China is in the spotlight after replicating organisms and returning to our natural satellite. Here is the testament of the most famous theoretical physicist. Studies rewriting the prehistoric period. The article lists the top ten scientific studies from recent months.
China is conducting a new experiment with macaques
Thanks to two eight-month-old monkeys, the topic of cloning is again becoming relevant. The birth of Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua, two female macaques, was announced on 24 January. Put together (Zhonghua), their names make up the phrase "Chinese people." And it was in this country that the most progressive (at least from an ethical point of view) steps in science were made. Many Western laboratories have abandoned this technique: there are already simpler ways to obtain stem cells. However, the Shanghai scientists have not forgotten the main direction of these studies. After Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua, the transition to man seems less incredible. It is no coincidence that at the end of November, the news of the birth of the first girls with modified DNA came from China.
Dinosaurs: boom after the flood
Somewhere between 232 and 234 million years ago, something happened. After that, a layer of reddish brittle rocks remained on Earth at very distant points from each other - from the Dolomites to South America. Scientists from the Science Museum (Muse) of Trento and the University of Ferrara today have a hypothesis published on April 16 in the journal Nature Communications. It was probably a kind of worldwide flood: prolonged, unrelenting rain caused by volcanic eruptions, increased CO2 and climate change. The so-called Carnic pluvial episode also caused an upheaval in the ecosystem. Dinosaurs, which before the flood represented 5-10% of animal species found in the form of fossils, after the end of the cataclysms accounted for 80%.
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Expansion of the universe
Astrophysicist Stephen Hawking died on March 14. His latest research, published posthumously in late April, leaves us with a legacy of a universe devoid of one of its most pressing problems - eternal inflation. We are talking about a hypothesis in which it is believed that the universe, when it appeared, expanded in a split second, provoking the birth of a new universe with relatively new inflation. And so on, in the endless process of the emergence of universes. Hawking worked until his death on an alternative hypothesis, heading the last article "A smooth exit from eternal inflation?" (A Smooth Exit from Eternal Inflation?). The question mark at the end remains as a reminder that this is only a hypothesis. However, even the benefit of doubt is already a wonderful gift. The last one before parting with the scientist.
Neutrinos and the black hole in Antarctica
Such a small messenger with such a huge message. The IceCube detector in Antarctica captured IC-170922A neutrinos, telling us a story spanning five billion years. That is how long the particle traveled, avoiding a huge black hole, moving in the direction of Orion. Researchers would not have been able to decipher this signal without the help of 15 other experiments on Earth and in space, which described the cataclysm taking place after analyzing the emissions of gamma rays, that is, photons with the highest energy levels. Even if the "capture" of a neutrino dates back to September 2017, the publication of the data of his "interrogation" took place on July 12. This is a new stage in the development of the so-called multichannel astronomy, which uses many instruments to observe this unique phenomenon.
Italian radar detects the presence of water on Mars
It is drier than the driest desert on Earth. But something indicates that Mars once had a lot of water. Dry river beds and streams have been spotted on the planet's surface by space probes. This year, the Italian Marsis radar, orbiting the Red Planet on the MarsExpress probe of the interplanetary station, found the first evidence of liquid water on it. The Martian lake is not on the surface, tormented by winds and cosmic rays, but under ice 1.5 kilometers thick near its south pole. The 99% Italian discovery, which brought together young researchers on an intermittent basis, earned a spot on the cover of Science magazine on July 25th. Team Leader Roberto Orosei,invited to talk about it at the Nobel Prize ceremony in Stockholm.
If in Siberia mom is a Neanderthal
And even more amazing. Homo sapiens and Neanderthal. Neanderthal man and Denisov man. A fairly diverse mating took place between our ancestors. Confirmation of this appeared on August 22 in a publication of the journal Nature: one woman 90 thousand years ago, discovered in a cave in Siberia, possessed DNA, which apparently indicated her hybrid origin. The woman's mother was a Neanderthal, and her father was a Denisovan man. It also became clear after some time and thanks to a number of discoveries that meetings between Homo sapiens and Neanderthals, previously considered random, occurred frequently and regularly, and even to this day - as scientists estimate - about 2% of the genome of Europeans and Asians is the heritage of our ancient ancestors …Even the shape of the skull - according to Current Biology magazine on December 13 - depends on our distant ancestors: those with an elongated shape should thank the Neanderthals for it.
Bull on a stone, the first cave painting
How did this bull appear in the cave? Big-bellied, on thin legs, with a stripe of ocher that stands out from the side (probably an arrow) - this bull, painted on a rock, is considered the first example of fine art and was created 40 thousand years ago. At first glance, it appears to be just a colored spot, and it is far from immediately possible to identify a pattern in it. However, we are in Lubang Jereji Saleh Cave in Borneo, where thousands of rock art, some of the oldest, have been found in the past few years. So, a group of Australian scientists decided to publish their observations in the journal Nature on November 7. The first drawing was found in South Africa this year. It is 73 thousand years old, but this is not a subject painting: this network of horizontal and vertical lines can be compared to a hashtag grid.
InSight's soft landing on Mars
60% of the probes that tried to land on Mars crashed on its surface. Therefore, on November 26, when InSight entered the atmosphere of the red planet and proceeded to land (the so-called six and a half minutes of horror), NASA scientists gripped their chairs tightly. Everything went according to instructions, and the US space agency confirmed its special relationship with Mars (only he owns the successful "landing"). The first photographs showed a probe with deployed solar panels, located in the Elysium Highlands, and a few hundred meters away - a thermal shield and a parachute, thanks to which the landing was carried out. The InSight mission, scheduled for the entire 2019, is to record earthquakes on the Red Planet.
Record approach of the probe to the Sun
Never before has a probe observed the Sun so close. At 27 million kilometers from it, the temperature already reaches a thousand degrees (and closer - already 1300). The Parker Solar Probe, a NASA instrument, photographed a corona of electrically charged plasma particles on November 8 that was transformed into a kind of fiery tongue due to the effect of the solar wind. However, the Parker Solar Probe, which took off on August 12, the result of a project conceived as much as 60 years ago, will reach a distance of six million kilometers in 2024, moving at a maximum speed of 190 kilometers per second (another record). The biggest mystery surrounding our star is why the corona is 300 times hotter than the surface. However, the probe will also have to determine what is the origin of the huge acceleration of the solar wind.
Beijing flies to the dark side of the moon
The flight took place on December 8. The direction of the ship is the dark side of the moon. China plans to land a lunar rover on its surface in order to make the next scientific discovery of the year. The explorer robot is called "Chang'e-4" after the moon goddess from Chinese mythology. It will reach the moon, probably in January, making a lunar landing in one of the most irregular zones: the Karmane crater, near the south pole, where one of the largest and oldest asteroids struck our satellite. According to Beijing media reports, the mission's goal is to plant potatoes and other seeds in the lunar soil. The target is ambitious, given that the constant darkness and temperatures of around -173 degrees will make it difficult to even power the probe.
Elena Dusi