Like all great researchers, we love spending time learning about the latest breakthroughs across science and technology. Here's what we found this week.
Scientists rewrite the history of the earliest known space weather incident.
Lancaster University | Staff. The alleged magnetic interference of a telegraph system in Exeter on Oct. 18, 1841, was found to have likely occurred on Oct. 18, 1848, when a geomagnetic disturbance coincided with auroras across Europe. The earliest credible instance of similar geomagnetic interference remains an 1847 event. (More)
> View an infographic breakdown of space weather phenomena and how they impact space- and ground-based technologies.
> A personal tragedy may have inspired Samuel Morse to invent the telegraph.
AI matches X-rays to 3D scans to make minimally invasive surgeries safer.
MIT | Adam Zewe. Real-time X-rays have been used to guide devices through small incisions, but the flat images make it difficult to determine a device's location and orientation. Accurately aligning these images with preoperative CT scans or MRIs to compensate has proved challenging for existing tools. However, the new model can match the flat images and 3D scans in minutes to submillimeter precision. (More)
> Computed tomography scans build 3D models using many X-ray cross-sections.
> ... while magnetic resonance imaging constructs models of internal anatomy by nudging hydrogen atoms.
The Mediterranean Sea is getting saltier and warmer faster.
American Geophysical Union | Sean Cummings. Measurements of temperature and salinity taken by robotic floats and research cruises from 1950 to 2025 showed accelerating rates to depths of about 2,500 meters (8,200 feet). Since 2000, surface waters have warmed about 0.5 degrees Celsius per decade—two to three times faster than global ocean surface temperatures over the same span. (More)
> Salinity and temperature drive the circulation of nutrients in the deep waters of the Mediterranean Sea, just like in the oceans.
> Where does the salt in Earth's bodies of water come from?
In some cases, deicing may be easier by cooling the ice, rather than heating it.
University of Texas at Dallas| Kim Horner. Researchers found that in extremely cold conditions, ice easily released from metal when cooled, rather than adhering more strongly. While materials contract when they are cooled, experiments showed that ice cooled and shrank more quickly than steel. The resulting mismatch created stress in the ice, producing fractures at the interface that facilitated detachment. (More)
> Thermal expansion and contraction are why bridges have expansion joints.
> Why does ice stick to surfaces like a person's tongue so easily?
