News about PaperPanda, Open Access, and Research
It has been 1 month since Alondra Nelson became acting head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) following the 7 February resignation of Eric Lander, who admitted to “disrespectful and demeaning” treatment of employees at the low-profile policy shop. Nelson, a sociologist who has written extensively about the impact of … Read more
A rare star that repeatedly explodes appears to be also generating the most energetic form of light in the Universe. Analysis of an eruption from the binary system RS Ophiuchi has revealed that the shock wave expanding out into space acts as a particle accelerator that generates gamma radiation. This suggests the conditions that generate … Read more
White dwarfs are what is left when stars like our sun have exhausted all of their fuel. They are dense, dim, stellar corpses — the last observable stage of evolution for low- and medium-mass stars. Whilst most massive stars will eventually go supernova, a low or medium mass star with a mass less than … Read more
This story is part of a special package being published this week about the barriers Black physicists face and potential models for change. Read more C. Smith/Science Apriel Hodari has spent many years studying how to improve training and reduce inequity in the scientific workforce. That research has brought her face to face with “the … Read more
This article was originally published at The Conversation. The publication contributed the article to Space.com’s Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. Can black holes become white holes? – Remy, age 9, Wangaratta, Victoria Hi Remy! Thank you for this great question. The short answer, unfortunately, is no. White holes are really just something scientists have imagined — they could exist, but … Read more
White holes are theoretical cosmic regions that function in the opposite way to black holes. Just as nothing can escape a black hole, nothing can enter a white hole. White holes were long thought to be a figment of general relativity born from the same equations as their collapsed star brethren, black holes. More recently, … Read more
A judge’s order blocking the Biden administration’s application of an interim climate metric will cause sweeping delays in agency rulemaking and stall planned projects requiring new environmental reviews, a White House official said this weekend. Dominic Mancini, the deputy administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, said a recent preliminary injunction … Read more
President Joe Biden’s decision to appoint two people to temporarily fill the White House’s top science advice position—a job typically held by one appointee—is drawing mixed reactions from the U.S. research community, including opposing takes from two former presidential science advisers. The Biden administration said yesterday it is “doubling down on science” by appointing geneticist … Read more
The United States still owes the world details about how it plans to meet President Biden’s pledge to cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by the end of this decade. The White House promised last year that those would come in the form of a comprehensive “U.S. National Climate Strategy.” That term was used more … Read more
Ten years ago, an unnamed American woman was diagnosed with HIV. Like the tens of thousands of people who test positive in the US each year, she faced a lifetime of anti-retroviral therapies to keep the virus from obliterating her immune system. Today, that’s no longer the case. The patient is part of an … Read more