Enlarge / Given the right data, a neural network can infer what radar maps would have looked like, were they available. (credit: NOAA/CIMSS. ) It’s become increasingly clear that quantum computers won’t possess a single moment when they become clearly superior to classical hardware. Instead, we’re likely to see them becoming useful for a narrow […]
Enlarge (credit: Trevor Mahlmann) The head of the European Space Agency has urged the continent’s leaders to stop facilitating Elon Musk’s ambition to dominate the new space economy, warning that the lack of co-ordinated action meant the US billionaire was “making the rules” himself. Josef Aschbacher, the new director-general of ESA, said that Europe’s readiness […]
Enlarge / A forest activist inspects land clearing and drainage of a peat natural forest in Riau province, Sumatra, Indonesia in 2014. (credit: Ulet Ifansasti | Getty Images) The world has lost a third of its forest since the last ice age, and an estimated 15 percent of global greenhouse gases still come from deforestation […]
Enlarge / People line up outside of a free COVID-19 vaccination site that opened today in the Hubbard Place apartment building on December 3, 2021 in Washington, DC. (credit: Getty | Samuel Corum) Amid a raging delta wave and fears of omicron, the United States on Thursday administered 2.2 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine, the […]
Rendering of Northrop Grumman’s (as yet) unnamed low Earth orbit space station. [credit: Northrop Grumman ] On Thursday afternoon, NASA announced that it had awarded three different teams, each involving multiple companies, more than $100 million apiece to support the design and early development of private space stations in low Earth orbit. This represents a big step […]
Enlarge / Rocket Lab calls this the “Hungry Hippo” fairing on its Neutron rocket. (credit: Rocket Lab) Welcome to Edition 4.25 of the Rocket Report! After the Thanksgiving holiday, we are now in the homestretch of 2021, with less than a month to go in the year. And it will be a consequential month, with […]
Enlarge / The TESS planet-finding observatory. (credit: NASA) For centuries, scientists only had a limited number of examples to look at when it came to understanding the formation of planets. As we’ve discovered ever-increasing numbers of worlds, however, we’ve found many that look like nothing what we have in our Solar System: hot gas giants, […]
Enlarge / Detail of Michelangelo’s unfinished painting The Virgin and Child with Saint John and Angels (tempera on wood, ca. 1497), aka The Manchester Madonna. The outlines of two angelic figures on left are rendered in green earth tempera underpaint. (credit: The National Gallery London/Public domain) Tempera is a painting medium that has been used […]
Enlarge (credit: Remko De Waal | Getty Images) Starting last Friday, the race was on—between a virus and information about it. And for a while, the information moved faster, even though there was hardly any of it. Scientists in South Africa identified a new variant of the virus that causes Covid-19—within days the World Health […]
Enlarge / The partially mutilated remains of a Vesuvius victim, found at the site of what would have been the beach of Herculaneum. (credit: Domenico Camardo/Herculaneum Project) Archaeologists have announced the “sensational” discovery of the partially mutilated skeletal remains of a middle-aged man who perished on the beach at Herculaneum during the eruption of Mount […]