Astronomers Find A Fluffy Planet With the Density of a Marshmallow:
Artist impression of ultra fluffy gas giant orbiting a cool red dwarf.
Astronomers have found a planet with the average density of a marshmallow. c Located approximately 580 light-years from Earth in the constellation of Auriga the Charioteer, this planet, identified as TOI-3757 b, is the lowest-density planet ever detected around a red dwarf star. NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite observed the crossing of this planet TOI-3757-b in front of its star, which allowed astronomers to calculate the planet’s diameter to be about 100,000 miles (150,000 kilometers) or about just slightly larger than that of Jupiter. TOI-3757 b’s average density was calculated as being 0.27 grams per cubic centimeter (about 17 grams per cubic feet), which would make it less than half the density of Saturn (the lowest-density planet in the Solar System), about one-quarter the density of water, or similar in density to a marshmallow. Along with being a big softie, scientists found that the Jupiter-sized exoplanet would also float if it were hypothetically put in a giant cosmic bathtub.
Vibrations From Mobile Phones Traveling on Bridges Can be Used to Assess Structural Integrity:
Data collected by mobile phones could be used to assess the structural integrity of bridges, suggests a new study, informing potential maintenance requirements and keeping them in action for 30% longer. Researchers have already found that smartphones can capture the same kind of information about bridge vibrations picked up by stationary sensors. To test the viability of this, in a study researchers drove over it 102 times with their devices running and they used 72 trips by Uber drivers with activated phones as well. They then compared the resulting data to what had been collected by 240 sensors that had been placed on the Golden Gate Bridge for three months. The findings suggest that crowdsourced monitoring could be a cheap and convenient way to monitor the structural integrity of transportation infrastructure worldwide. Results showed that data from the phones converged with that from the bridge sensors. For 10 particular types of low-frequency vibrations the engineers measured, there was a close match, and in five cases there was no discrepancy between the methods at all. The structural health of bridges is usually visually assessed by engineers on-site, which is oftentimes very expensive and infrequent. However, with this technology integrity of infrastructure like bridges can be reliably and cheaply measured as frequently as needed.
Embryos appear to reverse their biological clock early in development:
A study suggests that the biological age of both mouse and human embryos resets during development. Here, a human egg is illustrated surrounded by sperm. Credit: KATERYNA KON/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
Through a new study of mice and human embryos cells have been shown to reset their biological clock after conception. In this study, both mouse and human germline cells appear to reset their biological age in the early stages of an embryo’s development. It was observed that this reset happens during a rejuvenation period after an embryo has attached to the uterus, dubbing the age of the cells “ground zero”. However, this age is not in terms of chronological age but rather is determined by the overall health and function of the cells themselves (biological age). While much of the data for the human cells are restricted, the mice cells were shown to undergo a de aging process which seemed to resemble a similar process in human. Most of the secrets behind the process are currently unknown, but many applications could possibly be developed from these new findings to rejuvenate regular cells, expanding the human lifespan.
Sources:
Astronomers Find A Fluffy Planet With the Density of a Marshmallow (goodnewsnetwork.org)
Embryos appear to reverse their biological clock early in development (sciencenews.org)