An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Conversation: When wildfires swept through the hills near Santa Cruz, California, in 2020, they released toxic chemicals into the water supplies of at least two communities. One sample found benzene, a carcinogen, at 40 times the state’s drinking water standard. Our testing has now confirmed a source of these chemicals, and it’s clear…
Tag: Santa Cruz
Radioactive elements may be crucial to the habitability of rocky planets
The amount of long-lived radioactive elements incorporated into a rocky planet as it forms may be a crucial factor in determining its future habitability, according to a new study by an interdisciplinary team of scientists at UC Santa Cruz. Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-11-radioactive-elements-crucial-habitability-rocky.html…
How Many Alien Civilizations Are Out There? A New Galactic Survey Holds a Clue.
Here’s a good sign for alien hunters: More than 300 million worlds with similar conditions to Earth are scattered throughout the Milky Way galaxy. A new analysis [PDF] concludes that roughly half of the galaxy’s sunlike stars host rocky worlds in habitable zones where liquid water could pool or flow over the planets’ surfaces. From a report: “This is the science…
92-Year-Old Songwriter Tom Lehrer Releases All His Lyrics Into the Public Domain
Marketplace reports: Songwriter Tom Lehrer became a star in the 1950s and ’60s writing and performing satirical songs that skewered just about everything… Lehrer, 92, announced Tuesday via his website that he’s effectively putting everything he ever wrote into the public domain. That means his lyrics and sheet music are available for anyone to use or perform, without having to pay…
Metal-poor globular cluster forces astronomers to rethink theories
The discovery of the most metal-poor globular cluster recorded to date has forced scientists to rethink how both galaxies and globular clusters form. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/metal-poor-globular-cluster-ext8-found-in-andromeda-galaxy…
Moon and Mars rendezvous in early October
The moon and Mars are near each other on the sky’s dome on the night of October 2, 2020. From South America, the moon will appear to occult (cover over) Mars. Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/moon-mars-rendezvous-in-early-october…
Earth Barreling Toward ‘Hothouse’ State Not Seen In 50 Million Years, Epic New Climate Record Shows
[I]n a new study published in the journal Science, researchers have analyzed the chemical elements in thousands of foram samples and found that Earth is barreling toward a hothouse state not seen in 50 million years. Live Science reports: The new paper, which comprises decades of deep-ocean drilling missions into a single record, details Earth’s climate swings across the entire Cenozoic…
The true polar wander of Jupiter’s moon Europa
Cracks in Europa’s surface indicate the moon’s outer ice shell has shifted by as much as 70 degrees over the past several million years. It’s the kind of movement you’d expect from a planetary crust floating on a subsurface ocean. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/europa-ice-shell-70-degree-shift-true-polar-wander…
The Coronavirus is Most Deadly if You Are Older and Male — New Data Reveal the Risks
An anonymous reader shares a report: For every 1,000 people infected with the coronavirus who are under the age of 50, almost none will die. For people in their fifties and early sixties, about five will die — more men than women. The risk then climbs steeply as the years accrue. For every 1,000 people in their mid-seventies or older who…
California City Bans Predictive Policing In US First
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: As officials mull steps to tackle police brutality and racism, California’s Santa Cruz has become the first U.S. city to ban predictive policing, which digital rights experts said could spark similar moves across the country. “Understanding how predictive policing and facial recognition can be disportionately biased against people of color, we officially banned…