There’s an extreme, unusual warm spot on Earth right now
A big swath of Siberia has been way, way warmer than normal this year. Through May 2020, temperatures in the region averaged about 13 degrees Fahrenheit, or 7 degrees Celsius,...
MIT’s new way to remotely monitor vital signs over time could help with early COVID-19 detection in care homes – TechCrunch
MIT researchers have been building out the capabilities of a system they created that can monitor vital signs without requiring any direct contact sensors or wearables – using wireless signals...
CMU demonstrates nanoscale technology that causes plants to absorb nutrients with nearly 100% efficiency – TechCrunch
Spraying plants with fertilizers and pesticides is typically a highly lossy affair – as little as 1% of the substances currently used in industrial and food production farming is actually...
Your favorite band knows how long the pandemic will last
For a potent dose of coronavirus reality, follow the music. Many of the biggest music festivals in the nation — Coachella, Lollapalooza, Stagecoach, and JazzFest — won’t happen until (at...
Quark matter — the fifth state of matter within neutron stars
Quark matter may join solid, liquids, gases, and plasmas as a newly-understood state of matter. Far from being exotic, a new study suggests that quark matter could make up a...
You can help a Mars Rover’s AI learn to tell rocks from dirt – TechCrunch
Mars Rover Curiosity has been on the Red Planet for going on 8 years, but its journey is nowhere near finished — and it’s still getting upgrades. You can help...
Facebook’s ‘Deepfake Detection Challenge’ yields promising early results – TechCrunch
The digitally face-swapped videos known as deepfakes aren’t going anywhere, but if platforms want to be able to keep an eye on them, they need to find them first. Doing...
How Mars may have lost several systems of rings over billions of years
Rockin’ in the Mars room… Phobos, the innermost of the two moons of Mars, orbits a mere 6,000 kilometers (3,700 miles) above the surface of Mars, orbiting Mars once every...
NASA astronaut reveals an appalling experience of racial injustice
Leland Melvin blasted into space twice. But in a new interview with Bill Nye, the former NASA astronaut described an egregiously racist experience that could have almost certainly derailed his...
Scientist says we haven’t found ET yet because we’re doomed to destroy all life
A group of physicists working on the atomic bomb program at Los Alamos Research Laboratory in 1950 were having a discussion about aliens over lunch one day. The general consensus...