Will the Next Space-Weather Season Be Stormy or Fair?
The New York Times
As another 11-year cycle of solar activity begins, scientists debate how violent our stellar friend is likely to be.
The big news about the sun is that there is no big news. We are blessed, astronomers like to say, to be living next to a “boring star.” But the inhabitants (if there are any) of the planets orbiting the neighboring star Proxima Centauri, only 4.2 light-years away, are less fortunate. In April astronomers announced that a massive flare had erupted from its surface in 2019. For seven seconds, as a battery of telescopes on Earth and in space watched, the little star had increased its output of ultraviolet radiation 14,000-fold, in one of the most violent such flares ever seen in our galaxy. This was more than serious sunburn territory. “A human being on this planet would have a bad time,” said Meredith MacGregor, an astronomy professor at the University of Colorado who led the worldwide observing effort.
Some women are stocking up on the medications, saying they are concerned that the new administration could take steps to restrict access.
As the glaciers of South America retreat, the supply of freshwater is dwindling and its quality is getting worse.
It’s something turkey often isn’t — undeniably juicy and a guaranteed crowd-pleaser.
A rise in the disease in younger people was not followed by an increase in deaths, a study found, and might be a sign of overdiagnosis.
The Homotherium cub was preserved in Siberian permafrost with its dark fur and flesh intact.
A small study found ChatGPT outdid human physicians when assessing medical case histories, even when those doctors were using a chatbot.
For a century, exoplanet hunters have “discovered” planets around a nearby star, only to retract the claims. But the latest find is for real.
The unidentified patient had recently returned from Africa, where the virus has caused a deadly epidemic, health officials said.
The event produces some of the year’s fastest meteors, although the nearly full moon may make them challenging to spot.
Mr. Musk dug into his companies’ budgets, preferring to cut too much rather than too little and to deal with the fallout later. Under Donald Trump, he is set to apply those tactics to the U.S. government.
Behind the scenes at a Chicago zoo, chimpanzees who spent years entertaining humans are learning to befriend their own kind.