January 3, 2024: Coin flips aren't quite random, an exoplanet that's as dense as steel and where is the tardigrade emoji? —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | | Flipping a coin isn't as random as we think. A Ph.D. candidate studying research methods of psychology at the University of Amsterdam recruited 47 volunteers over multiple weekends to flip coins over and over. After a total of 350,757 coin flips, he calculated the landing frequencies of heads or tails and found that coins land on the same side 50.8 percent of the time.
How it works: Previous studies by physicists suggest that a flipped coin, while in the air, doesn't turn around its symmetrical axis, but instead wobbles off-center. That wobble causes the coin to spend more time on the side that was initially "up" before it was tossed.
What the experts say: For everyday bet-settling and kick-off-determining, the coin toss is still as good as random–a 1 percent bias isn't perceptible with just a few coin flips, says statistician Amelia McNamara of the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota. | | | Astronomers discovered an extremely dense exoplanet located more than 500 light-years from Earth. It's the size of our own Neptune, but 10 times denser, making it as dense as steel. Named TOI-1853 b, the planet orbits closely to its sun, once every 1.24 days–rare for a body of its size.
Why this is so cool: Researchers have two hypotheses for how TOI-1853 b formed. The first idea suggests a collision between two other protoplanets created the orb. In the second scenario the steel world was originally an even larger gas giant–the size of Jupiter–but solar radiation from its star burned away its outer layers of gas and dust, leaving the dense core.
What the experts say: If the gas-giant theory is true, then "this is the only way we can actually observe [a gas giant's] interior," says Chelsea Huang, an astronomer of Australia's University of Southern Queensland. | | | • India's Aditya-L1 space probe will arrive in a few days at a patch of space between Earth and the sun, almost a million miles away, called a LaGrange point--a "gravitational island." | 5 min read | | | • The current array of emojis available for digital communication doesn't represent life on Earth evenly, according to a new study, and excludes major branches of the tree of life such as flatworms and tardigrades. 😕 | 6 min read | | | • Federal regulators are fining the U.S. Postal Service over its failure to protect workers from heat after a letter carrier died of heat stroke in Dallas this past June. | 2 min read | | | • Our demand for lithium and other minerals used to make batteries for electric vehicles will only grow in the future, along with the harmful human rights and environmental impacts of extracting those materials, write Beia Spiller and Sangita Kannan, who research transportation and energy. "Given the potential for critical mineral mines to affect human rights, water quality and availability, the health of native species and air quality, the sustainability of mineral extraction must be at the center of policymaking," they say. | 7 min read | Evaporation ponds of the Sociedad Quimica Mineral de Chile lithium mine in the Atacama Desert. Credit: Hemis/Alamy Stock Photo | | | • At-home microbiome tests for gut health lack efficacy. | STAT News | | | • The world's largest known beaver dam was discovered in 2007 and is still going strong. | Yale Environment 360 | | | • Cutting babies' tongue-ties is more popular than ever. But is it really necessary? | The New York Times | | | Of the more than 5,000 exoplanets astronomers have so far spotted in the universe, it seems like each of those planetary bodies is unique in some way. We've observed cores of steel, atmospheres filled with quartz crystals, loopy orbits and desolate wastelands. Earth-type planets are rare so far, but then again, we've only found a fraction of a fraction of possible planets. | For now we are alone in the universe, so I'm happy to be on this spinning rock with you! Email me feedback on this newsletter anytime: newsletters@sciam.com. Same time tomorrow. | —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | Subscribe to this and all of our newsletters . | | | | Scientific American
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