Sabine posts
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Quantum Computing Newcomers: 2023 Update
[This is a transcript with links to references.]It’s been a while since we talked about quantum computing! The last time I did an overview video was in 2021, but that might as well have been in the stone age, so much has happened since! What’s going on, what’s new and who is saying what? That’s what we’ll talk about today.First things first, quantum computers calculate with “quantum bi...
Asteroid Dust, A Wok-Antenna, and Energy from Water
NASA To Live-Stream Opening of Asteroid SampleScientists gather to open the space capsule containing material from the asteroid Bennu.Image: NASANASA’s first-ever asteroid sample has arrived on Earth. It comes from the asteroid Bennu and was successfully dropped off by the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft in an Earth flyby on September 24. NASA has recovered and shipped it to the Johnson Space Center in Ho...
Science News Oct 3
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Welcome everyone to this week’s science news! Today we’ll talk about the Nobel Prize in physics, yet another superconductor retraction, whether Integrated Information theory is pseudoscience, why antimatter doesn’t anti-gravitate, sand that flows uphill which I swear has nothing to do with antigravity, the world’s most powerful X-ray laser, h...
1 Million Subscribers -- You can do it, too
[This is a transcript with links. Some of you may remember that this video should have run a few weeks ago. It turned out that a paragraph had gone lost somewhere in the production and it took some time to fix the issue But finally, here we go!]Oh dear, we’ve made it to 1 million subscribers. This is so crazy. Thank you all for making this happen. It’s been a life-changing experience. The bigg...
An Einstein Ring, Supernovae, and Bioprinted Nerves
Webb Telescope Spots Full Einstein RingEinstein Ring, JWST-ER1, original and magnified. Image: NASA/JWSTNASA’s James Webb telescope has found the most beautiful Einstein Ring ever. An Einstein Ring is a phenomenon produced by gravitational lensing, when light from one object is bent around another one. Usually the two objects are different galaxies and most of the time we don’t see a full ring...
Science News Sep 27
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Welcome everyone to this week’s science news. Today we’ll talk about raisins. Yes, raisins. Quasars with dark matter halos, pink diamonds, the last moments of a dying satellite, a new type of qubit, maybe, how to measure the length of the day with lasers, a new treatment method for brain cancer that’s got something to do with quantum mechanics,...
Is the universe pointless?
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Stephen Hawking might have been the most famous contemporary physicist in the eyes of the public, for me it’s been Steven Weinberg. Weinberg was one of the recipients of the 1979 Nobel Prize in physics, for his role in the development of the standard model. But if people knew one thing about him it’d be a quote from one of his books: “The more ...
Lithium, Moebius Strips, and Asteroids
Massive Lithium Supply Found in the USASizes and types of large, known lithium deposits. Image: Benson et al, Science Advances 9, 35 (2023)Scientists have discovered a huge deposit of lithium – a metal used in batteries – in a volcanic crater along the Nevada-Oregon border. The deposit lies in the southern portion of McDermitt caldera at Thacker Pass and is larger than the previous record hold...
Science News Sep 18
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Welcome everyone to this week’s science news. Today we’ll talk about the possibly first evidence for life on an exoplanet, with some caveats, chaos at the centre of the Milky Way, earthquake lights, a really old rock, noise cancellation for qubits, good news about air pollution, wifi that can see through walls, origami robots, the 2024 Breakthrou...
Don't trust me, I'm an influencer!
[This is a transcript with links to references.]On this channel I talk a lot. Guess you’ve noticed that. So in this video, I want to talk about how we talk, or how we communicate information on social media in general. Why is it so difficult to communicate on social media? What’s a parasocial relationship, and should you trust me? That’s what we’ll talk about today.Scientists have many the...
Dark Matter, Ozone, Proton Therapy, and Web3
Physicists Look for Dark Matter with Atomic Clocks (And Don’t Find It)Theoretical physicists from the University of Sussex and the U.K.’s National Physical Laboratory have proposed a method of using atomic clocks to look for certain types of dark matter particles (ultralight particles that include axions). According to the idea, if we pass through clouds of dark matter particles, the frequenci...
Science News Sep 12
[This is a transcript with links to reference.]Welcome back everyone to our weekly science news. Today we’ll talk about a bubble of galaxies, a climate scientist who made his own paper worse, double magic oxygen, a chemical reaction slowed down 100 billion times, Maxwell’s demon in biology, intelligent life on earth, the launch of a new X-ray space mission, drone racing, and of course the tele...
All you need to know about web3
[This a transcript with links to references.]Have you ever heard of Web3? If not, you’re not alone. In a YouGov survey in May this year, merely 24 percent of participants said they are familiar with the term. Elon Musk has taken shots at it, tweeting, “Has anyone seen web3? I can’t find it.” And the software engineer turned journalist Molly White runs a website called Web3 is going just gr...
Underwater Writing, AI Consciousness, and Lasers in Space
How to Write UnderwaterImage Credit: Moller, et al., Nano-Micro Small, 2023Have you ever tried to write your shopping list underwater? Neither have I. But a group of researchers from Germany and China have now developed ink that would be up to the task. Normal ink doesn’t work underwater because the act of writing itself would create turbulence that wipes away the ink. The new underwater ink ins...
Capitalism is good. Let me explain.
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Capitalism will kill us all. That is, if you trust Greta Thunberg. Which maybe you should not. Free markets will save us all. If you trust Robert F Kennedy, junior. Which maybe you should not. Maybe we should talk about what capitalism and free markets are. Will they kill us or save us? That’s what we’ll talk about today.Before we talk about capi...
Yin-Yang Entanglement, Biofriendly Viscosity, and LHC Trouble
A Yin-Yang-Shaped Photon Source Creates ConfusionA reconstructed signal with a Yin-Yang-shaped filter. Image credit: Zia et al., Nature Photonics, 2023.It can be difficult to figure out the properties of a laser beam, and yet you need to know those properties if your experiments require high precision. Physicists from Canada and Spain have recently published a paper that makes the beam analysis ea...
Do your own research. But do it right.
[This is a transcript with links to references.]I’ve noticed that a lot of scientists on social media make jokes about people who do their own research. This has been going on ever since COVID and it’s only been getting worse. We’re now at the point where they’re claiming you’re only allowed to talk about a topic if you’re an expert yourself. Don’t you dare commenting on anything you...
Andromeda, Robotaxi Trouble, Custom LEDs, and Mental Health
Dark Energy Pushes Andromeda AwayAndromeda. Image: NASAAstrophysicists at the University of Cambridge claim to have found a new way to measure dark energy by studying our galactic neighbor, Andromeda.Andromeda is hurling towards our own Milky Way galaxy at about 250,000 miles per hour (112 kilometres per second). The two are predicted to collide in about four billion years. Their motion depends on...
Science News Aug 22
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Welcome everyone to this week’s science news. Today we’ll talk about superchemistry, music in the brain, how to create matter from light, contrails, objects that take strange turns, why phone batteries might soon become replaceable, how to control fire, why we have to think about preventing hurricanes, and of course, the telephone will ring.Befor...
A global mental health crisis? Really?
[This is a transcript with links to references.]I’ve read that we have a mental health crisis. When I say “we”, I don’t mean that physicists are depressed because they still don’t understand quantum mechanics. Though there’s that. I mean, we, on this planet, supposedly have a mental health crisis. Though if you take a closer look at the headlines, most of them seem to be about the Unit...
A New Carbon Renewal Program, NASA's Latest Project, & Sound In A Vacuum
US Launches Pilot Program for Carbon RemovalThe US Department of Energy has announced it will spend $1.2 billion on two direct carbon capture facilities in Louisiana and Texas. This is a very interesting step because so far governmental efforts – if they exist at all – have focused on technologies that capture carbon dioxide at the source before it is released (known as carbon capture and stor...
Science News Aug 15
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Welcome everyone to this week’s science news. Today we’ll talk about the muon anomaly at fermilab, say good-bye to LK99, hear from scientists who say that sun is brighter than we thought, look at a new ion trap, talk about talk about a cold blob, plans for a new space station, delay with NASA’s trip to the moon, freeze rays, the smallest traffi...
How Dead is Moore's Law?
[This is a transcript with links to references.]My family’s first personal computer was a Commodore 128. It had 128 kilobytes of RAM and a display resolution of 320 times 200 pixel. The laptop I currently use is a few years old but has 16 gigabytes of ram and a screen resolution that outperforms my rapidly aging eyes. There’s no doubt that computing power has seen the most remarkable progress ...
An Umbrella in Space, Resume Padding, & Atmospheric Protection
A Giant Sun Umbrella to Slow Climate ChangeCredit: István Szapudi/UH Institute for AstronomyIstván Szapudi, a University of Hawaii astronomer, has proposed a radical method to prevent further global warming: Let’s put a shield between the Sun and Earth. “In Hawaii, many use an umbrella to block the sunlight as they walk during the day,” says Szapudi. “I was thinking, could we do the same...
Science News Aug 8
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Welcome everyone to this week’s science news. Today I have an update on the reproduction efforts for the supposed room temperature superconductor, LK 99, the first images from the Euclid mission, more trouble with Starlink satellites, first results from a new simulation for cosmological structure formation, how to steer drops with ultrasound, bacte...
Do we have evidence for new physics? Or not?
[This is a transcript with links to references.]I constantly hear physicists claim that there is something “wrong” with our understanding of the universe. It’s an argument they frequently use to justify new experiments, a better detector, a new telescope, a bigger collider. At the same time, they’ll also tell you that, try as they might, they can’t find any evidence that disagrees with ...
LEGOs in the Lab, Product Labels, & Massive Wind Turbines
Read This Label CarefullyA study led by UCLA psychologists has revealed that consumers often not only misremember product label marketing claims, but also overestimate their significance. In a study of about 300 students and adults, 74% were unable to distinguish between “scientifically studied” and “scientifically proven” when remembering labels presented. Furthermore, participants tended...
Science News July 31
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Welcome everyone to this week’s science news. Today we’ll talk about the new superconductor claim, bad news for new physics, a quantum radar, how to print origami, space-based solar power for a moon station, a dire prediction for the collapse of an ocean circulation, Europe’s first hyperloop test, why NASA shoots lasers at the rain forest, and ...
How to spot and avoid greenwashing
[This is a transcript with links to references.]Does this sound familiar? You go to a supermarket to get a new bathroom cleaner. One of them promises to be more sustainable and eco-friendlier, but the other one is cheaper. Which do you buy? Many companies try to appear environmentally friendly without making a real difference, a strategy that’s been dubbed “greenwashing”. So, is calling a pr...
Warm Dark Matter, Nuclear Waste, Dog Poop, and Personality Tests
Supercomputer Simulation Favours Warm Dark MatterA snapshot of the cosmic web in the new supercomputer simulation. Credits: Bruno Villasenor/UCSCA team of researchers from the University of California, Santa Cruz, has used the Oak Ridge supercomputer to try and figure out what dark matter might be made of. They ran more than 1,000 high-resolution hydrodynamical simulations, and calculated how the ...
