Early measurements of field strengths in molecular clouds were based on radiation from molecules whose energy levels are sensitive to magnetic field strengths. Those data suggested the fields were of moderate strength, but those conclusions were tentative. More recent observations with stronger signals measured the polarized radiation from dust grains aligned with the magnetic field. These observations obtain the field strength from the changes in field direction across the cloud map....

An international research collaboration headed by the University of Sydney has created technology that allows for the production of materials that mirror the structure of living blood vessels, with major implications for the future of surgery. Preclinical research showed that once the manufactured blood vessel was transplanted into mice, the body accepted it and new cells and tissue began to develop in the appropriate locations, thereby converting it into a “living blood vessel....

If you stumble upon an unusual rock that could be a meteorite, do not place a magnet on it to see if it’s magnetic – you’d end up erasing 4.5 billion years of magnetic history. Meteorites are remnants of our solar system’s first protoplanets and, in some cases, retain a record of the magnetic fields they’ve experienced in the distant past. “As planetary scientists, we’re interested in understanding how protoplanets formed and evolved prior to the formation of the planets we know today,” said Clara Maurel, a Ph....

The use of a tether assisted system could prevent an asteroid impacting Earth without the risk of fragmentation. Our planet exists within the vicinity of thousands of Near-Earth Objects (NEOs), some of which – Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) – carry the risk of impacting Earth causing major damage to infrastructure and loss of life. Methods to mitigate such a collision are highly desirable. A new paper published in EPJ Special Topics, authored by Flaviane Venditti, Planetary Radar Department, Arecibo Observatory, University of Central Florida, Arecibo, suggests the use of a tether assisted system to prevent PHA impact....

For many years, beer was brewed in open, horizontal vats. However, the industry transitioned to using large, closed vessels in the 1970s because they are simpler to fill, empty, and clean, allowing brewing in greater volumes while also incurring lower expenses. However, because of insufficient flavor production, these modern techniques produced lower-quality beer. During fermentation, yeast transforms half of the sugar in the mash into ethanol and half into carbon dioxide....

MIT researchers have created an inhalable version of mRNA, which might lead to novel therapies for lung illness. According to the researchers, this aerosol could be administered directly to the lungs to help treat diseases such as cystic fibrosis. “We think the ability to deliver mRNA via inhalation could allow us to treat a range of different diseases of the lung,” says Daniel Anderson, an associate professor in MIT’s Department of Chemical Engineering, a member of MIT’s Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research and Institute for Medical Engineering and Science (IMES), and the senior author of the study....

Already the 2022 Monkeypox outbreak has infected more than 28,000 people in the U.S. and more than 78,000 globally in more than 100 countries worldwide. Similar to COVID-19, mutations have enabled the virus to grow stronger and smarter, evading antiviral drugs and vaccines in its mission to infect more people. Now, the specific mutations in the monkeypox virus that contribute to its continued infectiousness have been identified by a team of researchers at the University of Missouri....

Cigarette smokers who quit smoking but substitute e-cigarettes, or other tobacco product, are more likely to relapse. The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have suggested that smokers who are unable to quit smoking may benefit by switching from smoking cigarettes to vaping e-cigarettes if they switch completely and are able to avoid relapsing to cigarette smoking. However, there have been few studies on whether smokers are able to transition to e-cigarettes—battery-operated devices that heat a liquid made of nicotine, flavorings and other chemicals to make an aerosol that users inhale into their lungs—without relapsing back to cigarette smoking....

Tuberculosis is most commonly associated with lung infections, however, in 2% of cases in the United States, it also affects the bones. This is a painful condition that leaves the bones looking like they’ve been gnawed. The 9,000-year-old skeletons of some Egyptian mummies exhibit telltale signs of having tuberculosis infection in their bones.It was a weird puzzle when Duke physician Jason Stout M.D. encountered a peculiar Wake County, North Carolina tuberculosis outbreak in the mid-2000s in which the infection had spread beyond the lungs in six people....

The research used a computer model of gas bubbles flowing through hydrate deposits, a common phenomenon which according to existing models, should not be possible based on physics. The new model helps explain how some deposits grow into massive natural gas hydrate reservoirs, such as those found beneath the Gulf of Mexico. A paper describing the research was published on February 16, 2020, in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. Gas hydrates are an icy substance in which gas molecules, typically methane, become trapped in water-ice cages under high pressure and low temperature....

During the last day in the transit to distant retrograde orbit, flight controllers performed a third in a series of planned star tracker development flight tests relative to the Sun, with a fourth planned for tomorrow. Star trackers are a navigation tool that measure the positions of stars to help the spacecraft determine its orientation. In the first three flight days, engineers evaluated initial data to understand star tracker readings correlated to thruster firings....

Beginning Thursday evening, teams conducted thorough assessments at Launch Complex 39B, closely inspecting SLS, Orion, mobile launcher, and other pad-related assets. They confirmed that there were no significant impacts from Hurricane Nicole, which made landfall more than 70 miles (110 km) south of the launch pad. The physical inspections supplemented remote monitoring using sensors and high-resolution cameras performed during the storm by a team in a safe location at Kennedy Space Center....

Working with the Department of Defense’s Space Surveillance Network, the team has verified that ICON remains intact. The ICON mission team is working to troubleshoot the issue and has narrowed the cause of the communication loss to problems within the avionics or radio-frequency communications subsystems. The team is currently unable to determine the health of the spacecraft, and the lack of a downlink signal could be indicative of a system failure....

The close approach (known as perihelion), also at a record distance, occurred at 4:25 a.m. EST (8:25 UTC), with Parker Solar Probe moving 364,660 miles per hour (586,864 kilometers per hour). The milestone also marked the midway point in the mission’s 10th solar encounter, which began November 16 and continues through November 26. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkjns APL/Steve Gribben The spacecraft entered the encounter in good health, with all systems operating normally....

What looks like a shooting target is actually an image of nested rings of X-ray light centered on an erupting black hole. On June 30, a team led by Andrew Beardmore at the University of Leicester, U.K., imaged the system using the X-ray Telescope aboard Swift, revealing a series concentric rings extending about one-third the apparent size of a full moon. A movie made by combining additional observations acquired on July 2 and 4 shows the expansion and gradual fading of the rings....

TESS primarily hunts for worlds beyond our solar system, also known as exoplanets. But its sensitive measurements of stellar brightness make TESS ideal for studying stellar oscillations, an area of research called asteroseismology. “Our initial result, using stellar measurements across TESS’s first two years, shows that we can determine the masses and sizes of these oscillating giants with precision that will only improve as TESS goes on,” said Marc Hon, a NASA Hubble Fellow at the University of Hawaii in Honolulu....

“We designed the Webb observatory to see the first lights that turned on in our universe. When I saw the first images released, I was struck with awe, wonder, and the satisfaction of knowing that whatever is out there, Webb will see it,” said Mike Menzel, NASA mission systems engineer for Webb at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. TIME named Webb a Best Invention in the “Design” category....

Millie Hughes-Fulford, PhD, a UC San Francisco scientist who flew in June 1991 aboard the first space shuttle mission dedicated to biomedical studies, died February 2 at the age of 75. She was the first woman to fly as a NASA payload specialist and was part of the first crew to include three women. On that nine-day mission aboard the space shuttle Columbia, Hughes-Fulford helped complete more than 18 experiments, which included herself and fellow crew members as subjects, as well as rodents and jellyfish....

NASA Television and the agency’s website continue to provide live coverage of the ascent. About 12 minutes after launch, Dragon separates from the Falcon 9 rocket’s second stage and begins a carefully choreographed series of thruster firings to reach the space station. The latest SpaceX Dragon resupply spacecraft is bound for the International Space Station after launching at 3:14 a.m. EDT Sunday on a Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, carrying more than 4,800 pounds of science experiments, crew supplies, and spacecraft hardware....

Stagljar is a professor of biochemistry and molecular genetics in the Donnelly Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research at U of T’s Temerty Faculty of Medicine. Last spring, with support from U of T’s Toronto COVID-19 Action Fund, his team began developing a new method for measuring immunity to coronavirus in those who recovered from COVID-19. They are now ready to reveal their creation — a pinprick test that accurately measures in under one hour concentration of coronavirus antibodies in blood....