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The research group’s results suggest that galaxies including Segue-1, Bootes I, Tucana II, and Ursa Major I are, in fact, some of the first galaxies ever formed, thought to be over 13 billion years old. Their findings are published in The Astrophysical Journal. When the Universe was about 380,000 years old, the very first atoms formed. These were hydrogen atoms, the simplest element in the periodic table. These atoms collected into clouds and began to cool gradually and settle into the small clumps or “halos” of dark matter that emerged from the Big Bang....

The nebula Messier 78 takes center stage in this image taken with the Wide Field Imager on the MPG/ESO 2.2-meter telescope at the La Silla Observatory in Chile, while the stars powering the bright display take a backseat. The brilliant starlight ricochets off dust particles in the nebula, illuminating it with scattered blue light. Igor Chekalin was the overall winner of ESO’s Hidden Treasures 2010 astrophotography competition with his image of this stunning object....

“We’re carrying on NASA’s legacy by designing an advanced spacesuit that will allow astronauts to operate safely and effectively on the Moon,” said Michael T. Suffredini, Axiom Space president and CEO. “Axiom Space’s Artemis III spacesuit will be ready to meet the complex challenges of the lunar south pole and help grow our understanding of the Moon in order to enable a long-term presence there.” The new Axiom Extravehicular Mobility Unit (AxEMU) spacesuit that was revealed today at Space Center Houston’s Moon 2 Mars Festival is a prototype, with a full fleet of training spacesuits to be delivered to NASA by late this summer....

The bacterium Escherichia coli takes about 20 minutes to duplicate in optimal conditions. Biological physicists state that the bacteria are impressively close to the limit established by the laws of physics. The scientists published their findings in a preprint arXiv. Jeremy England, a biological physicist at MIT in Cambridge wanted to examine how living systems seemed to defy the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Life doesn’t defy the second law of thermodynamics because it produces entropy in the form of heat to compensate for its state of orderliness....

Bats can broaden and narrow their visual field by modulating the frequency of their vocalizations they use to navigate and find prey. The scientists published their findings in the journal Nature. Bats find their way through the depths of night by emitting sonar signal and using the return echoes to create a map of their surroundings. This process, called echolocation, allows them to be proficient nocturnal predators. It’s been long known that smaller bats emit higher-frequency squeaks, and it was thought that the difference arises because the smaller animals must catch smaller insects, from which low-frequency sound waves with long wavelengths do not reflect well....

Now, a team of engineers at the University of Michigan have stacked a second layer of transistors directly atop a state-of-the-art silicon chip. They propose that their design could remove the need for a second chip that converts between high- and-low voltage signals, which currently stands between the low-voltage processing chips and the higher-voltage user interfaces. “Our approach can achieve better performance in a smaller, lighter package,” said Becky Peterson, an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science and project leader....

The research, published April 3 in Nature Communications, is also central to the recent awarding of two grants totaling $600,000 from the Connecticut Bioscience Innovation Fund and the Blavatnik Fund for Innovation at Yale. Andrew Miranker, a professor of molecular biophysics and biochemistry and of chemical & environmental engineering, and his team will use these funds to translate the discoveries into novel therapies for type 2 diabetes. Part of this effort includes the formation of a new biotechnology company, ADM Therapeutics, based in Connecticut....

Sunlight reflected by solar cells is lost as unused energy. The wings of the butterfly Pachliopta aristolochiae are drilled by nanostructures (nanoholes) that help absorb light over a wide spectrum far better than smooth surfaces. Researchers of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have now succeeded in transferring these nanostructures to solar cells and, thus, enhancing their light absorption rate by up to 200 percent. The scientists report their results in the journal Science Advances....

Molecular Link Between Chronic Pain and Depression Revealed Researchers at Hokkaido University have identified the brain mechanism linking chronic pain and depression in rats. Their research, which was recently published in The Journal of Neuroscience, could lead to the development of new treatments for chronic pain and depression. “Clinicians have known for a long time that chronic pain often leads to depression, however the brain mechanism for this was unclear,” said Professor Masabumi Minami at Hokkaido University, one of the authors of the paper....

The team will try to understand the history of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, which has the potential to reveal how the glacier has waxed and waned over time. Roughly 380 subglacial lakes have been discovered and mapped in Antarctica, and they have been explored remotely with ice-penetrating radar, gravity measurements, and seismic sensors. The lakes were created by geothermal heat that melts the Antarctic ice from below. Gravity and pressure force the melt water to flow, and it collects under the ice....

Each “day” in the series is made by averaging three days’ worth of measurements, a technique used to eliminate data gaps. Green indicates concentrations of carbon monoxide at approximately 100 parts per billion by volume (ppbv); yellow, at about 120 ppbv; and dark red, at about 160 ppbv. Local values can be significantly higher. A pollutant that can travel large distances, carbon monoxide can persist in the atmosphere for about a month....

NASA’s Cassini mission continues its adventures in extraterrestrial oceanography with new findings about the hydrocarbon seas on Saturn’s moon Titan. The findings are being presented this week at the Division for Planetary Sciences Meeting of the American Astronomical Society held in Tucson, Arizona. To the delight of Cassini scientists, two new bright features appeared in Titan’s largest sea, Kraken Mare, during the August 21 flyby. In contrast to a previously reported bright, mystery feature in another of Titan’s large seas, Ligeia Mare, the new features in Kraken Mare were observed in both radar data and images from Cassini’s Visible and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS)....

Study first to show how some toxins and drugs enter cells. For decades, scientists have wondered how large molecules such as proteins pass through cell walls, also known as plasma membranes, without leaving a trace. That ability is part of what makes certain drugs ­­­­– including some cancer treatments and the COVID-19 vaccine – work. And it is also how bacterial toxins enter human cells and wreak havoc. One such example is diphtheria toxin, which is produced by Corynebacterium diphtheriae and causes diphtheria, a serious and potentially fatal bacterial infection of the nose and throat....

A new study of NGC 2024 and the Orion Nebula Cluster show stars on the outskirts of these clusters are older than those in the middle. This differs from predictions of the simplest ideas for how stars like our Sun should form in these clusters. The data show early notions of how star clusters are formed cannot be correct. The simplest idea is stars form into clusters when a giant cloud of gas and dust condenses....

This black hole bounty consists of stellar-mass black holes, which typically weigh between five to 30 times the mass of the Sun. These newly identified black holes were found within three light years — a relatively short distance on cosmic scales — of the supermassive black hole at our Galaxy’s center known as Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*). Theoretical studies of the dynamics of stars in galaxies have indicated that a large population of stellar mass black holes — as many as 20,000 — could drift inward over the eons and collect around Sgr A*....

“This study adds to growing evidence showing the profound effectiveness of the Montreal Protocol. Not only has the treaty spurred healing of the ozone layer, it’s also driving recent changes in Southern Hemisphere air circulation patterns,” said lead author Antara Banerjee, a CIRES Visiting Fellow at the University of Colorado Boulder who works in the Chemical Sciences Division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). She started this work as a Postdoctoral Fellow at Columbia University....

A Johns Hopkins Children’s Center-led study in mice and lab-grown cells finds sulforaphane could help prevent and treat illnesses caused by certain coronaviruses, including COVID-19. Researchers at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center report evidence from lab experiments that a chemical derived from a compound found abundantly in broccoli and other cruciferous plants may offer a potentially new and potent weapon against the viruses that cause COVID-19 and the common cold. COVID-19 has already killed more than 6 million people worldwide, and studies have shown that common colds cost an estimated economic loss of $25 billion in the U....

The study was conducted by a team of scientists at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, led by Greg Delgoffe, Ph.D., Pitt associate professor of immunology. By disrupting the effect of the tumor microenvironment on immune cells in mice, the researchers were able to shrink tumors, prolong survival and increase sensitivity to immunotherapy. “The majority of people don’t respond to immunotherapy,” said Delgoffe. “The reason is that we don’t really understand how the immune system is regulated within this altered tumor microenvironment....

The “Third Pole” of the Earth, the high mountain ranges of Asia, bears the largest number of glaciers outside the polar regions. A Sino-Swiss research team has revealed the dramatic increase in flood risk that could occur across Earth’s icy Third Pole in response to ongoing climate change. Focusing on the threat from new lakes forming in front of rapidly retreating glaciers, a team, led by researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE), Switzerland, demonstrated that the related flood risk to communities and their infrastructure could almost triple....

The remarkable tetrahedral structure has now been imaged for the first time with a scanning tunneling microscope. This high-tech microscope can visualize single atoms. It operates at extremely low temperatures (269 degrees below zero) and uses quantum tunneling of an electrical current from a sharp scanning metallic tip through the cluster and into the support. Quantum tunneling is a process where electrical current flows between two conductors without any physical contact between them....