News about PaperPanda, Open Access, and Research
The first teaser trailer for the next live-action “Star Trek” spinoff, “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds,” has beamed in from Paramount Plus and it looks to be a cowboy adventure to the stars. “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” stars Anson Mount as Captain Christopher Pike, the first captain of Trek’s iconic USS Enterprise starship (before … Read more
March is a month of transition, as we change seasons from winter to spring. And at this particular time of year, we can look into the night sky for some sky objects with rather unusual aspects. Here’s a tour of some tantalizing targets for skywatchers that are visible each year in March, and the odd … Read more
By Rory Mc Donnell Jennie Edwards SLUGS and snails may not look frightening, but don’t be fooled. Poking out from beneath their slimy bodies is a tongue-like appendage called a radula, covered with thousands of tiny teeth. As gardeners know to their cost, this is a tool of extreme destructive power, which can shred stems … Read more
The sharp mirrors of the James Webb Space Telescope will finally be able to probe into the atmospheres of sub-Neptunes, which are mysterious planets that aren’t found anywhere near Earth. The observatory is in the middle of a commissioning period that will last until about June. But when it is ready, the observatory will seek out sub-Neptunes … Read more
China’s Yutu 2 rover has made yet another curious discovery during its travels on the far side of the moon, this time turning up a pair of translucent glass globules. The rover’s panoramic camera spotted the two glass spheres as it drove across the surface of Von Kármán crater on the far side of the … Read more
The timeline of the COVID-19 pandemic has been marked by a series of catastrophic waves: surging crests of infection spreading around the world, often spearheaded by newly evolved variants of the pathogen, such as Delta and Omicron. This is simply how viral evolution can play out, of course. But SARS-CoV-2 is an unusually successful … Read more
These are strange times indeed! During the Super Bowl this past week, fans were zapped with a mind-warping new trailer for Marvel Studios’ upcoming “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” (May 6) and the far-out preview perfectly captures the Sorcerer Supreme’s trippy dimensional-hopping insanity. Stepping in for “Doctor Strange” helmer Scott Derrickson, who did … Read more
Quantum mechanics – the behavior of the Universe at the smallest of scales – continues to surprise us, with scientists now having been able to successfully create a quantum object called a domain wall in laboratory settings. For the first time, these walls can now be generated in the lab on demand, occurring when … Read more
Two particularly strange stars may have formed in a lucky collision, according to new research. What makes these two stars unusual is the high levels of carbon and oxygen at the surface of their atmospheres. Those elements are left behind as a star burns its helium, but that process takes place in the star’s core … Read more
An elongated, cone-shaped skull with a possible metal implant could represent some of the earliest evidence from Peru of an ancient surgical implant. Or it could be a modern-day fake. The fact that the skull, which was donated to the Museum of Osteology in Oklahoma City, has a cone shape is nothing too unusual, … Read more