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Strange 'spacetime crystals' could give birth to tiny black holes

When we think about a black hole, we probably picture some vast cosmic titan, greedily consuming any matter unfortunate enough to fall within its gravitational influence. Thinking deeper, we probably imagine this ravenous cosmic beast forming from the explosive collapse of the core of a massive star. Maybe we even picture a supermassive black hole at the heart of a galaxy, formed from a multitude…
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How should we handle alien detection in a world of AI, deepfakes and social media? This committee is writing the rulebook

The International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) has ratified protocols advising what an astronomer should do if they discover evidence for extraterrestrial intelligence in our modern global world of social media, AI deep fakes and misinformation. Referred to as the “Declaration of Principles Concerning the Conduct of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI),” the post-detection…
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Is this the next Artemis crew? A look at the astronauts on NASA's shortlist

NASA is about to reveal the astronauts who will launch to space on the Artemis 3 mission. Speculation about who will be in that four-person crew has been high since the return of the Artemis 2 mission, which flew four astronauts around the moon in April. At the time, NASA Associate Administrator Amit Kshatriya said the announcement of the Artemis 3 crew would come “soon,” but he didn’t…
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Interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS is blasting out a bunch of methane. Here's why that's weird

Methane has been seen spewing from comet 3I/ATLAS, marking the first time that the gas has been identified on an interstellar object. The amount of methane, relative to water, is also larger than is typically seen in comets from our solar system, further highlighting how different this interstellar visitor is than objects from our own cosmic neighborhood. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)…
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