Astronauts are more than cosmic travelers. They’re also research subjects in the careful study of what exactly outer space does to the human body. On the ground, researchers measure vitals, draw blood, swab cheeks, and more. In orbit around the Earth, the astronauts do the work themselves. Continue reading
Category Archives: universe
Trees Around Factories Could Absorb 27% of Air Pollution
STORY AT-A-GLANCE
- Nature-based solutions can compete with technology to reduce toxic air emissions across the U.S.
- Restoring natural areas to county-level average canopy cover could reduce air pollution by an average of 27%
- In 75% of the counties, nature-based solutions ended up being less expensive than technological interventions such as smokestack scrubbers in mitigating pollution
- Maintaining current levels of vegetation as well as restoring vegetation cover in industrial areas could help reduce some of the most common types of air pollutants, including sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter
- A mycorrhizae network connects trees to each other in mind-blowing ways, such that trees might be viewed as beings with a capacity for intelligence, decision-making, learning and memory
Physicists Just Created the Most Detailed Simulation of the Universe in History
The formation of galaxies is a complex dance between matter and energy, occurring on a stage of cosmic proportions and spanning billions of years. How the diversity of structured and dynamic galaxies we observe today arose from the fiery chaos of the Big Bang remains one of the most difficult unsolved puzzles of cosmology. Continue reading
This Is How Light May Have Escaped from the Earliest Galaxies, Turning the Universe Transparent
At nearly the beginning of time, the universe was shrouded in darkness. Then, early galaxies produced bright, hot stars that leaked brilliant light intergalactic space through small channels, turning the universe transparent. Continue reading