Viral New Superconductivity Claims Leave Many Scientists Skeptical

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August 03, 2023

This week, we're putting up some resistance to an electrifying claim that's currently sparking a surge of interest around the globe. Our lead story covers the recent news of a potential major breakthrough in materials science—the possible identification of a high-temperature, ambient-pressure superconductor. That is, a substance that doesn't require extreme conditions to allow the frictionless flow of electrons (and thus the perfectly efficient conduction of electricity). Such a discovery could lead to truly revolutionary advances in power grids, transportation, computing and more—presuming, of course, it's genuine. Elsewhere, we have stories on a communications kerfuffle with the Voyager 2 spacecraft, the first images from the Euclid space telescope, a guide to decoding messages from aliens, the faintest stars you can see in the sky, and much more. Enjoy!

Lee Billings, Senior Editor, Space & Physics

Materials Science Viral New Superconductivity Claims Leave Many Scientists Skeptical Researchers say they have discovered a new room-temperature ambient-pressure superconductor, but many scientists are unconvinced By Dan Garisto

Space Exploration NASA Detects 'Heartbeat' from Voyager 2 Spacecraft after Losing Contact A glitch may have silenced NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft until mid-October—but a "heartbeat" signal offers hope for reestablishing contact earlier By Meghan Bartels

Astronomy Euclid Space Telescope Snaps Spectacular First Images The European Space Agency's ambitious Euclid space telescope is on its way to decoding the secrets of dark matter and dark energy By Monisha Ravisetti,SPACE.com

Astronomy Can You Decode an Alien Message? An artist, a programmer and a scientist have created a simulation of extraterrestrial communication to test Earthlings' ability to understand it By Shi En Kim

Astronomy What's the Faintest Star You Can See in the Sky? The "magnitude scale" for measuring stellar brightness also reveals the limits of naked-eye stargazing By Phil Plait

Astrophysics Rippling Waves of Plasma May Cause Massive Stars to 'Twinkle' Scientists have developed a new model to predict how much "gravity waves" could alter a star's brightness By Timmy Broderick

Climate Change A Sun Shield over Earth? Catch an Asteroid, and It Might Work A resurfaced idea for solar geoengineering imagines a sunlight-blocking space shield tethered to an asteroid By Chelsea Harvey,E&E News

Space Exploration This Is How the First-Ever U.S. Asteroid Sample Return Will Unfold Scientists are gearing up for a high-stakes finale to OSIRIS-REx, the first U.S. mission to snare a sample from an asteroid By Leonard David

Space Exploration Which Is More Dangerous: Outer Space or the Deep Sea? Explorers of space and the deep sea face similar dangers, but some differences make one realm safer than the other By Syris Valentine

Space Exploration Space Debris Will Block Space Exploration unless We Start Acting Sustainably We need satellites and rocket bodies designed with an end-of-life plan to keep space uncluttered and navigable By Moriba Jah

Defense Meet the Woman Who Supervised the Computations That Proved an Atomic Bomb Would Work Naomi Livesay worked on computations that formed the mathematical basis for implosion simulations. Despite her crucial role on the project, she is rarely mentioned as more than a footnote—until now By Katie Hafner,The Lost Women of Science Initiative

Engineering Science, Destroyer of Worlds--And Movie Scripts Oppenheimer won't bomb in the box office, but despite its director's best efforts, the science in the film is a bit of a fizzle By Charles Seife

Artificial Intelligence Oppenheimer Offers Us a Fresh Warning of AI's Danger The U.S. ignored Oppenheimer's warnings about nuclear weapons and rushed to build and deploy a dangerous technology. We must not make the same mistake with AI By Senator Edward J. Markey

Mathematics $1 Million Will Go to the Mathematician Who Busts the 'ABC Conjecture' Theory The founder of a Japanese media company has offered a large cash prize to anyone who can find a flaw in an unusual proof  By Manon Bischoff

QUOTE OF THE DAY "It's not rare for people to see weird stuff which in the end doesn't pan out." Doug Natelson, a physicist at Rice University, on the long and troubled history of "breakthroughs" in superconductivity

FROM THE ARCHIVE Controversial Physicist Faces Mounting Accusations of Scientific Misconduct Allegations of data fabrication have sparked the retraction of multiple papers from Ranga Dias, a researcher who claimed discovery of a room-temperature superconductor By Dan Garisto,Nature magazine | July 2023

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