September 27, 2023: An enormous frozen bubble in the universe, the most neglected tropical disease and star data are being turned into sound. —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | | Astronomers have discovered a mysterious structure consisting of a group of galaxies clustered around a gigantic spherical void just 820 million light-years from the Milky Way. Scientists think the phenomenon is a baryon acoustic oscillation, a pressure wave frozen in time, formed a split second after the big bang and then stretched out by the universe's expansion. Astronomers named the structure Ho'oleilana.
How it works: Moments after the big bang, the entire cosmos was pockets of matter and antimatter particles continually annihilating each other. The force of gravity compressed these plasma pockets in on themselves, squeezing and heating the matter into a clump with sound waves traveling at half the speed of light moving away from the center. These rippling waves pushed away the matter that hadn't already been drawn into the center of a clump and created a halo.
What the experts say: Because Ho'oleilana is bigger than most baryon acoustic oscillations, the researchers think it could be a sign the universe is expanding at a faster rate than first thought — at roughly 76.9 kilometers per second per megaparsec, as opposed to the standard range of 67 to 74. | | | If I asked you to guess which tropical disease goes most under-acknowledged you might wager dengue fever or Chagas disease. But the answer is snakebites. Exact numbers can be hard to determine, but globally it's estimated that as many as 2.7 million people are envenomed by snakes every year. Of these, up to 400,000 are permanently disabled, and estimates suggest that 81,000 to 138,000 die. Poorer nations suffer the greatest proportion of snake bites.
Why this is happening: Different kinds of snakes carry different toxins, so antivenoms typically must match the species. The world produces less antivenom than it needs, and production quality varies. The cost to manufacture the remedy is more than most patients can afford, and anti-venom isn't exactly a profitable business, which deters its production. And those bitten often live in remote areas where they can't access antivenom quickly.
What can be done: Development is underway for a universal snake antivenom, but ramping up production of all existing medicines will address part of the issue. Preventing further deaths and chronic injury requires overall strengthening of the health-care system. "Until you do this and improve the social and economic status of those vulnerable sections of community, you really will not be able to tackle the problem of snakebites," says Ravikar Ralph, a physician at the Christian Medical College in Vellore, India. | | | Astronomers and musicians are increasingly turning astronomical data into sound. This has birthed a new field called astronomical sonification. Tune in to our new three-part podcast mini-series that presents images and data from the Hubble and James Webb Space Telescope as sounds, including one brand-new sonification that has never been publicly released. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.
| | | • The evolution of a chemical defense gland allowed the most diverse group of beetles to repel predators and go on to conquer wholly new environments. | 7 min read | | | • Streetlights across the world have been turning purple. Here's what's going on. | 6 min read | | | • Most schoolchildren are taught to read through phonics—a system of instruction based on sounding out letters that is mandated in at least 32 states and the District of Columbia. But the system is woefully unsuited to English and is failing the nearly two thirds of kids who can't read in this country, writes psychologist Marion Blank. "Although alternative methods have received little attention, there are ways of teaching reading that do not rely on phonics," she says. | 5 min read | | | • Elon Musk said no monkeys died in the development of Neuralink. This investigation found otherwise. | Wired | | | • Women are freezing their eggs, not to lean into their careers, but because they can't find suitable mates. | The Atlantic | | | • The New York Times asked readers to record their bird observations over summer. Here's what they learned. | The New York Times | | | A great quote from the first episode of our new podcast mini-series: "Data doesn't care how it's presented. Scientists have just been defaulting to images," says show host Jason Drakeford. I would guess that this is true of MOST of the data we humans have collected about the world; our first representation is visual--charts, graphics, maps. Think of what we might learn if we gleaned insight (no pun intended) from more than what we can see or visualize? | This newsletter is for you! Let me know how I can improve it by emailing newsletters@sciam.com. Until tomorrow. | —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | Subscribe to this and all of our newsletters . | | | | Scientific American
One New York Plaza, New York, NY, 10004 | | | | | | Support our mission, subscribe to Scientific American | | | | | | | | | |
