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    Perseverance’s Robotic Arm starts Conducting Science

    May 13, 2021, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Perseverance’s robotic arm starts conducting science
    NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover used its dual-camera Mastcam-Z imager to capture this image of “Santa Cruz,” a hill about 1.5 miles (2.5 kilometers) away from the rover, on April 29, 2021, the 68th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The entire scene is inside of Mars’ Jezero Crater; the crater’s rim can be seen on the horizon line beyond the hill. Credit: Jet Propulsion Laboratory

    NASA’s newest Mars rover is beginning to study the floor of an ancient crater that once held a lake. Perseverance has been busy serving as a communications base station for the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter and documenting the rotorcraft’s historic flights. But the rover has also been busy focusing its science instruments on rocks that lay on the floor of Jezero Crater.

    What insights they turn up will help sc...

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    New Genetic Copycatchers Detect Efficient and precise CRISPR Editing in a Living Organism

    May 12, 2021, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    Red fluorescent detector proteins in fruit flies reveal detection from an actual copying experiment (left) and how perfect copying would appear (right). Fluorescent cells in the left panel also lack the function of a pigmentation gene called “pale” due to copying of the CopyCatcher element, which eliminates function of both copies of the pale gene. Control flies in the right panel, which have only one copy of the pale gene disrupted by insertion of the CopyCatcher (one functional copy of the gene), have bright red cells and normal bristle pigmentation throughout the body. Credit: Zhiqian Li

    Proof-of-principle research shows that genes can be accurately edited in cells throughout the body...

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    Lighting up Biology from Within

    May 12, 2021, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    A biochemical reaction between an enzyme called luciferase and oxygen causes fireflies to glow and is considered one of the most well-known examples of bioluminescence in nature. Source: Shutterstock

    Researchers at the University of Missouri have created a low-cost, portable device that can apply non-invasive bioluminescent imaging technology to many uses in animals, humans.

    A biochemical reaction between an enzyme called luciferase and oxygen causes fireflies to glow and is considered one of the most well-known examples of bioluminescence in nature...

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    Scientists Catch Exciting Magnetic Waves in Action in the Sun’s Photosphere

    May 12, 2021, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Researchers have confirmed the existence of magnetic plasma waves, known as Alfvén waves, in the Sun’s photosphere. The study, published in Nature Astronomy, provides new insights into these fascinating waves that were first discovered by the Nobel Prize winning scientist Hannes Alfvén in 1947.

    The vast potential of these waves resides in their ability to transport energy and information over very large distances due to their purely magnetic nature. The direct discovery of these waves in the solar photosphere, the lowest layer of the solar atmosphere, is the first step towards exploiting the properties of these magnetic waves.

    The ability for Alfvén waves to carry energy is also of interest for solar and plasma-astrophysics as it could help explain the extreme heating of the s...

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