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Tiny particle could expand our understanding of the known universe

A tiny particle, invisible to the naked eye, could expand our understanding of the natural world, according to scientists at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Illinois.

The particle in question is called a muon. Similar to an electron, it releases a negative charge, but a muon is much heavier and exists at a higher energy level than its more familiar counterpart.

A team of 200 physicists from seven different countries observed muons as they were shot through a magnetic field. The particle did not behave as they expected it to.

"If you send it through a magnetic field, it will sort of process in the presence of the field," Neil deGrasse Tyson said on CBSN Monday. "We know exactly how that puppy should be processing. You send it through and if it processes differently, something else is going on. That is not understood."

Tyson is not affiliated with the experiment, but is watching the potential breakthrough closely as director of the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space in New York City.

"We're thinking, is there another particle, is there another field, is there another force?" he said.

Tyson noted that heavy skepticism is healthy and most abnormal scientific results usually mean "you did something wrong in the experiment." But he said the potential breakthrough could open new doors in scientific discovery and learning about the world around us.

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"If the discovery holds up under further scrutiny and further testing, it will add to our understanding of physics," he said. "It might be that we just have to add another force to our collection of forces in the universe."

The possible discovery could also help scientists explain the nature and existence of matter in the universe, including dark matter and dark energy — forces which NASA says makes up about 27% of the total mass of the universe.

Tyson said scientists on Long Island, New York "had a hint of this phenomenon 20 years ago."

"There was already a hint that maybe ups the probability it is a real phenomenon," he said. "But it was never verified and you needed powerful accelerators to investigate and to repeat the experiment."

Scientists hope today's "powerful accelerators" that weren't available years ago could help unlock the decades-old mystery.

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Where to see the Hubble Space Telescope over Tampa Bay this week

Starting Tuesday, the Hubble Space Telescope will pass almost directly over St. Petersburg several nights this week.

What to look for: Heavens Above, a nonprofit satellite prediction site, says the HST will look like a bright star slowly moving from west to east.

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Wednesday or Thursday will likely be the best chance at a clear sky for viewing, St. Petersburg College Planetarium director Craig Joseph told Axios.

When to keep an eye out:

Tuesday, 9:30pm: The HST will reach its highest point in the southern sky, passing the star Regulus in the constellation Leo before disappearing into the Earth’s shadow.

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Wednesday, 9:19pm : HST will squeak past the Moon before disappearing in the eastern sky as it approaches the bright star Arcturus.

Thursday, 9:08pm: After passing overhead, it will disappear low in the eastern sky as it passes Arcturus.

Friday, 8:57pm: It will pass very close to Arcturus before disappearing.

Pro tip to make sure you catch a glimpse, via Heavens Above: Start looking toward the western sky a couple minutes before the predicted times.

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Whale wax disproves theory that Leonardo da Vinci sculpted bust of goddess

A bust that was long attributed to Leonardo da Vinci not only had nothing to do with him – it is made from a mysterious substance produced by sperm whales, scientists have found.

For more than a century, some scholars had insisted that the bust of Flora, the Roman goddess of spring, was the work of the Renaissance master.

In 1909 it was acquired by a museum in Berlin, where curators said its resemblance to several Leonardo portraits strongly suggested that it was one of his creations.

Its attribution has been the subject of intense debate ever since, but a team of scientists believe they have now resolved the matter for good - they think the bust was made by a British sculptor.

By subjecting the bust to chemical analysis and carbon dating, they found that it was created in the 19th century – more than 300 years after Leonardo’s death in 1519.

They also made another intriguing discovery – that the artwork is produced largely from spermaceti, a waxy liquid that comes from the head cavities of sperm whales.

The exact function of spermaceti is not well understood but scientists believe it may help sperm whales regulate buoyancy.

Before the hunting of the species was prohibited, the substance was used to make candles, ointments and cosmetic creams, as well as industrial lubricants.

“The bust was not produced during the Renaissance and thus cannot be attributed to da Vinci,” the team of French researchers said in a paper published in Scientific Reports.

“The Flora wax bust is made primarily of spermaceti, which was extracted from sperm whales.”

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The researchers, from the Chemistry Research Institute of Paris, said they had brought closure to a debate that had lasted more than a century.

Wilhelm Bode, the director-general of the Kaiser Friedrich Museum in Berlin, bought the artwork at auction in London.

He was convinced that the bust was the work of Leonardo, despite the fact that it was unusual during the Renaissance period to use wax as a material for sculpture.

In the years after its acquisition, more than 700 articles were written in the European press, “arguing for and against the da Vinci attribution,” the French researchers said.

It now seems likely that the bust was created by a British sculptor of the 19th century, Richard Cockle Lucas.

Chemical analysis of the whale wax used to make the bust showed that it was similar to the wax used in one a relief produced by Lucas in 1850, Leda and the Swan – based on the story from Greek mythology in which the god Zeus, in the form of a swan, rapes or seduces Leda, a princess.

Born in Wiltshire, Lucas was apprenticed to a cutler at the age of 12 and showed himself to be adept at carving knife handles. He moved to London and became a sculptor and, later, a photographer.

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In ‘Moon Landing of Genomics,’ Scientists Sequence Ancient DNA From Dirt

Scientists have pieced together multiple entire ancient bear genetic codes from soil sediment.

The secret is using whole genomes as templates to reconstruct the ancient DNA.

Scientists now have a whole floodgate of new genetics to open up.

Scientists have achieved a breakthrough they’re comparing to the moon landing: sequencing a full ancient genome from soil samples.

How’s that on par with humans touching down on the lunar surface? Well, the research team from the University of Copenhagen found the entire genetic code of an ancient bear species without obtaining it from fossils, marking the very first time scientists have found genes outside the fossil record. And by gathering the DNA from the soil, these researchers gathered a bunch of examples, rather than just one single specimen’s genome.

The scientists found the ancient bear genetic material in the soil of Chiquihuite Cave in rural Mexico. Like the ancient Chauvet Cave in France, Chiquihuite contains some of the oldest human evidence in the world—but humans weren’t the only ones to use the caves.

The ancestral bear DNA dates back to about 16,000 years ago, and it comes from an unsavory, but logical source: bear waste.

“When an animal or a human urinates or defecates, cells from the organism are also excreted,” geneticist Eske Willerslev told ScienceAlert. “We have shown that hair, urine, and feces all provide genetic material which, in the right conditions, can survive for much longer than 10,000 years.”

From there, the researchers assembled the pieces of environmental DNA (eDNA). “Standard eDNA techniques allow species to be determined [without] macrofossils across a variety of environments including sediments, ice cores, lakes, rivers, and oceans,” the scientists explain in their paper, which appears in Current Biology.

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So how did the team assemble the bears’ genome from these environmental scraps?

“We estimated a mitochondrial phylogeny using whole mitogenomes of the eight extant bears of the family Ursidae as well as three extinct bear lineages: cave bears (U. spelaeus) and the two extinct tremarctine bears, the North American giant short-faced bear, Arctodus, and the South American giant short-faced bear, Arctotherium, which we reassembled using the Andean bear as reference.”

Basically, the scientists patched together the complete ancient genome using modern and extinct bears as templates—think about using a model of a bottlenose dolphin as a guide to assemble the body parts of a killer whale. The parts aren’t exactly alike, but both animals have a dorsal fin and a blowhole.

Fossils offer scientists a huge amount of information, but the fossil record is spotty by nature, and doesn’t make sense to rely on as something to fully inform us about everyday activities and whole populations of animals. For example, one full T. rex specimen, while spectacular, doesn’t explain what the whole species’ genetic information was like.

Willerslev told ScienceAlert this research is “the moon landing of genomics” because it allows study of the genome without any fossil findings—bringing with it a vast wealth of new genetic information that can be gleaned fully from soil and other sediment.

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Can this mineral with an obscure backstory revolutionize solar power?

When the Biden administration announced in late March a $128 million initiative to improve the costs of solar power, a significant chunk of the money went to research into materials named after an obscure 19th century Russian geologist and nobleman: Lev Perovski.

Among the projects listed: $40 million for research and development into so-called perovskite materials that scientists are using to push the limits of just how efficient and adaptable solar cells can be.

And while perovskites aren't anything new — they were first found in Russia’s Ural Mountains in 1839, and they are relatively common — their more recent applications in solar power technology has sparked hope that humans will use them to better harness the thousands of megawatts of energy from the sun that falls on Earth every hour.

“Perovskites, I would argue, are one of the most exciting opportunities for solar cells in the immediate future,” said David Mitzi, a professor of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science at Duke University, who has studied the materials since the 1990s.

Any new solar power technology had to compete with silicon solar cells, an entrenched technology used for more than 50 years, Mitzi said. But perovskites had the potential to both enhance the efficiencies of silicon cells, and perhaps to compete with them directly: “I think there definitely are opportunities.”

Efficiency is just one of the features. Perovskite cells can be easily manufactured into a variety of electricity-generating materials, and at much lower temperatures — and therefore potentially lower costs — than silicon cells. But the stability and durability of perovskite cells will have to be addressed before they can entirely replace silicon.

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Scientists have now discovered a whole class of perovskite materials that share a specific structure, incorporating three different chemicals within a cubic crystal shape. They recognized years ago that some perovskites were semiconductors, like the silicon used in electronics. But it was only in 2009 that researchers found perovskites could also be used to build solar cells, which turn sunlight into usable electricity.

The first perovskite cells had very low efficiencies, so most of the sunlight that fell on them wasn’t used. But they’ve rapidly improved.

“The efficiency with which solar cells that have these perovskite materials convert sunlight to electrons has increased at a really incredible rate, to the extent that now the efficiencies are close to those of silicon solar cells in the lab,” said Lynn Loo, a professor of chemical engineering at Princeton University and the director of the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment. “That's why we are so excited about this class of materials."

Perovskite solar cells can also be made relatively easily – unlike silicon cells, which need to be refined at very high temperatures and so need a lot of energy to make. Perovskites can be made as thin sheets at low temperatures, or as inks that can effectively be “printed” onto substrates of other materials, such as flexible rolls of plastic.

That could lead to their use on surfaces where silicon solar cells wouldn’t be practical, such as the exteriors of cars or trucks; or they might even be printed onto cloth to power wearable electronics. Another possibility is to apply thin films of perovskites to the glass of windows, where they’d let through most of the light while using a part of it to generate electricity.

But one of the most promising uses of perovskite cells is to combine them with silicon cells so that they use more of the sun’s energy than silicon alone. The best silicon cells are approaching their theoretical maximum efficiency of about 29 percent. But perovskite cells can be tuned to generate electricity from wavelengths of light that silicon cells don’t use – and so covering silicon solar cells with semi-transparent films of perovskite cells could overcome that fundamental limit.

Physicist Henry Snaith at the University of Oxford, a leading researcher in perovskite solar cells, sees this as a way to combine the industrial dominance of silicon with the technological advantages of perovskites. He thinks “tandem” silicon and perovskite cells with efficiencies above 40 percent efficiency could be commercially widespread within 10 years, and that they could soon be followed by multilayered cells with efficiencies of over 50 percent.

The potential of perovskite solar panels has also caught government attention, both here and overseas. As well as creating new commercial opportunities for U.S. companies, perovskites could become a relatively inexpensive way for solar power to challenge fossil fuels for generating electricity. “I think a lot of us have aspirations for the technology to really begin to address some of the climate change issues that need to be handled by 2050,” said physicist Joe Berry, who leads research into solar perovskites at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colorado.

Perovskite solar cells still face problems, however, and key among these is the issue of stability. In part because they’re easy to make, perovskite cells also degrade quickly from humidity and heat. Some experimental perovskite cells have stayed stable for tens of thousands of hours, but they still have a long way to go to meet the 25 or 30 years of use of silicon cells, Snaith said.

Some of the most promising perovskite materials for solar power also incorporate lead, which can be released into the environment when the perovskite cells degrade. Researchers are studying alternatives to lead-based perovskites, such as tin-based perovskites, and similar crystal structures that incorporate other, safer substances.

“I think there are some challenges ahead,” Loo said. “Whether [perovskites] are going to play a significant role depends on whether we can overcome these challenges."

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The Lyrid meteor shower will light up the sky this week and peak on Thursday. Here's how to watch these shooting stars.

The first major meteor shower since January is coming to a sky near you over the next few nights – and the peak will be in the predawn hours Thursday, Earth Day.

"By April, after the months of meteor drought, many meteor-watchers are itching to get going," EarthSky.org reports. "So – though they produce only 10 to 15 meteors per hour at their peak – the Lyrids are always welcome."

A few shooting stars may be seen streaking across the sky early in the night, but like many meteor showers, the best time to watch the event will be during the second half of the night as the frequency of meteors slowly increases, AccuWeather said.

Also, the moon will be emitting bothersome light pollution until after it sets around 3:30 or 4 a.m. local time, after which the darker sky will make it easier to see the dimmer meteors.

Weather-wise much of the nation should be clear, which will make for excellent viewing of the Lyrids, according to AccuWeather.

The Lyrids have been observed for more than 2,700 years, NASA said, making them one of the oldest known showers. The first recorded sighting of a Lyrid meteor shower goes back to 687 B.C. in China. Observers there said the Lyrids were "falling like rain."

Lyrids are pieces of debris from the Comet C/1861 G1 Thatcher. In mid-April of each year, the Earth runs into the stream of debris from the comet, causing the meteor shower.

The Lyrids begin as tiny specks of dust that hit Earth’s atmosphere at 109,600 mph, vaporizing from friction with the air and leaving behind the streaks of light we call meteors, Astronomy magazine reported.

The meteors appear to emanate from the constellation Lyra the Harp, near the bright star Vega, which rises in late evening and passes nearly overhead shortly before dawn, the magazine said.

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The Lyrids are known for their fast and bright meteors, NASA said, though not as fast or as plentiful as the famous Perseids in August.

Lyrids frequently leave glowing dust trains behind them as they streak through the Earth's atmosphere, according to NASA. These trains can be observable for several seconds.

The next major meteor shower will be the Eta Aquarids, which is set to peak in early May.

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How to Prevent Birds from Flying into Your Windows

The thump of a bird hitting your window is an awful sound. And unfortunately, window strikes are quite common for wild birds, especially during their mating and migrating seasons in spring and fall. These collisions often end up injuring and killing our feathered visitors. This problem has significantly contributed to the loss of nearly 30% of the North American bird population since 1970. The good news is that there are several simple things you can do to stop birds from flying into your windows. Understanding why it happens will help you find the best solutions for your home.

Why Birds Fly into Windows "Research estimates that 365 million to one billion birds collide with buildings every year in the U.S. alone," says Alison Holloran, Executive Director of Audubon Rockies and Vice President of the National Audubon Society. So, why do birds fly into windows so much? The quick answer is that birds don't see the glass as a barrier. When habitat and sky are visible through clear glass (as in the case of a greenhouse, atrium, sunroom, or glass deck panels), birds often attempt to fly through what they perceive as an unbroken continuation of outdoor space.

But a more common cause of bird strikes is the reflection of the landscape and sky in a window. "When we see reflections of trees or gardens on a building, we humans recognize that's because of windows. That's not true for birds. They'll fly straight into the glass, thinking it's a landscape," explains Miyoko Chu, Director of Communications at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Occasionally, a bird will attack a window when it sees its own reflection. This most often occurs during mating season when the bird may believe its territory is threatened.

How to Stop Birds from Hitting Windows There are several good strategies for preventing birds from colliding with your windows. Since many windows pose little or no threat because of their size or placement, the American Bird Conservancy recommends identifying and focusing efforts on priority windows, especially those where you know bird strikes have occurred. Then, use these tips to minimize the danger.

Keep Feeders and Birdbaths Out of the Danger Zone Many gardeners like to make their landscapes inviting to birds by including plants that provide food and shelter, setting out feeders, and adding a bird bath. But birds within 10 meters (a little more than 30 feet) of windows are those most often killed, according to Daniel Klem, Professor of Ornithology and Conservation Biology at Mulhlenber College in Pennsylvania. "Once in this danger zone, birds are deceived trying to reach habitat and sky seen behind clear panes or mirrored in reflective panes," says Klem.

The Audubon Society recommends placing feeders and birdbaths either farther than 30 feet from windows or closer than 3 feet. When very close to your house, birds are unlikely to pick up enough speed to be seriously injured if they do strike a window.

Reduce Reflections "To prevent window strikes, break up the reflections on your windows," says Chu. "They key is to make sure that you do this uniformly across the glass���a single decal won't work because the birds will just fly around the decal."

Use white tape at least 1/8" wide, to create vertical or horizontal stripes on the outside of windows (if placed on the inside, they can be hidden by the reflection, and are therefore ineffective). Similarly, you can use decorative decals ($17, Etsy), tempera paint ($10, Target), or even white bar soap to create your own patterns. As long as the markings are no more than two inches apart, they will deter most birds.

Another option is to use a removable window film ($12, The Home Depot), which is easy to apply. It gives the appearance of an opaque surface from outside, but doesn't block the view from inside. It has the added advantage that if you do want to watch birds at your feeders, you'll be hidden from view so they won't get spooked by your presence.

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Keep Screens on Your Windows Insect screens on the outside of windows can significantly reduce reflection and provide a bit of cushioning if a bird does fly into it. Be sure to leave the screens on year-round. External shades, solar screens, and awnings also minimize reflections.

How to Help an Injured Bird Birds striking a window in full flight are often killed outright. Others may have internal injuries to which they succumb later, but some birds are only temporarily out of action.

"Many times when a bird hits a window, they are stunned and just need a little time to recover. Putting them in a dark, warm, quiet place lets them gather their wits about them, and then they can be released after 15 or 20 minutes," says Holloran. Place the bird in a box with a lid, and be sure to keep cats away while you wait for it to recover.

After 20 minutes, if the bird doesn't fly away on its own, "or if you noticed a bad injury at the outset, call a wildlife rehabilitator. They will advise and may ask you to bring the bird to them," says Chu.

While windows bring welcome garden views and sunshine into our homes, they pose a lethal threat to wild birds. But with a few simple adjustments, you can help your winged visitors avoid that danger.

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As climate change thaws mountain tops, risks of rockfalls surge

As a scientist counts down "3-2-1", five neon-colored orbs are lowered from a helicopter hovering overhead and released. The orbs barrel down the Swiss mountain, toppling beech and spruce trees as they pick up speed.

These "test rocks" – the heaviest weighing 3,200 kilograms (7,000 lbs)– are part of research aimed at understanding the growing risk of rockfalls around the world.

As climate change warms high-altitude mountain regions, boulders and rocks long frozen into place are being loosed and tumbling downslope.

"All of this is going in one direction: more unstable," said Christian Huggel, a glaciologist at the University of Zurich who was not involved in the mountain experiments.

"It's getting more dangerous, and especially more dangerous if you have massive investments in hazard-prone areas."

The world was horrified in February, when a hunk of rock and ice broke from a Himalayan peak and swept down the mountain, killing more than 200 people and wiping out a hydroelectric dam in its path.

"Where a rock will land, how it will bounce, how high it will jump … we can answer all that," said physicist Andrin Caviezel, one of the scientists tracing the cartoon-colored orbs down Schraubachtobel Mountain, near Switzerland's eastern border with Liechtenstein.

Though the team's test rocks started from the same spot, they each took a different path. The orange orb got trapped behind a tree stump. The pink one broke through a stone barrier to land, chipped and battered, in a stream bed.

"We took bets on whether they would get stuck or not," Caviezel said, laughing. "I lost."

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Over three years, the team from the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research has hurled their faux boulders down different mountains hundreds of times, gathering data for a computer simulation aimed at estimating a boulder's landing spot to within a meter.

"But we will never answer the 'when'," Caviezel said. "That was never in our model."

'YOU CAN HEAR THE STONES FALLING'

One night in July 2018 made Valais canton resident Robert Sarbach feel helpless – and terrified. Under a heavy downpour, a chunk of Ritigraben rock glacier broke away, sending waves of debris down to the valley below.

"It was intense and emotional," Sarbach recalled. "In the night you can see nothing. But you can hear the stones falling, and the water. And you smell the earth."

Scientists do not have much data on rockfalls, partly because they often happen in remote regions where few people live. New technologies are helping to detect more of the bigger rockfalls, though.

Seismic sensors clued scientists into an otherwise unreported rockslide in Tibet last month, with an estimated 40 million cubic meters of debris – enough to fill about 16,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools – crashing down in remote Yarlung Tsangpo.

That kind of technology could help detect disasters in the Himalayas, where many of the countries have fewer resources for search and rescue, said David Petley, an Earth scientist at the University of Sheffield who maintains a blog https://blogs.agu.org/landslideblog on landslides.

"In Switzerland, authorities would probably mobilise all resources to help you," Petley said. "In Nepal, you are probably on your own."

Still, for years evidence has suggested that landslides are already becoming more frequent. One 2012 study https://bit.ly/3x7jt6H by Huggel and colleagues published in Geology Today found a "strong increase" in the number of significant Alpine rock slope failures coinciding with warmer temperatures from the 1980s onward.

But permafrost covers only about 4% of Switzerland's area, which limits the country's rockfall exposure. In Alaska, where nearly 85% of the land contains some amount of permafrost, the danger may be higher.

One area of Alaska's Saint Elias Mountains that typically sees six rock avalanches per year on average experienced a total of 41 during the unseasonably warm years of 2013-2016, according to a 2020 study https://bit.ly/3mYOLbc published in the journal Frontiers in Earth Science.

Of particular worry are the U.S. state's coastal mountains, where a mass of rocks falling into the water can trigger big waves. The collapse of a mountain face at Taan Fjord in 2015 dumped a mass of rock into the water, unleashing a 193-meter (633-foot) tsunami in the Gulf of Alaska's Icy Bay, according to the U.S. National Park Service.

No one was injured, but the event raised alarms about such events occurring in the more heavily trafficked areas of Prince William Sound, visited by cruise ships and other vessels.

"That is the worst-case scenario that haunts me a little bit," said Ronald Daanen, a geohydrologist with the Alaska Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys.

The fact that climate change is also altering precipitation patterns can raise danger levels. Where frequent snowfall once replenished the ice caps, heavy rain might fall instead. That water can further eat into icy areas and trigger landslides.

On the lower slopes of Switzerland's Meretschihorn mountain, one couple had to be evacuated five times last year. Fearing a large rainfall-induced debris surge, officials are negotiating to permanently remove them from the risky area.

"We are not prepared" around the world for this risk, said Marta Chiarle, a geologist at Italy's National Research Council. "My impression is still that we are not taking this seriously."