EverythingScience

On November 13, 2026, Voyager Will Reach One Full Light-Day Away From Earth For the first time in humanity's long history, a human-made object will soon be a full light-day away from our home planet. Space, as they say, is pretty big, and human-made objects are slow. The record speed any human has ever traveled was set by Apollo 10 back in 1969, and has not been broken since. The fastest human spaceflight remains 39,937.7 kilometers per hour (24,816.1 miles per hour), and at those speeds, it would take 3,730 hours to travel just 1 astronomical unit (AU), the distance between the Earth and the Sun. At around 155 days, that's an unacceptable travel time to (for example) slam into the Sun. And while it takes you 155 days to get wherever it is you went, light and communications from Earth would reach you in about 8 minutes and 20 seconds, really rubbing it in how great it is to be massless. But we will get a real reminder of the vast distance and incredible speed of light in late 2026, when Voyager 1 becomes the first human-made object to reach one light-day away from Earth. This spacecraft was launched in 1977 and has been traveling ever since. At the time of writing, it is around 169.5 AU from the Earth, having become the first spacecraft to go beyond the heliosphere, cross the heliopause, and enter interstellar space. At its current position, it takes 23 hours, 29 minutes, and 27 seconds for signals from Earth to reach the spacecraft. At its current speed of about 61,198 kilometers per hour (38,027 miles per hour), it will still take over a year to widen that light-distance to a full 24 hours. When it does reach 25.9 billion kilometers (16 billion miles) from Earth, a journey that took nearly 50 years, it will finally be the distance that light can travel in a day. Source:IFLScience @EverythingScience

We Were Wrong About Fasting, Massive Review Finds Ever worried that skipping breakfast might leave you foggy at work? Or that intermittent fasting would make you irritable, distracted and less productive? Snack food ads warn us that "you're not you when you're hungry", reinforcing a common belief that eating is essential to keep our brains sharp. This message is deeply woven into our culture. We're told constant fuelling is the secret to staying alert and efficient. Yet time-restricted eating and intermittent fasting have become hugely popular wellness practices over the past decade. Millions do it for long-term benefits, from weight management to improved metabolic health. This raises a pressing question: can we reap the health rewards of fasting without sacrificing our mental edge? To find out, we conducted the most comprehensive review to date of how fasting affects cognitive performance. Why fast in the first place? Fasting isn't just a trendy diet hack. It taps into a biological system honed over millennia to help humans cope with scarcity. When we eat regularly, the brain runs mostly on glucose, stored in the body as glycogen. But after about 12 hours without food, those glycogen stores dwindle. At that point, the body performs a clever metabolic switch: it begins breaking down fat into ketone bodies (for example, acetoacetate and beta-hydroxybutyrate), which provide an alternative fuel source. This metabolic flexibility, once crucial for our ancestors' survival, is now being linked to a host of health benefits. Some of the most promising effects of fasting come from the way it reshapes processes inside the body. For instance, fasting activates autophagy, a kind of cellular "cleanup crew" that clears away damaged components and recycles them, a process thought to support healthier ageing. It also improves insulin sensitivity, allowing the body to manage blood sugar more effectively and lowering the risk of conditions such as type 2 diabetes. Beyond that, the metabolic shifts triggered by fasting appear to offer broader protection, helping reduce the likelihood of developing chronic diseases often associated with overeating. What the data showed These physiological benefits have made fasting attractive. But many hesitate to adopt it out of fear their mental performance will plummet without a steady supply of food. To address this, we conducted a meta-analysis, a "study of studies", looking at all the available experimental research that compared people's cognitive performance when they were fasting versus when they were fed. Our search identified 63 scientific articles, representing 71 independent studies, with a combined sample of 3,484 participants tested on 222 different measures of cognition. The research spanned nearly seven decades, from 1958 to 2025. After pooling the data, our conclusion was clear: there was no meaningful difference in cognitive performance between fasted and satiated healthy adults. People performed just as well on cognitive tests measuring attention, memory and executive function whether they had eaten recently or not. When fasting does matter Our analysis did reveal three important factors that can change how fasting affects your mind. First, age is key. Adults showed no measurable decline in mental performance when fasting. But children and adolescents did worse on tests when they skipped meals. Their developing brains seem more sensitive to fluctuations in energy supply. This reinforces long-standing advice: kids should go to school with a proper breakfast to support learning. Timing also seems to make a difference. We found longer fasts were associated with a smaller performance gap between fasted and fed states. This might be due to the metabolic switch to ketones, which can restore a steady supply of energy to the brain as glucose runs out. Source:ScienceAlert @EverythingScience

AI Is Overheating. This New Technology Could Be the Fix Engineers at the University of California San Diego have created an innovative cooling system designed to greatly enhance the energy efficiency of data centers and high-performance electronic devices. This new approach relies on a specially engineered fiber membrane that naturally removes heat through evaporation. It provides an effective and energy-saving alternative to conventional cooling methods such as fans, heat sinks, and liquid pumps, while also potentially reducing the large amounts of water used by many existing systems. The breakthrough is described in detail in a study published in the journal Joule. As artificial intelligence (AI) and cloud computing continue to grow, so does the demand for data processing, and the heat that accompanies it. Cooling now represents as much as 40% of a data center’s total energy consumption. If current growth continues, global energy demand for cooling could more than double by 2030. The newly developed evaporative cooling system may help slow this trend. It operates using an inexpensive fiber membrane made up of countless interconnected microscopic pores that draw cooling liquid across its surface through capillary action. When the liquid evaporates, it removes heat from the underlying electronics without the need for additional energy. The membrane is placed above microchannels that supply the liquid, allowing heat to dissipate efficiently from the components below. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

Scientists Discover Simple, Eco-Friendly Way to Break Down Teflon New scientific findings reveal a straightforward and environmentally friendly approach for breaking down Teflon, one of the most resilient plastics on Earth, into valuable chemical components. A team of scientists from Newcastle University and the University of Birmingham has created a clean, energy-efficient process for recycling Teflon (PTFE), a material widely recognized for its role in non-stick cookware and other uses that require exceptional heat and chemical resistance. The study shows that discarded Teflon can be transformed into reusable materials using only sodium metal and mechanical motion (movement by shaking) at room temperature, all without the need for harmful solvents. Detailed in the Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS) on 22 October, the research introduces a low-energy, waste-free method that provides a new alternative to traditional fluorine recycling techniques. Dr. Roly Armstrong, Lecturer in Chemistry at Newcastle University and corresponding author said: “The process we have discovered breaks the strong carbon–fluorine bonds in Teflon, converting it into sodium fluoride which is used in fluoride toothpastes and added to drinking water. Turning Waste Into Resources “Hundreds of thousands of tonnes of Teflon are produced globally each year – it’s used in everything from lubricants to coatings on cookware, and currently there are very few ways to get rid of it. As those products come to the end of their lives, they currently end up in landfill – but this process allows us to extract the fluorine and upcycle it into useful new materials.” Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

Zoning Out May Be Your Brain's Rinse Cycle, Study Finds We're all familiar with the feeling of zoning out, especially when we're sleep-deprived. A new study suggests these brief wanderings of attention are our brain's attempts to catch up on maintenance that usually happens while we snooze. The study, from researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), used brain measurements taken by both electroencephalogram (EEG) caps and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanners. Periods of zoning out – or "attentional failures", in the words of the study – were accompanied by a wave of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) flowing out of the brain, before it returned a second or two later. The patterns matched the waves of CSF that usually happen during deep sleep. The thinking is that this nightly fluid flow helps wash away waste products that build up during the day. "If you don't sleep, the CSF waves start to intrude into wakefulness where normally you wouldn't see them," says MIT neuroscientist Laura Lewis. "However, they come with an attentional trade-off, where attention fails during the moments that you have this wave of fluid flow." The study participants were each tested twice: after a night of restful sleep and after a night in the lab with no sleep at all. Unsurprisingly, their cognitive performance during the study tests was generally worse when they hadn't gotten any shut-eye the night before. While zoning out occasionally happened after a full night's slumber, it was much more common after the participants had stayed awake all night. It's almost as if the brain is trying to catch up with a burst of microsleep, at the temporary cost of your mind's focus. Source:ScienceAlert @EverythingScience

First-ever recording of a dying human brain shows waves similar to memory flashbacks — School of Medicine University of Louisville Imagine reliving your entire life in the space of seconds. Like a flash of lightning, you are outside of your body, watching memorable moments you lived through. This process, known as “life recall,” can be similar to what it is like to have a near-death experience. What happens inside your brain during these experiences and after death are questions that have puzzled neuroscientists for centuries. However, a new study from Dr. Ajmal Zemmar of the University of Louisville and colleagues throughout the world, “Enhanced Interplay of Neuronal Coherence and Coupling in the Dying Human Brain,” published in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, suggests that your brain may remain active and coordinated during and even after the transition to death, and be programmed to orchestrate the whole ordeal. When an 87-year-old patient developed epilepsy, Dr. Raul Vicente of the University of Tartu, Estonia, and colleagues used continuous electroencephalography to detect the seizures and treat the patient. During these recordings, the patient had a heart attack and passed away. This unexpected event allowed the scientists to record the activity of a dying human brain for the first time ever. What did they find? "We measured 900 seconds of brain activity around the time of death and set a specific focus to investigate what happened in the 30 seconds before and after the heart stopped beating,” said Zemmar, a neurosurgeon at the University of Louisville, who organized the study. “Just before and after the heart stopped working, we saw changes in a specific band of neural oscillations, so-called gamma oscillations, but also in others such as delta, theta, alpha and beta oscillations.” Brain oscillations are more commonly known as brain waves. They are patterns of rhythmic brain activity normally present in living human brains. The different types of oscillations, including gamma, are involved in high-cognitive functions, such as concentrating, dreaming, meditation, memory retrieval, information processing and conscious perception, just like those associated with memory flashbacks. “Through generating brain oscillations involved in memory retrieval, the brain may be playing a last recall of important life events just before we die, similar to the ones reported in near-death experiences,” Zemmar speculated. Source:University of Louisville @EverythingScience

Involving women in peace deals reduces chance of a conflict restarting by up to 37% Twenty-five years ago, on October 31, 2000, the United Nations unanimously adopted its landmark Security Council Resolution 1325 (WPS 1325). The resolution on women, peace and security reaffirmed "the important role of women in the prevention and resolution of conflicts, peace negotiations, peace-building, peacekeeping, humanitarian response and in post-conflict reconstruction." It also stressed the "importance of their equal participation and full involvement in all efforts for the maintenance and promotion of peace and security." The significance of women to building sustainable peace is undeniable. Our research has found that, on average, the incorporation of measures to include women in post-conflict society in a peace agreement reduces the probability of conflict recurrence by 11%. Even more significantly, if this process occurs alongside UN leadership, the probability of conflict recurrence is reduced by 37%. So the anniversary of WPS 1325 should be a reason to celebrate. Instead, the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, opened his report to the Security Council's annual debate on women, peace and security on October 6 with a warning. Guterres said the UN too often "falls short when it comes to real change in the lives of women and girls caught in conflict." He specifically noted the lack of inclusion of women in peace negotiations, the failure to protect women and girls from sexual violence, and the underfunding of women peacebuilders. Over the past 25 years, the Security Council has adopted almost 1,000 resolutions related to WPS 1325. In 2015, Resolution 2242 aimed for the more systematic integration of the women, peace and security agenda into "all country-specific situations on the Security Council's agenda." To facilitate this, the UN Security Council set up an informal group of experts. There is no doubt that the women, peace and security agenda has had a positive impact. Guterres noted that "gender provisions in peace agreements have become more common, and women's organizations have helped transform post-conflict recovery and reconciliation in communities worldwide." He declared that "women-led civil society and women peace builders … are the drivers behind holistic and sustainable peace." Yet according to a UN Women survey in early 2025, global cuts to foreign aid budgets make it harder for women to make these vital contributions to peace and security. The situation is similarly challenging for UN peacekeeping. The cumulative budget shortfall in mid-2025 stood at almost US$2.7 billion (£2.04 billion), with the US, China and Russia the three largest debtors. Despite a significant decrease over the past decade in the peacekeeping budget from US$8.4 billion in 2014-15 to US$5.2 billion in 2024-25, the share of unpaid contributions has more than tripled from 13% to 41% over the same period. If these two trends persist, the prospects for sustainable conflict resolution will dramatically diminish. Women as peacebuilders Aiming to explore how to prevent civil wars from recurring, we analyzed 14 protracted peace processes in recurrent civil wars. This analysis revealed that the UN, working with local women's organizations, was able to create and sustain multi-level coalitions committed to concluding, maintaining and implementing peace accords. We then tested these findings statistically against 286 agreements concluded in violent conflicts worldwide. This confirmed that—together—UN leadership and the inclusion of women in post-conflict society significantly increase the odds of a peace agreement surviving for more than five years. Finally, we conducted in-depth case studies of peace processes in the Bangsamoro region in the island of Mindanao in the Philippines, as well as in Burundi, Côte d'Ivoire, Liberia and Sierra Leone. This enabled us to establish how the UN and women-led organizations are able to help prevent civil wars from recurring. Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience

Why do some of us love AI, while others hate it? The answer is in how our brains perceive risk and trust From ChatGPT crafting emails, to AI systems recommending TV shows and even helping diagnose disease, the presence of machine intelligence in everyday life is no longer science fiction. And yet, for all the promises of speed, accuracy and optimization, there's a lingering discomfort. Some people love using AI tools. Others feel anxious, suspicious, even betrayed by them. Why? The answer isn't just about how AI works. It's about how we work. We don't understand it, so we don't trust it. Human beings are more likely to trust systems they understand. Traditional tools feel familiar: you turn a key, and a car starts. You press a button, and a lift arrives. But many AI systems operate as black boxes: you type something in, and a decision appears. The logic in between is hidden. Psychologically, this is unnerving. We like to see cause and effect, and we like being able to interrogate decisions. When we can't, we feel disempowered. This is one reason for what's called algorithm aversion. This is a term popularized by the marketing researcher Berkeley Dietvorst and colleagues, whose research showed that people often prefer flawed human judgment over algorithmic decision making, particularly after witnessing even a single algorithmic error. We know, rationally, that AI systems don't have emotions or agendas. But that doesn't stop us from projecting them on to AI systems. When ChatGPT responds "too politely," some users find it eerie. When a recommendation engine gets a little too accurate, it feels intrusive. We begin to suspect manipulation, even though the system has no self. This is a form of anthropomorphism—that is, attributing humanlike intentions to nonhuman systems. Professors of communication Clifford Nass and Byron Reeves, along with others have demonstrated that we respond socially to machines, even knowing they're not human. We hate when AI gets it wrong One curious finding from behavioral science is that we are often more forgiving of human error than machine error. When a human makes a mistake, we understand it. We might even empathize. But when an algorithm makes a mistake, especially if it was pitched as objective or data-driven, we feel betrayed. This links to research on expectation violation, when our assumptions about how something "should" behave are disrupted. It causes discomfort and loss of trust. We trust machines to be logical and impartial. So when they fail, such as misclassifying an image, delivering biased outputs or recommending something wildly inappropriate, our reaction is sharper. We expected more. The irony? Humans make flawed decisions all the time. But at least we can ask them "why?" For some, AI isn't just unfamiliar, it's existentially unsettling. Teachers, writers, lawyers and designers are suddenly confronting tools that replicate parts of their work. This isn't just about automation, it's about what makes our skills valuable, and what it means to be human. This can activate a form of identity threat, a concept explored by social psychologist Claude Steele and others. It describes the fear that one's expertise or uniqueness is being diminished. The result? Resistance, defensiveness or outright dismissal of the technology. Distrust, in this case, is not a bug—it's a psychological defense mechanism. Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience

Mars, we're coming for you! 🪐🛰️🛰️ Soon, our twin Explorer spacecraft built for NASA & ucbssl ESCAPADE mission will begin their journey to the Red Planet to study the history of its climate. The mission will study how the solar wind interacts with Mars’ magnetic environment and how this interaction drives the planet’s atmospheric escape, revealing how Mars changed from warm and wet to the cold, dry world we see today. By flying two spacecraft in different orbits around Mars, ESCAPADE will get a dual viewpoint to solve the mystery of Mars' atmospheric escape. It’s a low-cost mission delivering high-impact science. Source: @RocketLab @EverythingScience

Satellite images show parts of Jamaica in ruins after record-breaking Hurricane Melissa With the help of satellites, we are beginning to get an understanding of just how catastrophic Hurricane Melissa was. On Oct. 28, Hurricane Melissa became the fourth hurricane in 75 years to make landfall on the island of Jamaica and shattered several Atlantic hurricane records. It is now tied with the 1935 "Labor Day" hurricane for the strongest Atlantic hurricane to make landfall on record, according to Yale Climate Connections. As of Oct. 31, at least 50 deaths have been reported in the storm's wake, and total damages could reach over $50 billion, according to Reuters. The full impact of the storm is still being assessed. Satellite photos released by Vantor Technology (formerly Maxar) are beginning to reveal the extent of the damage left in Melissa's wake, which left the island of Jamaica unrecognizable in many parts. Vantor Technology recently shared imagery on X showing several locations throughout the island nation that flooded or were damaged by high winds brought by Hurricane Melissa. Following Hurricane Melissa, Vantor made its satellite imagery available for free in order to help rescue and recovery efforts. "This imagery can be used by frontline organizations and geospatial community members to map changes on the ground and identify the most severely impacted areas, helping ensure resources are allocated quickly and effectively," Vantor wrote alongside the images. Source:Space.com @EverythingScience

New Drug Kills Cancer 20,000x More Effectively With No Detectable Side Effects In a significant step forward for cancer therapy, researchers at Northwestern University have redesigned the molecular structure of a well-known chemotherapy drug, greatly increasing its solubility, effectiveness, and safety. For this study, the scientists created the drug entirely from scratch as a spherical nucleic acid (SNA), a nanoscale structure that incorporates the drug into DNA strands surrounding tiny spheres. This innovative design transforms a compound that normally dissolves poorly and works weakly into a highly potent, precisely targeted treatment that spares healthy cells from damage. When tested in a small animal model of acute myeloid leukemia (AML), an aggressive and hard-to-treat blood cancer, the SNA-based version showed remarkable results. It entered leukemia cells 12.5 times more efficiently, destroyed them up to 20,000 times more effectively, and slowed cancer progression by a factor of 59, all without causing noticeable side effects. According to the researchers, this achievement highlights the growing promise of structural nanomedicine, an emerging area of research where scientists carefully design both the structure and composition of nanomedicines to control how they behave inside the body. With seven SNA-based therapies already in clinical trials, this approach could pave the way for advanced vaccines and new treatments for cancer, infectious diseases, neurodegenerative disorders, and autoimmune conditions. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

Chang'e-6 Samples Indicate Water was Delivered to the Earth and Moon by Ancient Meteorites Source:Universe Today @EverythingScience