Unistellar, an innovative company in optical devices and a partner of the SETI Institute since the release of their user-friendly smart telescope in 2017, recently announced the launch of a groundbreaking new product: the ENVISION Smart Binoculars. This new device will captivate stargazers and outdoor enthusiasts, serving as an excellent instrument for outreach and scientific expeditions.
Next #SETILive: AI Identifies 27,500 New Asteroids!
TODAY, Jun 06, 2:30 PM PDT
In a collaboration between the Asteroid Institute and Google Cloud, machine learning algorithms identified 27,500 new asteroids using existing data sets from the NOIRLab Source Catalog Data Release 2 (NSC DR2). Join communications specialist Beth Johnson in a conversation with Ed Lu, Executive Director of the Asteroid Institute, as they discuss these results.
This is a wild headline from NPR: "A fungus is turning cicadas into horny zombies — but don’t panic."
"[The fungus] Massospora cicadina has been observed in cicadas in more than half a dozen states — both those belonging to Brood XIII, which emerges every 17 years and is concentrated in Illinois, and of Brood XIX, a 13-year group that is distributed across much of the southeast."
From the archives, 2022: ”We know now from decades of clinical practice, and now over the last couple of decades of research, that the earlier that we affirm someone, the better outcomes they have in terms of mental health and physical health.” https://www.texasobserver.org/healthcare-for-trans-kids-is-not-abuse/
The brain can store nearly 10 times more data than previously thought, study confirms, by Emily Cooke
published 6/4/24
Scientists harnessed a new method to precisely measure the amount of information the brain can store, and it could help advance our understanding of learning.
"...Measuring the precision of synaptic plasticity has proven difficult in the past, as has measuring how much information any given synapse can store. The new study changes that.
To measure synaptic strength and plasticity, the team harnessed information theory, a mathematical way of understanding how information is transmitted through a system. This approach also enables scientists to quantify how much information can be transmitted across synapses, while also taking account of the "background noise" of the brain..."
Following a stormy pattern with frequent periods of heavy precipitation and severe weather outbreaks, major drought improvement occurred this spring across the Great Plains and Mississippi Valley. Heavy precipitation from May 28 to June 3 resulted in additional improvements to parts of the central and southern Great Plains.
Social media may have given you a global megaphone, but the consequences – both personal and societal – are not always positive. It’s “Post Social Media” on Big Picture Science.
Fragments of mitochondrial DNA in sperm that are carried into the egg during fertilization are evidently the epigenetic mechanism by which fathers' health affects their childrens' health--specifically, the propensity for obesity and diabetes later in life.