They're finally back! Two astronauts who were on an eight-day mission ended up spending nine months in space.

@AssociatedPress has the details on their SpaceX capsule splashdown: https://flip.it/Jq.SWF

“The identification and official registration of a new species can take up to 13-and-a-half years—meaning some species may go extinct before they are even documented,” the organization says.

https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2025/03/ocean-census-new-species/

After researchers at an Antarctic base accused one of their team members of becoming violent and unstable, South Africa’s Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment says the situation is now “under control.” Read more about the case from @CBSNews
https://flip.it/C8mtnk
#Antarctica #Research #SouthAfrica #Science #Environment

Scientists Just Snapped the Clearest Image of the Universe’s First Light
https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-just-snapped-the-clearest-image-of-the-universes-first-light/
#Space #cosmology #science

Geriatric Penguins Get a ‘Retirement Home’ at New England Aquarium https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/16/science/penguin-retirement-home-aquarium.html #science

Behavioral studies in animals are biased toward those species that are easy to access and study. The effect is illustrated by an analysis of online videos of parrots, which revealed tool use in 17 species not previously reported--increasing the number of species showing this behavior from 3% to 7%.

https://www.cell.com/iscience/fulltext/S2589-0042(25)00417-1

Excerpts from a very disturbing op-ed about the growing use of petrochemicals in producing the foods we eat…
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Fossil fuels are on track to be an even bigger presence in our food system. As sectors like transport are decarbonizing, the oil industry has its sights on food, particularly through petrochemicals. An estimated 74% of all petrochemicals are already used for agricultural fertilizer and plastic.

The International Energy Agency projects that by 2050 half of all oil and gas will be used for petrochemicals. Based on current levels, 40% of that will be going into our food system in the form of plastics and fertilizers.

Chemical companies are now introducing microplastic-coated pesticides and fertilizers. Along with increasing the presence of plastics in food production and threatening public health, microplastics used this way dissolve in the soil, impacting soil health, reducing how much water soils can retain, and destroying healthy microorganisms essential for nutrient cycling.
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FULL ESSAY -- https://civileats.com/2025/03/11/op-ed-the-food-system-cannot-become-another-fossil-fuel-industry-escape-hatch/

HT > @jblue

Who says #science is not a growth business?

"Springer Nature has announced its results for the financial year 2024. Revenue was €1,847 million, representing, on an underlying basis, a 5% increase over the same period in 2023. Adjusted operating profit increased to €512 million, equating to underlying growth of 7%."

and a profit margin of nearly 28%

https://www.researchinformation.info/news/springer-profits-up-to-e512-million/

Scientists in China have developed a new cancer treatment by engineering tumors to mimic pork, triggering the body's immune system to attack them with precision. Using a genetically modified virus, they disguise cancer cells as foreign pig tissue, leading to a hyperacute immune rejection response that attacks the tumors while leaving healthy cells intact. The study was published in the journal Cell on January 18, 2025.

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3302422/chinese-scientists-turn-tumours-pork-radical-cancer-treatment

What Counts as a Planet?

by Patricia Fara

The scientific disagreement about whether Pluto is a planet is just the latest war in the classifications of planets.

https://www.historytoday.com/archive/great-debates/what-counts-planet

You couldn't write a dystopian novel with a grimmer plot than what we are witnessing in reality.

Here's how the story goes: Capitalism cuts down all the forests in search of profits, strip-mines the Earth in search of profits, pollutes our air and our water in search of profits... and now, what's left?

Oh, wait, say the capitalists, we haven't dug down into the deep sea yet in search of profits, er, um, minerals. And guess what, we can pretend we're doing that for the sake of the climate and environment!

Yeah, that's the idea. We need those minerals to make electric cars. So it's a win-win. We'll make billions more in profits, AND we'll make ourselves look good by promoting Green Growth!
________________________________

LEARN MORE https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2025/mar/12/as-countries-scramble-for-minerals-the-seabed-beckons-will-mining-it-be-a-disaster-visual-explainer

If you are involved in any way in helping to organize a conference in the US at this time, it is imperative that you offer online attendance and speaker options.

And not just because it's the right thing to do for environmental and accessibility reasons (but you should do it for those reasons, anyway).

A century of quantum physics

https://www.nature.com/immersive/d41586-025-00357-z/index.html – Especial en Nature sobre el centenario de la física cuántica

Preventie, opsporing, behandeling

Dankzij doorbraken in kankeronderzoek zijn sommige vormen van kanker, die eerder als ongeneeslijk werden beschouwd, nu beter te behandelen. Aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam (UvA) werken artsen en onderzoekers uit verschillende vakgebieden aan de volgende generatie kankerdoorbraken: van diagnose en behandeling tot zorg en ondersteuning. #science

https://www.uva.nl/nieuws-agenda/nieuws/features/kanker-bestrijdenlevens-verbeteren.html

Without scientists, who will grasp the complexities of environmental crises, advocate for evidence-based decisions, or even recognize the dangers in the first place?

But hey, who needs science when we can rely on gut feelings, political whims, or perhaps return to reading tea leaves?

And when disaster inevitably strikes, we can all feign surprise and pin the blame on a rogue scientist or, better yet, a convenient witch.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/17/climate/trump-eliminates-epa-science.html?unlocked_article_code=1.404.aeUC.tdm1nbDIVEL2&referringSource=articleShare

I can’t get over the cognitive dissonance of spending 12 hours of intense work in clinic, using every minute of my 25 years of training and experience to formulate treatment plans for my patients with #cancer, and then to come home and check the news and to read about every part of the infrastructure needed to attain the knowledge for these treatment plans bring intentionally dismantled

Things are a big mess around Saturn.

A new study has identified 128 more moons around the planet, bringing the total to 274. And a whole group of Saturn's moons seem to be shattered bits from a collision in the (astronomically) recent past.

https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/its-official-saturn-has-128-new-moons/ #space #science #astronomy

As the great authoritarian alignment continues in the #USA , nations that have collaborative work with various US Federal Level agencies need to protect their commitments and secure results.

https://www.science.org.au/news-and-events/news-and-media-releases/statement-on-us-government-intervention-in-australia-us-research-collaboration

In the fourth episode of the Climate Chronicles' first season, Becoming Human, Professor Dagomar Degroot explores how our hominin ancestors learned to cope with, and even exploit, the wildly fluctuating climate of the Pleistocene. He uses the extraordinary migration of a hominin species named Homo erectus to introduce the concept of resilience: a key but contested term that can help us understand our fate on a warming world.

Listen here: https://theclimatechronicles.com/2025/02/04/episode-5-miracles-of-resilience/