The World's Blackest Paint Could Stop Satellites Ruining Astronomers' Views

12 July 2026, By D. Nield

https://www.sciencealert.com/the-worlds-blackest-paint-could-stop-satellites-ruining-astronomers-views

Reflective satellites are getting in the way of stargazing.

  (Joshua Rozells)

Low Earth orbit is becoming increasingly crowded with satellites, and they're quietly erasing our view of the Universe.

There are currently over 14,000 of them in orbit, a number that's rising quickly. That's a real issue for astronomers.

So-called satellite-induced light pollution is already interfering with a significant number of images captured by observatories on Earth, and with thousands more low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites planned, the problem is only going to get worse.

"The night sky is one of humanity's oldest windows into the Universe," says astrophysicist Astha Chaturvedi from the University of Surrey.

"But it is becoming increasingly difficult to see things."

Chaturvedi and a team of researchers in the UK think they might have the answer: Vantablack 310, a specific formulation of one of the blackest materials ever developed, intended for use on spacecraft.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJNwAKSL17s

In lab tests, coating satellites with Vantablack 310 meant that only 2 percent of incoming light was reflected.

"Our results show that relatively simple material choices could make a meaningful difference to how satellites affect astronomical observations without requiring major changes to mission design," says Chaturvedi.

The researchers used physics models to test the black coating's performance at different points in orbit – a shiny satellite is more reflective over snow than over the open ocean, for example.

At its most reflective, the Vantablack 310 satellite scored between 6.7 and 7.0 on the AB magnitude scale (lower values indicate brighter).

Two bronze busts – one of which has been coated with Vantablack 310.

 (Surrey NanoSystems)



Many simulated orbits produced results comfortably above this, with values reaching 7.1 to 7.8.

That worst-case figure of 6.7 is just below the magnitude-7 threshold for satellite and orbiting-object brightness recommended by the International Astronomical Union.

It's also much better than the magnitude 3.7 scored by an uncoated SpaceX satellite tested by the researchers.

It's worth mentioning that SpaceX has also tested methods to reduce satellite brightness under the names DarkSat and VisorSat. Vantablack 310 proved comparable to or better than these as well.

"Under identical geometric and areal assumptions, the coated surface yields peak brightness values that are fainter than those reported for uncoated Starlink chassis, and comparable to or fainter than DarkSat and VisorSat variants," write the researchers in their published paper.

In addition, the team used an electron microscope to see how the ultra-black coating affected the treated satellite.

They found it created "coral-like features with cavity-like depressions", evidence of the physical properties that are doing the light trapping.

Under a scanning electron microscope, Vantablack 310 has a "coral-like" appearance. (Chaturvedi et al., Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 2026)


Vantablack 310 is a relatively new version of the original material, designed to be easier to apply and harder-wearing – though, as the researchers point out, all of this still needs to be put to the test in space.

"We emphasize that this study addresses optical performance only," write the researchers.

"Spacecraft-level thermal behavior, environmental durability, and system integration require dedicated thermal-vacuum testing and in-orbit validation and are therefore beyond the scope of this work."

Further experiments are already in the pipeline, and Vantablack 310 is set to be used on an upcoming CubeSat mission called Jovian-1. This will allow researchers to take real-world brightness measurements from the ground while the satellite is in orbit.

If we're going to be increasingly reliant on these LEO satellites for communication systems (and maybe even AI data centers), it shouldn't come at the cost of being able to get a full view of the night sky.

These initial tests show that Vantablack 310 can help – even if we'd still need a different solution for the space debris problem.

"Space is becoming increasingly crowded, creating challenges not only for astronomers but for everyone who values an unspoiled night sky," says astrophysicist Noelia Noël from the University of Surrey.

"What is encouraging about this research is that it moves us beyond simply identifying the problem and towards developing practical, evidence-based solutions."

The birth of modern Man

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Neanderthals Nearly Vanished 75,000 Years Ago – Then One Group Repopulated Europe

By U. of Tübingen, July 11, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/neanderthals-nearly-vanished-75000-years-ago-then-one-group-repopulated-europe/

Entrance to Pešturina Cave in Serbia, where a Neanderthal tooth genetically analyzed in this study was discovered. 

Credit: Dusan Mihailovic

A new study from the Senckenberg Nature Research Society and the University of Tübingen reveals major shifts in Neanderthal genetic history.

Near the end of their time in Europe, Neanderthals were not spread across the continent as a deeply varied population. Their DNA now points to a much narrower story: a severe genetic bottleneck, a retreat into one refuge, and a later expansion by descendants of that surviving group.

A study combining new DNA evidence with archaeological records suggests that Europe’s final Neanderthals went through a major population turnover before they disappeared roughly 40,000 years ago. An international research group led by Professor Cosimo Posth at the Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment at the University of Tübingen traced this history and found that earlier, more widespread Neanderthal populations in Europe had largely vanished.

The new analysis indicates that one localized group survived harsh conditions about 75,000 years ago by retreating to a climate refuge in what is now southwestern France. After about 65,000 years ago, descendants of that refuge population expanded across Europe. As a result, nearly all Late Neanderthals studied so far appear to come from the same maternal genetic lineage.

Excavations at the Tourtoirac rock shelter in France, where three Neanderthal remains analyzed in this study were found. 

Credit: Luc Doyon



Posth and his colleagues also found evidence of another sharp decline around 45,000 years ago. Neanderthal numbers fell quickly and reached a low point around 42,000 years ago, not long before the species disappeared. The findings were published in PNAS.

Neanderthals were genetically distinct from Homo sapiens, the modern humans who replaced them in Europe by around 40,000 years ago. The broad outline is known, but the details of their final population history have remained difficult to reconstruct because the evidence is scattered and incomplete.

“We have evidence that Neanderthals inhabited Europe continuously between 400,000 and 40,000 years ago. However, we have only fragmentary details of their population history,” says Posth. “So far, we know very little about the evolutionary developments that preceded their extinction.” For that reason, Posth and his colleagues focused on Late Neanderthals, the groups that lived between roughly 60,000 and 40,000 years ago.

Artist’s impression of the glacial landscape encountered by Neanderthals during the Ice Age.

 Credit: Direction de l’archéologie du Pas-de-Calais/Benoît Clarys
Ten rare new individuals


To follow the genetic trail, the researchers turned to mitochondria in Neanderthal teeth and bones recovered from caves and rockshelters. Mitochondria are small structures inside cells that help produce energy. They also carry their own DNA, inherited separately from the DNA in the cell nucleus.

“Mitochondrial DNA does not contain nearly as much genetic information as the entire genome of a human being, but it usually survives longer and is easier to obtain,” says Charoula Fotiadou from Posth’s research group and first author of the study.

That durability made mitochondrial DNA especially useful for rare and ancient Neanderthal remains. Fotiadou and colleagues sequenced mitochondrial DNA from 10 previously unanalyzed Neanderthal individuals found at six archaeological sites in Belgium, France, Germany and Serbia. They then compared those data with 49 previously published Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA samples.

Collection of Neanderthal skeletal elements retrieved from Goyet Cave in Bel-gium, three of which are investigated in this study. 

Credit: Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences



The genetic evidence was paired with archaeological information from ROAD, a major database documenting Neanderthal presence across Europe. ROAD was developed by the ROCEEH (The Role of Culture in Early Expansions of Humans) project of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences, the Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum Frankfurt, and the University of Tübingen.

“This allowed us to combine the two lines of evidence and reconstruct the demographic history of Neanderthals in terms of space and time,” said study co-author Jesper Borre Pedersen from the ROCEEH project.

Late Neanderthals all of the same stock

The combined evidence points to a major disruption around 75,000 years ago, when Ice Age conditions appear to have hit European Neanderthals hard. Archaeological sites became fewer and more concentrated in southwestern Europe, while genetic diversity dropped.

“Our data enabled us to reconstruct geographically that Neanderthals retreated to what is now southwestern France. There, around 65,000 years ago, a new population emerged and later spread across the whole of Europe,” says Posth. “This explains why almost all Late Neanderthals sequenced so far – from the Iberian Peninsula to the Caucasus – belong to the same line of inherited mitochondrial DNA.” The pattern suggests a large genetic turnover in European Neanderthals, with later groups descending mainly from one surviving lineage.

Artist’s reconstruction of the Neanderthal foetus from Sesselfelsgrotte in Germa-ny. One of the highlighted bones recovered from this individual was analyzed in this study.

 Credit: Alice Walczer Baldinazzo



The researchers also tested whether changes in mitochondrial DNA diversity matched what would be expected from a Neanderthal population that stayed roughly the same size over time. The result did not fit that stable scenario. Instead, the data point to a rapid and severe decline between 45,000 and 42,000 years ago.

“Genetically speaking, the Late Neanderthals were a very homogeneous group,” says Posth. “So it may be that the low genetic diversity – and possibly also the subsequent isolation of small groups – contributed to the disappearance of the Neanderthals.”

The birth of modern Man

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Scientists Think Bee Silk Could Be a Surprising New Supermaterial. Here's Why.

12 July 2026, By F. MacDonald

https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-think-bee-silk-could-be-a-surprising-new-supermaterial-heres-why

(Diane Labombarbe/iStock/Getty Images Plus)

While the world drowns in plastic, researchers are on the hunt for practical materials that are lightweight, tough, and biodegradable.

In recent years, scientists have increasingly turned to the natural world for inspiration – with a whole lot of research focusing on the impressive features of spider silk.

But there's another promising alternative hiding in plain sight: bee silk.

If you're scratching your head right now, you're not alone. Most people have never heard of bee silk.

"Silk production is far more widespread in nature than most people realize," Oran Wasserman, a molecular biologist who completed his doctorate at Utah State University in Justin Jones' Spider Silk Lab, told ScienceAlert.

"Silk has evolved independently many times, with at least 23 separate origins in insects alone," Wasserman explained, including ants, bees, and wasps.

Earlier this year, Wasserman and his team became the first to create a film of a specific type of bee silk – an important first step in harnessing the power of the incredible material.

In the insect world, silk can be used for anything and everything from web-building to nest construction to cocoon-spinning.

For bees specifically, the purpose is protection.

"Social bees, such as honey bees and bumble bees, produce silk to line the brood cells of their colonies," said Wasserman.

"Solitary bees, which make up about 75 percent of all bee species, spin silk to construct cocoons that provide protection from environmental stressors."

That's right, around three quarters of all bee species spin silk.

"Silk production is far more widespread in nature than most people realize," – molecular biologist Oran Wasserman

Researchers have actually been looking into the properties of different bee silks for the past 20 years, but Wasserman and the Jones lab have taken things a step further by creating a non-invasive approach to synthesizing the silk.

This is important, because even though everyone knows how impressive spider silk is – five times stronger than steel by weight! – it has proven incredibly hard to reproduce in the lab.

Wasserman's research focused on the blue orchard bee (Osmia lignaria), a solitary bee and important orchard pollinator with small, brownish, elongated cocoons that have a distinctive nipple-shaped cap at one end.

Three cocoons from the Blue Orchard Bee (Osmia lignaria). (deepspacedave/iStock/Getty Images Plus)



These cocoons are tougher than they look.

Despite both using silk to make cocoons, silkworms and blue orchard bees produce their silk very differently. A silkworm spins its cocoon from a single continuous thread.

A bee larva takes a more architectural approach, explained Wasserman. It anchors silk to the nest cell wall, pulls the strand across using its head movements, and fastens it at a new spot, repeating the process until fully enclosed.

The resulting cocoon has only a few structural layers, but they work together to balance gas exchange, mechanical protection, moisture retention, and parasite resistance.

That last point matters more than it sounds.

Solitary bee cocoons face a very real threat: parasitoid wasps. These are wasps that locate bee cocoons using chemical signals, then attempt to punch through with a needle-like appendage to lay eggs inside the developing bee (ew, we know).

The bee silk cocoon is essentially the larva's only line of defense.

Different stages of the larva and O. lignaria cocoon. (Wasserman et al., PLOS One, 2025)



And as well as being incredibly puncture-proof (a property the Jones Lab is actively studying further with a new protocol), the material is also flexible, antimicrobial, and breathable.

Exactly the combination you'd want in next-generation biomedical materials like surgical sutures, tissue-engineering scaffolds, and technical textiles.

The challenge with harnessing these properties, however, was recreating the silk outside of the bee larva.

Wasserman's initial attempts involved isolating single silk fibers from completed cocoons, but the process was laborious and resulted in a lot of broken strands. So the team went back to the source.

"The protocol we developed isolates the silk fibers directly from the larva's mouth," Wasserman explains.

The puncture measurement test protocol, which the team has now started working with. 

(Wasserman et al., STAR Protocols, 2025)

To do this, they use a 3D-printed rearing system that mimics the bees' natural nest cavity and then they actually raise bee larvae inside.

The team monitors each larva daily and steps in at the exact moment it begins spinning – when the first threads are still loose and within reach.

The fibers are then isolated and mounted for mechanical testing.

"One of the most promising aspects of the protocol is that the larvae continue to form their cocoons, indicating that the method is minimally invasive," explained Wasserman.

With those strands isolated, the team has now been able to produce the silk from scratch, using molecular biology techniques to insert the target genes into an engineered microorganism that pumped them out in the lab.

They then purified the resulting proteins (called fibroins) and cast them into transparent, freestanding films.

This is the first time a solitary bee silk protein has ever been produced this way and turned into a material.

While it's not directly usable for any applications just yet, the technique opens the door for more study of bee silk across different species.

For example, it's known that honeybee silk is stretchier than orchard bee silk, and this same technique could potentially be used to recreate that silk, or even mix it with other materials.

That's what Wasserman and his team are doing now with their bee silk – combining it with something even stranger: hagfish slime.

Hagfish slime is also being studied by the US military for its properties.

 (Ron Newsome/US Navy)



Hagfish are ancient, jawless deep-sea fish that release a viscous secretion when threatened. This secretion rapidly expands in seawater, clogging the gills of whatever is attacking them.

That slime is a mix of mucus and fine protein threads, and when those threads are stretched and dried, their mechanical properties approach those of spider silk.

Wasserman's lab uses the same molecular workflow for both hagfish proteins and bee silk, and both materials share a similar underlying protein structure. This means they could potentially be blended together into materials that combine the best properties of each.

"Silk has been used for various purposes for millennia," said Wasserman. "Even so, most of that attention has gone to a handful of species, mainly the silkworm and spiders.

"Across insects more broadly, silk is strikingly diverse, spun by many species that vary in its composition and mechanical properties … But surprisingly many aspects, such as their silk and cocoons, remain understudied.

"As the field continues to progress, I expect many of those open questions will start to get answered."

The Life of Earth

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World-First 'Super Alloy' Could Transform The Way Metals Are Made

09 July 2026, By D. Nield

https://www.sciencealert.com/world-first-super-alloy-could-transform-the-way-metals-are-made

The microstructural evolution of the alloy, heated for 32 hours (left) versus 64 hours (right). 

(Zhang et al., Science, 2026)

Metal alloys are used everywhere from aircraft to cutlery, making them an indispensable part of modern life.

Scientists are continuing to try to find ways to improve them – which often comes down to the way they're initially formed.

Steel is one of the classic alloy examples: mostly iron with a dash of carbon and other elements, making it much stronger and harder than iron on its own.

Now, an international team of researchers has come up with a new way of building alloys. The method, described in a new paper published in Science, promises to make metals that are several times stronger than the materials we rely on today.

The researchers prompted ordered atoms in their alloy. 

(Monash University/AI)

The trick is using lower, more controlled temperatures than is normal for alloy manufacturing, and letting the metal 'bake' for a specific period.

This leads to a more stable and ordered configuration of atoms, set in blocks known as grains, that are both smaller and more well-packed than usual.

"For more than a century, alloy development has focused on composition and processing," says materials scientist Jian-Feng Nie from Monash University in Australia.

"Our work suggests that how atoms organize during manufacturing may be just as important.

"The real significance is not just this particular alloy, but the demonstration that atoms can self-organize into defect-free structures in a bulk metallic material, meaning a large, continuous piece of metal, not a thin coating, film or microscopic sample."

The alloy was strongest after 32 hours of heating (panel C).

 (Zhang et al., Science, 2026)

That note on scaling is important – the idea of smaller, better-organized grains has been explored before, but scaling it up into something usable is challenging.

In the new study, the researchers mixed five metals together: hafnium, niobium, tantalum, titanium, and zirconium. After a brief high-temperature melting stage, the alloy was dropped to a relatively low 550 °C (1,022 °F) and left for several hours and even days.

At around 32 hours was when the researchers got their best result: a 'super alloy' called a Refractory High-Entropy Alloy (RHEAD).

It's two times stronger than steel, three times stronger than aluminum, and twice as strong as the same alloy made in a conventional way.

"By carefully controlling how the atoms organize during processing, we were able to create a highly connected structure with exceptional strength and stability," says materials scientist Yu Zhang from Chongqing University in China.

Both the choice of metals and the method of preparation create the conditions for the alloy atoms to organize themselves into repeating grain patterns, responding to the natural stresses between the mixed materials to create a structure free from defects.

That organization, plus the lack of defects and gaps between the recurring grains, is what gives the added strength.

Tests showed the new alloy achieved a compressive yield strength of more than two gigapascals while retaining its ductility, meaning it bends without breaking.

"If this concept can be applied more broadly, it could open the door to materials with properties that were previously considered unattainable, with implications for alloy design that could be applied across many systems and industries," says Nie.

"Instead of increasing alloy content to achieve better performance, we may be able to design internal structures that deliver superior properties with fewer alloying elements. That could lead to more efficient, sustainable, and cost-effective alloy production."

The researchers say their discoveries open up a wealth of possibilities for future manufacturing, in everything from aerospace to energy systems – and even technologies that haven't been imagined yet.

There's a lot more work to do though. Next, the team wants to understand not just what the atoms are doing in terms of rearranging themselves, but why they're doing it, which should enable this new technique to be expanded and refined.

"For more than a century, advances in alloys have come from altering the chemical composition and processing, guided largely by empirical trial and error," says Yiannis Ventikos, the Dean of Engineering at Monash University, who was not directly involved in the study.

"This research suggests we can actually engineer how atoms organize themselves, creating opportunities to develop materials with capabilities that were previously out of reach."

The birth of modern Man

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Making the Invisible Visible: $100 Device Detects Cosmic Particles Passing Through You

By H. Douwes, U. of Delaware, July 10, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/making-the-invisible-visible-100-device-detects-cosmic-particles-passing-through-you/

Invisible particles from deep space are constantly passing through us, but a new pocket-sized detector is making them visible in real time. 

Credit: SciTechDaily.com

A pocket-sized particle detector is making cosmic ray physics accessible from classrooms to major experiments.

Particles from deep space are passing through the world around you right now. They leave no sound, taste, smell, or sensation, but with the right detector, their arrival can be counted one by one.

These particles begin with cosmic rays, energetic particles that can be produced by exploding stars and other extreme astrophysical events far beyond the solar system. When cosmic rays strike atoms high in Earth’s atmosphere, they set off a chain reaction that creates secondary particles. One important result is the muon, a tiny particle able to travel through the atmosphere and even reach below the ground.

University of Delaware physics professor Spencer Axani has built a way to bring that invisible particle rain into classrooms and research labs. His invention, CosmicWatch, is a compact muon detector that can be used by experienced scientists and high school students alike.

The device is about the size of a box of animal crackers and can be assembled from roughly $100 in electronic parts. When a muon passes through, CosmicWatch lights up, records the event and stores the data for later analysis.

Spencer Axani, assistant professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, is the inventor of CosmicWatch, a portable, low-cost particle detector that tracks muons, invisible particles that originate from space. The particles help scientists learn more about the universe’s most extreme phenomena. 

Credit: Jeffrey C. Chase



CosmicWatch was first designed as an affordable way to introduce students to particle physics. It has since found a second life in international astrophysics experiments, where its small size and low cost make measurements possible in places that would be harder to reach with conventional equipment.

“CosmicWatch detectors allow us to do far more physics at a dramatically lower cost, in a compact and portable form, opening the door to many new kinds of experiments and outreach opportunities,” Axani said.

Birth of a detector

Muons matter because they carry clues about the cosmic rays that created them. By measuring muons, physicists can infer the energy, mass, and direction of the original cosmic ray, helping them study powerful objects and events such as supernovae, gamma ray bursts, and blazars. Muon flux also helped provide one of the earliest experimental confirmations of Einstein’s theory of special relativity in the early 1940s.

Their usefulness is not limited to space. Because muons can pass through matter such as walls, rock, and human tissue without causing damage, they can be used to peer inside large structures that are otherwise difficult to examine. In 2016, muon technology helped reveal an unknown corridor inside the Great Pyramid of Giza.

The challenge has always been access. Many muon detectors are large, expensive, and difficult to move, which limits both classroom use and the range of experiments that can be attempted.

Doctoral students Masooma Sarfraz and Miles Garcia (center and right) examine data from CosmicWatch in the lab, while senior Collin Owens and Axani work on part of a future experiment that will incorporate the invention. 

Credit: Evan Krape and courtesy of Musarate Shams



“A typical undergraduate physics lab course uses a rack of electronics about the size of a small bookshelf to measure muons,” Axani said.

Axani created CosmicWatch in 2017 while he was a graduate student at MIT. At first, his goal was practical: build a small, low-power muon detector for the IceCube observatory in Antarctica. IceCube is a vast detector buried beneath the ice that studies neutrinos, another kind of subatomic particle. A muon detector helps IceCube scientists separate background particles from the neutrinos they are trying to detect.

The project changed direction when Axani realized that the same design could become an educational tool. A portable, inexpensive detector could let students handle real particle physics data without needing a full lab of specialized electronics.

After joining the UD faculty in 2022, Axani continued refining the device and recently released its third version. The upgrades, described in an October article in the Journal of Instrumentation, allow CosmicWatch to monitor its local environment, survive high radiation levels and collect data more quickly.

A shot from when the balloon used in Shams’s experiment burst. He recovered the CosmicWatch miles away from the launch site, and used the data to show how the flux of cosmic rays coming from outer space changes with altitude. 

Credit: Evan Krape and courtesy of Musarate Shams



“Even though I had studied cosmic rays, I didn’t fully appreciate the rich physics behind the working of these detectors to actually ‘see’ the world and atmospheric particle production,” said Masooma Sarfraz, a doctoral student in Axani’s lab and primary author on the journal article. “For a student like me who has been working on theoretical ideas, this was a perfect opportunity to dive into the experimental side. It also connects beautifully to my current broader research work with particle physics.”

The newest CosmicWatch is useful for calibrating large-scale detectors and is now being used in the NuDot experiment at UD and the Coherent CAPTAIN-Mills (CCM) dark matter detector in Los Alamos, New Mexico. Another version is being developed to measure primary cosmic rays aboard rockets and spacecraft.

Science in action

CosmicWatch remains a teaching tool at UD, where Axani uses it to introduce students to particle, nuclear, and astrophysics. Students build the detectors themselves, learn how high-speed electronics work, and then use the devices to run experiments they design.

UD physics professor Spencer Axani has invented a portable, low-cost detector that senses invisible particles from space called muons. Muons help scientists learn more about some of the most extreme phenomena in the universe, like exploding stars, gamma ray bursts and blazars. CosmicWatch is being used in international astrophysics experiments, and in high school and college classrooms across the country, introducing a new generation of scientists to the field of particle physics. 

Credit: University of Delaware

Musarate Shams, a doctoral student in the quantum science and engineering program, adapted his CosmicWatch by adding temperature and pressure sensors. He wanted to use it to investigate cosmic rays in Earth’s upper atmosphere.

In May, Shams sent the device up on a high-altitude balloon that climbed to 100,000 feet, near the edge of space. After studying the data, he was able to show how the flux of cosmic rays from outer space changes with altitude.

“It’s a very cool thing to build something in the lab in a couple of days that’s able to detect these cool particles from hundreds of light-years away,” he said.

CosmicWatch is also reaching classrooms beyond UD. Natasha Holmes, the Ann S. Bowers Associate Professor of Physics at Cornell University, has students in her introductory physics courses build the detectors and use them in experiments. For Holmes, the value is not just that students learn a concept, but that they work more like experimental physicists.

Doctoral student Musarate Shams used a CosmicWatch he built in an experiment investigating cosmic rays in the Earth’s upper atmosphere. The detector was attached to a high-altitude balloon that rose to 100,000 feet above the Earth. 

Credit: Evan Krape and courtesy of Musarate Shams



“The students seem really excited about doing this thing that is more like what particle physicists and experimental physicists actually do,” she said. “They get to learn some coding with it, and sometimes they break the devices and then we have to talk to them about being careful with your equipment. It’s very different from a typical physics lab. We’ve had students say they’re doing ‘real science’ after using it.”

Worldwide physics

Axani estimates that thousands of CosmicWatch detectors have been built since the first version was released eight years ago. He hopes the number could grow into a global citizen science network, with people around the world measuring local muon rates and sending their data to a shared site online.

He is also developing a related detector that could help groups of satellites respond to their environment. For example, the detectors could warn satellites about solar flares, allowing them to power down when needed.

The project began as an educational outreach effort, but it has since moved into research, calibration work, and possible space applications.

“Although it started as an educational program, it’s found a use in a lot of different areas of physics,” Axani said. “It’s pretty cool.”

The birth of modern Man

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Humans Have a 'Sixth Sense' You've Probably Never Heard Of – And It Appears to Be Key For Mental Health

11 July 2026,By F. MacDonald

https://www.sciencealert.com/a-sixth-sense-youve-probably-never-heard-of-in-humans-may-be-crucial-for-mental-health

(Yana Iskayeva/Moment/Getty Images)

We all know that humans have five senses. But a growing body of research shows we have a sixth one that almost nobody talks about – and it may be just as important for our wellbeing as any of the others.

It's called interoception: the body's ability to sense and interpret its own internal signals.

This sense detects things that seem 'invisible' but are happening constantly: your heart rate, your breathing, your hunger, the temperature running through your body.

"Although we don't take much notice of it, it's an extremely important sense as it ensures that every system in the body is working optimally," psychologists Jennifer Murphy of Royal Holloway University of London and Freya Prentice of University College London wrote in The Conversation in 2022.

"It does this by alerting us to when our body may be out of balance, such as making us reach for a drink when we feel thirsty or telling us to take our jumper off when we're feeling too hot."

So far, so simple.

But researchers are now beginning to realize that interoception goes beyond simply regulating our biological needs, and may play a part in a range of mental health conditions – including anxiety, depression, PTSD, and eating disorders.

It's still early days, but the general idea is that our awareness of things such as our muscle tension, breathing and heart rate can give us important clues about when a situation is 'safe' or 'unsafe'.

When interrupted, this process could contribute to mental health conditions.

(Maria Korneeva/Moment/Getty Images)



For example, someone with anxiety might be acutely aware of their heart rate in a situation such as a social interaction, which makes them feel uncomfortable in that situation.

Murphy and Prentice's 2022 analysis of 93 studies found that interoception differs significantly between men and women – with women showing lower accuracy on heart-based tasks in particular.

This may partly explain why conditions like anxiety and depression are more prevalent in women than men from puberty onward, they wrote for The Conversation, though they stressed that the relationship is complex and not fully understood.

But they're not the only ones exploring this link.

An experiment published in eBioMedicine this year looked at how hunger impacted mood, and showed that people with strong and accurate interoception experienced fewer mood swings than those with poor interoception.

"This does not mean they never felt hungry – they just seemed better at keeping their mood levels stable," medical psychologist and corresponding author Nils Kroemer from the University of Tübingen in Germany wrote for The Conversation.

One of the most striking pieces of evidence about interoception comes from research on people with anorexia nervosa by scientists at UCLA.

(Carlos Barquero/Moment/Getty Images)



The idea is that in people with anorexia, they have stopped being able to 'listen' to their own internal hunger signals.

By testing this interoception with an ingestible vibrating pill, the researchers were actually able to show that this was indeed the case – even after the patients put weight back on.

"People with anorexia nervosa do not simply ignore signals from the body," said Sahib Khalsa, the study's senior author and a neuroscientist at UCLA.

"Rather, their nervous system may process gut sensations differently, making those signals harder to detect, trust and learn from. Over time, that may contribute to the persistence of symptoms even after weight is restored."

However, not everyone is so convinced – an opinion published in Frontiers in Psychology in 2024 claimed "There is no such thing as interoception".

The authors, led by cognitive scientist Felix Schoeller from MIT, admitted their headline was designed to grab attention, but in reality they believe that researchers may be oversimplifying many different factors under the broad term of this interoceptive sixth sense.

"While the title of this article is intentionally provocative, it serves to highlight a critical issue in the field: namely that the term 'interoception' is often used in ways that belie the complexity and diversity of the phenomena it purports to describe," the team wrote.

And they may have a point. Barry Smith from the University of London claims humans actually have up to 33 different senses.

What we can say for sure is that humans are much more sensory than we give ourselves credit for. Even if we don't have a name for those senses as yet, they're already playing a bigger role in our wellbeing than we realize.

"Better understanding all the factors that affect interoceptive ability may be important for someday developing better treatments for many mental health conditions," wrote Prentice and Murphy.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

A 'War' Between Elephants And Humans Is Brewing in Southern Africa

10 July 2026, By C. Cassella

https://www.sciencealert.com/a-war-between-elephants-and-humans-is-brewing-in-southern-africa

(Steve Stringer Photography/Moment/Getty Images)

Which footprint is bigger? An elephant's or a human's?

It depends on how you measure it.

As humanity leaves its mark on more of the African savanna, we are increasingly stepping on the toes of wild elephants.

Researchers in the United States and Namibia are now warning that a 'turf war' is afoot.

In Namibia, Botswana, and portions of Angola and Zambia, the rapid overhaul of wild land over the past two decades has brought humans and elephants into ever more conflict.

It's endangering both us and them.

African elephant in the village of Ramotswa in Botswana. 

(poco_bw/iStock/Getty Images)



Using public records, researchers have identified three major factors driving the increase in human-elephant conflicts from 2004 to 2020.

The growth of human populations and the increase in human land use were the main factors at play, but climate-driven water deficits also played a smaller role.

If all three of these factors continue unchecked, machine learning algorithms predict future battles over land and resources will intensify in number and extent.

"We find that the area at high risk of human-elephant conflict increases by 33 to 100 percent by 2085," the international team concludes.

"Aggressive human land-use expansion leads to the most dramatic increases in conflict… "

The new information comes at a crucial time in elephant conservation for this region of southern Africa.

Just as populations of the African savanna elephant (Loxodonta africana) are finally recovering from decades of poaching, their habitats are shrinking.

African savanna elephants are a keystone species, meaning that on their broad shoulders rests the fate of numerous other animals in the savanna ecosystem.

Unfortunately, however, it seems that our encroaching roads and fences are funneling the megafauna straight to human communities.

In this unnatural setting, elephants are known to raid crops, injure people, destroy infrastructure, and hurt livestock.

This can be devastating for local communities, and it has, at times, led to the culling of wild elephants. What's more, it undermines local support for elephant conservation.

"These trends, alongside the potential of growing climate pressures to further escalate conflict, present critical challenges for resource managers in the region," write the study authors, led by Evan Patrick from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

The team includes researchers from the University of Namibia and the nation's Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism.

In this nation, the most common form of human-elephant conflict is elephant crop raiding.

Warning traffic sign for elephants on gravel road in Namibia. 

(Gunter Lenz/imageBROKER/Getty Images)



Because farming is so important to the region, the study authors point out that aggressive encounters with elephants "can result in economic damages that outweigh local benefits from trophy hunting."

The 'war' that is brewing between elephants and humans is heating up in Namibia's Zambezi region in particular.

This wet landscape is located in the nation's eastern panhandle, and it is very attractive to expanding farming interests.

It is also a functional corridor between core elephant reserves, where these large creatures are protected by law.

African elephant walking through human spaces.

 (poco_bw/iStock/Getty Images)



In some regions, communal land management is self-governed and self-organized. This was intended so that on ancestral lands, the local people hold common property rights over wildlife and tourism operations.

Subsistence farming, however, remains a key livelihood strategy for many of these residents, bringing them head-to-head with elephants.

In the current study, human-elephant conflicts were assessed across 38 communal conservancies that have rapid population growth, with a combined population of nearly 150,000 people.

Using this data, future estimates consistently projected "a trend of increasing overlap and discord between elephants and human populations."

Today in southern Africa, nearly 300,000 elephants are protected by conservation efforts, but that success story may be at risk.

Without proactive intervention, the turf war between elephants and humans is projected to rapidly increase through the end of the century, conclude Patrick and colleagues.

Still, they argue, the fact that land use is the number one factor leading to human-elephant conflict should empower local decision-makers.

When planning for the future, leaving space for elephants could mitigate future damage, support coexistence, the researchers say, and "protect human livelihoods and at-risk species into the coming decades."

It's not too late to leave some parts of the savanna untrampled. We need to be careful where we step next.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

The “Hobbits” Mysteriously Disappeared 50,000 Years Ago – Scientists Have Revealed What Happened to Their Home

By N. Scroxton, G. van den Bergh, M. Gagan, and M. R. Puspaningrum, July 10, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/the-hobbits-mysteriously-disappeared-50000-years-ago-scientists-have-revealed-what-happened-to-their-home/

Homo floresiensis skull. 

Credit: Shutterstock

A long drought on Flores may have helped drive Homo floresiensis and its prey away from their cave refuge.

For more than a million years, a small human relative survived on the volcanic island of Flores in Indonesia. Then, about 50,000 years ago, Homo floresiensis (also known as “the hobbit” thanks to its small stature) vanished, leaving one of the most intriguing mysteries in human evolution.

New evidence points to a possible culprit: a severe drought that began roughly 61,000 years ago and lasted for thousands of years. In our new study, published in Communications Earth & Environment, we built the most detailed climate record yet for the area where these ancient hominins lived.

The results reveal an ecosystem that shifted from relative abundance to growing stress. As rainfall declined, H. floresiensis and one of its main food sources, a pygmy elephant, appear to have been pushed away from their usual refuge. That movement may have brought the hobbits into contact with the much larger Homo sapiens.

View of the Wae Racang river looking upstream from Liang Bua towards Liang Luar. 

Credit: Garry K. Smith



An island with deep caves

The discovery of H. floresiensis in 2003 changed our thinking on what makes us human. These diminutive small-brained hominins, standing only 1.1 meters tall, made stone tools. Against the odds, they reached Flores seemingly without boat technology.

Bones and stone tools from H. floresiensis were found in Liang Bua cave, hidden away in a small valley in the uplands of the island. These remains date to between 190,000 and 50,000 years ago.

Today, Flores has a monsoonal climate with heavy rainfall during wet summers (mostly from November to March) and lighter rain during drier winters (May to September).

However, during the last glacial period, there would have been significant variation in both the amount of rainfall and when it arrived.

To find out what the rains were like, our team turned to a cave 700 meters upstream of Liang Bua named Liang Luar. By pure chance, deep inside the cave was a stalagmite that grew right through the H. floresiensis disappearance interval. As stalagmites grow layer by layer from dripping water, their changing chemical composition also records the history of a changing climate.

Our caving team in the deep, brooding interior of Liang Luar in 2006. 

Credit: Garry K. Smith



Paleoclimatologists have two main geochemical tools when it comes to reconstructing past rainfall from stalagmites. By looking at a specific measure of oxygen known as d18O, we can see changes in monsoon strength. Meanwhile, the ratio of magnesium to calcium shows us the total rainfall amount.

We paired these measurements for the same samples, precisely anchored them in time, and reconstructed summer, winter, and annual rainfall amounts. All this provided unprecedented insight into seasonal climate variability.

We found three key climate phases. It was wetter than today year-round between 91,000 and 76,000 years ago. Between 76,000 and 61,000 years ago, the monsoon was highly seasonal, with wetter summers and drier winters.

Then, between 61,000 and 47,000 years ago, the climate turned much drier in summer, similar to that seen in Southern Queensland today.

The hobbits followed their prey

So we had a well-dated record of major climate change, but what was the ecological response, if any? We needed to build a precise timeline for the fossil evidence of H. floresiensis at Liang Bua.

The solution came unexpectedly from our analysis of d18O in the fossil tooth enamel of Stegodon florensis insularis, a distant extinct pygmy relative of modern elephants.

The jawbone and ridged molar of an adult Stegodon florensis florensis, the large-bodied ancestor of Stegodon florensis insularis. Scale bar is 10 cm. 

Credit: Gerrit van den Berg



Juvenile pygmy elephants were one of the hobbits’ key prey, as revealed by cut marks on bones in Liang Bua.

Remarkably, the d18O pattern in the Liang Luar stalagmite and in teeth from increasingly deep sedimentary deposits at Liang Bua aligned perfectly. This allowed us to precisely date the Stegodon fossils and the accompanying remains of H. floresiensis.

The refined timeline showed that about 90% of pygmy elephant remains date to 76,000–61,000 years ago, during the strongly seasonal “Goldilocks” climate. This may have been the ideal environment for the pygmy elephants to graze and for H. floresiensis to hunt them. But both species almost disappeared as the climate got drier.

The decline in rainfall, pygmy elephants, and hobbits all at the same time indicates that dwindling resources played a crucial role in what appears to be a progressive abandonment of Liang Bua.

As the climate dried, the primary dry-season water source, the small Wae Racang river, may have dwindled too low, leaving the Stegodon without fresh water. The animals may have migrated out of the area, with H. floresiensis following.

Cross-section of the precisely dated stalagmite used in this study, showing growth layers. The graph shows the improved timeline for Stegodon fossils in two excavation sectors at Liang Bua. 

Credit: Mike Gagan

Did a volcano contribute too?

The last few Stegodon fossil remains and stone tools in Liang Bua are covered in a prominent layer of volcanic ash, dated to around 50,000 years ago. We don’t yet know if a nearby volcanic eruption was a “final straw” in the decline of Liang Bua hobbits.

The first archaeological evidence attributed to Homo sapiens is above the ash. So while there is no way of knowing if H. sapiens and H. floresiensis crossed paths, new archaeological and DNA evidence both indicate that H. sapiens were island-hopping across Indonesia to the supercontinent of Sahul by at least 60,000 years ago.

If H. floresiensis were forced by ecological pressures away from their hideaway towards the coast, they may have interacted with modern humans. And if so, could competition, disease, or even predation then have been decisive factors?

Whatever the ultimate cause, our study provides the framework for future studies to examine the extinction of the iconic H. floresiensis in the context of major climate change.

The underlying role of freshwater availability in the demise of one of our human cousins reminds us that humanity’s history is a fragile experiment in survival, and how shifting rainfall patterns can have profound impacts.

The birth of modern Man

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

A Human Habitat at The Bottom of The Ocean Is Now Operational. Take a Look Inside

10 July 2026, By J. Cockerill

https://www.sciencealert.com/this-human-habitat-at-the-bottom-of-the-ocean-is-now-operational-take-a-look-inside

Vanguard is a subsea human habitat installed at Tennessee Reef in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. 

(Brendan Hall/DEEP)

Do you really, really, really like the ocean?

Do you like it so much that you would spend multiple days living on the seafloor in a structure that is part laboratory, part dormitory, and part diving vessel?

Soon, a crew of 'aquanauts' will do exactly that, inhabiting the first iteration of Vanguard, a short-term stay subsea habitat designed by ocean engineering company DEEP.

In many ways, life inside Vanguard is like being in a spaceship. 

(Brendan Hall/DEEP)



This is not the first time humans have experimented with ocean-floor living, but it's the first time DEEP – a private company founded in 2021 – has enabled it.

Vanguard is a pilot for their much more ambitious project, Sentinel, which the company claims will enable "both short-term and semi-permanent deployments anywhere on the continental shelf" by 2027.

Vanguard, which has been installed on a fixed platform at Tennessee Reef in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, 17 meters (56 feet) underwater, can house up to four crew members at a time.

ScienceAlert spoke to DEEP's director of scientific research, Dawn Kernagis, who will be one of Vanguard's first crew members.

As a NASA-trained 'aquanaut', Dawn Kernagis (bottom right, with SCUBA tank visible) is no stranger to undersea living. 

(NASA)



Kernagis's research focus is human physiology in extreme environments, especially as it relates to the brain and nervous system.

She was previously a crew member on NASA's NEEMO 21 undersea habitat mission, so she is no stranger to undersea living.

For scientists, spending continuous time at depth for research does offer some perks.

"We want to expand subsea habitation for broader humanity," – Dawn Kernagis, DEEP director of scientific research

For instance, bringing samples to the surface has always been a bugbear for marine biologists: the rapid change in pressure wreaks havoc on a specimen.

"When a sample gets brought to the surface, it decompresses. So now, whatever the molecular signature is, whatever the cell signature is [that you're looking at in the sample], it's really related to that decompression process, right? So you're not really seeing what that sample was like at depth," Kernagis explained.

"We're really excited about being able to revisit a lot of that science, and create this new opportunity for being able to process samples in near-real time, at depth."

Vanguard is also equipped with sensors that take continuous measurements of underwater conditions, even when humans aren't present.

Those pressure conditions are a big part of human life aboard Vanguard, too, where inhabitants will essentially be living in a pocket of submerged air, at almost the same pressure as the surrounding ocean.

Essentially, Vanguard is one big decompression chamber that controls the internal pressure, and its inhabitants, saturation divers.

"It's like you've been SCUBA diving for a really long time, and your tissues and your blood gets saturated with nitrogen, the inert gas that you're breathing," Kernagis said.

"That kind of diving has been around for a long time… essentially, once you're saturated, you could stay down there for weeks, months at a time."

The surface buoy provides air, power, and satellite comms to the crew below via an umbilical cable.

 (Brendan Hall/DEEP)



Crew members can leave the habitat on an 'umbilical' – a cord that pumps air from the Vanguard's supply, rather than a SCUBA tank – which allows for dives outside the structure lasting several hours, rather than the typical 60-minute limit to traditional recreational diving.

When they first arrive at Vanguard, transported via mini-submersibles, the crew and the habitat itself are 'compressed', with pressure controlled to match conditions outside. But after the crew enter, the vessel is closed off, and its contents, air and crew included, go through a gradual decompression.

"You're essentially 'ascending'… you're still on the bottom but the pressure inside that vessel is being reduced until it gets to the equivalent of the pressure we're living at here on the surface," Kernagis explained.

After a night of decompression, Vanguard is re-compressed to pressure just above the levels outside, and then the divers can jump right back in the ocean via the habitat's 'moon pool': a kind of downwards doorway open directly to the seafloor.

Crew members can enter and exit the vessel via a 'moon pool', which, at pressure, is open to Vanguard's interior. Roger Garcia, DEEP's habitat operations director, demonstrates. 

(Brendan Hall/DEEP)



Crew members will be in contact with an onshore base 24/7, via satellite communications. A generator on a buoy at the surface provides power; fresh water is supplied to a tank, not recirculated. Sewage and wastewater are captured and removed.

Habitats like Vanguard have great scientific potential, but there are many other possible applications.

DEEP's project partners offer some hints at other commercial interests: the Unique Group, for instance, is a subsea tech and engineering company that services the oil and gas, renewable energy, and defense sectors, while Bastion Technologies services American aerospace, oil and gas, and defense industries.

"There's a long history of using subsea habitats on the defense side of things," Kernagis said.

"One of the things we're really interested in looking at is human machine teaming. So, for example, how do divers in the water intersect with robots, whether there's autonomous underwater vehicles or remote underwater vehicles."

Another of DEEP's partners, Triton Submarines, is more focused on the recreational and commercial side of undersea living, which hints at the potential tourism applications of DEEP's technology.

"We want to expand subsea habitation for broader humanity," Kernagis told ScienceAlert.

She lists artists, historians, students and educators as potential future inhabitants.

"I think also politicians, that would be great, right? To give them that exposure of what's beneath the surface of the ocean."

For now, however, Vanguard's primary purpose is scientific research, to monitor the reef in which it is situated, and the crew who inhabit it.

"We're really working hand-in-hand with the National Marine Sanctuary to make sure that it's not just us putting the habitat down, but they're also seeing the maximum use of that habitat for science and restoration purposes," Kernagis said.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/