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Quantum computers require extreme cooling to perform reliable calculations. One of the challenges preventing quantum computers from entering society is the difficulty of freezing the qubits to temperatures close to absolute zero. Now, researchers have engineered a new type of refrigerator that can autonomously cool superconducting qubits to record low temperatures, paving the way for more reliable quantum computation.

AI tools are increasingly being used to track and monitor us both online and in-person, yet their effectiveness comes with big risks. Computer scientists have developed a new mathematical model which could help people better understand the risks posed by AI and assist regulators in protecting peoples' privacy.

Epithelial tissues are in constant interaction with their environment. Maintaining their functionality requires dynamic balance (homeostasis) and that their cell numbers are tightly regulated. This is achieved by cell extrusion programs, a checkpoint mechanism eliminating unwanted or harmful cells. Researchers have now demonstrated how physical signals can have an impact on the fate of extruding cells governing their death or survival. The results may establish novel paths for understanding tissue properties in both normal and pathological conditions.

A team has developed a new method that facilitates and improves predictions of tabular data, especially for small data sets with fewer than 10,000 data points. The new AI model TabPFN is trained on synthetically generated data before it is used and thus learns to evaluate possible causal relationships and use them for predictions.

A team has developed a new method that facilitates and improves predictions of tabular data, especially for small data sets with fewer than 10,000 data points. The new AI model TabPFN is trained on synthetically generated data before it is used and thus learns to evaluate possible causal relationships and use them for predictions.

AI-powered algorithm can analyze video recordings of clinical sleep tests and more accurately diagnose REM sleep behavior disorder.

Researchers have developed a method for quickly detecting and identifying very low concentrations of gases, which, could form the basis for highly sensitive real-time sensors for applications such as environmental monitoring, breath analysis and chemical process control.

An international team of scientists has called for the creation of an 18th addition to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, which would aim to mitigate against the accumulation of space junk in Earth's orbit. They believe a new SDG18 could draw direct inspiration from one of the existing goals -- SDG14: Life Below Water -- with lessons learned in marine debris management being used to prevent another planetary crisis before it is too late.

Sabre teeth can be ideal for puncturing the flesh of prey, which may explain why they evolved in different groups of mammals at least five times

The United Nations has 17 sustainable development goals that all member states have signed up to in an effort to balance economics and the environment - and now researchers say we need a new one to ensure we keep space junk under control

Few places in the solar system are better suited to a balloon than Titan. The combination of low gravity and high atmospheric density makes Saturn’s largest moon ideal for a lighter than “air” vehicle, and the idea to put one there has been around for at least two decades. So why haven’t we yet? The simple answer is the size of the necessary balloon is too large for the existing launch platforms. But a team from Boeing, the prime contractor on the Space Launch System (SLS), believes their new launch platform will be capable of getting a large balloon into orbit, along with its necessary scientific payload – and start unlocking the mysteries of this intriguing moon.

We’ve reported various balloon missions to Titan, including some that would “walk,” but Boeing’s design is more akin to a traditional blimp. It would have a balloon filled with helium and two ballast tanks that, combined with a cruciform tail, would allow the balloon to control its roll, pitch, and yaw. 

The balloon would intake local atmospheric gases to descend or expel them to rise to control its altitude. The Boeing engineers offered two different altitude configurations: a 150m3 balloon for a 5km altitude or a 400m3 balloon for a 20km altitude orbit. When compressed, both balloon sizes can fit into an SLS payload fairing.

Fraser discusses why a mission to Titan would be interesting.

The gondola is where the real magic happens, and the paper the authors released was scant on details of what precisely this science would be. They mention various tools, including RADAR and LIDAR systems to scan the surface of Titan and, in particular, keep track of any changes from geological activity. There could also be atmospheric sensors that could detect whether there were any organic molecules in the area that would give an indication of what kind of liquid methane cycle there is, if any.

Another important point about the mission design is that it would last a long time—the team expects such a balloon to last in Titan’s atmosphere for years. During that time, it would be able to notice long-term trends, like seasonal variability, and possibly why the night side of Titan appears to be warmer than the day side.

The mission was designed for a launch in the 2034-2036 time frame, with several different windows of opportunity during those years that would take advantage of a lower delta-v requirement to get to the Saturnian system. However, the SLS has had its own difficulties that could delay that timeline. While it has launched once, in 2022, its second launch is not planned until 2026 – almost four years later. It is also not reusable, and given the requirements it has to meet NASA’s demand for Artemis launches to the Moon, it is unlikely that any additional SLS launches will be available in that time frame. 

There are plenty of ideas for missions to Titan, as Fraser explains here.

That’s not to mention the cost, which is estimated at $2.5bn per launch at the time of writing. While that might eventually come down in price, it still has to compete with Starship, which has a higher launch capacity and has flown four times since the SLS took its first trip to the sky over two years ago.

Dragonfly, NASA’s helicopter mission to Titan, is already using a Falcon Heavy to launch in 2028. While the Falcon Heavy doesn’t have as much payload capacity as the SLS, it could still potentially get a smaller version of the same mission to Titan. Ultimately, as access to space gets cheaper, and there are more and more launch platforms capable of sending a balloon to this unique world, someday, a mission will likely be approved – it remains to be seen how it will get there.

Learn More:
Donahue et al. – Titan Atmospheric Current Rider: An SLS Launched Titan Balloon Mission
UT – What About a Mission to Titan?
UT – Exploring Titan with Balloons and Landers
UT – A Walking Balloon Could One Day Explore Titan – Or Earth’s Sea Floor

Lead Image:
Artist’s depiction of a balloon on Titan.
Credit – Donahue et al.

The post SLS Could Launch A Titan Balloon Mission appeared first on Universe Today.

This piece, by a pseudonymous researcher with a Substack, is another example of scientists decrying the journals and editors who make political statements in public. By so doing, the author points out, they simply decrease public confidence in science and scientists (down 10% in just five years, though still high). In other words, violating institutional neutrality in science is counterproductive. When Nature endorsed Biden four years ago, all it did was to erode confidence in the journal, and in U.S. scientists, while not moving any voters toward the Democrats.

Click the headline below to read the article for free:

The author speaks specifically about Holden Thorp, the editor of Science, certainly the most prestigious science journal in America. Thorp said this after the Democrats lost the election:

Holden Thorp, the Editor-in-Chief of Science, another preeminent science journal—the kind publishing in which makes or breaks careers of aspiring academics and the kind that defines funding and research strategies the world over, wrote a response, of sorts, to the voters “…who feel alienated America’s governmental, social, and economic institutions [that] include science and higher education”. His claim is simple: Trump’s message of “…xenophobia, sexism, racism, transphobia, nationalism, and disregard for truth…” resonates with them. It’s the people’s fault: the people voted wrong. Well… to borrow his own words, “Make no mistake.” Holden Thorp does not speak for me.

You can find Thorp’s op-ed here.

It’s not that the author is a Trump fan, for, like me, he despises the man:

. . . Harris’ legacy is tainted by her support for the diversity and social justice activism responsible for the damage that has been done to Western academic and social institutions in its name. She lost to Donald Trump, a conman and a charlatan of historic proportions who went as far as inciting a coup to remain in power the last time he was president, and a persona as anti-science as one could imagine after Lysenko’s death, second possibly only to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In many ways, 2024 was the year the Democrats handed the election to Trump

About the Pew surveys, with links in the article:

What these surveys and studies show is that people continue to trust scientists more, than they do politicians. It follows from this that the more scientists act like politicians, the less the public will trust us. Yet, in recent decades, scientific institutions and individual scientists have been acting more and more like the politicians by engaging in activism and social engineering.

I do not know who the author is, but he/she rejects being spoken for by Thorp simply because of Thorp’s dismissal of Americans as a “basket of deplorables” and declaring that his journal adheres to “progressive” politics:

Surveys and studies on public trust in science suggest that what people question is not the science, but “… the extent to which scientists’ values align with their own”, and how this alignment—or misalignment—affects the integrity of their findings. What are the values that people expect scientists to align with? According to Holden Thorps of academia, those values are xenophobia, sexism, racism, transphobia, nationalism, and disregard for truth. This disparaging message is nothing new. In fact, this has been the message communicated by individual academics and academic institutions to people on the outside for at least two decades, the message that can be found everywhere, from land acknowledgements to course syllabi. Academics are telling people that they stole “indigenous land”, that they are oppressors, colonizers, racists, misogynists, -phobes of all sorts, fascists, racists, nationalists. It is furthermore alleged that it is up to the enlightened academic elite to show the unwashed masses the path to salvation that lies through admitting one’s sins, accepting one’s guilt, and correcting the way one thinks, speaks, and behaves. Notably, the sins in question, as well as the alleged enlightenment of the accusers, are both imaginary.

It is not only that Holden Thorp and those like him have for decades been dripping disdain for the very people who pay their salaries, travel allowances, and research costs from their taxes; It is not only that his brand of academics have for decades been demonizing those regular voters he is talking about—bus drivers and fast food employees, teachers and policemen, servicemen and businessmen—as some sort of Nazi-adjacent monsters, accusing them of all sorts of imaginary sins. It is that those same people, while being demonized for their desire to live and enjoy normal, safe, and productive lives under the conditions afforded by the freedom and safety of Western civilization, the civilization built on the blood of the brave defenders of its values—those same people have at the same time witnessed the full-throttled support academia threw behind the black lives matter riots and Islamic terrorists—those real, living and breathing Nazis who behead children, rape women, burn entire families alive, and shoot their pet dogs; Hamas supporters were allowed to roam free on academic campuses, attacking people, vandalizing buildings, leaving a mess for the janitors to clean up, and, in general, destroying things built over generations by the very people the academics demonize.

In other words, those voters Holden Thorp is so disdainful of were witnessing the hypocrisy of the academic community, the members of which compromised the truth for political gain—exactly the sin Thorp is accusing his political rivals (Trump supporters) of. Against this backdrop, the surprising part is that trust in science and scientists remains as high as it does.

The article gives several more examples of the institutional capture and lack of institutional neutrality of science editors and journals, including the sad tale of Laura Helmuth and Scientific American (I note that the new, Helmuth-less journal seems to have retracted its wokeness). But the article ends on a note of hope. I have added the links from the original article.

As I was finishing this piece, there were several positive developments. As I have already mentioned, Laura Helmuth resigned from Scientific American, offering the journal a chance to reclaim its former scientific rigor. Marcia McNutt, the president of the United States National Academy of Sciences, wrote a powerful editorial Science is neither red nor blue, published in Science. The University of Michigan, formerly one of the hubs of diversity, equity, and inclusion ideology squandering some US$15M/year, resolved to no longer solicit diversity statements in faculty hiring, promotion, and tenure. A UofM physics professor offered a relatively mild testimony of the damage done by the DEI initiatives and the black lives matter grift, a testimony that was unthinkable only a few years ago. More generally, in the wake of October 7th, multiple institutions adopted political neutrality. These are important first steps in reversing and repairing the damage that was done to scholarship, research, innovation, and teaching over the decades of woke/DEI insanity.

As they say, “One can hope. . . .”

The next link gives FIRE’s list of schools that have adopted institutional neutrality à la the University of Chicago’s Kalven Principles. There are now 29 of them: a good start, but still a drop in the bucket given that there are about 6,000 colleges in the U.S.

A while back Luana debated Holden Thorp about the ideological takeover of science. Here’s a video of that debate, and I don’t think Thorp came out on top

The process of solving a crossword puzzle is mathematically similar to well-studied physical systems – but one property makes the game unique

Recently Meta decided to end their fact-checkers on Facebook and Instagram. The move has been both hailed and criticized. They are replacing the fact-checkers with an X-style “community notes”. Mark Zuckerberg summed up the move this way: “It means we’re going to catch less bad stuff, but we’ll also reduce the number of innocent people’s posts and accounts that we accidentally take down.”

That is the essential tradeoff- whether you think false positives are more of a problem or false negatives. Are you concerned more with enabling free speech or minimizing hate speech and misinformation? Obviously both are important, and an ideal platform would maximize both freedom and content quality. It is becoming increasingly apparent that it matters. The major social media platforms are not mere vanity projects, they are increasingly the main source of news and information, and foster ideological communities. They affect the functioning of our democracy.

Let’s at least be clear about the choice that “we” are making (meaning that Zuckerberg is making for us). Maximal freedom without even basic fact-checking will significantly increase the amount of misinformation and disinformation on these platforms, as well as hate-speech. Community notes is a mostly impotent method of dealing with this. Essentially this leads to crowd-sourcing our collective perception of reality.

Free-speech optimists argue that this is all good, and that we should let the marketplace of ideas sort everything out. I do somewhat agree with this, and the free marketplace of ideas is an essential element of any free and open society. It is a source of strength. I also am concerned about giving any kind of censorship power to any centralized authority. So I buy the argument that this may be the lesser of two evils – but it still comes with some significant downsides that should not be minimized.

What I think the optimists are missing (whether out of ignorance or intention) is that a completely open platform is not a free marketplace of ideas. The free marketplace assumes that everyone is playing fair and everyone is acting in good faith. This is 2005 level of naivete. This leaves the platform open to people who are deliberately exploiting it and using it as a tool of political disinformation. This also leaves it open to motivated and dedicated ideological groups that can flood the zone with extreme views. Corporations can use the platform for their own influence campaigns and self-serving propaganda. This is not a free and fair marketplace – it means people with money, resources, and motivation can dominate the narrative. We are simply taking control away from fact-checkers and handing it over to shadowy groups with nefarious motivations. And don’t think that authoritarian governments won’t find a way to thrive in this environment also.

So we have ourselves a Catch-22. We are damned if we do and damned if we don’t. This does not mean, however, that some policies are not better than others. There is a compromise in the middle that allows for the free marketplace of idea without making it trivially easy to spread disinformation, to radicalize innocent users of the platform, and allow for ideological capture. I don’t know exactly what those policies are, we need to continue to experiment and find them. But I don’t think we should throw up our hands in defeat (and acquiescence).

I think we should approach the issue like an editorial policy. Having editorial standards is not censorship. But who makes and enforces the editorial standards? Independent, transparent, and diverse groups with diffuse power and appeals processes is a place to start. No such process will be perfect, but it is likely better than having no filter at all. Such a process should have a light touch, err on the side of tolerance, and focus on the worst blatant disinformation.

I also think that we need to take a serious look at social media algorithms. This also is not censorship, but Facebook, for example, gets to decide how to recommend new content to you. They tweak the algorithms to maximize engagement. How about tweaking the algorithms to maximize quality of content and diverse perspectives instead?

We may need to also address the question of whether or not giant social media platforms represent a monopoly. Let’s face it, they do, and they also concentrate a lot of media into a few hands. We have laws to protect against such things because we have long recognized the potential harm of so much concentrated power. Social media giants have simply side-stepped these laws because they are relatively new and exist in a gray zone. Our representatives have failed to really address these issues, and the public is conflicted so there isn’t a clear political will. I think the public is conflicted partly because this is all still relatively new, but also as a result of a deliberate ideological campaign to sow doubt and confusion. The tech giants are influencing the narrative on how we should deal with tech giants.

I know there is an inherent problem here – social media outlets work best when everyone is using them, i.e. they have a monopoly. But perhaps we need to find a way to maintain the advantage of an interconnected platform while breaking up the management of that platform into smaller pieces run independently. The other option is to just have a lot of smaller platforms, but what is happening there is that different platforms are becoming their own ideological echochambers. We seem to have a knack for screwing up every option.

Right now there does not seem to be anyway for any of these things to happen. The tech giants are in control and have little incentive to give up their power and monopoly. Government has been essentially hapless on this issue. And the public is divided. Many have a vague sense that something is wrong, but there is no clear consensus on what exactly the problem is and what to do about it.

 

The post What Kind of Social Media Do We Want? first appeared on NeuroLogica Blog.

The extent to which parents feel disgust appears to come and go, which could be important for their children's health

The BepiColombo spacecraft is due to start orbiting Mercury next year, but a recent flyby has captured breathtaking images of its pockmarked surface

I am leaving for a week. The bad news is that I am going to Los Angeles, where wildfires are running rampant.

The wildfire that raced across the Hollywood Hills early Thursday, threatening a wealthy area indelibly tied to the American film industry, put additional strain on millions of Los Angeles residents already stressed by catastrophic blazes that have erased entire neighborhoods and streaked the sky with smoke and embers.

The fires have killed at least five people and burned more than 27,000 acres, equivalent to nearly 20,000 football fields. The largest ones, the Palisades and Eaton fires, have destroyed at least 2,000 structures and are already the two most destructive to ever hit Los Angeles.

Tens of thousands of Los Angeles residents were under mandatory evacuation orders or warnings on Thursday. Overnight, there was a palpable sense of anxiety as firefighting helicopters swept across a dark sky where orange embers were floating like lightning bugs.

There were traffic jams after a wildfire broke out in the Hollywood Hills near streets — Mulholland Drive, Sunset Boulevard — whose names evoke the grandeur of Hollywood movies. An evacuation order for that area was mostly lifted just before midnight.

A fire also reared up in the nearby Studio City neighborhood, burning several homes and prompting warnings of a potential evacuation. But it was quickly extinguished and no injuries were reported.

Residents feel vulnerable partly because strong desert winds and dangerously dry conditions — it hasn’t rained much in Los Angeles for months — are making it easier for more fires to start and spread. A shortage of water in local reservoirs makes it harder for crews to put fires out.

More than 16 million people in Southern California, from Malibu down to San Diego County, were under a red flag warning early Thursday morning. Forecasters warned that extreme fire danger would continue for at least another day.

There are three big ones.

From the Free Press newsletter:

Southern California is burning. Thousands have been forced to evacuate as wildfires rip through the area. There are five so far and not enough firefighters to deal with them, L.A. County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone said yesterday, telling reporters his department was “prepared for one or two major fires… This is not a normal red flag alert.”

So far, five people have been killed. Over 130,000 residents have been told to evacuate. Hundreds of schools have been closed, as tens of thousands of acres go up in smoke. Not even the rich and famous have been spared. Actor James Woods lost his home. The Malibu mansion of hotel heiress Paris Hilton went up in flames. Palisades Charter High School, among the most iconic public secondary schools in America and which educated J.J. Abrams, will.i.am, and Katey Sagal, has turned to ash.

Late yesterday morning, on Truth Social, our president-elect railed against California’s “Governor Gavin Newscum,” blaming him for the wildfires currently ravaging the state. According to Donald Trump, Newsom blocked a water restoration project because “he wanted to protect an essentially worthless fish called a smelt,” and that’s why California is burning. It’s not entirely clear what Trump’s trying to claim here—and believe me, I spent some time trying to figure it out. But the basic elements seem to be fire=bad, water=good, fish=tangentially related and controversial.

I am told that my conference, at the University of Southern California, is out of the fire zone and will go on. But I am also told that one friend whom I was going to visit has lost his home and everything in the fire. That is ineffably sad; the person was an artist and lost his studio as well. I cannot imagine losing everything you own, all at once.

I will report on the meeting and post when I can (I do my best). I am off to Midway Airport, where I hope to procure a giant coffee and a couple of sinkers at Dunkin Donuts.

 

A tiny quantum “refrigerator” can ensure that a quantum computer’s calculations start off error-free – without requiring oversight or even new hardware

Meanwhile, in Dobrzyn, Hili has specific reading choices:

Hili: Are you looking for a detective novel on the shelf?
A: You guessed it.
Hili: Take the one I haven’t read yet.

In Polish:

Hili: Szukasz jakiegoś kryminału na półce?
Ja: Zgadłaś.
Hili: Weź taki, którego ja jeszcze nie czytałam.

Facing high employee turnover and an aging population, nursing homes have increasingly turned to robots to complete a variety of care tasks, but few researchers have explored how these technologies impact workers and the quality of care. A new study on the future of work finds that robot use is associated with increased employment and employee retention, improved productivity and a higher quality of care.