The original black-and-white Pluto “landing” movie can be viewed at: http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/News-Center/News-Article.php?page=20160714-2

What would it be like to actually land on Pluto? This movie was made from more than 100 images taken by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft over 6 weeks of approach and close flyby in the summer of 2015. The video offers a trip down onto the surface of Pluto—starting with a distant view of Pluto and its largest moon, Charon—and leading up to an eventual ride in for a “landing” on the shoreline of Pluto’s informally named Sputnik Planitia.

To create a movie that makes viewers feel as if they’re diving into Pluto, mission scientists had to interpolate some of the panchromatic (black and white) frames based on what they know Pluto looks like to make it as sm...

Researchers find BCX—red pigment abundant in sweet red peppers, paprika, winter and butternut squash, oranges, and tangerines, among other foods—appears to counteract nicotine’s ability to accelerate the growth of lung tumors. Photo: Ingimage

Xiang-Dong Wang, a cancer researcher at Tufts, has spent a long time trying to figure out why carotenoids, the main pigments providing colors that range from yellow and pink to deep orange and red in most fruits and vegetables, seem to keep chronic diseases at bay. When a 2004 study by other researchers showed that eating foods containing beta-cryptoxanthin (BCX)—a red pigment abundant in sweet red peppers, paprika, winter and butternut squash, oranges...

Smart needle which is able to detect blood vessels deep in the body. Credit: University of Adelaide

A new high-tech medical device to make brain surgery safer has been developed by researchers at the University of Adelaide. The tiny imaging probe, encased within a brain biopsy needle, lets surgeons ‘see’ at-risk blood vessels as they insert the needle, allowing them to avoid causing bleeds that can potentially be fatal. The project is a collaboration with the University of Western Australia and Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital. “We call it a smart needle...

As this almost surreal observation of Saturn’s tiny moon Daphnis shows, we’re finally getting a really good look at the small-scale processes that are at work in Saturn’s rings Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

The wavemaker moon, Daphnis, is featured in this view, taken as NASA’s Cassini spacecraft made one of its ring-grazing passes over the outer edges of Saturn’s rings on Jan. 16, 2017. This is the closest view of the small moon obtained yet. Daphnis (5 miles) orbits within the 26-mile wide Keeler Gap. Cassini’s viewing angle causes the gap to appear narrower than it actually is, due to foreshortening.

The little moon’s gravity raises waves in the edges of the gap in both the horizontal and vertical directions...