Science

bipartisan-consensus-in-favor-of-renewable-power-is-ending

Bipartisan consensus in favor of renewable power is ending

Energy, partisanship, public opinion, renewable energy, Science, Sustainability / /

End of an era —

The change is most pronounced in those over 50 years old.

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Image of solar panels on a green grassy field, with blue sky in the background.

One of the most striking things about the explosion of renewable power that’s happening in the US is that much of it is going on in states governed by politicians who don’t believe in the problem wind and solar are meant to address. Acceptance of the evidence for climate change tends to be lowest among Republicans, yet many of the states where renewable power has boomed—wind in Wyoming and Iowa, solar in Texas—are governed by Republicans.

That’s partly because, up until about 2020, there was a strong bipartisan consensus in favor of expanding wind and solar power, with support above 75 percent among both parties. Since then, however, support among Republicans has dropped dramatically, approaching 50 percent, according to polling data released this week.

Renewables enjoyed solid Republican support until recently.

Renewables enjoyed solid Republican support until recently.

To a certain extent, none of this should be surprising. The current leader of the Republican Party has been saying that wind turbines cause cancer and offshore wind is killing whales. And conservative-backed groups have been spreading misinformation in order to drum up opposition to solar power facilities.

Meanwhile, since 2022, the Inflation Reduction Act has been promoted as one of the Biden administration’s signature accomplishments and has driven significant investments in renewable power, much of it in red states. Negative partisanship is undoubtedly contributing to this drop in support.

One striking thing about the new polling data, gathered by the Pew Research Center, is how dramatically it skews with age. When given a choice between expanding fossil fuel production or expanding renewable power, Republicans under the age of 30 favored renewables by a 2-to-1 margin. Republicans over 30, in contrast, favored fossil fuels by margins that increased with age, topping out at a three-to-one margin in favor of fossil fuels among those in the 65-and-over age group. The decline in support occurred in those over 50 starting in 2020; support held steady among younger groups until 2024, when the 30–49 age group started moving in favor of fossil fuels.

Among younger Republicans, support for renewable energy remains high.

Among younger Republicans, support for renewable energy remains high.

Democrats, by contrast, break in favor of renewables by 75 points, with little difference across age groups and no indication of significant change over time. They’re also twice as likely to think a solar farm will help the local economy than Republicans are.

Similar differences were apparent when Pew asked about policies meant to encourage the sale of electric vehicles, with 83 percent of Republicans opposed to having half of cars sold be electric in 2032. By contrast, nearly two-thirds of Democrats favored this policy.

There’s also a rural/urban divide apparent (consistent with Republicans getting more support from rural voters). Forty percent of urban residents felt that a solar farm would improve the local economy; only 25 percent of rural residents agreed. Rural residents were also more likely to say solar farms made the landscape unattractive and take up too much space. (Suburban participants were consistently in between rural and urban participants.)

What’s behind these changes? The single biggest factor appears to be negative partisanship combined with the election of Joe Biden.

For Republicans, 2020 represented an inflection point in terms of support for different types of energy. That wasn't true for Democrats.

For Republicans, 2020 represented an inflection point in terms of support for different types of energy. That wasn’t true for Democrats.

Among Republicans, support for every single form of power started to change in 2020—fossil fuels, renewables, and nuclear. Among Democrats, that’s largely untrue. Their high level of support for renewable power and aversion to fossil fuels remained largely unchanged. The lone exception is nuclear power, where support rose among both Democrats and Republicans (the Biden administration has adopted a number of pro-nuclear policies).

This isn’t to say that non-political factors are playing no role. The rapid expansion of renewable power means that many more people are seeing facilities open near them, and viewing that as an indication of a changing society. Some degree of backlash was almost inevitable and, in this case, the close ties between conservative lobbyists and fossil fuel interests were ready to take advantage of it.

Bipartisan consensus in favor of renewable power is ending Read More »

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Man suffers rare bee sting directly to the eyeball—it didn’t go well

bee sting, eye, health, NEJM, ophthalmology, Science / /

Nightmare fuel —

He did recover. No disturbing images in the article, but a link for those who dare.

–

Bees fly to their hive.

Enlarge / Bees fly to their hive.

In what may be the biological equivalent to getting struck by lightning, a very unlucky man in the Philadelphia area took a very rare bee sting directly to the eyeball—and things went badly from there.

As one might expect, the 55-year-old went to the emergency department, where doctors tried to extract the injurious insect’s stinger from the man’s right eye. But it soon became apparent that they didn’t get it all.

Two days after the bee attack, the man went to the Wills Eye Hospital with worsening vision and pain in the pierced eye. At that point, the vision in his right eye had deteriorated to only being able to count fingers. The eye was swollen, inflamed, and bloodshot. Blood was visibly pooling at the bottom of his iris. And right at the border between the man’s cornea and the white of his eye, ophthalmologists spotted the problem: a teeny spear-like fragment of the bee’s stinger still stuck in place.

(Images of the eye and stinger fragment are here for those who aren’t squeamish. The white arrow in Panel A shows the location of the stinger fragment while the asterisk marks the pooled blood.)

Get thee to an ophthalmologist

In a report published recently in the New England Journal of Medicine, treating ophthalmology experts Talia Shoshany and Zeba Syed made a critical recommendation: If you happen to be among the ill-fated few who are stung in the eye by a bee, you should make sure to see an eye doctor specifically.

“I am not surprised that the ER missed a small fragment,” Shoshany told Ars over email. “They pulled out the majority of the stinger, but the small fragment was only able to be visualized at a slit lamp,” she said, referring to a microscope with a bright light used in eye exams. In this case, they visualized the stinger at 10X or 16X magnification with the additional help of a fluorescent dye. Moreover, after spotting it, the stinger fragment “needed to be pulled out with ophthalmic-specific micro-forceps.”

After finally getting the entirety of the wee dagger out, Shoshany and Syed prescribed a topical antibacterial and prednisolone eye drops (a steroid for inflammation). At a five-month follow-up, the patient had recovered and the vision in his right eye had improved to 20/25.

For those now in fear of eye stings, Soshany has some comforting words: “Ocular bee stings are very rare.” She noted this was the first one she had seen in her career. Although there are documented cases in the scientific literature, the incidence rate is unknown. The odds of getting struck by lightning, meanwhile, are 1 in 15,300, according to the National Weather Service.

But one troubling aspect of this case is that it’s unclear why the man was stung to begin with. According to Shoshany, the man worked on a property with a beehive, but he didn’t work with the insects himself. “He reports he was just walking by and several bees flew up to him; one stung him in the eye,” she said. It’s unclear what provoked them.

Man suffers rare bee sting directly to the eyeball—it didn’t go well Read More »

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Researchers craft smiling robot face from living human skin cells

AI, Biz & IT, foreskin, Harvard, human skin, human skin cells, PromoCell, robot, Science, skin cells, slimy, Tech, University of Tokyo / /
A movable robotic face covered with living human skin cells.

Enlarge / A movable robotic face covered with living human skin cells.

In a new study, researchers from the University of Tokyo, Harvard University, and the International Research Center for Neurointelligence have unveiled a technique for creating lifelike robotic skin using living human cells. As a proof of concept, the team engineered a small robotic face capable of smiling, covered entirely with a layer of pink living tissue.

The researchers note that using living skin tissue as a robot covering has benefits, as it’s flexible enough to convey emotions and can potentially repair itself. “As the role of robots continues to evolve, the materials used to cover social robots need to exhibit lifelike functions, such as self-healing,” wrote the researchers in the study.

Shoji Takeuchi, Michio Kawai, Minghao Nie, and Haruka Oda authored the study, titled “Perforation-type anchors inspired by skin ligament for robotic face covered with living skin,” which is due for July publication in Cell Reports Physical Science. We learned of the study from a report published earlier this week by New Scientist.

The study describes a novel method for attaching cultured skin to robotic surfaces using “perforation-type anchors” inspired by natural skin ligaments. These tiny v-shaped cavities in the robot’s structure allow living tissue to infiltrate and create a secure bond, mimicking how human skin attaches to underlying tissues.

To demonstrate the skin’s capabilities, the team engineered a palm-sized robotic face able to form a convincing smile. Actuators connected to the base allowed the face to move, with the living skin flexing. The researchers also covered a static 3D-printed head shape with the engineered skin.

Enlarge / “Demonstration of the perforation-type anchors to cover the facial device with skin equivalent.”

Takeuchi et al. created their robotic face by first 3D-printing a resin base embedded with the perforation-type anchors. They then applied a mixture of human skin cells in a collagen scaffold, allowing the living tissue to grow into the anchors.

Researchers craft smiling robot face from living human skin cells Read More »

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Rocket Report: China flies reusable rocket hopper; Falcon Heavy dazzles

china, european space agency, falcon 9, falcon heavy, Firefly Aerospace, launch, rocket lab, rocket report, Science, Space, spacex, united launch alliance, vulcan / /
SpaceX's 10th Falcon Heavy rocket climbs into orbit with a new US government weather satellite.

Enlarge / SpaceX’s 10th Falcon Heavy rocket climbs into orbit with a new US government weather satellite.

Welcome to Edition 6.50 of the Rocket Report! SpaceX launched its 10th Falcon Heavy rocket this week with the GOES-U weather satellite for NOAA, and this one was a beauty. The late afternoon timing of the launch and atmospheric conditions made for great photography. Falcon Heavy has become a trusted rocket for the US government, and its next flight in October will deploy NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft on the way to explore one of Jupiter’s enigmatic icy moons.

As always, we welcome reader submissions, and if you don’t want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.

Sir Peter Beck dishes on launch business. Ars spoke with the recently knighted Peter Beck, founder and CEO of Rocket Lab, on where his scrappy company fits in a global launch marketplace dominated by SpaceX. Rocket Lab racked up the third-most number of orbital launches by any US launch company (it’s headquartered in California but primarily assembles and launches rockets in New Zealand). SpaceX’s rideshare launch business with the Falcon 9 rocket is putting immense pressure on small launch companies like Rocket Lab. However, Beck argues his Electron rocket is a bespoke solution for customers desiring to put their satellite in a specific place at a specific time, a luxury they can’t count on with a SpaceX rideshare.

Ruthlessly efficient … A word that Beck returned to throughout his interview with Ars was “ruthless.” He said Rocket Lab’s success is a result of the company being “ruthlessly efficient and not making mistakes.” At one time, Rocket Lab was up against Virgin Orbit in the small launch business, and Virgin Orbit had access to capital through billionaire Richard Branson. Now, SpaceX is the 800-pound gorilla in the market. “We have a saying here at Rocket Lab that we have no money, so we have to think. We’ve never been in a position to outspend our competitors. We just have to out-think them. We have to be lean and mean.”

Firefly reveals plans for new launch sites. Firefly Aerospace plans to use the state of Virginia-owned launch pad at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility for East Coast launches of its Alpha small-satellite rocket, Aviation Week reports. The company plans to use Pad 0A for US military and other missions, particularly those requiring tight turnaround between procurement and launch. This is the same launch pad previously used by Northrop Grumman’s Antares rocket, and it’s the soon-to-be home of the Medium Launch Vehicle (MLV) jointly developed by Northrop and Firefly. The launch pad will be configured for Alpha launches beginning in 2025, according to Firefly, which previously planned to develop an Alpha launch pad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Now, Alpha and MLV rockets will fly from the same site on the East Coast, while Alpha will continue launching from the West Coast at Vandenberg Space Force Base, California.

Hello, Sweden… A few days after the announcement for launches from Virginia, Firefly unveiled a collaborative agreement with Swedish Space Corporation to launch Alpha rockets from the Esrange Space Center in Sweden as soon as 2026. Esrange has been the departure point for numerous suborbital and sounding rocket for nearly 50 years, but the spaceport is being upgraded for orbital satellite launches. A South Korean startup named Perigee Aerospace announced in May it signed an agreement to be the first user of Esrange’s orbital launch capability. Firefly is the second company to make plans to launch satellites from the remote site in northern Sweden. (submitted by Ken the Bin and brianrhurley)

The easiest way to keep up with Eric Berger’s space reporting is to sign up for his newsletter, we’ll collect his stories in your inbox.

China hops closer to reusable rockets. The Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST), part of China’s apparatus of state-owned aerospace companies, has conducted the country’s highest altitude launch and landing test so far as several teams chase reusable rocket capabilities, Space News reports. A 3.8-meter-diameter (9.2-foot) test article powered by three methane liquid-oxygen engines lifted off from the Gobi Desert on June 23 and soared to an altitude of about 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) before setting down successfully for a vertical propulsive touchdown on landing legs at a nearby landing area. SAST will follow up with a 70-kilometer (43.5-mile) suborbital test using grid fins for better control. A first orbital flight of the new reusable rocket is planned for 2025.

Lots of players … If you don’t exclusively follow China’s launch sector, you should be forgiven for being unable to list all the companies working on new reusable rockets. Late last year, a Chinese startup named iSpace flew a hopper rocket testbed to an altitude of several hundred meters as part of a development program for the company’s upcoming partially reusable Hyperbola 2 rocket. A company named Space Pioneer plans to launch its medium-class Tianlong 3 rocket for the first time later this year. Tianlong 3 looks remarkably like SpaceX’s Falcon 9, and its first stage will eventually be made reusable. China recently test-fired engines for the government’s new Long March 10, a partially reusable rocket planned to become China’s next-generation crew launch vehicle. These are just a few of the reusable rocket programs in China. (submitted by Ken the Bin)

Spanish launch startup invests in Kourou. PLD Space says it is ready to start construction at a disused launch complex at the Guiana Space Center in Kourou, French Guiana. The Spanish launch startup announced this week a 10 million euro ($10.7 million) investment in the launch complex for its Miura 5 rocket, with preparations of the site set to begin “after the summer.” The launch pad was previously used by the French Diamant rocket in the 1970s and is located several miles away from the launch pads used by the European Ariane 6 and Vega rockets. PLD Space is on track to become the first fully commercial company to launch from the spaceport in South America.

Free access to space … Also this week, PLD Space announced a new program to offer space aboard the first two flights of its Miura 5 rocket for free, European Spaceflight reports. The two-stage Miura 5 rocket will be capable of delivering about a half-ton of payload mass into a Sun-synchronous orbit. PLD Space will offer free launch services aboard the first two Miura 5 flights, which are expected to take place in late 2025 and early 2026. The application process will close on July 30, and winning proposals will be announced on November 30. (submitted by Ken the Bin and EllPeaTea)

Rocket Report: China flies reusable rocket hopper; Falcon Heavy dazzles Read More »

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NASA will pay SpaceX nearly $1 billion to deorbit the International Space Station

deorbit, iss, NASA, Science, Space, spacex / /
Illustration of the SpaceX Dragon XL as it is deployed from the Falcon Heavy's second stage in high Earth orbit on its way to the Gateway in lunar orbit.

Enlarge / Illustration of the SpaceX Dragon XL as it is deployed from the Falcon Heavy’s second stage in high Earth orbit on its way to the Gateway in lunar orbit.

SpaceX

NASA has awarded an $843 million contract to SpaceX to develop a “US Deorbit Vehicle.” This spacecraft will dock to the International Space Station in 2029 and then ensure the large facility makes a controlled reentry through Earth’s atmosphere before splashing into the ocean in 2030.

“Selecting a US Deorbit Vehicle for the International Space Station will help NASA and its international partners ensure a safe and responsible transition in low Earth orbit at the end of station operations,” said Ken Bowersox, NASA’s associate administrator for Space Operations, in a statement. “This decision also supports NASA’s plans for future commercial destinations and allows for the continued use of space near Earth.”

NASA has a couple of reasons for bringing the space station’s life to a close in 2030. Foremost among these is that the station is aging. Parts of it are now a quarter of a century old. There are cracks on the Russian segment of the space station that are spreading. Although the station could likely be maintained beyond 2030, it would require increasing amounts of crew time to keep flying the station safely.

Additionally, NASA is seeking to foster a commercial economy in low-Earth orbit. To that end, it is working with several private companies to develop commercial space stations that would be able to house NASA astronauts, as well as those from other countries and private citizens, by or before 2030. By setting an end date for the station’s lifetime and sticking with it, NASA can help those private companies raise money from investors.

Do we have to sink the station?

The station, the largest object humans have ever constructed in space, is too large to allow it to make an uncontrolled return to Earth. It has a mass of 450 metric tons and is about the size of an American football field. The threat to human life and property is too great. Hence the need for a deorbit vehicle.

The space agency considered alternatives to splashing the station down into a remote area of an ocean. One option involved moving the station into a stable parking orbit at 40,000 km above Earth, above geostationary orbit. However, the agency said this would require 3,900 m/s of delta-V, compared to the approximately 47 m/s of delta-V needed to deorbit the station. In terms of propellant, NASA estimated moving to a higher orbit would require 900 metric tons, or the equivalent of 150 to 250 cargo supply vehicles.

NASA also considered partially disassembling the station before its reentry but found this would be much more complex and risky than a controlled deorbit that kept the complex intact.

The NASA announcement did not specify what vehicle SpaceX would use to perform the deorbit burn, but we can draw some clues from the public documents for the contract procurement. For example, NASA will select a rocket for the mission at a later date, but probably no later than 2026. This would support a launch date in 2029, to have the deorbit vehicle docked to the station one year before the planned reentry.

NASA will pay SpaceX nearly $1 billion to deorbit the International Space Station Read More »

scotus-tears-down-sacklers’-immunity,-blowing-up-opioid-settlement

SCOTUS tears down Sacklers’ immunity, blowing up opioid settlement

addiction, bankruptcy, opioid, opioid crisis, overdose, oxycontin, Policy, purdue pharma, Science, SCOTUS, settlement, Supreme Court / /

Not immune —

Majority of justices ruled on meaning of legal code; dissenters called it “ruinous”

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Grace Bisch holds a picture of stepson Eddie Bisch who died as a result of an overdose on outside of the U.S. Supreme Court on December 4, 2023 in Washington, DC. The Supreme Court heard arguments regarding a nationwide settlement with Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin.

Enlarge / Grace Bisch holds a picture of stepson Eddie Bisch who died as a result of an overdose on outside of the U.S. Supreme Court on December 4, 2023 in Washington, DC. The Supreme Court heard arguments regarding a nationwide settlement with Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin.

In a 5-4 ruling, the US Supreme Court on Thursday rejected an opioid settlement plan worth billions over the deal’s stipulation that the billionaire Sackler family would get lifetime immunity from further opioid-related litigation.

While the ruling may offer long-sought schadenfreude over the deeply despised Sackler family, it is a heavy blow to the over 100,000 people affected by opioid epidemic who could have seen compensation from the deal. With the high court’s ruling, the settlement talks will have to begin again, with the outcome and possible payouts to plaintiffs uncertain.

Between 1999 and 2019, as nearly 250,000 Americans died from prescription opioid overdoses, members of the Sackler family siphoned approximately $11 billion from the pharmaceutical company they ran, Purdue Pharma, maker of OxyContin, a highly addictive and falsely marketed pain medication. In 2007, amid the nationwide epidemic of opioid addiction and overdoses, Purdue affiliates pleaded guilty in federal court to falsely branding OxyContin as less addictive and less abusive than other pain medications. Out of fear of future litigation, the Sacklers began a “milking program,” the high court noted, draining Purdue of roughly 75 percent of its assets.

An “appropriate” deal

In 2019, Purdue filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, leading to negotiations for a massive consolidated settlement plan that took years. As part of the resulting deal, the Sacklers—who did not file for bankruptcy and had detached themselves from the company—agreed to return up to $6 billion to Purdue, but only in exchange for immunity. The bankruptcy court approved the controversial condition, while a district court later overturned it and a yet higher court reinstated it.

In today’s majority opinion from the Supreme Court, Justices Gorsuch, Thomas, Alito, Barrett, and Jackson found that the lower courts that approved the Sackers’ immunity condition had erred in interpreting Chapter 11 bankruptcy code. “No provision of the code authorizes that kind of relief,” they court ruled. The explanation boiled down to a single sentence in a catchall provision. While the code speaks solely about responsibilities of a debtors—which in this case is Purdue, not the Sacklers—the catchall provision allows “for any other appropriate provision” not otherwise outlined.

The erring lower courts, the high court wrote, had interpreted the word “appropriate” far too broadly. Based on the context, any additional “appropriate” arrangements in a settlement that was not explicitly outlined would apply only to the debtor (in this case, Purdue) not to nondebtors (the Sacklers). The provision cannot be read, the justices wrote, “to endow a bankruptcy court with the ‘radically different’ power to discharge the debts of a nondebtor.”

“Ruinous” ruling

Justices Kavanaugh, Sotomayor, Kagan, and Roberts disagreed. In a minority opinion penned by Kavanaugh and joined by Sotomayor and Kagan, the justices blasted the ruling, calling it “wrong on the law and devastating for more than 100,000 opioid victims and their families.”

“The text of the Bankruptcy Code does not come close to requiring such a ruinous result,” Kavanaugh wrote, noting that such deals granting immunity to “nondebtors” is a longstanding practice used to secure just settlements. Neither legal structure, context, nor history necessitate today’s ruling, Kavanaugh continued. “Nor does hostility to the Sacklers—no matter how deep: ‘Nothing is more antithetical to the purpose of bankruptcy than destroying estate value to punish someone,” he wrote, citing a legal essay on Chapter 11 for mass torts.

The opioid victims and others will “suffer greatly in the wake of today’s unfortunate and destabilizing decision,” the dissenting justices wrote. “Only Congress can fix the chaos that will now ensue. The Court’s decision will lead to too much harm for too many people for Congress to sit by idly without at least carefully studying the issue.”

SCOTUS tears down Sacklers’ immunity, blowing up opioid settlement Read More »

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Study: Scribes in ancient Egypt had really poor posture during work

ancient egypt, anthropology, Archaeology, bio archaeology, forensic archaeology, repetitive stress, Science / /

a scribe’s life —

There were degenerative joint changes in the spines, shoulders, knees, hips, and ankles.

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Statues depicting the high dignitary Nefer and his wife (Abusir, Egypt).

Enlarge / Statues depicting the high dignitary Nefer and his wife (Abusir, Egypt).

Martin Frouz/Czech Institute of Egyptology/Charles University.

Repetitive stress injuries are a common feature of modern life, especially for office workers who spend a good chunk of their working days at a desk typing on a computer. Apparently, scribes in ancient Egypt suffered from their own distinctive repetitive stress injuries, according to a new paper published in the journal Scientific Reports that provides fresh insights into how these scribes lived and worked during the third millennium BCE.

Egyptian kings, royal family members, and other elite people from this Fifth Dynasty era were buried in tombs in the acropolis at Abusir rather than at neighboring Giza, which by then had largely filled up thanks to all the activity during the Fourth Dynasty. The Czech Institute of Egyptology at Charles University in Prague has been conducting research at the site since 1960, leading to the discovery of nearly 200 tombs dating back to the Old Kingdom (between 2700 and 2180 BCE). The first human skeletons were excavated in 1976, and there are currently 221 Old Kingdom skeletons in the collection, 102 of which are male.

Scientists started looking into the health status and markers for specific activities in 2009, but it wasn’t until quite recently that there were enough skeletons to conduct a comprehensive study. That’s what Petra Brukner Havelková of Charles University and the National Museum in Prague, Czech Republic, and colleagues set out to do, analyzing the remains of 69 adult males of different social status and different ages at which they died.

The results show the scribes and the reference group differed in just under 4 percent of the various evaluated skeletal traits, which the authors attribute to the overall similarities in the sample (male, same age distribution, no physically demanding activities). However, the individuals identified as scribes had more degenerative joint issues clustered in several well-defined regions compared to males from other occupations, including the joint connecting the lower jaw to the skull, the right collarbone, where the right humerus meets the shoulder, the right thumb’s first metacarpal bone, where the thigh meets the knee, and all along the spine (but especially at the top). These bone changes can be indicators of repetitive stress.

Bad ergonomics?

  • Working positions of scribes. (A) cross-legged (sartorial) position, (B) kneeling-squatting position, (C) standing position. (D) Different position of the legs when sitting.

    Martin Frouz/Jolana Malátková

  • Osteoarthritis of the temporomandibular joint of a supposed family member of Khemetnu, the presumed owner of family tomb AS 79.

    Šárka Bejdová

  • Drawing indicating the most affected regions of the skeletons of scribes with higher prevalence of changes compared to reference group.

    olana Malátková

For instance, the osteoarthritis in the jaw joints may have been caused by the rush stems the scribes used to write hieroglyphics. The scribes would chew on the ends to make a brush, and whenever a pen started getting ragged or too clogged with ink, they would cut off the end and chew the next section to make a new brush.

Most scribes likely wrote with their right hands and used their left to roll papyrus into cylindrical scrolls. Writing with a rush pen required considerable dexterity, and as anyone with carpal tunnel syndrome could tell you, these sorts of repetitive motions can cause excessive stress in the hands and wrists. There were only minor wrist differences between scribes and the control group, but the significant right thumb degeneration in scribes likely corresponds to specific frequently used thumb motions and positions—probably the act of repeatedly pinching their pens, although the authors say more research is needed to make a definitive determination.

The degenerative signs noted in the cervical spines are likely due to the scribes’ typical working position. “The head had to be forward and the spine flexed, changing the center of gravity of the head and putting stress on the spine,” the authors wrote—a posture common to many modern occupations. Prolonged stretches of sitting cross-legged could also have contributed to the observed damage to the cervical spines. There were signs of stresses to the right rotator cuffs, which usually occurs when the arm is in an extended elevated position and is common among painters, for example. It’s also common in people prone to sitting for a long time and typing with unsupported arms.

As for the degenerative changes noted in the knees, hips, and ankles, the authors suggest this indicates that scribes may have sat with the left leg in a kneeling or cross-legged position and the right leg pointed upward—more of a squat or a crouch. Iconography and statues from that era frequently depict scribes in such positions, as well as standing. The authors concluded that scribes probably alternated their arm and leg positions, but the head and cervical spine were always in that stress-inducing forward position.

Where’s a good ergonomic office chair when you need one?

DOI: Scientific Reports, 2024. 10.1038/s41598-024-63549-z  (About DOIs).

Study: Scribes in ancient Egypt had really poor posture during work Read More »

synthetic-psychedelic-found-in-candies-linked-to-seizures,-intubation

Synthetic psychedelic found in candies linked to seizures, intubation

4-AcO-DMT, candies, CDC, chocolate, diamond shruumz, fda, kava, piper methysticum, psilocybin, psychedelic, Science / /

Toxic trip —

Cases grow to 39, including 23 hospitalizations, across 20 states.

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A Diamond Shruumz chocolate bar, which comes in a variety of flavors.

Enlarge / A Diamond Shruumz chocolate bar, which comes in a variety of flavors.

The US Food and Drug Administration has identified a synthetic psychedelic compound as well as compounds from a potentially toxic plant in the Diamond Shruumz-brand microdosing candies linked to a growing number of severe illnesses nationwide that have included seizures, intubation, and admissions to intensive care units.

As of June 25, the case total has grown to 39, including 23 hospitalizations, across 20 states, the FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

It remains unclear what is in the candies and what may be causing the severe illnesses. Diamond Shruumz does not provide a full list of ingredients. The term “microdosing” and other marketing used by Diamond Shruumz suggests the candies contain a psychedelic compound, but the company does not name any. To figure it out, the FDA has been analyzing multiple samples of Diamond Shruumz-brand candies, including chocolates, gummies, and candy cones. On Tuesday, the FDA reported finding the synthetic psychedelic compound 4-AcO-DMT in the company’s Dark Chocolate Bar and its Birthday Cake Chocolate Bar.

As Ars reported previously, 4-AcO-DMT (aka 4- acetoxy-N,N-dimethyltryptamine, O-acetylpsilocin, or psilacetin) is a common synthetic tryptamine used in psychedelics and was previously suspected to be in the Diamond Shruumz candies. The psychoactive drug has a chemical structure similar to the most notable mushroom-derived psychedelic, psilocybin, as well as LSD. Though safety data on the compound is scant, it is not known to be linked to some of the severe symptoms seen in the current string of illnesses. People who use 4-Aco-DMT describe it as producing effects similar to psilocybin, but without some of the unpleasant side effects noted with natural mushrooms, such as nausea. Still, according to the CDC, some people who use it could experience nausea, vomiting, fast heart rate, anxiety, agitation, lightheadedness, or tremor.

Additionally, the FDA found three compounds from the Kava plant (Piper methysticum) in the company’s dark chocolate bar, though not the birthday-cake flavored bar. The compounds are kavalactones—desmethoxyyangonin, dihydrokavain, and kavain.

Concerning kava

Kava is a plant found on some Pacific Islands and is used in traditional herbal remedies for the treatment of anxiety, insomnia, stress, and other ailments. But, over the years, it has also occasionally been linked to severe liver toxicity. In the early 2000s, this led to warnings, withdrawals, and even bans in several countries, including Germany, Switzerland, France, Canada, and the UK. In 2002, the FDA issued an advisory of its own over the associated liver injuries, which include hepatitis, cirrhosis, and liver failure. Later that same year, researchers published case reports of 11 people (two in the US and nine in Europe) who developed liver failure after using kava products and needed subsequent liver transplants.

In an update on the illnesses linked to Diamond Shruumz candies, the CDC noted that kava can cause numbness of the mouth and skin, loss of coordination, dizziness, sedation, and gastrointestinal effects, such as nausea and vomiting. Consuming kava products alongside alcohol or drugs like benzodiazepines (e.g. Valium and Xanax) can heighten the sedative effects. But, the CDC seemed to downplay the risk of liver toxicity here, noting that it has only occasionally been associated with chronic or heavy ingestion of kava.

In all, it’s still unclear if the compounds the FDA identified in the Diamond Shruumz chocolate bars so far can explain the illnesses seen in the linked cases. The CDC lists the severe and common symptoms from those cases as including seizures, decreased level of consciousness, respiratory failure, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, hallucinations, uncontrolled movements, abnormal heart rate (e.g., too fast or too slow), high or low blood pressure, excessive sweating or secretions, and flushed skin.

The FDA said testing of other Diamond Shruumz products is still in progress. The agency noted that there can be differences across products and batches. In the meantime, the agency advises consumers not to eat, sell, or serve any of the company’s products and, instead, discard them.

There is still no recall of the candies. Diamond Shruumz has not responded to multiple inquiries from Ars. The FDA said Tuesday that the agency has “been in contact with the firm about a possible voluntary recall,” but to date, Diamond Shruumz has not initiated one.

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dna-based-bacterial-parasite-uses-completely-new-dna-editing-method

DNA-based bacterial parasite uses completely new DNA-editing method

biochemistry, Biology, DNA, gene editing, molecular biology, RNA, Science / /
Top row: individual steps in the reaction process. Bottom row: cartoon diagram of the top, showing the position of each DNA and RNA strand.

Enlarge / Top row: individual steps in the reaction process. Bottom row: cartoon diagram of the top, showing the position of each DNA and RNA strand.

Hiraizumi, et. al.

While CRISPR is probably the most prominent gene-editing technology, there are a variety of others, some developed before, others since. And people have been developing CRISPR variants to perform more specialized functions, like altering specific bases. In all of these cases, researchers are trying to balance a number of competing factors: convenience; flexibility; specificity and precision for the editing; low error rates; and so on.

So, having additional options for editing can be a good thing, enabling new ways of balancing those different needs. On Wednesday, a pair of papers in Nature describe a DNA-based parasite that moves itself around bacterial genomes through a mechanism that hasn’t been previously described. It’s nowhere near ready for use in humans, but it may have some distinctive features that make it worth further development.

Going mobile

Mobile genetic elements, commonly called transposons, are quite common in many species—they make up nearly half the sequences in the human genome, for example. They are indeed mobile, showing up in new locations throughout the genome, sometimes by cutting themselves out and hopping to new locations, other times by sending a copy out to a new place in the genome. For any of this to work, they need to have an enzyme that cuts DNA and specifically recognizes the right transposon sequence to insert into the cut.

The specificity of that interaction, needed to ensure the system only inserts new copies of itself, and the cutting of DNA, are features we’d like for gene editing, which places a value on better understanding these systems.

Bacterial genomes tend to have very few transposons—the extra DNA isn’t really in keeping with the bacterial reproduction approach of “copy all the DNA as quickly as possible when there’s food around.” Yet bacterial transposons do exist, and a team of scientists based in the US and Japan identified one with a rather unusual feature. As an intermediate step in moving to a new location, the two ends of the transposon (called IS110) are linked together to form a circular piece of DNA.

In its circular form, the DNA sequences at the junction act as a signal that tells the cell to make an RNA copy of nearby DNA (termed a “promoter”). When linear, each of the two bits of DNA on either side of the junction lacks the ability to act as a signal; it only works when the transposon is circular. And the researchers confirmed that there is in fact an RNA produced by the circular form, although the RNA does not encode for any proteins.

So, the research team looked at over 100 different relatives of IS110 and found that they could all produce similar non-protein-coding RNAs, all of which shared some key features. These included stretches where nearby sections of the RNA could base-pair with each other, leaving an unpaired loop of RNA in between. Two of these loops contained sequences that either base-paired with the transposon itself or at the sites in the E. coli genome where it inserted.

That suggests that the RNA produced by the circular form of the transposon helped to act as a guide, ensuring that the transposon’s DNA was specifically used and only inserted into precise locations in the genome.

Editing without precision

To confirm this was right, the researchers developed a system where the transposon would produce a fluorescent protein when it was properly inserted into the genome. They used this to show that mutations in the loop that recognized the transposon would stop it from being inserted into the genome—and that it was possible to direct it to new locations in the genome by changing the recognition sequences in the second loop.

To show this was potentially useful for gene editing, the researchers blocked the production of the transposon’s own RNA and fed it a replacement RNA that worked. So, you could potentially use this system to insert arbitrary DNA sequences into arbitrary locations in a genome. It could also be used with targeting RNAs that caused specific DNA sequences to be deleted. All of this is potentially very useful for gene editing.

Emphasis on “potentially.” The problem is that the targeting sequences in the loops are quite short, with the insertion site targeted by a recognition sequence that’s only four to seven bases long. At the short end of this range, you’d expect that a random string of bases would have an insertion site about once every 250 bases.

That relatively low specificity showed. At the high end, various experiments could see an insertion accuracy ranging from a close-to-being-useful 94 percent down to a positively threatening 50 percent. For deletion experiments, the low end of the range was a catastrophic 32 percent accuracy. So, while this has some features of an interesting gene-editing system, there’s a lot of work to do before it could fulfill that potential. It’s possible that these recognition loops could be made longer to add the sort of specificity that would be needed for editing vertebrate genomes, but we simply don’t know at this point.

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Some European launch officials still have their heads stuck in the sand

ariane 6, falcon 9, Science, Space, starship / /

This is fine —

“Starship will not eradicate Ariane 6 at all.”

–

The first stage of Ariane 6 rocket Europe's Spaceport in Kourou in the French overseas department of Guiana, on March 26, 2024.

Enlarge / The first stage of Ariane 6 rocket Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou in the French overseas department of Guiana, on March 26, 2024.

LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP via Getty Images

There was a panel discussion at a space conference in Singapore 11 years ago that has since become legendary in certain corners of the space industry for what it reveals about European attitudes toward upstart SpaceX.

The panel included representatives from a handful of launch enterprises, including Europe-based Arianespace, and the US launch company SpaceX. At one point during the discussion, the host asked the Arianespace representative—its chief of sales in Southeast Asia, Richard Bowles—how the institutional European company would respond to SpaceX’s promise of lower launch costs and reuse with the Falcon 9 rocket.

“What I’m discovering in the market is that SpaceX primarily seems to be selling a dream, which is good. We should all dream,” Bowles replied. “I think a $5 million launch or a $15 million launch is a bit of a dream. Personally, I think reusability is a dream. How am I going to respond to a dream? My answer to respond to a dream is, first of all, you don’t wake people up.”

To be fair to Bowles, at the time of his remarks, SpaceX had only launched the Falcon 9 five times by the middle of 2013. But his condescension was nevertheless something to behold.

Later in the discussion, Bowles added that he did not believe launching 100 times a year, something that SpaceX was starting to talk about, was “realistic.” Then, in a moment of high paternalism, he turned to the SpaceX official on the panel and said, “You shouldn’t present things that are not realistic.”

In response, Barry Matsumori, a senior vice president at SpaceX, calmly said he would let his company’s response come through its actions.

Actions do speak louder than words

Eleven years later, of course, SpaceX is launching more than 100 times a year. The company’s internal price for launching a Falcon 9 is significantly less than $20 million. And all of this is possible through the reuse of the rocket’s first stage and payload fairings, each of which have now proven capable of flying 20 or more times.

One might think that, in the decade since, European launch officials would have learned their lesson. After all, last year, the continent had to resort to launching its valuable Euclid Space Telescope on a Falcon 9 rocket. This year, because the new European Ariane 6 rocket was not yet ready after myriad delays, multiple Galileo satellites have been launched and will be launched on the Falcon 9 rocket.

Some officials have taken note. In a candid commentary last year, European Space Agency chief Josef Aschbacher acknowledged that the continent faced an “acute” launcher crisis amid the Ariane 6 delays and the rise of SpaceX as a launch competitor. “SpaceX has undeniably changed the launcher market paradigm as we know it,” Aschbacher wrote. “With the dependable reliability of Falcon 9 and the captivating prospects of Starship, SpaceX continues to totally redefine the world’s access to space, pushing the boundaries of possibility as they go along.”

But not everyone got the message, it seems.

Next month, the Ariane 6 rocket should finally make its debut. It will probably be successful. Europe has excellent technical capabilities in regard to launch. But from day one, the Ariane 6 launch vehicle will cost significantly more than the Falcon 9 rocket, which has similar capabilities, and offer no provision for reuse. Certainly, it will meet Europe’s institutional needs. But it likely will not shake up the market, nor realistically compete with a fully reusable Falcon 9.

Who really needs to be woken up?

And what about Starship? If and when SpaceX can deliver it to the market, the next-generation rocket will offer a fully reusable booster with five times the lift capacity of the Ariane 6 rocket for half its cost or less. How can Europe hope to compete with that? The European Space Agency’s director of space transportation, Toni Tolker-Nielsen—who works for Aschbacher, it should be noted—said he’s not concerned.

“Honestly, I don’t think Starship will be a game-changer or a real competitor,” he said in an interview with Space News. “This huge launcher is designed to fly people to the Moon and Mars. Ariane 6 is perfect for the job if you need to launch a four- or five-ton satellite. Starship will not eradicate Ariane 6 at all.”

In one sense, Tolker-Nielsen is correct. Starship will not change how Europe gets its small and medium-sized satellites into space. Made and launched in Europe, the Ariane 6 rocket will be a workhorse for the continent. Indeed, some European officials are going so far as to press for legislation mandating that European satellites launch on European rockets.

But to say Starship will not be a game-changer represents the same head-in-the-sand attitude displayed by Bowles a decade ago with his jokes about not waking the deluded dreamers up. In hindsight, it’s clear that the dreamers were not SpaceX or its customers. Rather, they were European officials who had lulled themselves into thinking their dominance in commercial launch would persist without innovation.

While they slumbered, these officials ignored the rise of reusability. They decided the Ariane 6 rocket should look like its expendable predecessors, with solid rocket boosters. Meanwhile, following the rise of the Falcon 9, nearly all new rocket projects have incorporated a significant reusability component. It’s no longer just SpaceX founder Elon Musk saying companies need to pursue reuse or perish. Almost everyone is.

Perhaps someone should wake Tolker-Nielsen up.

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the-mythical-gryphon-was-not-inspired-by-a-horned-dinosaur,-study-concludes

The mythical gryphon was not inspired by a horned dinosaur, study concludes

cryptology, Folklore, geomyths, gryphon, mythbusting, mythical creatures, mythology, paleontology, Science / /

Fantastic beasts and where not to find them —

The mythological creatures are instead “chimeras of big cats and raptorial birds.”

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Painting of a griffin, a lion-raptor chimaera

Enlarge / Painting of a gryphon, or griffin, a lion-raptor chimera from ancient folklore.

Mark Witton

The gryphon, or griffin, is a legendary creature dating back to classical antiquity, sporting the body, legs, and tail of a lion and the wings, head, and front talons of an eagle. Since the 1980s, a popular “geomyth” has spread that the griffin’s unique appearance was inspired by the fossilized skeleton of a horned dinosaur known as Protoceratops. It’s a fascinating and colorful story, but according to the authors of a new paper published in the journal Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, there is no hard evidence to support such a connection.

“Everything about griffin origins is consistent with their traditional interpretation as imaginary beasts, just as their appearance is entirely explained by them being [mythological] chimeras of big cats and raptorial birds,” said co-author Mark Witton, a paleontologist at the University of Portsmouth. “Invoking a role for dinosaurs in griffin lore, especially species from distant lands like Protoceratops, not only introduces unnecessary complexity and inconsistencies to their origins, but also relies on interpretations and proposals that don’t withstand scrutiny.”

There are representations of griffin-like creatures in ancient Egyptian art dated to before 3000 BCE, while in ancient Greek and Roman texts the creatures were associated with gold deposits in Central Asia. By the Middle Ages, griffins were common figures in medieval iconography and in heraldry. The hippogriff named Buckbeak in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is a related mythical creature, the product of a griffin and a mare.

It was the legendary link to Central Asian gold deposits that intrigued classical folklorist Adrienne Mayor in the 1980s. Drawing on Greek and Latin texts and related artworks, she suggested (beginning with a 1989 paper in Cryptozoology) that nomadic prospectors stumbled across fossilized skeletons of Protoceratops and brought tales of strange beaked quadrupeds to other regions as they traveled southeast along ancient trade routes. The dinosaur’s bony neck frill might have been interpreted in early illustrations as mammal-like external ears, with its beak indicating a creature that was part-bird, leading to the eventual addition of wings.

This 9th century BCE relief depicts a griffin-like monster being pursued by a deity.

Enlarge / This 9th century BCE relief depicts a griffin-like monster being pursued by a deity.

L. Gruner/Layard (1853)

Over the last 30 years, Mayor’s hypothesis has gained traction in the popular media and within certain academic circles; it’s now one of the most famous and widely touted examples of geomythology. It’s not an entirely crazy idea, even if its origins lie in the pseudoscientific field of cryptozoology. After all, people as far back as Paleolithic times certainly used fossils as decorative ornaments or talismans, and there are bona fide cases of such “geomyths”: For example, British ammonites were modified into “snake stones”; shark teeth were interpreted as snake tongues; and “winged” brachiopods became “stone swallows” in historic China.

The case for skepticism

But Witton and fellow Portsmouth paleontologist Richard Hing were skeptical because of the lack of any material evidence to support the connection between the griffin and Protoceratops. And they weren’t alone. Paleontologist Paul Sereno once dismissed Mayor’s claims as “sophomoric” and questioned her understanding of how fossils are found, identified, and interpreted, per the authors. So they set out to conduct the first detailed assessment of Mayor’s claims, re-examining historical fossil records—including the distribution of sites where Protoceratops fossils have been found—and classical sources, as well as consulting with historians and archaeologists about the supposed link.

“It is important to distinguish between fossil folklore with a factual basis—that is, connections between fossils and myth evidenced by archaeological discoveries or compelling references in literature and artwork—and speculated connections based on intuition,” said Hing. “There is nothing inherently wrong with the idea that ancient peoples found dinosaur bones and incorporated them into their mythology, but we need to root such proposals in realities of history, geography, and palaeontology. Otherwise, they are just speculation.”

The mythical gryphon was not inspired by a horned dinosaur, study concludes Read More »

nasa’s-commercial-spacesuit-program-just-hit-a-major-snag

NASA’s commercial spacesuit program just hit a major snag

collins, Science, Space, suit / /

Suit issues —

“Unfortunately Collins has been significantly behind schedule.”

–

NASA astronaut Christina Koch (right) poses for a portrait with fellow Expedition 61 Flight Engineer Jessica Meir, who is inside a US spacesuit for a fit check.

Enlarge / NASA astronaut Christina Koch (right) poses for a portrait with fellow Expedition 61 Flight Engineer Jessica Meir, who is inside a US spacesuit for a fit check.

NASA

Almost exactly two years ago, as it prepared for the next generation of human spaceflight, NASA chose a pair of private companies to design and develop new spacesuits. These were to be new spacesuits that would allow astronauts to both perform spacewalks outside the International Space Station as well as walk on the Moon as part of the Artemis program.

Now, that plan appears to be in trouble, with one of the spacesuit providers—Collins Aerospace—expected to back out, Ars has learned. It’s a blow for NASA, because the space agency really needs modern spacesuits.

NASA’s Apollo-era suits have long been retired. The current suits used for spacewalks in low-Earth orbit are four decades old. “These new capabilities will allow us to continue on the ISS and allows us to do the Artemis program and continue on to Mars,” said the director of Johnson Space Center, Vanessa Wyche, during a celebratory news conference in Houston two years ago.

The two winning teams were led by Collins Aerospace and Axiom Space, respectively. They were eligible for task orders worth up to $3.5 billion—in essence NASA would rent the use of these suits for a couple of decades. Since then, NASA has designated Axiom to work primarily on a suit for the Moon and the Artemis Program, and Collins with developing a suit for operations in-orbit, such as space station servicing.

Collins exits

This week, however, Collins said it will likely end its participation in the Exploration Extravehicular Activity Services, or xEVAS, contract. On Tuesday morning Chris Ayers, general manager at Collins Aerospace, met with employees to tell them about the company’s exit from the program. A NASA source confirmed decision.

“Unfortunately Collins has been significantly behind schedule,” a person familiar with the situation told Ars. “Collins has admitted they have drastically underperformed and have overspent on their xEVAS work, culminating in a request to be taken off the contract or renegotiate the scope and their budget.”

NASA and Collins Aerospace acknowledged a request for comment sent by Ars early on Tuesday morning but as of the afternoon did not provide substantive replies to questions about this action, nor steps forward.

The agency has been experiencing periodic problems with the maintenance of the suits built decades ago, known as the Extravehicular Mobility Unit, which made its debut in the 1980s. NASA has acknowledged the suit has exceeded its planned design lifetime. Just this Monday the agency had to halt a spacewalk after the airlock had been de-pressurized and hatch opened due to a water leak in the service and cooling umbilical unit of Tracy Dyson’s spacesuit.

As a result of this problem, NASA will likely only be able to conduct a single spacewalk this summer, after initially planning three, to complete work outside the International Space Station.

Increased pressure on Axiom

During the bidding process for the commercial spacesuit program, which unfolded in 2021 and 2022, just two bidders ultimately emerged. A unit of Raytheon Technologies, Collins was the bidder with the most experience in spacesuits, having designed the original Apollo suits, and it partnered with experienced providers ILC Dover and Oceaneering. Axiom is a newer company that, until the spacesuit competition, was largely focused on developing a private space station.

As they evaluated bids, NASA officials raised some concerns about Collins’ approach, noting that the proposal relied on “rapid acceleration of technology maturation and resolution of key technical trade studies to achieve their proposed schedule.” However, in its source selection statement, the agency concluded that it had a “high level of confidence” that Collins would be able to deliver on its spacesuits.

It is not clear what NASA will do now. One person suggested that NASA would not seek to immediately re-compete the xEVAS because it could signal to private investors that Axiom is not capable of delivering on its spacesuit contracts. (Like a lot of other companies in this capital-constrained era, Axiom Space, according to sources, has been struggling to raise a steady stream of private investment.)

Another source, however, suggested that NASA likely would seek to bring a new partner on board to compete with Axiom. The space agency did something similar in 2007 with its Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program to provide cargo to the space station. When Rocketplane Kistler could not deliver on its commitments, the agency recompeted the contract and ultimately selected Orbital Sciences. If NASA were to re-open competition, one of the bidders could be SpaceX, which has already designed a basic spacesuit to support the private Polaris Dawn mission.

Since the awards two years ago, Axiom has been making comparatively better technical progress on its spacesuit, which is based on the Extravehicular Mobility Unit design that NASA has used for decades. However, the Houston-based company has yet to complete the critical design review process, which can be demanding. Axiom is also battling a difficult supply chain environment—which is especially problematic given that NASA has not built new suits for such a long time.

NASA’s commercial spacesuit program just hit a major snag Read More »