Salad in Space? New Research says it’s Not a Healthy Choice

Salad in space? New study says it's not a healthy choice
Researchers at the University of Delaware are looking at how plants grown in space are more prone to infections of Salmonella compared to plants not grown in space or grown under gravity simulations. Credit: Evan Krape / University of Delaware

Salad in space? New research says it’s not a healthy choice. It’s been more than three years since the National Aeronautics and Space Administration made space-grown lettuce an item on the menu for astronauts aboard the International Space Station. Alongside their space diet staples of flour tortillas and powdered coffee, astronauts can munch on a salad, grown from control chambers aboard the ISS that account for the ideal temperature, amount of water and light that plants need to mature.

But there is a problem...

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Scientists discover First Therapeutic Target for Preserving Heart Function in Patients with Pulmonary Hypertension

heart
Human heart. Credit: copyright American Heart Association

A research team has discovered a possible therapeutic target for pulmonary hypertension. The study, published in the journal Science Advances, identifies the first therapeutic target that can be modulated to preserve cardiac function in pulmonary hypertension, providing hope in the fight against this rare but fatal disease for which there is currently no cure.

Pulmonary hypertension is a condition of elevated blood pressure in the arteries that carry deoxygenated blood to the lungs. This increased pulmonary blood pressure puts the heart under continuous strain as it has to work harder to pump blood to the lungs.

Pulmonary hypertension affects between 15 and 50 people per million of the world’s population...

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Cobalt-free Batteries could Power Cars of the Future

A molecular lattice is on the right, and glowing pink spheres on the left. An arrow leads pink spheres to the lattice.
A new MIT battery material could offer a more sustainable way to power electric cars. Instead of cobalt or nickel, the new lithium-ion battery includes a cathode based on organic materials. In this image, lithium molecules are shown in glowing pink.
Credits:Image: Courtesy of the researchers. Edited by MIT News.

Many electric vehicles are powered by batteries that contain cobalt—a metal that carries high financial, environmental, and social costs.

MIT researchers have now designed a battery material that could offer a more sustainable way to power electric cars. The new lithium-ion battery includes a cathode based on organic materials, instead of cobalt or nickel (another metal often used in lithium-ion batteries).

In a new study, the researchers showed that this material, which...

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Lightest Black Hole or Heaviest Neutron Star? MeerKAT Uncovers a Mysterious Object in Milky Way

An artist’s impression of the system assuming that the massive companion star is a black hole. The brightest background star is its orbital companion, the radio pulsar PSR J0514-4002E. The two stars are separated by 8 million km and circle each other every 7 days.
Credit: Daniëlle Futselaar (artsource.nl)

An international team of astronomers have found a new and unknown object in the Milky Way that is heavier than the heaviest neutron stars known and yet simultaneously lighter than the lightest black holes known.

Using the MeerKAT Radio Telescope, astronomers from a number of institutions including The University of Manchester and the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Germany found an object in orbit around a rapidly spinning millisecond pulsar located around 40,000 ligh...

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