Titan’s winter polar vortex imaged by the Cassini Spacecraft’s ISS camera. The vortex is now in deep winter and can only be seen because the polar clouds within the vortex extend high above Titan’s surface into the sunlight. The vortex was extremely cold from 2012-2015 giving rise to unusual nitrile ice clouds. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute/Jason Major

A new study led by a University of Bristol earth scientist has shown that recently reported unexpected behaviour on Titan, the largest moon of Saturn, is due to its unique atmospheric chemistry. Titan’s polar atmosphere recently experiences and unexpected and significant cooling, contrary to all model predictions and differing from the behaviour of all other terrestrial planets in our solar system.

Titan is the largest moo...

Penn researchers leading the DARPA-funded Restoring Active Memory project constructed the first whole-brain map of electrical connectivity in the brain based on data from nearly 300 neurosurgical patients. Above, the image on the left represents the ~30,000 electrodes used in the study. On the right is a rendering of a whole-brain network derived from electrical activity during memory processing. Credit: Image courtesy of University of Pennsylvania

A team of neuroscientists at the University of Pennsylvania has constructed the first whole-brain map of electrical connectivity in the brain based on data from nearly 300 neurosurgical patients with electrodes implanted directly on the brain...

Tim Potteiger, a Ph.D. student in electrical engineering, tests his battery-switching device on a levitating electric vehicle in the School of Engineering. Credit: Joe Howell/Vanderbilt University

Nissan Leafs, which go about 107 miles on a charge, sometimes end up relegated to commuter cars due to battery-range worries. The mass-market, standard Tesla Model 3 can go double that but still can be disconcerting on long road trips. Both batteries could work up to 50% longer with a device provisionally patented by Vanderbilt University’s Ken Pence, professor of the practice of engineering management, and Tim Potteiger, a Ph.D. student in electrical engineering...

Moon crust formation graphic. Credit: The University of Texas at Austin/Jackson School of Geosciences

A team led by The University of Texas at Austin Jackson School of Geosciences took to the lab to recreate the magmatic melt that once formed the lunar surface and uncovered new insights on how the modern moonscape came to be. Their study shows that the Moon’s crust initially formed from rock floating to the surface of the magma ocean and cooling. However, the team also found that one of the great mysteries of the lunar body’s formation – how it could develop a crust composed of just one mineral – cannot be explained by the initial crust formation and must have been the result of some secondary event.

“It’s fascinating to me that there could be a body as big as the Moon that was completely ...