Recent Additions: New and Updated Entries in the Past 60 Days
Displaying entries 16 through 30 of 96 found.

Ecosmos: A Revolutionary Fertile, Habitable, Solar-Bioplanet, Incubator Lifescape

Whalen, Daniel, et al. Habitable Worlds Formed at Cosmic Dawn. arXiv:2501.08375. This paper by nine University of Portsmouth, University of Vienna, United Arab Emirates University, Kyoto University, Southern Federal University, Rostov-on-Don, Russia, University of Virginia and University of Exeter astroscientists can well represent the depth and breadth of the latest Earthuman instrumental and analytic capabilities which indicate how readily these first starry galaxies began to form orbital objects along with an aqueous supply. See also Whalen, Daniel, et al. Abundant Water from Early Supernovae at Cosmic Dawn by Daniel Whalen, et al at arXiv:2501.02051. Altogether it could be said that these findings can factually affirm that life and maybe hope does spring eternal.

Primordial supernovae were the first nucleosynthetic engines in the Universe, forging the elements for the later occasion of planets and life. Here we show that planetesimals, the precursors of terrestrial planets, formed around low-mass stars in the first cosmic explosions 200 Myr after the Big Bang. A dense core collapsed to a protoplanetary disk in which Earth planetesimals arose from their parent star in water fractions similar to the Solar System today. Habitable worlds thus formed among the earliest generation of stars in the Universe, before the advent of the first galaxies. (Abstract)

Whalen, Daniel, et al.. Abundant Water from Early Supernovae at Cosmic Dawn.. arXiv:2501.02051. In this year when instrumental and mathematical capabilities are able to span and plumb the any realm of space and time, DW and Christopher Jessop, Portsmouth University and Muhammad Latif, United Arab Emirates University astrophysicists can now detect and report an earliest, spontaneous occurrence of aqueous solutions in the first hundred million galactic years. Such an immediate, spontaneous occasion, it would seem to infer an inherently fertile, procreative natural genesis.

Primordial supernovae (Pop III) were the first nucleosynthetic engines in the Universe which forged the heavy elements required for the later formation of planets and life. Here we show that the first water in the Universe formed in Pop III core-collapse and enriched with primordial water to mass fractions similar to those in the Solar System today. Besides revealing that a primary ingredient for life was already in place in the early Universe, our simulations find that water was a key constituent of the first galaxies. (Excerpts)

Godfrey-Smith, Peter. Living on Earth: Forests, Corals, Consciousness, and the Making of the World. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 2024.. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 2024. The naturalist author (search) is a professor of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Sydney. In regard, he advises that along with his two prior books, Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness, and Metazoa: Animal Life and the Birth of the Mind this new work can be seen to altogether survey, articulate and document a second brain-based emergent course over and above bones and bodies. As Chapter VI: Life’s Cerebral Cognizance Becomes Complex, Smarter, Informed, Proactive, Self-Aware covers in detail, a primary path of heightened intelligence, cumulative knowledge, collective groupings, and beneficial behaviors can now be traced.

Peter Godfrey-Smith takes us on a grand tour of the history of life on earth. He visits Rwandan gorillas, Australian bowerbirds and coral reefs, considers the impact of language and writing, and weighs our responsibilities as they relate to factory farming, habitat preservation, climate change, and so on. Ranging from animate matter’s first appearance to future perils, Godfrey-Smith illumes a novel evolutionary course all the way to these Anthropocence challenges.

This book originated in an attempt to work through those themes: the history of action and how life has changed the Earth. My aim was to see the history of life through that lens, to work through organisms as causes, rather than as evolutionary products. This gave us, in some sense, an alternative history on the what-is-done side, not a what comes-to-exist side. It’s not really another version but a new perspective on a single course. The two modes are in there together, the constructive activities of animals is part of the whole evolutionary process. (7)

The idea of a history that puts minds, especially human minds, into a lineage of transforming agents, and treats these agents as part of the history of Earth, was the seed of this book and gave rise to its central stem. As that stem extended, other themes branched off from it. A place reached along the main development of ideas offered a vantage point from which to view other developments. (9)

Tang, Qing, et al. Quantifying the global biodiversity of Proterozoic eukaryotes.. Science. Vol 386/Iss 6728, 2024. At years end, a global team of twenty Nanjing University, UC Santa Barbara and Riverside, University of Hong Kong and University of Missouri researchers provide a comprehensive empirical reconstruction of how life’s earliest prokaryote rudiments came to be and proceed on their arduous course to cells and organisms. In regard, a whole temporal scenario from this fraught advent all the precarious, meandering way to our worldwise description record just now being filled in. How rare and especial must our Earthuman ability to accomplishment of such an this ecosmic self-observation and record truly be, at the edge of 2025.

The Proterozoic Eon [2500 to 539 Ma] is marked by many transformative evolutionary, environmental, and tectonic events. Here we report an analysis of the diverse evolutionary dynamics of Proterozoic and Cambrian eukaryotes. Our results provide deep insights into the coevolution of Earth and life in the Proterozoic Eon not possible earlier. The rise of animals coincided with the Shuram excursion (574 to 567 Ma) indicating a causal relationship between oceanic oxygenation. These various evolutionary fits and starts trajectories thus can now reveal the complex interplay in the Proterozoic Earth-life system. (Excerpts)

Gong, Yan, et al. Future Cosmology: New Physics and Opportunity from the China Space Station Telescope. arXiv:2501.15023. We note this entry by fourteen Chinese Academy of Sciences astrophysicists about a nationwide exploratory endeavor which plans to go forth into the farthest reaches of space and time. Our notice is that in the midst of worsening ethnic and geopolitical strife, an evolutionary Earthuman drive to deepseek, learn and gain knowledge presses on apace. We could cite similar instances for Russia.

The China Space Station Telescope (CSST) is the next-generation Stage~IV survey telescope. Here we review several CSST cosmological probes, such as weak gravitational lensing, two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) galaxy cluster abundance, cosmic void, baryonic acoustic oscillations (BAO) and more to discover new physics and opportunities in cosmology. We find that CSST will measure matter distribution from small to large scales, expansion history of the Universe and dark energy properties.

Tan, Qing-Hua, et al.. In situ spheroid formation in distant submillimetre-bright galaxies. Nature. 693/69, 2024. We enter this paper by eighteen astroscientists posted in China, France, the UK, Germany and Japan including Annagrazia Puglisi, among several similar each day, as a mid-decade exemplar of the ecosmic compass that our Earthuman explorers can now accomplish to quantify, so it seems, any dimension, feature and detail. As a result, one might note that a radical appreciation is in order of what individual persons are and a prodigious planetary is. Planatural Genesis will consider such revolutions this in our next Great Earethica section.

Most stars in today’s Universe reside within spheroids, which are bulges of spiral galaxies and elliptical galaxies. Here we show that spheroids are directly generated by star formation within the cores of luminous starburst galaxies in the distant Universe. Most of these galaxies are triaxial rather than flat disks. These observations simulations, reveal a cosmologically relevant pathway for in situ spheroid formation through starbursts that is triggered by interactions acting on galaxies fed by non-coplanar gas accretion streams. (Excerpt)

It is as humbling as it is motivating to think about how much we still have to learn about the universe. My collaborators and I have just tackled one of astrophysics’ enduring mysteries: how massive elliptical galaxies can form. Now, for the first time, we have solid observational evidence that provides an answer. Galaxies in the present-day universe fall into two broad categories of spiral galaxies, like our Milky Way, and elliptical galaxies, which are spherical. Future observations with JWST and Euclid space telescopes will map the distribution of stars in the distant ancestors.
(Annagrazia Puglisi, University of Southampton)

Luigi Gentili, Pier and Pasquale Stano. Empowering Chemical AI Through Systems Chemistry. ChemSystemChem. September, 2024. University of Perugia and University of Salento biochemists, whose website research studies go from life’s origin to synthetic models, broach a promising interface between this historic pursuit and novel 2020s Earthificial frontiers.

This work presents some perspectives on how Systems Chemistry can contribute to a Chemical Artificial Intelligence (CAI) which involves liquid chemical systems mimicking biological and human intelligence. The development of these autonomous chemical systems will be guided by an intent to better human well-being. In addition, this research line could foster a deeper comprehension of the origin of life and how cognitive capabilities emerge at a basic physico-chemical level. (Excerpt)

Zheng, Zhiling, et al. Large language models for reticular chemistry. Nature Reviews Materials. February, 2025. This contribution by six UC Berkeley chemists including Jennifer Chayes and Omar Yaghi presently proceeds to combine AI linguistic sources with an emphasis on networks between molecular complexities as a way to better delve and design novel material benefits.

Reticular chemistry is the science of networking molecular units into composites structures such as metal–organic and covalent organic assemblies. Large language models (LLMs), a type of generative AI, can augment laboratory research by extracting knowledge from literature, designing materials and interpreting experimental data. In this Perspective, we explore the concepts and methods used to apply LLMs such as prompt engineering, method augmentation and fine-tuning. (Excerpt)

Bartlett, Stuart, et al. The Physics of Life: Exploring Information as a Distinctive Feature of Living Systems.. arXiv:2501.08683. A global array of biotheorists composed of SB, California Institute of Technology, Andrew Eckford, York University, Matthew Egbert, University of Auckland, Manasvi Lingam, Florida Institute of Technology, Artemy Kolchinsky, Universitat Pompeu Fabra and Adam Frank, Gourab Ghoshal, University of Rochester provide mid-decade appreciations of the central role that an encoded knowledge resource seems to play in life’s metabolic essence and oriented emergence These consummate insights are then set within the rising evolutionary view of proactive organisms distinguished by their self-making, intelligent behavioral agencies

This paper explores the idea that information is an essential feature of living systems as they acquire, process, and gain knowledge about their environments to sustain themselves and achieve intrinsic goals. In particular, we view the transition to information-driven systems as a key step in abiogenesis, planetary habitability, and exoplanet biosignatures. By integrating theoretical and experimental approaches, this perspective advances our understanding of life's generative dynamics and universal principles. (Excerpt)

Savissky, Zack. What Is Entropy? A Measure of Just How Little We Really Know. Quanta. December13, 2024. As his bio below notes, the Austrian science writer posts an extensive, well researched, two century review of this auspicious energetic phenomena. Yet it seems that its dour conclusions remain and confounds us to this day. Our intent in these thermodynamic sections is to post an array of worldwise, 21st century theoretic advances (Philip Ball) which are at last setting aside a physical view which has for a long time been a daunting weight on science and philosophy.

Exactly 200 years ago, a French engineer (Sadi Carnot) introduced an idea that would quantify the universe’s inexorable slide into decay. But entropy, as it’s currently understood, is less a fact about the world than a reflection of our growing ignorance. Embracing that truth is leading to a rethink of everything from rational decision-making to the limits of machines.

Carnot’s insight emerged from an attempt to exert control over the clockwork world in the Age of Reason. But as the concept of entropy diffused throughout the natural sciences, its purpose shifted. The refined view sheds the false dreams of total efficiency and perfect prediction and instead concedes an irreducible uncertainty.

I'm a freelance science journalist, specializing in physics and astronomy. I tell tales of discovery and innovation to help people understand their place in the universe. I was recently named the top early-career science journalist by the National Academies of Sciences. (zacksavitsky.com)

Despons, Armand. Nonequilibrium properties of autocatalytic networks. Physical Review E. 111/014414, 2025. A CNRS, PSL Research University physicist contributes a further appreciation of nature’s self-making propensity by adding a thermodynamic drive. See also Structural constraints limit the regime of optimal flux in autocatalytic reaction networks by A. Despons, et al at Communications Physics (7/224, 2024).

Autocatalysis, the ability of a chemical system to make more of itself, is a crucial feature in metabolism and is thought to play a decisive role in the origin of life. Yet how autocatalytic systems behave far from equilibrium remains unexplored. In this work, we consider recent advances about the stoichiometric characterization of autocatalytic networks to study how this topological feature influences their nonequilibrium behavior. We then derive a decomposition of the chemical fluxes to view the existence of productive modes in their dynamics. Finally, we derive the thermodynamic cost associated with the production of autocatalysts. (Excerpt)

Scheurer, Christoph and Karsten Reuter. Role of the human-in-the-loop in emerging self-driving laboratories for heterogeneous catalysis. Nature Catalysis.. January 29, 2025. We cite this entry by Max Planck Institute researchers as an example of current realizations that such AI machinations cannot be turned loose to run on their own. Constant informed management is now becoming seen as an Imperative necessity in every generative application.

Self-driving laboratories (SDLs) represent a convergence of machine learning with laboratory automation which operate in active learning situations as algorithms plan experiments that are carried out by automated (robotic) modules. Here we argue against humans totally out of the loop. We instead conclude that crucial advances will come from fast proxy experiments, existing apparatus with real persons making continuous decision-making. (Excerpt)

Hincks, Adam. Does a Fine-Tuned Universe Tell Us Anything About God?. arXiv:2502.12083. A University of Toronto astrophysicist and Jesuit theologian first provides an expanded retinue of the precise parameters throughout the natural atomic and cosmic milieu. As they quite imply some formative agency in effect, for instance a creative divinity, such an attribution is left in abeyance.

The apparent fine-tuning of several fundamental parameters that determine the properties of our Universe and make it hospitable to life is sometimes used as an argument for God from design. I review this concept and examine the claim that God is its most probable cause. While not it setting aside, I argue that it is in tension with the more apophatic approach to God in the Abrahamic traditions. I then analyze the contingency of fine-tuning that situates it within the classical analogy of being that points to the Divinity.

Bohl, Abigail, et al. Probing the Limits of Habitability: A Catalog of Rocky Exoplanets in the Habitable Zone. arXiv:2501.14054. Cornell University astrophysicists including Lisa Kaltenegger propose and scope out an initial catalog to begin our planned galactic neighborhood cavnas.

Several ground and space based searches have increased the known exoplanets to nearly 6000. While most are highly unlike our Earth, a rocky world in a stellar Habitable Zone (HZ) can provide locales for life in the cosmos. However, a tabulation that observers can use to investigate does not yet exist. In regard, we identify 67 rocky worlds in an empirical HZ and 38 in a narrower 3D-model HZ. This first population will help shape search strategies with the JWST, the Extremely Large Telescope, and Habitable Worlds Observatory. (Abstract)

Fisher, Theresa, et al.. Network and Kinetics-based Biosignatures: Implications for the Putative Habitable World Observatory Design. arXiv:2501.04737. Seven University of Arizona, NASA Ames, ASU, UC Riverside and Carnegie Institution for Science astroscholars contend that factoring in the presence of nonlinear spatial and dynamic phenomena as an indication of animate vitalities could augment looking for physical gases and microbial rudiments.

Seven University of Arizona, NASA Ames, ASU, UC Riverside and Carnegie Institution for Science astroscholars contend that factoring in the presence of nonlinear spatial and dynamic phenomena as an indication of animate vitalities could augment looking for physical gases and microbial rudiments.

Previous   1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7  Next