wellness programs, social media challenges, and public health campaigns also routinely use the 10,000-step mark as a motivational goal and badge of accomplishment.

The bombshell findings

The new research poured cold water on the idea of 10,000 as a scientific minimum. Compared to the least active group (2,000 steps), those who managed 7,000 steps per day saw:

47% decreased risk of premature death
25% lower chance of cardiovascular disease
38% reduced risk of dementia
6% lower cancer risk
22% lower incidence of depressive symptoms
28% reduction in falls
14% lower risk of developing Type 2 diabetes

What’s more, these massive benefits approached a plateau with 7,000 steps; walking all the way to 10,000 steps per day generated only small additional reductions in risk for most conditions. For some diseases—like heart disease—benefits increased slightly beyond 7,000, but for many others, the curve flattened.

“Although 10,000 steps per day can still be a viable target for those who are more active,” according to the abstract, “7,000 steps per day is associated with clinically meaningful improvements in health outcomes and might be a more realistic and achievable target for some.” The authors add that the findings should be interpreted in light of limitations, such as the small number of studies available for most outcomes, a lack of age-specific analysis and potential biases at the individual study level.

‘More is better’—but only up to a point

Walking more remains beneficial, particularly for those who are mostly sedentary. The study found the greatest jump in health benefits when moving from very low step counts (~2,000) up to 7,000 daily. For the general adult population, 7,000 steps—about three miles—delivers the bulk of the effect. For adults over 60, benefits plateau a bit earlier, around 6,000–8,000 steps, while younger adults may see the curve level off closer to 8,000–10,000.

The researchers also revealed that the pace of walking was far less important: just getting in the steps, regardless of speed, provided the protective benefits.

Rethinking the fitness message

This research could prompt a shake-up in public health messaging, which has long promoted aspirational but somewhat arbitrary targets. Fitness professionals and wearable device makers now have fresh evidence to advise clients and consumers that a daily goal of 7,000 is both realistic and powerfully protective. Then again, 10,000 steps is catchy.

For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.

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July 28, 2025

Israeli rights groups accuse Israel of genocide in Gaza

Emir Nader

BBC News, Jerusalem

Reuters Israeli human rights groups B'Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel hold a news conference in occupied East Jerusalem to release reports accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza (28 July 2025) — B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel presented the findings at a news conference in Jerusalem

Two leading Israeli rights organisations have said Israel’s conduct in the war in Gaza constitutes genocide against the Palestinian population.

B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel released separate reports on Monday based on studies of the past 21 months of conflict.

The organisations, which have been active in Israel for decades, said in a joint statement that “in these dark times it is especially important to call things by their name”, while “calling on this crime to stop immediately”.

An Israeli government spokesman said it strongly rejected the accusations of genocide, which are the first to be made by human rights groups based in Israel.

“Our defence forces target terrorists and never civilians. Hamas is responsible for the suffering in Gaza,” David Mencer said.

At a news conference in Jerusalem on Monday, B’Tselem’s executive director Yuli Novak said her organisation’s report was “one that we never imagined we would have to write”.

The 88-page document states: “An examination of Israel’s policy in the Gaza Strip and its horrific outcomes, together with statements by senior Israeli politicians and military commanders about the goals of the attack, leads us to the unequivocal conclusion that Israel is taking co-ordinated action to intentionally destroy Palestinian society in the Gaza Strip.”

In its 65-page report, Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) said its health-focused legal analysis found that Israel had targeted Gaza’s healthcare infrastructure “in a manner that is both calculated and systematic”.

“The evidence shows a deliberate and systematic dismantling of Gaza’s health and life-sustaining systems – through targeted attacks on hospitals, obstruction of medical aid and evacuations, and the killing and detention of healthcare personnel,” the report said.

Dr Guy Shalev, executive director of PHRI, said: “Silence in the face of genocide is not an option. We want to stress: confronting genocide is not only the responsibility of legal and political institutions. Confronting it demands urgent action from the global health community.”

The organisations found the “horrific and criminal Hamas attack” on Israel on 7 October 2023 was a triggering event that caused fear and collective trauma among Israelis.

However, in its response to the attack, they alleged, Israel’s government had pursued a campaign based on the “promotion of extremist ideologies and the dehumanisation of Palestinians in Gaza”.

They said this was a reference to language used from political and military leaders to soldiers fighting on the ground, which labelled all Palestinians in Gaza as being responsible.

PHRI concluded that the acts it identified were “not incidental to war but part of a deliberate policy targeting Palestinians as a group”, and in a manner that fulfilled at least three acts defined in Article II of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, to which Israel is a signatory.

Reuters File photo showing Palestinians evacuating Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza, during an Israeli offensive (21 May 2024) — Only 18 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are still partially functional, according to the UN (file photo)

A number of international rights organisations, UN human rights experts, and scholars have accused Israel of committing a genocide in Gaza.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) is also examining a case brought by South Africa alleging that Israeli forces are committing genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza.

Israel has vehemently denied the allegation and has called the case “wholly unfounded” and based on “biased and false claims”.

Dr Shalev told the BBC that PHRI and B’Tselem were concerned that the organisations and their staff might be subjected to verbal or physical violence in Israel in response to their reports.

“But we are hoping that people will listen to what we are saying,” he added.

Yuli Novak of B’Tselem said the process at arriving at the conclusion that Israel was conducting a genocide had been fraught.

“To really understand that your country, your collective, is actually committing genocide, that is a very hard mental and personal process,” she said.

“It breaks something very basic in your understanding about who we are.”

Israel launched its war in Gaza in retaliation for Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack, which killed about 1,200 people and led to 251 others being taken hostage.

Israeli attacks have since killed more than 59,900 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. The ministry’s figures are quoted by the UN and others as the most reliable source of statistics available on casualties.

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July 28, 2025

‘We do not support this retraction’

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The retracted paper claimed that arsenic-based life had been discovered in California’s Mono Lake. | Credit: NASA

The controversial claim of microbes that exhibit arsenic rather than phosphorus in their biochemistry has been retracted by the journal Science 15 years after it was first published — but while most in the research community are pleased by the decision, the retraction has angered the authors of the original study.

Arsenic, as we know from its use as a poison, is a toxic substance. Thus, life as we know it of course would not include arsenic in its biochemistry. Yet, because the search for alien life is, by its very definition, a search for life as we don‘t know it, astrobiologists like to consider the possibility of organisms that have a different biochemistry to the one we’re familiar with.

This, in fact, led to NASA, — and with great razzamatazz, one might add — holding a press conference in 2010 that declared the supposed discovery of arsenic-based microbial life in Mono Lake, which is a heavily salt-rich body of water in California.

NASA claimed this discovery would forever change the search for life beyond Earth.

Life’s chemical details

Consider that all life as we know it, including human life, exclusively uses six key elements in its biochemistry: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, phosphorus, oxygen and sulfur.

Take phosphorus as an example. In our biochemistry, phosphorus, in the form of phosphate, is crucial for forming the sugar-phosphate backbone of molecules of RNA and DNA, as well as storing and delivering metabolic energy through adenosine triphosphate (ATP).

Astronomical observations, however, suggest phosphorus might not be evenly distributed across the Milky Way galaxy. And it has been posited that life in those phosphorus-depleted regions of space might survive by substituting phosphorus with another element, such as arsenic. It was this possibility that, 15 years ago, prompted a team led by Felisa Wolfe–Simon of NASA’s Astrobiology Institute to search for possible arsenic-based life in the extreme alkaline conditions within Mono Lake.

Then, in that 2010 press conference, the discovery team revealed they had found it in the form of a bacterium known as GFAJ-1 present in supposedly phosphorus-free samples from Mono Lake. The discovery was hailed as a revolutionary development in astrobiology — for all of about five minutes.

Despite all the hullaballoo of the press conference, when Wolfe–Simon and her team’s work was published online by the journal Science, other biochemists quickly came out to argue there were serious flaws in the research. Specifically, they argued that swapping out phosphorus for arsenic would cause DNA to dissolve within a second when exposed to water. More damning was the claim from the critics that the samples used by Wolfe–Simon’s team were contaminated by phosphorus from the lake. The life in those samples, the critics argued, was probably still just using the phosphorus within those samples.

When Science finally published the research paper in print a year later, it was appended by eight technical comments from other researchers highly critical of the findings, plus two extra papers from independent teams who tried to replicate the results but failed to find any evidence for arsenic-based life in Mono Lake. Wolfe–Simon and her colleague also published a response to the criticisms, in which they wrote that “we maintain that our interpretation of As [arsenic] substitution, based on multiple congruent lines of evidence, is viable.”

Not many people believed them, and Wolfe–Simon’s team have never published the results of any follow-up experiments that try to address some of the points in the criticism; they also declined to respond to any criticism other than through the medium of peer-reviewed letters. The blowback against Wolfe–Simon’s team was fierce and, at times, unsightly, with some abusive comments being leveled directly at Wolfe–Simon, who was still a young researcher. As a consequence, Wolfe–Simon opted to drop out of active research.

Now, 15 years later, Science’s Editor-in-Chief Holden Thorp and the journal’s Executive Editor Valda Vinson have reopened the can of worms by deciding to retract the paper. Why has it taken so long for them to do so?

“Science did not retract the paper in 2012 because at that time, Retractions were reserved for the Editor-in-Chief to alert readers about data manipulation or for authors to provide information about post-publication issues,” Science’s editors wrote in their official retraction notification. “Our decision then was based on the editors’ view that there was no deliberate fraud or misconduct on the part of the authors. We maintain this view, but Science’s standards for retracting papers have expanded. If the editors determine that a paper’s reported experiments do not support its key conclusions, even if no fraud or manipulation occurred, a Retraction is considered appropriate.”

A black and white image of several bacteria under a microscope. — Transmission electron micrograph shows a strain of the bacterium called GFAJ-1, which researchers claimed can incorporate arsenic into its DNA and other vital molecules, in place of the usual phosphorus. | Credit: Science/AAAS

The other side of the story

Traditionally, papers were only retracted if evidence of fraud or misconduct came to light, or if a paper’s authors requested that it be retracted, perhaps if new evidence disproved their results. However, the Retraction Watch website reports that, since 2019, Science has retracted 20 papers from its various publications, mostly on the basis of what the journal believes to be innocent errors.

Suffice to say, Wolfe–Simon and her team-members do not agree with Science’s decision. In their response, published in the interests of fairness along with the retraction by Science, the team stated their disappointment.

“We do not support this retraction,” they wrote. “While our work could have been written and discussed more carefully, we stand by the data as reported. These data were peer-reviewed, openly debated in the literature, and stimulated productive research.”

Moreover, the team argues that Science’s decision-making process was flawed and that it contravenes the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics, or COPE. Those guidelines state that retraction is only warranted when there is clear evidence of major errors, the fabrication of data, or falsification that damages the reliability of a paper’s findings.

“In going beyond COPE, the editors of Science explain that ‘standards for retracting papers have expanded’,” the team wrote. “We disagree with this standard, which extends beyond matters of research integrity. Disputes about the conclusions of papers, including how well they are supported by the available evidence, are a normal part of the process of science. Scientific understanding evolves through that process, often unexpectedly, sometimes over decades. Claims should be made, tested, challenged, and ultimately judged on the scientific merits by the scientific community itself.”

Thorp and Vinson went further in a blog post on Science’s website, where they were clearer on the reason for the retraction and arguing that COPE’s guidelines allow them to retract the paper. “Given the evidence that the results were based on contamination, Science believes that the key conclusion of the paper is based on flawed data,” they said.

The Retraction Watch website reports that Wolfe–Simon’s team said that when they had been told about the retraction, they were not told that it was because of the claimed contamination. In fact, they only heard that from a second-hand source who had seen the blog post. Even so, contamination had been the number one criticism going all the way back to 2010, and was not a new or surprising accusation.

Thorp and Vinson ended their blog post by saying “we hope this decision brings the story to a close.”

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July 28, 2025

A Panchromatic Characterization Of The Evening And Morning Atmosphere Of WASP-107 b

Spatial distributions of MnS (left) and Na2S (right) clouds as a function of longitude, averaged over all latitudes, and pressure in our cloudy SPARC/MITgcm model. The color mapping represents the mass mixing ratio of the cloud particle, with the same scaling in each panel. — astro-ph.EP

Limb-resolved transmission spectroscopy has the potential to transform our understanding of exoplanetary atmospheres. By separately measuring the transmission spectra of the evening and morning limbs, these atmospheric regions can be individually characterized, shedding light into the global distribution and transport of key atmospheric properties from transit observations alone.

In this work, we follow up the recent detection of limb asymmetry on the exoplanet WASP-107 b (Murphy et al. 2024) by reanalyzing literature observations of WASP-107 b using all of JWST’s science instruments (NIRISS, NIRCam, NIRSpec, and MIRI) to measure its limb transmission spectra from ∼1-12 μm.

We confirm the evening–morning temperature difference inferred previously and find that it is qualitatively consistent with predictions from global circulation models. We find evidence for evening–morning variation in SO₂ and CO₂ abundance, and significant cloud coverage only on WASP-107 b’s morning limb.

We find that the NIRISS and NIRSpec observations are potentially contaminated by occulted starspots, which we leverage to investigate stellar contamination’s impact on limb asymmetry measurements.

We find that starspot crossings can significantly bias the inferred evening and morning transmission spectra depending on when they occur during the transit, and develop a simple correction model which successfully brings these instruments’ spectra into agreement with the uncontaminated observations.

A Panchromatic Characterization Of The Evening And Morning Atmosphere Of WASP-107 b: Composition and Cloud Variations, and Insight into the Effect of Stellar Contamination

Matthew M. Murphy, Thomas G. Beatty, Everett Schlawin, Taylor J. Bell, Michael Radica, Thomas D. Kennedy, Nishil Mehta, Luis Welbanks, Michael R. Line, Vivien Parmentier, Thomas P. Greene, Sagnick Mukherjee, Jonathan J. Fortney, Kazumasa Ohno, Lindsey Wiser, Kenneth Arnold, Emily Rauscher, Isaac R. Edelman, Marcia J. Rieke

Comments: Currently under review with the Astronomical Journal. Comments welcome
Subjects: Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP)
Cite as: arXiv:2505.13602 [astro-ph.EP] (or arXiv:2505.13602v1 [astro-ph.EP] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2505.13602
Focus to learn more
Journal reference: AJ 170 61 (2025)
Related DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/addf38
Focus to learn more
Submission history
From: Matthew Murphy
[v1] Mon, 19 May 2025 18:00:03 UTC (6,001 KB)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.13602
Astrobiology,

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July 28, 2025

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Pakistan, Bangladesh express solidarity with Palestinian people – RADIO PAKISTAN

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US Squash Announces Partnership with InGenius Prep

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Pakistan finance minister due in US for ‘final’ round of trade talks

Pakistan, Egypt resolve to boost cooperation in defense, trade and other key sectors

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NASA Spaceline Current Awareness List #1,159 25 July 2025 (Space Life Science Research Results)

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Near-Earth Asteroid 2025 OW close encounter: an image – 27 July 2025

We captured the near-Earth Asteroid 2025 OW while it was safely approaching for its 28 July 2025 flyby with the Earth. It will come as close as 633.000 km from the center of the Earth, 1.6X times the average distance of the Moon.

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Fossil teeth reveal dinosaur diet clues

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What if 10,000 steps per day was never the magic number? Bombshell scientific study says you need far less for health benefits

Why 10,000 steps became ‘the goal’

The bombshell findings

‘More is better’—but only up to a point

Rethinking the fitness message

Continue Reading

Israeli rights groups accuse Israel of genocide in Gaza

Continue Reading

‘We do not support this retraction’

Life’s chemical details

The other side of the story

Continue Reading

A Panchromatic Characterization Of The Evening And Morning Atmosphere Of WASP-107 b

Continue Reading