livescience--2020-12-28--The strangest medical cases of 2020

The strangest medical cases of 2020

From a man with green urine to a teenager with a sewing pin in his heart , a number of intriguing medical cases caught our eye this year .
These `` case reports , '' which describe the conditions of individual patients , do n't usually have the type of broad implications that are seen in rigorous scientific studies with thousands of participants .
But they can sometimes help doctors better understand rare diseases or spot unusual signs of common conditions .
Here are 10 of the strangest case reports Live Science covered in 2020 .
Having your can be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Chicago found out , green pee can be a rare side effect of some medications .
The 62-year-old man was hospitalized after he was found to have high levels of carbon dioxide in his blood , a condition that can be life threatening .
The man was placed on a ventilator and given a general anaesthetic called propofol , according to a report of the case , published Dec. 2 in The New England Journal of Medicine .
Five days later , the man 's urine , which was being collected in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ green urine can be due to a number of factors , in this case , the culprit was propofol .
This medication is widely used for general anesthesia , but in rare cases , it can turn a person 's urine green .
Fortunately , this discoloration is benign and goes away once the medication is stopped .
Indeed , the man 's urine returned to a normal color once he was taken off propofol , the report said .
People can develop allergies to pretty much anything , including cold air .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Colorado , whose was so severe , he almost died .
The 34-year-old old man collapsed after he stepped out of a hot shower into a cold bathroom , according to a report of the case published Oct. 27 in .
The man was struggling to breathe and his skin was covered in hives .
He was experiencing a life-threatening , whole-body allergic reaction known as anaphylaxis .
Doctors diagnosed him with cold urticaria , an allergic reaction of the skin after exposure to cold temperatures , including cold air or cold @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a red , itchy rash ( hives ) after exposure to the cold ; but in more serious cases , people can develop anaphylaxis , which can cause their blood pressure to plummet and airways to narrow , making breathing difficult .
The man was treated with an antihistamine and steroids , and his condition improved .
He was prescribed an epinephrine auto-injector , which can treat anaphylaxis in emergency situations .
It is possible to overdose on candy , at least if you 're eating black licorice .
That 's because it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in large doses .
In an extreme case of this happening , a man in Massachusetts died after .
The 54-year-old man suddenly lost consciousness after experiencing a life-threatening heart rhythm problem , according to a report of the case , published Sept. 23 in The New England Journal of Medicine .
His family said that the man had a poor diet , and in recent weeks , he had consumed one to two large packages of black licorice every day .
Despite receiving multiple treatings in the intensive care unit , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the hospital , the report said .
Black licorice often contains a compound called glycyrrhizin , which is derived from licorice root , according to the Food and Drug Administration ( FDA ) .
Consuming too much licorice root or candies flavored with licorice root can be dangerous because glycyrrhizin lowers the body 's potassium levels .
This , in turn , can lead to high blood pressure and abnormal heart rhythms .
The FDA says that eating just 2 ounces of black licorice a day for two weeks can cause heart rhythm @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and older .
A teen 's chest pain had a surprising cause — there was a .
The 17-year-old went to the emergency room after he experienced a sharp pain in his chest that radiated to his back , according to a report of the case , published July 29 in .
A CT scan of his chest showed there was an `` linear metallic foreign '' object lodged in his heart , the report said .
That object turned out to be a 1.4-inch ( 3.5 centimeters ) sewing pin , which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ teen initially told the doctors he had n't ingested any foreign objects or experienced physical trauma to his chest .
But in a later interview , he revealed that he tailors his clothes and sometimes holds sewing pins in his mouth .
Still , he said he was n't aware of ingesting a sewing pin .
Foreign bodies in the heart are rare , especially in children and teens .
Fortunately , the teen recovered after his surgery and had no complications as far as the authors are aware , they said .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ sugar into alcohol .
The 61-year-old woman needed a liver transplant because she had cirrhosis , or scarring of the liver .
But her doctors were puzzled when her urine repeatedly tested positive for alcohol , even though she denied drinking , according to a report of the case , published Feb. 24 in the journal .
After some careful sleuthing , doctors discovered that microbes in the woman 's bladder were fermenting glucose ( sugar ) into alcohol .
The woman 's condition is similar to a rare disorder called `` auto-brewery @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which microbes in the gastrointestinal tract convert carbohydrates into alcohol .
People with ABS can get drunk just from eating carbs , .
But in the woman 's case , the fermentation was taking place in her bladder , which makes her condition distinct from ABS , the report said .
In her case , the alcohol did n't get from the bladder into the bloodstream , so the woman did n't appear intoxicated .
The woman 's condition was so rare that it did n't even have a name yet .
Her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ syndrome '' or `` bladder fermentation syndrome . ''
Although your mind may wander from time to time , you usually expect your physical organs to stay in the same spot inside your body .
But that 's not always the case , as a woman in Michigan found when her spleen traveled a whole foot inside her body over 48 hours .
The woman had a rare condition known as `` , '' which happens when the ligaments that keep the spleen in its usual spot become weakened and allow the organ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ scans of the woman 's abdomen taken just two days apart showed that her spleen had traveled from the upper left quadrant of her abdomen to the lower right quadrant , according to a report of the case published Nov. 19 in The New England Journal of Medicine .
That 's about a 1-foot ( 0.3 meters ) distance , the authors said .
The woman had a liver condition that resulted in her spleen getting larger , which in turn caused the ligaments surrounding her spleen to stretch out .
The typical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the spleen .
But in this case , the woman was hoping to receive a liver transplant , and undergoing a separate surgery to remove her spleen could result in complications that would prevent her from qualifying for a new liver .
So doctors decided to wait , and planned to remove the spleen at the same time as her liver transplant surgery .
People with COVID-19 are typically contagious for about eight days after they contract the infection .
But a woman in Washington state , meaning she was contagious during that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ showed symptoms of the disease , according to a report of the case , published Nov. 4 in the journal .
The 71-year-old woman had a type of leukemia , or cancer of the white blood cells , and so her immune system was weakened and less able to clear her body of the new coronavirus , known as SARS-CoV-2 .
The woman was infected in late February during the country 's first reported COVID-19 outbreak , which occurred at the Life Care Center rehabilitation facility in Kirkland , Washington .
Over a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would be tested for COVID-19 more than a dozen times .
The virus was detected in her upper respiratory tract for 105 days ; and infectious virus particles — meaning they were capable of spreading the disease — were detected for at least 70 days .
Eventually , the woman was able to clear the virus , although doctors do n't know how this happened .
The findings suggest that immunocompromised patients with COVID-19 may be contagious for much longer periods than typical .
A man in Brazil surprised his doctors when a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but — a very rare condition .
The 38-year-old man initially sought medical care for severe back pain , according to a report of the case , published May 6 in The New England Journal of Medicine .
A CT scan showed that his back pain was due to a herniated or `` slipped '' disk , a relatively common condition in which part of a cushion-like disk between the spinal vertebrae moves out of place .
But his doctors could n't help but notice that the man had an unusual anatomical feature @ @ @ @ @ @ @ seen in a typical person , the man had three : a normal-looking kidney on his left side and two fused kidneys located near the pelvis , the report said .
Having three kidneys is rare , with fewer than 100 cases reported in the medical literature .
The condition is thought to arise during embryonic development , when a structure that typically forms a single kidney splits in two .
The man did n't need any medical attention for his extra kidney , but he did receive oral painkillers for his back @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is a rare condition caused by bacteria that can thrive in warm water .
But it 's not always linked to hot tubs , as a teen in Australia found when he contracted the disease from his indoor swimming pool .
The teen developed severe breathing difficulties that sent him to the emergency room , according to a report of the case , published Nov. 11 in the journal .
Prior to his hospitalization , the teen had been recovering from ankle surgery and spent most of his time in his home 's @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their indoor swimming pool .
He was diagnosed with hot tub lung , a disease that can occur when people inhale certain aerosolized bacteria that belong to the genus Mycobacterium , including Mycobacterium avium .
An analysis of the pool water from the teen 's home found that it was contaminated with this bacteria .
The family said that they had recently switched the sanitizer they used for their pool , from chlorine to a non-chlorine alternative , and this allowed the bacteria to grow .
Several other people in the teen 's @ @ @ @ @ @ @ due to hot tub lung .
Two years later , the family had recovered but their lungs still showed signs of mild damage from the illness .
A woman who went to the emergency room for abdominal pain and vomiting found out that her symptoms were the result of complications from a surgery she had six decades earlier .
Doctors discovered there was a 1.5-inch ( 4 cm ) long in her intestines , according to a report of the case , published Jan. 8 in the journal .
It turned out the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over the course of nearly her entire life .
When the woman was six days old , she had undergone a surgery for an intestinal blockage .
But the surgical method that her doctors used left a dormant piece of intestine in her body , which accumulated substances over time , and gradually led to the formation of the stone .
Doctors were able to remove the stone via surgery , and the woman fully recovered .

From a man with green urine to a teenager with a sewing pin in his heart, a number of intriguing medical cases caught our eye this year.
These "case reports," which describe the conditions of individual patients, don't usually have the type of broad implications that are seen in rigorous scientific studies with thousands of participants. But they can sometimes help doctors better understand rare diseases or spot unusual signs of common conditions. Here are 10 of the strangest case reports Live Science covered in 2020.
Green urine
(Image credit: The New England Journal of Medicine ©2020)
Having your pee turn green can be scary. But as a man in Chicago found out, green pee can be a rare side effect of some medications.
The 62-year-old man was hospitalized after he was found to have high levels of carbon dioxide in his blood, a condition that can be life threatening. The man was placed on a ventilator and given a general anaesthetic called propofol, according to a report of the case, published Dec. 2 in The New England Journal of Medicine . Five days later, the man's urine, which was being collected in a catheter bag, turned green.
While green urine can be due to a number of factors, in this case, the culprit was propofol. This medication is widely used for general anesthesia, but in rare cases, it can turn a person's urine green.
Fortunately, this discoloration is benign and goes away once the medication is stopped. Indeed, the man's urine returned to a normal color once he was taken off propofol, the report said.
Cold allergy
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
People can develop allergies to pretty much anything, including cold air. That was the case for a man in Colorado, whose allergic reaction to the cold was so severe, he almost died.
The 34-year-old old man collapsed after he stepped out of a hot shower into a cold bathroom, according to a report of the case published Oct. 27 in The Journal of Emergency Medicine . The man was struggling to breathe and his skin was covered in hives. He was experiencing a life-threatening, whole-body allergic reaction known as anaphylaxis.
Doctors diagnosed him with cold urticaria, an allergic reaction of the skin after exposure to cold temperatures, including cold air or cold water. The most common symptom is a red, itchy rash (hives) after exposure to the cold; but in more serious cases, people can develop anaphylaxis, which can cause their blood pressure to plummet and airways to narrow, making breathing difficult.
The man was treated with an antihistamine and steroids, and his condition improved. He was prescribed an epinephrine auto-injector, which can treat anaphylaxis in emergency situations.
Lethal licorice
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
It is possible to overdose on candy, at least if you're eating black licorice. That's because it contains a compound known to be toxic in large doses. In an extreme case of this happening, a man in Massachusetts died after eating too much black licorice .
The 54-year-old man suddenly lost consciousness after experiencing a life-threatening heart rhythm problem, according to a report of the case, published Sept. 23 in The New England Journal of Medicine . His family said that the man had a poor diet, and in recent weeks, he had consumed one to two large packages of black licorice every day. Despite receiving multiple treatings in the intensive care unit, the man died 32 hours after arriving at the hospital, the report said.
Black licorice often contains a compound called glycyrrhizin, which is derived from licorice root, according to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Consuming too much licorice root or candies flavored with licorice root can be dangerous because glycyrrhizin lowers the body's potassium levels. This, in turn, can lead to high blood pressure and abnormal heart rhythms.
The FDA says that eating just 2 ounces of black licorice a day for two weeks can cause heart rhythm problems, particularly for people ages 40 and older.
Pierced heart
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
A teen's chest pain had a surprising cause — there was a sewing pin in his heart .
The 17-year-old went to the emergency room after he experienced a sharp pain in his chest that radiated to his back, according to a report of the case, published July 29 in The Journal of Emergency Medicine . A CT scan of his chest showed there was an "linear metallic foreign" object lodged in his heart, the report said.
That object turned out to be a 1.4-inch (3.5 centimeters) sewing pin, which doctors removed through open-heart surgery.
The teen initially told the doctors he hadn't ingested any foreign objects or experienced physical trauma to his chest. But in a later interview, he revealed that he tailors his clothes and sometimes holds sewing pins in his mouth. Still, he said he wasn't aware of ingesting a sewing pin.
Foreign bodies in the heart are rare, especially in children and teens. Fortunately, the teen recovered after his surgery and had no complications as far as the authors are aware, they said.
Bladder brewery
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
A woman's bladder turned into a brewery of sorts when it started fermenting sugar into alcohol.
The 61-year-old woman needed a liver transplant because she had cirrhosis, or scarring of the liver. But her doctors were puzzled when her urine repeatedly tested positive for alcohol, even though she denied drinking, according to a report of the case, published Feb. 24 in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine .
After some careful sleuthing, doctors discovered that microbes in the woman's bladder were fermenting glucose (sugar) into alcohol.
The woman's condition is similar to a rare disorder called "auto-brewery syndrome" (ABS), in which microbes in the gastrointestinal tract convert carbohydrates into alcohol. People with ABS can get drunk just from eating carbs, Live Science previously reported . But in the woman's case, the fermentation was taking place in her bladder, which makes her condition distinct from ABS, the report said. In her case, the alcohol didn't get from the bladder into the bloodstream, so the woman didn't appear intoxicated.
The woman's condition was so rare that it didn't even have a name yet. Her doctors proposed calling it "urinary auto-brewery syndrome" or "bladder fermentation syndrome."
Wandering spleen
(Image credit: The New England Journal of Medicine)
Although your mind may wander from time to time, you usually expect your physical organs to stay in the same spot inside your body. But that's not always the case, as a woman in Michigan found when her spleen traveled a whole foot inside her body over 48 hours.
The woman had a rare condition known as " wandering spleen ," which happens when the ligaments that keep the spleen in its usual spot become weakened and allow the organ to migrate inside the body.
CT scans of the woman's abdomen taken just two days apart showed that her spleen had traveled from the upper left quadrant of her abdomen to the lower right quadrant, according to a report of the case published Nov. 19 in The New England Journal of Medicine . That's about a 1-foot (0.3 meters) distance, the authors said.
The woman had a liver condition that resulted in her spleen getting larger, which in turn caused the ligaments surrounding her spleen to stretch out. The typical treatment for wandering spleen is removal of the spleen. But in this case, the woman was hoping to receive a liver transplant, and undergoing a separate surgery to remove her spleen could result in complications that would prevent her from qualifying for a new liver. So doctors decided to wait, and planned to remove the spleen at the same time as her liver transplant surgery.
Persistent coronavirus
(Image credit: NIAID-RML)
People with COVID-19 are typically contagious for about eight days after they contract the infection. But a woman in Washington state shed infectious virus particles for a record 70 days , meaning she was contagious during that entire time. However, she never showed symptoms of the disease, according to a report of the case, published Nov. 4 in the journal Cell .
The 71-year-old woman had a type of leukemia, or cancer of the white blood cells, and so her immune system was weakened and less able to clear her body of the new coronavirus, known as SARS-CoV-2.
The woman was infected in late February during the country's first reported COVID-19 outbreak, which occurred at the Life Care Center rehabilitation facility in Kirkland, Washington. Over a period of 15 weeks, the woman would be tested for COVID-19 more than a dozen times. The virus was detected in her upper respiratory tract for 105 days; and infectious virus particles — meaning they were capable of spreading the disease — were detected for at least 70 days.
Eventually, the woman was able to clear the virus, although doctors don't know how this happened. The findings suggest that immunocompromised patients with COVID-19 may be contagious for much longer periods than typical.
Three kidneys
(Image credit: The New England Journal of Medicine ©2020)
A man in Brazil surprised his doctors when a scan showed he had not two, but three kidneys — a very rare condition.
The 38-year-old man initially sought medical care for severe back pain, according to a report of the case, published May 6 in The New England Journal of Medicine . A CT scan showed that his back pain was due to a herniated or "slipped" disk, a relatively common condition in which part of a cushion-like disk between the spinal vertebrae moves out of place.
But his doctors couldn't help but notice that the man had an unusual anatomical feature. Instead of the usual two kidneys seen in a typical person, the man had three: a normal-looking kidney on his left side and two fused kidneys located near the pelvis, the report said.
Having three kidneys is rare, with fewer than 100 cases reported in the medical literature. The condition is thought to arise during embryonic development, when a structure that typically forms a single kidney splits in two. The man didn't need any medical attention for his extra kidney, but he did receive oral painkillers for his back pain, the report said.
Hot tub lung
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
So-called hot tub lung is a rare condition caused by bacteria that can thrive in warm water. But it's not always linked to hot tubs, as a teen in Australia found when he contracted the disease from his indoor swimming pool.
The teen developed severe breathing difficulties that sent him to the emergency room, according to a report of the case, published Nov. 11 in the journal Respirology Case Reports . Prior to his hospitalization, the teen had been recovering from ankle surgery and spent most of his time in his home's media room, which was next to their indoor swimming pool.
He was diagnosed with hot tub lung, a disease that can occur when people inhale certain aerosolized bacteria that belong to the genus Mycobacterium, including Mycobacterium avium.
An analysis of the pool water from the teen's home found that it was contaminated with this bacteria. The family said that they had recently switched the sanitizer they used for their pool, from chlorine to a non-chlorine alternative, and this allowed the bacteria to grow.
Several other people in the teen's family developed respiratory problems, also likely due to hot tub lung. Two years later, the family had recovered but their lungs still showed signs of mild damage from the illness.
Calcified stone
(Image credit: © BMJ Case Reports 2020)
A woman who went to the emergency room for abdominal pain and vomiting found out that her symptoms were the result of complications from a surgery she had six decades earlier.
Doctors discovered there was a 1.5-inch (4 cm) long calcified stone in her intestines, according to a report of the case, published Jan. 8 in the journal BMJ Case Reports . It turned out the stone had been developing inside the woman over the course of nearly her entire life.
When the woman was six days old, she had undergone a surgery for an intestinal blockage. But the surgical method that her doctors used left a dormant piece of intestine in her body, which accumulated substances over time, and gradually led to the formation of the stone.
Doctors were able to remove the stone via surgery, and the woman fully recovered.
Originally published on Live Science.


livescience--2020-12-28--10 science records broken in 2020

10 science records broken in 2020

This year was filled with record-breaking scientific discoveries .
Some earned the title of `` oldest , '' including the 7 billion-year-old stardust found to be the oldest material on our planet and a 31,000-year-old burial that held the remains of the oldest-ever found identical twins .
Others earned the title of `` longest , '' including a bird that traveled for 11 days straight from Alaska to New Zealand and a lightning bolt that stretched for more than 440 miles ( 700 kilometers ) .
Here are 10 times science broke records in 2020 .
A loud , long-beaked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for longest nonstop flight this fall .
On Sept. 16 , a male bar-tailed godwit ( Limosa lapponica ) known as `` 4BBRW '' set off from southwest Alaska and flew for 11 days straight to New Zealand , traveling a distance of about 7,581 miles ( 12,200 km ) , taking rounding errors into consideration .
The previous record was held by a female bar-tailed godwit that flew around 7,145 miles ( 11,500 km ) over nine days in 2007 .
Bar-tailed godwits are known to be impressive flyers , but 4BBRW @ @ @ @ @ @ @ — was extra impressive .
[ Read more about the long-distance flyer ] While exploring deep-sea canyons off Australia 's coast , researchers discovered a super long , stringy creature that may be `` the largest animal ever discovered , '' they said .
This creature , called a siphonophore measured 150 feet ( 45 meters ) long and was actually made up of many small critters called `` zooids . ''
Each zooid lives its own life but is always connected to its fellow zooids and performs a function for the entire @ @ @ @ @ @ @ extra long creature ] A beer can , photographic paper and a low-tech pinhole camera captured a photo of the sun 's journey across the sky every day since 2012 ; the photo may be the longest-exposure photo ever taken .
Eight years ago , a University of Hertfordshire student created a do-it-yourself camera and placed it on a telescope at the university 's Bayfordbury Observatory , eventually forgetting about it .
`` I had n't intended to capture an exposure for this length of time and to my surprise , it had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a photography technician at Barnet and Southgate College , said in a statement .
The resulting photo showed 2,953 arcs of light as the sun rose and fell .
[ Read more about the technique used to capture this photo ] An ancient turtle that lived 8 million years ago , with a shell that spanned nearly 8 feet ( 2.4 m ) in diameter , may have been the largest to ever exist .
The ancient creature belonged to a now-extinct species called the Stupendemys geographicus , that lived in northern South @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lasted from 12 million to 5 million years ago .
The beast weighed around 2,500 pounds ( 1,145 kilograms ) , which is almost 100 times as heavy as its closest living relative , the Amazon river turtle ( Peltocephalus dumerilianus ) , and twice the size of the largest living turtle , the marine leatherback ( Dermochelys coriacea ) , researchers reported in the study published on Feb. 12 in the journal Science Advances .
[ Read more about the giant creature ] A 31,000-year-old oval-shaped burial found at the archeological site @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the remains of identical twin infants , likely the oldest known in the world .
The grave was found in 2005 ; but in a new analysis , researchers used ancient DNA to confirm that the infants were identical twins and that they were likely cousins of a 3-month-old infant discovered in a nearby burial .
One of the infants died shortly after childbirth and the other lived for about 50 days , according to the study published on Nov. 6 in the journal Communications Biology .
[ Read more about these ancient @ @ @ @ @ @ @ found in a mine in northern Myanmar , scientists discovered the world 's oldest known sperm .
The amber held 39 tiny ostracods , a type of crustacean ; 31 of them belonged to a newly discovered species called Myanmarcypris hui .
Inside one of the adult females of M. hui , researchers discovered four eggs and a spaghetti-like mass that turned out to be 100 million-year-old sperm .
Prior to this discovery , the oldest confirmed sperm was 50 million years old and came from a worm cocoon in Antarctica .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the journal Proceedings of the Royal Academy B .
[ Read more about the ancient sperm ] Stardust found inside a massive meteorite that hit Earth half a century ago dates back 7 billion years , making it the oldest material found on the planet .
The ancient dust , made up of grains that are older than our sun , was sent out into the universe by dying stars .
This stardust eventually made it to our planet by hitching a ride on the Murchison meteorite , which fell in Australia in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that researchers have discovered grains that predate the sun in our planet 's rocks .
In the new study , researchers analyzed grains from Murchison , grinding up small bits of the meteorite and adding acid , a method that dissolves minerals and silicates , leaving behind the presolar grains .
The findings were published on Jan. 13 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .
[ Read more about this ancient stardust ] How fast can sound travel ?
Scientists figured out the fastest possible speed of sound in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( 36 km/s ) .
Sound can travel at different speeds depending on what material it 's traveling through ; for example , sound travels faster in warmer liquids compared with colder ones .
It can also travel at different speeds in solids versus liquids versus gases .
Calculations suggest that sound travels the fastest in the lowest-mass atoms .
So to figure out the maximum speed that sound can travel , a group of researchers calculated the speed of sound through a solid atom of hydrogen .
Hydrogen is the lowest-mass atom @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 's under immense pressure that 's a million times stronger than Earth 's atmosphere .
In this very specific condition , the researchers found that sound can travel close to its theoretical limit of 79,200 mph ( 127,460 km/h ) .
The findings were published on Oct. 9 in the journal Science Advances .
[ Read more about the speed of sound ] On Halloween in 2018 , a massive lightning bolt sliced the skies above Brazil .
The `` megaflash '' was more than 440 miles ( 700 km ) long and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ edge of Argentina , making it the longest lightning bolt ever recorded , according to an analysis from the World Meteorological Organization ( WMO ) posted in June .
The scientists used new satellite technology to confirm that the lightning bolt was more than twice as long as the previous record-holder , a flash that lit up Oklahoma skies in 2007 .
But lightning is n't actually getting bigger , the lightning-monitoring technology is just getting better , the researchers said in a statement .
The new analysis also showed that the longest @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over northern Argentina that lasted for nearly 17 seconds in March 2019 .
[ Read more about this spooky megaflash ] Scientists found fossilized guts in Nye County , Nevada , that date back to between 550 million and 539 million years ago , making them the oldest remnants of digestive tracts ever found .
The guts , which are about 30 million years older than the previous record-holder , belonged to little tube-like creatures called cloudinomorphs .
These guts could help scientists understand what types of creatures cloudinomorphs actually are .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ either cnidarians , similar to modern-day coral , or annelids like modern-day tube worms .
Analysis revealed that the soft tissue , which is likely the gut , looks like a tube ; that shape probably agrees more with the worm hypothesis , according to the scientists .
The findings were published Jan. 10 in the Journal Nature Communications .
[ Read more about these ancient guts ]

This year was filled with record-breaking scientific discoveries. Some earned the title of "oldest," including the 7 billion-year-old stardust found to be the oldest material on our planet and a 31,000-year-old burial that held the remains of the oldest-ever found identical twins. Others earned the title of "longest," including a bird that traveled for 11 days straight from Alaska to New Zealand and a lightning bolt that stretched for more than 440 miles (700 kilometers).
Here are 10 times science broke records in 2020.
Longest bird flight
Bar-tailed godwits are impressive flyers, scaling thousands of miles without stopping. (Image credit: Shutterstock)
A loud, long-beaked, rust-colored bird broke the world record for longest nonstop flight this fall. On Sept. 16, a male bar-tailed godwit (Limosa lapponica) known as "4BBRW'' set off from southwest Alaska and flew for 11 days straight to New Zealand, traveling a distance of about 7,581 miles (12,200 km), taking rounding errors into consideration. The previous record was held by a female bar-tailed godwit that flew around 7,145 miles (11,500 km) over nine days in 2007. Bar-tailed godwits are known to be impressive flyers, but 4BBRW's journey — prolonged by easterly winds — was extra impressive.
[ Read more about the long-distance flyer ]
'Longest animal ever'
An image shows the coils of the long siphonophore. (Image credit: Schmidt Ocean Institute)
While exploring deep-sea canyons off Australia's coast, researchers discovered a super long, stringy creature that may be "the largest animal ever discovered," they said. This creature, called a siphonophore measured 150 feet (45 meters) long and was actually made up of many small critters called "zooids." Each zooid lives its own life but is always connected to its fellow zooids and performs a function for the entire siphonophore.
[ Read more about this extra long creature ]
Longest-exposure photo
This image shows 2,953 arced trails of the sun, as it rose and fell over a period of eight years and one month. (Image credit: Regina Valkenborgh/University of Hertfordshire)
A beer can, photographic paper and a low-tech pinhole camera captured a photo of the sun's journey across the sky every day since 2012; the photo may be the longest-exposure photo ever taken. Eight years ago, a University of Hertfordshire student created a do-it-yourself camera and placed it on a telescope at the university's Bayfordbury Observatory, eventually forgetting about it. "I hadn't intended to capture an exposure for this length of time and to my surprise, it had survived," Regina Valkenborgh, now a photography technician at Barnet and Southgate College, said in a statement. The resulting photo showed 2,953 arcs of light as the sun rose and fell.
[Read more about the technique used to capture this photo]
Biggest turtle that ever lived
An illustration of a giant male (front) and female (left) Stupendemys geographicus out swimming for a snack. (Image credit: Jaime Chirinos)
An ancient turtle that lived 8 million years ago, with a shell that spanned nearly 8 feet (2.4 m) in diameter, may have been the largest to ever exist. The ancient creature belonged to a now-extinct species called the Stupendemys geographicus, that lived in northern South America during the Miocene epoch, which lasted from 12 million to 5 million years ago. The beast weighed around 2,500 pounds (1,145 kilograms), which is almost 100 times as heavy as its closest living relative, the Amazon river turtle (Peltocephalus dumerilianus), and twice the size of the largest living turtle, the marine leatherback (Dermochelys coriacea), researchers reported in the study published on Feb. 12 in the journal Science Advances.
[Read more about the giant creature]
Oldest identical twins
The twin infants' double burial was unearthed in Krems am Wachtberg, Austria. (Image credit: OREA ÖAW)
A 31,000-year-old oval-shaped burial found at the archeological site of Krems-Wachtberg, in Austria, held the remains of identical twin infants, likely the oldest known in the world. The grave was found in 2005; but in a new analysis, researchers used ancient DNA to confirm that the infants were identical twins and that they were likely cousins of a 3-month-old infant discovered in a nearby burial. One of the infants died shortly after childbirth and the other lived for about 50 days, according to the study published on Nov. 6 in the journal Communications Biology.
[Read more about these ancient twins]
Oldest sperm
Artist’s reconstruction of the Cretaceous ostracod crustacean Myanmarcypris hui male (right) and female (left) during mating. (Image credit: Dinghua Yang)
Inside a disc of amber found in a mine in northern Myanmar, scientists discovered the world's oldest known sperm. The amber held 39 tiny ostracods, a type of crustacean; 31 of them belonged to a newly discovered species called Myanmarcypris hui. Inside one of the adult females of M. hui, researchers discovered four eggs and a spaghetti-like mass that turned out to be 100 million-year-old sperm. Prior to this discovery, the oldest confirmed sperm was 50 million years old and came from a worm cocoon in Antarctica. The findings were published on Sept. 16 in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Academy B.
[Read more about the ancient sperm]
Oldest material on Earth
Dust-rich outflows of evolved stars similar to the pictured Egg Nebula are plausible sources of the large presolar grains found in meteorites like Murchison. (Image credit: Image courtesy NASA, W. Sparks (STScI) and R. Sahai (JPL). Inset: SiC grain with ~8 micrometers in its longest dimension. Inset image courtesy of Janaína N. Ávila. )
Stardust found inside a massive meteorite that hit Earth half a century ago dates back 7 billion years, making it the oldest material found on the planet. The ancient dust, made up of grains that are older than our sun, was sent out into the universe by dying stars. This stardust eventually made it to our planet by hitching a ride on the Murchison meteorite, which fell in Australia in 1969. This is the first time that researchers have discovered grains that predate the sun in our planet's rocks. In the new study, researchers analyzed grains from Murchison, grinding up small bits of the meteorite and adding acid, a method that dissolves minerals and silicates, leaving behind the presolar grains. The findings were published on Jan. 13 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
[Read more about this ancient stardust]
Fastest speed of sound
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
How fast can sound travel? Scientists figured out the fastest possible speed of sound in any medium: 22 miles per second (36 km/s). Sound can travel at different speeds depending on what material it's traveling through; for example, sound travels faster in warmer liquids compared with colder ones. It can also travel at different speeds in solids versus liquids versus gases. Calculations suggest that sound travels the fastest in the lowest-mass atoms. So to figure out the maximum speed that sound can travel, a group of researchers calculated the speed of sound through a solid atom of hydrogen. Hydrogen is the lowest-mass atom but isn't solid, unless it's under immense pressure that's a million times stronger than Earth's atmosphere. In this very specific condition, the researchers found that sound can travel close to its theoretical limit of 79,200 mph (127,460 km/h). The findings were published on Oct. 9 in the journal Science Advances.
[Read more about the speed of sound]
Longest lightning bolt
A megaflash crackles over Porto Alegre, Brazil. (Image credit: Shutterstock)
On Halloween in 2018, a massive lightning bolt sliced the skies above Brazil. The "megaflash" was more than 440 miles (700 km) long and stretched from the Atlantic coast to the edge of Argentina, making it the longest lightning bolt ever recorded, according to an analysis from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) posted in June. The scientists used new satellite technology to confirm that the lightning bolt was more than twice as long as the previous record-holder, a flash that lit up Oklahoma skies in 2007. But lightning isn't actually getting bigger, the lightning-monitoring technology is just getting better, the researchers said in a statement. The new analysis also showed that the longest duration record goes to a lightning strike over northern Argentina that lasted for nearly 17 seconds in March 2019.
[Read more about this spooky megaflash]
Oldest guts ever found
An artist's interpretation of the ancient cloudinomorph, with the guts shown in red. Artwork by Stacy Turpin Cheavens, University of Missouri. (Image credit: James Schiffbauer)
Scientists found fossilized guts in Nye County, Nevada, that date back to between 550 million and 539 million years ago, making them the oldest remnants of digestive tracts ever found. The guts, which are about 30 million years older than the previous record-holder, belonged to little tube-like creatures called cloudinomorphs. These guts could help scientists understand what types of creatures cloudinomorphs actually are. The leading hypotheses say that the creatures are either cnidarians, similar to modern-day coral, or annelids like modern-day tube worms. Analysis revealed that the soft tissue, which is likely the gut, looks like a tube; that shape probably agrees more with the worm hypothesis, according to the scientists. The findings were published Jan. 10 in the Journal Nature Communications.
[Read more about these ancient guts]
Originally published on Live Science.


livescience--2020-12-28--The coolest ancient weapons discovered in 2020

Ancient swords , elaborate daggers , even early artillery — 2020 turned up a number of intriguing ancient weapons that tell the story of the violence of the past .
These discoveries cover hundreds of thousands of years of human history , ranging from the ice age to medieval times .
The first stop in our weapons tour takes us to the ice age , where the now-extinct human species Homo heidelbergensis used tools to hunt .
Measuring about 25 inches ( 64.5 centimeters ) long , this throwing stick found in Germany was first reported in April in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 300,000 years and would have been used to wound or kill small prey , like rabbits , swans and ducks , according to the .
Homo heidelbergensis also used spears and long lances to hunt .
Most of these wooden weapons are long gone , but the German site of Schöningen preserves exceptional examples of this ancient hunting tradition .
What was thought to be a medieval sword sitting in an obscure museum is actually one of the oldest swords ever discovered .
The simple weapon was spotted in the San Lazzaro degli @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Though the sword was labeled as only a few hundred years old , Dall'Armellina recognized that it looked far more like a weapon from the Bronze Age than a medieval artifact .
She and her colleagues analyzed the sword and found that it is indeed a copper-arsenic alloy from the early Bronze Age , about 5,000 years ago .
The sword hails from Anatolia , or what is now eastern Turkey , where swords were first invented .
A mushroom hunter in the Czech Republic was out in the woods this spring @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fungi .
Sticking out of the soil was a piece of metal .
Mushroom hunter Roman Novák kicked at it and realized it was the .
He started digging and found not only the sword , but a bronze ax .
The hilt and pommel of the sword are decorated with delicate circular and crescent-shaped carvings .
Archaeologists with the nearby Silesian Museum examined the artifacts and pegged them to the Bronze Age , some 3,300 years ago .
It was not clear why the sword was out in the middle of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ washed away enough soil to make it visible for the first time in thousands of years .
Archaeologists plan to study the surrounding region further .
Around 2,500 years ago in what is now Siberia , a man , two women and a baby were laid to rest .
In the grave with them was a cache of treasures , including .
The people buried in the grave were part of the Tagar culture .
The weapons lay alongside both the man and the younger woman .
It was n't unusual for Tagar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ though they usually possessed bows and arrows , not the ax found in this grave .
The man and woman were probably in their 30s or 40s when they died .
Curled at their feet was the body of a woman in her 60s .
And scattered throughout the grave , archaeologists found the bones of an infant less than a month old , whose remains may have been disturbed by rodents after the burial .
A bone knife-handle discovered on the Isle of Man , near England , reveals the creativity of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
First unearthed in the 1970s , the bone pommel was finally analyzed this year , with a report in the journal in October .
The artifact was found in a grave holding the cremated bones of four individuals , including at least one teenager and one infant .
Along with the partially burned bones , which had been collected in two urns , archaeologists found bone beads and a bone knife pommel , probably made from the bone of a cow or horse .
The blade was gone , but the pommel @ @ @ @ @ @ @ size of a modern table knife , the researchers reported .
Perhaps even more intriguing than the weapon in this burial was a series of other artifacts : bones worked into rectangular shapes about an inch ( 30 millimeters ) long , with rounded corners .
Nothing like the bone rectangles has ever been found before , and it 's not clear what they would have been used for .
It took nine months of cleaning and restoration to turn what looked like an unimpressive lump of metal into this richly decorated Roman @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about 13 inches ( 35 cm ) long , was found in the grave of a Roman soldier at Haltern , the site of a Roman military base between 27 B.C .
and A.D. 14 .
The dagger was found in the base 's cemetery and is one of the few weapons discovered at the site .
The blade of the dagger is made of iron , and its handle is inlaid with silver .
Its sheath was sumptuous , lined with linden wood and decorated with red glass and enamel , silver @ @ @ @ @ @ @ often of sulfur , copper , silver and lead ) .
Romans were not usually buried with their weapons , so the presence of the dagger in the grave is a bit of a mystery , .
When archaeologists unearthed the 1,100-year-old grave of a Viking warrior in Norway , they were n't surprised to find a sword inside ; Viking men were often buried with their weapons .
But what made the grave strange was that the sword was on the warrior 's left side ; Viking swords are almost always found @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In life , a right-handed warrior would wear a sword on the left to be able to draw it easily .
The fact that Viking warriors are buried with their swords on the right suggests that they believed in a `` mirror afterlife , '' in which everything was flip-flopped .
The warrior buried in the Norwegian grave site may have been left-handed , , meaning he would have worn his sword on the right in life .
Thus , his sword was placed to his left in preparation for the mirror afterlife @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a medieval warrior 's body settled to the bottom of a Lithuanian lake .
It was found , alongside the soldier 's weapons , late this year .
It 's not clear why the man ended up at the lake bottom ; sediments had settled naturally over the body , burying him in silt 30 feet ( 9 meters ) below the water 's surface .
Near the body were two knives with wooden handles and an iron sword , all in a surprisingly good state of preservation .
An artifact discovered in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at first glance , like a particularly heavy-duty thermos — but it 's actually a siege weapon dating back to the 17th or 18th century .
The device is a mačkula , a kind of mortar used when laying siege to a fortress or castle .
According to , the bronze artifact was found near Nečven fortress , an archaeological ruin dating to the beginning of the 14th century .
The mačkula was found within one of the fortress walls .
It may have had both ceremonial and defensive value , according to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are traditionally used to celebrate winter festivals and victory in a traditional equestrian competition , the Sinjska alka , held every year in Sinj , Croatia .

Ancient swords, elaborate daggers, even early artillery — 2020 turned up a number of intriguing ancient weapons that tell the story of the violence of the past. These discoveries cover hundreds of thousands of years of human history, ranging from the ice age to medieval times.
An ice age throwing stick
(Image credit: Alexander Gonschior/University of Tübingen )
The first stop in our weapons tour takes us to the ice age, where the now-extinct human species Homo heidelbergensis used tools to hunt. Measuring about 25 inches (64.5 centimeters) long, this throwing stick found in Germany was first reported in April in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution . It dates back a whopping 300,000 years and would have been used to wound or kill small prey, like rabbits, swans and ducks, according to the University of Tübingen . Homo heidelbergensis also used spears and long lances to hunt. Most of these wooden weapons are long gone, but the German site of Schöningen preserves exceptional examples of this ancient hunting tradition.
A very old sword
(Image credit: Ca' Foscari University of Venice/Andrea Avezzù)
What was thought to be a medieval sword sitting in an obscure museum is actually one of the oldest swords ever discovered .
The simple weapon was spotted in the San Lazzaro degli Armeni monastery by then-student archaeologist Vittoria Dall'Armellina. Though the sword was labeled as only a few hundred years old, Dall'Armellina recognized that it looked far more like a weapon from the Bronze Age than a medieval artifact. She and her colleagues analyzed the sword and found that it is indeed a copper-arsenic alloy from the early Bronze Age, about 5,000 years ago. The sword hails from Anatolia, or what is now eastern Turkey, where swords were first invented.
A beautiful hilt
(Image credit: Silesian Museum, Czech Republic)
A mushroom hunter in the Czech Republic was out in the woods this spring when he discovered far more than delectable fungi.
Sticking out of the soil was a piece of metal. Mushroom hunter Roman Novák kicked at it and realized it was the blade of a sword . He started digging and found not only the sword, but a bronze ax.
The hilt and pommel of the sword are decorated with delicate circular and crescent-shaped carvings. Archaeologists with the nearby Silesian Museum examined the artifacts and pegged them to the Bronze Age, some 3,300 years ago. It was not clear why the sword was out in the middle of the woods, though recent rain may have washed away enough soil to make it visible for the first time in thousands of years. Archaeologists plan to study the surrounding region further.
4. A grave discovery
(Image credit: Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences)
Around 2,500 years ago in what is now Siberia, a man, two women and a baby were laid to rest. In the grave with them was a cache of treasures, including bronze daggers, knives and axes .
The people buried in the grave were part of the Tagar culture. The weapons lay alongside both the man and the younger woman. It wasn't unusual for Tagar women to be buried with weapons, though they usually possessed bows and arrows, not the ax found in this grave. The man and woman were probably in their 30s or 40s when they died. Curled at their feet was the body of a woman in her 60s. And scattered throughout the grave, archaeologists found the bones of an infant less than a month old, whose remains may have been disturbed by rodents after the burial.
Weapons of bone
(Image credit: WIN-Initiative via Getty Images)
A bone knife-handle discovered on the Isle of Man, near England, reveals the creativity of ancient peoples when it comes to weaponry. First unearthed in the 1970s, the bone pommel was finally analyzed this year, with a report in the journal Antiquity in October. The artifact was found in a grave holding the cremated bones of four individuals, including at least one teenager and one infant. Along with the partially burned bones, which had been collected in two urns, archaeologists found bone beads and a bone knife pommel, probably made from the bone of a cow or horse. The blade was gone, but the pommel would have held a knife about the size of a modern table knife, the researchers reported.
Perhaps even more intriguing than the weapon in this burial was a series of other artifacts: bones worked into rectangular shapes about an inch (30 millimeters) long, with rounded corners. Nothing like the bone rectangles has ever been found before, and it's not clear what they would have been used for.
A richly decorated Roman dagger
(Image credit: Elif Siebenpfeiffer)
It took nine months of cleaning and restoration to turn what looked like an unimpressive lump of metal into this richly decorated Roman dagger.
The dagger, which measures about 13 inches (35 cm) long, was found in the grave of a Roman soldier at Haltern, the site of a Roman military base between 27 B.C. and A.D. 14. The dagger was found in the base's cemetery and is one of the few weapons discovered at the site.
The blade of the dagger is made of iron, and its handle is inlaid with silver. Its sheath was sumptuous, lined with linden wood and decorated with red glass and enamel, silver and niello (a black mixture, often of sulfur, copper, silver and lead). Romans were not usually buried with their weapons, so the presence of the dagger in the grave is a bit of a mystery, archaeologist Bettina Tremmel told Live Science .
A sword for the "mirror afterlife"
When archaeologists unearthed the 1,100-year-old grave of a Viking warrior in Norway, they weren't surprised to find a sword inside; Viking men were often buried with their weapons. But what made the grave strange was that the sword was on the warrior's left side; Viking swords are almost always found buried to the deceased's right.
In life, a right-handed warrior would wear a sword on the left to be able to draw it easily. The fact that Viking warriors are buried with their swords on the right suggests that they believed in a "mirror afterlife," in which everything was flip-flopped. The warrior buried in the Norwegian grave site may have been left-handed, his discoverers speculated , meaning he would have worn his sword on the right in life. Thus, his sword was placed to his left in preparation for the mirror afterlife.
A sword in a lake
(Image credit: Photo by A. Matiukas)
Sometime in the 16th century, a medieval warrior's body settled to the bottom of a Lithuanian lake. It was found, alongside the soldier's weapons, late this year during a bridge inspection .
It's not clear why the man ended up at the lake bottom; sediments had settled naturally over the body, burying him in silt 30 feet (9 meters) below the water's surface. Near the body were two knives with wooden handles and an iron sword, all in a surprisingly good state of preservation.
Early artillery
(Image credit: Krka NP)
An artifact discovered in Croatia's Krka National Park looks, at first glance, like a particularly heavy-duty thermos — but it's actually a siege weapon dating back to the 17th or 18th century.
The device is a mačkula, a kind of mortar used when laying siege to a fortress or castle. According to Croatia Week , the bronze artifact was found near Nečven fortress, an archaeological ruin dating to the beginning of the 14th century. The mačkula was found within one of the fortress walls. It may have had both ceremonial and defensive value, according to park officials; bursts from a mačkula are traditionally used to celebrate winter festivals and victory in a traditional equestrian competition, the Sinjska alka, held every year in Sinj, Croatia.
Originally published on Live Science.


livescience--2020-12-29--Here's what we learned about aliens in 2020

In a year when mysterious monoliths literally appeared out of nowhere , you 'd think the first real detection of alien life would be a stone's-throw away .
Well , 2020 did n't bring any little green men , but it did bring astronomers closer to finding extraterrestrial life than ever before .
From organic molecules turning up around the solar system to mysterious radio signals finally being traced back to their source , here are some of the biggest findings of the year about where aliens may be ( and definitely are n't ) hiding in the universe .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ clouds of Venus In September , Venus became the most popular planet on Earth when scientists discovered possible traces of the molecule phosphine in the planet 's atmosphere .
On Earth , phosphine ( made from one phosphorous atom and three hydrogen atoms ) is mostly associated with non-oxygen-breathing bacteria , as well as some human activities .
The molecule is produced naturally by gas giants , but there 's no good reason why it should be on the hot and hellish world of Venus , the researchers concluded — unless , perhaps @ @ @ @ @ @ @ breathing it into the planet 's mysterious clouds ?
… But it 's not likely Exciting as it was , the phosphine discovery was met with strong skepticism from the scientific community .
For starters , it 's not even clear that the researchers detected phosphine at all ; their observations contained so much noise that something mimicking phosphine 's chemical signature could have appeared by accident , John Carpenter , an observatory scientist at the Atacama telescope in Chile , previously told Live Science .
And even if the reading was accurate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ totally randomly through a number of geological processes that do n't involve life at all , said Lee Cronin , a chemist at the University of Glasgow in the United Kingdom .
The processes that shape Venus ' scorching surface and sky are largely a mystery , and one trace of an inexplicable molecule is , sadly , not enough to confirm alien life exists there .
Significant study of the planet is required to solve this chemical conundrum .
There could be 36 alien civilizations sharing our galaxy How many intelligent alien @ @ @ @ @ @ @ billions of stars in the Milky Way ?
According to a study published June 15 in The Astrophysical Journal , the answer is 36 .
How did the researchers arrive at that number ?
By taking a fresh stab at a decades-old alien-hunting riddle known as the Drake equation .
Named for astronomer Frank Drake , who debuted the equation in 1961 , the puzzle attempts to guess the likely number of alien civilizations in our galaxy based on variables like the average rate of star formation , the percentage of stars that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ planets that have the right stuff for life .
Most of these variables are still unknown , but the authors of the new study tried to resolve them with the most up-to-date information on star formation and exoplanets available .
Their result ?
There are precisely 36 planets in the Milky Way that could host intelligence life similar to that on Earth .
But even if the researchers nailed all those unknown variables , it 'll still be a while before we meet one of our intelligence neighbors ; assuming an even distribution @ @ @ @ @ @ @ closest one is 17,000 light-years away from Earth .
And more than 1,000 alien stars could be watching us Will they find us before we find them ?
We could find out in this lifetime .
Two stars on the list host known exoplanets , one of which will have a direct line of sight to Earth in the year 2044 .
But while we hunt for alien worlds , are aliens also hunting for us ?
That 's the question that motivated an Oct. 20 study in the journal Monthly Notices of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ astronomers calculated the number of alien star systems that have a direct line of sight to Earth — and therefore could be watching us right now .
The team calculated that approximately 1,000 star systems within about 300 light-years of Earth could feasibly see our planet as it passes between their location and Earth 's sun .
Those sky-watching aliens would see our sun dim as Earth passes over it , just as humans have detected thousands of exoplanets by watching for suddenly-dimming stars in the night sky .
What 's more , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to ours , they could even detect traces of methane and oxygen in Earth 's atmosphere , which would be potential signs of life , the researchers noted .
Aliens are n't responsible for FRBs ( at least , not this one ) Fast radio bursts ( FRBs ) are millisecond-long pulses of radio light that blast through space thousands of times a day .
Until recently , nobody had any idea what they were .
Could it be aliens , pulsing the jets on their hyper-speed spacecraft ?
The idea had crossed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But for better or worse , that idea may be dead after astronomers successfully traced an FRB to a known source in the Milky Way for the first time ever .
The source , it turns out , was a magnetar : the fast-spinning , highly magnetized corpse of a long-dead star .
For thousands of years after their formation , these temperamental objects cycle through periods of violent activity , beaming powerful pulses of X-ray and gamma-ray radiation into the universe around them at seemingly random intervals .
While astronomers were watching @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an FRB beaming out of the dead star .
Perhaps not all FRBs in the universe come from magnetars ( aliens , you 're still on notice ) , but this discovery goes a long way toward solving a decade-old mystery of the cosmos .
About 4 billion years from now , Earth 's sun will swell into a red giant , then collapse into a small , smoldering white dwarf .
This fate is inescapable , and the odds of humankind fleeing to another star system are near-impossible .
Maybe , if @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , we could find a way to harness the dim light of our dead star and keep on trucking as a civilization .
And maybe , a paper published earlier this year to the preprint database arXiv suggests , other alien civilizations are already doing the same .
White dwarfs have been largely ignored in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence ( SETI ) , the paper 's authors claim , as a dead star is unlikely to host a thriving civilization .
But white dwarfs do sometimes have planets in their orbit – @ @ @ @ @ @ @ able to make their tiny sun work for them , even after death .
Astronomers therefore should n't cut white dwarfs out of their SETI equations , the authors write ; in fact , maybe we should be looking to them first .
Another underrated target in the search for alien life : oxygen-free planets .
While it has been long assumed that alien life needs air to breathe , a study published May 4 in the journal Nature Astronomy argues that maybe `` air '' and `` oxygen '' are n't always @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more common elements in our universe ( Jupiter 's atmosphere is 90 % hydrogen , for example ) , so what if an alien species evolved to breathe that stuff instead ?
It turns out , it may be possible .
The study authors exposed a type of non-oxygen-breathing bacteria called E. coli to two different `` atmospheres '' fabricated inside some test tubes .
One set of flasks was pure hydrogen , the other pure helium .
They found that the bacteria were able to survive in both conditions , though their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ opens the possibility for a much broader spectrum of habitats for life on diverse habitable worlds , '' study author Sara Seager , a planetary scientist at MIT , wrote in the paper .
The strange , cigar-shaped rock named 'Oumuamua has puzzled scientists since it was first spotted in our solar system in October 2017 .
The object was traveling too fast to have originated in our solar system , and seemed to be accelerating for no good reason .
Some astronomers — particularly Harvard University astrophysicist Avi Loeb — said it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by a paper-thin sail .
That theory met with ongoing skepticism this year , however , thanks to several studies that describe the object 's potential natural origins .
One of the leading theories : 'Oumuamua is a `` hydrogen iceberg '' – essentially , a solid chunk of hydrogen gas that strayed away from its local star and into the icy heart of a giant molecular cloud .
After leaving the core of the cloud , the berg was battered by radiation and molded into an elongated shape .
Once it entered @ @ @ @ @ @ @ off of the icy rock , causing it to accelerate without leaving a visible trail of gas .
It 's a tantalizing theory that explains many of 'Oumuamua 's quirks ; still , Loeb believes aliens are the more likely explanation .
Four worlds hold the most promise In our solar system , four worlds seem to have the right stuff for the possibility of life .
The foremost is Mars — one of the most Earth-like worlds in our solar system .
Earlier this year , a large lake was detected beneath @ @ @ @ @ @ @ new hope that tiny microbes could be present there ( assuming they have something to eat ) .
The other three candidates are all moons : Jupiter 's moon Europa , and Saturn 's moons Enceladus and Titan .
Like Mars , Europa hold the promise of water ; its surface is a vast expanse of ice , which may conceal a gargantuan global ocean more than 60 miles ( 100 kilometers ) deep .
Enceladus , too , is an icy world that may holds liquid water deep beneath its surface .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ water , grains of rocky particles and some organic molecules off of the moon and into space .
Titan , meanwhile , is the only moon in our solar system with a substantial atmosphere , which is rich in nitrogen — an important building block of proteins in all known forms of life .
Alien hunting just got a little harder On Tuesday , Dec. 1 , the Arecibo Observatory 's iconic radio telescope in Puerto Rico finally collapsed , after hanging on by a literal thread for nearly five months ( two @ @ @ @ @ @ @ left the telescope in dire condition ) .
The tragic collapse ends Arecibo 's 57-year legacy of searching the cosmos for signs of extraterrestrial life .
In 1974 , the telescope broadcast the now-famous `` Arecibo Message , '' declaring the technical prowess of humanity to any intelligent extraterrestrials that might be listening .
So far , there have been no answers – but that message to the stars inspired the 1997 film `` Contact , '' in which the Arecibo telescope plays a starring role .
The telescope 's loss leaves a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be filled .

In a year when mysterious monoliths literally appeared out of nowhere, you'd think the first real detection of alien life would be a stone's-throw away. Well, 2020 didn't bring any little green men, but it did bring astronomers closer to finding extraterrestrial life than ever before. From organic molecules turning up around the solar system to mysterious radio signals finally being traced back to their source, here are some of the biggest findings of the year about where aliens may be (and definitely aren't) hiding in the universe.
There could be alien life in the clouds of Venus
(Image credit: ESA/MPS/DLR/IDA)
In September, Venus became the most popular planet on Earth when scientists discovered possible traces of the molecule phosphine in the planet's atmosphere. On Earth, phosphine (made from one phosphorous atom and three hydrogen atoms) is mostly associated with non-oxygen-breathing bacteria, as well as some human activities. The molecule is produced naturally by gas giants, but there's no good reason why it should be on the hot and hellish world of Venus, the researchers concluded — unless, perhaps, there is some sort of life breathing it into the planet's mysterious clouds?
… But it's not likely
(Image credit: NASA)
Exciting as it was, the phosphine discovery was met with strong skepticism from the scientific community. For starters, it's not even clear that the researchers detected phosphine at all; their observations contained so much noise that something mimicking phosphine's chemical signature could have appeared by accident, John Carpenter, an observatory scientist at the Atacama telescope in Chile, previously told Live Science.
And even if the reading was accurate, phosphine could very easily be created totally randomly through a number of geological processes that don't involve life at all, said Lee Cronin, a chemist at the University of Glasgow in the United Kingdom. The processes that shape Venus' scorching surface and sky are largely a mystery, and one trace of an inexplicable molecule is, sadly, not enough to confirm alien life exists there. Significant study of the planet is required to solve this chemical conundrum.
There could be 36 alien civilizations sharing our galaxy
(Image credit: Angela Harburn/Shutterstock)
How many intelligent alien civilizations are lurking among the hundreds of billions of stars in the Milky Way? According to a study published June 15 in The Astrophysical Journal, the answer is 36.
How did the researchers arrive at that number? By taking a fresh stab at a decades-old alien-hunting riddle known as the Drake equation. Named for astronomer Frank Drake, who debuted the equation in 1961, the puzzle attempts to guess the likely number of alien civilizations in our galaxy based on variables like the average rate of star formation, the percentage of stars that form planets and the much-smaller percentage of planets that have the right stuff for life. Most of these variables are still unknown, but the authors of the new study tried to resolve them with the most up-to-date information on star formation and exoplanets available.
Their result? There are precisely 36 planets in the Milky Way that could host intelligence life similar to that on Earth. But even if the researchers nailed all those unknown variables, it'll still be a while before we meet one of our intelligence neighbors; assuming an even distribution of civilizations throughout the galaxy, the closest one is 17,000 light-years away from Earth.
And more than 1,000 alien stars could be watching us
(Image credit: NASA/NOAA)
Will they find us before we find them? We could find out in this lifetime. Two stars on the list host known exoplanets, one of which will have a direct line of sight to Earth in the year 2044.
But while we hunt for alien worlds, are aliens also hunting for us? That's the question that motivated an Oct. 20 study in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, in which astronomers calculated the number of alien star systems that have a direct line of sight to Earth — and therefore could be watching us right now.
The team calculated that approximately 1,000 star systems within about 300 light-years of Earth could feasibly see our planet as it passes between their location and Earth's sun. Those sky-watching aliens would see our sun dim as Earth passes over it, just as humans have detected thousands of exoplanets by watching for suddenly-dimming stars in the night sky. What's more, if those alien astronomers have similar technology to ours, they could even detect traces of methane and oxygen in Earth's atmosphere, which would be potential signs of life, the researchers noted.
Aliens aren't responsible for FRBs (at least, not this one)
(Image credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab)
Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are millisecond-long pulses of radio light that blast through space thousands of times a day. Until recently, nobody had any idea what they were. Could it be aliens, pulsing the jets on their hyper-speed spacecraft? The idea had crossed at least one astronomer's mind. But for better or worse, that idea may be dead after astronomers successfully traced an FRB to a known source in the Milky Way for the first time ever.
The source, it turns out, was a magnetar: the fast-spinning, highly magnetized corpse of a long-dead star. For thousands of years after their formation, these temperamental objects cycle through periods of violent activity, beaming powerful pulses of X-ray and gamma-ray radiation into the universe around them at seemingly random intervals. While astronomers were watching one such outburst, they also caught an FRB beaming out of the dead star. Perhaps not all FRBs in the universe come from magnetars (aliens, you're still on notice), but this discovery goes a long way toward solving a decade-old mystery of the cosmos.
White dwarfs may be alien strongholds
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
About 4 billion years from now, Earth's sun will swell into a red giant, then collapse into a small, smoldering white dwarf. This fate is inescapable, and the odds of humankind fleeing to another star system are near-impossible. Maybe, if we're still around at the time, we could find a way to harness the dim light of our dead star and keep on trucking as a civilization. And maybe, a paper published earlier this year to the preprint database arXiv suggests, other alien civilizations are already doing the same.
White dwarfs have been largely ignored in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), the paper's authors claim, as a dead star is unlikely to host a thriving civilization. But white dwarfs do sometimes have planets in their orbit – and a highly advanced civilization might be able to make their tiny sun work for them, even after death. Astronomers therefore shouldn't cut white dwarfs out of their SETI equations, the authors write; in fact, maybe we should be looking to them first.
Aliens might not breathe oxygen
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
Another underrated target in the search for alien life: oxygen-free planets. While it has been long assumed that alien life needs air to breathe, a study published May 4 in the journal Nature Astronomy argues that maybe "air" and "oxygen" aren't always synonymous. Hydrogen and helium are far more common elements in our universe (Jupiter's atmosphere is 90% hydrogen, for example), so what if an alien species evolved to breathe that stuff instead?
It turns out, it may be possible. The study authors exposed a type of non-oxygen-breathing bacteria called E. coli to two different "atmospheres" fabricated inside some test tubes. One set of flasks was pure hydrogen, the other pure helium. They found that the bacteria were able to survive in both conditions, though their growth was stunted. This experiment "opens the possibility for a much broader spectrum of habitats for life on diverse habitable worlds," study author Sara Seager, a planetary scientist at MIT, wrote in the paper.
Aliens (probably) didn’t build 'Oumuamua
(Image credit: ZHANG Yun/background by ESO/M. Kornmesser)
The strange, cigar-shaped rock named 'Oumuamua has puzzled scientists since it was first spotted in our solar system in October 2017. The object was traveling too fast to have originated in our solar system, and seemed to be accelerating for no good reason. Some astronomers — particularly Harvard University astrophysicist Avi Loeb — said it could be an alien spacecraft, powered by a paper-thin sail. That theory met with ongoing skepticism this year, however, thanks to several studies that describe the object's potential natural origins.
One of the leading theories: 'Oumuamua is a "hydrogen iceberg" – essentially, a solid chunk of hydrogen gas that strayed away from its local star and into the icy heart of a giant molecular cloud. After leaving the core of the cloud, the berg was battered by radiation and molded into an elongated shape. Once it entered our solar system, hydrogen began boiling off of the icy rock, causing it to accelerate without leaving a visible trail of gas. It's a tantalizing theory that explains many of 'Oumuamua's quirks; still, Loeb believes aliens are the more likely explanation.
Four worlds hold the most promise
(Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)
In our solar system, four worlds seem to have the right stuff for the possibility of life. The foremost is Mars — one of the most Earth-like worlds in our solar system. Earlier this year, a large lake was detected beneath the southern polar ice cap, giving new hope that tiny microbes could be present there (assuming they have something to eat).
The other three candidates are all moons: Jupiter's moon Europa, and Saturn's moons Enceladus and Titan. Like Mars, Europa hold the promise of water; its surface is a vast expanse of ice, which may conceal a gargantuan global ocean more than 60 miles (100 kilometers) deep. Enceladus, too, is an icy world that may holds liquid water deep beneath its surface. Recently, gargantuan geysers were spotted spraying water, grains of rocky particles and some organic molecules off of the moon and into space. Titan, meanwhile, is the only moon in our solar system with a substantial atmosphere, which is rich in nitrogen — an important building block of proteins in all known forms of life.
Alien hunting just got a little harder
(Image credit: University of Central Florida)
On Tuesday, Dec. 1, the Arecibo Observatory's iconic radio telescope in Puerto Rico finally collapsed, after hanging on by a literal thread for nearly five months (two mysterious cable-snapping incidents in August and November left the telescope in dire condition).
The tragic collapse ends Arecibo's 57-year legacy of searching the cosmos for signs of extraterrestrial life. In 1974, the telescope broadcast the now-famous "Arecibo Message," declaring the technical prowess of humanity to any intelligent extraterrestrials that might be listening. So far, there have been no answers – but that message to the stars inspired the 1997 film "Contact," in which the Arecibo telescope plays a starring role. The telescope's loss leaves a gap in SETI that won't easily be filled.
Originally published on Live Science


livescience--2020-12-29--10 huge black hole findings from 2020

10 huge black hole findings from 2020

Physicists are currently in a golden age of new knowledge about black holes .
Since 2015 , researchers have been able to get signals directly from merging black holes using the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory ( LIGO ) , while observatories like the Event Horizon Telescope ( EHT ) have produced the first image of .
This year was no exception , with a fresh crop of exciting and unique results expanding our black hole horizons .
Here , we take a look at some of the most spectacular black hole findings of 2020 .
Nobel Prize in physics goes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that this year was a great one for black hole research , science ’ s top achievement , , was handed in October to three physicists whose work has elucidated the lives of these mysterious cosmic entities .
Roger Penrose , of the University of Oxford in the U.K. , received one-half of the prize `` for the discovery that black hole formation is a robust prediction of the general theory of , '' while Andrea Ghez of UCLA and Reinhard Genzel , of the University of Bonn and the Max Planck Institute @ @ @ @ @ @ @ shared the other half `` for the discovery of a supermassive compact object at the center of our galaxy , '' according to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences .
Ghez is only the fourth woman to be awarded a Nobel in physics ever , after Marie Curie in 1903 , Maria Goeppert-Mayer in 1963 and Donna Strickland in 2018 .
Read more : Nobel Prize in physics awarded to 3 scientists for black hole discoveries LIGO and its European counterpart Virgo observe black holes through gravitational waves , ginormous ripples in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The facilities have already racked up a number of impressive discoveries .
But in May , the collaboration announced that it had spotted its , with one 85 times the mass of the sun and the other 66 times the sun ’ s mass smashing together to form a black hole 142 times the mass of the sun .
In addition to setting records , the finding was the first in the so-called “ forbidden ” zone of middleweight black holes .
Though astronomers had seen small black holes roughly the size @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ones with millions of times the mass of the sun exist in the centers of galaxies , no one had previously found evidence for black holes in this mid range .
Exactly how they formed remains a mystery that scientists are now working to unravel .
Shortly after the , the universe was permeated with hot and turbulent radiation .
In some regions the energy was dense enough that it could have theoretically collapsed in on itself and formed a black hole .
While physicists still don ’ t know if these entities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ PBHs ) , exist , they have lately been mulling over what would happen if they did .
Several papers , including one published in November , have suggested that these black holes , some of which would be smaller than those formed from dying stars , , an unknown substance that exerts an gravitational influence throughout the cosmos .
Experiments are underway to search for PBHs in upcoming years and either prove or refute their existence .
Read more : Swarms of primordial black holes might fill our universe What if you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the centers of galaxies and turned them up to 11 ?
That ’ s what researchers in a paper in September proposed , discussing the possibility of .
These entities would weigh at least 1 trillion times the mass of the sun , 10 times more than the largest currently known black hole , a beast with 66 billion solar masses named TON 618 .
Some of the SLABs could have formed in the early universe , making them another class of primordial black hole , which means we might be able @ @ @ @ @ @ @ microwave background , a light leftover from when our universe was only 380,000 years old .
Others could be spotted by looking for the way they distort the light of distant stars should a SLAB come between us .
The concept remains hypothetical for now but is attracting increased attention .
Read more : Black holes so big we did n't know they could form could be hiding in the universe The majority of the black hole duos detected by the LIGO and Virgo instruments have roughly the same mass as one another @ @ @ @ @ @ @ announced that they had observed its most asymmetric crash yet .
The objects , which smashed together about 2.4 billion light-years away , had around eight and 30 times the mass of our sun , respectively .
`` This is roughly equal to the ratio of filling in a regular Oreo to [ that ] in a Mega Stuf Oreo , '' Christopher Berry , a gravitational-wave scientist at Northwestern University , at the time .
Such an unexpected event was thought to be rare enough that the gravitational wave facilities wouldn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ years running .
The finding challenges these assumptions and has led researchers to consider , in which one black hole collides with another and then the resulting remnant goes on to merge with yet another black hole , as an explanation .
When a massive object comes within a certain distance from a black hole , the extreme gravitational forces present there can shred the object into long strands of material that get strewn all around .
This process , known colloquially as spaghettification , has rarely been seen because most black holes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gas and dust , the burps of former meals as well as material that escaped being eaten .
But in October , astronomers with the European Southern Observatory managed to catch in unprecedented detail using both the Very Large Telescope and New Technology Telescope .
The violent event , known blandly as AT 2019qiz , will give researchers insights into these occurrences and help them better understand in extreme environments .
Nobody wants to get too close to a black hole ( see the entry on spaghettification ) .
Luckily the cosmic Pac-Man @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of companion stars known as HR 6819 is at an astronomically safe distance from its partners .
Lurking 1,000 light-years from in the southern constellation of Telescopium , is three times closer than the previous record holder .
Astronomers can ’ t directly observe the black hole itself , but were able to infer its presence based on how it gravitationally influences the other two objects in the system , tugging on their orbits .
Skywatchers in the Southern Hemisphere can see the stars in the HR 6819 system for themselves with the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and looking in the constellation Telescopium , near the border with the constellation of Pavo , the peacock .
For a black hole to form , and energy must collapse down to a tiny point of infinite density .
Since infinities like this should be physically impossible , theorists have long sought a way to get around such a bizarre outcome .
According to string theory , which replaces all particles and forces with subatomic , vibrating strings , black holes might actually turn out to be something even weirder — a fuzzy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ October , a study showed that if the atoms in neutron stars , a type of stellar remnant not quite dense enough to form a black hole , were actually a bunch of strings , then compressing these strings together would actually form that would look like the aforementioned fundamental yarn ball .
The strange idea has yet to be fully fleshed out but is one possible alternative to dealing with infinity .
Read more : Black holes may not exist , but fuzzballs might Dangerous ‘ naked ’ black holes could lurk @ @ @ @ @ @ @ every black hole should be surrounded by what ’ s known as an event horizon — a boundary where once you fall in , you never come out .
Yet ever since black holes were first postulated , researchers have wondered if the event horizon is strictly necessary .
Could it be possible to have a black hole without one , ?
This might be dangerous since the known laws of physics break down inside a black hole ’ s event horizon , and a naked black hole wouldn ’ t offer that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ think nudity is forbidden for black holes , a paper in November suggested that there might be a way to check for sure .
The trick is to look for differences in the accretion disks , or rings of gas and dust formed when a black hole feeds , that could indicate a visible difference between naked and normal black holes .
Read more : Do dangerous 'naked ' black holes lurk in the universe ?
Christmas came early this year for black hole scientists .
In October , the collaboration overseeing LIGO @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bountiful new catalog of detected between April and September 2019 .
The 39 events included many intriguing findings , such as the massive black hole merger that resulted in a remnant with 142 solar masses , the extremely lopsided event with masses eight and thirty times the sun and a mysterious object that seemed to either be a small black hole or a large .
Researchers were thrilled with the data , which showed that the facilities were picking up on average one new signal every five days , and plan to use @ @ @ @ @ @ @ frequency of black hole mergers .
Read more : Scientists just found the largest neutron star ( or smallest black hole )

Physicists are currently in a golden age of new knowledge about black holes. Since 2015, researchers have been able to get signals directly from merging black holes using the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO), while observatories like the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) have produced the first image of a black hole’s shadow . This year was no exception, with a fresh crop of exciting and unique results expanding our black hole horizons. Here, we take a look at some of the most spectacular black hole findings of 2020.
Nobel Prize in physics goes to black holes
(Image credit: NASA)
As if to certify that this year was a great one for black hole research, science’s top achievement, the Nobel Prize , was handed in October to three physicists whose work has elucidated the lives of these mysterious cosmic entities. Roger Penrose, of the University of Oxford in the U.K., received one-half of the prize "for the discovery that black hole formation is a robust prediction of the general theory of relativity ," while Andrea Ghez of UCLA and Reinhard Genzel, of the University of Bonn and the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Germany, jointly shared the other half "for the discovery of a supermassive compact object at the center of our galaxy," according to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Ghez is only the fourth woman to be awarded a Nobel in physics ever, after Marie Curie in 1903, Maria Goeppert-Mayer in 1963 and Donna Strickland in 2018.
Read more: Nobel Prize in physics awarded to 3 scientists for black hole discoveries
LIGO sees its biggest black hole crash yet
(Image credit: N. Fischer, H. Pfeiffer, A. Buonanno, and the SXS Collaboration)
LIGO and its European counterpart Virgo observe black holes through gravitational waves, ginormous ripples in the fabric of space-time emitted when massive objects oscillate. The facilities have already racked up a number of impressive discoveries. But in May, the collaboration announced that it had spotted its largest black hole collision ever , with one 85 times the mass of the sun and the other 66 times the sun’s mass smashing together to form a black hole 142 times the mass of the sun. In addition to setting records, the finding was the first in the so-called “forbidden” zone of middleweight black holes. Though astronomers had seen small black holes roughly the size of our sun and know that colossal ones with millions of times the mass of the sun exist in the centers of galaxies, no one had previously found evidence for black holes in this mid range. Exactly how they formed remains a mystery that scientists are now working to unravel.
Read more: The largest black hole collision ever detected
Primordial black holes made it big
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
Shortly after the Big Bang , the universe was permeated with hot and turbulent radiation. In some regions the energy was dense enough that it could have theoretically collapsed in on itself and formed a black hole. While physicists still don’t know if these entities, known as primordial black holes (PBHs), exist, they have lately been mulling over what would happen if they did. Several papers, including one published in November, have suggested that these black holes, some of which would be smaller than those formed from dying stars, could conceivably make up dark matter , an unknown substance that exerts an gravitational influence throughout the cosmos. Experiments are underway to search for PBHs in upcoming years and either prove or refute their existence.
Read more: Swarms of primordial black holes might fill our universe
Super-duper-size black holes could exist
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
What if you took the incredibly massive black holes sitting in the centers of galaxies and turned them up to 11? That’s what researchers in a paper in September proposed, discussing the possibility of "stupendously large black holes," or SLABs . These entities would weigh at least 1 trillion times the mass of the sun, 10 times more than the largest currently known black hole, a beast with 66 billion solar masses named TON 618. Some of the SLABs could have formed in the early universe, making them another class of primordial black hole, which means we might be able to see their imprint on the cosmic microwave background , a light leftover from when our universe was only 380,000 years old. Others could be spotted by looking for the way they distort the light of distant stars should a SLAB come between us. The concept remains hypothetical for now but is attracting increased attention.
Read more: Black holes so big we didn't know they could form could be hiding in the universe
LIGO detects a lopsided merger
(Image credit: N. Fischer, H. Pfeiffer, A. Buonanno (Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics), Simulating eXtreme Spacetimes project)
The majority of the black hole duos detected by the LIGO and Virgo instruments have roughly the same mass as one another. But in April, the collaboration announced that they had observed its most asymmetric crash yet . The objects, which smashed together about 2.4 billion light-years away, had around eight and 30 times the mass of our sun, respectively. "This is roughly equal to the ratio of filling in a regular Oreo to [that] in a Mega Stuf Oreo," Christopher Berry, a gravitational-wave scientist at Northwestern University, wrote in a blog post at the time. Such an unexpected event was thought to be rare enough that the gravitational wave facilities wouldn’t see it after just a few years running. The finding challenges these assumptions and has led researchers to consider the possibility of hierarchical mergers , in which one black hole collides with another and then the resulting remnant goes on to merge with yet another black hole, as an explanation.
Read more: Scientists detect rare crash of two mismatched black holes
Telescopes watch a black hole 'spaghettify' a star
(Image credit: ESO)
When a massive object comes within a certain distance from a black hole, the extreme gravitational forces present there can shred the object into long strands of material that get strewn all around. This process, known colloquially as spaghettification, has rarely been seen because most black holes are surrounded by an obscuring cloud of gas and dust, the burps of former meals as well as material that escaped being eaten. But in October, astronomers with the European Southern Observatory managed to catch the spaghettification of a star in unprecedented detail using both the Very Large Telescope and New Technology Telescope. The violent event, known blandly as AT 2019qiz, will give researchers insights into these occurrences and help them better understand gravity in extreme environments.
Read more: Black hole caught turning a poor star into spaghetti
Closest black hole ever spotted
(Image credit: L. Calçada/ESO)
Nobody wants to get too close to a black hole (see the entry on spaghettification). Luckily the cosmic Pac-Man seen in May orbiting with a pair of companion stars known as HR 6819 is at an astronomically safe distance from its partners. Lurking 1,000 light-years from Earth in the southern constellation of Telescopium, the newfound black hole is three times closer than the previous record holder. Astronomers can’t directly observe the black hole itself, but were able to infer its presence based on how it gravitationally influences the other two objects in the system, tugging on their orbits. Skywatchers in the Southern Hemisphere can see the stars in the HR 6819 system for themselves with the unaided eye by consulting a star chart and looking in the constellation Telescopium, near the border with the constellation of Pavo, the peacock.
Read more: Astronomers find closest black hole to Earth
Black holes could be fuzzballs
(Image credit: Shutterstock)
For a black hole to form, matter and energy must collapse down to a tiny point of infinite density. Since infinities like this should be physically impossible, theorists have long sought a way to get around such a bizarre outcome. According to string theory, which replaces all particles and forces with subatomic, vibrating strings, black holes might actually turn out to be something even weirder — a fuzzy yarn-like ball of fundamental strings. In October, a study showed that if the atoms in neutron stars, a type of stellar remnant not quite dense enough to form a black hole, were actually a bunch of strings, then compressing these strings together would actually form not a black hole but a fuzzball that would look like the aforementioned fundamental yarn ball. The strange idea has yet to be fully fleshed out but is one possible alternative to dealing with infinity.
Read more: Black holes may not exist, but fuzzballs might
Dangerous ‘naked’ black holes could lurk in the universe
(Image credit: MARK GARLICK via Getty )
According to physicists, every black hole should be surrounded by what’s known as an event horizon — a boundary where once you fall in, you never come out. Yet ever since black holes were first postulated, researchers have wondered if the event horizon is strictly necessary. Could it be possible to have a black hole without one, a so-called ‘naked’ black hole ? This might be dangerous since the known laws of physics break down inside a black hole’s event horizon, and a naked black hole wouldn’t offer that barrier's protection. Though most theorists think nudity is forbidden for black holes, a paper in November suggested that there might be a way to check for sure. The trick is to look for differences in the accretion disks, or rings of gas and dust formed when a black hole feeds, that could indicate a visible difference between naked and normal black holes.
Read more: Do dangerous 'naked' black holes lurk in the universe?
A treasure trove of black holes
(Image credit: N. Fischer, S. Ossokine, H. Pfeiffer, A. Buonanno (Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics), Simulating eXtreme Spacetimes (SXS) Collaboration)
Christmas came early this year for black hole scientists. In October, the collaboration overseeing LIGO and its European counterpart Virgo released a bountiful new catalog of dozens of gravitational-wave signals detected between April and September 2019. The 39 events included many intriguing findings, such as the massive black hole merger that resulted in a remnant with 142 solar masses, the extremely lopsided event with masses eight and thirty times the sun and a mysterious object that seemed to either be a small black hole or a large neutron star . Researchers were thrilled with the data, which showed that the facilities were picking up on average one new signal every five days, and plan to use it to better understand the behavior and frequency of black hole mergers.
Read more: Scientists just found the largest neutron star (or smallest black hole)
Originally published on Live Science.