News about PaperPanda, Open Access, and Research
Every year, Hubble takes a little time to turn its electronic eyes closer to home. Rather than staring into vast distances across space and time, it focuses on our very own Solar System; specifically, the heavyweight planets that lurk out past the asteroid belt – Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. That’s not because they’re … Read more
By Graham Lawton Michelle D’urbano AND so this is Christmas, and what have we done? A year ago, I was writing a preview of 2021, which was shaping up to be pivotal for our fractious relationship with the environment. The UN was getting ready to launch not one, but two decades: one on ecological restoration … Read more
The identity of Blue Origin’s spaceflight auction winner is no longer a mystery. Justin Sun, the founder and CEO of the blockchain platform Tron, announced today (Dec. 22) that he’s the person who paid $28 million for a seat aboard Blue Origin’s first crewed spaceflight. That mission launched on July 20, carrying Blue Origin founder … Read more
After facing setback after setback this year, the nonprofit formed to make sure COVID-19 vaccines reach the poorest countries of the world may finally live up to its promise in 2022. A 14 December report shows that after scaling back its ambitions, the COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) Facility is close to meeting a revised … Read more
In a year dominated by covid and climate change, we also brought you plenty of weird and wonderful science coverage. Test your knowledge of some of the most intriguing nuggets, if you dare
By Annalee Newitz Michelle D’urbano IN THE waning days of this year, a meme has been making its way across Twitter that goes something like this: “If cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin were actually a reliable form of money, the porn industry would already be using them.” Pornography may not be your cup of tea, but adult … Read more
In his 1972 Nobel Prize acceptance speech, American biochemist Christian Anfinsen laid out a vision: One day it would be possible, he said, to predict the 3D structure of any protein merely from its sequence of amino acid building blocks. With hundreds of thousands of proteins in the human body alone, such an advance would … Read more
When Science crowned the development of effective SARS-CoV-2 vaccines the scientific Breakthrough of the Year in December 2020, it was a moment of celebration. “This breakthrough is a triumph for all of science,” Editor-in-Chief Holden Thorp wrote in an editorial. “There will be plenty of time for an exegesis of what went wrong. But for … Read more
December’s Cold Moon, the longest full moon of the year, will debut this Saturday night (Dec. 18), making it the last full moon before the winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere. To catch the Cold Moon at its fullest, look up at 11:36 p.m. EST (0432 GMT on Dec. 19). If you miss that moment, … Read more
December’s cold moon, the longest full moon of the year, will debut this Saturday night (December 18), making it the last full moon before the winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere. To catch the cold moon at its fullest, look up at 11:36 pm EST (0432 UTC on December 19). If you miss that moment, you’ll … Read more