 The military is no stranger to virtual reality (VR) technology. As noted by Wareable, the U.S. Army uses a combination of custom-made controllers and VR headsets to effectively mimic field-of-battle scenarios and have new soldiers perform various tasks under pressure, while the BBC reports that researchers in the United Kingdom are developing bomb-disposal training which is 90 percent cheaper and much safer than current training systems. But with VR systems coming down in price as they ramp up in quality, action-based virtual reality gaming is quickly becoming the norm — are kids just having fun, or can advanced game tech help potential recruits master the military mindset?Live Action or Living Room According to GeekWire, the HoloLens technology from Microsoft, which can display real-time battle data or help conduct training scenarios, has now "joined the military" to help Marines conduct training scenarios and researchers study the potential effects of IEDs. But as noted by Engadget, game-based VR such as the "Jackal Assault" space combat simulator — part of the incredibly popular "Call of Duty" franchise — is now available to all PS4 owners who also have a PlayStation VR headset. The verdict? It's immersive, fun and adrenaline-filled, marking common ground between commercially available game tech and some cutting-edge devices used by the military. VR is also making its way into the world of quick decision-making with the advent of realistic driving games. As noted by Michael Addabbo, Systems Engineer in Modeling and Simulation for Northrop Grumman: "Sometimes I'll go home and race in virtual online racing using a VR. The cars and race tracks are so accurate, professionals use them to practice, and I've found myself racing online with professional racing drivers practicing using VR." The ability to mimic real-world scenarios such as combat situations or high-speed racing puts VR on the path to significantly influence military technology — not only are gamers interested in what military operations look like from the inside, virtual reality games establish the foundation for effective skill-building.All Fun and Games? Of course it's easy to dismiss shoot-em-up games, even in virtual reality, as a poor imitation of actual military encounters. It makes sense; the violence depicted can be over-the-top or entirely too real without context, giving rise to worries that gamers who play combat-based simulators could develop issues such as increased aggression or decreased empathy. Recent research, however, paints a different picture. As noted by the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), new studies show that action games may boost cognitive abilities thanks to "improvement in perceptual templates, which help subjects understand their surroundings." In addition, researchers found that these benefits lasted for months after the initial experiment concluded, suggesting a net positive effect for gameplay. Psychology Today, meanwhile, reports that combat games which focus on working within teams suggests "a strong potential value of cooperative play in developing social behavior and curbing antisocial thoughts and behavior." In other words, being part of a tight-knit unit improves emotional resilience. And VR itself has come a long way from low-res imitations of the real world; now, accurate modeling and object physics help users apply skills learned in virtual simulations to the real world. Consider aviation — according to Addabbo, "with today's level of realism in VR, we're able to completely replicate the modern cockpit virtually. Every switch and knob works just like the real aircraft. Currently we're prototyping concepts in VR before we commit to fabricating real parts. We can explore things in VR and let real pilots try them out before we fabricate real parts saving time and money."Super Soldiers Consider: What's the ideal personality profile for military personnel? Individuals with strong communication skills, solid team-building experience, exceptional chaos and stress management and the ability to react quickly if situations change or hostile threats emerge. Current games provide the foundation for improved cognitive ability, communication and team work, while virtual reality gaming may help take the experience to the next level by introducing a kind of controlled chaos — gamers are immersed through visual, auditory and even tactile stimuli and must then respond to chaotic situations such as a pitched battle, nighttime air assault or virtual bomb defusal. Real-world results back up the potential benefits; as noted by Azad Kupelian, Lead Systems and Software Engineer for Northrop Grumman: "We're not just seeing cognitive gains through VR, but we're modeling the efficiencies of how people interact with machines and each other. Through the use of VR for factory design, we're able to more accurately predict how teams will work together on a floor before we even break ground, and also foresee how a part's design affects our ability to manufacture it much earlier in the development process, when changes cost less." Combined with the right outreach programs from military agencies, it may be possible to leverage VR gaming as an effective way to reach better-than-average recruits who can more easily transition into tech-savvy military roles. VR is now a reality for combat organizations worldwide. But augmented gaming may offer a new way to leverage this technology and seek out potential members with an above-average military mindset.

Virtual Reality Gaming: Mastering the Military Mindset?

A new study has illuminated the fact that there are polar bears at risk for health problems caused by exposure to toxic chemicals around Hudson Bay, Canada. These chemicals can disrupt biological functions in polar bears and damage their immune, digestive and reproductive systems, according to CBC News.  Even without the revelations about toxic chemicals, scientists have predicted that we could lose wild polar bears by 2100 due to climate change, according to Polar Bears International. After several decades of research, scientists are still learning more about how animals are affected by pollution.  New Study Reveals Chemicals in Polar Bears  Researcher Robert Letcher told CBC News that, "The new study complicates our understanding of the complex cocktail of chemicals the bears are exposed to as they try to adapt to changing climate ... if a compound can migrate its way through the food web, all the way up to the polar bear, it must be pretty extensive.'"  According to WWF, bears with high levels of certain chemicals have "low levels of vitamin A, thyroid hormones and some antibodies. These are important for a wide range of biological functions, such as growth, reproduction and the ability to fight off diseases."  Even worse, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, if mother polar bears are exposed to high levels of chemicals, their milk can even become poisonous to bear cubs, which are especially sensitive to environmental toxins in early development.   Enable targeting cookies to view this content.  The 2001 Stockholm Convention  Although the new study reveals a new mix of chemicals in bears, scientists have been concerned about this class of chemicals — called persistent organic pollutants — for decades. POPs are toxicants that remain in the environment for long periods of time and can travel via wind and water, so they often accumulate thousands of miles from the source, according to the Stockholm Convention.  According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, POPs have caused environmental and health problems for both wildlife and humans, which led to 91 countries signing an international treaty called the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants — designed to address transboundary pollution. They "agreed to reduce or eliminate the production, use, and/or release of the 12 most dangerous POPs," said the EPA. More chemicals have since been added to the list, such as substances used for everything from flame retardants to pesticides.  Unfortunately, POPs still put animals like polar bears at risk. Even though these chemicals are now banned, they still pose a threat to wildlife and human health for several reasons, according to the EPA. First, POPs last so long that even if production was completely eliminated, they would remain in our environment for many years. Secondly, they are difficult to contain and track; since they travel though wind and water, POPs can affect ecosystems far away from where they were originally produced. Additionally, many developing nations have only recently started to restrict POPs.  Keeping an Eye on Arctic Wildlife  The good news is that there is new technology to keep track of how animals are affected by pollution. New screening methods are better at detecting chemicals and researchers are keeping a close eye on Arctic wildlife. For example, a Northrop Grumman team recently developed a drone specifically designed to track polar bears.  Now that scientists have a better understanding of global warming, they are investigating what happens to these persistent chemicals when Earth's temperatures rise. "'If there's any stressing factor to life in the Arctic, it is climate change,'" Letcher said. "'It's a major challenge for us to understand how climate change variables are affecting contaminant exposure.'" 

Polar Bears at Risk From Toxic Chemical Exposure

What happens when three black holes share the same region of space, all orbiting one another? As Science News reports, it remains a mystery. Their orbits may be so unpredictable that even if their motions were measured to the maximum precision theoretically possible, their orbital paths would still elude us. Computer simulation of a black hole's orbit may thus demonstrate some fundamental characteristics of time. And, according to astrophysicist Nathan Leigh, the results show that "Quantum mechanics imprints into the universe chaos at a fundamental level." No Harmony of the Spheres The very idea of science is rooted in our experience that the world around us can be fairly predictable. If you drop an apple, it will probably fall straight down, not sideways or up. On the big scale of astronomical events, this predictability or regularity of nature is particularly strong, like the sun rising in the east every morning. The first great triumph of science was the ability to construct an accurate calendar and predict events such as a solar eclipse. These accomplishments were based on the regularity of celestial orbits. Today, this same predictability of orbits allows NASA to send spacecraft to the outer planets and measure the orbits of exoplanets many light-years away. If a black hole's orbit is not predictable, even in theory, that shakes things up. Running the Time Tape Backwards Orbital simulations and similar scientific models, explains Interesting Engineering, are based on a principle known as time symmetry. That is, if you simulate an orbit, then run the simulation backwards, it will work just as well. The simulated object will be orbiting in the opposite direction, but it won't fly off into the void in an unexpected way. The real universe, as Interesting Engineering notes, isn't quite so neat. If you drop a cup, it will shatter and won't piece itself back together. Astronomers and mathematicians have long known that orbits involving three objects can't be calculated with the precision attainable for two objects orbiting each other. This is commonly known as the three-body problem. The normal solution for this problem is to simulate the orbit step by step, as precisely as the available programming and computing power allow. Researchers have found that these simulated orbits can't always be run in reverse — that attempts to do so do not always end by reproducing the initial start conditions, as they should, according to the principle of time symmetry. What they didn't know was whether these failures were due to the nature of the universe, or only to the technical limitations of a particular simulation, such as how many decimal places it could calculate. Black Holes, Gravity and Quantum Mechanics  Now a team led by astronomer Tjarda Boekholt has built a simulation model so precise that the precision limit of the simulation is set not by the available computing power, but by the structure of the universe itself. It's specifically set by a distance known as the Planck length, which according to the theory of quantum mechanics is the shortest length that can be measured in the universe, according to Science Alert. (How long is the Planck length? About 0.000000000000000000000000000000000016 meters. Aren't you glad you asked?) The researchers tested their model by simulating the process of predicting the behavior of a black hole, or in fact three black holes. Why black holes? Because their gravitational fields, which are so intense that not even light can escape, magnify quantum effects — usually noticeable only on the subatomic scale — to the point where they can have large-scale effects. What the simulation research team found was that, even with Planck-length precision, their model couldn't play back about 5% of simulation runs in reverse to return to the model's initial conditions. These runs break time symmetry because predicting the behavior of a black hole in these runs turns out to be impossible. What's more, there is no way to know in advance which 5% of runs will break time symmetry, which means that time symmetry cannot ever be entirely counted on. A Touch of Chaos Physicists and mathematicians use the term chaos for systems in which tiny changes in initial conditions can produce dramatic changes in the final outcome. The study results, says Science News, confirm that orbital systems involving three black holes are fundamentally chaotic, and can never be reliably predicted over long periods of time. Says Science Alert, quoting team member Portegies Zwart, "Not being able to turn back time is no longer just a statistical argument ... It is already hidden in the basic laws of nature." By odd coincidence, reports Universe Today, astronomers recently discovered three supermassive black holes orbiting each other in a galaxy a billion light-years away. But they cannot provide a direct test of orbital chaos, because as Science News notes, we can't measure actual black holes with the accuracy needed to model their orbits to Planck-length precision. We can also be glad, perhaps, that the black holes' chaotic orbits are a billion light-years from Earth.

From a Black Hole's Orbit, Chaos Erupts

Is anyone out there? It's a question that's captured human interest since we first took to the stars — are we alone in the universe, or are there other intelligent lifeforms gazing up at the sky and wondering the same thing? Instead of waiting around for aliens to get in touch, stellar scientists decided to make the first move with the Arecibo Message — a brief, focused effort at interstellar communication aimed at the M13 globular star cluster just over 20,000 light-years from Earth. While we haven't heard back yet, the message remains a pivotal moment in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) and has helped to inform the future of human space exploration. The Universal Translator On November 16th, 1974, Puerto Rico's Arecibo Observatory turned its transmitter to the sky and beamed the most powerful and deliberate interstellar communication ever created into space. It took less than three minutes to complete the broadcast, which contained 1679 bits arranged into 73 lines with 23 characters per line. The 305-meter antenna produced transmission power equal to a 20 trillion watt multidirectional broadcast, but instead of sending information randomly out into the cold darkness of our universe, the team picked the globular star cluster M13 some 20,000 light-years away. Of course, it's not enough to just send a message; the Arecibo team also needed to craft a communication that civilizations with comparable technological capabilities of 1970s-era Earth could not only receive but understand. They settled on a pictorial postal package that contained crude images of the Arecibo telescope itself, our solar system, a stick-figure human and the familiar DNA helix. In addition, the total number of message bits, lines and bits per line were all purposely made prime numbers to help reduce the risk that receiving researchers would dismiss the signal as mere cosmic noise. Express Delivery With the capacity to send such a powerful message, why did scientists pick M13, also known as the Great Cluster in the constellation Hercules, instead of a system closer to home? Both physical constraints and communicative potential played a role; not only would the constellation be located directly above the observatory at the time of the broadcast, but the cluster also contained at least 300,000 stars and potentially as many exoplanets, making it an ideal target. As Nadia Drake — daughter of Frank Drake, who composed the Arecibo message — notes in a National Geographic article, the "heart" of M13 would also fit perfectly within the narrow beam produced by the transmitter, and even after the 20,000 year travel time, the cluster will remain firmly within the scope of the message's delivery radius. Cutting Through the Noise While there's some concern that potential extraterrestrial recipients might discover our message, track it back to Earth and arrive with less-than-noble intentions, the bigger worry is that we won't hear anything at all — that we're actually alone in the universe or that our message is simply missing the mark. Of course, there was never a realistic chance that the Arecibo Message was going to return a reply in our immediate future. Even if aliens at the other end of the line detected the transmission, decoded the details and had a way to circumvent light speed to send a reply, it would still take at least 20,000 for this digital delivery to happen. Even worse? As the New York Times notes, more than 250 aluminum panels were damaged when a support cable fell and tore a 100-foot long gash in the Arecibo antenna dish. While there are plans to repair the dish, both total costs and timelines are uncertain. According to Smithsonian Magazine, there might be a better option: building a SETI observatory on the moon. Not only would this take the burden off Arecibo as the sender and receiver of extra-solar contacts, it could also solve the bigger problem of radio noise. And, as the Smithsonian notes, not only does our atmosphere block a significant amount of the radio spectrum (great for life on Earth but not optimal for interstellar communication), but the rapid uptake of radio-based devices also makes an already loud receiving room that much louder. What happens if aliens intercept our message in-transit or discover one of the Voyager probes, then send a reply or reach out on their own — and we miss the message? The moon offers a calm and quiet alternative. As astronomer Phillipe Zarka notes, "The far side of the moon during the lunar night is the most radio-quiet place in our local universe," making it the ideal location for an orbiting SETI station and, eventually, a ground-based lunar observatory capable of listening intently for any universal replies. Can You Hear Us Now? The Arecibo Message represents humanity's first foray into deliberate delivery of interstellar communication. While it's unlikely that we'll hear back anytime soon, the medium — not the message — is what really matters when it comes to making first contact. From increasing investment in ground-based telescopes to the potential for lunar observatories, the more planetary packages we dispatch, the better our chances of finding new interstellar neighbors.

Ready, SETI, Go! Analyzing the Arecibo Message

Mega-blockbuster "Jurassic Park" gave us the iconic image of Brachiosaurus striding across fertile plains, head held high and body devoid of feathers. Instead, it had the smooth reptilian look commonly associated with Earth's once-dominant lifeforms. But evolving fossil research suggests that dinosaur skin wasn't so much flat as it was feathered — which opens the door to a prehistoric world full of fuzzy, feathery dino families that challenge our notion of the familiar. Did dinosaurs have feathers? Yes, but fossil finds still paint a fuzzy picture of how far this feathered framework fanned out. Bird Is the Word The idea of feathered dinosaurs isn't new — in the 1990s, fossils from China made it abundantly clear that dinosaurs were the ancestors of modern-day birds and shared their propensity for physical featheration. But this initial group of fuzzy fossils was confined to therapods or "raptor" dinosaurs, such as the velociraptor, which offered a close evolutionary link to our modern avians. However, according to a National Geographic piece from 2014, fossil discoveries in Siberia showcased a new species, Kulindadromeus zabaikalicus, which was similarly feathered but from a different family: the two-legged, beaked runner "ornithischian" group. These 4.5-foot-long speedsters sported thin feathers that likely evolved from scales. In fact, evidence of both scales and feathers were found in the fossils. While this dino couldn't fly, and it's not known exactly what the feathers were for (though one potential explanation is insulation), its discovery gave rise to the notion that almost all dinosaurs shared a common, feathered ancestor. Hit the Ground Running With the direct ancestors and running cousins of the feathered family, it was only a matter of time until flight-capable creatures also got their moment in the feather fossil spotlight. As Discover notes, work from 2018 found evidence of "novel filaments" on flying pterosaurs — considered "cousins" of the more familiar dinosaurs — suggesting they were at the very least fuzzy and potentially feathered. Analysis of well-preserved pterosaur fossils had already revealed hollow filaments known as "pycnofibers," indicating they had some type of furry covering. But the discovery of additional pycnofiber types in other pterosaur species demonstrated a branched structure type that only occurred on the creatures' wing membranes, which suggests that at least some pterosaurs had more familiar feather forms. However, debate remains about the origin of feathers across multiple evolutionary groups. Some scientists suggest that dinosaurs and pterosaurs shared a common, feathered progenitor and took their cue from the anatomy of this ancestor, while others argue that these two groups developed feathers independently. Regardless of their converged or parallel past, the fact remains: Feathers are everywhere. Facing the Feather Facts But wait! Before we get too far off the ground, it's worth noting that feather fossil frameworks take us only so far. According to an analysis of all known dinosaur skin specimens by Professor Paul Barnett of the Natural History Museum (NHM), it's unlikely that feathers fanned out particularly far from theropods, ornithomimosaurs and pterosaurs — creatures that all shared bird-like characteristics. Dinosaurs such as the horned ceratopsian Triceratops, meanwhile, were almost certainly scaly. Solving the scale-or-feather puzzle is much like dealing with the dino dental debate — it all comes down to accurately identifying examples of both in fossils of varying quality and age. As the NHM notes, true features must be made of beta-keratin, must display a branching structure and must originate from a follicle. Not surprisingly, this isn't an easy task when dealing with multi-million-year-old skin samples. Barnett puts it simply, "If we look at the evidence that we do have, and we combine that with evolutionary trees, what we find is that there is no evidence for the first dinosaurs being feathered." Instead, he suggests that all dinosaurs may have had the genetic potential to produce feathers — but not all had the predisposition. Discovering why — and how — specific species sprouted feathers offers an entirely new and engaging branch of study. Did dinosaurs have feathers? Affirmative. Did all dinosaurs have feathers? Fossil findings suggest this is a flight of fancy.

Did Dinosaurs Have Feathers? Fossils Fuel Fuzz-First Frameworks

Hearing the name "Stonehenge" creates a common set of mental images featuring massive and monolithic minerals towering above Salisbury skies. It also raises a host of questions around who built the structure, why and how they accomplished such a feat. Now, researchers from the University of Salford have added their own audio appellation: What did Stonehenge sound like? Henge-ing Your Bets Despite its place in human history and regular appearance in television, movies and novels, the history of this henge — a circular ditch and bank — aren't exactly set in stone. While it's likely the site was used as a burial ground and took millennia to fully construct, the mandate and methodology behind this prodigious project remain shrouded in myth. Consider the second phase of the building process, which historians typically date to around 2,800 BCE. Approximately 80 bluestones were lifted into standing positions and placed in a circular formation. Not only were these stones massive, but they were also likely located at least 200 miles from the Stonehenge landscape, meaning ancient builders needed to both ship and stand these stones without the aid of any modern technology — including the wheel. The site's purpose is also uncertain. Many scholars believe it may have been used as a ceremonial site or pilgrimage destination, while other researchers suggest it functioned as an astronomical calendar. More recent discoveries also indicate its potential as a place of healing. Now, there's a new entry making noise in the field of Stonehenge science: acoustic archaeology. Acoustic Advantages: The Science of Sound As Ars Technica notes, acoustic archaeology — also called archaeoacoustics — focuses on the role of sound during historical events or in specific locations. For example, acoustic archeologists have examined the role of "acoustic shadows" in the loss of critical Civil War battles and the sound of a chirping bird produced when visitors clap their hands at the bottom of the Mayan Temple of Kukulkan at Chichen Itza. The Stonehenge landscape has long been known for strange sounds. For example, the arrangement of stones creates peculiar echoes and produces humming noises in strong winds. Acoustical engineer Trevor Cox and his team at the University of Salford decided to explore these auditory oddities further by creating "Stonehenge Lego," a 1/12 scale model made of 3D-printed and painted blocks standing in for the real standing stones, which produced a structural soundscape capable of both amplifying speech and enhancing music. Cox and his team explain, "It seems improbable that sound was a primary driver in the design and arrangement of the stones at Stonehenge," but the acoustical advantages would certainly have garnered attention. Archeologist Timothy Darvill of Bournemouth University also notes that these structural sounds "must have been one of the fundamental experiences of Stonehenge." Can You Hear Me Now? Work by the University of Salford team turned up two salient soundscape insights: Audio signals inside the stone circle were amplified, while those outside were dampened. As a result, participants within the monument could better hear music or speaking, while those passing by were largely unable to listen in. To measure the acoustic properties of a structure, acousticians use what's known as "impulse responses" — the time between initial sound input (impulse) and any sound reflections (response) off any surfaces. For the Stonehenge Lego model, Cox and his team used four-directional speakers in five locations producing sounds at twelve times normal frequency to account for the 1/12 structure scale. They found that sound inside the circle reverberated for at least 0.6 seconds in most cases and up to 0.8 seconds for lower-frequency impulses. For comparison, larger spaces such as cathedrals may have reverb times up to 8 seconds, while your average living room comes in at around 0.4 seconds, making the 0.6-0.8 second range ideal to slightly amplify sound without causing significant interference or echo. Rock n' Role Much like the pyramids, the stones of Salisbury Plain stand as a testament to human ingenuity and engineering— and provide an endless source of speculation for historians, astronomers and archaeoacoustic adherents alike. Yet, while the exact role of this mammoth monolith may never be fully revealed, one thing is certain: There's beauty in the sound of science.

Stonehenge Sound Science Offers Acoustic Addition to Monumental Methodology

About five thousand light years from Earth, in the direction of the southern-sky constellation Centaurus, lies the coldest place in the universe — or at least the coldest natural object astronomers have yet detected. It's called the Boomerang Nebula on account of its appearance in telescope images (and because the astronomers who found it were Australian). Space.com reports that the object is believed to be the shroud of a dying red giant star that will in due course be "reborn" as a tiny but very hot white dwarf star. But for a brief cosmic moment, we're seeing it in a transitional phase when the shroud, formed from the dying star's outer layers, has become extremely cold. The Low End of the Thermometer How cold is the Boomerang Nebula? We can't (yet!) send a thermometer to take its temperature, but we can measure its radiation spectrum, a reliable guide to temperature. And according to Science Alert, it is cold: a frosty -458.5 degrees F, or -272.5 degrees C, less than half a degree (Centigrade or Kelvin) above absolute zero, the theoretical temperature of matter with no heat content whatsoever. In fairness, asking what is the coldest place in the universe is a bit of a trick question because the coldest places we know of are in laboratories right here on Earth. As Astronomy magazine wryly noted in 2015, one could even give the address (a lab at Harvard), but some other lab may might be the current record holder. Earthly labs use deliberate refrigeration technology to achieve such low temperatures, but how did the Boomerang Nebula get so cold? The minimum temperature of the universe as a whole is set by the so-called cosmic microwave background (CMB), left over from the Big Bang more than 13 billion years ago. The CMB temperature comes out to -270.4 C, more than two degrees Centigrade warmer than the Boomerang Nebula. In fact, per Science Alert, astronomers only realized how cold the Boomerang was when they discovered that it was absorbing CMB radiation that passed through it. That could only happen if the nebula was colder than the CMB temperature. In effect, the Boomerang Nebula is a naturally occurring laboratory-grade refrigerator. Shroud of a Dying Star Apart from the puzzle of it being the coldest place in the universe, the Boomerang Nebula is a familiar type of object called a protoplanetary nebula. In spite of the name, it has nothing to do with protoplanets, or planets of any sort. Rather, it is an initial stage in the formation of a planetary nebula, so named because it looks like a cluster of distant planets when viewed through a small telescope. These objects are formed when a sunlike star reaches the final stages of its life cycle. As its nuclear fuel runs low, internal processes cause the star to expand into a red giant. Then, as the internal nuclear furnace runs out, the star's core collapses while its already-distended outer layers are puffed away into space. The core finally becomes a white dwarf, a "dead" (but still very hot) stellar cinder. Ultraviolet light from the white dwarf causes the surrounding shroud to fluoresce and become visible as a planetary nebula. The nebula expands and ultimately fades away, leaving just the slowly cooling white dwarf. The Boomerang is still early in the process of forming a planetary nebula, hence the term "protoplanetary," but how did it become the coldest place in the universe? A Hidden Binary The likely answer, says Space.com, was first proposed by astronomer Raghvendra Sahai, who wrote in a 1990 scientific paper that the expansion of a red giant's outer layers into a protoplanetary nebula could act as a natural refrigerator. Just as compressing a gas heats it up, reducing its pressure by allowing it to expand cools it down. Astronomy magazine notes you can see this process at home: Spraying from a can of whipped cream or tire-inflating gas causes the container to feel cooler. Ordinarily the gentle expansion of a protoplanetary nebula would not produce the very low temperature of the Boomerang, but measurements show that the Boomerang is expanding much faster than usual. The likely culprit is now believed to be a companion star to the dying red giant that formed the Boomerang. As it swelled into a red giant, says Science Alert, it actually absorbed the companion stars, but the companion's orbital motion tore the red giant's outer layers away, hurling them off into space at nearly 100 miles per second, ten times the usual expansion rate. According to Universe Today, the result is that we are watching the Boomerang in the brief cosmic moment of maximum cooling. According to astronomer Lars-é…ke Nyman, co-author of the paper describing the process, "We see this remarkable object at a very special, very short-lived period of its life. It's possible these super cosmic freezers are quite common in the universe, but they can only maintain such extreme temperatures for a relatively short time." Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

The Coldest Place in the Universe — And How It Got So Cold

 As a health-conscious consumer, you're probably aware of the buzz around probiotics. But did you realize that live yogurt might soon be on the menu in bee hives? The global bee population is under attack and scientists recently found that probiotics might be just the thing to help the insects recover.Decline of the Bees Beekeepers have noticed declining bee populations around the world since the late nineties. But in 2005, apiarists began reporting losses at a more frequent rate — opening hive after hive to find whole colonies dying at once. Researchers and farmers alike began to worry about the loss of these social insects.  As major crop pollinators around the world, bees are an invaluable species. Bees play a major role in agriculture, both for food and fiber crops. As essential pollinators for plants such as oranges, apples, cotton, lima beans and canola, the European Union estimated their value at around 153 billion Euros in 2005. In North America, bees are responsible for pollinating over a third of the foods you eat. The state of North Carolina estimates that — averaged over five years — honey bees "directly accounted for approximately $96 million in annual fruit and vegetable production (67.9%) and approximately $186 million in total annual crop productivity (24.5%)." Colony Collapsers But why should the global bee population suddenly take such a hit? Upon noticing the decline, bee researchers swung into action. Still, nothing seemed clear. Finally, after a number of studies, scientists narrowed the collapsing bee population puzzle down to three main factors: Infection: Infection is often a cause of sudden death throughout a population. Bees, as hive animals, are susceptible to a range of pathogens. When scientists looked at affected hives, they found higher levels of parasitic Varroa mites. While these mites don't actively kill their hosts, they weaken the bees by feeding off them. They also carry viruses that affect larval development by causing wing deformation or early death. Loss of habitat and supporting food plants: With changes in agriculture and the effects of climate change, habitats all over the world are changing. Simply put — bees need flowers. They need the pollen and nectar as food to survive and rear larvae. Insecticides and fungicides: When researchers analyzed hives that had collapsed, they found high levels of chemicals commonly used as pesticides and fungicides by the agricultural industry. A group of these sprays known as neonicotinoids, or neonics, seemed the worst culprits. In the end, there isn't a final and definitive answer; researchers have found that all of these factors combine to weaken the insects. Studies show that bees exposed to the neonics exhibit less resilience to infections and dietary stress. They didn't live as long as unexposed bees and also show behavioral changes. These changes impacted hive life since affected bees were less likely to perform vital cleaning or hygiene activity that keeps a hive healthy. Exposure to neonics also seriously impacted flight, with exposed bees foraging less for food or struggling to navigate their way home.Probiotics for Bee Microbiomes? Along with breeding Varroa-resistant strains and reducing pesticide use, bee specialists are finding that there are ways to help the bee population resist the stresses of modern living. Most recently, research in fruit flies shows that carefully selected probiotics can benefit the insects. When exposed to the neonic pesticides, the flies showed changes in their microbiota or bacterial flora and were more likely to die of infection or heat stress. However, when treated with probiotics, the challenged flies lived longer and resisted infection. The researchers found that the probiotic lactobacilli stimulated the insect's immune system. Since fruit flies have a similar immune system and carry the same bacterial populations, it's possible that this kind of support could help bees too. Not Just the Bees but the Birds, Fish and Beasts of the Field  Research into probiotics shows there is potential for the live bacteria to help in other areas of animal health, especially for species used in food production. Traditionally, farmers have used antibiotics as growth promoters to accelerate cost-effective animal rearing. However, in order to avoid the dangers of developing antibiotic resistance, the farming industry is now looking for alternatives such as in-feed probiotics. A 2016 report from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization summarizes the potential benefits of probiotics for the food industry and global food security. Food Conversion: Ruminants such as dairy cattle rely on their rumen microflora for getting energy from feed. Since probiotics change the gut bacterial content, they can be used to make food digestion and conversion more efficient by altering the rumen contents. Animals would need less feed to produce meat and milk, for example. Growth Rate: Poultry grows faster with in-feed probiotics, producing better quality meat in a shorter rearing time. The same is true for beef cattle and pig production. Infection Control: There's also some evidence that probiotics could help farm animals resist infection and producers are already moving toward this and other strategies to reduce antibiotic usage. In the future, probiotics may be an important feature of global agriculture and food security. As for bees and live yogurt? Yes, it is a possibility — apiarists already support bee colony health by placing pollen patties in the hive as a nutritional snack for busy workers.

Solution to Bee Population Woes Includes Probiotics

 Nowhere in the world are the effects of global climate change more visible and dramatic than in the Arctic, as documented by NASA's Aqua satellite and other powerful monitoring tools. The rate of warming across the Arctic is twice the global average. Vast regions of the Arctic Ocean, once covered with sea ice year round, are now open water during the summer months. This Arctic climate change is a transformation that has profound short and long-term national security implications. As the Arctic Ocean becomes open to widespread human activity, the world economy will be changed, with all the security implication for sea routes and other economic activities. At the same time, changes in the Arctic climate could accelerate climate changes worldwide. Opening the Northwest Passage ... Nearly five hundred years ago, explorers began searching for the Northwest Passage — a sea route around the northern edge of the North American continent that would save thousands of miles during a voyage between Europe and Asia. For centuries they never found it. Ships that attempted the Northwest Passage found their way blocked by Arctic sea ice. As NASA recounts, not until 1903—1906 did explorer Roald Amundsen succeed in making the passage in a specially built ship. But the voyage remained impassable to commercial shipping or indeed any conventional ships. Arctic climate change, however, is on the verge of opening the Arctic sea lanes — not only the Northwest Passage but also its counterpart, the Northeast Passage along the Arctic coast of Russia. Arctic coasts will thus become accessible for the first time. Ironically, Arctic land transportation could become more difficult as permafrost melts into marsh and mud. Rich deposits of natural resources are known to exist along these Arctic coasts, but sea ice rendered them economically out of reach. Now they are becoming accessible, potentially triggering a gold rush of activity that could raise the economic — and security — stakes across the Arctic region. As the CBC notes, the impact on Canada is particularly dramatic: Canada has the world's longest coastlines, more than 100,000 miles in all, most of it within the Arctic circle. Claims of territorial and navigation rights, once only nominal, may now become flashpoints of tension. Thus the Arctic region draws special attention in a Pentagon report on the national security implications of global climate change. Worldwide Security Implications But Arctic climate change has other national security implications that extend far beyond the Arctic. Polar bears are not alone in being threatened by the retreat of the Arctic sea ice. During the summer, the Arctic season of the midnight sun, intense sunlight pours down. Historically, sea ice has reflected most of it back into space. But as the ice melts, this summer sun is absorbed by sea water, warming it — and thus accelerating the process of global climate change. The warmer it gets, the faster the sea ice melts, and the more ice is melted, the more rapid the warming, a classic vicious circle or positive feedback loop. The effects, such as disruption of agriculture, could have a destabilizing effect on security worldwide. In responding to this national security challenge the first requirement is knowledge. As the Arctic region is transformed, we need to monitor both changing environmental conditions and growing human activity in the area. Yet Arctic conditions remain rugged at best, often hostile, making autonomous drone operations a natural and necessary solution for research and patrol surveillance alike. Thus a new tool for Arctic research is becoming available just as the need for it is growing.

The Seas They Are A Changin': Arctic Climate Change and National Security

 Black holes remain a contentious issue among stellar scientists. While their existence is all but confirmed, debate continues about exact mechanisms of operation, size and impact on general relativity. However, we are close to having some answers. As noted by National Geographic in 2017, a global team of researchers completed the first ever "photo shoot" of Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way, using the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). These pictures are close to being developed by the MIT Haystack Observatory and the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy, Mother Nature Network said.  Then there will finally be hard evidence — one way or another — of the existence or absence of mega-sized black holes.  The Theory  According to general relativity, massive objects curve or "warp" space—time and create gravity. Conceptually, the easiest visual is stretching out a blanket and then dropping a ball in the middle — the heavier the ball, the bigger its depression.   Enable targeting cookies to view this content.  Smaller objects will naturally fall "down" toward the ball, but if they're moving at high speed — like planets orbiting the sun — they roll around the massive center. Einstein's theory also predicts that the closer objects get to massive objects, the more gravity affects their orbit. As noted by New Scientist, this is evident in Mercury's orbit, which is odd enough that scientists once argued for the existence of another planet inside its orbit to explain the disturbance.  General relativity also predicts the existence of black holes at the center of galaxies that are orbited by all mass in that galaxy. And while repeated testing has yielded results consistent with black hole formation and existence, researchers have never been able to directly observe a black hole. If the EHT worked as intended, a close-up may soon be available. [skyword_iframe src="//www.youtube.com/embed/e-P5IFTqB98" height="315" width="560" ]  Current Observations  There's a sizable amount of research that suggests that black holes are out in the cosmos warping space-time and consuming all matter that comes their way. In January 2017, for example, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory detected gravitational wave distortions that indicated a black hole—to—black hole binary collision. In 2015, LIGO spotted these black holes on a collision course; the current measurement lines up with predictions about their impending crash.  Or consider the work of Aurelien Hees of the University of California. In the 1990s, Hees and other scientists began tracking the orbits of stars close to Sagittarius A* — S0-2 and S0-38 take 16 and 19 years, respectively, to complete full revolutions. Now Hees and his team have tracked their entire orbits and found that general relativity accurately describes their path and movement. Next year, S0-2's elliptical orbit will take it just 111 AUs from the black hole, for an even better chance to view potential deviations. So far, however, relativity and the four fundamental forces hold up, with no sign of the mysterious "fifth force" posited by some experts.  Teams at the University of Texas and Harvard University, meanwhile, tackled another question: What happens when a black hole "eats" stars that stray too close? The accepted theory is that they're trapped by the event horizon — the point past which even light cannot escape — and then simply "vanish." But other theories postulate the existence of a hard surface, something stars would crash into once they're trapped in the gravity well. Researchers determined what would happen if the hard surface theory were true — the star's gas would envelop the black hole and create a glow. Researchers then sought evidence of these so-called "transients" using current data on star masses. The result? No transients and further affirmation of Einstein's theory.  Smile!  All this goes to show why the work of the EHT is so critical. Using five telescopes in Hawaii, Arizona, Mexico, the South Pole and Spain — combined with the acuity-enhancing Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, researchers may finally have taken the first picture of black-hole event horizons. It was a grueling process, since the telescopes needed clear weather at all locations simultaneously to gather solid data. While there's no guarantee that the end result will be usable, and even if the images aren't ideal, astronomer Heino Falcke said they "will turn black holes from some mythical object to something concrete we can study."  Let's just hope we caught Sagittarius A*'s good side.   

Physics Photo Op: Black Hole Images May Soon Be Available

Sixty years ago NASA opened its doors. In just over a decade, the agency put a man on the moon and permanently expanded human perception. But in 2011, NASA's space shuttle program ended and astronauts began hitching rides on Soyuz spacecraft to the ISS. In 2014, the Obama administration put any plans for a new moon mission on hold indefinitely. Space Policy Directive-1, however, has now driven NASA to embrace commercial space flight as a way to manage routine operations in low-earth orbit, while the agency develops plans for both manned moon landings and trips to Mars. With private companies ready for blast off in 2019 and looking to pave the way for large-scale commercial tourism, the future of space travel may be much closer than it appears. Slip the Surly Bonds of Earth As noted by NPR, the first commercial space flights carrying four NASA astronauts will launch in 2019. The upcoming flights are a test-run of sorts: If everything goes well, further missions will be scheduled to deliver and retrieve ISS crews, shuttle supplies and support other NASA low-earth initiatives. They're not without challenges: Astronauts used to taking the helm and making critical decisions will instead be along for the ride unless something goes wrong. In Air & Space, astronaut Bob Behnken described the shift to automation as "'transitioning to allow humans to do things they're good at, like recognizing when something's not quite right. What we're not good at is monitoring one parameter for hours and hours to make sure it's perfect.'" Getting it Right "Space taxi" manufacturers also have to pass rigorous NASA tests to ensure their craft are up to the challenge. For example, issues with fuel pressure and cracked engine turbines prompted redesigns of the Falcon 9 rocket — NASA wants at least seven successful launches before signing off, along with five successful fueling runs designed to be carried out when crews are on board. Boeing, meanwhile, must address concerns about a crew abort system that Air & Space noted could "tumble dangerously," along with contact potential between the craft's heat shield and parachute system. Bottom line? If commercial companies can't produce craft with odds of a fatal incident less than one in 270, NASA won't green-light new space taxis. Costs of Doing Business Beyond a better way to reach the ISS than buying seats on a Soyuz, what's the advantage of commercial space flight for NASA? According to Bloomberg, one major benefit is the cost savings yielded by the ability to re-use rockets by landing them upright rather than having them burn up on re-entry. The use of private companies also helps NASA leverage what amounts to a cloud model of space travel: The agency doesn't pay for the hardware or maintenance, just the use of resources. But when the future of space flight is driven by commercial interests, new costs must also be considered. As EnGadget points out, current NASA space crews are effectively elite athletes. Commercial space flight solutions will need to account for a wide variety of medical needs without sacrificing too much power, space and material consumption. The Coming Age of Commercial Space Flight So what happens if the 2019 flights are successful? Large aerospace companies and other smaller ventures will start ramping up private tourism opportunities and commercial offerings. According to Forbes Technology Council, increasing competition in this market will drive lower prices, while the advent of space mineral exploration will drive a kind of "goldrush" of companies looking to stake their claim. Back to Basics For NASA, commercial trips let them focus on the future of space flight from their perspective: getting to the moon and beyond. The agency has plans to build a lunar-orbiting station — the Gateway — by 2023, and land astronauts on the moon shortly after. The Insight Lander touched down on Mars Nov. 26, and in July 2020, NASA will launch its next Mars rover, laying the foundation for manned missions by the mid-2030s. Final Frontier Space continues to fascinate and excite humankind. But the costs of space exploration are incredibly high, making it difficult for NASA to secure funding as budget restraint dominates government discussions. As noted by Time, however, the benefits are also substantial; exploration "is in effect a cultural conversation on the nature and meaning of human life." Leveraging commercial space flight to defray routine costs, NASA has the chance to redefine the future of space travel and take first steps into the next phase of human space exploration. Northrop Grumman and NASA are leaders in space discovery. To learn more about our partnership and Northrop Grumman job openings, take a look at our careers page.

Commercial Space Flight, Private Taxis and the Future of Space Travel

In the modern world, it's common for people to spend huge chunks of their day staring at screens for work, essential tasks, entertainment and social interaction. Most of these screens are backlit LED screens that emit a high proportion of blue light, especially compared with older incandescent light bulbs and natural sunlight. Because people are spending so much time on computers, tablets and cell phones — often with their eyes just inches away from the screen — some eye care professionals are worried that this could cause lasting harm.   So, does blue light damage your eyes? How do blue light glasses work? Let's explore.   What Is Blue Light?   Visible light is part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Within this spectrum, radio waves have the longest wavelengths and the least energy, followed by infrared light, visible light, ultraviolet light, X-rays and gamma rays, which have the shortest wavelengths and most energy. Within the visible spectrum, red light has the longest wavelengths and least energy, followed by orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. The last three colors — blue, indigo and violet — are often grouped together as "blue."   In the eye, light travels first through the cornea and then through the lens to reach the retina in the back. The retina contains rod cells that produce images in black and white (which is essential in low-light conditions) and cone cells to detect color (which is only possible in bright-light conditions). The cornea and lens block most UV light and prevent it from reaching the retina. Excessive exposure to UV light is known to damage the cornea and cause snow blindness, according to the American Academy of Ophthalmology. This exposure can also increase the risk of cataracts in the lens, as the National Eye Institute explains. Sunglasses with quality lenses can block 99%-100% of UV light and 75%-90% of visible light and are strongly recommended for anyone in bright sunlight.   Blue light is not blocked by the cornea or the lens — despite having just slightly longer wavelengths and slightly less energy than UV light. Most flat screen devices use a blue-light LED (peak emission of ~450-470nm) coupled with a yellow phosphor (peak emission ~580nm) to produce light that appears white, as the journal Molecular Vision describes. This color distribution is very different from that of natural sunlight.   Does Blue Light Damage Your Eyes?   Experiments have shown that blue light — more than other wavelengths of visible light — can damage retinal cells in Petri dishes and in laboratory rodents. However, these experiments are done with levels of blue light that far exceed what would be produced by a typical screen. For example, a 2018 study published in PLoS One exposed mice to bright white light (5,000 lux) for 24 hours a day for 7 days.   "Lux" is a measurement of light per surface area. Experts recommend about 300 lux for living rooms and between 500 and 800 lux for reading areas, according to ThoughtCo. The lux provided by a computer or tablet depends on the brightness setting and the distance to the user's eyes. According to Elemental, desktop computers can provide anywhere between 0.5 and 37.8 lux. This is far below the 5,000 lux used in the 2018 PLoS One experiment and many similar experiments. As an additional point of reference, sunlight can provide around 100 lux on an overcast day and over 10,000 lux on a very bright day, according to the Engineering Toolbox. Therefore, sunlight provides far more blue light than LED screens.   While the laboratory experiments on blue light are extreme, some of the results are concerning because the retinal cell damage is similar to what is seen in age-related macular degeneration, which is a leading cause of vision loss in older adults.   How Do Blue Light Glasses Work?   The 2018 PLoS One experiment used a special filter that blocked 94% of blue light while allowing other wavelengths to flow through. More typical filters only block 30%-50% of blue light and also block other wavelengths to some extent. These filters work in the same way as sunglasses that block UV light. Many companies now offer glasses that block blue light and filters that can be placed over digital screens to block blue light.   The American Academy of Ophthalmology does not recommend any special blue light-blocking eyewear for computer use. This is because the available evidence doesn't indicate that the amount of blue light produced by electronic devices harms the eye. Furthermore, blue light has many positive effects. It increases alertness, memory and cognitive function, and it treats seasonal depression.   Nonetheless, some people find that blue-light blocking glasses can decrease eye strain when viewing digital devices for long periods of time. Digital eye strain commonly results in dry, irritated eyes and difficulty focusing. This is temporary and can often be prevented by following the 20/20/20 rule: After every 20 minutes of computer time, focus on something about 20 feet away for 20 seconds.   Finally, blue light is known to suppress the production of melatonin hormone, which induces sleep. Many experts recommend turning off digital screens at least 30 minutes before bedtime.   Blue light is all around us, especially as our world becomes more digitized. But taking the proper precautions can help you keep your eyes protected.   Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery. 

Does Blue Light Damage Your Eyes?


Time dilation, in the form of the so-called Twin Paradox, is a popular and long-standing plot element in science fiction, dating back at least to Robert Heinlein's classic YA novel "Time for the Stars," first published in 1956.In the novel, one of two twin brothers goes on a voyage of interstellar exploration aboard a ship capable of traveling at nearly the speed of light. The other remains on Earth. When the starship returns and they meet again, the star-faring protagonist is still young, while his twin brother has grown old.The underlying phenomenon, relativistic time dilation, is not only a basic consequence of Einstein's theory of relativity. It has also been demonstrated experimentally many times, as the National Institute of Standards and Technology points out.

Getting Relative

The discovery of time dilation and of the theory of relativity itself has roots going back generations beyond Heinlein's novel, to the late 19th century. According to Space.com, in 1887, a physicist and chemist — Albert Michelson and Edward Morely, respectively — attempted to determine the Earth's precise movement through the universe by measuring the speed of light as observed in various directions.At the time, physicists assumed that space had a fixed geometric framework, called the "ether," that light flowed through and which Earth was also moving through, orbiting the sun and also being carried along by the sun's own motion through interstellar space.But to Michelson and Morely's surprise, their instruments measured the speed of light as the same in all directions. They checked their instruments; these worked fine but still gave the same results. Physicists were left puzzled for nearly 20 years, until a young Albert Einstein came up with an explanation that seemed completely bizarre but that also worked.Einstein showed that the speed of light really IS the same for all observers, no matter where they are or how fast they are going. The rigid cosmic "ether" that Michelson and Morely had taken for granted did not exist. Instead, our measuring instruments — both yardsticks and clocks, along with everything else in the universe — turned out to be "rubbery" in a sense, seeming to stretch or shrink so that the measured speed of light always came out the same.And in 1905, Einstein published his results, calling it the theory of special relativity.



What's so Special About Special Relativity?
Einstein's original theory was called "special" relativity because it did not attempt to cover everything. It dealt only with the effects of high speeds on matter, setting aside the implications of acceleration or gravity and, thus, was formally applicable only to special cases.Nevertheless, much of what popular culture associates with Einstein and relativity — including the speed of light as the cosmic speed limit and the famous equation E=mc2 — falls within the scope of special relativity. This also includes the time dilation effects of very high (relative!) speeds, including the "Twin Paradox" of interstellar travel at relativistic speeds.In 1915, Einstein expanded his work to incorporate gravity and acceleration; this enlarged and "generalized" version of the theory was aptly called general relativity. However, for decades, general relativity was regarded as a bit like the Andromeda Galaxy — awesome but remote, far from any practical applications. As Universe Today notes, general relativity's greatest claim to fame in popular culture was that only a handful of people in the world could understand it.Over time, though, general relativity has come to seem a bit less abstruse. The discovery of black holes — objects so dense and massive that not even light can escape from them — was a big win: One of the strangest theoretical predictions of general relativity turned out to be for real.
 


Black Holes and Time Dilation
As it turns out, general relativity also has its own implications for time dilation. In general relativity, the force of gravity is indistinguishable from acceleration, and both can cause clocks to run slower (as measured by an outside observer). If one of two twins orbited close to the event horizon of a black hole, that person would age more slowly than their sibling who remained on earth.We do not have the technology to achieve this (yet!) any more than we can achieve the "old-fashioned" time dilation of a traveler going nearly the speed of light. But per Science News, atomic clocks have reached such a high level of precision that we can measure the time-dilation slippage between clocks that are one millimeter apart (about 1/25 of an inch). The clock that is one millimeter lower (closer to Earth's gravitation) runs a tiny bit slower, just as general relativity predicts it should.Score one for Albert Einstein!Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.
 

Time Dilation: Games Relativity Plays With Clocks

The equation at the heart of Einstein's theory of relativity, E=mc2, is surely the most familiar equation in the world. It expresses that matter and energy are interchangeable, a fact that explains how the sun can shine for billions of years — and that led to the development of nuclear energy. We usually think of this process as a way to convert a small amount of matter into a lot of energy. The very form of the equation, "solving for E" as the mathematicians put it, underlines this capability. But the theory's famous equation actually works in both directions. If you write the equation m=E/c2, it is exactly equivalent to the familiar version and still expresses the theory of relativity. We usually write the equation the familiar way for a few reasons. One is that people have typically been more interested in obtaining a lot of energy rather than a little bit of matter, which we already have in piles all around us. Another reason, though, is that creating matter from energy may be good Einstein theory but is very difficult to do in practice. Going Uphill Is Harder A procedure for creating matter (specifically an electron-positron pair) from colliding light beams was outlined as early as 1934 by a pair of physicists named Gregory Breit and John A. Wheeler. But as Brookhaven National Laboratory physicist Zhangbu Xu explains, "Breit and Wheeler already realized this is almost impossible to do." The process would require a collision of extremely high-energy photons — in fact, a collision of gamma ray beams. Breit and Wheeler did offer a theoretical alternative involving acceleration of heavy ions. And, as Xu explains, "their alternative is exactly what we are doing" at the Brookhaven laboratory's Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). As IFL Science reports, in an enchanting twist, the ions used for the RHIC experiments were gold ions — just the thing for a whiff of alchemy. More remarkable is the speed to which those ions are accelerated: 99.995% of the speed of light — barely under the universe's ultimate speed limit, itself another consequence of the theory of relativity. Two streams of gold ions were driven to this enormous speed, in opposite directions and arranged so that they just barely missed a head-on collision. But according to Live Science, when charged particles such as ions (which have their own magnetic fields) are fired through another magnetic field at very high speed, they produce a wake of so-called virtual photons that, in Xu's words, are "traveling with [the ion] like a cloud." These photons do collide, and their collisions produce electron-positron pairs — exactly as the Einstein theory of relativity says should happen. (As a bonus, Brookhaven reports that the experiment also demonstrates another previously elusive effect of relativity: a vacuum polarized by a powerful magnetic field, affecting light passing through it, similar to what sunglasses do.) But Is It Real? There is a complication, though. These virtual photons are not quite real — they exist only for profoundly small fractions of a second, and for that brief time they have mass, which "real" photons do not. The electron-positron pairs produced when these photons collide are definitely real, but if they result from virtual-photon collisions, do they truly represent energy converted to matter or merely some other effect of very high-energy physics? As Science News reports, the researchers tested this question by using Brookhaven's STAR (Solenoid Tracker at RHIC) detector to make extremely precise measurements of the electron-positron pairs' trajectories. STAR showed that, thanks to the enormous speed of the gold ions that triggers the whole process, the trajectories of these created particles match exactly what would be expected from collisions of "real" photons. So are we seeing the "real" Breit-Wheeler effect? For now, the question is almost philosophical. But as other research teams ramp up the power of experimental lasers, we may soon be able to test the effect with indisputably real laser beams. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

A Twist on the Theory of Relativity: Creating Matter from Energy

Do mermaids exist? Sadly, we can definitely say no, they do not. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) puts it simply: "No evidence of aquatic humanoids has ever been found." Unsurprisingly, however, this hasn't stopped the search for proof of mermaids that could upend the scientific status quo. Have merfolk fanatics had any luck? Not a bit. Is it interesting to see what they've come up with? Absolutely. The Mermaid Myth Myths surrounding mermaids, and to a lesser extent mermen, have existed for centuries. It makes sense, as the sea is both a mysterious force and an essential part of life for many people. Indeed, for hundreds of years sea travel was the only option for inter-ocean transport. It also stands to reason that sailors and people living on shorelines sometimes saw things they couldn't explain, and many believed what they were seeing took the form of a half-human, half-fish creature. Of course, what exactly a mermaid looks like depends on your source material. In Europe and North America, the top half of a mermaid's body resembles that of a human woman, while the bottom is a fishtail. In Scottish folklore, mermaids achieved their underwater ability by wearing the skin of a fish, and if they lost this skin while on land, they wouldn't be able to return. Sailors often associated mermaids with sirens who lured ships off course and their crews to rocky deaths on shoals or reefs. In the collection of Middle Eastern folktales known as One Thousand and One Nights, mermaids have faces and hair like women and tails like fish, but their hands and feet are inside their bellies. Head to Japan and you'll hear tales of the ningyo, a monkey-fish hybrid that lives in the sea. Supposedly, the creature came into being when a fisherman trespassed into protected waters and was cursed to wander the ocean as a monkey-fish mix. On his deathbed, he appeared to Prince Shotoku and asked the prince to forgive him for his crimes and build a temple to display his remains as a reminder of the sanctity of life — and not to trespass. Thanks to American and European influence, Japanese conceptions of merfolk have slowly shifted to the more familiar human-fish hybrid. Of Monkeys and Merfolk Earlier this year, scientists got the chance to examine one of these ningyo up close and in person after it was found inside a safe in an Okayama Prefecture temple. The effort began with Hiroshi Kinoshita, a board member of the Okayama Folklore Society. After coming across a picture of mummified ningyo remains in a book about mythical creatures, he was able to track the body back to the temple, where it was worshiped as an omen of good health. Notes left inside the mummy's original box indicate that the creature was supposedly caught in the mid-18th century, sold to an affluent family, and eventually passed on to the temple. In February 2022, the temple priests agreed to let scientists examine the body using a CT scan and take DNA samples to evaluate its genetic makeup. While those results haven't yet been released, there's a likely explanation: Someone may have grafted the head and torso of a monkey onto the tail of a fish and then added embellishments of human hair and nails. This isn't the first "mermaid" that's been found in Japan. Ningyo are worshiped at several other temples across the country, and during the early years of European travelers visiting Japan, fake mermaids were sold to curious Western tourists who were unfamiliar with the legend. Making a Mermaid Where science says no, human ingenuity bridges the gap. In Weeki Wachee Springs State park, there's a year-round show featuring women dressed as mermaids who swim through "a mysterious blue underwater world of mermaids, manatees, turtles, and bubbles." Earlier this year, Discovery Channel's Animal Planet aired a mermaid special that combines science fiction with some real events to make the case for mermaids. Paired with a somber, scientific tone, the special generated enough interest that NOAA received questions about the potential existence of mermaids and issued a formal statement regarding the lack of evidence to suggest that they are real. Do mermaids exist? Put simply, there is no proof of mermaids being real, and the same goes for monkey-sea creature hybrids. Nonetheless, the fascination with mermaids isn't going under. Rather, folks who are passionate about ocean people are creating their own versions of what mermaids might look like and exploring new ways of searching for these elusive sea sirens. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Proof of Mermaids? Science Tells the Tail

What critical component does our planet have that just-down-the street solar neighbor Mars is missing? Water's not a bad guess, and life always tops the list when tantalizing new hints about Martian creatures come to light. But today, we're talking about a more protective property: Earth's strong magnetic field.  How does Earth's magnetic field work? Where did it come from, and how is it changing over time? How is the concept used (and misused) in popular media, and what are actual STEM experts doing with magnetic field functions?  What Are Magnetic Fields, and How Do They Work?  Despite the ubiquity and familiarity of magnets, their exact operation remains a mystery. The basics are easy: It's all about electron spin. In most objects, electron spin is fairly even — approximately half spin one way and half spin in the opposite direction. However, in materials such as iron, nickel, and cobalt, more electrons spin one direction than the other. When exposed to an external magnetic force, these objects become permanently magnetized. In practice, this means the creation of north and south poles and a corresponding magnetic field that flows from north to south. This type of magnetism is known as ferromagnetism.  There's also another type of magnetism that matters: electromagnetism. In this case, an electric current applied to an object causes the electrons to align, in turn creating a magnetic field. This field only exists so long as the current is on — when the source shuts off, the magnetic field fails.  The challenge? While we understand how magnetism works in context, scientists still aren't exactly sure why the conditions for magnetism exist in the first place.  What Causes Earth's Magnetic Field?  Earth's magnetic field is likely tied to the movement of molten metal in the Earth's core that causes electric currents and effectively makes the planet into a massive magnet with two poles, north and south. But these don't always line up with the geographical north and south poles. In fact, Earth's magnetic poles switch places approximately once every 300,000 years, and there's evidence that we're due for another switch soon. Right now, the poles are moving at 35 miles per year.  The result of this molten movement is a magnetic field that extends out and around our planet in a "teardrop" shape thanks to pressure and compression from solar wind. It's this wind we'd need to be worried about if our magnetic field ever disappeared — the strength of Earth's field means that most high-energy particles tossed our way by the sun never reach the surface; instead, they're trapped by constantly moving field lines. Worth noting? The intensity of these particle pushes isn't consistent. Solar "storms" can cause an uptick in particle volume, which in turn creates brighter and more easily visible northern and southern lights.  But this isn't the whole story. New research suggests that Earth may have had a magnetic field more than 4 billion years ago, long before the core started solidifying and molten rock movement began the process of massive magnet creation. The result? Other forces must have been at work — but there's no consensus around exactly what causes Earth's magnetic field.  Magnetic Movie Magic  Given the ubiquity and familiarity of our magnetic field, it's no surprise that the concept shows up in a host of sci-fi movies. The caveat? Some do it better than others.  In the swing-and-a-miss magnetism department, we've got films like Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. In the film — spoiler alert! — the heroes turn on a massive electromagnetic coil to pull in the evil T-X for an untimely demise. The problem? Other magnetic items in the scene are totally unaffected. This is an oversight we see in sci-fi quite a bit: the science conveniently stops working when the fiction demands it.  On the other side of the coin are movies like The Core, which do a decent job of explaining the protective impact of Earth's magnetic field and why it's such a massive problem that the planet's core has stopped spinning. It's not all good news, however. The movie claims that Earth's magnetic field protects us from solar microwaves, which simply isn't true. Not only does the sun produce a minimal amount of microwaves compared with other types of radiation, but these waves are absorbed by the air when they arrive. Even more problematic? Magnetic fields don't affect microwaves. At all.  Making Magnetic Fields Work for Us  While movies may not make the most of magnetism, scientists are hard at work looking for new ways to leverage this field-producing framework.  Consider work from MIT on ferrimagnetic substances. While similar to ferromagnetic materials, there's a significant difference between the two. Ferromagnets see the north-south axes of their atoms lined up in the same direction, in turn producing a strong magnetic field. Meanwhile, ferrimagnets have sets of atoms with axes in the opposite direction. If the number of atoms pointing in each direction is equal, the result is no magnetic field. However, changing the orientation of even a few atoms produces a weak magnetic field. While they can't compete with ferromagnets for strength, their ability to flip directions with only minor adjustments makes ferrimagnets a great choice for data storage — new research leverages small changes to rapidly flip the magnetic polarity, effectively allowing these magnets to act as a "1" or "0" in binary storage devices.  Efforts from the University of Konstanz managed to isolate a new type of magnetism that exists in strontium ruthenate (Sr2RuO4), which is a well-known superconductor. Using a beam of muons, the team found surface magnetism that exists independently of superconductivity and can coexist alongside it — something long thought impossible. The muon beam revealed that, unlike most magnetic materials that rely on electron spin, circulating electron currents at nanometer scale are responsible for Sr2RuO4's magnetism. Other work includes the development of ultra-sensitive magnetometers capable of pinpointing positions even if GPS systems are damaged or unavailable.  Mars 2.0?  Simply put, our planet's magnetic field offers a massive benefit for life on Earth. Without it, solar radiation would slowly strip away our atmosphere, in turn giving rise to a second red planet in our solar system.  Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology, and engineering. 

An Attractive Opportunity: Unpacking Earth's Magnetic Field

Getting a full-body health scan sounds like a great way to detect potential problems before they become too serious. After all, early detection is the rationale behind blood tests for high cholesterol, mammograms for breast cancer, colonoscopies for colon cancer, and blood tests for other cancers. Companies such as Prenuvo offer a full-body health scan that can detect hundreds of different health conditions in the early stages, such as tumors and aneurysms (weakened arteries). So if you have the money and are concerned about your health, why wouldn't you spend $500 for a full-body CT scan or $2500 for a full-body MRI? Well, there are actually some good reasons not to do so, and some reasons why it could be a good idea. Benefits and Risks At the outset, there's simply no evidence that the benefits of an MRI or CT scan outweigh the risks for people who show no signs of illness, as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) notes. This benefit versus risk calculation is also why the American Cancer Society only recommends mammograms for women over 40, unless they are at increased risk. Mammograms use X-rays to detect breast cancer, and X-rays cause DNA damage that can increase the risk of developing cancer.  CT scans also use X-rays combined with computer technology to produce image "slices" of the inside of the body. When a CT scan is used as a whole-body scanner, it results in more X-ray exposure than a typical mammogram. For patients who are showing symptoms, CT scans can be used to detect various cancers and determine whether they have spread to other parts of the body. They can also detect a buildup of calcium in the arteries of the heart, blood clots and other abnormalities. The most detailed images may require patients to ingest special dyes or radioactive material, according to Choosing Wisely. CT scans are also used on trauma patients to detect broken bones or other internal injuries quickly. Another type of body scanner is the MRI, which uses harmless magnetic fields and radio waves instead of X-rays, so there's no increased cancer risk. This makes MRIs the preferred choice for people who need frequent imaging, according to the Cleveland Clinic. MRIs are also better than CT scans for providing clear images of soft tissues, such as the heart, liver, kidneys, spleen, brain, spinal cord, nerves, muscles, ligaments and tendons. While MRIs pose less risk than CT scans, there's still the very real possibility of finding something unexpected that's not causing any harm, which could lead to additional tests, biopsies and unnecessary treatments. The Results Have Been Significant A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine reported on 2000 healthy volunteers between the ages of 45 and 97 who each underwent an MRI of the brain. A whopping 7.2% of participants showed evidence of a stroke, 1.8% had cerebral aneurysms (a weak spot in a brain artery), and 1.6% had non-cancerous tumors. None of these volunteers were showing any symptoms, and most would continue to be unaffected by anything detected in the MRI. It's up for debate whether these MRIs provided any information that could benefit these patients. In a similar study, the British Medical Journal reported on 600 emergency room patients and found that one-third had abnormalities detected by CT scan that were unrelated to their emergency room visit.  MRI or CT scans may be beneficial for individuals at high risk of developing certain diseases. Studies are currently underway for patients at high risk of lung cancer or colon cancer, according to the FDA. For some women at high risk for breast cancer, MRIs are recommended in addition to mammograms. Reputable healthcare institutions do offer total-body CT scanning for high-risk patients working closely with knowledgeable physicians. For example, the Cleveland Clinic offers total-body CT scanning to analyze three major areas of the body: the lungs (to detect potentially malignant nodules), the heart (to detect aortic aneurysms and calcium deposits within the coronary arteries) and the abdomen/pelvis (to detect kidney stones, cysts, enlarged lymph nodes, large abdominal/pelvic masses, fatty liver). So while full-body health scans aren't recommended for everyone, anyone at high risk or with worrisome symptoms should — as always — contact a healthcare professional. Are you interested in all things related to technology? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

A Full-Body Health Scan Could Be in Our Future

Destructive hurricanes like Harvey and Irma certainly get attention, but the threat of rising sea levels is an everyday concern for coastal populations. While some corners of the world still debate the legitimacy of climate change, the governments of low-lying coastal cities aren't waiting around, especially when the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) and the non-profit environmental group Climate Central predicted that the U.S. faces an extreme sea-level rise of up to 12 feet by 2100. Instead, public and private entities prepare for drastic upheaval by exploring natural and artificial technologies and new planning approaches that have the potential to combat flooding. Floating cities, living shorelines and other options might give coastal communities a fighting chance to adapt to a rapidly changing world. Disappearing Islands Rising sea levels are the most striking example of the earth's spiking temperature. Heat-trapping greenhouse gases have caused glaciers and massive ice sheets to melt and expand the depth of oceans. Most scientists concur that global warming will continue to accelerate the melting, but they don't know how fast land ice will melt, and thus put coastal areas at risk of flooding. Erosion and the outright depletion of land are the costs of more sea water. At least eight low-lying Pacific Ocean islands have vanished in the past 70 years, according to New Scientist. At the same time, coastal areas like Miami deal with an overflow of rain that can't easily discharge into the Biscayne Bay, especially when the sea is at its highest level during the fall, causing "King" tides to simultaneously carry saltwater directly onto the streets, as the Miami Herald reported. Reconfiguring and Building Anew For cities directly in the path of a rising sea, taking an innovative approach to combating climate change isn't the pursuit of a new aesthetic or a bold opportunity to make a profit but rather a calculated preparation for the worst nature has to offer.  Consider Miami. On a small but effective scale, city planners have embraced various technologies and approaches to properly plan for more water. The city intends to use 3D models to have a better sense of how to plan urban development around flood zones. Miami is also benefiting from grant money to participate in programs to improve permitting processes and storm water management, as well as pay for a chief resilience officer whose sole task is to create a comprehensive climate change strategy, according to GCN. Taking an even bolder approach, Miami looked at the possibility of tearing down properties and returning flood-susceptible areas to nature, the Miami Herald explained. In French Polynesia, rising sea levels initiated the consideration of simply restarting civilization on a floating city. With many of its island coastlines eroding or at risk of disappearing, the government allowed the Seasteading Institute, a Silicon Valley enterprise, to explore the development of the world's first self-sufficient floating city, the Huffington Post reported. Aside from housing people, a floating city could serve as a hub for oceanographic and climate resilience research and implementation, including wave and tidal energy experiments and explorations into trapping atmospheric carbon on the sea floor, a Seasteading Institute executive told the Huffington Post. Combating Change Naturally For those who can't afford the potential livable space cost of $504 per square foot on a floating city, other avenues are being considered to preserve some semblance of existing property. Natural or nature-based structures known as "living shorelines" aim to protect shores more inexpensively and more effectively than man-made bulkheads and walls. NOAA contended that shorelines with intact natural coastal habitats suffer less damage and bounce back more quickly from severe storms. In 2016, the Army Corps of Engineers approved a nationwide permit that lowers regulatory hurdles to build living shorelines, such as wetlands with sea and marsh grasses, sand dunes, mangroves and coral reefs. Whether municipalities take incremental approaches by raising sidewalks, building natural recovery zones or restarting planning strategies, or if they boldly shoot for the moon by creating a floating city space, the time to address climate change has arrived in full force. Steps taken now will go a long way toward preserving the future.

Rising Sea Levels Trigger the Redesign of Coastal Communities

It's become increasingly clear that COVID-19 is here to stay, — as a result, companies are looking to make detection and treatment as fast and easy as possible. One new device is the InspectIR COVID-19 breathalyzer test, which received FDA emergency use authorization in April 2022. If you're wondering how this test works, what is unique about this new healthcare technology or why it matters, read on. How the InspectIR COVID-19 Breathalyzer Technology Works This new healthcare technology uses a specific technique called gas chromatography mass-spectrometry. The American Chemical Society likens this groundbreaking tech to a tricorder from Star Trek: a portable method that can analyze the components of a chemical mixture. Gas chromatography mass-spectrometry is the combination of two separate, powerful techniques. Gas chromatography vaporizes a substance. It's then usually carried into a tube by an inert gas through a stationary phase, which is often a viscous liquid over a solid. Because gases react differently to passing through a stationary phase, a detector can tell what the different components are and how much of each there is. In mass spectrometry, the substance is ionized and its components are then separated according to the ratio of their mass to their charge. Once separated into fragments, scientists are able to determine what's in the sample through a spectrum. These two techniques work together because the gas chromatography separates each component and then mass spectrometry can analyze them individually. The InspectIR COVID-19 breathalyzer test can identify five separate volatile organic compounds associated with the novel coronavirus in a patient's breath, thanks to gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. If the test detects any of these, it returns a positive result. How Does It Compare to Other Tests? This new healthcare technology can only be administered by professionals, which means it is not a replacement or substitute for at-home antigen or PCR tests. The accuracy rate of this breathalyzer test is high — 91.2% for positive samples and 99.3% for negative samples, which is similar to the accuracy of antigen tests. It was even able to identify COVID-19 in patients displaying no symptoms. According to FDA documents, the company does recommend following up a positive result with a more accurate molecular test. Negative tests shouldn't be taken at face value and should instead be considered with the patient's exposure history. In other words, you may still have COVID-19 even if the test comes back negative. It's also less invasive than other tests; patients need only blow into a straw rather than undergo a deep nasal swab. And it returns results faster than many competitors — within three minutes. What Are the Drawbacks? There are a few drawbacks to this method, however. First, the technology is relatively untested. Some scientists and doctors think that there needs to be more real-world use of gas chromatography-mass spectrometry as a diagnostic tool before it's used in real-world testing situations. It's also only approved for those 18 or older, so it's not suitable for children. Additionally, despite the technique being described as "portable," it still requires suitcase-sized equipment. And each machine can only process a single test at once, which means using this technology for mass testing would be cumbersome. Despite its speed, that makes this technology less than ideal for rapid testing. Why Does This Matter? The approval of the InspectIR COVID-19 breathalyzer test is significant for a broader reason, though. This is the first authorized use of a breathalyzer machine as a diagnostic tool. Scientists and researchers have been trying to perfect this technology for years. This is an interesting step forward for the new healthcare technology, and it remains to be seen how well it does in practical, daily use over the next few years. Are you interested in all things related to technology? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

InspectIR COVID-19 Breathalyzer Test Is the First of Its Kind

It happens to all of us eventually. Someone challenges a strongly held opinion, and we're faced with a dilemma: dig in our heels or give their perspective a fair shake. While it's easy to imagine a scenario that involves a good-natured back-and-forth, the reality is often less amenable and more argumentative. Why? Because despite best efforts at agnostic information exchange, we all carry around a complex and ever-changing belief system that informs our opinions and drives our actions. But where do these beliefs come from? Why are they so strongly held, and if we're wrong ("No, you're wrong!"), how do we kick-start the process of change? Being Is Believing Whether we know it or not, we all have a system of beliefs. As noted by research from Spain's University of Alicante, "Every human being has a belief system that they utilize, and it is through this mechanism that we individually 'make sense' of the world around us." By creating narratives about what's happening, why and how, we're better able to navigate and overcome challenges that come our way. The Alicante article defines several key characteristics of belief systems:   Values. Values are often "abstract summaries of behavioral attitudes" that are developed in response to action and then become codified over time.  Substantive Beliefs. Driven by values, substantive beliefs are the most important tenants of a belief system — the big ideas that drive the narrative at scale.  Language. Belief systems also use language to define logical rules that relate substantive beliefs to each other in a system, in turn providing a framework for action.  Prescriptions. Prescriptions speak to the actions and norms that are part of the belief system: the things that are done — or avoided — to ensure alignment with substantive beliefs.  These elements are further defined by personal commitment. Greater personal commitment due to environmental, societal or even economic factors can create shared systems of belief that expand both their reach and relevance. A quick glance at human history shows both the power and potential problems that come with shared beliefs. Their output notwithstanding, however, believing is tied to being. But is it naturally occurring? Navigating Nature and Nurture Not surprisingly, belief systems develop from both nature and nurture. The beliefs of parents and other family members influence those of children. Over time, this may lead to a reinforcement of beliefs or a rebellion that sees a stark divergence from existing norms. Here, nurture tells the tale — experiences in family environments play a substantive role in the formation of opinions. As noted by the American Psychological Association, however, there's also a genetic component to these beliefs. While genetics aren't directly responsible for specific attitudes and opinions, genetic factors can influence personality and perception which, in turn, govern belief. This is often shown through studies that examine twins who have markedly different life experiences but still share similar beliefs. Well, That's One Opinion Opinions are like... well, you probably know the saying. But despite its less-than-savory language, the idea is spot-on: Everyone has an opinion. The problem? They can't all be right at the same time. Some opinions are strongly held but have little in the way of substance. Others are more flexible even if there's ample evidence to support them. No matter the parameters, however, they share a common source: Your belief system. Put simply, what you believe involves connected webs of opinions informed by your existence and experience. As a result, it's easy to conflate what you know to be true with something your belief system tells you is true. Consider an experiment on how our brains process information by researchers from Ben-Gurion University and Hebrew University in Israel that first had participants rate the grammatical accuracy of sentences they read and then rate their agreement with the positions espoused by those sentences. When reading statements they agreed with, participants had no problem verifying the grammar. When they disagreed, it took longer to inspect and evaluate the sentence structure. The results suggest that when it comes to processing belief-driven material, our brains work differently right down to grammar, making it easier to parse what we already agree with and more difficult to lend credence to opposing views. Facing Facts So how do you get someone — or how can someone get you — to shift strongly held opinions? Facts seem like the most obvious answer, but as personal experience has probably pinpointed, this often goes off the rails. But why? Human history plays a role in this facts vs. opinions debate. In historical environments where a matter of seconds could make the difference between life and death, taking the time to analyze opinions for factual accuracy wasn't a great use of time. And while we now have the greater luxury of time, our brains still carry over this opinionated action. Consider a psychological study from Stanford in which participants were divided into two groups: those in favor of capital punishment and those against. Both groups were given two (fictitious) studies to read that were also for and against and contained a host of seemingly legitimate statistics. If pure reason was the reality of the human condition, you'd expect the groups to meet in the middle, but — you guessed it — both believed more strongly in their original position after having seen the supposed evidence. What happened? Put simply, the existence of opposing information didn't create food for thought but had the opposite intention: Believers simply dug in their heels. Changing the Game As it turns out, actual change isn't impossible to achieve in this fight of facts vs. opinions. Instead, it's down to the approach — and it all starts with empathy. Let's say you're looking to convince someone that their opinion is wrong. Even if you're armed with incontrovertible facts, you've got a tough road ahead. Since their opinion is part of a larger construct of beliefs, they're naturally inclined to filter everything you say through this lens, meaning it loses power even if it's the unvarnished truth. Actually making a change requires an understanding of why and not what. Why do people hold the beliefs they do? A recent Forbes piece highlights this effect in an experiment that looked to convince people they should recycle less. Addressing common factors such as personal inconvenience and the inefficiency of many recycling programs made no difference — these facts fell away in the face of the moral obligation held by passionate recyclers. But when presented with information that showed potential negative impacts on wildlife and local environments posed by some recycling programs, attitudes started to change. By aligning arguments with underlying reasons for belief, it was possible to kick-start a cognitive shift. The Opinion Imperative Opinions aren't just preferences. They're often tied to fundamental belief systems driven by nature and nurture and reinforced by the existence of conflicting facts and figures. This isn't to say they're immutable — empathetic arguments can help drive cognitive change — but these personal perceptions remain a powerful component of the human experience. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology and engineering.

Belief System Basics: Exploring the Opinion Imperative

Solar flares are energetic explosions of radiation released from the surface of the sun. Coronal mass ejections — solar explosions that release extremely hot streams of plasma into space — can cause solar flares to reach the Earth's surface. Although rare, some of the most serious solar flare effects include damaging magnetic storms on Earth; in the past, they have triggered regional blackouts. There are telltale signs of an impending solar explosion, but scientists have recently discovered a new way of predicting coronal mass ejections. The answer lies in the sun. What Happens When a Solar Flare Erupts? Scientists already know that some eruptive solar flares have warning signs. Often, they are preceded by arches of plasma — magnetic flux ropes — that visibly rise from the surface of the sun, according to Space.com. However, scientists have made a new discovery, recently published in Nature, about how solar flares occur and erupt. After careful research and observation, a team of scientists located the presence of what they call "magnetic cages," which might explain why some eruptive solar flares reach Earth and others do not. According to the study, magnetic cages are structures made of magnetic field lines that rise from the sun's surface. Before a dangerous flare, a magnetic flux rope grows under a solar arcade. If the rope develops a kink and becomes unstable, a burst of energy might blast through the cage, leading to coronal mass ejections that have the potential to reach Earth. If the cage is more substantial, however, NASA explained that the flare may not be able to blast through. "Our results show that the role of the cage, and thus of the environment, crucially affects the class of eruption ... that can be produced in an active region," the study authors wrote in Nature. What Are Solar Flare Effects? The Earth rarely experiences solar flare effects, yet they can have dramatic effects when they occur. In 1859, a plume of magnetized plasma shot 93 million miles from the sun to the Earth in less than a day. Known as the Carrington Event, it is the largest geomagnetic storm in history, according to Motherboard. Based on information from FEMA, Motherboard speculates that if a storm of that magnitude hit the Earth today, GPS signals, telecommunications and electricity would be in serious danger. On March 10, 1989, astronomers witnessed a powerful solar explosion on the surface of the sun that created a blackout in all of Quebec. This explosion released a billion-ton cloud of gas; NASA noted that this would be like the energy of thousands of nuclear bombs exploding at the same time. Companies like Northrop Grumman have joined forces with the Space Weather and Analysis Forecast System to monitor space weather's effect on military operations. Can We Prepare for Solar Flares? Scientists cannot stop these coronal mass ejections from happening. However, if scientists learn to predict coronal mass ejections, humans can take preventative measures here on Earth. "Shedding light on the origin and evolution of solar flares could help scientists forecast how powerful these explosions occur, which could help experts prevent widespread havoc on earth," according to Space.com. Survivalist websites, like Ready.gov, recommend taking precautions against solar flares just as you would for any other natural disaster: learn to purify water, and keep an emergency kit on hand with flashlights, medical supplies and non-perishable foods.   

A Rare Type of Solar Flare May Have Potentially Devastating Effects

In a world filled with technology, some of the most sophisticated designs exist in nature. Butterfly wing anatomy, for example, is delicate, complicated and efficient. Butterfly wings are also extremely fragile and sensitive to temperature changes, so what prevents them from overheating?   How to Study Butterfly Anatomy   Researchers at Columbia University and Harvard University used a new technique called infrared hyperspectral imaging to find out how butterfly wings avoid overheating. They learned that butterfly wings are based on a complex thermodynamic structure that can teach us about how to make more efficient cooling materials. The researchers anesthetized butterflies and then used a paintbrush to carefully remove the wing scales to reveal the wings' nanostructure. They also injected a blue stain into the butterfly's thorax. This stain was then carried by hemolymph, which is like a bug's version of blood, so it spread throughout the butterfly's living cells and tissues, making it easier for the scientists to see the tiny details and go deeper than butterfly wing anatomy.   However, even with a stain, it is difficult to study how butterfly wings manage heat. According to ScienceNews, butterfly wings are so thin and semi-transparent that thermal cameras can't distinguish the difference between heat from the wings or other things in the background. To get around this challenge, the Columbia-Harvard team designed a technique based on infrared hyperspectral imaging where each pixel of an image represents an infrared spectrum. Then they used this special thermal camera to map the way heat dissipated from certain areas on the delicate wings of more than 50 butterfly species.   What Keeps Butterfly Wings From Overheating?   With this new imaging technique, the researchers were able to map out the thermodynamic properties that make butterfly wings so efficient, as well as gain a deeper understanding of how the insect's body works as a whole.   "This work shows that we should reconceptualize the butterfly wing as a dynamic, living structure rather than as a relatively inert membrane," said Naomi E. Pierce, a biology professor at Harvard who co-led the new thermodynamic research. "Patterns observed on the wing may also be shaped in important ways by the need to modulate temperatures of living parts of the wing."   They discovered a "wing heart" that beats a few dozen times per minute to control blood flow to the scent pads of certain species of butterflies. More surprising, they discovered that butterfly wings contain a network of mechanical and temperature sensors that work similarly to a household radiator heater.   Butterfly wings contain a mixture of living and nonliving structures covered by scales made of a rigid substance called chitlin, according to Scientific American. The live portions of wings have scent pads, pheromone-releasing organs and veins; chitlin membranes stretch between the wing veins.   It turns out that the scales covering different parts of the wing have different shapes to help regulate the wing's heat. Butterfly wings don't overheat because of a process called radiative cooling, according to Scientific American. Because heat is electromagnetic radiation generated by the vibration of molecules, when a material exposes more molecules on its surface it will be able to dissipate more heat. Therefore, the structure of materials will allow them to release heat more quickly than others.   There is one type of scale that covers the wing's non-living parts, which aren't as sensitive to heat. Then there are special scales to cover the living parts of the wing that are more susceptible to overheating. Scales over the scent pads are shaped like a bunch of tiny tubes, similar to radiators but only one micron in diameter. Just like a household heater, these nanostructures are shaped to efficiently dissipate warmth. While the radiator-style scales help protect the wing's organs from overheating, the scales covering veins are also efficient at emitting heat, although they are thicker, with many holes.   The Columbia and Harvard researchers also experimented with how butterfly wings handle different environmental conditions. They varied the light and temperature and found that this radiative cooling anatomy caused the live areas of butterfly wings (the veins and scent pads) to always be cooler than the lifeless areas of the wings.   Butterfly-Inspired Technology   Butterfly wings are joining a growing list of nature that inspires technology. Because of their complex thermodynamic structures, butterfly wings can teach us how to make more efficient cooling materials. The researchers are using what they learned from butterfly wings, along with other studies they've done on sub-Saharan ants, to develop a cooling polymer and spin it into nanostructures inspired by butterfly wing anatomy.   This material could be used to coat structures such as buildings to help them get rid of heat. Similar heat-repellent materials are often white because that color doesn't absorb heat. But as a bonus, just like butterflies, this new lightweight cooling material could be made in a variety of colors.   Butterfly-inspired cooling materials would be especially useful for developing heat-resistant aircraft. Nature is the ultimate inspiration for aircraft. Someday, airplane wings could be as efficient as butterfly wings.    Enable targeting cookies to view this content.    

Butterfly Wing Anatomy Inspires Cool New Materials

What does ordinary table salt have to do with Jupiter's moon Europa and the destination of NASA's upcoming Europa Clipper mission? As often happens in space science, the answer to this question is straightforward, but the implications are breathtaking. The detection of sodium chloride on the surface of Europa lends support to the theory that Europa not only has an underground ocean, but that this ocean contains the building blocks of life, and perhaps its own ecosystem of living organisms. All of which means that the Europa Clipper mission just might provide the first direct evidence that perhaps we are not alone. Misbehavior of the Gods First, a little background. As Space.com recounts, the four large moons of Jupiter, including Europa, were discovered by Galileo using his homemade telescope in January 1610. They are still collectively called the Galilean moons, but he simply numbered them. As Business Insider tells us, it fell to another astronomer to give them individual names. That astronomer, Simon Marius chose to name them for four of the Roman mythological god Jupiter's many romantic conquests. In order of distance from Jupiter, they are Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. And as Business Insider also wryly notes, NASA is not above a little scientific mythology of its own. Another mission currently investigating Jupiter and its moon system is named Juno, after Jupiter's mythological (and very jealous) wife. Science Fiction Lends a Hand, and So Does NASA By the early 20th century, a new scientific mythology took form: science fiction. The moon and Mars usually played the starring role in early science fiction, but as Popular Science details, the four big moons of Jupiter, including Europa, got their share of attention. That is about where things stood until the 1970s, when space missions provided our first close-up views of these distant worlds — and spectacular views they were. As Space.com describes, each of the four big moons turns out to have very different surface features: from Io, the most volcanically active object in the solar system, to Callisto, the most heavily cratered. Jupiter's moon Europa does not have volcanoes and practically no craters. In fact, scientists determined that the surface of Europa cannot be more than about 160 million years old (even though Europa itself is nearly as old as the solar system, about 4.5 billion years). Some force, it seems, is continually "repaving" the surface of Europa. Not only is the surface being continually renewed; it is also almost completely flat. The most conspicuous surface features are linear markings, like scratches or cracks. A Hidden Ocean â€¦ One type of force, gravitational tides, turns out to account for both Io's volcanoes and Europa's flat, cracked surface. Tidal forces generated by Jupiter itself and the other moons subject all of the moons to flexing, which, over millions of years, heats them up internally. Thus, the inner moons, especially — Io and Europa — are much warmer internally than you would expect of worlds so far from the sun. When they formed, much of their material was water ice. The interior of Io is so hot that the ice long ago vaporized and escaped into space. Europa, not so close to Jupiter, only got hot enough to melt the ice. Per Geology.com, the result was and is a layer of liquid water believed to be as much as 60 miles deep — several times deeper than the deepest spot in Earth's oceans. A thin layer of ice, only a few miles thick at most, covers this ocean, which contains more water than all of Earth's oceans combined. â€¦ Of Salt Water All of which brings us back to that recent detection of sodium chloride (or in layman's terms, table salt) on Europa. Liquid water anywhere always gets the attention of researchers, because it seems to be an ideal environment for life. But water by itself is not enough: For life, you also need its building blocks and nutrients, most of which are to be found in rocks. If Europa's underground ocean is salt water, reports Phys.org, it must be in contact with rock, and surely contains many other dissolved substances, making the prospects for life that much stronger. And for a final touch, says Scientific American, these results indicate that liquid water must sometimes reach very close to the surface, or even break through before freezing, which could make detecting life on Jupiter's moon Europa that much easier. Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

Jupiter's Moon Europa: A Moon With an Ocean — and Possibly Life

Key Takeaways  Mindfulness is an exercise for training the brain. Research shows benefits for reducing stress, increasing memory and boosting attention span. Mindfulness and meditation can change the anatomy of the brain.Mindfulness is a meditation practice that involves intentionally paying attention to the present moment. Researchers studying the science behind mindfulness meditation have demonstrated that it can actually change the way our brains work. As more and more Americans report depression and anxiety, there has been increased public interest and scientific attention to mindfulness in recent years. Could something as simple as meditating be a realistic alternative to pharmaceutical solutions?"The science is new on this subject, but it's deeply embedded in the religious practices, especially in south Asian countries like India and Nepal," said Muhammad Aadil, M.D., resident physician in psychiatry at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School.He reviewed the latest research on mindfulness in the journal Cureus and as a physician, he educates his patients about mindfulness. We spoke with Dr. Aadil to learn whether mindfulness is a fad or the real deal, and to understand what happens to the brain during meditation.Benefits of Mindfulness"Our mind is always wandering and always thinking about different things and not staying in the present moment,"said Aadil. "So, if you can train your mind to stick in the present time, it can truly change your life."Scientific studies have demonstrated that mindfulness can help focus our thoughts. According to the University of California, Berkeley's Greater Good Magazine, consistent meditation can improve your compassion, ability to solve problems, attention span and resiliency to stress. Mindfulness helps the mind and body recover from stressful situations. For example, researchers have found that mindfulness makes breakups and divorce easier.In general, according to Greater Good, mindfulness is a positive influence on relationships with loved ones. For example, studies have shown that when couples discussed a conflict, the stress hormone cortisol spiked during these difficult conversations, as expected. But after the conflict was over, the more mindful participants calmed down faster and quickly returned to normal cortisol levels.Mindfulness can be a helpful tool for parents. It has been linked to lower stress, depression, and anxiety among parents of preschoolers and children with disabilities, and mindful parenting practices can help parents be more empathetic with their children.Scientific American reports that evidence-backed benefits of mindfulness include memory improvement, stress reduction, healthier diet and sleep improvement. One study found undergraduate students who took a two-week mindfulness class performed better on the reading comprehension portion of the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) test used for graduate school admissions by 16 percentile points.Mindfulness programs have widely been shown to help people cope with mental health such as anxiety and stress, and they can also improve physical health by helping people improve their eating and sleeping habits. For example, people who meditate with their eyes closed fall asleep faster, Aadil said.Mental Health and Meditation PracticesMindfulness can be part of psychological treatment called cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), to help people with post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and eating disorders. In those situations, meditation can supplement, though not replace standard treatment."The gold standard treatment is medication," says Aadil. He adds, "Maybe in the future, with better techniques for mindful CBT, we might be able to reduce the dosage of the medication, but I don't see that it will completely replace medication."But for mild depression and mild anxiety, mindfulness practices can be very effective without medication, according to Aadil."If I see a patient that's in the emergency or in the outpatient clinic," said Aadil, "I ask if they have heard of any mindfulness techniques. And if they say no, then I just educate them on the basics of mindfulness."When Aadil has more time with patients, he does a guided two- to five-minute mindfulness therapy. The idea is to have the patient close their eyes, focus on breathing slowly and being only in the present moment. Depending on how technically savvy his patients are, he may also suggest meditation apps to help them continue to practice mindfulness at home.What Happens to the Brain During MeditationNeuroscientists have studied mindfulness and discovered that meditation actually changes the physical structure of the brain. The Observer reports that when Harvard Medical School scientist Sara Lazar was skeptical about her yoga teacher's claims about the benefits of meditation, she used MRI technology to find proof. Surprisingly, she observed that meditation can help us stay sharper as we age. The frontal cortex, which is the part of the brain associated with memories, typically thins out as we age. The brain scans revealed that older meditators had the same amount of gray matter in their cortex as their younger counterparts.In another study, the Harvard neuroscientists observed people who had never meditated before as they went through an eight-week mindfulness training program. The results demonstrated that mindfulness activates the parts of the brain related to memory storage, empathy and emotional regulation, as evidenced by an increase in brain volume in the hippocampus and temporoparietal junction. At the same time, meditation reduces activity in the fight or flight survival instinct part of the brain (amygdala), which triggers stress hormones.According to Greater Good Magazine, long-term, consistent meditation makes people more resilient because it reduces the inflammatory response in people when they are exposed to stressors."There are certain inflammatory markers for depression and anxiety that you can measure in the blood," Aadil explained. "For individuals who are meditating for a long time, meaning for more than a year or two years, those inflammation markers go down in the blood."Training the BrainWhile there is science behind mindfulness meditation, some studies have shown mixed results. For example, according to Greater Good, a study showed that a mindfulness program for adults had no impact on depression or anxiety in teens. Many other studies were inconclusive about the benefits of mindfulness practices.One big issue is that not everyone is motivated to do brain training exercises. For many people, it's difficult to sit still for several minutes."One thing we can do is start teaching kids or children at a very early age, at least some basic mindfulness techniques," says Aadil.Even a mindfulness expert such as Aadil admitted that he sees low success rates with his patients. Most of his patients are homeless, dealing with severe financial stress and addiction problems, so it's difficult for them to prioritize meditation when they have more urgent issues to address.After extensively studying mindfulness practices and learning the proven benefits, Aadil still finds it difficult."I have read so much about meditation," Aadil says. "I know how effective it is, I know how beneficial it is, I have multiple apps, I have a reminder for every day. But I'm still not able to practice daily."Mindfulness is an exercise for training the brain. It's not only about carving out a few moments of peace in your day. Just like the benefits of physical exercise extend beyond your sweat session, mindfulness has lasting benefits. Like many other skills, meditation is easy for some people and challenging for others. But like any other skill, it takes practice and dedication.Northrop Grumman is a pioneering company. Learn more about where we're active in digital transformation, technology and innovation.

The Science Behind Mindfulness Meditation Is All in Your Head

When light is manipulated in a laboratory, it can create beautiful patterns that are just as unique and picturesque as a snowflake. These patterns aren't just for show though; they serve an important purpose. As Northrop Grumman's Matthew O'Donnell explained, when you combine two or more vortices of light, they create petal patterns, which can create an "alphabet" for transmitting information — even quantum information — over large distances. "If we ignore the fact that light is made up of discrete particles called photons and treat light as electromagnetic waves, then planar light consists of electromagnetic waves that are wiggling together in synchrony as the light propagates forward, much like a marching band in a parade moves together in lock-step along a boulevard," O'Donnell said. "Vortices are different than plane waves in that the waves that make up the vortex are out of phase with respect to each other in just the right way so that the light propagates in a kind of tornado," he added. When you combine two or more petal patterns, they form interference patterns. These patterns consist of millions and millions of photons, said O'Donnell. If you have entangled photons or entangled optical vortices, that "opens up a new world of quantum communication, quantum encryption and quantum computing," he noted. How does this work? According to O'Donnell: "The idea of both these technologies is to leverage a resource known as entanglement only available by working at the discrete level of nature described by quantum theory. The quantum resource of entanglement allows technology to surpass limits normally constraining it from reaching a higher level of performance. Only quantum technology can operate at the absolute physical limit allowed by nature." For instance, take quantum computing. A quantum computer with fewer than 100 qubits — quantum bits — is known in many cases to outperform even the most powerful mainframe computers. A conventional computer performs calculations by performing operations on bits that can take on the value of either one or zero, nothing in between. (Bits are the fundamental units of computation, similar to how the whole numbers are manipulated to perform arithmetic.)  A quantum computer, on the other hand, performs calculations by operating on qubits which may take on the value of zero, one, or both at the same time. The latter situation is called being in a superposition of one and zero — something that can only happen in quantum.  Furthermore, unlike bits, qubits can be "entangled" with each other (another feature that is unique to quantum) to form a powerful computational network that can outperform any size of networked conventional computer cores. Now, petal patterns can be used as quantum bits. But, instead of being limited to superpositions of one and zero, petal patterns can be created as superpositions of tens or hundreds of different states. Imagine the complex networks that can be formed by entangling petal patterns with each other.  If you're interested in a career pursuing scientific advances like this, check out our available positions.

Petal Patterns May Fuel Quantum Computing

On February 11, 2016, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory — LIGO — announced the detection of gravitational waves for the first time. It ended a 50-year search for direct confirmation of the elusive gravitational waves, first predicted by Albert Einstein.The observatory is sometimes described as two observatories, because its key instrument, a laser interferometer, has two sections. One is located in Livingstone, Louisiana, the other in Hanford, Washington. Working together, they form a single precision instrument a couple of thousand miles across.If success in detecting gravitational waves marked the end of one era, it signaled the beginning of another: the exploration of the universe using new instruments of fantastic, nearly unimaginable precision, of which LIGO is only a beginning.Elusive GravitySir Isaac Newton identified gravity as a basic property of nature and described its characteristics, but he did not explain how it worked. Albert Einstein proposed in 1916 that gravity was not a mysterious "force" but rather a bending of space itself in the presence of a heavy mass. He also showed that the massive accelerating objects — such as orbiting black holes — would distort the fabric of space, sending gravitational waves outwards in all directions like ripples expanding on a pond.Strong indirect evidence supported Einstein's theory of gravity, but actually detecting gravitational waves was difficult — so difficult that while active efforts to detect them began in the 1960s, no one succeeded until LIGO did a year ago.The LIGO instrument consists essentially of two vacuum pipes, each two and a half miles long, containing lasers that can measure each pipe's length with extreme precision. Extreme as in measuring a change equal to 1/5000 the size of a proton. Neil DeGrasse Tyson describes this as "the most precise measurement ever made, by far."This unfathomable precision allowed researchers to detect the subtle jostling of the pipes by a powerful gravitational disturbance: the collision of two black holes, each many times more massive than the Sun, in a distant galaxy.David Yeaton-Massey, an experimental physicist doing basic research at Northrop Grumman, had the opportunity to work on LIGO while completing his PhD at Caltech."Being part of a team dedicated to listening to what the universe is whispering to us was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. The concept is relatively simple, much like electromagnetic radiation is produced when you shake an electron, gravitational radiation (a little ripple in spacetime) is produced when you shake matter. Despite the simplicity the analogy offers, it took a pair of massive, distant black holes colliding close enough to earth (140 billion light years) for us to see the event. The scale and scope of what the LIGO community accomplished cannot be underestimated."A Quiet Place in the SkyWhile scientists were already confident that Einstein was right, LIGO's success opens the way to a new branch of astronomy, exploring the universe by measuring gravitational waves and mapping their patterns.This will require even more precision than LIGO achieved, and by far the best place to make such measurements is in outer space. A space mission called LISA Pathfinder has already been launched — not to detect gravitational waves itself but to test the technology needed for a future mission.A deep space gravitational wave observatory remains years down the road, but 2018 should see the launch of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). A successor to the famed Hubble Space Telescope, it will take precision astronomy in space to a new level. Unlike Hubble, the JWST will primarily observe the universe in infrared light, blocked from ground-based observatories by Earth's atmosphere.And instead of orbiting a few hundred miles above Earth, JWST, for which Northrop Grumman is the main industrial partner, will float in space in a position about a million miles from Earth (technically, in the second Sun—Earth Lagrange point). The distant location will help shield the JWST from Earth's own heat radiation, which otherwise would wreak havoc on infrared sensors that must operate at very low temperature.The JWST will not observe gravitational waves, but its infrared telescope will be able to look farther into deep space — and further back into the early history of the universe — than any existing telescope. The science is astounding: JWST will help us see the first stars and galaxies, better understand how galaxies form over billions of years and, finally, help identify earth-like planets that potentally support life. Whether earth-based or space-based, a new era of amazingly engineered machines will unlock mysteries that we can only guess at today.Learn more about how you can play an active role in Northrop Grumman-affiliated projects such as the James Webb Space Telescope.

Making Waves: LIGO Celebrates an Anniversary of Proving Einstein's Theory

Plankton don't get the credit they deserve. Despite weighing at just 1% of the world's photosynthetic biomass, these predominantly unicellular protists account for almost 50% of photosynthetic production, making them a very big deal that comes in a very small package. Researchers tackling genetics in microscopic marine life recently unlocked a new gene editing tool that could help us better understand plankton biology and leverage their promising potential to keep oceans clean. Photo Finish Also called phytoplankton, from the Greek phylo (plant) and plankton (to drift or wander), these sort-of-fauna floaters play an incredibly important role in Earth's ecosystem at large thanks to their unparalleled diversity. As noted by the NASA Earth Observatory, it's hard to nail down a single plankton definition — some are bacteria, some are protists and many are single-celled plants. And that's not all. Zooplankton are tiny animals that feed on phytoplankton and become food for fish and other species, while even smaller subsets — bacterioplankton and virioplankton — are also making oceanic rounds. Mass-wise they're not a big deal, but their sheer volume makes them valuable thanks to massive photosynthetic output; they're one of the world's most important producers of oxygen, according to National Geographic. They're also critical in the carbon cycle: Plankton remove approximately 10 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year and then transfer that carbon to sea life, lakes and deeper ocean layers. Given their role as food for larger marine life, photosynthesis front-runners and carbon collectors, there's no doubt that plankton play a critical role in environmental regulation — but their genetic makeup remains largely mysterious. The Plankton Problem Climate change is now driving zooplankton adrift, pushing them toward the poles as marine temperatures increase. According to Dr. Lukas Jonkers, however, "We think that these findings are indicative of what is happening in marine ecosystems. If you take that assumption, it means that most species have moved their distribution." If that's the case, it means plankton of all types are now on the move, but there's no guarantee that they can handle the differing season lengths and light conditions that come with more northerly or southerly latitudes. Best case? Similar shifts in sea life distributions, which could have knock-on effects for the fishing industry at scale. Worst case? Shrinking species population as once-abundant plankton becomes perilously difficult to find. The genetics of microscopic marine life also pose potential problems. As the NASA piece notes, some plankton species are biotoxic and create so-called "red blooms," which are massive plankton growths that can kill both marine life and humans who ingest contaminated seafood. Even non-toxic blooms can cause critical conundrums when substantial amounts of plankton die simultaneously. The resulting deadfall sinks toward ocean or lake floors and is set upon by bacteria, which use available oxygen to power their process of decomposition. The issue? This depletes all available water-borne oxygen to create a "dead zone" that kills marine life. As noted by Science Daily, new algorithms make it possible to observe and assess the impact of phytoplankton blooms across the globe using satellites to provide evolving data on water quality and potentially toxic hot spots. Scientific Sea Change While satellite imaging lets researchers observe the outer life of plankton populations, the complex genetics in microscopic marine life have made looking inward more challenging. According to a new study published in Nature Methods,  researchers from the University of East Anglia were able to deliver and express foreign DNA in 13 species that have never before transformed. They were also able to evaluate the potential cause of non-transformation in 17 other species; in turn, laying the foundation for an expanded understanding of genomes discovered in plankton. The sheer variety of plankton potential — from antibacterial compounds to antiviral and antifungal solutions — makes this a worthwhile endeavor. If scientists can create reliable methods to modify phytoplankton, it should be possible to reduce their toxic impact, better control their bloom cycle and even increase the photosynthetic output — all critical in the fight to keep our oceans blue and our terra firma green. As noted by Science Magainze, the international research team used a variety of methods to modify plankton DNA. For some species, shooting tiny gold or tungsten particles covered with DNA through cell walls produced the best result. For others, jolts of electricity made cell walls "leaky" and allowed new DNA to seep through. Specific protist successes included modification of a fish-killing toxic plankton species, and one that infects both mollusks and amphibians. While these discoveries don't present a complete understanding of the genetics in microscopic marine life, they provide a key testing protocol: By modifying genetic structure and then observing how plankton react, teams could uncover ways to boost antibiotic resistance or lower infectious impact. According to lead UK study author Thomas Mock, "These insights will improve our understanding about their role in the oceans, and they are invaluable for biotechnological applications such as building factories for biofuel or the production of bioactive compounds." Blue Genes, Green Benefits Genomes discovered in plankton play a critical role in the management of marine life, the consistency of carbon and the output of oxygen worldwide. But these small-scale big hitters remain most mysterious thanks to the sheer volume and variety of species worldwide. New gene-editing efforts, however, may help unlock promising plankton potential to deliver positive environmental and economic outcomes.

Genetics in Microscopic Marine Life: The Plankton Potential

An oxygen minimum zone in the ocean is often called a "dead zone" because the dissolved oxygen levels are so low that most sea creatures can't survive. There has been an increase in the number of low-oxygen zones, which poses big threats to oceans. This is urgent, since — just like humans on land — marine animals need oxygen to survive.       A Growing Problem       A team of experts from a United Nations group, called the Global Ocean Oxygen Network, released a study in the January 2018 issue of Science about the growing number of low-oxygen sites in the ocean.       According to the scientists, oxygen concentrations in ocean water have been declining since at least the middle of the 20th century. They found that oxygen minimum zones in the open ocean have expanded by several million square kilometers and the problem is even worse in coastal water; some sites now have oxygen concentrations low enough that animals are fleeing.       What Causes Deoxygenation in the Ocean?       A phenomenon called nutrient loading is the main reason we're seeing an increase in low-oxygen zones, according to the Global Ocean Oxygen Network and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). This is a process where polluted water from urban centers and land-based agriculture trickles into streams and rivers that flow into the ocean. This water is full of fertilizers and other nutrients that create problems when they enter natural environments.       NOAA scientist Alan Lewitus explains that excessive nutrients in the water can stimulate explosive blooms of algae. When the blooms die, they sink to the bottom of the sea where bacteria decompose them and consume oxygen from the water, ultimately making the environment uninhabitable.       According to the United Nations Development Programme, dead zones are costing fisheries, the tourism industry and other coastal livelihood tens of billions of dollars annually and will only continue to increase unless something changes.       Marine life is already vulnerable because of plastic pollution, acidification and other threats to oceans. The oxygen problem is also connected to rising ocean temperatures caused by climate change. Lisa Levin, one of the authors of the Global Ocean Oxygen Network study, explained to Newsweek that warm water is inhospitable to oxygen.       As the ocean gets warmer, the water's overall oxygen concentration decreases. Rising temperatures also slow down ocean circulation and cause layers of water to stratify so the high-oxygen surface waters don't mix as well with deep water in an oxygen minimum zone, according to Scientific American.       Three Steps to Help the Ocean Breathe Again       "'This is a problem we can solve,'" says Denise Breitburg, the lead author of the Global Ocean Oxygen Network study. She continues in a statement, "'Halting climate change requires a global effort, but even local actions can help with nutrient-driven oxygen decline.'"       The scientists highlighted three main ways to fix the ocean's oxygen problem. First, we can stop adding to the problem by addressing two of the causes: nutrient pollution and climate change. The authors suggest that cutting fossil fuel emissions would help fight climate change, and new policies can help reduce the amount of fertilizers leaching into groundwater. The Chesapeake Bay is a success story where better sewage treatment, farming practices and laws like the Clean Air Act have helped improve the ocean's health.       Secondly, there are steps we can take to protect fish near low-oxygen zones, such as creating marine-protected areas or no-catch zones animals could use to flee low oxygen. Lastly, we can work on improving tracking this problem around the world. Scientists have been working on creating models to help predict where low-oxygen zones will be in the future, but they need more data about current oxygen levels in the ocean worldwide.       Scientists around the world are grappling with many complicated threats to oceans, but eliminating low-oxygen zones is extremely important to the health of creatures and humans alike.           

Gasping for Air in the Ocean's Oxygen Minimum Zone

What would happen if Antarctica melted? If you're reading this in the Northern Hemisphere, you might not be too worried about events around the South Pole, but since we're all connected by Earth's oceans, you might want to pay attention.

As our planet continues to experience an unprecedented rise in temperature, the devastating effects of global warming are becoming more apparent each year. Antarctica glaciers melting even more or losing our entire southernmost continent would have a profound effect the world over, with people living close to sea level most impacted.



Rising Temperatures and Vanishing Ice



Climate change is affecting air temperatures and warming our oceans. For example, Greenland is reporting its warmest temperatures in 1,000 years, and this is melting the country's ice cap quite rapidly. Warmer temperatures are also causing sea ice to vanish in the Arctic, opening up navigation routes and thawing permafrost.



Global warming is impacting the Antarctic, too. Unlike the Arctic, Antarctica is firmly grounded on rock. It's a land mass, and therefore, it won't melt away like the North Pole; however, global temperature increases are already melting the ice that's built up over the centuries on the land and spills off its shores. 

NBC reported on a recent study that describes rapid acceleration in ice loss from both Greenland and Antarctica — both of which are contributing to rising sea levels. Using satellite imaging, the researchers estimate that ice sheet melt from Greenland alone is three times faster than 30 years ago and now accounts for around 25% of sea level rise.

It's worth noting that not only is Antarctica experiencing faster melting, but it also holds 90% of the world's ice, as described by the National Science Foundation.



Ice 101: The Different Types of Melting Ice



There are three types of ice under discussion here. Firstly, there's sea ice that forms on the ocean's surface. This ice is found at the North Pole and also surrounds the Antarctic landmass, forming when it's cold enough for seawater to freeze. Sea ice generally forms on the surface and shows seasonal fluctuation. Since it displaces an equal volume, melting sea ice doesn't contribute to rising sea levels.



The second type of ice comes from snowfall and ice accumulation over land. As this ages and compresses, the frozen freshwater forms glaciers. In the Antarctic, these ice sheets flow off the landmass and into the sea, where they form the third type of ice: ice shelves. These ice shelves exist mostly beneath the ocean surface and give support to the glacier edges. Glacier and ice shelf melt is what contributes to rising sea levels.



What's at Stake for Our Future?



When you think about what would happen if Antarctica melted, you might envision a dystopian underwater world, but is that realistic? While that might be a stretch too far, Antarctica glaciers melting would still have a profound effect on sea levels. For example, if the West Antarctica ice sheet disappeared completely, it would trigger a 3.3-meter rise in sea level.



A rapid melt is unlikely, though, but there's always science fiction. Business Insider illustrates what an overnight melt of all the world's ice would look like. For one thing, we'd wake up to a 66-meter rise in sea levels that would wipe out major coastal cities. Surviving that would mean learning to live with saline, as salt water would inundate our freshwater supplies. Less salty oceans would affect weather patterns and the climate, with more moisture evaporation fueling wilder storms.



We're unlikely to see what would happen if Antarctica melted in our lifetime, as it would take thousands of years, though scientists are predicting a rise of 0.8 meters in sea level by 2100. As noted in a Nature Communications paper, this rise would impact people living in areas less than two meters above sea level (62% of this land lies in the tropics).



Loss of ice in the Antarctic is still of concern. The ice not only holds vast stocks of freshwater, but its physical appearance is also protective. According to an article published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the albedo effect — which is caused by ice reflecting sunlight back into space — helps cool the environment by sending heat away from Earth. Ice also traps toxic chemicals that were banned decades ago as well as pathogens, such as bacteria and ancient viruses that we've never experienced in the modern age.
What Can We Do to Stop It?



But is it too late to reverse this ice melt? Although global warming is strongly impacting ice melt, research shows that the effects vary according to location. The International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration notes that variation in the rate of ice loss across the West Antarctica ice sheet could show sensitivity to local changes in the wind and ocean current.
Commentary from the collaboration suggests that mitigating climate change by curbing greenhouse gas emissions over the next few decades might help slow ice sheet collapse, so not all is lost yet — we can still make a difference before it's too late.



Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Learn more about our people and life at Northrop Grumman, or check out our career opportunities to see how you can be a part of defining possible.



What Would Happen If Antarctica Melted? 

If you've ever been expecting a baby (or are currently expecting), you know how difficult the process can be. You worry about every single thing until the child arrives, and whether you're adopting, using a surrogate or you or your partner are pregnant, it's a nerve-wracking time when it seems like every little thing could affect the baby's health. One question that's often brought up is whether a person's diet can affect the baby they are carrying. We know that bacteria can have an ill effect on a fetus, and we also know that certain foods are bad for babies. For example, pregnant people are advised to avoid eating certain kinds of fish that contain mercury. But more broadly, can what a person eats, whether before or during pregnancy, affect a baby's genetics? To understand what can alter a baby's DNA, we need to look closely at a key question: what is epigenetics? How Biological Parents Pass Down Their Genes To answer the question of whether diet can affect a baby's genes, we first have to look at exactly how genetics work in a fetus. At conception, the egg and sperm combine, and these two contain all the genetic material necessary to create a human. As these cells replicate and divide, the genetic information is copied to each new cell. Genes are sections of DNA that determine traits such as eye color and body type. DNA comes in pairs of 23 chromosomes, with one half of every pair coming from each biological parent. While there are exceptions to this rule (such as genome-wide uniparental disomy or diploidy (GWUPD), where all genes are inherited from one parent), they are extremely rare. Diet's Genetic Role Starts Early There's often burdensome pressure placed on pregnant people to think only of the fetus inside them, and not of themselves, when they're making choices. Individuals should consult with their doctor about which are the right choices for them. It turns out that there is a direct connection between what a pregnant person eats and their baby's genes, and that link starts before conception. According to a study published in Nature Communications, what a person eats before getting pregnant can have a significant impact on a child's DNA. The team behind this study looked at pregnant people in an area of the Gambia where food availability was dependent on climate. More nutrient-rich food was eaten during the rainy season than the dry season, so the researchers looked at 84 people who had conceived in the peak of rainy season and 83 who had done so in the peak of dry season. They found that nutritional well-being at the time of conception can affect a baby's genetics. Diet doesn't alter the genes themselves, but what it can do is affect which genes are and are not expressed (turned on or off), in the earliest stages of development. This is called epigenetics. What is epigenetics? Epigenetic changes, which are caused by a person's behaviors or environment, can play a key role in whether a person will inherit a metabolic condition, such as diabetes or insulin resistance. And it's not just the parents that can influence this; scientists have found that the diet of grandparents and even great-grandparents can cause epigenetic changes as well. It's not clear exactly how our genes retain these memories as they're passed down, but there's increasing evidence that this does occur. Diet and Exercise Can Alter Your DNA We know that diet and exercise can alter your DNA as an adult, so it's not surprising that similar effects can be seen in the genes of a developing fetus. In fact, exercise can lower the risk of a child inheriting heightened risk for diabetes and other harmful medical conditions. A 2021 study in the Journal of Applied Physiology shows that, in rodents, exercise during pregnancy can mitigate negative effects that a poor diet might have on offspring — so much so that if the parent carrying the child stays active during pregnancy, the risks of passing on a metabolic problem such as insulin resistance to a baby nears zero. It's increasingly clear that living a healthy lifestyle full of exercise and eating healthy foods is important before conception even occurs. But everything is in moderation, and there's no reason to worry whether having an indulgent meal or skipping a morning run will cause harm to a fetus. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

How parents' diet can affect a baby's genes

Nobody is fully in control of their body or mind when they sleep. It's common for people to snore or occasionally talk in their sleep, or to have dreams that inexplicably combine real-life and imaginary events. Upon waking up, you might vividly recall portions of a dream, just the faintest snippets, or nothing at all. One of the most puzzling, and potentially dangerous, nocturnal behaviors is sleepwalking. Unknowingly getting up, and sometimes performing complicated tasks, is an especially unsettling way to lose control of your body. We'll take a look at what causes sleepwalking, but first, let's define what it is and its prevalence. What Is Sleepwalking? The medical term is "somnambulism," which involves a person getting up and walking around while in a state of deep sleep, according to the Mayo Clinic. Sleepwalking is most common in children, with most growing out of it by the time they reach puberty. A typical episode occurs one to three hours after falling asleep and lasts fewer than 10 minutes, sometimes ending within a few seconds. The person may sit up in bed and look around with a blank expression on their face, rub their eyes, or tug on their pajamas. They may get out of bed and walk around with their eyes open. The sleepwalker may engage in normal activities such as getting dressed, eating or urinating but may do so in a clumsy or inappropriate way — for example, eating pet food or urinating in the closet. Since they are in a deep state of sleep, the sleepwalker typically will not respond when spoken to or may respond incoherently. The person may return to bed on their own, with or without waking up confused, or may be gently coaxed back to bed. Whenever possible, experts advise against waking a sleepwalker, as they may react with fear, confusion or anger. If the sleepwalker can return to bed without waking up, they will typically have no memory of the event. As Current Biology reports, it's estimated that 17% of children sleepwalk, and 2% to 4% of adults regularly sleepwalk or engage in related behaviors. It's quite common for people to sleepwalk occasionally, with 29% of adults experiencing at least one episode in their lifetime, which is often related to the use of sleeping pills or antidepressants. If you have a sleepwalker in your home, preventing injury should be a top priority. Keep guns and knives out of reach. Close and lock windows and doors as appropriate, and use safety gates at the tops of stairs. Remove tripping hazards and other potentially harmful objects. These measures are usually sufficient for the occasional sleepwalker. However, a serious discussion with a medical professional is recommended if the episodes are frequent (e.g., one to two times a week), prolonged or likely to result in serious injury. For example, some sleepwalkers will leave the house and even attempt to drive a car. What Causes Sleepwalking? The immediate cause of somnambulism is still unknown, but there is a clear genetic component. About 22% of children whose parents have no history of this behavior will sleepwalk, according to the Sleep Foundation. That number rises to 47% if one parent has a history of sleepwalking or 61% if both parents were known to sleepwalk. Sleepwalking occurs during the deepest phase of sleep. According to StatPearls, the four stages of human sleep are N1, N2, N3 and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. N1, N2 and N3 are stages of non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep. The human body cycles through all these stages four to five times each night, averaging about 90 minutes per cycle. N1 is the first and lightest stage of sleep and usually lasts just one to five minutes. Everything starts to slow down, including eye movements and muscle activity. N2 is a deeper sleep, when heart rate and body temperature drop. This stage is important for consolidating memory. Eye movement stops, and teeth grinding may occur. N2 may last 25 minutes in the first cycle and lengthen with each successive cycle. N3 is the deepest stage of non-REM sleep, and there is usually no eye movement or muscle activity. This is also the stage when sleepwalking, night terrors and bedwetting occur. Individuals forced to wake up during this stage tend to be "groggy" — with moderately impaired mental performance for up to an hour. As people age, they tend to spend less time in this stage and more time in N2. Finally, REM sleep is associated with vivid dreams and rapid eye movement. The legs and arms become temporarily paralyzed, but heart rate increases and the brain is highly active. The first REM period typically lasts 10 minutes, with the final one lasting up to an hour. In the morning, people tend to wake up spontaneously during REM sleep. Children are more prone to sleepwalking because their brains are still developing, and they spend more time in deep N3 sleep. Contributing Factors Regardless of age, people are more likely to sleepwalk when they are extremely fatigued, probably because they are spending more time in deep sleep. Other factors that increase the risk of sleepwalking are associated with disruptions in sleep, such as stress and anxiety, sudden noises or touches, illness, fever or going to sleep with a full bladder. Migraines, drinking too much alcohol and certain medications can also trigger an episode. Restless legs syndrome and obstructive sleep apnea (pauses in a person's breathing pattern) are also common culprits. Any underlying medical issues should be treated to reduce somnambulism. For some sleepwalkers, relatively straightforward measures can decrease the likelihood of an episode:   Keep a regular sleep schedule.  Reduce stress.  Ensure the room is dark, quiet and comfortable for sleeping.  Limit drinks and caffeine in the evening.  Use the toilet before bedtime.  If those options fail, sleepwalkers may benefit from therapy or medications. Researchers are still working to understand what fully causes sleepwalking, so it may take some time for a patient's physician to tailor an effective strategy to combat this potentially dangerous sleep disorder. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

What Causes Sleepwalking?

To explore the boundaries of science fiction and the real world of science, technology and engineering, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Los Angeles-Las Vegas Section recently hosted an event in California called "Sci-Fi vs Sci-Tech." Aerospace engineer Aldo Spadoni attended the event as a panelist and moderator.  Humanity has embarked on a Second Space Age, fueled by new technology developments and both private and government space exploration initiatives. What has inspired people to push the boundaries of human imagination and accomplishment? Science fiction films and television shows like "Star Trek" and "Star Wars" have always been a major source of fascination and inspiration; they've also influenced many to pursue sci-tech careers. "Sci-Fi vs Sci-Tech" was organized by Ken Lui, AIAA LA-LV Section events chairman, with support from Robert Friend, LA-LV Section chairman. The event featured a panel of experts including Rod Pyle, space author and historian; Rick Sternbach, space and science fiction artist; Harriet Brettle, CalTech planetary sciences graduate student; Madhu Thangavelu, USC professor; Dr. Rostislav Spektor, project leader and research scientist; and Allan Grosvenor, senior aerodynamics engineer. The meeting began with a look back at the Apollo 11 Moon landing and Viking 1 Mars landing, in celebration of the 49th and 42nd anniversaries of those events, respectively. On hand were former Apollo and Viking program engineers Robert L. Norcross Jr. and Gary Moir; they provided first-hand recollections of the many challenges involved while working on these amazing programs. Back to the Future The event was well attended, with great audience interaction and wide-ranging discussions. Pyle started with a look at past visions of the future, providing examples from the 1930s and 1940s including humanoid robots, flying cars and cities in the sky. "I thought it might be instructive to look at how we envisioned the future in decades past, and from this, we might learn something about how to look ahead. While these early visions had some elements of accuracy, our future turned out to be much more about miniaturization, digitization, big city congestion and a turn to rampant consumerism. But we do have GPS and texting," he said with a wink. Humans Versus Robots The panelists fielded a number of questions related to the human role in space exploration. The space environment remains extremely hostile to humans, so why continue to pursue human space exploration at great expense and risk? At least for the immediate future, humans have proven to be far more adept and flexible than robots at onsite data gathering and assessment. Beyond exploration, venturing into space is also about assuring human survival by establishing permanent colonies. Thangavelu provided some insights into how we might safely live and thrive on the Moon. Most science fiction films typically portray future humans that appear and behave much the same as they do now. In the future, however, spacefaring humans might be drastically altered to better function in the space environment. Imagine human minds downloaded into miniaturized robots, which Pyle likened to "robotic cockroaches with human brains." The Challenges Ahead The panelists generally agreed that an expanded human presence in the solar system will require the ability to travel quickly, safely and efficiently. Spektor provided an overview of promising advances in electric/plasma rocket propulsion technology. Other options discussed included nuclear thermal and pulse rockets, and laser-driven solar sails that could potentially push tiny micro-spacecraft on interstellar missions. Science fiction films are not always optimistic, and there has been a general trend toward dystopian visions of the future. Pyle noted that "we can and should do better, looking to the future and clearing a path for what we might achieve if we can spot some aspirational, pro-social goals." The Frontiers of Imagination Science fiction can still portray a positive future with characters overcoming adversity, inspiring interest in space exploration and the pursuit of technical careers. "As an artist who has worked in both science fiction as well as real sci-tech, I am amazed and excited about the ways that the two areas inform and inspire each other," Sternbach said. "Scientific observations and innovations in real technology drive science fiction to imagine what might be possible. At the same time, dreams of new air and space vehicles, destinations, materials and processes help scientists and engineers bring those dreams into reality," Sternbach added. Attendees were treated to a surprise visit by none other than Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin, who shared his ideas for efficient space transportation infrastructure in the vicinity of the Earth and moon. The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Los Angeles-Las Vegas Section plans to host similar local events in the future.

The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Explores Sci-Fi Versus Sci-Tech

An experimental blood test could one day make early detection of cancer possible. At least two research studies published this year show exciting advances in DNA methylation analysis, a method that examines biochemical alterations of genetic material for the presence of cancer. Dubbed "liquid biopsies" by some, one of the experiments accurately predicted the emergence of 50 cancers and where the tumor was growing in thousands of people, reports Chemistry World; the other made predictions up to four years before symptoms occurred, according to Scientific American. The existence of a single test that can potentially screen for multiple cancers at once could lead to early interventions and treatments that save lives. "Achieving this goal is one of the most ambitious undertakings in healthcare, and this is exactly what we are committed to doing," team scientists from the California-based healthcare company, GRAIL, wrote in a feature for Nature Research. Early Detection of Cancer Anyone who visits their primary care physician on an annual basis knows that a handful of cancer screening tests already exist. Mammograms, for instance, look for early signs of breast cancer, colonoscopies check for colon cancer and Pap tests screen for cervical cancer. Undergoing such tests before symptoms appear can make a difference. More than 90% of women diagnosed with breast cancer in the early stage survive at least five years compared with women diagnosed at late stages, reports Cancer Research UK. More than nine in 10 patients with bowel cancer will survive at least five years if diagnosed early and 90% of women diagnosed early for ovarian cancer will survive at least five years compared to those diagnosed when the disease had advanced to a late stage. Unfortunately, cancer screening tests return an unacceptably high rate of false positives. A study published in Cancer, a peer-reviewed publication from the American Cancer Society, showed that over a period of 10 years, about 50 to 60 of 100 women who get annual mammograms; 23 of 100 people who get stool tests; and 10 to 12 in 100 men screened for prostate cancer have false-positive results. Even tests that return low false-positive results depend on the presence of malignant cells or tumors. For instance, mammograms depend on anomalies in breast tissue. Colonoscopies are accomplished using a long, flexible, tubular instrument that transmits an image of the colon to a monitor, where a doctor examines the tissue for abnormalities. And a Pap test involves sampling a small amount of mucous from the cervix and analyzing it under a microscope to detect abnormal cells. Exciting new approaches could provide accurate and early detection of cancer long before abnormal tissue or cells appear. DNA Methylation Analysis Early cancer detection could be possible because of a biochemical process, called methylation, which is the transfer of four atoms — one carbon atom and three hydrogen atoms (CH3) — from one substance to another. The transfer to and from substances work as a kind of biological switch, turning on and off a host of systems in the body. In the case of DNA, methylation can turn on or off the expression of certain genes linked to cancer. Because this process occurs in tens of millions of known places in the body, it offers a global view of cancer, the GRAIL researchers say. "In contrast to typical cancer mutations that only affect a handful of genomic locations, there are nearly 30 million sites, known as CpG sites, across the human genome that can be methylated or unmethylated, making them a ubiquitous and rich signal for detecting cancer," the GRAIL team writes in Nature Research. GRAIL scientists and those from the second team that published their research in Nature Communications, studied blood from tens of thousands of people over a period of years. The scientists looked at methylation patterns in the DNA of the blood and plugged the information into machine learning algorithms. Over time, some of those people developed cancer and that information was also fed to the algorithms. Eventually, the machine learning algorithms began to recognize a relationship between abnormal methylation patterns in the DNA and certain cancers. Next, the scientists sampled blood from new patients and fed information about methylation patterns in that blood to the machine learning algorithms, which were able to make predictions from what it saw. "What we showed is: up to four years before these people walk into the hospital, there are already signatures in their blood that show they have cancer," Kun Zhang, a bioengineer at the University of California, San Diego, and a co-author of one of the studies told Scientific American. Although more research is needed, DNA methylation analysis could fundamentally change cancer treatment. For a disease that is the second leading cause of death worldwide, the progress marks one of the most exciting possibilities in the early detection of cancer.

Blood Test Could Make Early Detection of Cancer Possible

"Negative energy" sounds like something that Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock would have used to get out of a jam in the original Star Trek series. And appropriately enough, as Science Alert reports, using negative energy to draw energy from black holes was first proposed by physicist Roger Penrose in 1969, back when classic Trek was still airing new episodes. Penrose's work earned him a belated Nobel Prize just last year. And in an interesting bit of synchronicity, new studies suggest that negative energy could not only be the ultimate power supply but also a way to look for alien life and seek out new civilizations. Kirk and Spock would surely have approved. Tapping Into the Ergosphere Black holes, in spite of their name, can be some of the brightest objects in the universe. The reason is that a black hole's intense gravity field pulls down any matter it captures. The captured material is accelerated to nearly the speed of light, releasing enormous energy when infalling streams collide. But this process is only a starting point for drawing energy from black holes. New research published in the scientific journal Physical Review D indicates that rotational energy already captured by the black hole can be extracted by tapping into a region called the ergosphere. As Universe Today reports, the ergosphere is located just barely above the event horizon that cuts the black hole off from the outside universe. The black hole's rotating magnetic field produces a breaking and reconnection of magnetic lines of force, and the extreme conditions within the ergosphere ramp up the resulting magnetic particle collisions to maximum intensity. Delivering 150% Under the right conditions, such collisions can cause one particle — or an entire particle stream — to fall through the event horizon, acquiring negative energy. The other particle (or stream) picks up a corresponding amount of positive energy and shoots out the ergosphere, carrying more energy than it started with. This doesn't quite count as magical free energy from black holes, because the particles that fall through the event horizon cause the black hole's rotation to slow down. But in the meantime, there's plenty of stored-up energy from black holes that a sufficiently advanced civilization could draw on. And because of this stored energy, a black hole power extraction system could potentially run at 150% efficiency, according to Universe Today — an efficiency rating we associate with athletes, perhaps, but not actual power generators. The Sound of Magic What's more, in yet another bit of intriguing synchronicity that so often pops up in science, Science Alert reports that a separate research project gave experimenters a foretaste — or at least a fore-listen — of what more than 100% efficiency sounds like. We do not yet have anything close to the technology needed to tap energy from a black hole. We don't even have the tech to simulate the black hole with a fast-spinning metal cylinder, as one physicist proposed in 1971. But a research team in Scotland realized that the Penrose Effect could be demonstrated using sound waves, which are easier to work with because they travel a million times slower than light waves. By spinning a disk faster than sound, speakers mounted on the disk could be made to put out sound at negative frequencies — not quite as weird as negative energy, but still pretty weird. And when the experiment was run, the sound that came out of the speakers was 30% louder than the power that fed into them could have produced, according to Science Alert. Sound energy was being drawn from the rotating disk by a process analogous to drawing energy from black holes. To Seek Out New Civilizations Energy from black holes is pretty awesome, but where does alien life fit in? According to Live Science, while we don't yet have the ability to plug our power cables into a black hole, advanced civilizations out there may be able to do exactly that. And if someone is doing it, we do have the technology needed to detect it. "Since fast magnetic reconnection in the ergosphere should occur intermittently in the scenario proposed here, the associated emission within a few gravitational radii from the black hole is expected to display a bursty nature," the report abstract in Physical Review D states. This doesn't necessarily mean that any "bursty" emission from a spinning black hole must be a sign of alien life. But it does give us a guide as to where and how to look for potential signs of power production by advanced alien civilizations. So, stay tuned! Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

Could Alien Life Draw Energy from Black Holes?

Pest control in the skies over the Florida Keys is taking on a distinctive buzz this year. Thousands of genetically modified mosquitoes are being released to evaluate their impact on local populations. As a strategy, releasing modified mosquitoes into the wild could help to reduce arbovirus infections such as Zika virus, chikungunya and dengue. Since climate change is already expanding the range of many disease-bearing flying vectors into the United States, scientists and clinicians alike are eager to find out if this strategy is a winner. Pest Control Over the Florida Keys In April, the first ever release of genetically modified mosquitoes in the U.S. launched, according to Nature. Tens of thousands of eggs carrying modified Aedes aegypti males were placed in secret locations around Monroe County's Cudjoe Key, Ramrod Key and Vaca Key. These males, each carrying a gene that's lethal to female larval development, will hatch and fly off to interact with the resident population. In breeding with the locals, they'll create generations where the females do not survive. Within several rounds of breeding, the number of female A. aegypti will hopefully decline to a point where the wild population itself is severely suppressed. Additionally, since it's only the females of this species that bites, Scientific American notes that this should also reduce transmission of serious arbovirus diseases such as dengue, chikungunya and Zika virus. Genetic Modification Tech at Work The bioengineering tech at work in the modified A. aegypti males buzzing around the Florida Keys is highly specific. Science Magazine describes how the modification adds a tetracycline transcriptional activator variant (tTAV) gene to the male genome. The engineered males carry the dominant lethal gene that they transmit to female offspring. In the lab, the gene's lethality is suppressed simply by adding the antibiotic tetracycline to the mosquitoes' food. Since this is not available in the wild, lethality activates and renders the females non-viable. The Centers for Disease Control notes that, although this is the first time this has been deployed over U.S. soil, more than one billion genetically modified mosquitoes have been released safely and successfully in other areas around the world. Brazil, the Cayman Islands and Malaysia have all been involved in trials carried out by U.K.-based firm Oxitec, testing the technology's ability to control wild populations and suppress arbovirus transmission. An Engineered Future to Pest Control Globally, according to the number of people killed, mosquitoes are the world's deadliest animal. As CNET notes, mosquitoes kill more people than sharks, snakes, hippos and even humans per year — all due to the transmission of fatal and debilitating viral diseases. With the expansion of flying insect vector ranges due to global warming, as well as the increasing resistance to insecticides, public health strategies have had to evolve to protect people effectively. Genetic modification (GM) is only one approach, but it does seem to be more efficient than traditional methods, such as insecticide use or releasing irradiated insects to suppress populations. Insecticide gets tricky once species become resistant. And irradiation, although successful at sterilizing males, needs huge numbers of insects for success because the process renders them weaker than unmodified males. The World Health Organization (WHO) has accepted GM, advising that it avoids increased insecticide use due to resistance. The Oxitec approach, known as Release of Insects carrying a Dominant Lethal (RIDL), is one GM technique. Other high-tech tools for insect control include infecting breeding populations with debilitating Wolbachia bacteria species, modifying insect foods for lethality and other precision molecular approaches. For example, Bt maize suppresses local insect populations by giving them something poisonous to chew on. Nature describes how the engineered maize species kills off caterpillars and grubs by incorporating a protein derived from a common soil bacterium that kills the pests and is harmless to people. When the larvae start feeding, they ingest the toxic Cry proteins and die rapidly, so the crop is protected. Another GM approach uses highly specific CRISPR targeting. Researchers created populations containing the Cas-9 targeting modification alongside individuals with the guide RNA targets. A BioRxiv preprint describes how the scientists homed in on genes that destroyed functionality in both male and female A. aegyptii populations. Using CRISPR, they disrupted spermatogenesis and attacked the gene responsible for flight. Not only did the genetically modified mosquitoes produce sterile males, but they also created non-viable females. Without being able to fly, female mosquitoes could not mate or reproduce. Furthermore, because they also could not search for humans for a blood meal, this modification could also impact disease transmission. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Genetically Modified Mosquitoes Tackle the World's Deadliest Animal

Einstein famously called it "spooky action at a distance"; the notion that obtaining information about one particle in an entangled pair provides information about the other, no matter how far they are apart. Often called one of the trickiest ideas in science, quantum entanglement has given rise to a host of arguments and experiments — from possibly dead cats to many-worlds concepts and quantum time tweaks — that further complicate the issue, making it even harder to unpack and understand. Let's simplify the spooky and help settle the score with a quick look at the quantum condition. State of the Union Understanding quantum entanglement starts with the quantum state. All photons — the ideal particle for quantum questions since they can be reliably split into entangled pairs — exist simultaneously in multiple states. It's called quantum superposition: The idea that all states are potentially possible until a photon is observed or measured. Simple, right? Not so fast. When it comes to entangled pairs, measuring one tells you something about the other: For example, if the first one you measure spins up, its pair must spin down — no matter where it's located — giving rise to Einstein's spooky action statement. But here's the thing: We're already familiar with this framework. Science Alert likens it to finding one glove of a set. If it's a right-handed glove you know the other has to be left-handed, even if you can't see it to confirm the observation. If you've misplaced the pair and you're searching the house, the gloves are in superpositional state; they could be either left- or right-handed. Once you find one, however, you collapse this condition and confirm the configuration of both. Quantum entanglement isn't quite this easy; while knowing some states provides 100% certainty about the action of the paired particle, most offer only a probability, making another state only more or less likely for the entangled entity. Still, this means the more scientists learn about one particle, the greater their body of knowledge about the other — instantaneously — no matter where it's located in the universe. But this also poses a problem, since it seemingly violates the notion that nothing — not even information — can travel faster than the speed of light. What You See — And What You Get The action of observation is fundamental for science. Measurement allows for greater accuracy and understanding, but in a quantum entanglement scenario, measurement seemingly has an impact on the properties of particles themselves. This doesn't dovetail with classic conceptualizations of the world, or what physicist John Bell called "realism" — that the properties of objects remain consistent regardless of observation. But even before the deep dive into quantum mechanics, issues were cropping up around the edges of classical construction: Heisenberg's uncertainty principle states that as the position of a particle is more precisely determined, momentum predictions suffer a precision loss — and vice versa. At first glance, this makes it seem like the act of observation changes the behavior of the particle itself; instead, it simply precludes our ability to obtain all knowledge simultaneously. Quantum entanglement poses the same problem. If particles exist in "real" states, their properties shouldn't be affected by measurement or observation; knowing something about one of a pair shouldn't tell you anything about the other. To test this theory, scientists sent pairs of photons toward detectors located a significant distance apart. If both had the same polarization, they should reach the detectors. If not, at least one would be blocked. Under a quantum view of the universe, entangled pairs should show higher polarization correlations than if they're governed by classical conditions — and that's exactly what happens. Some criticism has suggested that scientists' decision about the angle of approach to each detector wasn't entirely random, in effect imposing outside, unknown constraints on the experiment. To solve this issue, one team used a random measurement setting based on the wavelength of light detected from high-redshift quasars, effectively removing any human hubris. The results? Higher state correlation than would be expected under classical models. Spooky Security As noted by Scientific American, the idea of entanglement offers potential benefits for information security. Scientists at the University of Bristol have now created and deployed an eight node quantum network that spans 17 kilometers and empowers secure communication using what's called quantum key distribution (QKD). Consider those most classic of communicators: Alice and Bob. In a QKD model, Alice and Bob use a pair of entangled photons to create a private key. Both randomly perform a set of measurements, compare the results and select the measurement subset that gives them the same results as the basis for their quantum key. Scaling this up has proven problematic, however, since adding "Charlie" to the mix without having him go through Bob to get to Alice required separate links to both. While this only requires three links for three end nodes, the volume increases rapidly — eight-node networks need 28 links and 100-node networks require 4,950. The Bristol team solved this problem by creating a central source model that allows direct connection between any two nodes without the need to pass through other users, in turn making spooky security both possible and potentially profitable. Closing the Quantum Loophole Ultimately, the quantum conundrum comes down to free will. The idea that measuring one particle property seemingly influences the probability of its paired partners' state isn't an easy thing for humans to handle, since it seems to violate the core concepts of our universe: Information can't travel faster than light, and measurement shouldn't preclude specific properties for either particle pair. But just like the case of the missing glove, there's no compulsion in collapsing the quantum state — instead, more information about preexisting conditions has simply been confirmed. Spooky? Undoubtedly. Solid science? Absolutely.

Quantum Entanglement: Simplifying the Science of Spooky Action

As visual representations of scientific concepts go, the periodic table is hard to beat. It's easily recognizable, relatively simple to understand and for the last 150 years has acted as a reliable roadmap to help chemists uncover new elements and expand the sum of human knowledge. The American Chemical Society (ACS) described it as "perhaps as foundational to chemistry as the discovery of DNA has been to biology." But Dmitri Mendeleev's elemental Excel spreadsheet has also become a kind of cultural touchstone. Tables of every size and shape are easily available. Want a colored-coded representation of key elemental groups? No problem. Need a dog-themed periodic table of the EleMUTTS? Of course! Want to learn the periodic table through a song set to the tune of Jacques Offenbach's "Infernal Galop"? Of course you do. It's no surprise, then, that the United Nations decided the table's sesquicentennial was worth recognizing: According to the official UNESCO website, 2019 is the International Year of the Periodic Table. So let's dive in — how did Mendeleev develop his table? How well does it stand up under pressure? And what happens when the table's not big enough for all the elements at the party? Let's Table This Discussion As noted by the Royal Society of Chemistry, Dmitri Mendeleev wasn't the first scientist who attempted to group the elements into some type of easily recognizable framework. In 1789, Antoine Lavoisier classified elements by their properties (gases, metals, non-metals and earths). In 1865, John Newlands noticed similarities in elements of atomic weights that differed by seven. He called it the "Law of Octaves," later known as the "Periodic Law." Mendeleev noticed that certain types of elements regularly reoccurred when elements were arranged according to atomic weight — reactive non-metals were directly followed by light reactive metals and less reactive light metals. He wasn't afraid to move elements around the table based on their behavior, says the Royal Society of Chemistry. This ran counter to the notion that elements should be ordered by atomic weight, but it produced better far results. For example, nickel is lighter than cobalt but better aligns with palladium — located in the next row down — than rhodium. Choosing action over atomic weight made Mendeleev's table much more accurate, especially after protons were discovered; when classified according the number of protons in the nucleus, Mendeleev's table was spot-on, according to the Royal Society of Chemistry. The table's biggest benefit was predictability. Elements directly above or below each other in columns — or "groups" — share similar characteristics. For example, the alkali metals of the first column "usually carry a +1 charge in reactions, react vigorously with water, and combine readily with nonmetals," as noted by ThoughtCo. Those in the same row — or "period" — share the highest unexcited electron energy level. The table helped paved the way for a better understanding of chemical reactions work, predict outcomes when combining elements of differing groups or periods, and helped pave the way to discover new elements. Filling In the Gaps Along with his Law of Octaves, John Newlands also created a version of the periodic table. The problem? Keeping the pattern meant cramming multiple elements into the same space and hoping for the best. Needless to say, the Chemical Society was not impressed. Mendeleev, meanwhile, knew he didn't have all the answers. So whenever he came across a potential gap in his table, he left it alone. What's more, he predicted that new elements would be found to close these gaps — and sure enough, they were. He knew there should be an element after aluminum (which he called "eka-aluminium") but since no known elements had the right properties, he left the space blank. He also predicted the properties of eka-aluminium, which included an atomic weight of around 68, a solid density of 6.0 grams per centimeter cubed and a valency of three. In 1875, Paul-é‰mile Lecoq de Boisbaudran discovered gallium, which had an atomic weight of 69.72, a density of 5.9 grams per centimeter cubed and a valency of three — just as Mendeleev predicted, says the Royal Society of Chemistry. Also of note was the discovery of the noble gases by William Ramsay. While some saw them as contradictions to Mendeleev's work, further research found their natural home as the final group on the periodic table. What's Next for the Nature of the Universe? Chemists have been regularly adding new elements to the table. As noted by JSTOR Daily, the table currently caps out at element 118 — oganesson — a noble gas that has a half-life of just 0.89 milliseconds. Work is already underway to find elements 119 and 120 but as oganesson's short-lived existence makes clear, this isn't an easy task. Starting with element 105, rutherfordium, artificial preparation is required and researchers have very little time to observe any inherent properties before decay occurs. There are predictions that an "island of stability" will be found — a group of elements with exceptionally stable nuclei because their nuclear shells are filled with the "magic number" of protons or neutrons. According to the JSTOR piece, 184 neutrons is the next predicted magic number. New elements may also be found using technologies from other disciplines, such as the soon-to-launch James Webb telescope, which will observe and help analyze distant gas clouds. Just because we can't produce super-heavy, super-stable elements here on Earth, that doesn't mean some ancient gas cloud isn't out there doing great work. And while we're at it, let's go really far out on a scientific limb: According to Phys.org, a new paper suggests that once elements chunk their way up over an atomic weight of 300, the rules of normal matter may break down. Here's the idea: Normal, or baryonic, matter is made of protons and neutrons that contain bound quark triplets. Past 300, there's speculation that elements may be composed of "freely flowing 'up' and 'down' quarks" that aren't bound into triplets. This up down quark matter (udQM) would be stable for super-heavy elements beyond the end of the periodic table and could exist on a "continent" — not just an island! — of stability. Don't Mendeleev Me Here Mendeleev's work was a critical jumping-off point for the advancement of chemistry, technology and scientific speculation. As our brief history of the periodic table shows, however, this isn't a find-and-forget situation: There's always more room for elements left off the first draft (and even some that might be too big for our current table). Along with recognition through 2019's International Year of the Periodic Table, Mendeleev himself was immortalized in Element 101: a metallic radioactive transuranic element in the actinide series that was discovered in 1955 and named mendelevium in honor of his work.

It's Elementary: A Brief History of the Periodic Table

This Thanksgiving, whether you're making savory dinner rolls or sweet apple pie, the success of your meal will depend on the science of baking. Baking is both an art and a science. Bakers can experiment with flavors and alternative ingredients, but most of your favorite Thanksgiving baked goods start with the same basic formula. As science enthusiasts, there's no better way to celebrate Thanksgiving than to break down the chemical and molecular interactions behind our favorite desserts. Solid Flour provides the basic structure for everything from the crustiest French bread to the puffiest pastry. It's made of starches and protein called gluten. When you mix flour and water together, the proteins combine to form an elastic web called a gluten network. This gluten web traps air bubbles, while the starch sets as it heats to add support to the structure, according to The Spruce Eats. Different recipes call for different types of flour because of the protein content. Bread flour, for example, has a higher protein content, which gives it a strong gluten network and sturdy structure. Cake flour has lower protein content, which produces a weaker gluten network and fluffier end product, according to kitchn. While gluten networks are helpful for providing structure, too much gluten formation can give your baked goods a tough texture. Mixing dough helps these networks form, which is why we knead bread dough (to make it strong and stretchy) and avoid overmixing cakes, cookies and quick breads like banana breads. Shortening ingredients such as butter, oils and fats help limit gluten formation, because fat repels the water that gluten networks require. When you cut butter into flour, for example, it coats the flour and repels the water-based ingredients that you'll add next. This avoids activating too many proteins at once, shortening the gluten formation so that you end up with softer, more tender pastries. According to the Spruce Eats, fat also helps make cake fluffy. When you cream sugar and butter, the mixing process creates small pockets of air where the sharp edges of the sugar crystals interact with the fat. Liquid Water allows ingredients such as yeast or baking soda to do their jobs. It also hydrates gluten so that the dough can take shape. Eggs serve several purposes in baking, such as binding the other ingredients together and providing structure since they start as liquid but become more solid when they are heated. Some recipes call for separating the yolk from the white because they each have different properties. The yolks are filled with nutrients and fat, which adds to the pastry's flavor and texture. Yolks contain an emulsifier called lecithin that brings water-based liquids and oil together, even though they usually repel each other. This process helps mix the ingredients together so that they are distributed evenly throughout the batter. It's important to set the oven to the correct temperature because yolk proteins unfold and gel together when heated. When whipped, the water and protein in egg whites incorporates air bubbles that make a foam to lift dough and give it a fluffy, delicate texture. When whipped egg whites are heated in an oven, the air inside them will expand, further rising the dough, according to kitchn. Gas Leavening, or making the dough rise, is an essential aspect of the science of baking. When liquid ingredients are heated in the oven, they emit some steam that helps lift the dough. Typically, though, a specific leavening ingredient such as yeast or baking soda will be added to baked goods. This is where you must measure ingredients as precise as a chemist measuring materials for a science experiment. Too much leavening agent will make the bubbles so big that they'll pop and leave you with a flat baked good, according to The Spruce Eats. On the other hand, if you don't add enough leavening agents, you'll end up with a dense end product. A single-celled fungus called yeast is the classic leavening ingredient. It is such an ancient pantry staple that in August 2019, scientists collected 4,500-year-old yeast from ancient Egyptian pottery. Smithsonian reports that the scientists used the ancient yeast to bake a loaf of bread. Yeast works by absorbing sugar and excreting carbon dioxide gas, which makes the dough rise according to Fine Cooking. Yeast contributes to the bread's flavor, because during the fermentation process, yeast breaks down large starch molecules into smaller, flavorful simple sugars. Yeast helps develop the gluten network and strengthen the dough. When yeast releases gas into the dough, protein and water molecules are pushed together, which, just like kneading the dough, gives them another opportunity to form gluten. While yeast requires patience, baking powder works instantly. Baking powder contains a dry acid and baking soda, which is also known as sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3). According to ThoughtCo., baking soda (a salt) reacts with acidic ingredients and heat, which creates carbon dioxide as a byproduct. As soon as baking soda touches a water-based ingredient (milk, eggs, etc.), a chemical reaction occurs and gas bubbles start to release. This is why it's important to avoid overmixing or leaving the batter out of the oven for too long. When you bite into your Thanksgiving baked goods, think about the chemical and molecular interactions that make them so delicious. The aroma, color, flavor and texture all start at the molecular level. Recipes should be followed in order, just like you would follow the procedure of a science experiment. If you skip steps or go out of order, you'll miss out on essential chemical reactions. This could leave you with deflated bread or dense muffins. A perfectly browned pie crust doesn't happen by luck — it's the science of baking. 

Breaking Down the Science of Baking

Can you digest gum? As a child, you may have heard that a piece of swallowed gum will stay in your stomach for seven years. That hopefully convinced you to wrap up your chewy treat after the flavor ran out and throw it neatly in the trash. Less considerate people might stick their gum where some poor soul will need to scrape off the slowly solidifying, disgusting mess. But is swallowing gum that bad? Let's explore what really happens when you swallow gum. History of Chewing Gum Humans have been chewing gum derived from trees since the Stone Age. In Denmark, a 5,700-year-old piece of birch tar with human toothmarks was found filled with well-preserved DNA from the chewer and her recent meal, as described by Smithsonian magazine. The ancient Greeks chewed the sweet resin of mastic trees. Native Americans chewed resin from spruce trees, and European colonists picked up the habit. Farther south, ancient Mayans and Aztecs chewed sap from sapodilla trees. The first patented chewing gum sticks hit US markets in 1871. According to Britannica, they were manufactured from sapodilla sap that was harvested much like natural rubber. During World War II, chewing gum was included in US military rations, and soldiers helped spread its popularity overseas. Soon, there weren't enough sapodilla trees to keep up with demand. After World War II, chemists learned to create artificial gum bases using synthetic polymers, which are essentially different types of synthetic rubber. Today, many gum manufacturers use butyl rubber, which is also used to make inner tubes, tires and basketballs. A few companies still use natural sap. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates gum as a non-food item, so manufacturers need to use "food grade" materials but don't need to disclose their ingredients. The rubbery gum base is typically mixed with softeners such as paraffin wax or vegetable oil for elasticity. Additional ingredients include natural or artificial sweeteners, flavors such as mint or fruit, colors, preservatives, and perhaps a candy coat. Through clever marketing and applying the science of taste, the gum industry had an estimated $32 billion in global sales in 2019, according to Statista. What Happens When You Swallow Gum? Except for the gum base, the ingredients in gum can easily be broken down by the digestive system. It's the gum base that sticks to sidewalks, school desks, human hair, and dental work. So what happens if you swallow a piece? Can you digest gum? No, but it doesn't stick to your stomach for seven years either. It follows the same path as anything else you swallow, including indigestible items such as popcorn kernels, watermelon seeds, small pieces of bone and the fiber base of raw vegetables. Food enters the gastrointestinal (GI) system through the mouth. Chewing mechanically breaks food into smaller pieces, and enzymes in saliva start the process of chemically breaking down molecules so they can be absorbed. Anything that is swallowed, including gum, then enters the esophagus and is carried into the stomach. The stomach mixes food with acid and digestive enzymes until it becomes a slurry of juices and solids. This slurry then drains into the small intestine, where bacteria and more enzymes help break down the solid material. Nutrients are absorbed through the walls of the small intestine. Muscle contractions move the slurry through the small intestine, which is about 20 feet long in adults. Anything left is then transferred to the large intestine, which is also called the colon. Water is absorbed through the walls of the colon until the remaining material is the appropriate consistency to be expelled as waste. If you swallow a piece of gum, it will typically exit the gastrointestinal track within a few days and be largely unaffected by the process. What's the Worst That Could Happen? While occasionally swallowing a piece of gum is typically no big deal, serious problems can arise. For small children — who may not understand that gum should not be swallowed — gum is a choking hazard like coins or small toys that can block the esophagus. If these items make it through the esophagus into the stomach, anything smaller than a quarter will usually pass through the GI tract and be expelled as waste. However, indigestible items can clump together to form a bezoar, which is too large to move normally through the GI tract. This can clog the system and lead to severe abdominal pain, constipation and vomiting. A bezoar may require surgical removal. While rare, there are some documented medical horror stories that involve swallowing gum. A publication in the journal Pediatrics described three cases of children who suffered gastrointestinal blockages because they regularly swallowed gum. The youngest child was 1.5 years old and had a mass stuck in the esophagus containing four coins held together by a large wad of gum. Two other cases involved 4.5-year-olds with bowel obstructions. One child had been suffering from constipation for two years, and was offered gum five to seven times a day to encourage trying to go to the bathroom. This child always swallowed the gum. Doctors found and removed a "taffy-like" mass from this child's rectum consisting mostly of gum. The other 4.5 year old also regularly swallowed gum and had a "multi-colored mass" of chewing gum removed. This is not just a problem for small children. Consider the case of an 18-year-old Israeli female reported in the journal Gastrointestinal Endoscopy. She had been chewing and swallowing at least five pieces of gum per day for several years and was admitted to the hospital with stomach pain. Her stomach was filled with solid masses of gum and food material, which had to be removed in multiple stages. So, feel free to enjoy your gum just like the ancient Greeks, Mayans and Native Americans — just put it in the trash when you're done. There's no good reason to test your GI tract with tire rubber. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology and engineering.

Is Swallowing Gum Dangerous?

For some, the future comes too fast. Technologies of tomorrow seem to quickly usurp yesterday's trends. But luckily advances in restoration architecture have come together to save parts of history from total obliteration. Lasers, virtual reality and 3D printing are recent additions to the conservation technology toolbox, giving historians new ways to preserve cultural landmarks that may have been lost — or are at risk of being lost — to time, neglect, wars or disaster. Lasers 3D-Mapped Notre Dame At 6:20 p.m. local time on Monday, April 15, 2019, an alarm rang out at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, France. A fire had started in the building's iconic spire and spread through the roof, nicknamed "The Forest" for its framework of beams hewn from 12th century oaks. Nine hours later, firefighters extinguished the flames, reports CNN, and the world looked with shock upon the ruins of a historical landmark. But all was not lost. Ten years prior to the fire, the late Andrew Tallon, an architectural historian at Vassar College, and computer scientist Paul Blaer of Columbia University laser-scanned every inch of Notre Dame, inside and out, according to The Atlantic. It took them five days to place markers around the structure and then point a Leica scanner, mounted on a tripod, at 50 different locations. They collected more than 1 billion data points, according to Leica, and computer software converted the scanned data into three-dimensional forms. As part of this architectural conservation project, Tallon also used a digital camera to collect high-resolution panoramic photos of the interior and exterior, and overlaid them onto the 3D scans to map the details. There was only one problem, reports The Atlantic. No one is quite sure where the files are. Roughly a terabyte in size, Blaer estimates, the files are small enough to fit on a single hard drive and, since they were collected 10 years ago, are unlikely to have been uploaded to the cloud. A colleague of Tallon's, John Ochsendorf, of MIT, told The Atlantic he thought they might be with Tallon's widow. If found, these details would offer invaluable resources to those rebuilding the Gothic cathedral. Remote Sensing Uncovers a Lost Mayan City High-resolution aerial images are creating breakthroughs in archaeology and technology. Using an aerial mapping technology, called LiDAR, scientists are able to see archaeological sites hidden beneath soil, sand, vegetation or even man-made structures. Last year, Marcello Canuto of Tulane University and his team published an unprecedented study in the journal Science, detailing the dozens of ancient cities in northern Guatemala that they found using this laser-based technology. It's similar to radar in that it emits a signal that is analyzed with a sensor when it reflects off a distant object and returns. The difference is that radar uses radio waves and Lidar uses light waves. Onboard sensors are able to measure the precise elevation and geospatial location of features on Earth's surface to create a 3D topological map. According to a press statement from Tulane University, Canuto and his team conducted aerial surveys of 810 square miles and found 61,480 ancient structures, 362 square kilometers of terraces, 952 square kilometers of farmland and 106 square kilometers of causeways. Based on the ruins, the scientists estimate that 7 to 11 million people lived in the area between the years 650 and 800. Virtual Reality and 3D Printing Preserve a Trove of Heritage Sites Arguably one of the most ambitious projects to use conservation technology to save landmarks is the Open Heritage Project, started by San Francisco-based Ben Kacyra, an engineer and founder of a company that developed a portable scanning technology. The idea for the project came to Kacyra in 2001 as he watched television footage of the Taliban, a Sunni Islamic fundamentalist group, destroying the Buddhas of Bamiyan — monuments in Afghanistan that date back to the 4th and 5th centuries, reports Smithsonian. Well-versed in scanning technology, Kacyra decided he could use it to create 3D experiences of heritage sites, even ones that had already been destroyed. He founded the nonprofit CyArk in 2003 to use 3D scanning technology, digital imagery, drones and virtual reality to compile open-source data and share visual representations of culturally significant sites. CyArk teamed up with Google to create an online library, which contains some 27 sites from 18 countries. Visitors to the Open Heritage Project can view the Maya ruins of Chiché©n Itzé¡ in Mexico, the ancient city of Bagan in Myanmar, the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., and more using a laptop or virtual reality goggles. This past January, CyArk and Google partnered with the 3D printing company Stratasys to make some of the world's heritage sites available as 3D-printed models. In a press statement, Chance Coughenour, a digital archaeologist and program manager with the Google Arts and Culture division, said, "These detailed scans can also be used to identify areas of damage and assist restoration efforts." For all that has been saved, plenty has been lost. In 1900, a hurricane nearly wiped away the city of Gavelston, Texas, according to History. In 2018, a fire ravaged Brazil's 200-year-old Rio de Janeiro National Treasure Museum. But advances in restoration architecture and conservation technology are making it possible to digitally record and preserve the world's cultural heritages for future generations.

How Architectural Conservation Technology Is Saving Landmarks

The most common materials in the world, including plastic, steel, glass or wood have distinct molecular and chemical properties that give them intrinsic qualities, such as strength, flexibility or transparency. But an entirely different class of materials, called metamaterials, are coming onto the scene.  Artificially engineered, these materials have unique geometries and physical structures that can manipulate any mechanical or electromagnetic wave that passes through them. Metamaterials can perform a host of futuristic tricks; they can absorb sound waves to produce silence, bend light to create invisibility cloak technology and dampen seismic waves to safeguard a building against an earthquake.  Metamaterial applications are numerous, but here are five of the coolest.  Sound Silencers  If you've ever traveled by train or plane, you know the thunderous noise large engines can make. Industrial noise occurs in factories, too — it even emits from the fan in your refrigerator. Some scientists, like Yun Jing and his colleagues at North Carolina State University, are building metamaterials to quiet these large machines.  In the journal of the Annual Review of Materials Research, Jing describes a material he designed that behaves like a kind of sound cage. Gaps in the cage are large enough to allow air to pass through but small enough that sound waves become trapped inside. Soundproof and ventilated, the cage could keep engine noise to a minimum.  Sonar Deflectors  In the deep ocean, submarines crews use sound waves, or sonar, to detect other seafaring vessels. But what if you have a stealth mission ahead of you and you don't want to be detected? Talk to engineer Amanda Hanford and her team at Pennsylvania State University. They designed a metamaterial device that renders objects invisible to sound. If the hull of a submarine were covered in this material, it would force the energy from oncoming sound waves to spread around the object, instead of bouncing off and returning a signal, reports the BBC.  Earthquake Dampeners  Earthquakes have injured or killed hundreds of thousands of people around the world since 2000, reports Our World in Data, and the annual damage earthquakes cause to infrastructure is in the billions of dollars. Researchers are looking at various applications of metamaterials to soften the blow of these violently shaking natural disasters.  One method involves building blocks called robotic meta-atoms, developed by a group of physicists from the University of Amsterdam, says PhysOrg. Each tiny device vibrates on a unique spring, causing the concentric rippling energy passing over it to shift and move in only one direction. That dissipates the wave in one direction and amplifies it in another. A device made from these meta-atoms could potentially redirect the energy of a seismic wave away from a building and in a safer direction.  Heat Shields  Dozens of space companies and agencies are currently drafting plans to send satellites and spaceships into orbit and beyond. Once outside Earth's protective atmosphere, spacecraft electronics become vulnerable to infrared heat and radiation from the sun. Current methods to protect them involve radiator panels made from quartz tiles. But these tiles are heavy, adding to the cost of launches.  Last year, researchers from the University of Southampton announced they had developed a thin, lightweight coating from metamaterials designed to radiate infrared heat away from spacecraft. Called a metamaterial optical solar reflector, or a meta-OSR, the material is made from metal oxide, a material commonly used for transparent electrical contacts. The team created a pattern in the surface of the material to bend each electromagnetic wave in the infrared spectrum away from it and also reflect sunlight.  Invisibility Cloaks  Scientists are closer than ever to creating an invisibility cloak that competes with Harry Potter's.  In research published last year in the journal Optica, researches led by engineer José© Azaé±a reported that they had developed invisibility cloak technology in the form of a spectral cloaking device that could make objects invisible in daylight. The device, called an optical filter, manipulates the various frequencies of visible light, such as the red, blue and green wavelengths of light seen in a rainbow.  The filter works by shifting one frequency of light to another as the light passes through the object, reports Tech Times. Once the light wave has passed, it returns to its original state. For instance, the filter would shift the red wavelength of light passing over a red apple to another frequency, rendering the apple invisible. Such a filter could be used to cloak military operations, but it could also be used in the telecommunications industries to improve radio signals.  Each year, scientists improve upon the technology of metamaterials, remarkably engineered coatings, devices and components. These structures, which are typically microscopic or smaller, allow scientists to control mechanical and electromagnetic waves in novel and surprising ways. From saving lives to shielding covert operations from enemy eyes, these materials push the limits of light and sound and will take humans into a future we haven't yet imagined.        

Engineered Metamaterials Could Lead to Invisibility Cloak Technology

Fast radio bursts, or FRBs, are one of the most exciting unsolved mysteries in astronomy today. FRBs are incredibly powerful flares of short-wavelength radio waves from space. Each one is the result of an event that lasted just a few milliseconds but produced as much as 500 million times the energy our sun does over a comparable amount of time. Fast Radio Burst (FRB) Basics Radio waves are part of the electromagnetic spectrum — which includes infrared light, visible light, ultraviolet light, X-rays and gamma rays — and, therefore, travel through space at the speed of light. The first FRB was discovered in 2007 by an astronomer at West Virginia University who was looking through old data from a radio telescope in Australia. The millisecond-long blip seemed to originate from outside the universe. Dozens more FRBs were later found, but most were one-off events that were detected once and never repeated. This made FRBs impossible to predict, difficult to observe and extremely challenging to trace to a specific source. Without more information, researchers could only speculate about the astronomical events that might trigger such intense radio bursts. A Repeating FRB One FRB (named FRB 121102) was identified as repeating in 2016. Researchers pointed a large radio telescope to the location of a previously observed FRB and found that the signal repeated every few weeks or so, as explained by the SETI Institute. This repetition helped scientists trace the source of the FRB to a dwarf galaxy 3 billion light-years away. The massive distance traveled by this FRB indicated that it was the result of an incredibly energetic event. Furthermore, the fact that FRBs last only a few milliseconds means that the objects producing them can't be much bigger than 200 miles across, which is the distance that radio waves can travel in that time. Therefore, the source of FRBs must be extremely dense, compact objects that are considerably smaller than an ordinary star. Possibilities included supernovas, colliding black holes and magnetars, which are collapsed stellar corpses that possess the strongest magnetic fields in the universe. More (Digital) Eyes on the Sky Before 2017, astronomers had detected a total of approximately 140 fast radio bursts. That number quickly increased when the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) telescope became operational. As explained in Nature, CHIME is a giant telescope with no moving parts that scans the sky as Earth rotates. Digital image processing allows it to "look" in thousands of different directions at the same time. Between 2018 and 2019, CHIME detected 535 FRBs. Analysis revealed that the FRBs originated from across the universe and fell into two distinct categories. The majority of the 535 bursts were one-off events, while 61 were "repeaters" that came from 18 different sources. The repeaters typically lasted at least three times longer and emitted a much narrower band of radio frequencies. These findings suggest that FRBs are the result of at least two distinct astrophysical phenomena. The one-off FRBs are likely the result of cataclysmic events, such as the collision of two neutron stars or magnetic storms in young magnetars. The repeaters require more complex explanations, none of which have been verified. Most of the repeaters are unpredictable, but two are known to have a regular cycle. The first repeater ever identified (FRB 121102) is now known to follow a cycle of 90 days of FRB activity followed by 67 days of silence. This repeater is incredibly active; ScienceAlert reported that 122 bursts were detected in a one-hour period. The second repeater with a regular cycle is named FRB 20180916B, which repeats every 16.35 days. An FRB From Within the Milky Way In April 2020, astronomers detected an FRB that came from our own galaxy. As explained in Astronomy, the magnetar SGR 1935+2154 started emitting X-rays from its location near the center of our galaxy some 30,000 light-years away. Eager to catch the show, astronomers focused their telescopes and were able to catch X-rays, gamma rays and a fast radio burst that was named FRB 200428. The FRB lasted just 1.5 milliseconds, was the closest FRB ever detected and was 3,000 times brighter than any previously observed magnetar radio signal. While magnetars had been a favored contender to explain FRBs, this was the first evidence that they can actually produce radio waves powerful enough to account for the signals. This Milky Way magnetar did not release as much energy as would be required for the FRBs from millions or billions of light-years away, so it's possible that FRBs detected from outside our galaxy come from younger, more active magnetars. FRBs From the Spiral Arms of Galaxies In May 2021, astronomers used the excellent resolution of the Hubble Space Telescope to trace the source of five FRBs to the spiral arms of five distant galaxies, as reported by NASA. These galaxies are located 400 million to 9 billion light-years away and are described as "[mostly] massive, relatively young and still forming stars." This is consistent with the idea that FRBs originate from young magnetar outbursts. But just when it seemed that the mystery of fast radio bursts was mostly solved, the universe had another surprise in store. An FRB From an Old Neighborhood In 2021, National Geographic described how a repeating FRB (named FRB 20200120E) was traced to a globular cluster, which is one of the most ancient objects in the observable universe. Globular clusters are dense collections of very old stars and don't seem to contain the kinds of stars that can collapse into magnetars. This discovery has forced astronomers to explain how a population of old, quiet stars can generate such powerful blasts. Possible explanations include other types of stellar corpses, but there's currently no supporting evidence for that theory. This FRB example highlights how powerful radio waves from space might come from a variety of different sources. Identifying these sources will take powerful equipment, ingenious software and creative minds. Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

Radio Bursts Hint at Powerful Blasts From Billions of Light-Years Away

Insect migration is a global occurrence, with moths, dragonflies and others taking flight in search of food and breeding grounds. If you grew up in North America, you may be familiar with one species with an especially long journey: the Monarch butterfly. Twice a year, Monarchs take a 3,000-mile journey between overwintering grounds in Mexico and food sources in the United States and southern Canada. Thousands make the journey successfully, but their route has dangerous roadblocks in the form of climate change and human interference. Monarch's Flight The Monarch butterfly (Danaus plexipuss) is a major pollinator and also the only butterfly species to make a twice-yearly migration. There are two populations in North America. Western butterflies, a smaller population, live to the west of the Rocky Mountains, overwintering mostly in California and into Mexico. A much larger population to the east spends the winter roosting on Mexican hillsides. The U.S. Forest Service describes how they return each fall from feeding grounds in north and central U.S. states and southern Canada. Their journey was first discovered and reported in 1976 in National Geographic by University of Toronto researcher Dr. Frank Urquhart. Prior to this, it was as if the butterflies simply vanished from sight, and no one knew where they disappeared each winter. Through tagging and one of the earliest citizen science projects, Urquhart traced the disappearing populations. The World Wildlife Fund describes the Monarchs reappearing in Mexico each year around el Dié¡ de los Muertos. The butterflies roost among oyamel and pine trees on the high slopes of Mexico's Sierra Madre. They cluster together for warmth and safety, forming bright orange, densely packed colonies until triggered to fly north again by the longer days of spring. Monarchs at Risk Monarch butterfly numbers are dwindling. They're not listed as endangered in Canada but are included under the Species at Risk Act. Their status under the Endangered Species Act in the U.S. is under review, along with protection legislation for their habitat. The downward trend also affects Monarch butterflies west of the Rockies. A report in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution reveals that western numbers dropped in abundance by 97% between the 1980s and the mid-2010s. National Geographic notes that, at this rate, models predict an 11% to 57% chance that Monarch numbers will fall so low over the next 20 years that the population will not be able to recover. Climate Change and Other Impacts Although the insect migration each year poses a huge threat to individual survival, studies show that deaths along the route are not the primary cause of the population slump. Tagging studies carried out by Iowa State University researchers summarized in Science Daily show that migration mortality due to factors such as car strikes, for example, is not significant, and most butterflies make it to their destination. Monarch butterflies make their twice-yearly journey for two reasons — food and shelter — and both are under threat from climate change and human activity. Overwintering forests are under threat of logging in Mexico, and food sources are sensitive to herbicides. Milkweed grows alongside major migratory routes, such as the I-35 running through the central and mid-west U.S. Nectar-rich plants are important energy sources for migrating butterflies, but milkweed supports a vital part of the Monarch's life cycle. Not only do the butterflies lay their eggs on the underside of milkweed leaves, but the cardiac glycoside toxins in the plant sap help protect the larvae from predators and parasites. Climate change, through temperature and carbon dioxide levels, is impacting this beneficial habitat. Not only is rising CO2 changing the toxin production in the plants and rendering its protection less effective, but increased temperatures are forcing the butterflies into longer migrations as they journey to breeding grounds further north. And the impacts can be seen already; though Monarchs are built to fly long distances, their wings are now growing even larger to cope with the stress of a longer migration. Saving Monarchs Canada, the U.S. and Mexico are all involved in saving Monarch butterfly populations. Efforts mostly involve protecting habitat and food sources. For example, the National Wildlife Federation's Mayors Monarch Pledge sees municipalities in the three countries taking steps to protect environment. Their actions include protecting and creating habitats for not only the butterflies but all pollinators along the major migration routes. Captive breeding is also a popular eco initiative. However, a 2019 study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS) suggests that individuals bred in captivity may not migrate as successfully compared with wild butterflies. There's also a Monarch Highway initiative devoted to creating and maintaining pollinator habitats. For example, milkweed benefits from seasonal maintenance. Mowing the plants especially in time for egg laying season ensures a fresh crop of young and tender leaves for the butterfly larvae. Although actions like legislating environmental protections may be a little beyond what the everyday citizen can accomplish, there are practical steps you can take to protect Monarch butterfly food sources and habitat. Planting a butterfly garden helps to provide energy for the migrating insects and also supports local pollinators. You can also take part in annual Monarch counts and other citizen science observation projects to keep this amazing insect migration in the air.

Monarch Butterfly Migration at Risk From Climate Change

In 2018, Kilauea had its largest eruption in centuries. Because the volcano, which is located on the big island of Hawai'i, is easily accessible, it's closely monitored by scientists. During this massive volcanic eruption, scientists from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) were able to collect data on what was occurring. They discovered that this eruption was so much larger than usual because of a particular seismic event. According to a new study published in Nature, the collapse of Kilauea's caldera likely occurred because of the volcano's vents. Understanding Caldera Collapse When a volcano eruption occurs, sometimes a large depression, known as a caldera, will form. According to National Geographic, this happens because the magma inside the volcano provides support to the sides. After a volcano erupts, the magma chamber empties, eliminating that support. The sides of the volcano can collapse inward, forming a caldera. This can happen in an instant, with a violent eruption, or more slowly, as is the case with the caldera in the Kilauea volcano on Hawai'i. When scientists Alberto Roman and Paul Lundgren at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory looked at the data coming out of Kilauea's massive 2018 eruption, they wanted to know why it was the volcano's largest in over 200 years. They were also interested in what specific mechanisms caused it. The answer to the first question was relatively easy — the volcano eruption was so large due to caldera collapse. As the caldera fell into the volcano, the large block of rocks became stuck inside the volcano, building the pressure inside. According to Scientific American, during the 2018 volcano eruption at Kilauea, scientists were directly able to connect increases in lava flow from the building pressure to the eventual collapse of the caldera. The effects were seen within minutes of collapse up to 40 kilometers away from the volcano, and the "pressure pulses" created surges in lava flow that lasted for hours. What Triggers Caldera Collapse? The more difficult question, though, is what actually are the mechanisms that trigger the collapse of the caldera? According to a study published in Science, the Kilauea caldera collapsed after a very "small fraction" of the magma within the volcano was evacuated. This means that volcanoes don't need the magma chamber to be anywhere close to empty before calderas collapse. How, then, can we evaluate the mechanisms of what conditions lead to caldera collapse? It's an important question because it will allow scientists to better predict how forceful a volcanic eruption will be. It can also assist in better understanding the levels of lava flow and how large the rift zone — which are the weak points of the volcano through which lava can erupt — will be. Understanding the mechanisms of caldera collapse will help scientists understand the short-, medium- and long-term effects of volcano eruptions, especially in populated areas around the volcano. Kilauea is a shield volcano, which means that it is large, gently sloping and forms the shape of a shield. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, these volcanoes not only erupt at the summit, but they can also erupt in multiple of the aforementioned rift zones that radiate out from the summit and join together as they flow outward. The scientists at NASA's JPL were able to put together a model of collapse based on the data from the 2018 eruption. They found that these rift zone vents, which are openings within the volcano's structure further down from the caldera, were the culprit. As lava flowed through these vents, the magma was released. The caldera collapsed after it lost this support structure during the volcano eruption. The rock falling into the magma chamber subsequently pressurized the lava flow, creating pressure pulses that increased the severity of the eruption. Life-Saving Science Knowing what triggers the collapse of a volcano's caldera is crucial, especially in heavily populated regions such as the area around Kilauea on Hawai'i. "If we see an eruption at a low-elevation vent, that is a red flag or warning that caldera collapse is possible," said Alberto Roman in the NASA release. "Similarly, if we detect earthquakes consistent with the slipping of the caldera rock block, we now know that the eruption will likely be much larger than usual." If scientists can predict the severity of an eruption, that means they can let officials know if evacuations are needed — helping local populations prepare and potentially saving lives. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology and engineering.

Scientists Just Discovered a Hidden Force Behind Volcanic Eruption

 Particle accelerators have made their way into mainstream media — when the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN discovered five new baryons "hiding in plain sight," it was enough to make headlines worldwide. What's often left out, however, is some of the basic science behind particle accelerator functions, how they've evolved over the years and what could come next for these high-speed subatomic smashers. Perhaps time travel?    A Brief History of Making Small Things Go Really (Really) Fast    Particle accelerators work by using electric fields to accelerate groups of particles to high speeds. Two basic models — linear and circular — exist, and both require extremely cold, clean vacuum tubes that enable the particles to accelerate without interference and allow electromagnets to steer and focus the particle beam. So far, scientists have been able to boost particles to 0.99997 times the speed of light before smashing them into metal foil or other objects and recording the results.   Enable targeting cookies to view this content.   As noted by Symmetry Magazine, the first modern circular accelerator was created in 1930 and was less than five inches across. One year later, Ernest Lawrence and M. Stanley Livingston created an 11-inch accelerator. Compare that to the circular LHC at CERN, which is five miles (eight kilometers) in diameter, or the linear accelerator at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, which is almost two miles (about three kilometers) long. Accelerators have already made significant contributions to human advancement — some are used to modify the material properties or plastics or harden joints used in semiconductors, while others are used to produce heavily-charged particles for medical treatment or inspect cargo for national security purposes.    Interesting Outcomes     Along with discovering new particles, accelerators can also be used to produce quark-gluon plasma (at 7.2 trillion degrees Fahrenheit), which is thought to have dominated the early moments of the universe and is so hot that even quark bonds are broken. Pushing particles to near the speed of light creates unique outcomes: They both gain effective mass and experience time more slowly relative to observers outside the particle accelerator. This can be seen in the lifespans of pi mesons, which typically disintegrate in millionths of a second. Accelerated to high speed, however, these particles can exist for much longer, suggesting that they're likely experiencing a slower relative time frame.    The Future of Subatomic Smashing    So what's next for particle accelerators? Stephen Hawking suggested they're the basis for time travel into the future — go fast enough and everything starts to slow down. While earth-bound accelerators may not work for getting humans up to speed, the action of rapidly orbiting an object (like a circular accelerator) or going really fast in a straight line (like a linear accelerator) has yielded positive results. According to Phys, two projects are currently under review at CERN: A 31-mile (50-kilometer) long linear tunnel and a circular accelerator with a diameter of about 50 to 62 miles (80 to 100 kilometers). Already, researchers have developed a device that can produce electric pulses of 180,000 volts that last exactly 140 millionths of a second with no disruptions from "peak pulses." And as noted by Popular Mechanics, the development of micro-fabricated dielectric laser accelerators (DLAs) allowed the creation of millimeter-sized solutions that could rival CERN's performance over just 100 feet. As new storage and transmission technologies develop, the results could be "tabletop" accelerators and the potential for commercialization of these particle producers.    There are more than 30,000 particle accelerators currently in use worldwide, and the number is steadily growing as new scientific breakthroughs occur and commercial applications become less costly. The market here is both shrinking and expanding as research teams look for new ways to speed up subatomic particles, reduce the footprint of facilities and continue to propel humanity into the future. Ready for the challenge?    

Time Travel and Tiny Technology? The Future of Particle Accelerator Impact

Humans have always been amazed with the glinting, sparkling minerals that our Earth produces. But do all shining jewels originate underground? These objects do mostly come from geological processes and sedimentary rock. As National Geographic describes, they form when either lava or magma cools down, or when mineral-rich water is trapped. But there is one precious gem, as noted by The Smithsonian Magazine, that is made by a living creature, and it is certainly prized very highly. Oyster pearls, both freshwater and saltwater, come from the reaction of this bi-valve mollusk to irritation under the shell. How Do Oysters Make Pearls? Oyster pearls are the result of irritation. The shell is set up as an outer layer to protect the soft body of the oyster. Between the oyster and its shell lies the mantle, described by How Stuff Works as the organ that secretes the components of the shell. The mantle creates shell out of minerals consumed by the oyster as food. This is an ongoing process that allows for growth, and also repair if the shell is damaged. The inner layer of shell sits right next to the mantle. It's a smooth, shiny layer made of calcium carbonate, conchiolin and aragonite, also known as nacre. Another name for this is mother-of-pearl, and this is in fact where a pearl forms. When an irritant, like a fragment of shell or sand, gets between the mantle and the shell, the oyster starts covering it up to reduce the itch, so to speak. According to The Natural History Museum, the mantle secretes nacre around the irritant as a natural defense, building up layer upon smooth layer, with a beautiful pearl as the end result. Do All Shellfish Make Pearls? Although clams and mussels can also make pearls, not all shellfish secrete nacre from their mantle. Pearl farmers choose species of oyster that are known to be good at growing pearls. These will either be harvested from natural growth or cultivated by stimulating the oyster directly to form a pearl. When growing artificial pearls, also known as cultured pearls, farmers may select certain oyster species that will form pearls in either freshwater or seawater. Cultured pearls still make pearls in response to an irritant, but in this case, the farmer introduces the irritant into a cut made between the mantle and the shell. According to American Pearl, pearl formation can take between six months and four years. Farmers harvest oyster pearls carefully through a small incision and may use an oyster repeatedly for harvesting pearls. Harvesting doesn't necessarily lead to death for the oyster. Pearls come in several colors — white, black, gray, green, blue and red. They can be round and smooth, or irregular, as in baroque pearls. Color is variable, but only oysters in the South Pacific create black pearls. Ocean Biominerals and Climate Change Understanding how oysters make pearls can provide insights to support climate change research. Global warming is taking place because of rising levels of greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere, and as these gases increase in abundance, more of the Sun's energy is trapped. Accordingly, researchers have noted increases in ocean temperatures. Not only are oceans getting warmer, but they're also trapping increasing amounts of carbon dioxide, which is making the water more acidic. This is affecting the formation of biominerals like coral, mollusk shells and maybe even pearls. Since shells are made of carbonate materials, rising acidity is dissolving them and making them thinner. This affects the ability of the shellfish to survive and multiply. Biominerals like corals and mollusk shells are showing evidence of climate change, and according to The Smithsonian Magazine, they're also great records of climate change in the past. Ancient bacterial colonies called stromatolites and corals grow in layers, each one affected by surrounding conditions. These rings of growth provide a visual record for the conditions in which the organism grew, granting researchers a glimpse into how our planet adapted to periods of climate change in the past. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Oyster Pearls: An Irritating Story

Particle physics is on a quest to uncover the fundamental components of the universe by analyzing, cataloging and measuring the particles that combine to create everything. This is no easy task — the sheer variety and variability of these physical firmaments makes this a constantly changing puzzle that can seem utterly inscrutable until a new secret is unlocked. Now, new research into the muon — a small, electron-like particle 200 times heavier than its negatively charged cousin — may point the way to the next particle pivot: wobbles. Standard Operating Procedure To help make sense of the universe and how it operates, scientists created the Standard Model. This wasn't an easy task, either. As SciTechDaily notes, while the electron was discovered in 1897, the last piece of the current framework — the Higgs boson — wasn't confirmed until 2012. The model provides a way to reconcile three of the four fundamental forces: electromagnetism, the strong nuclear force and the weak nuclear force. It also highlights the role of quarks and leptons as the building blocks of all matter, including the familiar trio of protons, neutrons and electrons. Work on the Standard Model has pinpointed that photons play a role in carrying electromagnetism, while the strong force relies on gluons to ensure atomic nuclei stability and the weak force leverages W and Z bosons to drive the powerful nuclear processes that keep stars burning for billions of years. However, despite its utility, the Standard Model has a blind spot: gravity. While the model does a great job describing which particles underpin the other three fundamental forces, gravity is conspicuously absent. That's because scientists have never been able to tie a specific particle to the creation and distribution of gravity. While it plays a critical role in the operation of our universe — from counterbalancing the expansive tendencies of nuclear reactions within our sun to keeping our feet firmly planted on planet Earth — this seemingly simple attractive operation has historically resisted any in-depth understanding. But new muon measurements may change all that. Cracking the Code What's important to remember about scientists — and particle physicists specifically — is that they're never satisfied with the status quo. While the Standard Model provides a starting point for understanding the universe, obvious gaps in the current framework mean there's more work to be done. In practice, this work is about finding novel approaches to potentially break the model by conducting experiments, taking measurements and then comparing the results to what the model predicts. The challenge? For years, the model has been coming up with the right answers, much to the frustration of physicists who know there's something missing. Repeated experiments using different particle approaches have churned out accurate measurement after accurate measurement — until now. Recent follow-up work on previous muon experiments using more advanced equipment suggests a crack in the current model and offers hope that scientists may have finally found the key to a new revolution in particle physics. Meet the Muon So, what exactly is a muon? Think electron, but heavier. Much heavier — 200 times heavier, in fact. As Science Daily notes, both muons and electrons "are essentially tiny magnets with their own magnetic field." However, unlike electrons, muons are far less stable, only existing for a few millionths of a second before they decay. It's also difficult to observe muons even during their brief time here, since the vacuum they occupy isn't empty. "It's your cappuccino-foam version of the vacuum, where there's virtual particles winking in and out of existence all the time," Lawrence Gibbons, who led the Cornell team involved in the new research, told Science Daily. "And that turns out to affect the strength of the magnetic field of a muon." Thanks to work done at CERN in 1959, followed by more precise experiments in 1966 and 1969, and then another round at Brookhaven National Laboratory in 1999, researchers finally found something: disconnect between observed and predicted magnetic measurements when muons made their way into this vacuum. New efforts at Fermilab with more precise and advanced equipment have confirmed these findings — and may pave the way for a much more massive muon impact. Let's Get Physics-al The work at CERN, Brookhaven and Fermilab all focus on the same thing: the g-2 value of muon, which represents the amount they "wobble" via vacuum interactions. As Fermilab particle physicist Jessica Esquivel notes, this wobble is called the precession frequency. "When muons go into a magnetic field, they precess, or they spin like a spinning top," she tells Vox. To measure precession, the Fermilab efforts used a powerful particle accelerator — capable of creating 20 times more muons than those used previously at CERN — to shoot an intense beam of muons into highly sensitive detectors, which measured their precession frequency. As the Standard Model predicted, this precession occurs when muons collide with virtual particles, which Esquivel describes as "sort of like ghosts of actual particles." "We have photons that kind of pop in and out and they're just kind of like there, but not really there," she told Vox. However, despite this here-and-gone-again strangeness, these virtual particles have a physical impact on muon wobbles. But this is where it gets really weird: Experiments at Fermilab confirm that muons are wobbling more than they should be, according to the Standard Model. Even more exciting? Scientists don't know why. Wobbling Our Way Forward The lack of certainty here is what makes these experimental results so interesting. Under the Standard Model, muon g-2 values are explainable using current particle interactions and should produce predictable results. However, the Fermilab efforts suggest that something else is causing this extra wobble — something that lies outside the current functional framework, as Esquivel and her colleagues told Vox. And while there's already been some discussion of this "breaking" the Standard Model, it's more like filling in the details where data was clearly missing. Esquivel likens it to the addition of elements to the periodic table.  "Even back then," she told Vox, "they had spots where they knew an element should go, but they hadn't been able to see it yet. That's essentially where we're at now." In practice, this muon movement opens the door to a host of potential particle operations. This unexpected wobble might be caused by interaction with long-predicted dark matter or dark energy particles, or it could help to establish a particle-based link to the outlying fourth fundamental force of gravity. Esquivel puts the impact of this motion measurement simply: "It's once-in-a-lifetime. We're chasing new physics and we're so close, we can taste it." One muon meal, extra wobble — coming right up! Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

Meet the Muon: Wobbling Its Way Into Particle Physics History

A new study on the science of taste suggests that the taste of sugar could make people feel more full, therefore helping to regulate appetite. But before you rush to grab a cookie to curb your hunger, consider that other studies have shown that sugar and fat trick the brain into wanting more food. Nutrition is complicated. Researchers are trying to understand the complicated physiology of hunger, satiety and overeating. A better understanding of the relationship between flavor and hunger could lead to new treatments for obesity, a disease that is common, serious and costly, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Does Sweet Taste Reduce Appetite? The new study, published in the journal Nutrients, was conducted by a team of Austrian and German researchers. They explored how flavor might trigger our bodies to respond to what we eat. In the age of nutrition apps and fad diets, many people are familiar with the concept of counting calories. The basic idea is if you want to lose weight, you need to burn more calories than you consume. But the human body runs on biology, which is often much more complicated than mathematics. The Austrian-German team examined how the perception of sweetness affected the regulation of satiety — in other words, whether tasting something sweet made you feel hungry or full. The study was limited — it only looked at 27 healthy male adults — but the results strongly suggest that more research on this topic would be worthwhile. The participants tasted different forms of sugar and then waited two hours before eating breakfast. They either had glucose (simple sugar), sucrose (table sugar) or one of the sugars mixed with lactisole, a substance that reduces the sensation of sweetness. All of the solutions had the same energy content so that the researchers could isolate sweetness as a factor. Basically, everyone consumed the same amount of sugar, although some of the sugar tasted sweet and some did not. When participants had the sucrose and lactisole cocktail, they ate around 13% more calories at breakfast. The researchers also noted that those participants had reduced body temperatures. Through blood tests, they also found lower concentrations of serotonin, a neurotransmitter that the researchers note has an appetite-controlling effect. "This result suggests that sucrose, regardless of its energy content, modulates the regulation of satiety and energy intake via the sweet taste receptor," Barbara Lieder, one of the study's authors, said in an announcement released by ScienceDaily. Interestingly, they did not see the same results with the glucose and lactisole test solution. Additional research could help to explain why, but the researchers suggest it could be because glucose and sucrose activate the sweet receptor in different ways. How Taste Buds Work The new study reveals that taste and hunger are connected in ways that may be more complicated than we previously thought. Plus, there is more than one type of hunger. According to Scientific American, metabolic (homeostatic) hunger — i.e., when your stomach growls — is driven by physiological necessity. But hedonic hunger is a powerful desire for food, even if your body doesn't actually need it. This type of hunger is linked to the brain's reward circuit. Similar to the way that drugs and gambling give us temporary "rewards" that lead to addiction, extremely sweet or fatty foods can trigger a response. According to Scientific American, eating these foods can make our taste buds send signals to various regions of the brain, which releases dopamine. If this happens too often, it desensitizes the system, so overeaters end up needing even more sugar or fat to reach the previous dopamine release, leaving them always wanting more food. Consequences of Taste and Hunger Studies that link taste to hunger and satiety could help people better understand which types of food could trick us into better nutrition. Further studies on the science of taste could nail down the details and help us understand how certain flavors of food trigger hormone responses so that we can make healthy choices. Sometimes, our bodies need more intervention than simple nutritional advice. Patients who have obesity, for example, may need medication or surgery to treat the disease. Scientific studies can lead to drug development, such as a medicine that could mimic bariatric surgery, according to Scientific American. Further studies could help to explain how taste buds work, especially in the gut. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Sugar and the Science of Taste

Human memory is a powerful but tricky thing. Memories shape our identity. Evocative senses — especially smells — can instantly trigger vivid memories. But memory can also mislead us. We have probably all encountered situations in which we misremembered things — from the trivial, like "Where did I put down my keys?" to the significant, such as how we met someone. Even collective memories, shared by large numbers of people, can turn out to be oddly wrong, a condition that has been dubbed the Mandela Effect. So, what is false memory? And what does it tell us about ourselves and the world around us? What Is False Memory? The Mandela Effect is named for South African statesman and civil rights activist Nelson Mandela. When he died in 2013, news of his death stirred up some surprising — and mysterious — memories. People around the world reported that they remembered hearing of his death decades earlier, in the 1980s. Some even vividly recalled watching his funeral on television, according to PRI. One of the people who shared this phantom memory was, as Snopes reported, self-described paranormal researcher Fiona Broome. She wrote about it on her website and dubbed collective errors of memory the "Mandela Effect." A more general and established term for memory errors — both individual and collective — is "confabulation." The Mandela Effect is not limited to people misremembering news events. It applies to other collective memory mistakes. As Snopes recounted, one of the most popular examples is the children's book series and TV cartoon, "The Berenstain Bears," which many people misrecall as "The Berenstein Bears." In another odd misremembering, according to Snopes, if you ask people how many states are in the United States, a surprising number will say 52, not 50 (which is correct). Stumbling Across the River of Time? As Snopes speculated, the Mandela Effect could be a consequence of multiverse theory — the proposition that our entire observable universe is only one of "many worlds," representing different ways that a time stream might have developed. Thus, people who remember seeing Mandela's funeral in the 1980s may not be simply misremembering. They might have somehow slipped across from an alternate history where Nelson Mandela did die in the 1980s. In our world, he was imprisoned for many years. Likewise, people who recall "The Berenstein Bears" may have grown up in a parallel world where the bears' name really did end in -stein. All of this is fun stuff — but alas, there is a hitch. There is a famous saying, attributed to astronomer Carl Sagan, that "'extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.'" As David Deming points out in an article published in the journal Philosophia, this argument has its own complications. If the people who share these memories did all come from an alternate universe, wouldn't they also share other memories of well-known news events that happened differently in that universe? It's a bit of a jump to assume that all those people somehow fell across the time stream from an alternate universe. Skeptic examined some of the factors that lead to this conclusion-jumping. Tricks the Brain Plays Mass confabulation and the Mandela Effect point to the subtleties of how the human mind works. In the case of the Berenstain Bears, "-stein" is a much more common word ending than "-stain." Chances are that many of us never even noticed the actual spelling until it was brought to our attention. As for people who say the US has 52 states, said Snopes, this suggests a brain slip, with people remembering that a deck of cards has 52 cards instead. In the case of Nelson Mandela, he vanished from public view during his lengthy imprisonment, so it's no surprise that many people thought he must have died. But exactly why and how their brains went on to construct vivid "memories" of a funeral remains a puzzle. All of these examples suggest that memory is not like a recording, but more like a narrative that the brain reconstructs out of multiple building blocks — blocks that can sometimes get mixed up or misplaced. What is the Mandela Effect? Insight to the complexities of the human mind. And, for science fiction writers and Hollywood, a pretty good excuse to play with multiverse concepts.

What Is the Mandela Effect?

As its advocates have espoused for generations now, technology aims to improve how humans live, work and have fun. Technology can also hinder that progress, particularly when bad actors or design flaws make machines work in ways that don't help humans. Those shortcomings have been evident with AI technology, like machine learning algorithms, which, instead of preventing bias, have advanced the prejudices held by humans. From a chatbot that unleashed racially insensitive tweets to an algorithm that predicted crime based on race, these AI-supported programs have behaved just as imperfectly as people. But several new tools propose to end bias in AI, while observers in and out of the tech industry call for human designers to go a step further and be more mindful of what they create. Biases Found in Machine Learning Algorithms The algorithms of machine learning, natural language processing (NLP) and other foundational elements of AI supposedly operate outside the boundaries of human imperfection. AI programs promise to neutrally screen job candidates, handle loan applications, predict criminal activity and make other decisions that are subject to human biases. But a string of discoveries has shown many programs — even those designed to perform seemingly frictionless tasks — can't make objective or even good "choices." A University of Massachusetts study revealed that many NLP algorithms are programmed with only natural English, decreasing its ability to detect dialects. Many widely used NLP tools identify African-American English as "not English" at higher rates than expected. A ProPublica investigation of a software that was designed to detect future criminals found that its algorithms were more likely to falsely flag black defendants as candidates to again commit crimes, wrongly labeling them as reoffenders at almost twice the rate as white defendants. The software also mislabeled white people as low risk more often than black people. Tech giants were not immune to AI-produced biases. An MIT study found IBM visual recognition technology had an error rate of 34.7 percent when identifying women with darker skin tones, while the error rate for identifying that same group of people with Microsoft technology was 20.8 percent. And as CNBC observed, Facebook and YouTube could stand to learn a lesson from Microsoft, whose Twitter chatbot generated racist and anti-Semitic tweets in 2016; two years later, both social media platforms came under fire for offering offensive content in their search bars. Building the Ethics of AI Although the list of biased technology looks long, the list of bias technology and ideas to counter prejudice just might be longer. On the tech side, IBM has created a tool that the company says can review AI-backed software for unintentional bias, as Fortune reported. Google introduced a "What-if Tool," an open-source web application that lets people analyze machine learning software for algorithm fairness. Microsoft also made significant improvements to clear the biases in its facial recognition technology. According to Fortune, the software didn't have a diverse enough data set to include as many photos of women with darker skin as lighter-skinned men. Some observers contend that humans are inherently biased and AI technology itself will correct those leanings, because it is "learning" largely without human involvement. Others, though, argue that if humans design the programs, the algorithms will be flawed from the start. "It's not enough to try to avoid bias in AI—we must actively work to identify and counteract unintended bias in our algorithms," said Amanda Muller, Technical fellow, Northrop Grumman. "Technology advances like Explainable AI help us identify potential bias by providing insights into how and why AI decisions are reached. Advances in the development of synthetic data allow us to reduce or eliminate bias in our training data sets. And inclusion of bias testing in our AI governance processes provide for the identification and correction of bias during development and operations. As AI technology continues to evolve, so must our diligence in recognizing and actively countering AI bias." Business leaders whose companies use AI tools and who lean toward increasing human responsibility can consider following five standards that two professors proposed in MIT Technology Review. To hold algorithms accountable, the professors say, companies should have someone always responsible for the technology, be able to explain decisions made by the program, understand the errors that AI makes, let the public or a private entity audit the product and strive to be fair by evaluating any discriminatory effects. Machines, like humans, might always have some inclination toward biases. But as the professors believe, humans have an undeniable duty to ensure that the machine learning algorithms don't run astray. Are you interested in all things related to technology? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Preventing Bias in AI Technology Requires Human and Tech Oversight

More than 84 million Americans own pets, and they're spending $95 billion on food, treats, supplies and vet care every year. Talk to most owners and it's clear this cash outlay is tied to care — pets are part of the family and provide a fundamental, emotional bond.  So it's no surprise that we've often wondered if our four-legged, furry friends feel the same things — and express them the same way — as their human housemates. So let's settle the debate once and for all: Do animals have facial expressions? Do animals experience the same emotions as humans?  Emotional Impact  The worst case scenario for animal-loving humans hoping for a shared emotional bond? That pet-based emotional permutations don't match our own experience — what if our creature companions are just playing along for food, treats or belly rubs?  As noted by the Greater Good Magazine from UC Berkeley, there's almost certainly some continuity across the feeling framework. Research with chimpanzees revealed gestures designed to comfort dying elders and sooth crying infants. In one case, primatologist Frans de Waal taught a young female chimpanzee how to bottle-feed and burp her baby when she couldn't produce enough milk.  Research from the University of Lincoln, meanwhile, found that dogs are not only able to differentiate between emotional states in humans, but can also recognize specific emotions by combining visual and auditory cues. To test their capacity for emotional recognition, dogs were shown angry or happy facial expressions and played audio clips of similarly pleased or annoyed human beings — but the two cues didn't always match. The team discovered that dogs spent "significantly longer" looking at facial expressions when sight and sound aligned. The research team puts it simply: "Our study shows that dogs have the ability to integrate two different sources of sensory information into a coherent perception of emotion in both humans and dogs."  Pets can also communicate emotions with relative ease — dogs are often seen slouching down and looking at the floor after being scolded, indicating guilt, while cats are thought to display feelings of contentment when curled up and purring on their owner's lap. This is where emotional waters get murky, however; while emotions are described by de Waal as "bodily and mental states," feelings are "internal subjective states." In other words, while animals have evolved to recognize and respond to human experience with appropriate emotional responses, it's impossible to know exactly how they feel.  Face the Music  Emotions are one thing, but do animals have facial expressions? And if so, are they analogous to our own? The answer is simple: sort of.  As noted by Quartz, researchers have reliably identified signs of pain recognition in mice, rats, rabbits, horses and sheep because they have a similar "pain face" — tightened eyes, flattened cheeks and tensed mouths. According to The Scientist, meanwhile, recent AI work was able to decode seven specific facial expressions in mice including disgust, pleasure, pain, fear, sickness and flight. They're very similar — probably not something you'd notice at a glance — but they suggest a certain commonality to creature facial functions.  Cats also have facial expressions but as noted by The Washington Post, an online survey found that humans aren't so hot at connecting emotional dots. The survey featured close-up videos of cat faces without any sound and asked participants to classify the expression as positive or negative. Just 13% of test-takers scored over 75% — the average score was under 60%.  There's also evidence that different animals — such as dogs and horses — share common facial expressions when playing, even when people aren't present. According to Discover, dogs and horses both displayed the relaxed, open-mouthed expression common among mammals when playing and "rapidly imitated each other's facial expressions, the first time such mimicry was seen between species." This expression equivalence helps reduce the chances of misconstrued intent and avoids potential displays of aggression.  The Eyes Have It  When it comes to facial expressions, it's also worth pointing out a particular quirk found in our canine companions: puppy dog eyes. Famous for melting hearts, these arched eyebrows and wide gazes make dogs seem like cute human infants and tap into our natural predisposition to protect such sweet creatures.  But it turns out pups may not be quite so precious after all. As noted by a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS), "Domestication transformed the facial muscle anatomy of dogs specifically for facial communication with humans." When the musculature of dog and wolf heads were compared, researchers found that domesticated dogs had developed an eyebrow muscle specifically designed to deliver a devastating puppy face — and get exactly what they want.  All the Feels  Do animals experience the same emotions as humans?  It's more accurate to say that animals have evolved to recognize and respond to human emotions and facial expressions by displaying behavior we associate with specific states of feeling. While it's not a perfect match, it's close enough to count — although we can't ask cats, dogs, birds or bunnies exactly how they feel about their two-legged friends, their interest in learning our emotional tells and creating key connections make them both sensitive and steadfast companions. 

Once More, With Fur-ling: Do Animals Have Facial Expressions?

From the beginning of humanity, people have wondered: What's out there? It began as stargazing but eventually gave way to science, with human curiosity driving the discovery of new and more innovative ways to slip the surly bonds of Earth. While rocket launch technology is now developing at a breakneck pace, it's worth taking a look back at the evolution of space exploration — where did we start? Where have we been? And where are we going next? Eyes to the Skies With rapid advances in rocketry largely coming over the last century, it's easy to suggest technology as the driving factor: Without the right materials and equipment, surely rocket launches were out of reach. Not quite. Historical records show burgeoning interest in rocket precursors, such as steam-powered devices, around 400 B.C., and it's generally agreed that Chinese innovators developed the first real rockets in the first century A.D. Much like modern fireworks, these small rockets were often used in local and religious festivals, and so-called "Chinese fire arrows" were also used against Mongol invaders. Further refinement over the next millennium led to more extensive use of rockets in warfare. For example, the Congreve rocket used in the late 1700s was a stick-guided rocket capable of carrying incendiary or antipersonnel munitions up to two miles. By 1844, spin stabilization techniques, which made rockets spin like a bullet using angled jet vents, were implemented for greater accuracy. Making It Work In 1898, Russian schoolteacher Konstantin Tsiolkovsky suggested that rockets might be capable of space travel if they could achieve great enough range and speed. His solution was liquid propellant. That way, rockets would only be limited by the velocity of escaping gases. To underpin this idea, he developed the Rocket Equation:  The equation applies to any device with the characteristics of a rocket — that is, it can apply acceleration to itself using thrust generated by expelling its mass at high velocity. For his substantive contributions to the field, Tsiolkovsky is often called the father of modern astronautics. Next came work from Robert H. Goddard and Hermann Oberth. Oberth helped develop Germany's suite of advanced V-2 rockets that could achieve massive thrust over short distances by burning one ton of alcohol and oxygen every seven seconds, while Goddard developed plans for both two-stage and three-stage rockets along with gyroscope flight instruments and parachute-equipped cargo containers. He was the first to launch a rocket powered by liquid and gasoline. Up, Up and Away! It all came together on October 4, 1957 when the Soviet Union successfully launched the first rocket into space. The R-7 ICBM rocket carried Sputnik, humanity's first satellite, into orbit. Being about the size of a beach ball, Sputnik only transmitted a signal for just over two weeks and burned up in the atmosphere on January 4, 1958 after its orbit decayed. By January 31, 1958 the United States launched a rocket of its own, Explorer I, and in October 1958, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) officially launched. The Race to Space These ongoing efforts also launched the space race. Both Russia and the United States threw everything they had into creating better, faster and safer rockets that were capable of sustained space travel. The US began with the Mercury program. The Mercury-Redstone launch vehicle used a combination of liquid oxygen and alcohol to produce 78,000 pounds of thrust — enough to send astronaut Alan Shepard into space. The Mercury-Atlas launch vehicle, meanwhile, lifted John Glenn into orbit with 365,000 pounds of thrust. The Gemini program came next and saw the world's first spacewalk and in-orbit rendezvous. Getting there required the Gemini-Titan II launch vehicle, which boasted an impressive 430,000 pounds of thrust. This paved the way for the iconic Apollo program and moon landing, but getting from Earth to its small, rocky companion was no easy task. To accomplish this goal, the Saturn V rocket weighed more than 6.1 million pounds at launch and generated 7.5 million pounds of thrust — more than 17 times the thrust of the Gemini-Titan II. The familiar space shuttle, meanwhile, which was used to carry crews into space from 1981 to 2011, clocked in at 7.8 million pounds of thrust. Passengers Come on Board The rockets themselves weren't the only things getting upgrades. What began as unmanned space flights eventually led to rocket launches that included primate passengers as human analogues to assess the impact of spaceflight on circulatory, nervous and skeletal systems. First was Albert the rhesus monkey in 1948, followed by his successor Albert II in 1949 and then Albert III through VI in quick succession. Sadly, all died either in space or shortly after their return. In 1959, the United States successfully recovered Able the rhesus monkey and Baker the squirrel monkey alive after their flight and did the same with a chimpanzee named Ham in 1961. This paved the way for Alan Shepard's historic flight into space on May 5, 1961, followed by John Glenn's orbit of Earth in February 1962. In 1963, cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova was the first woman in space aboard the Vostok 6, and in 1983, mission specialist Sally Ride became the first American female astronaut in space on the seventh space shuttle mission. All Systems Go What's next for rockets? First up is even more power. With NASA looking to send astronauts back to the moon and eventually to Mars, a new space shuttle launch system (SLS) was required. While it bears some visual similarity to the retired space shuttle, it's taller and heavier, and it will generate up to 8.8 million pounds of thrust — 15% more than its Saturn V counterpart. There's also a push to make rockets reusable. Historically, the first stages of multi-stage rockets were unrecoverable after being jettisoned when they ran out of fuel. Now, companies are working on reusable stage one and two boosters that can return to Earth intact and upright. Not only could this reduce the total amount of rocket launch waste being created, but it's much more cost- and time-efficient to refuel and reuse these boosters than it is to build new ones from scratch. This is rocket science — two millennia worth. While launch efforts are finally hitting their stride as technology and innovation collide, they're built on a platform of human curiosity that's always been determined to discover what lies beyond. Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

Rocket Launch Rundown: Exploring Two Millennia of Space Travel

Camouflage probably makes you think of dazzle ships or zebra stripes — visual hacks for invisibility to outwit potential predators. But there's also the type of cloaking technology that stops more than visual detection. For example, moths have developed high-tech ways to confuse bat sonar, simply by using wing architecture as a stealth coating to absorb sound waves. Moths are locked in an age-old struggle for survival; even under cover of darkness, it's risky for them to fly at dusk and nighttime, as they're still visible to their top predator, bats. Equipped with biosonar, bats use echolocation to send out high-pitched acoustic radar to bounce back from potential meals in flight. Bat sonar helps them locate and identify moths for dinner on the move. But as recent research shows, moths are far from defenseless: Cloaking technology in the moth armory includes jamming signals, distraction and silencing. It's All About the Wing Moth wings are covered in overlapping layers of tiny scales. They're not just there for decoration, though; some patterns act as visual camouflage to blend into surroundings or mimic a bigger, tougher predator. A recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) used a method called acoustic topography to show that the repeating patterns of scales on the moth wings give an important advantage to moths in flight. The research team used empirical and mathematical analysis to show that earless moth species possess sound-absorbent wings. Projecting sound waves at the wings, a team of researchers discovered the echoes bouncing were much quieter, as New Scientist describes. In other words, when the bat sonar hits the moth wings, the echo coming back to the bat is much fainter and harder to detect — and it doesn't translate as a meal, either. Another <a target="_blank" href="https://www.pnas.org/content/1PNAS paper in 2018 used laser Doppler vibrometry and 3D modeling to show that the way the moth wing scales are arranged covers the whole bat echolocation range. According to Science News, the wings absorb around 50% of the bat sonar energy hitting the wing. Quieter echoes and low signal volume translate as not worth hunting to the bat, and the result is one safe moth. Moth Ears: Jamming Signals and Redirection Another way to evade capture is to listen for trouble. Some moth species have developed "ears" capable of detecting bat sonar. PBS Nova describes that, when they hear the echolocation pings, the moths simply swerve to avoid being caught. Some moths will also loudly announce how toxic they are. Jamming bat echolocation with a burst of ultrasound also helps. A 2015 PNAS research paper showed that moths would send out jamming signals in response to playback of bat squeaks in the lab. According to Nature, some species manage this by rubbing their genitals against their abdomens. Lunar moths use their long, twisty tails to throw bats off the chase. University of Washington researchers found that both the length and the twist were essential in distorting the echolocation signals, pushing the echo center away from the vulnerable body area. Bats were confused by the return signal and often chased after a moth that wasn't where they thought it was. Biomimicry for Aircraft Stealth Commenting on the recent PNAS paper in New Scientist, researchers compare the moth acoustic camouflage to the cloaking technology used to keep stealth bombers hidden from enemy radar. Stealth technology, also known as low observable technology, is a key tool in military applications that renders personnel and equipment invisible to radar, infrared, visual and other observation spectra. Altering the shape of an aircraft wing or fuselage, for instance, or applying a special coating can distort reflection or absorb the electromagnetic radiation from radar, similar to the way that the scales on the moth wing provide acoustic camouflage. Biomimicry, or copying examples of how nature solves a visibility issue, often inspires new stealth technology. Maybe one day, moth scales could be deflecting more than just bat sonar. Are you interested in all things related to technology? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

How Moth Cloaking That Outwits Bat Sonar Is Inspiring Stealth Technology

In a high plateau of the Andes Mountains in Peru, archaeologists were at an excavation site looking for artifacts when they uncovered the remains of a big game hunter. The skeleton, which they called WMP6, seemed especially important because it was buried with an extensive kit of stone weapons and blades. "Everybody was talking about how this was a great chief, a big man," archaeologist Randy Haas told Science. But upon closer inspection, the archaeologists realized the bones were lighter and more slender than expected, which made them wonder if the hunter could have been female. Their study suggests that our early hunter-gatherer ancestors might have structured their society with more gender equality than previously thought. The Female Hunter The high status hunter was, in fact, a young woman. These ancient bones suggest that women warriors were responsible for hunting down and catching large Andean animals such as vicué±a and deer. But how can we be so sure? The excavation site, called Wilamaya Patjxa, is located at an altitude of 12,877 feet. After 9,000 years, there wasn't much left of WMP6 — just fragments of a skull, teeth and partial leg bones, according to the study in ScienceAdvances. The archeologists used a new forensic technique to confirm that the bones belonged to a female hunter. In addition to using the standard methods for studying ancient bones, they also analyzed the skeleton's tooth enamel to find out whether it had a male or female version of a protein called amelogenin. Even if the skeleton was female, how could the researchers be sure that she was a leading hunter? Certainly, the hunting tools were a clue. She was buried with blades and stone projectiles that were likely the tips of spears, darts or arrows. Her toolkit was extensive, while a nearby male skeleton was buried with only a few hunting tools. It is possible that her tools were a gift or had another symbolic meaning, but it's more likely that she was a hunter. The researchers studied isotopes of carbon and nitrogen in the woman's teeth, which revealed that she ate a typical hunter's diet of animal meat and plants. Archaic Gender Roles  This recent discovery challenges common assumptions about the gendered division of labor throughout history and today. This wasn't the first time we've heard about a female big game hunter. But previously, women warriors were considered outliers. Our modern understanding of hunter-gatherer societies typically assumes that men went into the wild to do the dangerous work of hunting while women gathered edible plants and took care of the children.  However, in their study, the researchers point out how early economies that relied on big game would have encouraged participation from "all able individuals," no matter the gender. Plus, they suggest that childcare duties were likely shared among the community, which would have given women the opportunity to hunt.  They explored this hypothesis by reviewing previous reports of similar ancient remains in academic journals — and they found nearly half of the big game hunters were female. Based on this evidence, they wrote, "Early big-game hunting was likely gender neutral or nearly so." There is disagreement among experts on this subject, with others suggesting that only 10% of hunters were women, as the New York Times reports. Additional research should help to clear up this question and help us understand human history. Perhaps by better understanding our ancestors, we can dispel stereotypes about men and women in the modern workplace.

Ancient Woman Found in Peru: Was She a Powerful Big Game Hunter?

More than 13 billion years ago, a supermassive black hole produced storm winds that blew through a young galaxy at speeds of up to a million miles per hour. The galaxy, now known as HSC J124353.93+010038.5 (shortened for convenience to J1243+0100) may have a supremely colorless official name — but in the early days of the universe, it must have been a very dramatic place. Galactic-scale storm winds have been observed before, but never in a galaxy so far away — 13.1 billion light years, to be exact. This means we're seeing it as it was 13.1 billion years ago when the universe itself was less than a billion years old. And finding storm winds in such a young galaxy, in the early universe, tends to confirm something that astronomers have wondered about: Galaxies and their central supermassive black holes must have developed together, each helping to shape the other. A Matter of Balance Galaxies and supermassive black holes are clearly related; most galaxies have this kind of black hole at their center. But determining exactly how they are related has proven tricky. As Techexplorist reports, a team of researchers recently tackled this question. On the implications for how galaxies develop, lead author of the research paper Takuma Izumi noted, "This is an important question because it is related to an important problem in astronomy: How did galaxies and supermassive black holes coevolve?" According to Universe Today, the most widespread view has been that galactic winds arose at a later "starburst" stage of galactic development, when large numbers of bright stars would form and their combined radiation could drive a cosmic "wind" of energetic particles, similar to the solar wind but on a vastly larger scale. But the newly discovered wind blowing through J1243+0100 suggests that a supermassive black hole can drive powerful galactic storm winds much earlier than the starburst era. As Science Daily reports, the research team that made the discovery began by searching for very distant (and thus very early) galaxies with Japan's Subaru Telescope, then they zeroed in on J1243+0100 with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, or ALMA, in Chile. What they found was not only a very turbulent, stormy, young galaxy — but also a striking "coincidence" that is probably no coincidence at all. The supermassive black hole at the core of J1243+0100 has about 300 million times the mass of the sun. The galactic bulge of J1243+0100 itself has a mass of some 30 billion suns, a hundred times heavier. This is roughly the same proportion of supermassive black-hole mass to surrounding galaxy mass that is observed in our own Milky Way galaxy and other nearby galaxies. The new findings suggest that this proportional pattern is built deep into the formation process of galaxies — and operated even in the early universe. But why? Falling In, Blowing Out The answer may relate to the seeming paradox that supermassive black holes — notorious for having gravity so powerful that not even light can escape — are some of the brightest objects in the universe. The reason is that as streams of falling matter plunge toward a black hole, they collide with other streams, and these collisions release enormous energy — enough to drive a blast of particles outward, even as other particles are falling inward. As the outward storm wind builds up, it can finally choke off the streams of falling matter. This in turn limits the further growth of the supermassive black hole and eventually causes the storm wind itself to die down. Thus, the gravitational infall and storm winds' outward blast can produce a long-term balance, leading to the observed result of a consistent mass ratio between the supermassive black hole and galactic bulge — for both mature galaxies like our Milky Way and distant young ones like J1243+0100. One swallow does not make a summer, and observation of one remote galaxy in the dawn of the universe does not make a conclusive result. The research program is ongoing, examining dozens of other distant galaxies for telltale signs of storm winds. But the discovery of storm winds in J1243+0100 does point toward a greater understanding of the balancing forces that have shaped the galaxies we see around us, including our own. Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

A Supermassive Black Hole Storm May Reveal Secrets About the Early Universe

Climbing is a specialized skill that uses numerous abilities and techniques. Scientists working in robotics and materials research often gain inspiration from the natural world, using biomimicry as a guide, and this is especially true when looking to mimic climbing. For instance, animals that climb trees, and other animals with cool abilities, can be frequent sources of inspiration. So, what is it about climbing that inspires the research, and what is it that these innovators look for?There's interplay between speed, safety and efficiency, according to a research study published in the Royal Society that analyzes how climbing animals climb. For us, the activity makes use of our strength and the coordination of our hands and feet to propel us up a rock face, tree or other environmental hurdle. Similarly, many animals use their paws and feet, but others rely on special adaptations or techniques that are less common.Bears (but Not Polar Bears)Bears are pretty good climbers — so good, in fact, that the usual advice is not to try climbing a tree to escape them. They have strong curved claws in each foot that can grip tree bark, and as the National Parks Service points out, they're quite agile. However, unlike other animals that climb trees, they descend back legs first. They also use human-like techniques for rock climbing: scaling up with three points of contact and pushing with powerful leg muscles.While grizzlies can also climb, it's useful to know that polar bears cannot — though trees are scarce in the Arctic might not offer much of an escape route anyway.Mountain GoatsMountain goats, especially ibex species, are incredibly nimble in their mountain habitats. They use this amazing climbing skill to seek out nutritious herbs and lick salts from rock faces.Like other even-toed ungulates, they have two horned toes on each foot that are curved and can splay out. The outer edge is quite hard and comprises a horn wall, whereas the center is softer. The ability to widen the toes and deform the soles to match terrain surfaces gives these goats an incredible grip on near-vertical terrain.Hermit CrabsAsk anyone who has ever managed a tank of hermit crabs, and they'll tell you they have a few cool abilities that help them escape. They scale vertical tank walls with apparent ease, and tank enrichment should include hermit crab climbing toys. Anything with protrusions is scalable to these animals, including tree bark, coral walls and each other. The crabs use the tips of their legs to climb, a behavior that's employed in foraging, asserting dominance and escaping from predators.Hermit crabs have inspired robotics researchers to build pipe-climbing maintenance robots that can scurry along pipework in petrochemical plants to keep an eye out for ductwork failures.GeckosGeckos have serious climbing skills in all orientations, being able to cling to vertical surfaces just by the stickiness of their feet. They've inspired numerous biomimicry projects, including robotic climbers that can scale any surface and multi-use adhesive tape for spaceflights.What helps geckos climb is the tiny hairs, or setae, on their feet that generate weak but effective van der Waals charges between molecules. These grippers cling to surfaces without leaving a trace, last a lifetime and are inspiring the development of strong, reusable adhesives by NASA for space missions.OctopusesOctopuses also have interesting climbing abilities. Though they need to be in water to use them, their strong and flexible tentacles help them climb vertical surfaces. These tentacles are equipped with numerous strong and powerful suckers that can latch onto smooth surfaces, according to the New England Aquarium. Octopuses can even escape their tanks unless precautions are taken. Fortunately, a simple layer of Astroturf can stop their suckers from clinging, and aquarists usually also use a heavy or lockable lid on their enclosures to stop them from wandering.Their climbing ability has also inspired robotics. Biomimicry researchers have developed robots with features based on the tentacle and sucker anatomy of octopuses' limbs that can grip and manipulate irregular objects, including ladder rungs and rough walls.As biologists continue to study the amazing abilities of wildlife, engineers will undoubtedly identify even more qualities from the animal kingdom worth mimicking through human technology.Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Biomimicry Inspiration From Five Animals That Climb Trees and More

Were there aquatic dinosaurs roaming the oceans once upon a time? And if there were, what did they look like? In short, they did exist millions of years ago, and thanks to the fossil record, we have a pretty good idea of what they looked like. From toothier versions of today's dolphins to enormous Komodo-dragon-like sea monsters, these fabulous beasts once ruled the seas. Did Dinosaurs Live in Water? Before diving into the prehistoric world of aquatic dinosaurs, it's best to lay one myth to rest. Yes, there were dinosaurs that hunted the seas and lakes, but that's because they could, not because they had to. At one time, it was proposed that certain dinosaurs were so large that they needed to immerse themselves in lakes and other large bodies of water to provide enough buoyancy to stay upright. You've probably seen this in school textbooks and other illustrations, where a brachiosaurus or diplodocus peers out of a primeval lake, munching a mouthful of mossy greens. This isn't the truest depiction, as explained in The Smithsonian Magazine. Examination of fossil records shows that there's good evidence to support the notion that large dinosaurs did not need to stand armpit deep in water to stay upright. For example, clear fossil footprints track ancient creatures that stomped across soft mud at the banks of rivers and lakes. Footprints gradually became more tip-toe as water buoyancy took over, with the reverse taking place on the opposing bank when the ancient beasts lumbered out. Another pointer is dinosaur bone density. As The Guardian points out, most fully aquatic animals have dense bones, which help them submerge. Aquatic dinosaurs had much lower density, and some even had air pockets in their bones, which means they would have bobbed around on the surface, unable to stand on the lake bed. Although they didn't have inbuilt snorkels, many dinosaurs did have upward-flaring nostrils that would have been handy for semi-submerged life. However, this still doesn't point toward the creatures being fully aquatic to cope with bulk. Rather, it only serves as evidence that dinosaurs, like other animals, fully exploited the various habitats available to them in their search for food. So, were there aquatic dinosaurs that did live the entirety of their life submerged? Spinosaurus, the First Water-Loving Dinosaur? In April 2020, National Geographic reported the discovery of a water-loving dinosaur in the Moroccan Sahara with a snout like a modern crocodile and conical teeth to keep slippery fish from getting away. The fossilized skeleton, found in what would have been one of the abundant river systems that once covered this modern-day desert region, had several features that showed the cretaceous theropod was well equipped for aquatic life 95 to 100 million years ago. The spinosaur not only had bones dense enough to help with buoyancy, but when paleontologists uncovered its tail, they found bony struts sticking out from the vertebrae. Reconstruction shows that this gave the spinosaur a tail like an oar, which could be used to propel the aquatic dinosaurs through the water. Furthermore, the articulation between the vertebrae showed that the kind of flexion this enabled was similar to that of other animals that swim. Plesiosaurs, Still With Us Today? Another recently uncovered Moroccan Sahara fossil shows that plesiosaurs were also aquatic dinosaurs. Science Direct describes how paleontologists found scattered bone and teeth remnants in the ancient river systems showing that these animals could also move between salt water and fresh water. The fossilized teeth indicate that plesiosaurs not only ate armored river fish but also spent a considerable amount of time living and hunting in fresh water. According to the BBC, plesiosaurs died out around 66 million years ago — but then again, maybe the myths about the Loch Ness Monster are true. (Spoiler alert: Probably not). Mosasaurus, the Film Star If you remember a particular film scene from a summer blockbuster about dinosaurs —where a giant water monster erupts from below to grab a great white shark before crashing back and showering the crowd with water, that's the cinematic version of a mosasaurus. The real version was around 56 feet long (just over 17 meters), which is similar in size to a megalodon. The mosasaurus lived during the Cretaceous period, around 145.5 to 65.5 million years ago. As NewsWeek notes, these weren't truly dinosaurs but reptiles and distant relatives of today's iguana. Science Daily describes fossil skeletons found in Morocco as having a short, wide muzzle and looking like a Komodo dragon with flippers. The fossil records of this species show a shark-like fin tail for moving through water, as well as a set of palatal teeth. This secondary row of huge conical teeth helped the Mosasaurus prevent prey from escaping once they were grabbed. Tooth evidence shows that the mosasaurus ate more than just fish, as damage to teeth and healed fractures in jaw bones show that larger animals were munched as prey, and that the mosasaurus lived a violent life as an ocean apex predator. Ichthyosaur, the Sea Dragon An ichthyosaur fossil found in a Rutland Water excavation in the UK shows that the 180-million-year-old sea dragon had a 2-meter (around 6 feet) skull that weighed around one metric ton (over 2,000 pounds). The 10-meter (around 33 feet) specimen is the largest, most complete ichthyosaur fossil skeleton ever found, though The Guardian notes that this species could be anywhere from 1 to 25 meters long. This prehistoric reptile, which was alive during the Jurassic period, became extinct around 90 million years ago. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Were There Aquatic Dinosaurs?

"Bird Box" has been a massive success for Netflix. According to The Verge, more than 45 million accounts streamed the movie in the week after its premiere, and the difficult scenarios faced by the film's blindfolded protagonist proved so popular that viewers have been covering their own eyes to attempt similar feats. The risky nature of these "'Bird Box' Challenges" prompted Netflix to post a Twitter warning. Their mass appeal ties neatly into evolving discussions about the nature of the movie's antagonists: Some speculate that instead of aliens or demons, a mass psychogenic illness explains the events of the film. So let's dive in — when it comes to "Bird Box" theories, does a mass mental illness make sense? The Story So Far If you're not familiar with the "Bird Box" phenomenon, here's a quick primer. *Spoiler Alert* A mysterious event — called "The Problem" — causes waves of suicides across the world. Upon seeing something nearby, most affected individuals attempt to kill themselves; when The Problem comes to Los Angeles, main character Malorie flees to a safe house. Other members of the house speculate that invisible or alien entities are responsible for the outbreak, and the windows are covered in an attempt to protect those inside. Other survivors approach the house — some have seen these "entities" and, instead of killing themselves, attempt to force others to view them as well. Eventually, group members blindfold themselves for safety. Though invisible, the entities drive Malorie's pet birds into a frenzy. It is later established that the entities can cause gusts of wind and speak to blindfolded individuals in voices they find familiar, attempting to convince them to remove their blindfolds.  Because the entities are never seen and their method of action is never explained, many "Bird Box" theories have emerged: Characters in the film speculate that ancient demons have found humanity wanting, while others suggest aliens are attempting to conquer the planet. Alternative Explanation: Mass Psychogenic Illness Mass psychogenic illness (MPI) offers a potential scientific remedy to this movie madness. Also called mass sociogenic illness, MPI is defined by SAGE Journals as "a nervous system disturbance characterized by the rapid spread of illness signs and symptoms among members of a cohesive social group, for which there is no corresponding organic origin." In other words, one member of group begins exhibiting strange or dangerous behavior, and others quickly follow. As noted by Family Doctor, these illnesses have occurred for hundreds of years around the world but are often poorly documented. Common symptoms include:   Headache  Dizziness  Faintness  Weakness  Feelings of choking  Often, these illnesses have environmental "triggers" — smells, sights or sounds that make members of a group believe they are in danger. Combined with sudden physical reactions from the initial observer, mass psychogenic events can quickly spread across large groups. Cultural Impact Several notable instances of MPI have been documented, including the infamous "Dancing Plague" of 1518. As noted by Ozy, a woman named Frau Troffea began manically dancing in the streets of Strasbourg and wouldn't stop. Others joined her over the following weeks, and some died when they refused to stop for food or water. MPI also appeared more recently. According to the New England Journal of Medicine, in November 1998, a high school teacher in Tennessee noticed a "gasoline-like" smell and quickly displayed signs of headache, nausea, shortness of breath and dizziness. Over the next few days, hundreds of staff and students were hospitalized with similar symptoms, but no physical cause was found despite extensive government investigations. NCBI describes another MPI case: In October 2011, teenage girls in Leroy, New York, all developed "facial tics, muscle twitching and garbled speech." Folk theories attribute the cause to a local dump releasing toxic fumes, but no definitive cause has been identified. Thinking Outside the Box Could mass psychogenic illness account for the mass hysteria and suicidal behavior seen in "Bird Box"? Some of the basic framework certainly applies — i.e., humans living in social groups exposed to sudden behavioral changes related to environmental stimuli. If we accept the film's narrative conceit, however, the theory of MPI becomes harder to defend. Some of those exposed to the stimuli exhibit physical changes; those who don't commit suicide display modified irises, which other survivors check for prior to granting safe house entry. It's evident that other animals can sense the presence of the stimuli. While gusts of wind could be misattributed to intention rather than random physical phenomena, when characters in the film hear a voice encouraging them to remove their blindfolds, the voice is shown as external and malicious rather than as internal narrative. Last but not least is the problem of free will. While MPIs can cause observable physical effects such as nausea, muscle twitching and shortness of breath, there's no indication that they can cause overwhelming suicidal thoughts or remove free will. While some of those afflicted with the Dancing Plague did refuse to stop and eat, many survived by taking breaks at night and resuming the next day. The core concept of "Bird Box" rests on the idea that whatever force — alien, demon or biological agent — is present in this fictional universe can cause people to experience thoughts of such intensity and despair that they choose to end their own lives rather than live with what they see. No recorded MPIs include this type of forced action compelled by overwhelming emotion. Flight of Fancy Bottom line? While characters in "Bird Box" display some of the characteristics associated with mass psychogenic illnesses, the physical changes caused by observed stimuli and the sudden, intrusive nature of suicidal thoughts make it likely that a far more fictional — and sparsely defined — threat accounts for this terrifying world of blindfolds and birds. If you're experiencing suicidal feelings, get help: Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or IMAlive at 1-800-784-2433.

"Bird Box" Theories: Is Mass Psychogenic Illness the Real Monster Here?

There's no denying the juggernaut that is video gaming. Both lauded and lamented by news agencies, governments and researchers alike, the gaming industry is now worth more than $57 billion per year, as VentureBeat notes. According to recent research from NPD, 244 million people in the United States are playing video games for an average of 14 hours per week — and 65% play multiple games across multiple platforms.   But what are the effects of video games on the brain? Are we gaining new skills to become screen savants, capable of applying virtual knowledge in the real world? Or are we destined to become digital zombies, mindlessly staring at screens while traditional social interaction crumbles?   Not surprisingly, the answer lies somewhere in the middle. Here's a look at the mental machinations and operative impact of video games on the human brain.   From Frogger to Fortnite   While the recent rise of mobile-driven gaming has both widened the appeal and deepened the worry about video game impacts, gaming itself has a substantive history that stretches back more than 80 years. As The Museum of Play notes, Edward U. Condon created one of the first-ever video games for the World's Fair in 1940. Designed to play Nim — a game that involves players trying to avoid picking up the last matchstick — the computer was able to beat human competitors 90% of the time.   The 1950s saw the creation of chess-playing programs, and 1972 gave rise to Pong. By 1981, Pac Man was chomping his way into people's hearts, while Super Mario was getting his feet off the ground and Frogger tried to stay the course across a busy road. The rise of home consoles and decrease in desktop costs helped to drive a new generation of games. Thanks to Atari, Coleco, Sega and Nintendo, gaming quickly went mainstream. Fueled by reliable broadband Internet access and the rapid adoption of smart phones, gaming came of age in the second decade of the 21st century. In 2010 came the release of mega-hit Minecraft, and massive multiplayer online role playing games (MMORPGs) saw immense uptake with games such as World of Warcraft, Guild Wars 2 and Final Fantasy XIV. Cross-platform play also increased uptake thanks to hugely popular games such as Fortnite and Call of Duty.   Bottom line? Games have gone from expensive, niche hobbies to something everyone can enjoy, no matter their digital preferences. From in-depth building games like Minecraft to online social interactions in MMORPGs to bite-sized gaming on mobile phones, there's something for everyone.   Benefits of Playing Video Games   Beyond the fun of leveling up your character, beating the big boss or building something truly epic in Minecraft, are there any mental or physical benefits to video gaming? As it turns out, absolutely.   "Studies show that playing video games can change how our brains perform, and even their structure," according to recent research published in Science Daily. Some studies found that gamers displayed improvements in both sustained and selective attention and that attention-related processes had a reduced activation threshold, making it possible to focus on more demanding tasks for longer. In addition, the research noted that "there is also evidence that video games can increase the size and efficiency of brain regions related to visuospatial skills" — among both gamers and volunteers, the right hippocampus was enlarged after completing a video-game training program.   As the Dana Foundation notes, there's also evidence to suggest that playing action games can improve contrast sensitivity in adults, which is the ability to differentiate between multiple shades of gray, in turn potentially boosting their ability to do the same in real-world scenarios such as driving at night. Pro-social games may also help to encourage helpfulness and kindness outside of digital worlds. And professions requiring superb precision — such as laparoscopic surgeons — reported an increase in skills after playing a specially designed training game.   Potential Pitfalls of Sustained Screen Time   It's an oft-repeated scenario by opponents of digital delivery: people scrolling blank-faced through social media sites or getting so absorbed in video games that they can't be bothered to go outside, socialize or even eat. The situation isn't impossible — occasional reports emerge of gamers spending so much time online that they neglect their responsibilities or even end up in the hospital.   But in reality, these stories are outliers. The vast majority of gamers know when to stop or are compelled to put down controllers thanks to outside forces such as school, work or social obligations. But there is a grain of truth to these computational concerns. Some potential pitfalls of sustained screen time include:     Eye strain: As the American Optometric Association (AOA) notes, digital eye strain (also called computer vision syndrome) often occurs as a result of prolonged screen use. Symptoms include eye discomfort and vision problems, and "the level of discomfort appears to increase with the amount of digital screen use." To limit the impact, the AOA recommends the 20-20-20 rule: Every 20 minutes, look at something 20 feet away for at least 20 seconds.  Digital desensitization: There are also concerns around desensitization, with some research suggesting lower activity in the brain's rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rACC) and amygdala after playing violent video games, as the Dana Foundation points out. With interactions between these brain regions often thought to impact resolution of emotional conflicts, decreased functioning could indicate a suppression of emotional response. The caveat? This is correlation, not causation, which indicates a need for caution in interpretation.  Online addictions: Video games have also been linked to Internet gaming disorder, which according to the American Psychiatric Association affects between 0.3% and 1% of the population. The symptoms of this disorder are similar to those of other addictive issues and include functional and structural changes in neural reward systems that lead to cravings and potentially obsessive behavior.    The Kids Are (Mostly) Alright   With pandemic pressures pushing kids and parents into a screen time-focused framework for both learning and leisure, there's understandable concern around the impact of digital content delivery for kids.   The good news? It's (mostly) alright. As a recent Time article notes, games offered many kids a way to connect with friends when in-person social interactions weren't possible, and while e-learning tools can never take the place of in-classroom instruction, they provided a way to help bridge the engagement gap.   Also critical in kids gaming? Context. Setting boundaries is essential — such as limited or supervised screen time — as is finding the right fit for gaming. Social, interactive games or those that prioritize creation are preferable over more brute-force focused gaming options.   Time to Level Up   What are the effects of video games on the brain? Recent studies suggest that, in some cases, games can help to improve attention span, foster social connections and increase contrast sensitivity. The caveat? Everything in moderation. No matter how fun the game or how big the mental benefits, it's worth taking a break to reduce eye strain and engage with other human beings face to face.   Simply put, while games won't save humanity, they're not the digital, destructive force described by their opponents. Overall, the balance appears to be positive: General enjoyment paired with moderate cognitive benefits suggest that video games offer both physical and virtual value for players.   Are you interested in all things related to VR and AR? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery. 

Screen Savants or Digital Zombies? The Effects of Playing Video Games on the Brain

In the northern hemisphere, the full moon that occurs closest to the autumn equinox (when day and night are roughly equal around the world) is called the Harvest Moon. For several days in a row, the moon will rise near sunset to provide extra light, which farmers can use to harvest summer crops before winter arrives.   Many cultures — especially those at temperate latitudes — mark the occasion with evening festivities. In China and other Asian countries, the Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated with paper lanterns and mooncake pastries. In 2021, the Harvest Moon was on September 20.   People often assume the Harvest Moon is bigger and brighter than other full moons, but that's not necessarily true. What makes it so special is that, when it rises above the horizon, an optical illusion makes the rising moon appear enormous.   Moon Basics   The moon travels around the Earth once every ~29.5 days, which is called a lunar month. The Earth travels around the sun once every ~365.25 days, which is called a year. Half the surface of both the Earth and the moon is illuminated by the sun at any one time, while the other half is (nearly) dark. The Earth also spins on its axis, making a full rotation every 24 hours, which gives us day and night. On Earth, the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. The moon also rises in the east and sets in the west, but the time of moonrise and moonset changes dramatically over the course of a lunar month.   When the moon is positioned roughly between the Earth and the sun, a person on Earth can only see the dark side of the moon — the part that is not illuminated by the sun. This is the New Moon, which rises in the morning and sets in the evening. As the moon continues its rotation around Earth, it will rise and set an average of 50 minutes later each day. As this occurs, you can see a larger and larger portion of the illuminated side of the moon. Halfway through the lunar month, the Full Moon rises at sunset and sets in the morning. As the moon continues its rotation, people on Earth will see a smaller and smaller portion of the illuminated side of the moon until it becomes a New Moon and the cycle starts over.   The Moon's Path Across the Sky   The Harvest Moon only occurs in the northern hemisphere. This is because: (1) The Earth is tilted 23.5 degrees on its axis as it travels around the sun (which gives us seasons), and (2) the moon's orbit around the Earth is tilted at a 5-degree angle relative to the equator, as EarthSky notes. As a result of these two tilts, the moon's path across the night sky changes throughout the year and appears different depending on the observer's latitude (distance from the equator).   The path of the Harvest Moon at moonrise is nearly parallel to the horizon, according to The Old Farmer's Almanac. This causes the moon to rise above the horizon at nearly the same time for a few nights in a row. This effect is most pronounced at northern latitudes and becomes less noticeable for observers closer to the equator.   Over the course of a year, the moon rises an average of 50 minutes later each day, but extremes occur during the Harvest Moon. Using information available on Time and Date, anyone with an internet connection can find the moonrise time for any city on a particular date. In the days surrounding the Harvest Moon in 2021, the number of days it took for the time of moonrise to change by 50 minutes was: 10 days in Helsinki, Finland (latitude of 60.2 degrees north), 5 days in London, England (51.5 degrees north), 4 days in New York City, New York, US (40.7 degrees north) and 3 days in Miami, Florida, US (35.8 degrees north). In contrast, on the night after the same full moon in Melbourne, Australia (37.8 degrees south), the moon rose 61 minutes later.   The situation is roughly reversed for the spring equinox, which occurs in late March. In the days surrounding the full moon closest to the spring equinox in 2022, it will take three days for the time of moonrise to change by 50 minutes in Melbourne, Australia (37.8 degrees south). In contrast, the night after the same full moon in Helsinki, Finland (60.2 degrees north), the moon will rise a whopping 94 minutes later.   The Moon Effect Optical Illusion   The Harvest Moon is celebrated for being big and bright, but it's not necessarily bigger or brighter than any other full moon. When the moon rises above the horizon, an optical illusion called the Moon Illusion makes it appear enormous, as explained by NASA.   Essentially, your brain is comparing the size of the moon to things it sees in the horizon, such as oceans, mountains, trees and buildings. Your brain knows that the moon is behind these big things, so the moon must be even bigger. As the Moon rises high in the sky, there are no Earth objects to compare it to, so the brain perceives it to be smaller.   People often describe a moon near the horizon as red or orange, which is not an optical illusion. When the moon is low in the horizon, you are viewing it through the thickest part of the atmosphere. Short wavelength blue light scatters when it travels through the atmosphere, which leaves mostly longer wavelength red and yellow light to reach your eyes.   Comparing Full Moons   The 2021 Harvest Moon was notable because it was the fourth full moon of the summer. Each season usually has three full moons, but because the moon's orbit around the Earth is not synchronized with the Earth's orbit around the sun, there's an "extra" full moon every two-and-a-half years. This lack of synchronization also means that the Harvest Moon can occur up to two weeks before or two weeks after the autumn equinox. Since the autumn equinox is September 22 or 23, the Harvest Moon is usually in September.   The moon follows an elliptical path around the Earth, causing some full moons to be closer to Earth than others. When measured from Earth, the closest full moons can be 14% bigger and slightly brighter than other full moons, according to NASA. This 14% difference pales in comparison to the perceived difference produced by the Moon Illusion.   EarthSky offers a comparison of some of the recent Harvest Moons: In 2021, it was an average-sized full moon. In 2020, it was the second-smallest full moon of the year. In 2019, it was the smallest full moon of the year. In 2015, it was a Super-Harvest Blood Moon, or the largest moon of the year combined with a total lunar eclipse.   With the great variety of ways that the Earth, moon and other celestial bodies travel through space, there is always something interesting to see.   Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation. 

The Harvest Moon Lights the Night as Autumn Arrives

An endangered plant having the ability to hide from people searching for it seems like something out of a science fiction movie. But research published in Current Biology suggests that fritillary species may be using camouflage plant stealth to avoid being picked. ScienceNews describes how Fritillaria delavayi plants growing in easily accessible mountain sites blended in more with the background, becoming almost invisible to the human eye. However, rather than camouflage plants pulling on camouflage pants, this is more an example of evolutionary pressure at work rather than wardrobe stealth. Hiding in plain sight means that the invisible fritillary survives to flower and thrive. Commercial Harvest for Traditional Medicine Fritillary plants grow in temperate areas of the world, from Europe through the Middle East and into Asia. These perennial flowering plants — specifically, their tiny bulbs — are highly valued in Traditional Chinese Medicine for cough and respiratory illness remedies. Smithsonian Magazine notes that as many as 3,500 bulbs are needed for one kilogram of the medicinal powder valued at around $480 USD. Now, researchers are noting how human harvesting activity has put pressure on these prized wild populations. Researchers examining endangered fritillary populations had previously been baffled by how their study populations could disappear from one year to the next. However, with access to harvesting records, they began to understand the enormous pressure on certain sites from human foragers. The prized tiny plants grow on scree slopes in high-altitude areas, meaning that only easily accessible locations are harvested. This puts more pressure on these perennials to become a camouflage plant in order to live and grow another year. Studying a Camouflage Plant in Its Natural Environment Using spectrometry, the research team measured how closely the fritillary matched the rocky alpine meadows that they grew in. They found that in certain areas, more turned into a camouflage plant and blended into the background. At first, the scientists thought that this was probably due to predation, since most plant evolution is driven to avoid being an animal's lunch. However, ScienceNews notes that when the team looked more closely, they couldn't find any evidence of nibbling — a telltale sign that herbivore action is responsible for plant disappearance. Science Alert reports that the researchers then turned to the human population for answers. From discussions with the local population, they were able to estimate how heavily certain areas were harvested. When they compared the spectroscopy data with the harvesting estimates, they found that plants in heavily harvested areas were more likely to show drab gray-brown coloring rather than the usual vibrant green. The Benefits of Invisibility and Other Tales of Evolution To the fritillary plants, being invisible is a huge benefit. By blending into the rocky scree surroundings, the plants avoid being noticed by people searching for them. In computer tests, the researchers found that it took people longer to spot the camouflage plant in an image. Fritillary plants hiding in plain sight aren't the first evidence of human activity influencing evolution, though it is an uncommon cause of adaptation. Dr. Bernard Kettlewell's research on wing colorization published in Nature in 1955 showed that industrial pollution influenced Peppered Moth development. Where environments were covered in heavy black soot, those with black wings had an advantage over lighter-colored moths and could avoid predators to survive and breed. Human Activity Shapes Evolutionary Adaptation A 2005 paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) also describes how human pressure can impact plant adaptation. The research team that published the study investigated how harvesting for desirable species led to changes in the plant populations. Their data found that the highly prized Himalayan Snow Lotus decreased in height over a 100-year span. This was not seen in related species that were less threatened and not prized by collectors. Another PNAS study suggests that humans as predators drive far greater rates of evolutionary change than other natural selection processes. Human harvesting drove more rapid phenotype changes in various wild populations than previously appreciated, leading the study's authors to sound a note of alarm. This was also seen in a 2009 Evolutionary Applications study, which notes that fishing pressure has reduced the age and size at maturation for several heavily fished species at sea. Human activity is driving a lot more than camouflage plant adaptation. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology, and engineering.

Camouflage Plant Stealth Helps to Preserve High-Altitude Fritillary Populations

Rapid advances in healthcare technology trends, such as hand-held genome sequencers and cancer treatment drugs, are shaking up the healthcare industry. In the wake of World Health Day on April 7, let's take a closer look at some important new medical technology.   Healthcare IoT   Some medical devices can now alert consumers to whether they're likely to need treatment. The "internet of health things" translates data into easily accessible information and communicates with other objects, machines or people. For instance, Sentrian, a remote patient intelligence company, uses a platform to detect 88 percent of hospital visits five days in advance with a 3 percent false positive rate, according to ReadWrite. In addition, preventative healthcare can harness the connectivity and monitoring abilities of new medical technology to help patients better adhere to treatment programs. According to Accenture's 2017 survey, approximately 73 percent of healthcare executives said they thought IoHT would be "disruptive" to the healthcare industry within three years.   Healthcare Information Storage   If you've visited a doctor's office recently, you might have been surprised that they still use pen and paper in a world where pretty much everything has gone digital. Finally, that's starting to change. In its iOS 11.3 release, Apple allowed consumers to see their electronic medical records, empowering them to update their doctors better about their medical histories. As Computerworld noted, thanks to such access "'in the provider-to-patient-to-provider scenario, a physician may share test results with a patient and the patient may then schedule a follow-up appointment.'"   Hand-Held Genome Sequencer   The Human Genome Project in 1990 was the result of 13 years of collaboration and millions of dollars in research. Flash forward 28 years, and now genome mapping can be performed with a hand-held device, according to the BBC. Such sequencing can be used to analyze the DNA of cancers to determine the best course of treatment. Examining the genetic code of different bacterias could also help doctors detect antibiotic resistance early.   Artificial Pancreas   The FDA last year approved a hybrid closed-loop insulin delivery system that uses computer algorithms to provide an adequate level of insulin to the body, according to CNBC. The device could provide hope for the 1.25 million Americans living with Type 1 diabetes.   Looking Ahead   While we don't yet know the extent of the impact new healthcare technology trends will have, it is encouraging to see a rise in informed patients. With more accessible data, there is also hope for progress in curing diseases like cancer, diabetes and heart disease. Though we don't know what the future holds, the notion of such progress continuing into the 2020s should be a major cause for optimism.   

Healthcare Technology Trends to Keep an Eye Out For

There are five Platonic solids: the tetrahedron, hexahedron (cube), octahedron, dodecahedron and icosahedron. They're a unique group of three-dimensional shapes that have identical polygons on each face and the same number of polygons meeting at each corner. These same-surface solids aren't new to the mathematical party — they're called "Platonic" because Athenian philosopher Plato famously associated them with elements of nature — but they still remain a source a mathematical mystery. Now, a new dodecahedron discovery is shaking up the five solids framework with pathway permutation.   Solid Gold   So, what sets a Platonic solid apart from other shapes? It's all about repetition. Each Platonic solid has the same polygon on every face and the same number of polygons touching at each corner (which is called a vertex), and the internal angles of these meeting points add up to less than 360 degrees.   For an easy example, consider the cube. It has six sides, each of which is a square, with three squares meeting at each corner. Each internal angle is 90 degrees, meaning that the total at each vertex is 270 degrees. Three of the other five Platonic solids — the tetrahedron, octahedron and icosahedron — have triangles on each face, while the dodecahedron has pentagons.   Here's a quick breakdown:     Tetrahedron — four triangle faces, three triangles meet at each corner with combined angles of 180 degrees  Hexahedron (cube) — six square faces, three squares meet at each corner with combined angles of 270 degrees  Octahedron — eight triangle faces, four triangles meet at each corner with combined angles of 240 degrees  Dodecahedron — 12 pentagon faces, three pentagons meet at each corner with combined angles of 324 degrees  Icosahedron — 20 triangle faces, five triangles meet at each corner with combined angles of 300 degrees    Five for Fighting   Why five? Why not ten, twenty or a thousand Platonic solids?   The answer is simple, if not immediately obvious: internal angles. Consider a hexagon, which has internal angles of 120 degrees at each corner. To create a three-dimensional polygon, at least three faces need to touch, meaning the internal angle of identical hexagon vertices is 360 degrees (3é—120) and the shape goes flat. The same problem happens if we add more corners to the existing line of Platonic solids — while three pentagons meeting give a combined angle of 324 degrees at 108 degrees each, adding one more corner bumps this up to 432 degrees and makes creating a cohesive polygon impossible.   While it's possible to solve this angle problem by changing the shape of some sides to bring internal totals under 360 degrees, the solid is no longer uniform. Despite mathematical efforts to prove otherwise over two millennia, there are only five shapes that satisfy all three conditions: identical faces, uniform corner connections and combined vertex angles less than 360 degrees.   Found in Translation   Despite the ample time to study the five Platonic solids, questions still remain. One of the most popular centers on corners and pathways: Is it possible to stand at the corner of any Platonic solid, walk in a straight line, and arrive back at your starting point without passing through any other corners along the way? Recent research found that no such corner-to-corner or "geodesic" paths exist across tetrahedrons, octahedrons, icosahedrons or cubes. But what about pentagon-based dodecahedrons?   As it turns out, there are an infinite number of ways to start at a corner, walk across a dodecahedron and end up back where you started, all without crossing your own path. Research published in Experimental Mathematics, three mathematicians — Jayadev Athreya, David Aulicino and Patrick Hooper — found "exactly 31 equivalence classes of closed saddle connections" that can be used as the basis for non-overlapping routes. They relied on the use of computer algorithms to create what are known as "translation surfaces."   These surfaces start as Platonic solids that have been pulled apart at the corners to lie flat. Each iteration of this lay-flat surface is called a "net" and offers a staring point for our potential Platonic path. When this path reaches the edge of the net, another net is added, rotated by some multiple of 36 degrees to represent the next circuit around the dodecahedron. Lay out 10 nets and you've covered all 360 degrees, meaning the 11th net is effectively the same as the first and can be joined to its corresponding counterpart on the first net to produce a complete translation surface.   Using advanced computer modeling, the team was able to calculate all possible paths from all possible corners and demonstrate that there are, in fact, a host of non-crossing, verified dodecahedron routes that lead away from and back to the same vertex.   Shaping the Future   While the mathematical and statistical modeling that underpins investigation into the five Platonic shapes may not capture public interest like the ongoing evolution of more well-known theories of quantum mechanics and relativity, research makes it clear that even well-known and seemingly well-understood frameworks still contain secrets that could help shape our understanding of the physical world. 

Pathway Passion: Dodecahedron Discovery Shakes Up Five Platonic Solids Framework

A sticky string oozes out of a spigot and forms a customized structure. This scene could either describe the additive manufacturing process called 3D printing or how an arachnid spins its spider web to trap prey. Spider webs are marvels of sustainable engineering. They are intricate structures tailor-made for their environment from a nontoxic, biodegradable material that is remarkably strong, tough and elastic all at once. Scientists study spider webs to develop materials with similar properties for practical applications in medicine, industrial use and aerospace engineering. What Are Spider Webs Made Of? There are many different types of webs — for trapping prey, protecting eggs, and more — but they are all made of silk proteins. Specifically, they are made of glycine, alanine and serine, which are amino acids, a.k.a. the molecules that combine to form proteins. Webs vary in structure and material. Different species make various webs, but even a single spider produces a variety of silk. Some spider silk is sticky, while other silk is waterproof or optimized for the spider to walk on it. Along with versatility, engineers are interested in spider silk for many useful characteristics:   Strength: It is five times stronger than steel (by weight) and at least as strong as Kevlar.  Toughness: Although webs appear delicate, they are relatively difficult to damage.  Elasticity: It can stretch more than rubber and nylon, according to research published in the journal e-Polymers.  Flexibility: It is more flexible than nylon, per Discovery.  Stickiness: It is stickier than most tape, as Evolution News explains.  Temperature resilience: Webs can withstand high and low temperatures, according to e-Polymers.  Energy absorption: Its static load and impact resistance are better than those of other artificial and natural materials, according to e-Polymers.  Each of these properties is useful, but the unique combination makes spider silk especially intriguing and worth pursuing. Materials engineers can develop novel substances that are strong and flexible, but nobody does it as well as spiders. How Spiders Spin Webs The silk starts as a liquid called dope in the spider's glands. The glands secrete the dope and the spider pushes it through ducts, then through spigots on its spinnerets, which are silk-spinning organs located on its rear abdomen. Similar to the way a 3D printer squeezes plastic through a nozzle, the spider's spigot has a valve that controls the thickness and speed of the material, so it can customize the web. Finally, the spinnerets wind strands together to form a thread. It is a sophisticated process that humans have struggled to understand and replicate. Science journalist Katherine J. Wu, Ph.D., writes for the New York Times, "On their way out of a spider's bottom, the protein building blocks in silk, called spidroins, fold themselves and interlace, creating a highly organized structure without guidance from any outside force." There are many types of webs, such as draglines that spiders use to travel, pheromone-laced webs that females use to attract mates, and nursery webs for carrying spiderlings. But the best known is called an orb web. The spider excretes the thread into the air, and it catches on a nearby branch or some other anchor nearby, as HowStuffWorks explains. The first thread becomes a bridge that the spider travels across as it strategically releases threads to form a web. Some strands are sticky enough to trap prey. But the spider also weaves a few strands without an adhesive coating, so they can walk along the web without getting stuck themselves. Can Humans Use Spider Webs? People have been using the spider web directly and indirectly for thousands of years. For example, Ancient Greeks and Romans used balled-up webs as bandages, according to Discovery. Spider silk is particularly well suited for medicine because it is non-toxic and absorbable. It could also be a vector for drug delivery and a basis for 3D photodetectors for bioimaging. Scientists and engineers are exploring industrial applications such as cables, sensors, composite materials and soft robotics. Spider silk also has potential for aerospace, such as for developing shock-absorbing components for rocks or strong and flexible composite materials for aircraft and spacecraft. The possibilities are endless — armor, clothing, art and more. The trick is spiders don't make great livestock. It is challenging to extract silk from the spider's glands due to the complicated process of spinning silk threads and the fact that each spider has several glands that produce a variety of silk types. Plus, you can't put a bunch of spiders in a cage together; they are carnivorous animals that will eat each other. Scientists continue to discover what spider webs are made of and how they are made, while also exploring ways to create spider silk, for example, through genetic engineering or synthetic chemistry. Synthetic biology is an emerging research field that could provide a path for artificial spider silk. Until then, humans continue to be inspired by spiders and their ultra-strong sustainable designs. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

A Closer Look at Nature's 3D-Printed Marvel: The Spider Web

Programmable microstructures hold the promise of giving tiny devices greater flexibility and functionality — capabilities that could reshape the delivery of healthcare and even improve the exploration of planets.However, there's long been one large hurdle to these miniature devices accomplishing big tasks: They not only have to be microscopic, but they also need to bend and twist in a way that suits the job in front of them. Cilia in cellular organisms have those capabilities, but not for wide-scale applications. Recent scientific advances might finally have a solution: artificial cilia that can be more flexible than the real thing.Harvard researchers say they have developed a single-material, single-stimuli microstructure that can outmaneuver even living cilia. In other words, unlike other developments in the field, their invention needs only one trigger — in this case, light — to move, and requires only one material for its design. Their creation could change "the ways we design materials and devices for a variety of applications, including robotics, medicine and information technologies," as one of the researchers notes.Recreating Helpful CiliumAs you might remember from high school biology class, cilia can be found in almost every type of cell in animals. According to Sciencing, these hair-like organelles are typically no more than 10 micrometers long and, among many biological roles, move beneficial cells as well as harmful materials such as pathogens.Scientists and engineers admire the productivity of these tiny workers and have tried to replicate their nimbleness, but creating artificial cilia has been challenging. It usually requires fabrication processes that involve several steps as well as different stimuli that will trigger the microstructure's movement — basically, too much activity behind development and too many impetuses to function.An invention by North Carolina State University and Elon University brilliantly exemplifies this complexity: synthetic cilia that bend into new shapes in response to a magnetic field and return to their original shape when exposed to light. As Advanced Science News explains, this creation comes about through several steps. It begins with dipping a mold into a polymer that's dissolved through an organic solvent, and then, once the solvent is drawn off, the cilia take shape.Simple to Build, Simple to MoveResearchers at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) say they have designed an artificial cilium with a single material. Instead of relying on "complex multi-component materials," they instead use only a photoresponsive liquid crystal elastomer.They say it also functions simply: When exposed to light, its building blocks realign and the structure changes shape. And as those changes occur, a cycle of perpetuation takes hold. A new spot on the microstructure will also be exposed to light, changing that area as well. This feedback loop creates a self-propelled and endlessly programmable microstructure. "Once you turn the light on, it does all its own work," says one of the Harvard researchers.The shape changing of the artificial cilia drives the "endlessly reconfigurable" twisting and turning that will hopefully make microstructures "potentially transformative" for a wide range of applications that require repetitive and defined movement, the researchers say.Ideal for "Soft" ApplicationsMicrostructures are all about flexibility. In a paper submitted last year to the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, another Harvard SEAS team explained how their work in designing shape-shifting materials could similarly create new, dynamic uses for application. "These structures allow for independent control of the geometry and mechanics, laying the foundation for engineering functional shapes using a new type of morphable unit cell," a researcher explained.By all accounts, artificial cilia accomplish a new way of configuring structural elements — which spurs robotics potential. Instead of facing limitations with "hard" components, soft robotics driven by artificial cilia could achieve tasks that have been out of reach.For instance, a recent Georgia Tech College of Engineering story detailed how soft, flexible robots could revolutionize healthcare. Their wide range of motion means they could navigate catheters or endoscopes to the right places in the body, all while minimizing stress and damage to tissue. Amputees could have prosthetics that mimic the softness and suppleness of skin. Stroke patients who lost mobility could have their full range of motion restored from joint supports powered by soft robotics.The possibilities don't end on Earth. NASA is studying how soft robots could explore the tight spots of a moon or planet, as Space.com explains. That's a long way from what you learned about cilia in high school.Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Artificial Cilia: More Flexible Than the Real Thing

Discoveries in science usually begin with something in the world around us that we would like to understand. The phenomenon comes first, then we work out a theory to explain it. But as the American Association for the Advancement of Science reports, sometimes the discovery process goes the other way. A theory may successfully explain one phenomenon — but the same theory also implies the existence of other phenomena that no one has ever yet observed or perhaps even imagined. In the late 1800s, a German physicist named Heinrich Hertz confronted a challenge of just this sort. Some years earlier, in 1865, British physicist James Clerk Maxwell had set forth a theory that linked electricity and magnetism. These early discoveries would lead their successors to creating some of the technologies we rely on every day. A Hidden Surprise in Maxwell's Equations Maxwell's theory was the first of what are now called field theories. It not only showed that electricity and magnetism were related; it also demonstrated that light waves resulted from an interplay of electric and magnetic fields. It was the first big step from the billiards-ball universe of Sir Isaac Newton to the universe of fields as we understand it today. But Heinrich Hertz had an additional insight. He realized that Maxwell's theory didn't just explain familiar visible light. The theory also implied that a similar interplay of electric and magnetic fields — what we now call electromagnetic radiation — should take place on other scales, producing waves of electromagnetic radiation that would be vastly longer than light waves. With only Maxwell's equations to guide him, Hertz came up with a simple device, combining an electrical induction coil and a Leyden jar (an early form of capacitor) that — in theory — could produce invisible electromagnetic waves. He paired this with another simple device, two brass spheres with a spark gap between them, to detect the waves. And they worked! As Hertz wrote in his 1889 report of his discovery, the sparks "are microscopically short, scarcely a hundredth of a millimeter; they last only about a millionth of a second. It almost seems absurd and impossible that they should be visible; but in a perfectly dark room they are visible to an eye which has been well rested in the dark." Heinrich Hertz had built the world's first radio transmitter and a receiver to pick up its signal. Physicists were, well â€¦ electrified by his achievement, which not only confirmed Maxwell's theory but also showed that light was only one small portion of a much broader spectrum of electromagnetic radiation. Wireless Telegraphy and a Night to Remember At first, to the wider world, Heinrich Hertz's work was simply a cool scientific discovery with no practical applications. But in the early 1890s, per Columbia University, "Hertzian waves" as they were then called, caught the attention of a technology-minded young Italian, Guglielmo Marconi. For decades, people had been looking for some technology that would allow a telegraph link without wires — avoiding the cost of stringing lines and the constraint of fixed routes. But none of the early attempts at "wireless" communications worked out. By 1894, Marconi had improved on Hertz's purely experimental apparatus — and by the next year, he could send and receive signals across a distance of more than a mile, even with a hill in the way. Two years later, he applied for a British patent and demonstrated his technology to officials from the British post office and observers from the military. In 1897 Marconi launched a company called the Wireless Telegraph and Signal Company. Communication from and to ships at sea was one of the first applications Marconi pursued, and a Marconi device was used as early as 1899 to summon rescue after a ship collision. Then, in 1912, the Titanic disaster showed the world the critical role that wireless communications could play in rescue at sea. Beyond Communications So, what are radio waves used for? The most common use is for communication. From the pioneering wireless telegraph to the cell phone, sending and receiving messages has been the most widespread and familiar application of radio-frequency technology. But other uses were also soon found for radio-frequency (RF) waves. All electromagnetic waves, including RF waves, carry energy and can be used to heat materials. For example, microwave ovens are an offshoot of radar technology, but according to the book Manufacturing Techniques for Polymer Matrix Composites (PMCs), the idea of radio-frequency heating has been used for resin and composite curing since the early 1900s. Radio waves can also be used for direction finding, a technique closely tied to Marconi's early insight about radio and maritime safety. Radio waves, like visible light, stream outward from a source — and with the right type of receiver, you can determine what direction they are coming from. Thus, radio beacons can serve as the equivalent of lighthouses but are detectable through fog. Since the 1920s, radio direction-finding has been particularly important in aviation. But today, a variant technique — using precise timing of satellite transmissions rather than direction of the transmission — is the basis for GPS location technology. Enter Radar If a radio transmitter can function as the equivalent of a lighthouse, it can also function as the equivalent of a spotlight. Per the National Weather Service, Heinrich Hertz himself had found that objects could reflect the electromagnetic waves he detected. In 1904, a German inventor even patented a method for ships to radio-detect hazards to navigation, though his device did not prove usable enough for service. In 1922, experimenters at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory near Washington D.C. found that passing ships on the Potomac and Anacostia rivers disrupted transmissions from their experimental high-frequency radio equipment. The research team recognized that the same principle might be used to detect enemy ships. Incremental but steady progress continued in the years that followed, and in 1937, the British government began development of the world's first radar early warning system. A high-power transmitter technology, called the magnetron, provided a crucial element of the system, which would be decisive in the Battle of Britain. Radar was the most dramatic wartime application of RF technology, but World War II gave an enormous boost to every aspect of the technology. The sheer amount of RF equipment built and used was impressive. Unsurprisingly, new RF technologies such as television — still semi-experimental before the war — took off in the postwar era. RF Technology Enters the Space Age The American Physical Society reports that, as researchers in the early 1930s were exploring the technology that would become radar, an engineer at Bell Labs was assigned to track down the sources of static that sometimes interfered with radio transmissions. The engineer, Karl Jansky, found that one major source of static was thunderstorms. But another source of static was more elusive, though curiously rhythmic. It slid across the sky every day and showed subtle shifts in the course of a year. Jansky finally determined that the signal came from the direction of the constellation Sagittarius — the same direction as the center of the Milky Way galaxy. We now know that the static Jansky detected is produced by turbulent gas swirling around the black hole at the center of our galaxy. From this, a new branch of science had been launched: radio astronomy. It would come fully into its own in the postwar years, powered by the new generation of ultra-sensitive receivers originally developed for wartime use. Another postwar development, the transistor, allowed development of far more compact RF equipment of all sorts. This also allowed high-powered and sophisticated radio and radar systems to be packed into missile nose cones and satellites. In time, the transistor would also make RF technology far more reliable and cheaper, setting the stage for the enormous proliferation of RF devices of all sorts, including smartphones and RFID tags for identifying lost pets. In spite of all this progress, there was a time in the late 20th century when RF technology seemed to be falling a bit out of fashion, at least in the popular culture. Broadcast TV networks were losing viewers to cable, while music tapes, CDs and wired internet downloads encroached on the popularity of radio. Even on the defense applications side, the hottest topic was what might be called "anti-RF" technology — better known as stealth technology, at the heart of which are shapes and materials that make aircraft and other vehicles less visible to enemy radar. The outward sidelining of RF technology was more about pop-culture image than reality, but it had some real consequences. Technology-minded kids were more likely to fiddle with computer equipment than radio equipment, as kids in the midcentury era had done. The downstream consequence was a shortage of RF engineers once RF technology became "in" again. "Wireless" Makes a Comeback In the last couple of decades, the apparent sidelining of RF technology has turned around in a big way. The most obvious sign of this is our phones. Mobile radiotelephones have existed for many decades, but earlier models were fairly bulky and expensive, and remained specialty devices. But cellphones were small, cheap and handy, and then compact computer technology turned them into smartphones. Suddenly wireless, which had over time become an archaic word for "radio," became the hottest thing going. While the sheer number and variety of RF devices used in everyday life has continued to proliferate, the defense sector also remains a leader in pushing the RF technology frontier. This has been the case since the dawn of the technology, when British army and navy observers witnessed Marconi's demonstration of radio in 1896. In a crisis or in combat, timely and reliable information is always precious. Highly mobile modern warfare has made the wireless information battlefield more critical than ever, while posing the toughest challenges for technology systems as well as their operators. At the same time, defense research is exploring entirely new RF technologies. Every RF receiver since Heinrich Hertz's experimental rig, for example, has used some form of antenna to pick up the signal. But recent works with quantum effects that produce vastly bloated "Rydberg atoms," highly sensitive to RF frequencies, could provide an entirely new way to detect RF signals, from radar beams to radio transmissions, with capabilities no conventional antenna system can match. Conventional antennas, for example, must be scaled in proportion to the RF waves they detect, meaning that low-frequency signals can only be detected by bulky antennas. Quantum RF technology, however, allows compact scanners to detect even long-wave signals — denying a spectrum "hiding place" for hostile transmissions. At the same time, quantum technology can allow friendly forces to stay a jump ahead of enemy attempts to jam their communications. Between the proliferation of RF applications and the development of entirely new technologies, the great pioneering age of RF engineering, it seems, may still lie ahead of us. <p class="Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

From Heinrich Hertz to WiFi: Tripping the Light Fantastic

The use of electric therapy for chronic pain treatment is an old idea, but it's getting new attention as researchers and doctors look for alternative ways to alleviate severe, long-lasting pain. In ancient times, physicians discovered that the sting of electric fish could sometimes leave patients feeling better by reducing their chronic pain, according to Oxford Academic. By the 19th century, pioneering electrical researchers found that the nerves of living tissue responded to electric stimulation. Electrical treatment of pain fell out of favor as it became associated with crank theories and dubious gadgets, but by the 1970s, researchers were giving electric therapy (also called electrotherapy) a second look. Today, amid the risks of opioid use in pain treatment and the limitations of pharmaceutical alternatives, the use of electric treatment for chronic pain therapy is seeing a new surge of interest and development. Electric Fish and Frankenstein's Monster According to Oxford Academic, in the early days of the Roman empire, physician Scribonius Largus noted that chronic pain in some patients could be alleviated by the electric shock produced by a torpedo fish. Scattered reports of the use of eels and other electric fish for pain treatment continued into American colonial times. Meanwhile, experimenters such as Benjamin Franklin found that nerves responded to electric impulses by contracting. Clearly, electricity played a role in life processes. The potential role of electricity in medicine would enter popular culture a few decades later in a big way — but not as a medical miracle. As a separate report from Oxford Academic recounts, Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein," published in 1814, gave bio-electricity an unforgettable starring role in her new, scientific twist on the horror story. Electric Snake Oil? As electrical technology developed, new devices became available. And, in spite of Frankenstein, enthusiasm was widespread. As Oxford Academic notes, a Boston newspaper reported that "cases of rheumatism, disease of the liver, stomach and kidneys, lung complaints, paralysis, lost vitality, nervous disability, female complaints" were cured by one such "electrifier." But electric therapy for chronic pain treatment gradually slipped into the ranks of medically dubious treatments. The late 19th and early 20th century marked the golden age of snake oil, patent medicines and other medical quackery, and electrical gadgets were dismissed as belonging to the same class. The Electric Pain Treatment Revival By the 1960s and 1970s, serious medical researchers were again looking at electricity as a means of chronic pain treatment, as Oxford Academic points out, and they were getting effective results in pain reduction. These treatments remained quasi-experimental due to technical limitations in the devices and the limited number of doctors trained with the technology. However, in the 1980s, effective transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation devices — often called TENS devices — became commercially available. Awareness and use of electric therapy for pain began to grow. However, pharmaceutical methods of pain treatment were still more widely available and regarded as simpler and less costly. In recent years, attention is turning again to the potential for electric pain treatment. As Time magazine reports, the pharmaceutical industry has hit something of a wall in developing new drugs for pain treatment. At the same time, as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) explains, misuse of opioids has reached epidemic levels, pushing the pain treatment community to look for alternatives to these powerful but extremely dangerous drugs. Looking Forward Meanwhile, the sophistication and capability of TENS devices continue to grow. Medical News Today reports that, though clinical research into electrical chronic pain treatment remains limited, a growing number of doctors and patients are finding electricity to be an effective means of alleviating pain from a wide variety of causes. Some of the conditions that TENS devices have shown effectiveness in treating include fibromyalgia, arthritis and spinal cord injury. Other forms of electrical stimulation may prove useful in treating these and other serious conditions. In fact, Nature reports that three paralyzed people were able to regain some control of their leg muscles through the use of electric therapy. More research surely needs to be done into the effectiveness and applications for electricity-based treatments — and no doubt, this form of therapy may need some image rehabilitation. But it may return the favor by giving science and medicine a wider range of ways to rehabilitate us. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Chronic Pain Treatment May Get a Jolt From Electric Therapy

Tricks of the light aside, for a celestial body to be seen during the day, it has to compete with the sun. Not many objects can outshine our main sequence star in its own system. A few supernovas have been so bright that they've been visible during the day. Meteors, if they are big enough, flare like giant torches as they burn through the atmosphere. And here and there across history, a comet rivaling the sun in brilliance has streaked across the sky, terrifying Earth-dwellers.
Then there is the moon. It breaks all the rules. Long before humans understood the orbital plane of the Earth and the stars, how many ancient people looked up at the moon and thought - what even is that thing?
Trickster or Rockstar
It's not hard to see why the moon had our species scratching their collective heads for millennia. It's nearly constant, phasing in and out every 27 days. But in most other ways, the moon makes less sense than anything else in the sky. How can it look as bright as firelight, but also seem solid? Why can we sometimes see the moon during the day, sometimes see it at night and sometimes not at all? What are those strange patterns across the surface, and why do they never change? Why doesn't the moon follow the same path across the sky as the sun, planets and stars? And why does it occasionally, seemingly out of nowhere, turn red?
In previous eras of human history, the amount of moon information possessed by modern eighth-graders would have made them legends. Or landed them in jail.
Around 600 BCE, Anaxagoras proposed to his fellow Athenians that the moon was not a deity but rather a rock — one that had been flung from the Earth. The sun, likewise, was solid and also burning. Rather than making its own power, the moon reflected the burning sun's light. This celestial setup allowed Anaxagoras and anyone of like mind to correctly predict that when the orbital planes of the three solid objects lined up, solar and lunar eclipses would be the result.
Seeing Is Believing
Suffice to say, Athenians were not entirely of like mind. Many ancients found it easier to imagine a god stationed in the sky than a highly reflective rock — one placed up there for unclear reasons by known forces. Why this rock never came down, why it continued to phase and how it remained unphased by weather seemed equally unfathomable. These days, basic knowledge of astronomy is a birthright. But 2600 years ago, it was simpler to arrest Anaxagoras for heresy than to understand that lunar phases are an optical illusion: that when the sun sets in the west as the moon rises in the east, the moon appears full only because we are standing in-between two distant, differently-sized bodies. Telescopes, invented more than a thousand years after Anaxagoras died in exile, allowed us to easily see craters, rocky planes and other imperfections in the sphere that was once believed to be a god.
Then, of course, we went there.
Post-Apollo, lunar knowledge is commonplace. Using a tennis ball and a flashlight, two school kids standing in a dark room can easily demonstrate phases of the moon. The child playing the sun stands still with the flashlight shining straight away from them. The other child playing the Earth faces the flashlight, trying not to squint too much. They hold the tennis ball in front of them with their left arm outstretched, then they rotate 90 degrees to the left. Presto: They can only see 25% of the illuminated moon. The moon/tennis ball is 50% illuminated, but the child only sees one illuminated quarter of it from their position. We see the same illuminated quarter from Earth during first-quarter moons.
Meanwhile, all the children standing around the child with the flashlight can see 50% of the moon lit up, as it always is. As the child with the tennis ball continues to rotate to their left, they will be able to see more of the moon lit up, too. It all looks the same from the sun's perspective. From the perspective of the child with the tennis ball, the day is going from noon to sunset, and the moon is waxing toward full as time fast-forwards through one whole week.
As the World Turns
Why can we see the moon during the day? Why is it crescent at dawn, first-quarter at noon and full at sunset? All this can be demonstrated in only a few minutes. But don't let the humbleness of the flashlight and the tennis ball fool you. Understanding this interaction of rotating bodies requires a surprisingly advanced appreciation of geometry. Entire civilizations rose and fell before simple demonstrations such as this were deemed more compelling than pantheons filled with drama, intrigue and interpersonal strife.
Speaking of which: The orbital plane of the moon relative to the Earth can be demonstrated with the same simple setup. If the moon's orbital plane were exactly the same as the one the Earth uses to travel around the sun, we would have lunar and solar eclipses every month. Instead, we only have them every so often. That's because the orbital plane of the moon is offset from Earth's orbital plane by about 5 degrees. To demonstrate this, instead of standing straight up, the child holding the tennis ball in front of them should slump a little to the left, as if one ear were heavier than the other. Or they could let their arm holding the ball wobble while they spin it. Either way, the ball should sink slightly below the line of the flashlight beam, then float slightly above it. As the child spins around in place with the tennis ball slightly offset, they'll create a solar eclipse only every so often, when their wonky orbit happens to dash directly in front of the flashlight beam.
New Gods
As easy as that, two lightly equipped children can blow eons of mythology out of the sky. At least, the part of moon mythology that explains how the sun is a god in a chariot, a dragon or any other mystical moon persona. In the era of lunar cam live-streams and satellite constellations, it's easier than ever before to see how the moon is 50% illuminated at all times. Yet, wherever you are on Earth, night or day, Northern or Southern Hemisphere, the same rules apply now as they did then. Whatever phase you are in — be it crescent, first quarter, waxing gibbous, full, waning gibbous, third quarter, waning crescent or new — you'll see the part of the half-lit moon that faces you now.
Thousands of years ago, even those who understood the physics of the Earth-moon-sun system could never have imagined how we see the moon today. How when clouds crowd the sky and snow falls on our rooftops, we can call up a perfectly clear view of the lunar surface. How, at any given moment, we can ask a glowing box in our hand to show us the crater Anaxagoras as seen by an orbiting spacecraft. Partly lit by the sun, partly concealed in shadow, the rock thrown into space continues to challenge us to rise above assumptions, superstitions and the comfort of not knowing, and to look back at the whole, imperfect form of the Earth as it hovers above the horizon.
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Tails From the Orbital Plane: Why We Can See the Moon During the Day

If you've spent any time looking into diets that promote weight loss, you've likely heard of "negative calorie foods." These are foods that supposedly require more energy to digest than they provide in calories. A common example is celery — a crunchy vegetable filled with fiber and water that provides just six calories per stalk, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's searchable database.But is it really possible to have foods with negative calories?Negative Calorie Food CandidatesMost of the so-called "negative calorie foods" are vegetables and fruits with high water and fiber content. The lowest calorie foods are vegetables, which typically have less sugar than fruits. Listed below are the number of calories in 100 grams of some common vegetables and fruits, and some meat and dairy items. The foods are listed from fewest to most calories, with the water content included in parentheses. 	Celery: 14 calories (95% water) 	Zucchini: 17 calories (95% water) 	Tomatoes: 18 calories (94% water) 	Green peppers: 20 calories (94% water) 	Romaine lettuce: 20 calories (95% water) 	Spinach: 23 calories (91% water) 	Watermelon: 30 calories (91% water) 	Strawberries: 32 calories (91% water) 	Broccoli: 34 calories (89% water) 	Grapefruit: 39 calories (90% water) 	Peaches: 39 calories (89% water) 	Onions: 40 calories (89% water) 	Carrots: 41 calories (89% water) 	Blueberries: 57 calories (84% water) 	Apples: 60 calories (85% water) 	Whole milk yogurt: 78 calories (85% water) 	Roasted chicken breast: 79 calories (77% water) 	Baked potato: 93 calories (75% water) 	85% lean ground beef: 232 calories (60% water) 	Cheddar cheese: 409 calories (36% water)People react in different ways to different diets, and if you are interested in changing your weight, you should consult a dietician. But on a basic level, if someone is looking to maintain or lose weight, an advantage of high fiber veggies and fruits is they fill you up and take longer to digest than highly processed foods. Therefore, they don't provide a lot of calories but prevent you from feeling hungry — which helps you eat less. Many fruits and vegetables are rich in vitamins and minerals, and are thus an essential part of a healthy diet.However, limiting yourself to just a few low-calorie foods is inadvisable, according to the Mayo Clinic, because you can easily miss out on essential nutrients including protein and fat. The UK National Health Service generally recommends 2,000 calories a day for women and 2,500 calories a day for men. If you decided to limit yourself to foods that contain roughly 20 calories per 100 grams (~200 calories per 1 kilogram), you would need to consume about 10 kilograms (22 pounds) of those foods a day to maintain your weight. That's about 17 heads of romaine lettuce or 61 large green peppers. So it's certainly possible to lose weight by consuming lots of veggies and fruits, but you'd want to mix it up by including other foods with different nutrients.All of this still doesn't quite answer the question of whether there are foods with negative calories, or foods that require more energy to digest than they provide in calories.Energy Required to Digest FoodEating food and digesting food takes energy. In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, the act of chewing gum burns 11 calories per hour. A stalk of celery provides 6 calories, which would be offset by a half hour of chewing. Clearly, the act of chewing isn't enough to make celery a negative calorie food.What about the energy required to digest food, absorb the nutrients and dispose of the waste? According to a review published in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition, approximately 60% of a person's total daily energy expenditure is used for "basal metabolism," or the energy required to operate your various organ systems at rest. After eating, researchers have studied the "thermic effect of food," or when your metabolism increases after eating because your body is using energy to digest the food, absorb the nutrients and dispose of the waste. This increase in energy use after eating accounts for approximately 10% of total energy expenditure. The remaining ~30% of daily energy expenditure is used for the other activities of daily life — standing, walking, reading, socializing, preparing meals, intentional exercise, remembering website passwords, etc.For someone consuming 2,000 calories a day, 10% of total energy expenditure is 200 calories, which would be expected to go toward digesting and processing food. Assuming that nothing else changes when you decrease the number of calories consumed — which is unlikely to be true — eating a negative calorie diet would require eating less than 200 calories a day. That's less than four medium-sized apples. Yikes!Of course, eating and digesting would be impossible if it weren't for the "basal metabolism" that maintains all of your organ systems — the brain, cardiovascular system, digestive system, liver, kidney, skeletal muscle, immune system and so on. So eat your fruits and veggies as part of a healthy diet, and don't worry too much about the "negative calorie" label.Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Do Negative Calorie Foods Exist?

You likely think about what to eat every single day. After all, it's one of the basic requirements you need to survive. Yet you may not ruminate on what happens to your food after you eat it. How does the body break down food anyway? How do you process what you eat and how does your body use the nutrients? How long does it take?This article will examine the ins and outs (pun intended) of food digestion, including how digestion happens, what occurs within your body when you eat, how your system processes different ingredients and digestion time.How Is Food Digested?The digestive system is larger than you think. According to Johns Hopkins, it consists of "the mouth, esophagus, stomach, pancreas, liver, gallbladder, small intestine, large intestine and anus." All of these organs work together to ensure you can digest the food you eat.The process of digestion starts before you take a single bite — your sense of smell triggers extra saliva, which has enzymes that start the long process. The pancreas produces those enzymes, and after you swallow food, those enzymes mix with other digestive juices in your stomach. This watery mixture then moves to your small intestine, where the nutrients are extracted, and whatever is left moves through your large intestine and is excreted through the anus.Do Different Foods Digest at Different Rates?This description of digestion seems quite simple, but in reality it's quite complicated. The process of digestion takes, on average, several hours. You know that recommendation to eat protein to feel full? That's because protein, along with fat, takes longer to digest than carbohydrates.The type of food you're eating has a huge effect on the amount of time it takes to digest. Liquids are the fastest — water leaves the stomach in just 10 minutes. More complex liquids take up to an hour, while carbs like pasta and rice can take just 30 minutes. Add protein into the mix? You're looking at two to four hours, possibly even longer. Proteins take longer to digest because breaking them down into their component amino acids takes more time than digesting carbs or other foods.What Impacts Digestion Time? Is Faster Better?It's not just the kind of food you're eating that impacts digestion time. Other factors include what time of day you eat, gender (women digest more slowly than men), and age (the aging process slows down digestion, which is part of the reason elderly people have to keep an eye on their digestive health).Your body's natural circadian rhythms are also tied to your digestive system — eating when your body expects you to eat means that digestion happens faster. If you decide to eat a lot at 1 a.m., your digestive system likely isn't expecting it, and will process that food more slowly. Digestion is a very individualized process that varies from person to person; it's even possible that your body type has a significant impact on how you digest food.The rate of digestion could also provide health benefits. Generally speaking, the faster the digestion time, the better. Studies have shown that slower transit time through your digestive system is linked to increased harmful bacteria. Conventional thinking is that the more gut bacteria you have, the healthier your digestive system, but it turns out that isn't actually always the case. Longer digestion time and food sitting too long within your large intestine can produce harmful bacteria.If you want to prioritize your digestive health and pay attention to how your body breaks down food, eat a balanced diet (with lean proteins and fiber) and stay hydrated. Eat on a regular schedule, exercise regularly (digestion requires energy, after all!), sleep well, and keep stress and anxiety levels low.Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

How Does the Body Break Down Food?

We take it for granted that the sky is blue — but is that a matter of fact or a matter of perspective? Colorblindness is more common than you might think: About one in 12 men and one in 200 women experience the condition, according to Healthline. A deeper look at what it means to be colorblind can help us better understand the way others see the world, and maybe teach us something about vision itself. How Vision Works Vision begins in the retina, which is an important membrane that lines the surface of the back of the eye. The retina is made of several layers of tissue, including a layer of photoreceptors — the specialized cells that absorb light (photons) and convert it into signals that are sent to the brain to create an image. Scienceline explains that two types of photoreceptors help us see: rods and cones. Rods distinguish between black and white (and help us see in the dark), while cones work in bright light, allowing you to see color. People with normal vision have three types of cones that each detect a certain range of color: red, blue and green. In other words, different types of cones detect certain wavelengths of the visible light spectrum. Colorblindness, which can also be called color vision deficiency, happens when the pigments in those light-sensitive cones are missing or not working properly. Therefore, when a person has missing or dysfunctional pigments in their retina's cones, they may perceive colors differently than most people do. Often, people with colorblindness see colors less intensely and therefore have trouble distinguishing one color from another. In rare cases, people with severe color blindness may not see colors at all, or they could also have symptoms such as involuntary eye movements (nystagmus) or sensitivity to light, according to the National Eye Institute. Types of Colorblindness Most people are aware that colorblindness exists, but medical providers can help to diagnose the specific condition so that patients are aware of how their eyes affect their perception of colors. There are four main types of colorblindness. The variety depends on which cones are affected and whether the cones are dysfunctional or missing altogether. 1. Anomalous Trichromacy People who have anomalous trichromacy have all three types of cones, but one type doesn't work properly. Most commonly, people have trouble telling the difference between red and green or have trouble seeing the difference between some shades of red, yellow and green. Sometimes, the effects are so mild that people don't even realize they are colorblind. There are subcategories between different types of red-green colorblindness, according to Healthline. For example, people with protanomaly have the long wavelength cones ("L" cones), but the cones are dysfunctional, which causes red to look like green. Deuteranomaly, on the other hand, causes the opposite issues; the medium wavelength cones ("M" cones) of the eye are dysfunctional, causing green to look redder. 2. Dichromacy While anomalous trichromacy can make it hard to put together a puzzle or coordinate an outfit, dichromacy is a more serious version of color blindness. People with this condition don't just have dysfunctional cones. Rather, they are lacking a type of cone altogether, which means they can't see an entire section of the rainbow. 3. Monochromacy In monochromacy, two of the three cone types are missing. This rare condition can cause people to see mostly blurry images in black, white and shades of gray. According to MedlinePlus, not only do people who have blue cone monochromacy see fuzzy colorless images, but they also experience sensitivity to light (photophobia), nystagmus and nearsightedness (myopia). 4. Achromatopsia Complete colorblindness, also called achromatopsia, is a rare disorder in which all the cones are either missing or dysfunctional. In this case, people who are colorblind experience a complete lack of color vision, plus additional vision problems. (Note: Some experts consider blue cone monochromacy to be a form of achromatopsia because it involves vision impairment.) What Causes Colorblindness Most forms of colorblindness are genetic. In other words, most people who are colorblind inherited a gene for the condition from their parents. The genes associated with colorblindness are recessive and carried on the X chromosome, according to Scienceline, which explains why this condition is more common in males. Females typically have two X chromosomes, so even if they have a recessive colorblind gene, their other dominant gene can override it. However, males usually have only one X chromosome, so if they inherit the gene, they will be colorblind. Specifically, MedlinePlus explains that mutations in the OPN1LW, OPN1MW and OPN1SW genes cause color blindness. Genetic changes involving any of these genes can lead to an absence of cones or to the production of abnormal pigments or defective cones. Although most colorblindness is genetic, it can also be caused by damage to the eye or the brain. Colorblindness has been linked to:   Alcoholism  Congenital diseases  Cataracts  Side effects of medicine (such as chloroquine, which is used to treat malaria)  Diseases involving the retina  Exposure to toxic chemicals, such as organic solvents  Outlooks and Treatments Most of the time, colorblindness is mild and not considered a disability. It is a common condition, especially among white men. There is no cure, but according to NEI, most people who are colorblind are able to adjust and don't have problems with everyday activities. Treatments can include special eyewear that can help individuals differentiate colors. There are also apps where people can take pictures to identify colors. Plus, depending on what causes colorblindness (such as a side effect of a medicine), it could be temporary. Emerging gene therapy research could also provide some new ways to treat colorblindness. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

What Does It Mean to Be Colorblind?

Rainbows are the stuff of myth and legend. They're impossible to ignore — these sudden arcs of vivid colors streaming across the horizon naturally inspire a sense of awe and wonder. The also awaken our scientific curiosity with questions about the form and function of these fantastic phenomena. So let's dive into the science of the stunning: How are rainbows formed? What types exist? And what does it all mean? Mastering Meteorological Magic The basic rainbow recipe is simple: water and light. But creating the ideal end result isn't a question of whether you mix the basic ingredients well enough — it's a question of weather. As noted by the Met Office, two environmental conditions are required to reveal a rainbow:   The sun must be 42 degrees (or less) above the horizon  Water droplets — typically in the form of rain or fog — must be present  Sunlight entering a water droplet is refracted (bent), with each color in the visible spectrum refracting at a different angle due to differing wavelengths. These multiple rays of light are then partially reflected off the inside edge of the droplet and refracted again when leaving. If the sun is more than 42 degrees above the horizon from the observer's point of view, the refraction won't be significant enough to produce a rainbow. If the sun is below 42 degrees and there's enough water in the air, refracted light will naturally spread out into a familiar spectrum based on its wavelength. Red light has the longest wavelength at 650 nanometers and appears along the rainbow's top edge. Violet has the shortest wavelength at 400 nanometers and appears at the bottom. The position and shape of rainbows depend on observer location. For example, observers on the ground at sunset will often see what appears to be a complete arch with clear terminations on each end. Someone looking down from a plane at the same time may see a complete circle. In both cases, the center of a rainbow is the anti-solar point, which is directly opposite the sun. ROY G. BIV, Redux The familiar mnemonic device makes it easy to remember the classic rainbow color spectrum — Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo and Violet — though differentiating between blue and indigo with the naked eye is no easy task. Roy G. BIV pairs up nicely with what's know as a primary rainbow, which is created "when sunlight strikes raindrops in front of a viewer at a precise angle (42 degrees)," according to National Geographic. But this isn't the only rainbow reality. In fact, multiple rainbow variations exist, including:   Double Rainbows: Double rainbows happen when light is reflected twice inside raindrops creating a faint, reverse-spectrum image above the primary rainbow.  High-Order Rainbows: Rainbows produced by second, third or fourth reflections of light are called higher-order rainbows. For example, a tertiary rainbow is the third reflection of light within water droplets and is seen when facing the sun. Tertiary rainbows are much broader and fainter than their primary or secondary siblings.  Twinned Rainbows: Unlike a double rainbow, twinned rainbows are two distinct, standard-spectrum rainbows produced when sunlight strikes an air mass containing water droplets with multiple shapes and sizes.  Supernumerary Rainbows: These rainbows are pastel-colored and can be seen under the inner arch of a primary rainbow. They occur when light rays interact across small water droplets of similar size.  Red Rainbows: Next on the list of rainbow variations are these monochrome manifestations. They form at sunrise or sunset when shorter color wavelengths — such as blue, indigo and violet — are scattered in the atmosphere and only red remains visible.  Moonbows: A moonbow is a much fainter primary rainbow produced when sunlight reflected by the moon refracts through water droplets.  Of Signs and Symbols Beyond their visual impact, rainbows also carry cultural impact. In Judeo-Christian culture, for example, rainbows appeared to Noah after the great flood as a sign of hope for better times. There's also the oft-repeated legend of leprechauns guarding pots of gold. As noted by the BBC, these Irish tricksters supposedly grabbed gold from Vikings and will hand it over to treasure hunters who find the rainbow's end. The problem? Perceived location and length vary with difference, making this an impossible task. In Australia, aboriginal groups of the Pennefather River see the rainbow as a multi-colored serpent with the power to protect them from rain, while some Hindu traditions view the rainbow as a tool used by Indra, the god of thunder and war, to shoot arrows of lightning. In Norse mythology, meanwhile, the rainbow (or bifrost) was a burning bridge connecting Midgard and Asgard, the kingdoms of men and gods. And in Japan, land was formed from the ocean of chaos after creators descended from the rainbow bridge of heaven. Seeing Is Believing Environmental interactions in Earth's atmosphere produce incredible results — from terrifying lightning storms and powerful waterspouts to stunning rainbows and beautiful aurora borealis. And while there's a perfectly rational expiation to the question "how are rainbows formed?", empirical evidence doesn't negate emotional response. Instead, it highlights the human condition: the sometimes powerful, sometimes paradoxical balance of stunning beauty and scientific truth. 

Science of the Stunning: How Are Rainbows Formed?

Every movement is perfectly timed; every sound is precise. It's amazing to watch people with a natural affinity for rhythm in their element — often, they're incredible singers or dancers who seem almost superhuman in their ability to stay on beat. But where does it come from? Is it simply sheer grit paired with in-depth musical training? Or is it a biological process at work? Turns out it's a bit of both — and it all starts with auditory memory. So lean in, listen up and let's break down the beat. Dance Dance Evolution As noted by a study from the University of Amsterdam, "A sense of rhythm is a uniquely human characteristic." Study author Fleur Bouwer found that both training and concentration were unnecessary for people to bop with the beat — instead, it appears that we're biologically hardwired to have the music move us. Research into music and rhythm suggests human sociability as its evolutionary antecedent; connection over music helped humans foster stronger social connections. Along with recognizing and responding to rhythm, humans can also organize sounds into songs. By briefly storing notes we've just heard, our brains connect them to the next, and the next, and the next to form a rhythmic chain that can have us unconsciously tapping our feet, nodding our heads or clapping our hands. Audible Explanations But how does it all work? For that, we have to tackle auditory memory — also called echoic memory. A subcategory of sensory memory along with haptic (touch) and iconic (sight), echoic memory captures and holds audio information. When we hear sounds, our auditory nerves capture raw sonic information, convert it to electrical signals and transmit it to our brains. There, sounds make a brief stopover in the primary auditory cortex (PAC) before moving on to short-term memory, where meaning is assigned to the sounds we've just heard. These could be conversations, music or auditory information from the environment that's potentially relevant, such as the sound of a car approaching or someone calling your name. According to the "Handbook of Neurologic Music Therapy," auditory memory lasts between 2 and 4 seconds to give your brain time to process the information. This is longer than iconic memory, which typically lasts for 1000 milliseconds because "most salient visual information continues to be present for repeated scanning, whereas auditory information —due to its temporal waveform nature can never be re-scanned unless it is actually repeated." In other words, since your brain probably won't a get second chance to hear the exact same sound, more time is afforded to process and understand auditory input before it moves out of your short-term memory. Listen and Learn If we're predisposed to rock with the rhythm, why do some people struggle to stay sonically aligned? Most of us have met someone (or are that someone) who seems to dance to the beat of their own drum when it comes to keeping pace. A study from McGill University examined the phenomenon — known as "beat deafness" — to better understand potential causes. The study looked at 32 people and their ability to keep the beat with a metronome by tapping their fingers. For most people, even a 5% change in metronome speed was noticeable, causing them to speed up or slow down their tapping to match. While the process wasn't instantaneous — participants would overshoot or undershoot before settling in close to the beat — it was generally reliable. Except for those with beat deafness. While these participants were able to detect a shift in tempo, they were unable to match it. If they sped up or slowed down, they stayed there and weren't able to settle in on the correct rhythm. The cause? Analysis suggested a biological root cause driven by internal oscillators. For most people, these oscillators make it possible to automatically match up with beats in a song with physical processes, such as tapping their fingers, clapping or walking. For individuals with beat deafness, meanwhile, these oscillators aren't working as intended. The McGill study found that in one case, the individual's auditor oscillator ran at a unique frequency compared to others in the control group, making it challenging to find the beat. In another, the oscillator lacked what researchers called a "dampen" function, making it impossible to settle in and find the beat of the music. Worth noting? The McGill work found that true beat deafness is extremely rare. In the study, just two people were identified as having true beat deafness. While some of the control group weren't music masters, they were able to stay largely on tempo, even if it took some time. Feel the Beat Bottom line? While musical training and hard work can help humans better match auditory rhythms, the underlying process of staying on beat is largely biological. This starts with auditory memory: Raw information is converted into meaningful sound by our short-term memory over a span of 2 to 4 seconds. If repeated sound exposures suggest a beat, internal oscillators help us "settle in" and find a tempo that matches. If these oscillators are out of alignment, however, the result can be a recognition of rhythm without the ability to keep pace. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Auditory Memory: And the Beat Goes On

On December 21, 2020, sky watchers were treated to a solar spectacle: the great conjunction. Created by the close alignment of Jupiter and Saturn along their respective orbital paths, the conjunction created a super-bright "star" that was visible anywhere on Earth. But not everyone enjoys this planetary light show — some see the great conjunction as a harbinger of curses or apocalyptic omens. Is this just creative conjecture? Or are there concerning coincidences that lend credence to the notion of a cosmic curse condition? Time for some solar system mystery-solving to see if this is truth, fiction or something in between. What Is the Great Conjunction? Conjunctions occur whenever two astronomical objects — including stars, planets, moons or asteroids — appear close together or overlapping in the sky as seen from Earth. This happens when they have the same ecliptic longitude, also called right ascension, which seemingly puts them in the same "spot" in the sky. In fact, these objects are still usually millions of miles from each other, but from the perspective of observers on Earth, they appear in close proximity. Planetary conjunctions occur regularly, with the trio of Mercury, Mars and Venus accounting for the bulk of these observable overlaps, either with each other or with their more far-flung solar system siblings. The rarest of all conjunctions occurs when Jupiter "catches" Saturn along its orbital path. These "great conjunctions" occur once every 20 years, but not every great conjunction is so great for those on Earth. In some cases, the planets are close together but not so close that they form a single point of light. In others, the bulk of the conjunction occurs during the day or isn't visible in certain parts of the world. It's been 400 years since Jupiter and Saturn appeared this close to each other, and before 2020, the last time the planets were both less than a 10th of a degree apart in the sky and widely visible at night was March 4, 1226. Creating the Ideal Conditions for a Cosmic Curse While cosmic phenomena like the Jupiter and Saturn conjunction make for spectacular viewing, they also create the conditions for speculation around more nonscientific happenings. In much the same way solar and lunar eclipses were often thought to be harbingers of change or doom, so too are great conjunctions sometimes considered to be explanations for real-world events. Consider Tecumseh's curse. Legend has it that after Shawnee brothers Tecumseh and Tenskwatawa were defeated in the Battle of Tippecanoe and Tecumseh was killed, Tenskwatawa placed a curse on then-Gov. William Henry Harrison, who went on to become president in 1840. During his inaugural speech, Harrison caught pneumonia and died a month later. Tecumseh's curse — as it came to be known — was said to be responsible for Harrison's fate and was blamed for the deaths of other presidents elected in years ending in zero. From Abraham Lincoln to Warren Harding, Franklin Roosevelt, and John Kennedy, the "curse" held until Ronald Reagan (elected in 1980) survived a 1981 assassination attempt. The common denominator? Each of the election years ending in zero included the great conjunction, leading some to conclude that the planetary alignment of Jupiter (the Roman king of the gods) and Saturn (his father) was responsible for the death of these American leaders. If You Don't Succeed Tri, Tri and Trigon Again Tecumseh's curse wasn't the first time the Jupiter and Saturn conjunction was tapped as a source of strife. According to University of Rochester historian Laura Ackerman Smoller, medieval and Renaissance-age Europeans often connected this celestial event to apocalyptic prophecies. In part, this was because Jupiter and Saturn were the slowest moving and most distant planets yet discovered and the 20-year conjunction cycle made it easy to line up prophetic prediction with observable cosmic events. Zodiac-based astrology also played a role in amping up the effects of these conjunctions. With the 12 zodiac signs divided into four "trigons" of three fire signs, three water signs, three earth signs and, three air signs, conjunctions inevitably aligned with the zodiac map to appear within one trigon repeatedly over three consecutive planetary meetups. After 12 conjunctions — or around 240 years — the conjunction moved into a new trigon, in turn heralding change. Every 960 years, the "greatest conjunction" occurred, which saw the pattern return to its beginning. Supposedly, these large trigonal shifts were tied to events such as the birth of religious leaders or the onset of natural disasters. In practice, the exact dates of these events were often adjusted to better fit conjunction patterns and line up with predictions. Let's Get Together Bottom line? Stay healthy if you're hoping to see the next big great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 2080. And if you're concerned that the 2040 conjunction will bring bad luck, take solace in the fact that the two giants won't appear to be quite so close — and remember that planetary pairings tend to pique the human penchant for pattern predilection. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

The Great Conjunction Curse: Creative Conjecture or Concerning Coincidence?

Microbes (also called microorganisms) are not only all around us — they are also inside us. Vast colonies of microorganisms inhabit our digestive system and other tissues, where their activity is vital to our life and health. Though invisible to the naked eye, and never even imagined until the microscope revealed them, microorganisms are not only ubiquitous but often easily cultivated. As ScienceAlert explains, wipe down practically any surface, dab the wipe in a Petri dish, keep the Petri dish warm and cozy for a few days, and you will cultivate colonies of microorganisms to show off to your friends with a handy microscope. The ease of finding and cultivating microorganisms is good news for microbiologists: They have no shortage of microbes to study. They've also been able to apply tools such as genomics to examine the genetic material of microorganisms, sequencing their DNA in the same way as geneticists who study the human genome or those of other plants and animals. Examining in the Wild There is a hitch: Not all microorganisms thrive equally well in the artificial environment of a Petri dish. Thus, the gathering process outlined above, even in sophisticated versions, does not give us a cross section of microbes but only those that thrive in a lab. As a result, according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), traditional methods of microorganism cultivation and study tend to give us "laboratory knowledge" of these microscopic creatures. Even in our microscopes, we see them only in highly artificial conditions, not living and acting within their natural ecosystem. This is a serious limitation, rather like trying to understand the behavior and ecology of tigers, if the only tigers you could study were in a zoo. When Genomics Goes Meta To get around this limitation, microbiologists have devised an approach called metagenomics, which examines the gene sequences not of individual specimens but of entire ecological communities. And, per ScienceAlert, this technique has begun to yield spectacular results — most recently the discovery of 12,000 species of microbes that had never been observed in a lab. Such a large-scale discovery was possible because more than ten thousand metagenomes, or group samples, were collected from all parts of the world, across land and sea, providing researchers with an unmatched range and variety of ecosystems. According to the National Human Genome Research Institute, the term "metagenomics" combines "genomics," a.k.a. the study of gene sequencing and effects, with "meta", which denotes multiplicity. (In various contexts it can also mean "more," "beyond," or "transcending.") Separately, the NCBI notes that metagenomics is "both a set of research techniques, comprising many related approaches and methods, and a research field" — the branch of microbiology that uses those techniques to microbe ecosystems rather than only at individual microorganisms. Putting a Jigsaw Puzzle Through a Blender All of this has its own challenges. As Jacinta Bowler of ScienceAlert rather vividly puts it, the process "sounds like trying to reassemble a jigsaw puzzle that's been put through the blender." But this is not the first time that scientists have confronted similar problems. From dinosaurs to our own hominid ancestors, animal species have been reconstructed from scattered bone fragments. Similar achievements abound across scientific disciplines. What scientists in all field do when confronted with a mass of scattered bits of evidence is look for patterns and use them to group the finds. In metagenomics, this pattern-matching process is known as "binning." Metagenomics is in the process of transforming microbiology, which through the 20th century worked primarily with cultured microorganisms. Only gradually did microbiologists fully grasp the degree to which the natural environment is dominated by microbes never found in the lab. A review from the American Society for Microbiology describes this transformation as a "culture divide" between studying "wild" versus culture-grown microbes. But in the big picture this "culture divide" reflects not just the development of new technologies but also a growing understanding that living organisms and systems can only be understood in an ecological context shaped by their interactions with one another. 

A World of Microbes Revealed by Metagenomics

NASA is officially in the search for UFOs. In June, the government organization announced that it would provide scientific context to the Pentagon's ongoing UFO investigations.It's a controversial field, to say the least. Last year, the Director of National Intelligence issued a UFO report on 140+ unexplained object sightings. But NASA is clear that they do not believe these UFOs are of alien origin, so why are they launching this investigation? Here's the deal behind what's happening.NASA Hasn't Always Thought Fondly of Searching for UFOsNASA has a long history with UFOs. The term dates back to the 1950s — even the very first astronauts reported seeing unidentified objects during their flights. Apollo 16 astronauts captured a UFO in footage, and it remained a decades-long mystery. But in 2004, NASA determined that the object in question was actually a floodlight attached to the spacecraft.One of NASA's core missions is to explore the unknown, and the agency has sent out multiple spacecraft to explicitly search for signs of present and past alien life. The Voyager spacecraft even harbored messages for alien civilizations. But NASA has always declined to engage with the conversation around UFOs.Now, that's changed. NASA is assembling a team to study "unidentified aerial phenomena" (UAPs) headed by David Spergel, a respected astrophysicist. They'll be building on the work of other governmental agencies, such as the Pentagon, but NASA is working on this project independently.Other Agencies Have Already Begun Studying UFOsNASA certainly isn't the first official organization to commission a study on UFOs. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, located within the Pentagon, released a UFO report in 2021. That report makes clear that 143 of 144 UAP sightings are unexplained. This report was followed by a congressional hearing on UFOs in May 2022.But the study of UFOs within the U.S. government goes back much further than this. While NASA is only entering the fray now, Project Blue Book was a secret investigation by the U.S. Air Force into UAPs that took place from 1947 to 1969 (that supposedly included information on the Roswell incident of 1947). The report was later declassified, and of a total of 12,618 UAP sightings during the investigation period, 701 still do not have explanations.Research on UAPs, especially within the military, continues to the present day. In 2020, the Department of Defense established the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force (UAPTF), which is located within the Department of the Navy. The chief interest of UAPTF is cataloging unidentified objects and determining whether they might pose a threat to national security. This has been the primary driver of virtually all search for UFOs within the US government — until now.NASA Brings a Scientific Perspective to the Search for UFOsNASA has made one thing clear: The organization does not believe that UAPs are of extraterrestrial origin. But that doesn't mean that they aren't worth studying, which is why the agency is building this team. The aim here is to gather as much data as possible on these phenomena in order to improve UAP observations going forward."Given the paucity of observations, our first task is simply to gather the most robust set of data that we can," said David Spergel, the committee president, in a NASA release. "We will be identifying what data — from civilians, government, non-profits, companies — exists, what else we should try to collect, and how to best analyze it."The results of this study will be available to the general public, unlike the Pentagon's research. Anyone will be able to see what NASA finds in its search for UFOs.Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

NASA Is Joining the Search for UFOs - But Not Because They Believe Aliens are the Cause

The Black Death, a pandemic that swept Europe and Asia in 1346 to 1353, killed much of the population, according to History Today. Outbreaks continued to occur every few generations in Europe, the Middle East, Northern Africa and Asia for the next 500 years.
Despite its huge impact on human history, exactly what caused the Black Death — the original source of the infectious Yersinia pestis bacteria — has been unclear. A recent study published in Nature used ancient DNA to pinpoint the source of the Black Death, offering insights that could help mitigate current and future pandemics, including COVID-19.
A Look Back at the Plague
The plague can be transmitted through airborne particles and the bite of infected fleas, which feed on rats that have long been blamed as the source of the Black Death. The plague bacteria first attack the lymphatic system, causing painful swelling of the lymph nodes in the groin, armpits or neck. This stage is called bubonic plague because of the swollen buboes that ooze pus and bleed.
The infection goes on to cause fever, chills, vomiting, diarrhea and agonizing pain. Without antibiotic treatment, about 60% of patients die, as explained by Frontiers in Microbiology. The bacteria can spread to the lungs and become highly infectious pneumonic plague, which has a mortality rate of 90–95%. It can also spread to the blood and become septicemic plague, which is nearly 100% lethal.
The History of the Black Death
The known history of the Black Death in Europe starts in Crimea, which is a peninsula on the Black Sea. Ships could sail from the Black Sea through Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey) and into the Mediterranean Sea to access much of Europe, Northern Africa and the Middle East.
In October 1347, some trade ships from Crimea docked in Sicily. Many of the sailors on board were already dead, and the others were covered in the swollen buboes of bubonic plague, according to HISTORY. The ships were turned away, but the damage was done. The Black Death had entered Europe and would spread by land and by ship, carried by rats and their fleas.
Before the plague arrived in Sicily in 1347, there were stories of a "Great Pestilence" that was ravaging China, India, Persia, Syria and Egypt. The historical records here are less clear, so the origins of the Black Death remained a mystery for 675 years.
Tracing the Source
As reported in Nature, an international team of historians, archaeologists and geneticists headed to Central Asia. This is where Pakistan, Afghanistan and other countries reside north of India, west of China and south of Russia. In present-day Kyrgyzstan, there are two cemeteries that had an unusually large number of burials in 1338 and 1339 and tombstones indicating that the cause of death was "pestilence."
Could this area have been the source of the Black Death that decimated Europe from 1346 to 1353? By sequencing ancient DNA from these grave sites, the research team was able to confirm the presence of plague. Furthermore, they were able to obtain the complete DNA sequence of the plague bacteria responsible for those deaths and compare it to other DNA sequences for Y. pestis.
The previously identified DNA sequences fall into four major groups, which are the result of a "Big Bang" mutation event associated with the start of the Black Death. The ancient DNA sequence fit perfectly at the base of the plague family tree. These results provide good evidence that the source of the Black Death was in Central Asia.
Plague Reservoirs Are Keeping the Bacteria Alive
Plague is not primarily a disease of humans and would die out if there were only human hosts. However, plague bacteria survive within wild rodent populations around the world in so-called plague reservoirs. Therefore, the "pestilence" noted on ancient tombstones in present-day Kyrgyzstan must have come from a plague reservoir if it was truly what caused the Black Death. Indeed, researchers found that the ancient plague DNA sequence closely matches the sequence of Y. pestis found recently in nearby wild rodent populations.
The presence of animal reservoirs makes it nearly impossible to completely irradiate plague. According to the World Health Organization, there are still cases of plague every year, mostly in Africa during the epidemic season. Luckily, antibiotics now provide an effective treatment.
The Death Tolls of 3 Major Pandemics
In Europe from 1347 to 1352, the Black Death killed an estimated 25–30 million people out of a population of 80 million, according to World History. That's around 30–40% of the European population. It's estimated that the Black Death was responsible for an additional 25 million deaths in Asia and North Africa, as explained in National Geographic.
For comparison, the 1918 flu pandemic claimed an estimated 17.4 million lives (.95% of the worldwide population at the time), according to the most recent (2018) estimates by Spreeuwenberg et al. as reported by Our World in Data.
As of February 2023, COVID-19 has caused more than 6.5 million deaths in a global population of 8 billion people (0.23% of the global population), according to the World Health Organization. This number is based on 7.5 million deaths officially attributed to COVID-19 and an estimate of unreported deaths.
Lessons for COVID-19 and Future Pandemics
Just as plague reservoirs allow plague to return to healthy populations, viral reservoirs are of grave concern for COVID-19. The virus that causes COVID-19 can infect a variety of animals, including bats, white-tailed deer, farmed mink and domestic cats and dogs.
As explained in Nature, viral reservoirs could be the source of new variants of COVID-19, such as the highly infectious Omicron variant. The Omicron variant has an astonishing 50 mutations compared to the original virus that emerged from Wuhan, China. What is truly remarkable is that these 50 mutations were not detected gradually — despite sequencing millions of COVID-19 samples — but showed up in the tested population all at once. A leading theory is that Omicron evolved in an animal reservoir, such as rats, and was then transmitted to humans.
Experts agree that the next pandemic is inevitable and that the only question is when. As such, it would be wise to gain a better understanding of the source of infectious diseases today so we can better protect against them tomorrow.
 
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Ancient DNA Reveals What Caused the Black Death

Today, more than 6 million people in the U.S. are living with Alzheimer's disease, the most common type of dementia. Unlike many diseases that can be spotted early enough to start meaningful treatment, a diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease typically comes years after it has advanced.
However, hope is building that recent gains in research could someday help detect Alzheimer's disease early. Recent studies using blood and urine tests, imaging of the brain and even an infrared sensor all highlight the many efforts aimed at making an incurable disease curable. If successful, these diagnostic tools could let people potentially benefit from effective treatments before the disease has progressed too far.
Let's take a look at how Alzheimer's disease works and the promising research and testing being developed today that will give us hope for tomorrow.
Alzheimer's Disease Doesn't Immediately Show
Mild memory loss is usually the first noticeable symptom of Alzheimer's disease. As the condition worsens, people often lose the ability to communicate and properly function. Scientists don't know exactly what causes the disease, but as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes, age and genetics play a role, while education, environment, diet and other diseases might also be involved.
For years, the disease has been diagnosed through mental status and neurophysiological tests, as well as laboratory analyses and brain imaging, as the Mayo Clinic explains. But because it often takes months or even years of memory issues and other behavior to form a discernible pattern for family members or friends to notice, a clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease usually comes once the condition has progressed.
Yet, scientists no longer view Alzheimer's disease as an end-of-life condition and are focusing on how its triggers influence the brain, causes that the National Institute on Aging explains in detail. The researchers' focus includes determining how the natural amyloid-beta protein creates plaques that disrupt cell function, seeing how the tau protein collects inside neurons and studying the role of chronic inflammation, vascular problems and diminishing neuronal connections.
Discovering New Ways to Detect Alzheimer's Disease
These areas of research are behind several possible new ways to detect Alzheimer's disease early. Here are a few promising methods that are currently in development:
A Blood Test for Alzheimer's Disease
University of Washington researchers devised a laboratory test that can detect the levels of amyloid-beta protein in people early on. Their test spotted the protein not only in the blood of people with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and moderate-to-severe Alzheimer's but also in those who later developed MCI, according to Medical News Today.
Finding a Key Molecule in Urine
Another research team claimed to be the first to recognize a molecule in urine that can reveal early-stage Alzheimer's disease. Their test analyzed formic acid, a urinary biomarker. The researchers believe this easy test could lead to a widespread clinical push to frequently screen people's urine to find Alzheimer's disease early, as WalesOnline reported.
PET Scans as a Preventative Tool
Scientists at Lund University in Sweden studied the brains of 1,325 people who didn't have signs of cognitive impairment using the imaging test known as positron emission tomography (PET). They discovered the amyloid-beta and tau proteins in some people and found they were significantly more at risk of developing Alzheimer's disease compared to test participants who experienced very little to no cognitive decline years later, according to Medical News Today.
One of the lead researchers believes their findings demonstrate that an Alzheimer's disease diagnosis can be based on biology and what is seen in the brain. "If we can diagnose before cognitive challenges appear, we may eventually be able to use [a] drug to slow down the disease at a very early stage."
Detecting a Protein Event Early
In 2022, researchers at Ruhr-University Bochum in Germany created an advanced blood test for Alzheimer's disease that identified misfolded amyloid-beta biomarkers in plasma. The test isn't an ordinary blood draw — instead, they used an immuno-infrared sensor.
As ScienceDaily reports, their discovery means they might be able to see signs of Alzheimer's disease in blood up to 17 years before clinical symptoms appear.
Hope for a Brighter Future
These and many other studies are chasing a goal that had long seemed too distant to reach: early and effective diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease that can align with the many treatment therapies being developed today. While still not near enough, that distance finally doesn't seem as far.
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Taking Steps Toward Improving the Diagnosis of Alzheimer&#8217;s Disease

Scientists know from the study of tree rings, layers of ice in glaciers, ocean sediments, coral reefs and sedimentary rocks that climate change has been occurring on Earth on a regular basis for at least the last 5 or 6 million years — without any help from humanity.
Over the last million years, for example, the surface temperature of Earth has risen and fallen by approximately 3 to 8 degrees Celsius in ice-age cycles roughly every 100,000 years. As recently as 20,000 years ago, the sea level was at least 120 meters lower than today because so much water was frozen in ice sheets.
As explained by the Australian Academy of Science, these global changes can be attributed to slight wobbles in Earth's orbit that have altered when and where sunlight falls on our planet's surface, variations in the sun's output of solar energy and even volcanic eruptions that have generated billions of sunlight-reflecting particles, effectively cooling the climate.
Climate Change as an Agent of Natural Selection
In parallel with these climatic gyrations, the human race has also been evolving. According to the Smithsonian's Human Origins Program, the emergence and survival of today's Homo sapiens species — an evolution that included the genera Ardipithecus, Australopithecus afarensis, Homo habilis, Homo erectus and Homo neanderthalensis — supports the theory that human adaptations have occurred largely in response to environmental instability and that individuals who survived were those best able to adapt to these changing environmental conditions.
The adaptations most central to this human evolution include the ability to walk upright, the capacity to make tools, the enlargement of the brain, the emergence of complex mental and social behavior, and dependence on technology to alter surroundings.
How Did Climate Change Affect Early Humans?
Researchers have observed that most organisms on the planet live in habitats that experience moderate daily or seasonal variations in temperature, light and precipitation. Over time, these organisms typically develop characteristics and behaviors well suited to living and surviving in this preferred habitat. If the cyclical variations become too extreme, however, an organism will either have to move its habitat or adapt to the new habitat through genetic change. Otherwise, it will go extinct.
Humans have proven to be extremely adaptable to changes in environmental conditions and habitat. Over the last 5 million years, for example, large-scale shifts in temperature and precipitation have turned grasslands and shrublands into woodlands and forests and changed cold climates into warm ones. Tectonic events have also altered the landscape, creating changes in rainfall patterns or in the size or location of lakes and rivers.
These changes forced hominins — any of the aforementioned bipedal species closely related to humans — to rethink the rules of engagement for securing food, clothing and shelter in their now-altered habitat.
Climate Instability Motivates Survival Skills
Human Origins Program Researcher Rick Potts has developed an idea called variability selection that hypothesizes that key events in human evolution were shaped not by habitat alone — some people think, for example, that walking upright evolved from the need to travel long distances in drier climates — but rather by environmental instability. Human ancestors may have responded to increased variability in their environment and habitat by developing coping mechanisms or characteristics that enabled them to survive.
Potts has examined this theory in the context of fossil records of early humans. He's found that ancient hominins lived in a variety of habitats on multiple continents. The genus Ardipithecus ramidus, for instance, has been found in wooded habitats, while Australopithecus anamensis, the notional beginning of upright-walking hominins, have been found in open savannas with low trees and shrubs adjacent to grasslands and forests.
A further indication of early humans' ability to tolerate different environments was the dispersal of the genus Homo erectus beyond Africa into Asia. Hominins have been found in geographically and environmentally diverse habitats in sites ranging from Hadar in Ethiopia and Turkana in Kenya to Dmanisi in the Republic of Georgia, Java and the Nihewan Basin in China. In these locations, the groups encountered a variety of plants, animals and foods in diverse climatic conditions, including harsh monsoonal rains and extreme aridity.
How Did Early Humans Adapt to Their Environment?
The genus Australopithecus anamensis (aka "Lucy") features a skeleton with a human-like hip bone, knee joints, long ape-like arms, longer grasping fingers than humans and flexible feet for walking or climbing. This configuration gave it the ability to move around in diverse habitats, alternating as needed between walking and tree climbing.
The first known stone tools, which date to about 3.3 million years ago, indicate hominins' ability to interact with and adjust to their environment. The earliest tools, which featured stone-on-stone pounding and crushing, enabled hominins to access a wider variety of foods than they could eat by simply using their teeth. This diversity of stone tools allowed them to include both animal meat and plants in their diets. Paleoanthropologists have found evidence that early humans could carry these tools from habitat to habitat as the climate changed.
But the evolution of tools (and humans) didn't stop there. Beginning about 400,000 years ago, hominins began developing smaller, more diverse tools that allowed them to access food sources in new and effective ways. By creating sharper-edged rocks and attaching them to spears or arrows, for example, hominins were able to create projectile-type weapons, which allowed them to spear fish and hunt prey from a distance.
Adding Brains to the Outfit
Another key adaptation of Homo sapiens, according to the Human Origins Program team, has been encephalization — the evolutionary enlargement of the brain relative to body size. Over the first 4 million years of human evolution, this trend was modest at best. But over the last 800,000 years, during the periods of greatest climatic fluctuations, encephalization became much more pronounced.
A larger brain allows humans to be more thoughtful about how they manage their lives. For example, it allows them to process and store information, plan ahead and solve more abstract problems. It can also help them generate more versatile solutions to new and diverse survival challenges.
Closely related to these problem-solving skills were increasingly sophisticated social interactions among groups of early humans. They might have used these social alliances for various tasks, such as trading resources during prosperous times or sharing them to mitigate the effects of periodic famines or droughts.
Surviving by Diversifying
Of course, not all hominins survived. Some fell victim to their inability to adapt to significant and persistent climate changes. Homo neanderthalensis, for example, endured dramatic shifts in climate between glacial and interglacial conditions, including rapid swings between cold and warm climates. Their approach to dealing with this environmental instability, however, proved ineffective.
While modern humans have developed more specialized tools to satisfy their diverse dietary needs, Neanderthals' tool sets (and, by extension, their diets) appear to be far more limited. While humans were busy using their growing brains to develop social networks and exchange goods with other groups over long distances, Neanderthals maintained more limited connections with outside groups. Eventually, modern humans were able to expand their presence to include Europe, Asia, Australia and the Americas, while Neanderthals went extinct.
How Will Future Climate Change Affect Human Evolution?
Today, humans are dealing increasingly with the very real effects of climate change, from rising sea levels, more frequent wildfires and more severe storms to periods of uncharacteristically hot and cold weather. In many ways, they're dealing with the same challenges faced by their hominin ancestors: radically altered landscapes, unpredictable environmental conditions and ways of life that may no longer even exist.
Against this backdrop, our brave new world will continue to test how flexible and adaptable the human species truly is and perhaps guide us toward the beginnings of an inevitable evolution to Homo futuris.
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Uncovering the Links Between Climate Change and Human Evolution

In 1961, meteorologist Edward Lorenz, experimenting with computer simulations for weather prediction, made a slight tweak to one of the input variables for a simulation run. As MIT Technology Review recounts, he rounded off a value of 0.506127 to 0.506, restarted the program and stepped out to get a cup of coffee while the simulation ran. When he got back and checked the results, he was startled to find that this tiny change to one input parameter had not just modified the resulting simulated weather, but completely transformed it. His discovery, later dubbed the butterfly effect theory after the nearly imperceptible results of a butterfly flapping its wings, would go on — in the best butterfly-effect manner — to completely transform scientists' understanding of nature by giving rise to chaos theory.  So, what is the butterfly effect exactly? What Is the Butterfly Effect? In the 1960s, scientists' conceptions of how nature worked were still deeply shaped by Sir Isaac Newton's conception of an orderly, essentially predictable universe. As American Scientist reports, the philosopher Pierre-Simon Laplace had argued in the 18th century that if we knew the laws of nature and made sufficiently precise observations, "nothing would be uncertain and the future, as the past, would be present to [our] eyes." Lorenz was not initially concerned with the broad philosophical implications of his unexpected simulation result. For him, a little unpredictability in weather simulation was good news. In previous tests, as MIT Technology Review explains, his simulated weather was too predictable, tending to repeat the same patterns over and over. Real weather, as we know, is full of surprises. To be useful, weather predictions needed to predict the unexpected rain showers, not just the ones obviously coming. In fact, Lorenz's discovery would build the foundation for modern computer weather simulations, which commonly employ an "ensemble" of simulation runs, with slightly varying input conditions, to test the range of likely weather possibilities. Goodbye Seagulls, Hello Butterflies Meanwhile, news of Lorenz's work gradually spread from meteorologists to the broader scientific community. He had originally described what we now call the butterfly effect as "a seagull causing a storm." In 1972, he gave a presentation to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, entitled "Predictability: Does the Flap of a Butterfly's Wings in Brazil Set Off a Tornado in Texas?" The change from seagulls to butterflies was suggested by another meteorologist, Philip Merilees. The butterfly effect theory now had a name that perhaps helped it capture the imaginations of both scientists and the public: What could seem more delicate and easy to miss than the flap of a butterfly's wing? Butterflies of Doom?  But there may have been more to butterflies than their image of delicacy. As Gizmodo notes, in 1952, nearly a decade before Lorenz's surprising computer run, science fiction writer Ray Bradbury published a time travel story called "A Sound of Thunder." In the story, a traveler into the dinosaur-era past carelessly steps off a marked trail and crushes a butterfly. When the characters return to the present day, the world has been dreadfully altered by the cascading effects of that butterfly's death. (No source, alas, explicitly tells us whether the theory's name was inspired by Bradbury's story.) Butterflies of Uncertainty Whatever the source of the name, the TV Tropes website explores how popular culture has taken up the butterfly effect theory with enthusiasm, though (not for the first or last time) the pop culture version of the theory is not always exactly what the scientists had in mind. Thus, there is no way to use this information to trigger a vast result from a minute initial action. Instead, chaos theory, aka the butterfly effect theory, shows why we cannot fully predict the future.

The Butterfly Effect Theory and the Limits of Predictability

Nanotechnology isn't a new concept. As noted by News Medical, human notions of nanoscale technologies have existed for centuries, but over the last few decades rapid technological advancements have empowered nanotech solutions in manufacturing and development. The caveat? Human-centric solutions have been more difficult to deliver. Now, alternative energy sources and antiviral compounds are in development as the evolution of nanotechnology picks up speed. What's next for nanoscale solutions? Viral Victories Viruses are stubborn. While pharmaceuticals exist to block specific viral protein bindings, they're limited. The emergence of drug-resistant viral strains is of critical concern, since these new strains are often more potent and resilient. Because of that, they require larger doses of medication, potentially causing adverse side effects. Some work on anti-viral nanocompounds has already been done, using rigid gold and silver nanoparticles to mimic heparan sulfate (HS) proteoglycans used as binding points for many viral variations. According to Phys.org, new research from the Potsdamn Institute of Biochemistry and Biology and the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, along with work from the Institute of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the Center for Infection Medicine (both of Freie Universitat), has led to the development of flexible antiviral nanotech compounds which "can effectively and permanently bind and shield viruses, thus preventing infections." Initial data shows inhibitory effects of up to 90 percent. Color Conditions Humans have a fascination with color. From fashion to safety to emotional well-being, color impacts the human condition. Sadly, though, traditional colors fade. Here's why: Pigments and dyes block certain wavelengths of light, in turn producing specific colors. But over time — and under exposure to sunlight — these pigments decay and fade. Naturally occurring colors in beetles and butterflies, however, are produced by slit-covered, nanoscale pillars. Varying slit widths produce destructive light interference which in turn creates long-lasting, fade-resistant color, according to Phys.org. As noted by Nanowerk, a team from the University of Hamburg, the ITMO-University in St. Petersberg and the Helmholtz-Center Geesthacht have developed a "photonic glass" that uses 200-nanometer hollow spheres, which "produce a blue color much closer to the perimeter of the chromaticity diagram," solving previous problems with weakly saturated colors produced by homogenously filled sphere solutions. Transistor Transformations Current transistor technology requires substantial power for operation. Another evolution of nanotechnology focuses on the development of all-carbon nanotube transistor radios capable of high-speed transmissions that require just one-thousandth the power of existing solutions. According to Nanotechnology Now, the technology, developed as a joint venture between between Northrop Grumman and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, uses "thousands of perfectly aligned, single-walled carbon nanotubes as a type of semiconductor thin film." Both proof-of-concept and power considerations are important: This is the first radio prototype that leverages carbon nanotubes for all active and vital components, and it could potentially increase battery life seven-fold compared to current transistor technology. Energy Evolution Nano-driven alternative energy sources are also in development. <a target="_blank" class="SWhtmlLink" href="https://www.power-technology.com/news/researchers-create-hydrogen-energy-source-using-nanotechnology/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Power Technology reported that researchers from Manchester Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom are working nanoscale, screen-printed, graphene-like electrodes that are embedded in carbon-based ink. Used in electrolysers, these electrodes separate water into its component parts — hydrogen and oxygen — and store the hydrogen for later use. The big advantage here? Not only are these electrodes environmentally-friendly, they don't require consumer demand to make economic sense. Hydrogen can be captured and stored as a gas with no deterioration or loss, then used on demand in a fuel cell. Potential use cases include remote communities that currently import expensive fossil fuels, and power-intensive military applications. Nano Tech, Big Impact The evolution of nanotechnology is now delivering human-centric value. From flexible antiviral compounds to non-fading colors, low-power transistors and renewable energy sources, thinking small delivers big impact.

Energy Sources and Viral Defenses: The Evolution of Nanotechnology

Quantum mechanics is quantitatively strange, describing probability-based phenomena across a host of atomic processes. This atypical action is typically odd at small scales, but there's an exception: superfluid. This macro-scale manifestation comes with unique properties and massive scientific potential.       The Fundamentals       The concept of superfluidity was first explored by Pyotr Leonidovich Kapitsa, John F. Allen and Don Misener in two 1938 papers. As noted by Nature, the trio discovered that when liquid helium-4 was cooled below its "lambda point" of 2.17 kelvins (K), the typically colorless liquid known as He-I became He-II — a liquid with no friction, no viscosity and the ability to "creep" up the sides of any holding container.       What was going on? The explanation rests with Bose-Einstein condensate, which Scientific American defines as a process "in which individual particles overlap until they behave like one big particle." Under the right conditions fundamental particles known as bosons can "condense" and begin acting in unison rather than exhibiting the typical randomness associated with particulate probabilities. Helium-4 atoms are composite bosons made up of six fermions — two protons, two neutrons and two electrons — and subject to this condensed state under super-cooled conditions.       Worth noting? The absent friction is analogous to superconductivity; as noted by Nobel Prize-winning physics professor Anthony Leggett, "according to our modern understanding, superconductivity is nothing more than superfluidity occurring in an electrically charged system." Just as superfluid liquid can flow seemingly forever without friction, an electric current can do the same in superconductor systems, potentially continuing "for a time much longer than the age of the universe."       Second Sounds and Strange Stars       Frictionless fluidity across a non-viscous volume is only the first of condensed helium's superpowers. Along with the ability to creep upward along any surface and escape through microscopic cracks, this ultra-cold element also displays:         Quantum Critical Velocity: As noted by the New World Encyclopedia, if superfluid is placed in a rotating chamber, it remains perfectly stable until reaching critical angular velocity. It then begins to rotate in quantized vortices — unlike normal liquids, it doesn't rotate uniformly and can only spin at specific rates. If more speed is added, more vortices will form.  Mega Thermal Conductivity: No other substance can currently match He-II's thermal conductivity, which is 1 million times greater than He-1. Why? Second sound. This phenomena occurs when heat moves like a wave — similar to the propagation of sound through air — rather than via diffusion.        Although helium-4 is the most common superfluid, it's possible to coax helium-3 into the same state. New research also suggests that other elements could be super-cooled to create a fermionic condensate with superfluidic properties. With the search for new chemical elements and the so-called "island of stability," there's plenty of room an entire league of super-powered subatomic standouts.       There's also strong evidence that pulsars — rapidly-spinning neutron stars — are made of spinning superfluids surrounded by two crustal layers. Repeated detection of rotational anomalies in these pulsars suggests that some of the superfluid core may occasionally move outward and strike the outer crust, causing a temporary speed increase. Other inner-core superfluid then catches this outlier and reduces rotation to normal values.       Turning Up the Heat       Beyond their unique properties, there is also offer some practical potential.       In chemistry, helium-4 is being used as a quantum solvent for Superfluid Helium Droplet Spectroscopy (SHeDS). Single molecules placed in He-II solvents exhibit their gas-phase characteristics, allowing more precise observation and measurement of molecular properties.       Researchers from Cornell University are also working on a long-held scientific goal: high-temperature superfluidity. The term "high" is relative to the starting state superfluids, many of which hover around 1 K (or -457.87 F). By using an exciton — an electron paired with an electron "hole," which is the absence of an electron where one could exist in atomic lattice, causing a net positive charge — the Cornell-led team was able to raise minimum condensation temperature from just above absolute zero to 100 K, or -279.67 F.       While this is a far cry from room-temperature superfluidity, postdoctoral researcher Zefang Wang notes that "the realization of an exciton condensate at much higher temperature than earlier studies provides an exciting opportunity to explore this quantum phase of matter at significantly less stringent experimental conditions." In practice, more stable quantum states comprised of condensed excitons could be used to create new lighting technologies that are both brighter and more efficient than current LEDs.       Smooth Operator       At super-low temperatures, helium-4 isotopes exhibit unique fluidic properties. Lacking friction and viscosity, these smooth superfluids have changed our understanding of superconductor mechanics, paved the way for improved stellar science and are expanding the potential for room-temperature quantum technologies.    

It's Absurd, It's Insane, It's ... Superfluid!

Rocketing to 300 km above sea level is a pretty great way to get noticed — but for Dr. Sally Ride, having the spotlight was never the goal. Even while actively making history as an astronaut and scientist, Ride continually eschewed efforts angling to praise her above others. In doing so, she redirected the spotlight to something she believed was far more deserving of everyone's attention: gender equity in the sciences. "Just One of the Guys" From the time her star rose as the first American woman in space to her retirement from NASA in 1987, Ride insisted on being treated as "just one of the guys," The Guardian reports. As many astronauts do, within a few years of joining the astronaut core, Dr. Ride became an expert in new areas, including flying jets, parachuting and, in her case, a new field: engineering for the shuttle's robotic arm. This last skill led shuttle commander Bob Crippen to choose Ride to join the June 1983 shuttle launch, according to UC San Diego. To Ride, it didn't make a difference that she had specialized to earn her place, or that she was one of only five women singled out from an applicant pool of 8,000 — or even that she was going to attempt the first deployment and retrieval of a satellite using the robotic arm pallet. On the eve of her much-anticipated 1983 flight on the Challenger Shuttle, she insisted that there was "nothing different" about her flight. Reimagining Leadership In an age when a woman with a PhD in physics was one in a million, Dr. Ride maintained that what she had done and what she was about to do was business as usual. Her insistence that no crew member should be treated differently from any other was publicly perceptible, according to the Guardian. On the occasion of her historic flight into orbit on the Space Shuttle, Ride declined the flowers that were offered to only her rather than to the entire crew of the Challenger. Dr. Ride's second flight was remarkable as well — not only for having the largest shuttle crew that had ever flown (seven members strong) but also for featuring the first female shuttle commander, Dr. Kathryn D. Sullivan, whose spacewalk was also a first by a female-identifying person. Ride's third flight was unfortunately marked by tragedy. As the Guardian notes, when the Challenger exploded shortly after launch in January 1986, Dr. Ride's astronaut role was reassigned. She became a presidential commission investigator into the accident that killed her colleagues, classmates and friends. Dr. Ride took this opportunity to highlight what she felt was important in her August 1987 report to the NASA administration. "Leadership cannot simply be proclaimed — it must be earned," she wrote. Ride then retired from NASA and did just that: earned her way into the leadership of the next generation of space explorers. Spreading a Passion for STEM Dr. Ride spent the next 25 years bringing space down to Earth. To help make space a key topic in science education, Ride authored seven space science books geared toward school-aged children. To help rectify the gender gap in STEM fields, she started Sally Ride Science. To this day, students entering third through 12th grade can enroll in STEM workshops through the Sally Ride Science Junior Academy. Dr. Ride made it possible for children to control satellites. Borrowing the idea from JPL's KidSat, which had flown on shuttle missions, Ride directed the installation of EarthKAM aboard the International Space Station, NASA notes. EarthKAM continues to take and transmit student-requested images. Similarly, GRAIL MoonKAM allows middle-school students to request that specific photographs of the Moon's surface be taken by the lunar-orbiting GRAIL satellites "Ebb" and "Flow."  In addition to providing numerous educational resources, Sally Ride Science (SRS) hosts leadership events for female-identifying people to share ideas and create opportunities. The annual meeting is organized by Ride's longtime partner, Dr. Tam O'Shaughnessy. Leaving Her Mark Since her passing in 2012, Dr. Ride's image has been shared in special ways to commemorate her achievements. Not only has her visage graced a postage stamp, but soon, it will also appear on a special edition of the U.S. quarter, according to SRS. Signs of Dr. Ride's legacy are also apparent in modern social movements that promote authenticity, equality and rights of personhood. The LGBTQ community has a hero in Dr. Ride, whose partner carries on her work. As Dr. O'Shaughnessy explains in a Space.com article, Dr. Ride was someone who lived a life consistent with her personal and professional values, leaving behind a legacy of being openly available as a means to promote inclusivity in the space community. Dr. Sally K. Ride was so much more than the first American woman in space. At 32, she was the youngest American ever to travel to space. Even so, she exuded the genuine humility of someone more interested in what we as a species can do. In keeping with views about leadership and empowering potential, Dr. Ride made space accessible — literally, in the case of Ride EarthKAM and GRAIL MoonKAM — to children all over the world. Through teaching, advocacy and her work as an astronaut, Dr. Ride raised the bar and shattered the glass ceiling while lowering barriers to entry for women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. She created the space in which greatness for people of every gender and orientation becomes more achievable. She reminds us that brilliance is a universal trait — one that she mirrored back to a world full of people she believed to be equally capable, equally important and equally poised to rise to great heights. Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

Ride of a Lifetime: Sally Ride's Adventure Into Space, Science and Advocacy

It starts with subtle changes: food cravings, neck stiffness, frequent urination, feelings of fogginess and even euphoria. Then, you might experience nausea, sensitivity to light and sound, and numbness in parts of your body. Next comes a severe throbbing headache that can last a few hours or days. Finally, the headache subsides, and you have a migraine hangover. Migraine causes are still not fully understood, but scientists are making progress and developing new treatments. According to Discover Magazine, migraines are so debilitating that they are the number one cause of disability in people ages 15 to 49. Current research suggests genetics and environmental factors contribute to this neurological disease. And as researchers continue to learn more about causes, they are exploring new migraine treatments that could provide much-needed relief for an estimated 1 billion people worldwide who experience migraines. A Wide Range of Experiences People who don't suffer from migraines might mistakenly confuse them with severe headaches. However, migraines involve various symptoms and a timeline that can last several days or longer. Generally, migraines include four phases (although everyone does not always experience each phase). Mayo Clinic describes the four stages of a migraine:   Prodrome: In the days leading up to a migraine, people can experience warning signs such as constipation, fluid retention, mood changes, neck stiffness and frequent yawning.  Aura: Some people experience a gradual escalation of sensory and motor symptoms such as vision issues, pins and needles sensations and even difficulty speaking.  Attack: The main event typically involves a pulsing headache and heightened sensitivity to light and sound, often accompanied by nausea and vomiting.  Postdrome: The days after a migraine attack are similar to a hangover, in which people experience a foggy, drained feeling.  Migraine Causes Children and adults can get migraines, although they often start during adolescence and gradually become less frequent and less severe throughout adulthood. Risk factors include genetics, age, sex and hormone changes. A young boy, for example, is less likely to experience migraines than a 30-year-old woman who has a family history of migraine. The American Migraine Foundation reports that migraines affect 1 in 5 women, 1 in 16 men, and 1 in 11 children. But what causes migraines? Scientists used to think the dilation of blood vessels caused migraines. But during the last few decades, researchers have discovered that migraines are more related to the trigeminal nerve, which is part of the nervous system and transmits a variety of sensations from the head, including pain. Discover Magazine explains that in the last 20 years, researchers discovered that the pain comes from neuroinflammation of structures in the brain that sense pain. There are many areas of the brain and several types of neurotransmitters, such as serotonin, which help to regulate pain in your nervous system. Another neurotransmitter called calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP) appears to be a vital part of the migraine puzzle. People with migraines have more CGRP than average. Plus, scientists conducted experiments that revealed elevated levels of CGRP during migraine attacks. Migraine Treatments There is no cure for migraines, but as researchers continue to pinpoint migraine causes, they lead the way for new treatment options. There is now a range of strategies for preventing and treating migraines. Here are a few of the most common treatments:   Learning triggers and making lifestyle changes to avoid them when possible can help. Some migraines appear to be random, but others are related to triggers such as changes in sleep, food or stimuli. Some people keep a consistent routine to avoid triggering migraines. Plus, people use relaxation techniques and head to a dark room to rest when symptoms begin.  Pain relievers and migraine relief medications can help to reduce symptoms of mild migraines and make people more comfortable during an attack.  Medications that were developed for other uses, such as beta-blockers, calcium channel blockers, antidepressants and anticonvulsants can help to prevent migraines.  Triptans, also called serotonin receptor agonists, are a type of medication that can relieve symptoms by blocking pain pathways in the brain and shrinking swollen blood vessels that develop from migraine attacks, according to Healthline.  External neural stimulators, Botox (onabotulinumtoxinA) or hand-held machines that zap various nerves may also help.  Today, there are several new options, such as drugs that tighten the blood vessels in the brain, monoclonal antibodies (laboratory-produced molecules) that specifically target CGRP and drugs that target other receptors. More than 10,000 scientific articles about migraines have been published in the last five years (see: PubMed). This is an active research area that will continue to open pathways for innovative treatments in the future. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Evolving Understanding of Migraine Causes and Treatments

Astronauts not only have the privilege of exploring space, but they look cool doing it. Anyone who has dreamed of leaving Earth has visualized slipping on an astronaut's standard gear of pure white spacesuit, reflective helmet and black boots. But space travel is about more than looking good. It's also about surviving against all odds and successfully completing the mission. That's why astronaut gear is designed to be practical and tough, giving space travelers comfort and a sense of security. It's also why aerospace textiles in general are durable and flexible. These materials shape essential components that can't wither when exposed to the extreme conditions of space travel. They're the backbone of everything from spacesuits and inflatable habitats to antennas and rovers. Just as aerospace technologies constantly evolve, materials for space also keep taking new forms so that astronauts can achieve their goals with ease and confidence. Designing for Comfort and Safety NASA fully recognized the dangers of space travel in 1967 when the three-member crew of Apollo 1 — the first piloted mission of the Apollo program — died in a fire during a launch pad test. The tragedy led to many significant changes to NASA spacecraft and the attire of astronauts, including the introduction of PBI textiles. Non-flammable and stable at high temperatures, PBI found its way into astronaut flight suits, webbing, tethers and other space gear. Success in the stars led earth-bound agencies such as fire departments and the U.S. military to use PBI in gear. Decades later, fire safety is still paramount. With the interior atmosphere of the International Space Station (ISS) closely mirroring Earth, the fibers of astronaut clothing have to char during a fire, instead of melting and dripping into human skin. But NASA also had a problem with cotton — the material most used for astronaut clothing in the past. Cotton lint interfered with the onboard air filters of the ISS, so yarns made of multifilament fibers are now preferred. As NASA itself highlights, textiles are the oldest engineering material and are a source of unique properties that are conducive to space travel: light in weight, flexible and a high strength-to-weight ratio. The best features of textiles can also mesh to create composite structures. NASA, for instance, has a patent on carbon fiber reinforced phenolic composites that offer optimal thermal protection from the high heat of re-entry into Earth's atmosphere. Textiles make missions easier inside and outside the spacecraft. For extravehicular activity — "EVA" in NASA parlance — textiles are behind thermal insulation blankets, inflatable structures and tools such as restraints and tethers. Inside the ship, textiles make up bag and storage containers, a sleep station's cushion and cover, a harness for an exercise treadmill and, of course, clothing. Space Is a Booming Textile Market With several government agencies and private companies racing to again explore the moon, visit Mars for the first time and travel farther into deep space, the market for aerospace textiles is larger than ever, leading to more experiments and more creations. For example, space industry customers of Composite Fabrics of America (CFA) have increased orders for the company's carbon fiber textiles. "Carbon fiber is very strong and durable. It starts as a textile, but when it's encapsulated in a resin and cured, it holds a shape, yet it is very lightweight. That makes it an excellent solution for aerospace use," CFA's executive director of sales told the non-profit Industrial Fabrics Association International (IFAI). Because missions vary, Clark Co., a developer of space suits since NASA's Gemini program, takes different approaches to the design of materials for space. To keep costs low, it takes advantage of CAD modeling and uses prototyping before manufacturing. "Inside the suit, you are essentially in your own personal spacecraft," a company design manager explained to IFAI. "It needs to be airtight yet selectively permeable to allow water vapor to escapeâ€¦We use low-elongation fabrics that will hold their shape while allowing people to move. You have to design the suit from the inside and understand what the user is feeling. If the suit isn't optimally sized or is designed improperly, it can be pretty painful when it is pressurized." Mars Needs Origami and Metals Because of the flexibility, durability and adaptability of textiles, all sorts of applications are possible in space. And as seen with Clark Co., it helps that modern technology allows textile designers to be creative before spending large sums of money on manufacturing. For instance, a collaboration between research organizations and a textile studio — known as MoonMars — is integrating origami structures and digital weaving to create inflatable human habitats and research stations on the moon and Mars. "Origami structures made of textiles can be unfolded into a myriad of different shapes," the head of MoonMars said. "They are lightweight. They can be easily deployed and re-used in different configurations and sizes for flexible spatial usage." NASA, meanwhile, invented technology that uses 3D weaving techniques to create textiles that have a specific use in space, increasing the chances the materials will thrive because they are specific to a mission. But a focus on specificity hasn't stopped NASA from thinking outside the box. A NASA systems engineer whose mother was a fashion designer is creating woven metal fabrics to potentially be used for large antennas, meteorite shields and other uses in space. Think about it, the catwalk is influencing a spacewalk.

Space Travel Calls for Flexible and Protective Aerospace Textiles

There's a lot of discussion about immunity and protecting ourselves from infectious diseases these days, and with good reason — the modern marvel of vaccination has the ability to protect not just the vaccinated but also those who cannot receive an immunizing jab. Learning about disease transmission through a population can help you understand not only what herd immunity is but also how herd immunity works to provide considerable benefits to a population that has achieved this state. It's All In The Herd Yes, it is quite literally all in the herd, though as Yale Medicine points out, community immunity might be a better term to use when explaining what herd immunity is. According to The Lancet, the phrase "herd immunity" was first used by American livestock veterinarians who were seeing epidemics of spontaneous miscarriage among cattle and sheep in the early 1900s. This disease, which was called "contagious abortion," was the leading health threat to herds at the time and caused loss of productivity and economic hardship for farmers throughout the United States, who had to destroy their animals to prevent the disease from spreading. However, through observation, livestock veterinarians started to notice that instead of culling the herd, it was much better to build protection by naturally acquired infection. Animals that went through a miscarriage storm were ultimately protected. This led Adolph Eichhorn, writing for the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association in 1918, to liken the disease to a fire, noting that restricting new fuel would stem the spread. Accordingly, it was found that herd immunity could be achieved by avoiding addition of new cattle, as those that had already experienced the disease were immune. What Is Herd Immunity? Herd immunity is reached when a population enjoys some degree of protection from contagious disease due to a significant portion of the population developing immunity. As The Mayo Clinic describes, when this point is reached, spread declines throughout the population, conferring community protection on those who cannot gain immunity themselves. Individuals can gain immunity from contagious disease either by catching and recovering from an infection, or through effective vaccination. Either method can give antibody protection from future infection, thereby reducing the number of individuals who would be susceptible to the disease. Disease spread then slows, which means the infection is less prevalent in the community and at-risk individuals are less likely to be exposed. This is extremely important to individuals who cannot receive vaccination, or for whom natural disease could be severely damaging or fatal. How Does Herd Immunity Work? For contagious disease to spread effectively through a population, a certain amount of individuals needs to be infected and carry the virus as an infected reservoir. In other words, there needs to be enough of the virus present that other individuals can catch it. This depends somewhat on the R0 value of the disease. Healthline describes this mathematical construct, pronounced "R naught," as a measure of the infectivity of a disease. For example, an R18 means that in a population that is completely open to infection and has no inbuilt immunity, one infected individual could pass the disease to 18 others. With infection, the disease vector multiplies and increases its spread, which may continue if immunity does not develop. Herd immunity occurs when the proportion of individuals who are immune to the disease passes the threshold level required to maintain infection within the population. For instance, establishing herd immunity to measles, which has an extremely high R0 value, requires around 95% population immunity, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Another example is Polio, which requires 80% immunity to "break the chain of transmission." What Creates Herd Immunity? Herd immunity comes either from vaccination programs or recovery from the disease itself. Global News notes that an effective vaccination program not only controlled polio in the mid-twentieth century but also caused the extinction of the virus's wild types 2 and 3 globally. Measles is also held in check by strong vaccination programs, though when rates fall, outbreaks can occur. Smallpox is another vaccine success story. USA Today notes that vaccination has eradicated the disease globally, and the WHO declared it extinct in May 1980, with an 80% threshold protection achieved after the disease had caused some 300 million deaths at the beginning of the last century. The end result of herd immunity is community protection, where people who can be vaccinated help to protect those who cannot. In the cases of smallpox and polio, a philosophy of "think global; act local" was adopted, and to good effect. We should look to these successful examples of herd immunity development as we aim to address issues of viral infection in our own time. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

What Is Herd Immunity, and How Does It work?

What is the universe made of?
Human understanding of the universe — how it works, its vastness and what it's made of — has changed and grown, especially after humans began to apply mathematics, writing and new investigative principles. In the few hundred years since people began systematically investigating the nature of things, scientific principles and tools have been refined, and many of the mysteries of the universe have been revealed.
For example, scientists know that the universe is everything: all the matter and energy that space contains, even time itself. The universe comprises all the stars in all the galaxies and even things astronomers can't observe yet. But simply knowing that the universe is everything isn't enough to satisfy most people. We want specifics to precisely answer the question, "What is the universe made of?"
Breaking Down the Universe
Scientists typically like to break down the components of the universe into three categories: normal matter, dark matter and dark energy.
Normal matter consists of every visible object in the universe. This includes galaxies, star clusters, planets, dwarf planets, rogue planets, moons, rings, ringlets, comets, meteorites — every object in the universe and every bit of matter that makes up all the known elements in the periodic table, from black holes and massive stars to specks of space dust. All the types of normal matter obey the same natural laws, even though they exhibit different characteristics.
It's believed that normal matter was created during the Big Bang. The early newborn universe was a heaving mass of neutrons, protons, electrons, photons and other subatomic particles that zipped around and smashed into one another forming hydrogen — the simplest and lightest atomic element, which is made of only a proton and an electron. Fourteen billion years later, individual hydrogen atoms remain the most common element found in the universe, making up nearly 95% of the universe's atoms.
Helium is the second lightest and second most abundant element in the observable universe. According to NASA, close to 5% of the universe's atoms are helium. All the rest of the elements in the periodic table make up a fraction of the remaining 1% of all ordinary matter in the universe.
Astronomers have also estimated the number of stars in the observable universe, starting with the Milky Way galaxy, which contains at least 100 billion stars. Since the observable universe contains at least 100 billion galaxies, this means there must be close to 10 sextillion (10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000) stars in the universe.
What About Dark Matter and Dark Energy?
But what about invisible matter? What about energy? For astrophysicists, dark matter and dark energy are the greatest mysteries and biggest challenges of the universe. Scientists label them as "dark" because they can't directly observe them, which means most of the universe that can be known remains unknown. But the universe, as we understand it, wouldn't work if dark matter and dark energy didn't exist.
If all the normal matter — the stars, planets, comets and everything else we can observe — represents less than 5% of what the universe is made of, then about 27% of the remainder is dark matter, and 68% is dark energy, neither of which is even remotely understood. But there's still hope. In the early 21st century, astronomers discovered thousands of planets around other stars, detected gravitational waves for the first time and produced the first image of a black hole. We're learning more about these mysteries of the universe every day.
While dark matter can't be observed directly yet, its fingerprints are preserved in the universe's first light as tiny fluctuations in radiation. We can investigate some of the properties of dark matter using gravitational lensing, a process that measures how much the dark matter causes light from a background source to bend. NASA's Chandra X-Ray Observatory and optical telescopes use gravitational lensing to help map the distribution of dark matter in colliding galaxy clusters.
By using the gravitational lensing technique, astronomers can get an idea of the galaxy's mass and measure how much the dark matter bends the light. When the mass we calculate from the bend and the mass we can observe directly don't agree, we know dark matter must be present. The warping and magnification of this light give us insight into the amount, density and distribution of dark matter in any given lensing galaxy. Astrophysicists have calculated that dark matter — even though it can't be seen or measured — must make up a significant portion of the universe.
The Even More Mysterious Part of the Universe
Even stranger than dark matter, though, is dark energy, which is thought to be more abundant than either matter or dark matter. Dark energy is the unseen repellant force required to explain the expansion of the universe, which should be slowing down because of the gravitational attraction between galaxies. Models of the force required to explain the universe's accelerating expansion rate suggest that dark energy must make up about 68% of the universe.
The Chandra Observatory has placed limits on dark energy by looking for its effects on galaxy cluster evolution throughout the history of the universe. By comparing observations of galaxy clusters with experimental models, researchers are studying how dark energy competed with gravity throughout the history of the universe. Considering that dark energy makes up about three-quarters of the universe, understanding it is one of the most significant challenges facing scientists today.
Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

What Is the Universe Made Of?

Following the recent landing of NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover, one group of engineers reflected on how their innovative work with deployables led to the discovery of water on Mars.
In 2000, a small team of engineers and technicians at Astro Aerospace in Carpinteria, California (now owned by Northrop Grumman) were presented with a particularly vexing challenge: to develop a 40-meter long antenna powerful enough to survey beneath the surface of Mars, and able to fit on the Mars Express, a space exploration mission proposed by the European Space Agency (ESA).
At the time, the team had little idea that their innovative antenna would eventually support the discovery of liquid water on Mars.
Pioneering a New Concept
The team had the opportunity to be creative in coming up with a design for the Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface and Ionosphere Sounding (MARSIS) antenna.
"It was a very 'soft' program," said Geoff Marks, who was lead technologist for MARSIS. "Our customer provided with the required thickness and length of the radar antenna, then asked to come up with an idea for how to fit it in the spacecraft, then deploy it in space."
The antenna had to be built for a low frequency radar, so it had to be very long once fully deployed in orbit. But it needed to stow to about 1.5 meters in length while in transit and be able to fit on the side of a spacecraft the size of a subcompact car.
Fortunately, the team had some tricks in their deployables toolbox. Since 1958, their company, Astro Aerospace, had been pioneering the technology of space-deployable structures — devices that can be dramatically reconfigured once in space.
For the MARSIS mission, the team designed a lightweight deployable dipole antenna: two 20-meter booms or poles, which would collect information by sending radar pulses to Mars' surface and receive pulses in return. A third, shorter boom would eliminate interference between real signals and possible scatter, like a really large set of rabbit ears for your television set.
The most innovative aspect of the design was a new concept imagined by Marks, called foldable-flattenable-tube (FFT) booms, which enabled the antennas to stow. FFT booms could support the full length of the antenna's electrical elements and, like the cardboard tubing inside paper towel rolls, were long, light, thin-walled and — with some tricky engineering — able to fold.
Taking MARSIS from Concept to Reality
In just a few short years, the first-of-its-kind deployable antenna was developed by Astro Aerospace's group of passionate problem solvers with backgrounds spanning from bicycle mechanics to doctorates in physics.
"The technicians and the engineers both brought different sides of the equation to execute the hardware," said Michael Beers, who was the structural engineer for MARSIS. "You need a diversity of skills and backgrounds to bring a product from concept to execution."
The team took advantage of computer simulation tools to successfully test components of MARSIS, an important step since Earth's gravity makes it physically difficult to test fully constructed deployable space hardware, according to Bob Chang, senior principal representative in business development.
"On Earth, the antenna doesn't pop straight out like it does in space, so these mock demonstrations are key to building our confidence in the success of the mission," said Bob.
A Cool and Wild Ride
In 2004, a year after arriving at Mars, the MARSIS antenna was deployed — and the MARSIS team had redeployed to new projects, from addressing challenges in satellite-based telecommunications to working on products studying the effects of climate change.
Still, Marks said it wasn't difficult to keep up with the Mars Express, as its findings were published in numerous scientific journals — including the exciting discovery of a subglacial lake of liquid saltwater trapped under Mars' southern ice cap. One of the antenna's most groundbreaking findings, this upended the previous belief that water only existed on Mars in solid or gas form. Later research found three additional bodies of water.
"We knew MARSIS was for deep surface penetration, but didn't know what we'd find with it," Marks said. "It's pretty cool and a wild ride that MARSIS found liquid water on Mars, which may pave the way for human exploration or even lead to the discovery of life on the red planet."
Today, NASA's quest to explore the mysteries of Mars continues with the Perseverance Rover, which landed on Mars on Feb. 18. For one Mars year — about 687 Earth days — the Rover will collect information to further our understanding of Mars.
While new discoveries on Mars are often several years — or, in the case of the MARSIS antenna, over a decade — in the making, that never deters forward-looking engineers and scientists. After all, each team builds on the hard work of their predecessors, confident that their work today will pave the way for those who follow.
Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

The Art of the Deployable: Reflecting on the Innovative Antenna Which Led to the Discovery of Water on Mars

 Each year, hundreds of adventurers crowd the slopes, hoping to make it to the summit of Mount Everest. Unfortunately, this popularity is causing ecological problems on the world's highest peak, since not everything that goes up comes back down again. Climbing season to ascend Mount Everest comes around each May when the weather window is favorable. Although this remote area should be a pristine wilderness, visitors leave reminders from the outside world that are threatening to overwhelm Mount Everest as a high-altitude garbage dump. The very conditions that make this mountain a bucket-list climbing challenge also make it an eco-challenge for tourism.Trash in but Not Trash Out For many years, only highly experienced climbers would consider heading to the peak, and only after major preparation; one in four would die on the mountain. Nowadays, trekking firms will take you there in relative safety for a fee. Each year has seen increasing numbers of clients heading to the top, bringing climbing gear, oxygen bottles, provisions and camping equipment. Harsh conditions mean harsh choices — survival or carry out your trash? When every step in the low-oxygen atmosphere is an effort, waste removal is low priority; trash left on the mountain includes climbing gear, tents, packaging and human waste. There are no porta potties in the death zone. And neither is there decomposition. Conditions are too cold, too extreme for bugs and enzymes to break down waste materials. So, the trash, the feces and even the bodies stay there frozen in time.Climber Clean Up Last year, the Nepali government issued climbers with a refundable deposit alongside climbing permits that encouraged each person to bring back 8 kg of garbage from the mountain. In 2017, it is equipping climbing parties with giant canvas sacks to take with them. Holding more than 80 kg, the plan is to leave these at various points up the climbing route to accumulate trash. Once full, the helicopters that bring climbing ropes up to the slopes will return laden with trash. This climbing season also started well for trash removal, with Chinese teams removing more than four tons from the north side of Everest ahead of peak season. However, these methods rely on willingness and ability. So far they're unenforceable, and when safety is a concern, removing trash is the lowest priority.Eco-Climbing to the Rescue Some climbers deal with waste proactively, committing to eco-climbing. Asian Trekking, a firm that organizes annual trash removal expeditions on the mountain, minimizes waste by smart outfitting. By switching to solar power for cooking stoves, they reduce reliance on local firewood. Although studies have shown that deforestation and resulting soil erosion is not primarily from supporting climbers on Everest, they found that increasing tourist numbers put greater pressure on local forestry resources for building and fuel. In addition to mobile water filtration and trash bags, climbers keep it clean by carrying personal sanitation storage to carry human waste off the mountain.Climate Change Reveals Urgency There is urgency in cleaning up Mount Everest; climate change is affecting the world's highest peaks, shrinking glaciers and reducing snow cover. As well as making climbing conditions more hazardous (the 2014 and 2015 avalanches are thought to be due to glacier and icefall instability), this exposes trash. Along with an opportunity for record-breaking high-altitude kayaking, the meltwater carries human pathogens from the vast amounts of human fecal waste into water systems below.  The Mount Everest Biogas Project (MEBP), however, is attempting to capitalize on all that shit by installing a local bioreactor. Normally, human fecal waste is carried away from base camp by Sherpas, using barrels to bring approximately 26,000 pounds of poo annually to the open pits at Gorak Shep. Here it sits, leaching into the local water system. MEBP engineers are proposing an ingenious system to digest the waste and create methane gas as fuel with fertilizer as a useful byproduct. Since the temperature hovers around freezing year round — not good for the digestive bacteria that the bioreactor relies on — the system will be warmed by a solar panel array. Extreme Recovery As glaciers recede and snow cover diminishes, it uncovers more than trash. Everest holds around 200 bodies, either visibly along the climbing routes as a stark reminder of the extreme conditions, or hidden in crevasses or inaccessible gullies. The dead do not decompose in the extreme cold and wind, but freeze into the landscape. Transporting a 75 kg cadaver at sea level may be easy, but above 8,000 meters in the death zone, rescuers must overcome low oxygen conditions while freeing what is now a 150 kg frozen block from the ice. Although some grieving families request repatriation, many acknowledge that climbers simply wish to remain on the mountain after death so teams remove them to less visible locations. Despite proactivity, trash removal from the summit of Mount Everest will remain a hands-on venture until autonomous recovery vehicles are developed. It could, however, benefit from an eye in the sky. Although helicopter rotor blades cannot create lift at such extreme altitudes, unmanned aerial reconnaissance such as the Northrop Grumman Global Hawk is more than able to fly at that altitude. Equipped with multiple sensors, the Global Hawk has already taken part in post-disaster recovery missions. Capable of surveying debris, terrain and even bodies from high altitude, this sensor capability could prove valuable for directing human garbage removal efforts on the mountain.

Peak Trash: The Summit of Mount Everest

The ultimate road trip is coming up thanks to the next stage in Pangaea theory. Even though today's continents formed by breaking apart from a massive supercontinent millions of years ago, according to The Conversation, plate tectonics predict that we could all be very close neighbors once again.  But don't book time off quite yet: Novopangea, as the potential supercontinent is called, is around 200 to 250 million years away.   What Was Pangaea?  Pangaea, from the Greek pangaia, which means "all the Earth," once contained almost the whole landmass on the planet. Pangaea theory, according to National Geographic, suggested that the tectonic plates forming the planet's outer crust slid over the inner layers until they merged as a landmass surrounded by a massive ocean called Panthalassa.  Movement didn't stop there though.  Driven by rift formation and subduction, the plates and their landmasses continued drifting, eventually breaking up Pangaea. The Geological Society noted that this formed the current arrangement of continents and oceans around 50 million years ago, when India collided with Eurasia to form the Himalayas.  Pangaea's Discovery  The discovery of Pangaea hinges on a series of coincidences that pushed earth scientists to dig deep into our planet's history. Anyone who has looked at a world map can't help but notice how neatly South America fits into the west coast of Africa. According to Scientific American, there are a number of clues that led researchers to consider that our continents and land masses are not fixed in location and have indeed been on the move since formation.  One finding shows that the iron-rich rocks formed from lava vary in their orientation around the world. As the lava cools, the rocks magnetize and line up according to the Earth's magnetic field. Geological survey shows that the orientations vary by location, suggesting that the original lines of formation have shifted as the landmasses moved around over the millennia.  Additionally, LiveScience noted similarities between coal deposits in North America and Poland, and that the age and type of rocks found across the Appalachian ranges match those found in the Scottish Highlands. Fossil records also show the same species popping up in areas that are now far apart.  Future Supercontinent Travel Itineraries  These findings strongly support Pangaea theory in that at one time in Earth's history, the animals that became those fossils could simply walk from one area to another unhampered by oceans to cross. And thanks to plate tectonics, seen in action as spectacular volcanic eruption and lava outflow forming new land, we're likely to see this again.  The tectonic plates are still moving at a rate of a few centimeters per year, according to The Conversation. This also means that with enough time, another supercontinent could form. Novopangea is one proposal, where the continents merge again as the Atlantic Ocean continues to open and the Pacific closes. Pack your Bags?  Traveling across a massive continent regardless of configuration will be quite different to a road trip today. Expect new mountain ranges thrown up by the squeeze from each continental collision. Local and global climate will also change.  When Pangaea split, ocean currents altered direction and strength affecting movement of warm air and water around the planet. As the continents come together again, systems such as the Gulf Stream will alter course or disappear.  Although modern human migration did take advantage of land bridges, it happened too late to exploit the lack of ocean borders brought about by Pangaea theory. The Smithsonian documented human migration of modern hominids at around 80,000 years ago when our early ancestors left to colonize the ancient world beyond Africa. However, maybe our descendants will take advantage of landmass contiguity, benefiting from a new Pangaea for a global road trip in the (very) distant future. 

Pangaea Theory Has Earth's Surface on the Move

While the existence of dino dentists might have improved saurian species' quality of life (though, good luck getting a T-Rex to wait half an hour after a fluoride treatment before eating), great teeth aren't a remedy for sudden asteroid impacts. But fossilized dinosaur teeth do offer a glimpse into evolutionary history, helping paleontologists understand dino diets and critical evolutionary impacts. So, sit back and open wide, because we're heading back to the Jurassic period for some dental detective work. Tooth or Dare Despite their historical distance, dinosaurs remain a compelling study scenario for humankind: What did they look like? What did they eat? And how did they evolve over their millions of years on planet Earth? While this curiosity often results in a rallying cry to apply science and technological know-how to bring back a new generation of genetically-engineered dinos, this is both incredibly difficult and — as Jurassic Park made abundantly clear — dangerous. Thankfully, there's a better and safer way to discover more about our prehistoric pals: fossilized dinosaur teeth. Why? Because teeth are built with a bone and enamel combination that stays extremely well preserved. Dental archeologist Debbie Guatelli-Steinberg recently told NPR, "It's kind of convenient because teeth hold so much information." Not only does the shape and design of a dino tooth indicate its likely purpose, but calcified bacterial remnants and microscopic pitting can help identify what dinosaurs were eating — and how they ate it. Peter Ungar, an anthropologist at the University of Arkansas, delved into this dental microwear analysis to discover what animals ate by analyzing what food did to their teeth. He also leaned into a great dental pun, calling this chomp-and-chew history a "foodprint." Worth noting? When it comes to any dental detective work, Ungar makes it clear that teeth are typically adapted to the toughest part of an animal's diet rather than what it eats all the time. As he put it, "If you eat Jell-O almost every day of the year, but sometimes you need to eat rocks ... you want teeth that can eat rocks." Bite Me! So, what did dinosaurs really eat? And how did they eat it? While the jagged, steak knife-edged chompers of large predators such as the T-Rex have been studied in-depth, that's just the shallow end of the prehistoric pond. Consider recent work from the University of Alberta, which examined the Saurornitholestes, a small meat-eating dinosaur. Potential recreations suggest that it looked sort of a like a goose with a terrifying dino makeover. Analysis of scratches left on fossilized teeth showed that the dinosaur likely bit down and then pulled its head backward when chomping on prey. According to Ryan Wilkinson, co-author of a paper that examined the Saurornitholestes and two similar, small meat-eating dinosaurs — the Dromaeosaurus and the Troodon — the motion is best described as "puncture and pull," which helped these creatures grab onto prey and then tear off pieces of meat. The team also discovered differences across these three similar species. Analysis of Troodon fossils showed differences in their smaller teeth, called denticles, suggesting that if they struggled while prey fought back hard, the thrashing motion could more easily break these teeth than those of Dromaeosaurus or Saurornitholestes. As a result, Troodon likely went after slower, smaller prey that was less likely to cause dental destruction. Prehistoric Periodontology Analysis of dinosaur teeth also provides critical insight into vertebrate evolution. While mammals were generally thought to have more complex tooth structures than their reptilian cousins, recent examination of fossils from Changchunsarus Parvus, a small herbivorous dinosaur found in China, found evolved tooth development in this early species of ornithopod. Not only did C. Parvus teeth show evidence of more advanced "wavy enamel" similar to that of later ornithopods, but they also developed a unique tooth replacement method that allowed continual recycling of teeth without disrupting the mouth's overall shearing surface. Meanwhile, work on preserved teeth and jaws from Captorithus Aguti — a reptile that lived before the age of dinosaurs — showed evidence of increased right-side jaw wear indicating the potential for functional brain asymmetry, which is a critical feature of vertebrate evolution at scale. Food for Thought Fossilized dinosaur teeth offer a bite-sized look into the history and evolution of Earth's lizard overlords. Perhaps the same will be said someday of human molars and munchers left behind after our own apocalypse — but what will those looking back think of our fossilized fragments? Depending on the evolution of current diets and our ability to overcome general apathy toward dental service delivery, human history might offer the whole tooth — or nothing but the tooth.

Dental Detectives: Dinosaur Teeth Deliver Details on Diets

The South Pacific is home to new islands that seemingly appear out of nothing. Volcanoes erupt below the ocean's surface, spewing hot lava that eventually cools down and hardens, becoming an island. As volcanic activity creates new land formations across the globe, scientists study these brand-new islands to learn how our planet was formed, as well as other planets and moons in the solar system. Land Appearing Out of Nowhere Most of the South Pacific's volcanic landforms wash away in a couple months, but a new island that formed in 2015 in the island nation of Tonga is lasting long enough for scientists to investigate. According to Space.com, the island, unofficially called Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai, formed when an undersea volcano erupted in December 2014 through January 2015. Scientists kept an eye on the island before it even formed and used satellite imagery to watch it slowly rise out of the ocean. The newborn island comprises dramatic cliffs, a crater lake and new plant life. The land provides a peek into our planet's past, demonstrating in real time what it's like when new land develops. NASA scientists suggest that the island could be our best replica of ancient Mars. Jim Garvin, chief scientist at the Goddard Space Flight Center explained, "We have an eruption on Earth with an accelerated erosion because it's in a marine environment, but on Mars, that environment may have been very ephemeral. By looking at these things in more detail, we can start to put time constraints on â€¦ the persistence of water, [which] is a holy grail on Mars." According to the National Park Service (NPS), the HawaiÊ»i Volcanoes National Park displays the results of at least 70 million years of volcanism, migration and evolution, and active volcanoes are still adding to the island of HawaiÊ»i. These changes can cause drama on Earth, where we're used to divvying up land. When volcanic eruptions create new land, who owns it? Vice reports Hawai'i is continuously expanding, with lava flows not only covering existing land but also spilling into the ocean creating new masses called lava extensions. This ever-changing landscape has caused disputes over ownership, but new land belongs to the state. How Scientists Study Volcanic Landforms Iceland's volcanoes hold hints about the chemical reactions that occur when lava interacts with ice, as scientists suspect it does on Jupiter's moon Europa. In an attempt to determine how planets and moons evolved, planetary scientists from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center are studying the lava fields of Iceland's glacier-covered volcanoes, according to Phys.org. They're measuring temperatures, drilling through ice and using a technique called Raman spectroscopy to analyze the chemistry of the ice. The information they gather will help them understand Earth and beyond. There are volcanoes throughout the solar system. For example, the moon's dark patches indicate inactive volcanoes, and there are remnants of volcanoes on Mercury, Venus and Mars. "You can use Earth science to study volcanoes on this planet and then apply that knowledge to the Moon, Mars and other bodies," Patrick L. Whelley, a Goddard planetary geologist told Phys.org. "Plus, we don't have the luxury of watching volcanic eruptions up close anywhere besides Earth." Iceland is a good substitute for Mars because they are both covered in a volcanic rock called basalt. According to Phys.org, Iceland grew from continual volcanic eruptions in the last 15 to 20 million years. Geological Discoveries Beyond Earth Today's geological discoveries hint at our solar system's geological past. By figuring out the best techniques for analyzing volcanic landforms in the South Pacific islands and Iceland, scientists are also helping to develop methods that could be deployed on future space missions to dig into the origins of planets and moons throughout our solar system.

Volcanic Landforms Reveal Clues About Planetary Origins

What is reality? Author Philip K. Dick offers a succinct definition: "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." It's a solid starting point — even if you don't believe in gravity, you'll still fall down if you trip. But this definition doesn't account for a universe of hidden interactions and seemingly irreconcilable operations, one that gets stranger and stranger the more we poke and prod. And poke and prod we do, eternally. The quest to understand reality dates back millennia, starting with heavenly explanations for natural phenomena that steadily drifted toward more observation-driven assessments and eventually moved into the realm of intellectual theory-crafting. But are we any closer to a complete explanation? Physicist and Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek thinks so, offering an account of "fundamental lessons we can learn from the study of the physical world" in his book, Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality. For Wilczek, our universe is composed of just a few ingredients governed by similarly few laws, but with minor differences in distribution or condition driving vastly different outcomes. "The world is simple and complex, logical and weird, lawful and chaotic," he writes. His work also does what great books do — create more questions than answers. Let's see what we can do about that as we dive into the fundamental and frustrating concept of reality with a look at where we've been, what we've discovered and what comes next. Get Me a Philosopher, STAT! Lacking scientific specifics and given the pervasive oddity of the universe, discussions of reality have often been confined to the realm of philosophy, which afforded the ability to swing for the metaphysical fences and — perhaps more importantly — explore human nature itself. Consider the 1892 paper "What Is Reality?" by philosopher David G. Richie. In it, he suggests that the ultimate reality isn't physical law or observable phenomena but rather the "potentiality" of thought itself. "Unfortunately," he notes, "the uncritical metaphysics of the ordinary and of the scientific understanding do not generally take the notion of potentiality quite seriously. Hence it is necessary to take the longer route of philosophical criticism." It's an intriguing supposition, and one that reflects a substantive portion of the human experience. The problem? It also reinforces the human-centric nature of philosophy itself: the efforts we take to ensure we don't feel too small given the scale of the universe and our place in it. But to understand reality, we need to think bigger. Fours Majeure The first frameworks of human understanding of the universe relied on divine action. Thunderstorms? The gods are getting angry. Poor harvest? Probably the work of an offended or mischievous deity. Eclipse? Something has gone very, very wrong in the vaults of heaven. And then came the Greeks, who proposed a new way of looking at the world. They defined four fundamental elements — earth, fire, air and water — and suggested that all matter was made of these elements in differing proportions. This quadratic quantity didn't last long, however. Aristotle soon added the element of "aether" that supposedly held the stars and planets. Early scientific experiments, such as those conducted by Empedocles, helped to differentiate between air and aether. By inverting a bowl filled with air in water, he showed that the air didn't simply vanish, suggesting that it a) wasn't aether and b) was actually something. Worth noting? While the Greeks often get credit, they weren't alone in their elemental assertion — the ancient Chinese culture came to similar conclusions, as did those of Persia and Japan, according to The Five Elements in the Literary Heritage of Iran and Japan: A Comparative Study. While the four-element framework was simplistic and eventually gave way to a much more precise understanding of chemical components and object interactions, it represented one of the first forays into a physical rather than philosophical understanding of reality. He Ain't Heavy, He's Fundamental No discussion of our physical universe is complete without a nod to Isaac Newton. While the apple story is almost certainly apocryphal, the fact remains that Newton suggested something no one had ever thought of: gravity. It seems strange now, but in the late 17th century there was no concept of gravity, no universal law that explained why we don't simply float away into the aether at random. In his Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Newton laid out his case for gravity, suggesting that all objects exerted this attractive force on one another — and that the more mass they had, the bigger the force. This notion was incredibly handy, because it let scientists calculate the trajectory of thrown objects, account for the moon's orbit around the Earth and quantify the interplanetary relationships in our solar system. However, Newton did run into trouble when it came to explaining the mechanism of gravity, arguing that while it "must be caused by an agent acting constantly according to certain laws," he was uncertain exactly how this agent operated. Lack of complete understanding aside, Newton's work paved the way for one of the biggest shifts in our comprehension of reality: the four fundamental forces, which help to explain almost everything that happens in our universe. As Space.com outlines, they are:   Gravity: The classic. Newton described this force as an attraction between two objects, and while later work found this isn't quite accurate, gravity is the most easily observed and conceptually understood force.  The electromagnetic force: Also called the Lorentz force, electromagnetism describes the interaction between charged particles. While electric and magnetic interactions were originally seen as separate, ongoing scientific work found that charged particle interactions also generated magnetic fields, fundamentally connecting these two forces.  The weak force: The weak nuclear force is responsible for particle decay, which causes subatomic particles to change type over time. This decay is critical to the process of nuclear fusion that powers our sun, and it occurs at specific, measurable rates governed by the subatomic composition of elements.  The strong force: The strong nuclear force holds subatomic particles together and is six thousand trillion trillion trillion times stronger than gravity, according to HyperPhysics. While it only operates at very small distances (10^ -15 meters or less), it offers massive destructive and productive potential when particle bonds are broken or new bonds are forcibly created.  Throwing Curveballs And then there's Albert Einstein. It seems he's always there, lurking in the science shadows — and he plays a critical role in our understanding of reality thanks to his theory of relativity. Einstein's work was predicated in part by Niels Bohr's concept of complementarity, which he used to help explain the results of Thomas Young's Double Slit Experiment. This experiment showed that light had the properties of both particle and wave. Complementarity suggests that this wave/particle duality are both accurate descriptions of the same reality that "complement" rather than oppose one another — instead, human limitations in observation and interpretation make these results appear irreconcilable. The theory of relativity expanded this concept to the universe at scale, suggesting that any measurements involving time and space are relative to both the location and motion of the observer. This is especially relevant to gravity, which Einstein suggested was not an instantaneous, attractive force between two objects but rather a curvature of spacetime determined by an object's mass. The bigger the object, the bigger the curve and the more substantive the gravitational force. So substantive, in fact, that observers close to a massive object would find time itself slowing down relative to the passage of time experienced by more distant observers. Einstein's curvature theory, while significantly more complex, has also been consistently accurate in describing the movement of light around massive objects, including planets, stars and even black holes. And it has fundamentally changed the way we view the nature of reality and the universe. Discovering the Real Deal: A History of Trial and Error So, what does this continual conversation around the nature of reality suggest? That trial and error are essential to the process of understanding. It makes sense, then, that discussions of reality have historically been relegated to philosophers. While scientists recognize the value of revising theories based on new evidence, the seeming lack of evidence for many fundamental forces has provided an ever-frustrating framework. Even Einstein — absolute out-of-the-box thinker that he was — didn't believe that gravitational waves caused by accelerating mass would ever be detected. But on September 14, 2015, all the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) captured evidence of gravitational waves produced when two black holes collided, according to Science Alert. Since they were 1.3 billion light-years away, the signal took some time to arrive and was perilously tiny when it finally crossed our paths. And this is hardly the end of our efforts to understand reality. Consider the ongoing discussions about dark matter, dark energy, string theory, quantum mechanics and worm holes — just when we think we've unlocked the secrets of how the universe works, it turns out we've only peeled back another layer, and what's inside makes absolutely no sense. Strangely enough, it's the very unpredictability and unwillingness of the universe to give up its secrets that keeps us so obsessed. It's our nature; we're easily adaptable, even more easily bored and constantly looking for new challenges, new opportunities and new questions to explore. Asking "what is reality?" — over and over and over and over again — not only gives us something to do with these big brains of ours, but it also helps us understand both our universe and ourselves just a little bit better. Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics and engineering, has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

What Is Reality? Your Quick-Start Guide to the Nature of the Universe

Food allergy prevalence is rising globally. Since there is no effective cure and allergy often comes with life-threatening anaphylaxis, people are advised to steer clear of risky foods and carry an EpiPen. However, a recent study reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) shows that although almost 19% of surveyed adults believe they have a food allergy, only 10.8% fit the criteria based on clinical signs and diagnostic rigor. Food allergy testing with advances in precision medicine could help untangle the myths from the facts, helping a growing population worldwide manage day-to-day life and avoid restrictive dietary practices.What Defines a Food Allergy?A food allergy is not a sensitivity or intolerance. It is an immune-mediated response to allergens in foods. When certain foods are eaten, or simply touched or inhaled, these sensitizing markers trigger the immune system into overdrive.According to the Mayo Clinic, signs of an allergic reaction come on within a few minutes or a couple of hours, and include itchiness and hives, swollen lips, and vomiting among other symptoms. Exposure to an allergen triggers an overwhelming cascade of immune responses, releasing highly potent compounds such as histamine that activate further adverse tissue reactions. Anaphylaxis is the most severe reaction, with constricted airways and a swollen throat. Blood pressure can drop sharply and without treatment, consciousness is lost rapidly leading to coma and death.While a food intolerance may be uncomfortable, it does not involve an immune response or risk death. As described by the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (AAAI), food intolerance affects the gut; feeling bloated is a commonly reported symptom, along with other gastrointestinal disturbance. Although oral immunotherapy shows some promise as a preventative measure, the only treatment for food allergy is strict avoidance. Intolerance is a lifestyle choice, whereas an allergy isn't.Food Allergy TestingFood allergy testing involves assessing the antibody response to allergen exposure. The Mayo Clinic advises that definitive diagnosis needs a combination of approaches, including skin tests and antibody response.The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lists eight common allergens including fish, eggs, shellfish and peanuts. During skin testing, a small amount of the foods is scratched into the skin; allergy shows up as bumps and redness. However, this isn't definitive, so other tests including dietary challenges are useful. It is worth noting here that measuring antibody levels is only useful if the test is for immunoglobulin E (IgE). Both the AAAI and the Canadian Society of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (CSACI) do not recommend food-specific IgG food allergy testing as it has no scientific basis.Why the Increase?A 2017 review in the journal Immunity notes that there has been a sharp increase in people with food allergies over the last two decades but there's still no conclusive evidence to show why this is happening. Although it's likely that environmental factors modify risk, the BBC notes that links to increased pollution and antibiotic use have not been proven.One theory is that increased exposure to novel foods could be driving the increase. As global trade and increased leisure travel bring us into contact with other cultures, our dietary choices also diversify, bringing us novel foods and ingredients to explore. Skin sensitization to peanut oil in diaper cream and wheat proteins in face soap has been linked to food allergy.Conversely, previous advice on limiting early childhood exposure to allergens may also have caused the increase in food allergy. A review published in Nutrients overturns advice given in the 1990s to avoid peanuts during pregnancy and in infancy. Numerous studies showed that delaying exposure was associated with development of food allergy.Potential Treatment and DiagnosisAlthough there are some potential treatments under investigation, the current cure for food allergy is strict avoidance. There is, however, strong evidence that eating a varied diet from early childhood could help stop many food allergies developing. For example, the LEAP Study in the UK shows that exposing children to peanuts from early infancy reduced incidence of peanut allergy.Oral immunotherapy, where patients desensitize themselves by eating increasing amounts of the allergen, shows some promise. With successful treatment, patients can eat more of the food before triggering a response. Unfortunately, this only works as a preventive measure and the allergy returns if treatment lapses.There are also trials looking at epicutaneous immunotherapy, using skin patches to deliver food allergens. However, a recent study in children published by JAMA showed inconclusive resultsThere is also currently no single diagnostic test that identifies allergy or indicates its severity; the only option many people have is to avoid the food completely. Business Wire describes how immunoglobulin E (IgE) epitope mapping could both identify allergies and show how severely a person might react. A precision medicine approach like this could help many people manage food allergy with less impact on daily life.

A Look at Food Allergy Testing and Diagnoses

The universe is full of bright and shiny objects, including the occasional glittering space gem. Closer to home, luminous moons with ancient ice in their shadowed craters bounce light back at passing satellites whose solar panels seem to flash and flare when tilted at certain angles. Buried among these are a class of rarer objects that sparkle, but they aren't stars, planets, or even spacecraft. Gemstones in space might not glitter when their ancient crystals of carbon, sand and metal reflect the light from nearby suns, but rare space gems found inside meteorites from India, Russia and Sudan provide us with an unparalleled view of processes at work inside distant worlds. All That Glitters Is Not Gold Humankind has long been aware that precious materials rain down from the heavens. The metal dagger buried with King Tut, for example, was made of "iron from heaven" — a blend of iron, nickel and cobalt found only in meteorites. It was prized by the ancient Egyptians as durable material for weapons and tools. To prove that the "iron-from-heaven" dagger really did fall from the stars, scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory used X-ray fluorescence spectrometry. Fluorescence is a type of atomic fingerprint. Because every element has a slightly different configuration of electrons, every element absorbs and then releases energy a bit differently. To test what the dagger was made of without even touching it, scientists bombarded the dagger with X-rays then watched, using a detector, to see how the metal in the dagger would absorb then re-emit the energy. The dagger contained iron, 11 nickel and cobalt. What's most important about this is that this particular combination does not occur on Earth. Researchers can look for space gems in a similar way. Using X-Ray diffraction (which watches how a crystal scatters light instead of how a metal absorbs it), researchers discovered nanodiamonds in pieces of a meteorite that had exploded over Sudan in 2008. Nanodiamonds are crystals made of carbon. As is the case with Earth diamonds, space gem diamonds form in places without oxygen. The reason is simple: if you let the forming carbon crystals touch oxygen, they turn into graphite — the mineral used in pencils. Natural Earth diamonds are formed 150 to 700 km down from the surface. Here, the carbon crystals endure immense pressure, and in the absence of oxygen, they form into their unique double-pyramid shape. These non-metallic carbon crystals are then carried to the Earth's surface by volcanic eruptions or shifts in tectonic plates. Occasionally, erosion of land by rain, wind and rivers may reveal where diamonds were formed millions or even hundreds of millions of years ago. Space gems — diamonds, sapphires, rubies and opals — may form the same way, deep inside faraway planets. If there's no water or oxygen around, and the planet is massive enough to create crushing pressure, it is possible for a space gem to form in the atmosphere of a gas giant. This possibility has led to discussions about whether the weather on Saturn includes diamond rain. Carbon formed in the presence of oxygen in one part of Saturn's atmosphere is crushed first into graphite and then into diamond as it falls toward the center of the planet. Diamonds formed in this way are hypothesized to be able to reach about a centimeter in size, uncut. Shine On Because they form in gas and not rock, space gems born in the atmospheres of stars are typically tiny — so tiny that rather than falling inward they would be blown outward on solar winds. Such nanodiamonds have been found via microscopy in stony meteorites. Their double-pyramid crystal patterns prove that wherever they came from in the galaxy, there was a lot of pressure and little to no oxygen. The space dust that streams down on us all day, every day, includes bits and pieces of all kinds of precious, semi-precious, and common materials made in the outer layers of our sun and billions of other stars. Larger diamonds also rain down on Earth from time to time. In 2021, NASA geologists found two 10-micron diamonds in a meteorite that fell in Sutter's Mill, California. While these two were much larger than the usual nanodiamonds, 10 microns is still very small: about 1/10th the diameter of a human hair. Diamonds are not the only gemstones in space. Opals — specifically fire opals — have been found on Mars. In stark contrast to how diamonds can be used as evidence of the absence of water and oxygen, opal crystals form in the presence of liquid. The discovery of fire opal crystals near a deposit of another substance, ferrihydrite, has been used as evidence that water and rock interacted for extended periods of time on the surface of Mars. It would be quite something if the 50 tons of space debris falling on us every day carried with it diamonds big enough to see with the naked eye. Sadly, large space gems are much rarer than that, at least around here. However, nanodiamonds might well be a feature of every star with carbon in its atmosphere, giving the entire visible universe yet another reason to shine on. Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

Space Gem or Fools Gold? The Search for Diamonds in the Sky

Early one morning in a Lake Tahoe cabin, a woman was attacked by a black bear, one of the most dangerous animals in the U.S. The bear charged at her when she startled it as it was tearing her freezer apart looking for food. "I remember seeing his big paw right on my face and basically nothing else," she told CNN. "And I started feeling my body being ripped apart." While it's impossible to truly know the bear's intention, a representative from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife suggested that bears in that area, which is an urban-rural interface, survive by pursuing human sources of food. The bear was hungry, and like a twisted version of the Goldilocks story, it helped itself to someone else's food. We've all heard similar stories of wildlife attacking humans, especially as humans continue to encroach on the remaining natural habitats that support wild animals. Are some animals born mean, or is there a deeper reason behind these attacks? The Most Dangerous Animals in the U.S. As the early-morning snack story illustrates, bears are more ferocious than people may realize. They often top lists of the most dangerous animals. These powerful animals, which are called Ursidae in science lingo, are common in North America. They have sharp claws and strong teeth and can weigh anywhere from a pound at birth up to 1,600 pounds, according to the Be Bear Aware Campaign. There are a few species of bears in the U.S.: black bears (relatively small and common), brown bears (an apex predator with almost no enemies except humans and sometimes called grizzly bears, although that's just one subspecies), and polar bears (the largest land carnivores). Outdoor experience website Outforia analyzed confirmed deaths caused by animals over the last 50 years and developed a list of the most deadly animals in North America. Here are animals that caused the most fatalities in the last half-century:   Brown bear (70)  Shark (57)  Snake (57)  Black bear (54)  Alligator (33)  Cougar (16)  Polar bear (10)  Wolf (2)  Plus, Fodors calls out a few other dangerous American animals:   Coyotes  Ticks (due to transmissible diseases)  Jellyfish  Bees, hornets and wasps  Deer and moose (as part of car crashes)  While this second group of animals isn't as deadly, they cause harm. Coyotes often live near humans and eat household pets. Ticks carry bacteria that can cause illnesses such as Lyme disease. Jellyfish, bees, hornets and wasps sting, leaving painful marks and possibly worse if the person they sting is allergic.  Finally, while deer and moose aren't known for attacking people, they can cause vehicle crashes. What are the odds? Surprisingly high. LCB, a gambling information website, crunched the numbers and discovered that people are far more likely to be killed by deer than by any other animal. And while any fatality is tragic, we really can't blame Bambi. Much like the bear problem, it's not that deer wander into our path; it's that we have wandered into theirs. LCB points out, "Due to rapid urban development, the deer's natural habitat is shrinking, causing them to share more space with humans, where they often wander into oncoming traffic and cause car crashes." Animal Instinct Even the most dangerous animals usually have a good reason for attacking humans and our pets. It all relates to instinctive behavior and the driving forces behind evolution. Instinct, according to Britannica, is "an involuntary response by an animal, resulting in a predictable and relatively fixed behavior pattern." First and foremost, we are invading their territory. Whether it's by accident, like in the case of deer, or on purpose, like more ferocious animals, these animals have a natural instinct to stay in their territory. We can see this even in our own homes, for example, when pets guard their favorite snuggle spot. And when an animal can physically overpower a person, all bets are off. According to Outforia, bears are fiercely territorial. Another reason animals may harm humans is when they are afraid. We may be relatively weak, but we are, after all, at the top of the food chain when we use weapons, so it makes sense for their wild animal instinct to tell them to perceive humans as a threat. Carnivorous animals also attack humans for food due to a severe lack of natural resources when their natural food sources have been depleted by human intervention or because we look like their prey. Scientists have linked shark attacks, for example, to a case of mistaken identity because surfboards look like seals, USA Today reports. And there's truth behind the "mama bear" stereotype: Animals will hurt humans if they perceive us as threats to their babies. In conclusion, if we stay out of the way, even the most dangerous animals in the U.S. are not here to harm us. Your odds of being killed by an animal could be as high as 1 in 674,600 in Montana or as low as 1 in 8,184,535 in Massachusetts, according to LCB. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology and engineering.

When Animals Attack: The Most Dangerous Animals in the U.S.

Laser technology is a staple of science fiction and our daily lives. This 60-year-old technology continues to improve, and engineers are still developing brand new applications for lasers. "Lasers are really hot right now," says Carly Wright, an optical engineer who works in the laser engineering group at Northrop Grumman. Lasers are used in medical procedures, beauty treatments, telecommunications, industrial applications, robotics, autonomous vehicles, toys, scientific research and more. Due to their power and precision, lasers are also being developed for military use. "There's a lot of interest in putting lasers on a wide variety of platforms to defeat a really wide variety of targets," says Wright. How Do Lasers Work? Although the term "laser" is widely understood today, it was originally an acronym for light amplification by a simulated emission of radiation. A laser produces a very narrow beam of light, but it's not just any light. So, how do lasers work? First, you have to understand the fundamentals of light. Each color of light has a different wavelength on electromagnetic spectrum. Sunlight looks like white light, but it actually includes a mixture of all the different colors, or wavelengths of light. Lasers are different, NASA explains, because they produce a narrow beam of light in which all of the light waves have very similar wavelengths. This alignment of waves makes laser beams narrow, bright and extremely precise. Think of a flashlight versus a laser pointer. A beam of light from a standard flashlight spreads out, but a laser pointer stays focused wherever you aim it. These properties mean laser beams can travel very long distances and concentrate their energy on a very small area. A Brief History of Lasers Today's laser technology is made possible because of the fundamental principles of modern physics that Max Planck and Albert Einstein and their peers discovered in the early 1900s. According to Interesting Engineering, at the turn of the century, Planck figured out the relationship between energy and the frequency of radiation. He described that energy couldn't just be transferred in any amount (as presumed by classical physics). Instead, energy is emitted or absorbed in discrete packets, which we now call quanta. Einstein then expanded on Planck's insight and proposed that "electrons could be stimulated into emitting light of a particular wavelength." Although they weren't specifically looking to define what is a laser, scientists continued to experiment with light over the next few decades, with the invention of holography in 1948, and the first proof of Einstein's principles in action in 1954, with the MASER (Microwave Amplification of Stimulated Emission of Radiation). Laser technology truly took off in the early 1960s. During this time period, the term laser was created, and the first practical laser was prototyped and patented. Scientists developed several types of lasers, including the first continuous-beam laser, the solid-state (semiconductor injection) laser, and the carbon dioxide laser. In 1961, lasers were used for medical treatment for the first time, in an optical surgery that was faster and more comfortable than conventional treatments. Today, lasers are such a common medical tool that they are used to remove everything from tumors to unwanted hair. They're also used in endless other facets of our lives, including telecommunications, consumer electronics, law enforcement, entertainment, manufacturing and military equipment. Lasers in Real Life When laser weapons are portrayed in science fiction, there's often a bright flash of light that shoots opponents with a "pew, pew!" sound. In reality, Wright explains that lasers are stealthier than the ray gun you might be imagining. As an optical engineer, she spends most of her time working in a lab experimenting with the laser source of a direct energy (DE) weapon. Not only are lasers silent, but some are also invisible. "The lasers that we work with, are not visible to the eye," she says. "So when you think of laser weapons, you think of a red laser shooting through space. That's not the case. It doesn't make a sound."  Make no mistake: Light, especially when concentrated in a laser, is hot and dangerous. Wright has watched a laser drill a precise hole through a brick. She works in a class 1,000 clean room, wearing a full "bunny suit" of protective gear including a mask, gown, booties, gloves and laser goggles. In addition to their precision and power to zap objects with heat, lasers have another property that makes them a powerful weapon. Wright says, "As long as you have electricity or fuel, you can use your lasers, and there's not a finite number of shots that you can take." That's particularly valuable for the naval battle space, where refueling at sea is challenging. Despite all the awesome new technology that scientists and engineers are developing today, lasers remain a hot topic.

The Future of Laser Technology (Hint: It's Bright)

In the direction of the springtime constellation Boé¶tes lies what may be the largest structural feature in the universe: an arc of galaxies extending some 3.3 billion light years. The possible structure, now simply called the Great Arc, is more than nine billion light years distant — millions of times farther than the visible stars of Boé¶tes, such as the bright red giant Arcturus. Astronomers are not yet sure whether the Great Arc is a true physical structure or a mere visual coincidence. But if it is real, the Great Arc is not simply colossal; it also poses a challenge to the Cosmological Principle, a basic conception of the universe that dates back to Albert Einstein. "Oh, Look at This" The (possible!) discovery of this vast and problematic assemblage of galaxies grew out of an ongoing project to map the distant regions of the universe. According to Science News, the mapping project uses light from thousands of very remote quasars — bright, compact galactic cores so far away that they appear in the telescope as starlike points of light. As the light from these quasars passes through space on its way to Earth, some of that light is absorbed by atoms in intermediate galaxies. Thus, we can determine their presence and composition even without directly imaging them. As British PhD candidate Alexia Lopez examined the data from the survey, she began to find hints of a pattern. As Livescience recounts, Lopez described it as "sort of a hint of a big arc." She showed the findings to her doctoral advisor. "Oh, look at this," she exclaimed. Her advisor, Roger Clowes, suggested running some statistical tests to determine whether the Great Arc is a true physical structure or a mere visual coincidence. Such visual effects are common, such as the constellation Boé¶tes itself, made up of unrelated stars that merely happen to form a distinctive pattern as seen from Earth. The statistical tests came back showing only a 0.0003 chance of the Great Arc being a mere coincidence. Too Big to Fit? If the Great Arc is real, it poses a major challenge to Einstein's Cosmological Principle, which has been a key concept in cosmology for a hundred years. In a nutshell, the Cosmological Principle holds that the universe, when examined on the largest scale, looks more or less the same no matter what direction you look in. Per Sci-News, the principle holds that the largest true structures in the universe should be no more than about 1.2 billion light years across — little more than a third the size of the Great Arc. Albert Einstein first introduced the Cosmological Principle in order to simplify mathematical calculations, but it has done so well at explaining the universe we observe that astronomers would be very reluctant to abandon it. In the interview with Livescience, cosmologist Daniel Pomaré¨de, co-discoverer of another anomalously large cosmic structure — the South Pole Wall, spoke of the key role the Cosmological Principle plays in our understanding of the universe. "It would be very bold to say that it will be replaced by something else," he said. According to Sci-News, astrophysicist Subir Sarkar noted that "our eye has a tendency to pick up patterns," wryly adding that some people have claimed to see Stephen Hawking's initials in the cosmic background radiation, the oldest light in the universe. Lopez agreed that the Great Arc poses a challenge. But evidence continues to grow for the existence of oversized cosmic structures such as the South Pole Wall and the Great Arc. In a Futurism article, Lopez also noted that if confirmed, her finding "would overturn cosmology as we know it." She added that "our standard model, not to put it too heavily, kind of falls through." And there — pending further research — the matter stands. A powerful theory, and a growing hint of contradicting facts: business as usual on the frontiers of cosmology. Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team. 

An Arc of Galaxies Three Billion Light-Years Long May Challenge Cosmology

ASMR, or autonomous sensory meridian response, is everywhere right now. ASMR videos, podcasts and music have seemingly taken over the internet — the acronym was even added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary in September 2020. But what is ASMR? Why is it so appealing, and what makes it so satisfying to the human brain? Conversely, why are there some people who find ASMR upsetting? Let's dive into the ins and outs of autonomous sensory meridian response and how it affects our brains. What Is ASMR? Autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR) is the term used to describe a specific sensation people feel. According to Vox, it's often characterized as "'tingles' that run through the back of someone's head and spine" after experiencing certain audio or visual sensations. If that sounds vague, that's because ASMR isn't well-defined; ASMR triggers are often defined as such if they produce a reaction, and not everyone reacts the same to each trigger. It's important to note that ASMR does not produce a sexual reaction, though it's often described as a "brain orgasm." ASMR can be as simple as a person whispering, a scalp massage, turning pages of books or spraying a water bottle. They can also be videos of role-playing mundane activities — being treated by a doctor, getting a facial or being measured for a garment by a tailor. According to The New York Times, YouTube is currently the place to go if you're looking to try out ASMR for yourself. What Is the Science Behind Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response? Interestingly, many consider ASMR a pseudoscience — a result of drugs or the reactions of people who are looking for intimacy. However, an examination from Scientific American reveals that ASMR is real, but only for a select group of people. In a study published in PLOS ONE in 2018, researchers discovered that ASMR videos do promote calmness and excitement, reduced heart rate and increased skin conductance levels after watching ASMR videos, but these changes were only present in people who were affected by ASMR. The study concluded, "Hundreds of thousands of people watch ASMR videos and anecdotally report that these videos help them to sleep, relax and combat stress and anxiety. Our results are consistent with the idea that ASMR videos regulate emotion and may have therapeutic benefit for those that experience ASMR." In another study published in the journal BioImpacts, researchers used functional MRIs to look at the brain during ASMR experiences. They found that ASMR directly affected regions of the brain associated with rewards and emotional arousal. Clearly, for those who are affected by ASMR, the process triggers something in these regions of their brains. Why Does ASMR Affect People Differently? Some people swear by ASMR; however, it seems that most people aren't affected by it at all. But there are also others who can't stand the sounds or experiences of ASMR. Such is the case for people with misophonia, a sensitivity to sound that affects around 20% of the population, according to Popular Science. People who have been diagnosed with misophonia have disproportionately negative responses to ordinary sounds, such as chewing and swallowing. It creates a fight-or-flight response, raising the heart rate, which is the opposite effect that ASMR has on people who love it. Interestingly, there may be a connection between those affected by misophonia and ASMR, even though they produce opposite responses in people. In a study published in PeerJ, participants who self-identified as ASMR sensitive scored higher on the Misophonia Questionnaire (a tool doctors use to diagnose patients with misophonia) than those who were not ASMR sensitive. This could indicate that people who enjoy ASMR may also have misophonia, a sensitivity to sound — but their reaction to it is just very different. What Might the Future Hold for ASMR? While ASMR has entered the mainstream of technology and pop culture, it's likely to remain a niche for now, simply because not everyone is affected by it and because some who are affected by it have strongly negative reactions. But consider the future: What is ASMR going to look like as more technologies progress? The advent of tech such as virtual reality (VR) could hold promise, thanks to its ability to increase the intimacy and sensation of ASMR. People are already starting to explore what might this be able to do for ASMR, and the demand for VR is high. Until that happens, though, ASMR devotees still have thousands of videos to scroll through on YouTube, with hundreds of new ones being added each day. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

What Is ASMR, and Why Does It Captivate the Human Brain?

Researchers at the University of Toronto recently developed a new method for cancer detection that could catch the disease before symptoms appear. When cancer is detected early, patients may have better survival rates, according to the National Cancer Institute, but we don't have effective screening tests for early detection of many types of cancers. The Toronto team led by Dr. Daniel De Carvalho combined several techniques to develop a blood test that reveals biomarkers for cancer.  A Blood Test for Cancer The researchers combined liquid biopsy, epigenetic alterations and machine learning to detect cancer by identifying molecular biomarkers in the blood that indicate cancer even at the very early stages, according to Nature. This isn't the first time that scientists have attempted to develop a blood test for cancer. Liquid biopsies, as these blood tests are called, detect small amounts of circulating-free DNA (cfDNA). In other words, they can find microscopic evidence of tumors circulating in a patient's blood. It's a growing segment of the medical field that is expected to hit more than $22 billion by 2022, according to MarketWatch. Previously, liquid biopsies haven't been specific enough or sensitive enough to help doctors identify a treatment plan. MarketWatch pointed out that low specificity and sensitivity are restraining factors of the liquid biopsy market, and BioNews reiterated this ongoing challenge, saying that previous liquid biopsy techniques had a low sensitivity for cancers at the earliest stages. Improving Upcoming Medical Technology The big challenge with liquid biopsies is that they are looking for a very small amount of cfDNA in blood, which is also filled with other protein that has nothing to do with cancer. There is simply too much data to draw useful conclusions.  "'We are very excited at this stage,'" Dr. De Carvalho said in a press release published on Science Daily. "'A major problem in cancer is how to detect it early. It has been a 'needle in the haystack' problem of how to find that one-in-a-billion cancer-specific mutation in the blood, especially at earlier stages, where the amount of tumor DNA in the blood is minimal.'" Carvalho and his team approached the problem as if they were data scientists. They profiled changes in gene expression called "epigenetic alterations," which helped them identify thousands of modifications unique to each cancer type, according to the press release. Then they applied machine learning to sift through all the data to create classifiers to highlight the presence of tumor DNA within blood samples and, importantly, to determine the type of cancer. So far, they have profiled and successfully matched more than 700 tumor and blood samples. Looking ahead, the team will analyze data from large population health research studies already under way in several countries, where blood samples were collected months to years before cancer diagnosis.  Are We There Yet? While this work makes great progress toward an effective liquid biopsy, early cancer detection hasn't been solved yet. In Nature, Carvalho and his colleagues explained, "'This work sets the stage to establish biomarkers for the minimally invasive detection, interception and classification of early-stage cancers based on plasma cell-free DNA methylation patterns.'" Even if this technique is perfected in the future, liquid biopsies still wouldn't be a cure-all medical technology. The American Cancer Society pointed out that just because a small amount of cancer is identified doesn't mean doctors know what to do next. Treatment depends on the type of cancer and how aggressive it is. In fact, some cancers are so slow-growing that they would never need treatment.