Science & Space

swift observatory left to burn up as nasa calls off its orbital rescue There will be no rescue. NASA has cancelled the piece of the mission that counted: no spacecraft will lift the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory back to a safe altitude, and the telescope is now expected to fall back into Earth's atmosphere and burn up before the year is out.

Swift Observatory Left to Burn Up as NASA Calls Off Its Orbital Rescue

falcon 9 debris leaves a 60 foot scar on the moon and nasa just photographed it Getting the photograph took six days of orbital waiting. NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter needed its own track and a freshly made scar on the moon to fall into alignment, and then had to roll onto its side so its cameras looked straight down at terrain 60 miles beneath it.

Falcon 9 Debris Leaves a 60-Foot Scar on the Moon, and NASA Just Photographed It

same receptor two routes cambridge team maps the brain circuits behind obesity drugs Here is a puzzle that has nagged metabolism researchers for years: two obesity drugs hit the same receptor in completely opposite ways, and patients lose weight either way. A mouse study out of Cambridge has now supplied an answer, and it is not that one drug wins the tug-of-war. The two classes were never competing for the same target — they operate in different parts of the brain.

Same receptor, two routes: Cambridge team maps the brain circuits behind obesity drugs

double chooz measures the faint antineutrino afterglow of a reactor thats already switched off Power down a nuclear reactor and the core doesn't fall silent. It merely fades.

Double Chooz measures the faint antineutrino afterglow of a reactor that’s already switched off

197 people no cameras german researchers id strangers using nothing but everyday wifi Researchers at Germany's Karlsruhe Institute of Technology sat 197 volunteers in front of a bog-standard WiFi setup and worked out who each one was with almost 100% accuracy. There was no camera involved. Nobody needed a phone in their pocket. All it took was the radio traffic your router is already scattering around the room.

197 people, no cameras: German researchers ID strangers using nothing but everyday WiFi

kyoto researchers turn 1200 starlink satellites into an upper atmosphere imaging array Roughly 99 percent of the gas in Earth's upper atmosphere carries no electrical charge — and that neutral majority happens to be the portion our instruments have the hardest time detecting. The remaining fraction, the ionosphere's ionized gas, is comparatively simple to track: charged particles disturb the passage of radio waves and leave behind a signature that can genuinely be measured.

Kyoto researchers turn 1,200 Starlink satellites into an upper-atmosphere imaging array

esa will livestream the aug 12 total solar eclipse from a spanish mountaintop totality runs just 81 seconds On Aug. 12, 2026, the strip of ground where the Moon covers the Sun completely barely grazes Europe. Greenland, Iceland, a sliver of northeastern Portugal, and then Spain — that's the list. The rest of the continent is left with a partial eclipse, and that is a wholly different thing to witness.

ESA will livestream the Aug. 12 total solar eclipse from a Spanish mountaintop — totality runs just 81 seconds

voyager 2 gets a power reprieve nasas big bang buys the probe another year Since the Nixon years, Voyager 2 has shed roughly 4 watts of usable power annually — and that slow bleed was on track to claim yet another one of its science instruments before 2026 ended.

Voyager 2 Gets a Power Reprieve: NASA’s “Big Bang” Buys the Probe Another Year

no needle required oral glp 1 pill trims up to 12 of body weight in 36 weeks A pill you can swallow with breakfast — or without it — that takes twelve percent of your body weight off over 36 weeks. That is the number coming out of a randomized phase II trial of aleniglipron published in Nature Medicine, and the fact that it is a pill matters every bit as much as the percentage.

No needle required: oral GLP-1 pill trims up to 12% of body weight in 36 weeks

washu fuel cell breakthrough targets data centers that keep draining the grid Start with 9%, not with catalyst chemistry. That is the share of annual U.S. electricity generation the Electric Power Research Institute estimates data centers could be consuming by 2030, against 4% of total electricity demand in 2023. Everything else here is an answer to that gap.

WashU fuel cell breakthrough targets data centers that keep draining the grid