NASA officials have completed an investigation into an incident that caused damage to a 70-meter radio frequency antenna last year.

The incident, which occurred at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex near Barstow, California, affected the space agency’s Deep Space Station 14 (DSS-14), a 70-meter radio-frequency antenna, which currently remains offline awaiting repairs and system upgrades.

Joel Montalbano, acting associate administrator for NASA’s Space Operations Mission Directorate, emphasized that the agency “takes safety and any departure from established procedures seriously,” adding that investigations into the incident at Goldstone “made clear that we must strengthen our processes. We are acting on the investigation’s findings.”

Incident at Goldstone

The damage was caused last September 16, 2025, when the antenna reportedly over-extended during rotation during tracking for NASA’s Juno mission. Stress on the antenna’s cabling and support infrastructure, as well as damage to its fire-suppression system, is expected to cost between $4.1 and $4.6 million in repairs.

Fortunately, no injuries were reported at the time of the incident, and a Mishap Investigation Board was convened to investigate the underlying causes. Following on-site inspections, interviews, and reviews of technical documentation from NASA’s three Deep Space Network facilities, the results of the investigation were included in a report submitted in April, which also made recommendations on how to prevent future incidents.

Software Issues

A primary factor behind the incident had been what the reports’ authors characterize as “software weaknesses, human error, and an undetected failure in the antenna’s hydraulic limit system,” according to a recent NASA statement.

“Investigators determined an electrical issue at the antenna the previous day caused the control system to misreport the antenna’s rotation state, an issue that went unnoticed and triggered multiple limit-stops during the Juno track,” the statement added.

Over-rotation of the antenna resulted after flooding in the antenna base was spotted by operators, following troubleshooting efforts that accidentally bypassed safeguards in the system’s hardware and software.

Investigators also determined that the antenna’s hydraulic limit system had already been rendered inoperable before the September 16 incident, following damage sustained “in an undocumented prior incident.”

Modernization for Future Missions

On June 5, Montalbano emphasized that NASA plans to follow the guidance in the review board’s report, with a focus on ensuring greater adherence to procedures to help limit the likelihood of future mishaps.

“We will update and improve procedures, rebuild core in-house capabilities, and reinforce operational discipline across the Deep Space Network,” Montalbano said.

“NASA remains focused on learning from this and modernizing systems, so DSS-14 and the broader network are ready to support our ambitious future missions,” he added.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

In 1925, while exploring the remote jungles of the Amazon on a quest to uncover a fabled lost city, British explorer Percy Fawcett and his small expedition party vanished without a trace.

Fawcett, a noted geographer, artillery officer, cartographer, surveyor, and archaeologist, set off into the rainforest accompanied only by his son, Jack Fawcett, and Jack’s best friend, Raleigh Rimell. Their goal was to locate an ancient lost city rumored to exist in the heart of the Amazon that Fawcett and others called “The Lost City of Z.”

While Fawcett and his expedition crew’s fate remains unknown, new advancements in modern archaeological science, propelled by technologies that include unmanned aerial vehicles and LiDAR, are now revealing what could be the archaeological reality behind part of what the ill-fated British explorer sought.

“The reward is that we’re finally finding the ‘lost civilisation’ that explorers like Percy Fawcett were searching for a century ago,” says José Iriarte, a professor of archaeology at the University of Exeter, writing in a piece featured at The Conversation, though adding that such discoveries are now being made “by cajoling a drone rather than battering through jungle.”

LiDAR: Unearthing Lost Worlds Hidden from Time

For a time, archaeologists presumed that the Amazon rainforest was a vast wilderness that, while abundant in resources, would have been capable of supporting only small, scattered communities.

With the aid of modern technologies, those past ideas have gradually changed as new archaeological evidence continues to push researchers toward rethinking past assumptions. Among these technologies is advanced laser-mapping technology known as LiDAR (light detection and ranging), which archaeologists have put to great use in the last several decades to aid in uncovering evidence of surface features that were once either inaccessible or otherwise invisible during ground-based surveys.

Something else that LiDAR excels at is penetrating the dense forest of areas like the Amazon, enabling researchers to get unprecedented aerial views of the surface below the canopy, along with any structures that may have been left there by humans from long ago. The result has been evidence of sprawling ancient societies hidden beneath the cover of thick jungle, revealing the Amazon as a region that once supported large populations that existed in sophisticated, interconnected landscapes.

Rediscovering a ‘Lost Civilization’ in the Amazon

A particularly striking example of such discoveries involves the Llanos de Moxos region of northern Bolivia, where recent LiDAR surveys have revealed the presence of a sprawling archaeological site long hidden by dense jungle. Archaeologists believe the ancient settlement is linked to what is called the Casarabe culture, which would have thrived in the area sometime between A.D. 500 and 1400.

“The Casarabe organized into a hierarchy of four different sizes of settlements,” writes Professor Iriarte in his recent piece at The Conversation. “The biggest ones—the primary settlements—were as large as 3km² or 300 hectares.”

“That’s enough space for over 400 football pitches,” Iriarte notes, “suggesting that they could have accommodated substantial numbers of people.”

Unseen Evidence of an Ancient Amazonian Culture

Viewed from the ground, an observer who braved this dense region of Bolivian jungle might only see thick patches of forest separated by grassland savannahs.

That all changes when viewing LiDAR imagery obtained during aerial surveys, however. Through the sensitive detection capabilities afforded by laser pulses that can easily penetrate the dense vegetation, a lost world emerges—one the likes of which Percy Fawcett and other early explorers once only dreamed of rediscovering.

Researchers have now successfully identified a vast network of settlements at Llanos de Moxos, connected by raised causeways, canals, reservoirs, and engineered agricultural systems that cover an area of close to 20,000 square kilometers.

These complexes upend past thinking about the presence of isolated settlements in the region, and instead appear to show sites covering areas as large as three square kilometers, featuring monumental civic and ceremonial architecture, towering conical pyramids that ascend to heights of 20 meters, and the presence of massive U-shaped structures, which archaeologists believe had likely served as ceremonial structures that once hosted gatherings.

Unprecedented Scale of a Hidden World

Another surprising feature is the scale of the structures archaeologists have uncovered, which they say rivals some of the most well-known monuments like those of the ancient Tiwanaku civilization in the Andes.

Yet, unlike many densely packed ancient cities, the Casarabe landscape also differs in several ways: the unique variety of urbanism it reflects is suggestive of dispersed populations whose connected infrastructure also brought them together through ancient shared water management systems.

“It was clearly all planned and coordinated,” Iriarte explains, adding that the ancient builders at Llanos de Moxos engaged in precocious designs that were intended “not only as living spaces but for integrating the population across the region.” Similar architectural planning has been observed at other ancient sites around the world, which include those assembled by the ancient Maya of Central America, as well as the builders of Angkor across the world in Cambodia.

The “Dark Earth” Enigma

Beyond just architecture and clues to the way of life of these ancient societies, researchers are also gaining new insights into the agricultural practices of the early Amazonian world.

For many decades, scientists presumed that a major limiting factor on the region’s ability to sustain larger populations hinged on the presence of factors that included poor soils, seasonal flooding, droughts, and tropical diseases. However, mounting evidence suggests that the indigenous societies of the region were far from hindered by the landscape, and instead managed to transform and manage farmland at scales previously unimagined.

Along with sophisticated agricultural systems, ancient Amazonians were also capable of engineering remarkably fertile soils, known as Amazonian Dark Earths, which Iriarte says “combined charcoal, bone and waste materials with the existing poor-quality soil to make it fertile enough for widespread farming.”

“Amazonia had reclaimed vast expanses of seasonally flooded savannahs over several thousand years to create raised and drained field systems,” he adds, also noting the construction of extensive drainage networks and the cultivation of diverse crops such as maize. Rather than merely adapting to the rainforest, the ancient inhabitants of the Amazon actively reshaped it.

An Amazonian Archaeological Revolution

Thanks to similar LiDAR surveys that have recently been undertaken in nearby countries, including Ecuador’s Upano Valley, where thousands of structures linked by roads and organized according to highly structured settlement plans have been detected, the recent findings at Llanos de Moxos are one of the latest additions to a broader revolution in archaeology made possible through such exciting Amazonian discoveries.

In addition to Bolivia and Ecuador, researchers have also documented ceremonial earthworks, geometric enclosures, and sprawling ancient settlements in Colombia, Peru, and Brazil in recent years, all of which are challenging decades of past assumptions about ancient life in the Amazon.

Despite the recent advancements in our understanding, many questions remain unanswered. Among the questions archaeologists have are those related to how these ancient societies were governed, as well as what factors led to their decline, a fall which was precipitated by unknown factors that occurred before European arrival.

Possible contributing factors may include shifts in ancient climates, as well as environmental pressures. It is also possible that political changes or conflicts that emerged between neighboring societies may have played a role, which could have contributed to disruptions in trade networks that may have further weakened these once thriving societies.

Despite the remaining mysteries about these enigmatic cultures, one thing is becoming increasingly clear: the Amazon was far from being the unclaimed tropical wilderness many long believed it to be. In many ways, the fascination with lost cities and ancient civilizations that drove explorers like Percy Fawcett—and which led to his untimely fate—had more basis in reality than many historians, archaeologists, and explorers probably guessed.

As ongoing LiDAR surveys continue to expand across previously unexplored regions, archaeologists believe thousands more structures may still await discovery, suggesting that some of the Amazon’s greatest archaeological secrets remain hidden, but no longer kept entirely from view.

“What lies beneath the Amazon is not just a hidden past,” Iriarte says. “It is a reminder that even the most seemingly untouched landscapes can carry deep histories, waiting—sometimes just beneath our feet—to be revealed.”

Professor José Iriarte’s complete article appeared at The Conversation on June 8, 2026.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

A small Greek island on the eastern edge of the Mediterranean has revealed a new species inside a man-made tunnel carved into a hillside.

During a survey of Kastellorizo in the Dodecanese, researchers found a previously unknown cave cricket inhabiting an artificial underground passage on Mount Vigla. The species, described in the Journal of Orthoptera Research, is part of the genus Dolichopoda. These cave-dwelling crickets occur throughout southern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean, and often form distinct species when populations become isolated in separate underground habitats.

These cave-dwelling crickets  throughout southern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean and often form distinct species when populations become isolated in separate underground habitats.

The team named the species Dolichopoda balrogi after the Balrog, the ancient fire-demon who resided beneath the mountains in the Mines of Moria in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. In Tolkien’s story, the Balrog remained hidden underground until disturbed by the Dwarves.

An Island With No Caves

Kastellorizo covers about nine square kilometers, making it one of the smallest inhabited islands in Greece. The island is actually located closer to the Turkish coast than to the Greek mainland. The landscape also lacks any accessible natural caves. The only underground environment available for survey was a single man-made tunnel, which explains why the cricket remained undiscovered until now.

Morphological analysis of both male and female specimens showed that D. balrogi has a unique combination of physical features. The structure of the male epiphallus, the shape of the tenth tergite, and the form of the female ovipositor set it apart from other Dolichopoda species.

Molecular analysis confirmed this. DNA barcoding showed that the Kastellorizo population belongs to an evolutionary lineage alongside southwestern Anatolian Dolichopoda species, especially D. sbordonii and D. lycia. However, this is the first time an Anatolian Dolichopoda lineage has been documented within European territory.

A Biogeography Bridge

Kastellorizo’s location already makes it a unique case in the eastern Mediterranean. Although it is officially part of Greece, the island sits just a few kilometers from the Turkish mainland, and its plants and animals reflect this proximity. The discovery of D. balrogi fits this pattern since its closest relatives are not found on other Greek islands but along the coast of Anatolia.

This finding also adds to the evidence that Kastellorizo acts as a biogeographic bridge, hosting species with roots and connections that set them apart from the rest of the Aegean islands.

“These findings remind us that biodiversity discoveries are not limited to remote tropical forests or deep oceans,” added lead researcher Konstantinos Kalaentzis. “Even familiar landscapes and human-made structures can harbour species that have remained unnoticed.”

A Fragile Find

Cave-adapted organisms such as Dolichopoda crickets are particularly vulnerable. Their entire known range may extend only to a single tunnel, cave, or hillside. D. balrogi appears to only exist in this single man-made passage. Construction, flooding, or other disturbances to that habitat could eliminate the species before researchers fully understand it.

The authors note that documenting hidden subterranean fauna is a necessary first step toward protection, and that artificial underground environments should receive more attention as possible refuges for specialized cave-dwelling species.

The Greek islands are among the least studied archipelagos in the Mediterranean in terms of biodiversity. The discovery of a new species with Anatolian evolutionary roots in a single tunnel on a nine-square-kilometer island suggests that the region’s unexplored caves and crevices may harbor many more undiscovered species.

Austin Burgess is a writer and researcher with a background in sales, marketing, and data analytics. He holds an MBA, a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, and a data analytics certification. His work focuses on breaking scientific developments, with an emphasis on emerging biology, cognitive neuroscience, and archaeological discoveries.

A new proposed Senate bill aims to establish clear guardrails for the U.S. military’s use of artificial intelligence (AI), drawing a definitive line on one of the most consequential questions in modern warfare: who has the final say when lethal force is used?

On June 8, Senator Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) introduced the proposed Human Authority in Lethal Operations Act of 2026, or “HALO Act,” which would impose sweeping requirements on the Department of War (DoW) to ensure that autonomous and semi-autonomous weapon systems remain under meaningful human control.

The legislation would establish new design standards, testing requirements, oversight procedures, and legal safeguards for military systems that use artificial intelligence to identify, recommend, prioritize, or engage targets.

The bill aims to ensure that responsibility for battlefield decisions remains with human commanders, rather than shifting to algorithms. The legislation would require the Pentagon to designate accountable commanders for any engagement involving AI-enabled autonomous or semi-autonomous weapons and mandates that those commanders retain “ultimate discretion, judgment, and control over the use of force.”

“The past few months have shown us that there is an urgent need for commonsense guardrails to ensure the Defense Department’s use of AI is in line with Americans’ national security and privacy priorities,” Sen. Schiff said in a press release. “There are good reasons to use AI technology to advance our national security,” although he emphasized that, like with any tool, AI should not be allowed solely to guide human enterprises, “particularly when the risks of harm can be fatal.”

The proposal arrives amid growing concern among policymakers, military planners, and technology experts about the increasing role of artificial intelligence in combat operations.

Significantly, these concerns are no longer theoretical. As The Debrief previously reported, Israel’s reported use of the AI targeting system “Lavender” in Gaza triggered renewed debate over how much trust militaries should place in algorithmic target selection, particularly when civilian lives may be at risk.

Other recent examples have added to the concern, including studies showing that AI models can escalate dangerously in simulated war games, as well as the Pentagon’s continued push toward autonomous drones, AI-controlled aircraft, and robotic battlefield systems.

Even Pope Leo XIV recently weighed in on the issue in Magnifica Humanitas, his first encyclical, or formal papal teaching letter, warning that autonomous weapons could make war more feasible and less subject to human control, and arguing that lethal decisions must not be delegated to opaque or automated processes.

While the Pentagon has repeatedly stressed its commitment to responsible AI development, the HALO Act would codify many of those principles into law and create new statutory requirements governing how military AI systems are designed, tested, approved, and monitored.

Among the bill’s most significant provisions are requirements that autonomous weapon systems operate within predefined geographic areas, target sets, and timeframes. If a system cannot complete an engagement within those authorized parameters, it would be required to terminate the engagement until additional human operator and commander review is completed.

The legislation also calls for extensive record-keeping, cybersecurity protections, and continuous oversight to guard against unintended engagements and hostile manipulation.

The bill would also require senior Pentagon officials to conduct formal reviews before AI-enabled weapons enter development and again before they are fielded. Those reviews would assess legal compliance, operational safety, reliability, cybersecurity, and risks to civilians and protected infrastructure under the Law of Armed Conflict.

Beyond battlefield autonomy, the legislation targets several controversial uses of artificial intelligence in national security. It would prohibit covered Defense Department AI capabilities from inferring a person’s religion, race, political identity, sexual orientation, or emotional state. It would also restrict the purchase or receipt of Americans’ personal data from data brokers or other third-party sources when that data was obtained in a manner that would violate the bill’s rules.

Perhaps most notably, the proposed HALO Act explicitly forbids removing humans from decision-making processes involving presidential actions related to nuclear weapons.

“No covered artificial intelligence capability may be used with the intent, purpose, or outcome of… removing a human from the chain of decisionmaking for actions critical to informing and executing decisions by the President, including initiating or terminating nuclear weapons employment,” the proposed bill reads.

The measure also includes whistleblower protections for personnel working on military AI systems, mandates regular reporting to Congress, and requires the Pentagon to identify and remediate any fielded systems that fail to meet the law’s requirements.

Existing autonomous systems would undergo a comprehensive review, and any system found to be noncompliant could face retirement, modification, or suspension pending corrective action.

While the bill includes exemptions for certain defensive systems, cyber capabilities, mines, and other categories of military technology, its wider message is that as artificial intelligence becomes more deeply integrated into national defense, Congress wants humans, not machines, to remain responsible for high-stakes decisions.

The HALO Act is not the only effort underway on Capitol Hill to establish guardrails around military AI.

In March, Senator Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) introduced the AI Guardrails Act. Last week, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) introduced separate legislation that would similarly prohibit the Pentagon from using artificial intelligence to launch nuclear weapons, conduct warrantless surveillance of Americans, or deploy fully autonomous weapons.

“Right now, the Pentagon is moving toward deploying incredibly powerful AI technology without commonsense guardrails in place, which could have catastrophic consequences that make all of us less safe,” Sen. Gillibrand said in a statement. “We must act now – not to stifle technological progress, but to establish clear rules of the road that keep humans in charge and keep AI’s use in warfare smart and safe.”

The competing proposals could set the stage for a broader congressional debate over the role of artificial intelligence in future military operations, particularly if lawmakers seek to incorporate them into the Fiscal Year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

Before that can happen, however, the HALO Act and similar proposals must navigate the legislative process. The bills will first be considered by the relevant Senate committee, where lawmakers may hold hearings, debate their provisions, amend the text, or decline to advance them. If approved, it would then need to pass both the Senate and the House before being sent to the president for signature, either as a standalone measure or as part of a larger NDAA.

“My legislation would protect Americans from unlawful domestic surveillance, ensure that humans in the chain of command exercise responsibility for the use of any lethal technology, and maintain strong ethical protections in the deployment of autonomous and semi-autonomous weapons,” Sen. Schiff said in a statement.

Tim McMillan is a retired law enforcement executive, investigative reporter and co-founder of The Debrief. His writing typically focuses on defense, national security, the Intelligence Community and topics related to psychology. You can follow Tim on Twitter: @LtTimMcMillan.  Tim can be reached by email: tim@thedebrief.org or through encrypted email: LtTimMcMillan@protonmail.com 

A multi-institutional team of researchers led by University of Connecticut Professor Zhe Zhu has developed a method for measuring the dynamic, real-time activity of urban environments from space, which they are calling an “Urban Pulse.”

The research team behind the novel urban activity metric said that monitoring a city’s Urban Pulse could help mitigate uncontrolled urban sprawl or decay and enable environmentalists and urban planners to intervene before disasters become unavoidable.

Measuring an Urban Pulse Could Reveal Neighborhoods ‘Not Doing Well”

Although environmentalists and urban planners have a wide range of tools to measure the activities within a city, Zhu notes that scientists have spent decades merely capturing the “outcome of urbanization,” such as a finished road or a newly completed home. However, the researcher and lead author of a study detailing the Urban Pulse methodology added that, even with all the current tools, “you don’t really see the dynamics within an urban area.”

According to a statement detailing the new approach, a city’s pulse is determined by all construction activity within it. Along with new construction, the metric includes repairs, infrastructure improvements, or expansion into previously undeveloped green spaces. When used correctly, the researchers said that it can help determine “if and where their city is not doing well.”

“This would allow (authorities) to be proactive rather than conducting a metaphorical autopsy after the decay of an area is evident,” the team explained.

Bridging the Gap Between Abstract Urban Theories and Measurable, Real-World Data

To test their approach, the team evaluated the Urban Pulse of six cities: Seattle, Shenzhen, Lagos, Mumbai, Dubai, and Mexico City. This involved a deep examination of what the team termed “decades of dense time-series data” collected by NASA’s Harmonized Landsat and Sentinel-2 (HLS)  satellites for physical transformations in an urban environment, such as new construction, measurable infrastructure improvements, and demolition.

Instead of analyzing each city’s changes manually, the team evaluated the above changes on what they called “the neighborhood level” using a deep-learning and time-series-analysis approach called CAPES, developed by former UConn postdoctoral researcher Ji Won Suh. The team said that, by observing these “high-frequency rhythms of development” from a broad ‘outer space’ perspective, their approach “bridges the gap between abstract urban theories and measurable, real-world data.”

After examining CAPES’ results, the team found several key markers within the Urban Pulse. For example, the view from space revealed that growth within cities is not smooth and steady. Instead, Zhu and colleagues said that development happens in “abrupt, intense, and episodic bursts of construction.”

CAPES also revealed that the rhythms of an urban environment are cyclical. For example, while a city may show relatively steady growth on a broader level, individual neighborhoods go through “dramatic boom-and-rest cycles” of expansion and dormancy that don’t appear to follow predictable annual seasons.

The third pattern revealed by measuring the six cities’ Urban Pulse from space was that cities are “asynchronous,” meaning a single city does not ‘beat’ in unison. The team noted that neighborhoods “pulse at completely different times.” When it functions properly, this “uncoordinated rhythm” helps prevent the city’s infrastructure and labor markets from “overheating.”

Unlike previous methods for tracking a city’s evolution, the team noted that their Urban Pulse approach can help researchers “visualize a city’s reaction to global shocks.” For example, the team said that their analysis captured “the exact moment the COVID-19 pandemic triggered a widespread, synchronized ‘cardiac arrest’ in urban development worldwide.”

However, their new tool also revealed what the researchers termed “profound inequalities” in how individual cities recovered from the dramatic halt to urban growth. For example, the team said that the Urban Pulse of Shenzhen revealed synchronized ‘dips’ in activity, followed almost immediately by “rapid, policy-driven rebounds.” However, the same Orban Pulse analysis showed that the reactions in Mumbai and Mexico City were much more “muted.”

“It’s like in human beings,” Zhu explained. “When you get a disease, it’s not going to show up exactly the same in different people.”

A ‘Very Impactful Tool’ for Navigating Cities

Although the Urban Pulse metric offers a tantalizing tool for academics, the team noted real-world benefits for global policymakers, urban planners, and environmentalists, adding that “it serves as an early warning system.”

“By monitoring the rhythm, rate, and amplitude of neighborhood pulses, governments can identify early signs of urban decay or unsustainable sprawl and intervene before crises become entrenched,” they explained.

The team also suggested that making Urban Pulse data publicly available could “revolutionize how everyday people interact with their cities.” For example, an urban family considering a move to a new city or a new part of their current city could track a target neighborhood’s pulse to spot early warning signs of decay or early indicators of positive-trending growth. The same data could help business owners plan new locations or expanded service routes, depending on the business profile and the local Urban Pulse trends.

“This is going to be a very impactful tool influencing not only top-down policy decisions from governments but also bottom-up decisions from everyday people navigating their cities,” Zhu explained.

In a recent study, “The Urban Pulse: Diagnosing the urbanization process as spiky, cyclical, and asynchronous” was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.

For years, people around the world have reported being disturbed by a low, persistent droning sound of unknown origin.

Often described as more of a vibration than a specific tone, this sound has become widely known as “The Hum,” a phenomenon that is more frequently reported in certain cities and specific areas than others.

Over time, possible explanations have included industrial ventilation systems, military sonar experiments, and, in some online discussions, extraterrestrial signals, although none of these theories are supported by evidence.

However, in a recent study from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), published in PLOS ONE, researchers now offer evidence that, for most people who experience this phenomenon, the source is probably not external, but instead may actually originate within their own auditory system.

From Bristol to Taos and Beyond

Residents of Bristol, England, first widely reported The Hum in the mid-1970s, when the Bristol Evening Post received several reports from people who claimed they experienced hearing a strange, low sound. People initially thought the industrial fans in an area warehouse were responsible, but the hum persisted after the warehouse shut down.

By the 1990s, reports of a similar phenomenon began surfacing in Taos, New Mexico, where residents described a persistent, diesel engine-like rumble. Both state and federal authorities investigated the sound but could not explain it. The Taos Hum became one of the most studied and widely recognized examples of this phenomenon. Since then, similar reports have come from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and several European countries.

As reports grew, people proposed explanations ranging from ocean-generated infrasound to military sonar and CIA transmitters. Some online discussions have even suggested alien technology as a possible cause. In 2012, Canadian teacher Glen MacPherson, who first experienced The Hum on the west coast of British Columbia, created the World Hum Map and Database Project to document cases worldwide. The project has since collected thousands of entries.

Testing Two Hypotheses

To investigate the phenomenon, Professor Markus Drexl at NTNU recruited 28 people in Germany who all reported hearing a persistent, unexplained humming sound. Clinicians refer to this as a low-frequency sound percept, or LFSP. Most participants described the sound as having a frequency around 50 Hz, about the same as a deep mechanical rumble.

The research team tested two main explanations: whether participants had unusually acute sensitivity to low-frequency sound, or whether some were perceiving sounds generated by their own inner ears.

“We know that there are people who hear low-frequency sounds that can actually be measured, even if other people don’t hear them,” Drexl said. “But it’s not so easy to find the source of these sound waves, because it’s a struggle to localize low-frequency sounds.”

What the Ear Produces on Its Own

The cochlea, a spiral-shaped structure in the inner ear that converts sound waves into neural signals, also actively amplifies incoming sounds. This amplification produces faint sounds emitted from the ear, known as spontaneous otoacoustic emissions (SOAEs).

Most people are not aware of these emissions. In rare cases, people perceive SOAEs as tinnitus. Drexl’s team investigated whether people who hear the Hum might be detecting a low-frequency version of this phenomenon.

The results did not support this idea. The team found no low-frequency SOAEs in any participant. The hypothesis of unusually acute low-frequency hearing was also not supported; while a few participants had slightly better low-frequency hearing than average, most did not.

“Even though the group we tested was small, it still means that the hypothesis of having especially good hearing for low-frequency sounds does not hold for most people,” Drexl said.

When the Sound Has No Source

This left a third group: participants who reported hearing something that no external instrument could detect. “Then there are people who hear something that cannot be measured objectively. We believe people in this category have a form of low-frequency tinnitus,” Drexl said.

The Hum differs from typical tinnitus because most people who experience it first believe the sound comes from an external source, sometimes spending years searching for its origin before realizing it is internal. The researchers still have not ruled out external causes completely. In some cases, near industrial sites or coastlines, genuine low-frequency sources may exist. However, researchers identified no external source for most participants in the study.

“Based on our results, although we haven’t ruled out cases of physical external sound sources, we suggest that subjective tinnitus in the low-frequency range is often the cause of hearing pulsations of low-frequency sound perceptions,” Drexl said.

The Blind Spot in Auditory Research

The study also highlights that the low-frequency range of the auditory system remains poorly understood in hearing science.

“What we know about the hearing system is mainly based on how we capture and process sound with higher frequencies. We know less about how the auditory system handles and processes low-frequency sound, or infrasound,” Drexl said.

Although the cause of well-known cases like the Taos Hum remains unresolved, the new findings suggest that many reports of unexplained low-frequency sounds may actually originate from within the auditory system rather than from an external source.

Austin Burgess is a writer and researcher with a background in sales, marketing, and data analytics. He holds an MBA, a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, and a data analytics certification. His work focuses on breaking scientific developments, with an emphasis on emerging biology, cognitive neuroscience, and archaeological discoveries.

The foundation of global space law that has governed human activity outside Earth for nearly six decades may be approaching a breaking point, according to a new analysis by two astronomers who argue that the legal framework created during the Cold War is inadequate for an era of commercial spaceflight, global political instability, and growing militarization of orbit.

The study, published in Frontiers in Space Technologies, argues that the 1967 Outer Space Treaty (OST), long regarded as the foundation of peaceful space exploration, confronts mounting challenges from transforming global power shifts, increasing orbital competition, and the emergence of private companies as dominant players in space activities.

Dr. John Barentine of the Center for Space Environmentalism and Dark Sky Consulting, along with Dr. Aparna Venkatesan, a physicist and astronomer at the University of San Francisco, contend that while the treaty remains valuable, it may not be able to address the realities of the modern space age.

Rather than emphasizing legal reforms alone, the paper raises a wider question about humanity’s relationship with space itself. Researchers suggest that future governance of outer space may require a fundamental shift away from viewing space as a resource to be exploited and toward treating it as an environment that deserves stewardship and protection in its own right.

Although neither author specializes in international relations or military affairs, they argue that astronomers are uniquely positioned to witness how changes in space policy increasingly affect scientific research and humanity’s future in orbit.

“We are living through a time in which Earth and near-Earth space are facing unprecedented levels of potentially irreversible change,” researchers write. “The modern history of our discipline is inseparable from the technological developments brought on by those who sought to make a warfighting domain of outer space.”

A Space Treaty Born From the Cold War

The Outer Space Treaty emerged during one of the most tense periods of the Cold War. Negotiated primarily by the United States and the Soviet Union, the agreement established several basic principles that still govern space activities today.

Among them are prohibitions on national sovereignty claims over celestial bodies, restrictions on the placement of weapons of mass destruction in space, and commitments to use outer space for peaceful purposes.

For decades, the treaty has been credited with helping prevent an outright orbital arms race. Yet, Dr. Barentine and Dr. Venkatesan argue that the document was written for a vastly different world. One in which only a handful of nations possessed launch capabilities and private space companies were virtually nonexistent.

Today, dozens of countries operate satellites, commercial firms launch rockets at unprecedented rates, and ambitious plans for lunar bases, asteroid mining, and cislunar infrastructure are rapidly moving from science fiction to reality.

Researchers argue that the treaty’s framers could not have anticipated many of these developments, leaving major legal and moral questions unresolved. They note that the treaty lacks robust enforcement mechanisms and provides no definitive mechanism for resolving disputes between member states.

Space Has Always Been a Military Domain

A central theme of the paper is that warfare and space exploration have been intertwined from the beginning.

The authors trace the history of military activity in space back to the V-2 rockets of World War II and the launch of Sputnik in 1957, which demonstrated Soviet intercontinental missile capabilities as much as scientific achievement.

They also recount historical examples such as Soviet space weapons experiments, anti-satellite weapon testing by multiple nations, and the Strategic Defense Initiative of the 1980s, often remembered by its popular nickname, “Star Wars.”

In recent years, nations including the United States, China, India, and Russia have invested heavily in military space capabilities. Meanwhile, proposals such as advanced missile-defense architectures and growing concerns about anti-satellite weapons have renewed fears that space could become an increasingly contested military environment.

The researchers warn that global disputes on Earth are increasingly likely to spill into orbit, where the consequences could be especially severe. In contrast to terrestrial battlefields, debris generated by destructive actions in space can persist for years or even decades, threatening spacecraft belonging to many nations.

The Commercial Space Revolution Creates New Questions

The study additionally highlights the rapid rise of private space companies as a challenge that the Space Treaty never fully anticipated.

Under Article VI of the Space Treaty, governments are responsible for overseeing activities conducted by non-governmental entities within their jurisdictions. However, the researchers argue that the explosive growth of commercial spaceflight is creating uncertainty concerning regulatory oversight and responsibility.

This issue is especially important for the United States, which currently accounts for more than half of all low-Earth-orbit launches and operates the majority of active satellites.

As commercial firms assume larger roles in launch services, communications infrastructure, and moon missions, questions about who bears responsibility for environmental impacts and operational decisions become increasingly important.

The researchers suggest that future governance systems must address not only nation-state behavior but also the increasing influence of private actors whose interests may not always coincide with long-term environmental management.

A Forthcoming Lunar Land Rush?

One of the study’s most important observations concerns the Moon.

Dr. Barentine and Dr. Venkatesan describe moon missions as an early glimpse of future space geopolitics. Five nations have already successfully landed spacecraft on the Moon, and plans for permanent infrastructure continue to accelerate.

Because the Space Treaty prevents claims of sovereignty but does not completely resolve questions about resource use and operational exclusion zones, the researchers warn that countries arriving first could effectively secure the most valuable locations for science, resource extraction, or future settlements.

That dynamic, they argue, risks creating new forms of competition despite the treaty’s intent to promote cooperation.

The same concerns extend to orbital congestion and space debris. Researchers note that nations with little or no involvement in space activities may nevertheless bear the consequences of falling rocket stages and orbital debris generated by major space powers.

Rethinking Humanity’s Relationship With Space

Rather than advocating abandoning the Outer Space Treaty, the researchers ultimately argue that it remains the best framework currently available. However, they contend that future agreements must move past traditional geopolitical thinking.

The paper proposes drawing inspiration from the growing global “Rights of Nature” movement, which argues that ecosystems possess intrinsic value and deserve legal protections independent of human economic interests. Applied to space, such an approach would emphasize environmental health, reciprocity, and long-term stewardship over competition and exploitation.

Dr. Barentine and Dr. Venkatesan point to examples such as the peaceful management of Antarctica, international cooperation aboard the International Space Station, and partnerships among scientific institutions and Indigenous communities as models that could help shape future space governance.

Ultimately, they argue that the greatest threat to the space environment may not be legal loopholes nor technological restrictions, but humanity’s own willingness to abandon cooperation when competition becomes tempting.

“As our title reveals, the fundamental challenge lies in defending the space environment from failure of human goodwill and trust, rather than defending the space environment from the blind spots of current treaties,” researchers write. “The story of humanity in space is still being written, requiring innovation and determination from institutions and communities alike.”

Tim McMillan is a retired law enforcement executive, investigative reporter and co-founder of The Debrief. His writing typically focuses on defense, national security, the Intelligence Community and topics related to psychology. You can follow Tim on Twitter: @LtTimMcMillan.  Tim can be reached by email: tim@thedebrief.org or through encrypted email: LtTimMcMillan@protonmail.com 

The mystery of the Greenland shark’s incredible longevity may finally be unraveling, as a team of international researchers has completed the first comprehensive genome map of the creature.

Native to the cold waters between Greenland, Iceland, and Canada, Greenland sharks boast one of the longest vertebrate lifespans on Earth, approaching 400 years. In a recent paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers led by Shigeharu Kinoshita of the University of Tokyo have identified some of the genetic basis of that extraordinary lifespan, which they say future researchers may exploit to treat cancer and age-related illnesses.

Greenland Sharks Longevity

As genetic sequencing technology has improved and costs have fallen, there has been a major increase in the number of sequences from long-lived species for comparative analysis. Discoveries have included identifying increases in genes related to the immune system and growth hormone receptors in rockfish and bat species noted for their longevity.

With an entire lifecycle in slow motion, Greenland sharks’ longevity can be traced to their prolonged development: they take 150 years to reach sexual maturity, growing only 1 centimeter per year. Despite being one of the slowest swimmers in the ocean, the species undertakes large-scale migrations spanning over 1,000 kilometers.

Genome Mapping

Large genome sizes, like those of the Greenland shark, pose enormous mapping challenges, full of many repetitive sequences. Despite their importance for management and conservation, few whale and shark species have been sequenced due to the difficulty involved. To fill data gaps in the genetic causes of longevity, aquatic species evolution, and the risks of biodiversity loss, the team chose the Greenland shark as their subject.

The University of Tokyo-led team mapped roughly 5.9 billion DNA base pairs, accounting for 96.7% of the shark’s genome. Among the discoveries were the identification of specific genetic features likely related to the Greenland shark’s longevity. 

In their paper, they wrote of discovering “genetic traits associated with cancer, immune response function, genome stability, and cardiac function, deep-sea adaptations, and population size dynamics,” in the new research.

Longevity Results

One of the most crucial of these traits is how the shark appears to mitigate the genetic strain that contributes to aging by stabilizing the building blocks of chromosomes. Chromatin is a structure consisting of DNA, RNA, and proteins, which makes up chromosomes.

In the Greenland shark, the histone H1.0 protein, which binds DNA in chromatin, undergoes an amino acid substitution that may enhance stability and reduce the effects of aging.

Another genetic tool aiding the shark’s longevity is the presence of 59 copies of the FTH1b gene, which researchers discovered on pseudochromosome 33, far above the number seen in other shark or fish species. This helps regulate ferroptosis, a form of programmed cell death, thereby mitigating cell damage. Since the gene controls iron storage and ferroptosis is iron-dependent, the researchers say this multiplication of FTH1b could prevent oxidative cell damage.

Beyond those specific expressions, researchers also found expansion of entire gene families associated with DNA repair, immune functions, and cancer resistance.

Although limited to a single species, the research does advance general understanding of the genetic factors involved in extended lifespans. However, it will be up to future researchers to identify how this new information can be applied to human concerns.

The paper, “The Greenland Shark Genome: Insights into Lifespan Extremes and Population Dynamics,” appeared in Earth and Planetary Science Letters on May 19, 2026.

Ryan Whalen covers science and technology for The Debrief. He holds an MA in History and a Master of Library and Information Science with a certificate in Data Science. He can be contacted at ryan@thedebrief.org, and follow him on Twitter @mdntwvlf.

For patients with disorders of consciousness such as coma, vegetative states, or unresponsive wakefulness, clinicians face a longstanding challenge of determining whether any awareness remains. While surface brain recordings can measure general electrical activity, they do not reveal what is happening deep within the brain.

Now, a new study from Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München may bring clinicians closer to a measurable indicator of brain states in these conditions.

Researchers at LMU have found a new type of electrical rhythm in the central thalamus, a small area deep inside the brain. Published in Nature Human Behaviour, the study suggests that this rhythm could serve as a biological indicator of conscious states.

A Signal That Tracks Awareness

The signal does more than just appear with consciousness. It also changes as the brain moves between different states. For example, the rhythm becomes stronger during REM sleep, which lets researchers see small shifts in awareness even within the same stage of sleep.

“Our results show that the central thalamus plays an important role in regulating brain states,” said Dr. Aditya Chowdhury, lead author of the study. “In the context of existing research, our results show that this small deep-lying brain structure could actively influence our states of consciousness.”

Professor Tobias Staudigl, who led the research team, argues the signal’s consistency makes it more than just an interesting discovery. “These characteristic rhythm patterns can be reliably attributed to specific states and thus have the potential to serve as a measurable biological signature of states of consciousness,” Staudigl said.

Getting Inside the Deepest Part of the Brain

Recording electrical activity from deep brain structures is one of neuroscience’s most persistent technical problems. Standard surface EEG can detect general patterns from the brain’s outer layers, but it misses details from deeper areas. Since the thalamus sits at the center of the brain, it has remained largely inaccessible through non-invasive methods.

The LMU team had a rare chance to study this. Their research involved patients already undergoing deep-brain stimulation therapy for epilepsy, which uses electrodes in the thalamus to help control seizures. These electrodes let the researchers record signals directly from inside the thalamus, something that is almost never possible otherwise.

The team combined these recordings with surface EEG, eye-tracking, and detailed sleep-stage analysis. This approach allowed them to see how thalamic activity changes as patients transition between wakefulness and different sleep stages. Their findings offer the most detailed picture yet of what the thalamus actually does as consciousness changes.

Medical Implications

Disorders of consciousness, like coma, vegetative state, and minimally conscious state, are some of the hardest problems in neurology. One reason is that doctors have lacked reliable biological markers to assess patients’ awareness. The thalamic rhythm found in this study could help solve that problem.

If this signal truly tracks brain states linked to consciousness, it could help doctors evaluate awareness in patients who cannot communicate, guide treatment choices, and monitor how patients respond to care over time. The researchers believe it could also be used to improve deep brain stimulation therapy by allowing doctors to adjust treatment based on real-time thalamic activity rather than general clinical signs.

Staudigl was recently awarded funding by the European Research Council to explore the clinical potential of this discovery and to develop applications for treating neurological disease.

Understanding consciousness has always been one of science’s most difficult challenges. While the study does not answer the fundamental question of what consciousness is, these findings provide a consistent, measurable signal that indicates how the brain moves between conscious and unconscious states.

Austin Burgess is a writer and researcher with a background in sales, marketing, and data analytics. He holds an MBA, a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, and a data analytics certification. His work focuses on breaking scientific developments, with an emphasis on emerging biology, cognitive neuroscience, and archaeological discoveries.

Northwestern University engineers have unveiled an extremely energy-efficient 3D camera, called SpiderCam, inspired by how jumping spiders judge depth before making a calculated leap.

The research team behind the novel device said their technology could help engineers build wearable technologies, assistive devices, robots, drones, and other futuristic technologies that benefit from quickly and efficiently gauging their surroundings.

How Jumping Spiders Inspired Energy-Efficient SpiderCam

According to a statement announcing SpiderCam, 3D cameras typically estimate image depth in two ways. The first approach involves captured images from multiple viewpoints and comparing them, and the second involves projecting a light source, often an infrared (IR) laser, and then measuring the reflection.

Although both methods can produce realistic three-dimensional images, they can require significant computing power, additional operational energy, and often expensive hardware such as lasers.

Fortunately, millions of years of evolution have resulted in a creature that possesses a hyper-efficient way of estimating depth: the jumping spider.

“Jumping spiders jump to catch prey, to avoid predators and to get around, and that requires excellent vision,” said Northwestern’s Emma Alexander, the study’s corresponding author and an expert in bio-inspired computer vision. However, the researcher notes that their brains are extremely small, requiring the ability to calculate distances in an energy- and computationally efficient way.

According to Alexander, jumping spider eyes have multiple layers of retinas in each eye, rather than just one as in human eyes. When measuring distance, each retina focuses on an image at a slightly different distance, resulting in some images being blurrier than others.

“They see multiple levels of focus at all times,” Alexander explained. “So, they are always collecting pairs of images.”

After collecting these images in real time, the fly’s poppyseed-sized brain compares their sharpness, yielding a surprisingly accurate depth estimate, as evidenced by the creature’s ability to jump with precision.

Prototype Captures Images at Two Distances and Compares Their Blurriness

Inspired by nature’s hyper-efficient, extremely accurate depth estimation method, Alexander’s team decided to build a 3D camera using the same basic approach.

“We wanted to understand whether we could borrow some of the same principles to create an extremely energy-efficient depth sensor that could be used in resource-constrained situations where users don’t have unlimited access to power,” Alexander explained.

Instead of capturing images at multiple distances, as the jumping spider’s eye does, the Northwestern team’s initial design captures two images of the same scene at different focal lengths. Next, the system uses a custom algorithm to analyze the sharpness of the edges and textures captured in each image. The team said this analysis acts as a “translator between blur and distance” in the fly’s brain, resulting in “depth measurements in real time.”

To best approximate the naturally evolved energy efficiency of a jumping spider’s eye, Alexander’s team built the algorithm directly into a customizable computer chip specifically optimized for energy efficiency called a field-programmable gate array (FPGA).

The final prototype integrating the team’s dual-lens system generates depth maps at 32.5 frames per second. Critically, it generates this level of accurate 3D maps while consuming 624 milliwatts of power. For comparison, the team notes that 624 milliwatts is “less energy than used by a standard nightlight.”

Future Versions Could be Even More Energy Efficient

Although the team said that the current version of the SpiderCam is the “first passive FPGA-based 3D camera system to operate below one watt,” they hope to improve its optics and expand its field of view. Once they have a commercial-grade version, the team hopes to integrate SpiderCam into wearable devices and small robots.

Beyond proposed applications, the Northwestern team said that they “envision” a future, ultra-energy-efficient version  of the chip capable of “bringing 3D vision to applications where conventional depth sensors are impractical.”

“I’m very interested in settings where you’re very resource constrained and can’t just plug a camera into a wall,” Alexander explained. “For example, it could be deployed in field settings with limited power.”

“Separately, I also think it’s particularly exciting for applications like augmented reality where you’re interfacing with the physical world and need to know the locations of objects around you,” the researcher added.

The study’s co-first authors, Marcos Ferreira and Tianao Li, presented this work at the Computer Vision Foundation’s Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition (CVPR) in Denver. Complimentary registration is available for members of the media.

Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.

An analysis of dental tartar containing traces of human diets dating back over 33,000 years has revealed that ancient Europeans and many early Asian populations likely only ate insects by accident, perhaps as larvae in the carcasses of dead animals.

Conversely, the new study found that intentional insect consumption, called entomophagy, was more common in tropical regions and among Neanderthal populations.

Although the difference has some cultural and religious roots, the team found evidence that the abundance of insects in the tropics and the decreasing ability of humans migrating away from the tropics to digest insects likely led to the modern-day separation over thousands of years.

The Institute of Evolutionary Biology (IBE), a joint center of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and Pompeu Fabra University (UPF), research team behind the new findings suggests their research could help explain why some modern populations still consume insects as food while other parts of the world consider it gross or taboo, especially given the increasing food demands of a rising world population.

Insect Consumption in Ancient Northern Europeans Likely Accidental

According to a statement announcing the new research, hundreds of millions of people currently include insects in their diet. However, they also note that most of the Western world continues to “show an aversion” to including any of the more than 1,611 insect species designated as edible by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in theirs. Although some theories suggest the difference is almost purely cultural, the team concedes that “its origin remains unknown.”

To explore the origins of human entomophagy, the IBE analyzed 745 samples of ancient human dental tartar dating back to 33,000 before present. According to the team’s results published in the journal Science Advances, dental tartar (sometimes called dental ‘calculus’) is a critical archaeological tool because it preserves the DNA of the species these human ancestors consumed during their lifetimes.

Although the analysis found evidence for entomophagy amongst virtually all ancient populations sampled in the study, the levels varied dramatically. Notably, the evidence suggested that ancient humans in northern Eurasia did not routinely eat insects in measurable quantities. Instead, any consumption was likely incidental, including consumption of insect larvae in rotting food.

Curious whether the lack of entomophagy in ancient European and Central and Northern Asian populations was purely cultural or whether genetic and geographic factors were involved, the team studied human genes involved in chitin digestion. Chitin, which can be found in some marine animal shells, is also part of an insect’s hard exoskeleton.

According to the study authors, the analysis revealed that the ‘chitinase’ genes in North Eurasian human populations “carry mutations that confer a reduced capacity to digest insect exoskeletons.” Their analysis revealed that this reduced capacity to digest insect exoskeletons has persisted in the genomes of modern Eurasian populations “for the last 9,000 years,” which would coincide with the widely accepted date for the origin of agriculture.

Pablo Librado, study leader and a principal investigator at the IBE, said the “scarce presence of insects in the diet of northern Eurasians” suggests that the cause may not lie solely in more recent cultural factors but also in ecological and evolutionary components dating back several millennia. 

Neanderthals and Denisovans Probably Ate Insect Larvae in Rotting Meat

When the team compared data from ancient human tartar with that of ancient Neanderthals, they found that Neanderthals engaged in much higher levels of entomophagy than humans living in the same regions. According to the study authors, Neanderthal insect consumption levels were similar to those found in western chimpanzee populations, which the researchers note “rely on entomophagy to supplement their diet on the savanna, especially during periods of drought.”

Further analysis of the extracted insect DNA showed that the group most commonly consumed by the Neanderthal specimens included flies and mosquitoes. Although the team only analyzed the DNA, they noted that a recent hypothesis suggests Neanderthals ate carcasses laden with mosquito larvae.

“The abundance of mosquito remains reinforces the possibility that the carcasses of their prey were kept in ponds and marshy areas, where mosquitoes lay their eggs,” the team’s statement explained.

An analysis of the Neanderthal DNA and the DNA from the lone Denisovan study subject revealed that both ancient hominid populations could digest chitin. This result reinforced the genetic basis for increased or reduced entomophagy beyond cultural factors. 

Humans Ate Fewer Bugs When They Moved Away from Tropical Regions

One geographic component identified by the chitinase DNA analysis showed higher levels of digestive enzyme expression among humans living in or near the tropics. However, the expression of these enzymes gradually decreased as populations moved away from tropical regions. The team said this variation, which has been maintained for at least the last 9,000 years, “reflects the abandonment of entomophagy in European populations.”

Manuel Piñero, a predoctoral researcher at the IBE and first author of the study, noted that large numbers of insects must be consumed to offset the “high caloric cost” of collecting them, which might explain the higher levels of entomophagy in this region.

“In the tropics, there is a greater availability of social insects, such as termites and locusts,”  Piñero  explained, adding that the biomass and diversity of tropical edible insects enable “sustainable exploitation throughout the year.” The researcher also noted that insect consumption “adds to pest control.”

When discussing the implications of their findings, Librado highlighted the DNA and geographic factors the IBE team uncovered.

“Beyond cultural or religious factors, our results suggest that the reduced availability of insects in non-tropical areas may have been a key factor in the abandonment of entomophagy, leading to a reduced capacity to digest insect exoskeletons,” the researcher explained.

Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.

An iron artifact recovered by archaeologists may be the oldest of its kind ever found in Japan, according to new research.

Recovered during excavations at the Hayashi-Fujishima archaeological site in Fukui, the capital city of Fukui Prefecture, the artifact measures slightly more than an inch and a half across, just under an inch in width, and just a millimeter in thickness.

The presence of tiny, triangular teeth measuring up to 3 millimeters deep indicates the artifact’s use as an early saw, according to investigations by the Fukui Prefectural Archaeological Research Center, which recently announced the discovery.

While similar discoveries have been made in Japan, none are believed to be as old as this saw, which archaeologists have tentatively dated to the late Yayoi Pottery Culture Period, which thrived between the second and third centuries, making it the oldest known in the country.

Tomokatsu Uozu, Deputy Director at the Center, said the age of the discovery indicates the advancement of early iron technologies along the region’s coastal communities during the period.

“The artifact could be an important piece of evidence supporting the advancement of ironware culture along the Sea of Japan coast during the Yayoi period,” Uozu recently told The Asahi Shimbun.

Similar Discoveries in the Ancient East

The saw uncovered at the Hayashi-Fujishima archaeological site bears some similarities to saws from the same period that have been unearthed during past excavations in China.

Such similarities are important, since it is believed that the same iron processing techniques used in the creation of the saw from the Hayashi-Fujishima site originated in China, having been carried across the Korean Peninsula and eventually reaching northern Kyushu, where ancient traders carried it along the Sea of Japan to its eventual arrival at Fukui.

The saw recently showcased by the Fukui Prefectural Archaeological Research Center is only one example of the many artifacts recovered from the Hayashi-Fujishima site.

Identified Decades After Its Discovery

Past work at the site has uncovered additional iron artifacts, as well as stone tools, pottery, distinctive “magatama” and “kudatama” bead varieties, and a range of items during primary excavations, which were conducted during the late 1990s and early 2000s.

The site is believed to also host what remains of an ancient settlement dating to the Yayoi period, a period that was significant for the emergence of organized food production, as well as a unique element associated with the culture: the creation of distinctive, keyhole-shaped burial mounds.

However, it wasn’t until 2021, during restoration work with many of the artifacts retrieved from the site, that researchers first noticed something significant that had gone unnoticed decades earlier at the time of the artifact’s discovery: tiny serrations were present on one of its edges.

Further examination with the help of X-ray CT scan imaging confirmed the artifact’s identity as a triangular or “beak-shaped” saw, similar to other discoveries from later periods. At the time of its use, the complete saw would likely have measured up to five times the length of the remaining fragmentary portion.

Another notable feature of the saw is that the tip of the blade is bent, which archaeologists think may indicate that the saw was used for work involving fine crafting of wooden or stone items.

Breaking Earlier Records for Japan’s Oldest Saw

The discovery now overturns the previous oldest artifact of its kind known from the region, which was uncovered from a third-century burial mound in Hyogo Prefecture. That saw’s association with the Kofun Period, which thrived near the end of the third century, made it the oldest known at the time of its discovery.

Although additional studies are required, the team says that confirmation of the age of the Hayashi-Fujishima site’s saw would extend the timescales once again on the earliest use of such technologies by as much as a century.

A meteorite discovered in Africa could be evidence of a lost protoplanet that once orbited our Sun, according to researchers at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

In a recent paper published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters, the team revealed evidence of an ancient protoplanet that may have been as large as Mars based on simulations of how the meteorite sample may have formed.

The four-and-a-half-billion-year-old world carried an unexpected geological makeup, which the researchers say casts doubt on common assumptions regarding planetary evolution.

Protoplanetary Demise

According to the UC Boulder team, the massive protoplanetary body collided with another object four and a half billion years ago, shattering it completely. This is the first definitive evidence of a lost protoplanet in our solar system, based on analysis of the angrite meteorite NWA 12774, a shard of that planetary embryo recovered from the Sahara Desert.

“It’s incredible to think there was once a world this large,” said lead author Aaron Bell, an assistant research professor in the Department of Earth Science at CU Boulder. “We only know it existed because a few fragments of it happened to land on Earth. These meteorites preserved evidence of a completely different pathway through which early planets developed.”

A Rare Meteorite Sample

Angrites, a rare type of volcanic rock, serve as a record of our solar system’s distant past. These rocks began forming only a few million years after the solar system’s birth, making them valuable evidence of this early era. However, they are extremely rare and difficult to find.

NWA 12774 is one of only 68 angrite samples identified among more than 80,000 meteorites cataloged by scientists. Given its rarity, the discovery could potentially reshape how researchers understand these ancient rocks.

Until now, scientists had assumed that angrites originated from relatively small asteroids less than 124 miles (200 kilometers) wide, based largely on their chemical composition. Large rocky planets such as Earth and Mars contain significant amounts of silicon dioxide, while angrites contain very little of the compound.

Unexpected Meteorite Discovery

Researchers began to reconsider those assumptions when they identified clinopyroxene in the meteorite sample. This mineral, commonly found in Earth’s crust and mantle, appeared unusually rich in aluminum, suggesting that it formed under significant pressure deep within a planetary body.

To investigate this unusual characteristic of NWA 12774, the University of Colorado Boulder team recreated the conditions under which the sample could have formed. Their analysis revealed that pressures of at least 17.5 kilobars were required to produce the aluminum-rich clinopyroxene found in the meteorite. For comparison, one kilobar is roughly equivalent to the pressure at the deepest part of Earth’s oceans, near the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Rethinking Meteorite Origins

The researchers’ discovery proved that at least this particular angrite sample could not have formed inside a small meteorite, as a body with a radius of at least 621 miles would be required to generate the pressure needed to produce the crystals. 

Additional evidence suggested the parent body may have been even larger. The crystals’ sharp edges and delicate internal structures indicate they likely formed at relatively shallow depths beneath the surface. Reconciling both the high-pressure conditions and the shallow formation depth suggests that the parent body may have ranged in size from the Moon to Mars.

“There are many meteorites sitting in drawers that haven’t been thoroughly studied, so there were likely more of these protoplanets we don’t know about,” Bell said.

Exactly what happened to this ancient world remains uncertain, but researchers believe it was likely destroyed in a massive collision early in the solar system’s history. Fragments of that lost protoplanet may have later contributed material to other bodies, potentially including Earth itself.

“The materials that formed the angrite parent body are fundamentally different from the ingredients of Earth and Mars,” Bell concluded. “It points to a distinct and separate evolutionary path in planetary formation in the early history of our solar system.”

The paper, “High-Pressure Clinopyroxene in Northwest Africa 12774 and New Geobarometric Evidence for a Planetary Embryo-Sized Angrite Parent Body,” appeared in Earth and Planetary Science Letters on July 1, 2026.

Ryan Whalen covers science and technology for The Debrief. He holds an MA in History and a Master of Library and Information Science with a certificate in Data Science. He can be contacted at ryan@thedebrief.org, and follow him on Twitter @mdntwvlf.

Scientists from ETH Zurich in Switzerland have announced a series of successful experiments involving the repair of injured spinal cords in zebrafish and mice after being injected with magnetically controlled microrobots containing pluripotent stem cells.

According to a statement announcing the ETH team’s work, both the zebrafish and mice injected with the microrobots showed improved movement and normalized exploratory behavior within just a few days after treatment.

Although the initial studies were confined to lab animals, the team hopes their magnetically controlled microrobot approach to the precision delivery of pluripotent stem cells could eventually be adapted for humans with spinal cord injuries.

Spinal Cord Repair Microrobots Treat Nerve Cells That Resist Regeneration

Unlike some cells in the human body, nerve cells within the spinal cord rarely regenerate on their own. If the spinal cord is injured, scarring can further reduce the ability of the nerve fibers within the cord to regrow. For people living with spinal cord injuries, this scenario can offer a bleak prognosis for recovery.

In recent decades, scientists have turned to the natural regenerative properties of pluripotent stem cells. Although the use of stem cells was initially controversial due to the need to extract neonatal stem cells, scientists ultimately learned to convert ordinary stem cells into pluripotent stem cells capable of becoming any cell type in the human body.

The most promising approach involves implanting stem cells at the site of the injury and then using electrical stimulation to promote the growth of new cells. However, according to the ETH team behind the new approach, the current method has several drawbacks.

First, stimulating the cells requires the use of implanted electrodes. Second, the team notes that after transplantation, many of the stem cells “do not always survive or integrate properly into the existing tissue.”

To improve healing and increase the chance of restoring spinal cord nerve cell function, they said their new approach combines therapeutic stem cells with magnetoelectric nanoparticles and uses magnetic fields to guide them to the “precise site of an injury” and “stimulate the stem cells to accelerate repair.”

NPCbots Combine Stem Cells and Magnetically Controlled Nanoparticles

To construct their magnetically guided spinal cord repairing robot, the team built what they termed a “biohybrid microrobot.”

First, the team creates pluripotent stem cells from adult cells by genetically manipulating them in the lab. The result is what researchers call an “induced” pluripotent stem cell (iPS). According to the study authors, these newly pluripotent iPS cells are used to derive living neural progenitor cells (NPCs), meaning “they have the potential to differentiate into various types of nervous system cells.”

Next, the team creates customized magnetic nanoparticles consisting of two layers. The inner layer responds to the “commands” from the magnetic fields used to control them, and an outer layer that converts this response into an electrical signal.

According to Professor Salvador Pané i Vidal of the Multi-Scale Robotics Lab at ETH Zurich, each tiny robot has a reservoir near the center “where we trap the cells.” The professor said the best way to accomplish this is to inject the nanoparticles into a solution with the NPC, “and wait for the two components to bind.”

After 30 minutes, the process is complete, and the team is left with a batch of nanobots, each around 6 micrometers in size. Since the new robots combine a magnetic bot and a reservoir of NPCs, the team named them ‘NPCbots.’

In preparatory cellular experiments, the researchers used hundreds of thousands of NPCbots. However, several million were required for animal trials.

Zebrafish and Mice Regain Movement After Injections

To test the efficacy of their new NPCbots, the ETH team injected millions of them into the spinal cord of zebrafish larvae with spinal cord injuries. To improve the chances of nerve regeneration, the NPCbots were injected directly into the site of the injury.

After injecting the microrobots, the injury site was subjected to electromagnetic fields. Although the repair was not immediately evident, the team noted that after three days, the zebrafish with the injured spinal cords “exhibited nearly normal swimming and exploratory behaviour.”

Next, the team injected millions of NPCbots into mice with completely separated spinal cords. According to the team, the results were “very promising.”

“After 28 days, the animals’ nerve cells had reconnected at the site of the injury,” they explained.

The team said further observation of the treated mice revealed “increasingly normal movement patterns,” including improvements in gait, stride length, and coordination. The ETH team also noted that the mice’s exploratory behavior “improved significantly.”

When discussing the mouse experiments, the team described the result as “particularly significant” because zebrafish spinal cords regenerate, whereas mouse spinal cords do not. They also noted that the treatment was “well tolerated by the animals,” with no reported immune reactions or adverse effects.

Minimally Invasive and More Precise Treatments with Microbots

Unlike science fiction movies, where tiny robots repair tissue mechanically, the research team said that the stem cells carried by the NPCbots are exposed to electrical stimulation, “greatly enhancing their differentiation after transplantation.” This means the nanoparticles convert the electric signals from the EM field into electrical impulses, stimulating healing.

Unlike more complicated stem cell procedures that use implanted electrodes and cables, the team said they only needed to apply external magnetic fields around the spinal cord injury site. The team said this simplification was “crucial,” since the spinal cord is considered extremely sensitive. They also note that the ability to manipulate the frequency and field strength of magnetic fields, combined with their ability to penetrate deeply into tissue, makes the entire process safe and easy to control.

“Microrobotic guidance makes the treatment more precise and minimally invasive,” Hao explained.

After the NPC bots have delivered and stimulated the stem cells, the team said they “essentially dissolve” within the tissue. Because the bots contain a barium titanate coating, the researchers also believe that they will be “stable and minimally reactive” with surrounding tissue. Still, they concede that “further studies will determine whether and how the particles are degraded or excreted over the long term.”

Expanding NPCbot Therapies to Increase the Effectiveness of Other Targeted Therapies

Although the team described the animal trials of their NPCbots as “promising,” they noted that further research is needed before the process can be attempted on human patients with spinal cord injuries. For example, Hao noted that in addition to ‘clinical aspects’ that require more exploration, the team needs to start by determining which magnetic fields “work best in humans” and determining the “optimal stimulation duration” for human NPCs. Nevertheless, the team noted, they are “already considering further applications.”

“The reproducible and scalable production of microrobots using our lab-on-a-chip system demonstrates that the platform’s application potential extends beyond basic research,” Professor Vidal explained.

Some potential biomedical applications mentioned by the RETH team include cardiology, oncology, wound healing, “and other targeted therapies,” adding that their process could make such treatments “safer, more controllable and more effective.”

The study “Magnetoelectric Microrobots for Spinal Cord Injury Regeneration” was published in Nature Materials. 

Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.

Strange green stones, evidence of repeated ancient expeditions, hidden burials, and other discoveries have been made in a remote cave high in the Pyrenees mountains.

The findings were made in a cave located more than 7,300 feet above sea level, revealing evidence that ancient visitors repeatedly endured the hardships of climbing to such altitudes for a period spanning 2,000 years. The question for archaeologists had been why this cave seems to have held such importance.

Now, discoveries at the remote site could potentially alter our understanding of ancient European uses of mountain landscapes in prehistoric times. Of key importance, archaeologists have uncovered ancient hearths that contain small samples of green minerals, which point to ancient mining activities that likely supported ancient metallurgy in the region.

Two Millennia of Human Interest

For more than 2,000 years, ancient Europeans repeatedly traveled to this remote cave, leaving behind evidence of their visits that includes ancient hearths and even a child’s tooth, suggesting the possibility that there may even be hidden graves at the site.

Professor Carlos Tornero, a researcher with the Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution, says these discoveries are surprising, since past research suggested such areas would only have been occasionally traversed by humans during periods of migration, rather than becoming destinations.

“For a long time, high-mountain environments were seen as marginal, places prehistoric communities passed through occasionally,” said Tornero, who is the lead author of a new study detailing the findings.

That wasn’t the case with this Cave 338, as archaeologists now call it, which turned out to be a far more unique site.

“We found a really rich archaeological sequence, including multiple combustion structures and a very large number of green mineral fragments,” Tornero recently said. “We can’t say exactly how long people stayed each time, but the repeated use of the space and the density of remains suggest occupations that were short to medium in duration, but happening again and again over long periods of time.”

Evidence of an Ancient Copper Mining Industry

At Cave 338, initial excavations began with a small area spanning six square meters near the cave’s entrance. There, Tornero and the team uncovered evidence of human activity temporally associated with four distinctive layers.

In the most recent layer of human occupation, artifacts from historical periods were found, although in smaller numbers, which suggested that the cave’s use had likely decreased gradually with time. Similar limited use was evidenced in the cave’s deepest layers, where charcoal fragments were discovered with dates indicating human activity as far back as 6,000 years ago.

Within layers two and three, significantly more activity was discernible. Discoveries within these layers included nearly two-dozen hearths, many of which contained burned fragments of a green mineral that researchers believe may be malachite.

If confirmed, this is significant, since malachite is rich in copper and can be processed to extract the metal, meaning that ancient visitors to the cave may have visited the site specifically to mine this unique green mineral. Cave 338 would therefore represent a very high-altitude mining camp, which ancient Europeans somehow discovered and repeatedly visited.

When Fire Heats the Green Stone

Based on radiocarbon dating, hearths located in the site’s second layer are approximately 3,000 years old, while those in the layer directly beneath it date to between 4,000 and 5,000 years ago.

Dr. Julia Montes-Landa of the University of Granada, who was a co-author of the new paper, says that evidence suggests many of the fragments were thermally altered—in other words, they were intentionally exposed to fire—while some of the samples found at the site were not.

This, she argues, “clearly suggests that fire played an important role in their processing and that there was a deliberate intention behind it.”

“They weren’t burned by accident,” Montes-Landa says.

Another indication of ancient industrial activity at the site involves the placement of the hearths in layers two and three, many of which overlap, which strongly suggests reuse. However, more than one area containing overlapping hearths is present, which also suggests that while reuse occurred, it took place in successive periods of visitation throughout time.

Hidden Burials and Prehistoric Artifacts

In addition to ancient evidence of mining and thermal alteration of stone, within the site’s third layer, a small amount of human remains—an ancient baby tooth and a finger bone believed to have belonged to a child—were found.

Such scant remains do not provide context for the cause of death or whether the remains came from the same individual. However, it does point to the possibility of hidden burials that may exist in other portions of the cave.

In addition to human remains, prehistoric artifacts were found at the site, which date to the second millennium BC, including a shell pendant and another made from a bear’s tooth.

“The shell pendant is interesting because it has parallels in other sites in Catalonia, which suggests shared traditions or connections between different communities,” Tornero said. “The bear tooth pendant is much less common.”

“That might point to something more specific or symbolic, possibly linked to the local environment,” Tornero suggests.

Lingering Questions

Obviously, 338 held significance to ancient inhabitants of the region, since, despite the daunting trek reaching it would have required, humans clearly returned there over and over again for a period of at least two thousand years, although evidence of human presence at the location extends to as much as double that amount of time.

Going forward, Tornero, Montes-Landa, and their colleagues hope that future excavations may reveal additional clues about who had been coming here for so long, and what specifically attracted them to the cave.

Of key significance will also be confirmation that the mineral contains copper.

“The identification of the green mineral as malachite is still preliminary,” Tornero says, adding that ongoing research “will provide final answers shortly.”

Much work remains to be done at the site, and Tornero and his team plan to resume excavations there later this year.

“The excavation hasn’t yet reached the full depth of the site,” Tornero said, “so the sequence is not completely documented.”

“This summer we will continue the archaeological work,” Tornero added.

For now, Cave 338 already shows that even some of the most remote areas of the Pyrenees could have played significant roles in the way ancient humans utilized the land and its resources.

“As such, the site provides a key reference framework for understanding high-mountain occupation, resource exploitation and mobility dynamics in the Pyrenees during later prehistory,” the authors write in their recent paper.

The team’s paper, “Beyond 2,000 meters, first evidence of intense prehistoric occupation in the Pyrenees,” appeared in Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

Astronomers from around the world were fascinated last year when 3I/ATLAS, the third interstellar object ever observed passing through our Solar System, was discovered.

The SETI Institute was one of the many organizations that examined the unusual interstellar object, conducting a comprehensive search for any signs that it might be producing technological signals.

Using the Allen Telescope Array (ATA) at the Hat Creek Radio Observatory in Northern California, SETI researchers scanned a broad range of radio frequencies in search of potential evidence of extraterrestrial technology associated with 3I/ATLAS. The data that came back was clear: no signs of artificial signals. As most astronomers expected, 3I/ATLAS is most likely a natural comet. 

Observations of interstellar objects have become more common in recent years, due to advances in telescopic technologies available to astronomers. Discovered last July, 3I/ATLAS is only the third confirmed interstellar visitor to enter our Solar System, preceded by 1I/ʻOumuamua in 2017, and 2I/Borisov in 2019. 

These rare discoveries help astronomers understand the materials in our cosmic backyard. By analyzing the composition of these objects, scientists can gain a deeper understanding of how planetary systems develop and evolve throughout the galaxy.

The Research 

The majority of recent astronomical observations indicate that 3I/ATLAS is a natural object, albeit one that exhibited some unusual qualities. However, the possibility remains that we may one day find a technological artifact from an intelligent civilization; it is equally possible that at some point, aliens may also discover a spacecraft of Earthly origin. 

“Eventually, our own Voyager spacecraft will be extraterrestrial artifacts in other stellar systems,” Sheik told The Debrief. “Given that, it is important that we understand the natural distribution of interstellar objects so that we will be able to identify any anomalies that could one day be signs of an artificial interstellar object.”

The SETI research team studied 3I/ATLAS for over seven hours using the ATA, searching radio frequencies from 1 to 9 gigahertz. This range is especially important because it can detect narrowband radio signals, which are rarely produced by natural space phenomena and are often considered possible signs of technological activity.

Researchers found 74 million narrowband signals, but after filtering out human interference and motion-matched sources, only about 200 remained. These were later confirmed to come entirely from Earth-based technology or satellites.

“To be clear, we did not detect any radio signals from 3I/ATLAS. We ruled out the presence of signals down to power levels comparable with everyday appliances: for example, we definitely would have picked up a cell tower or a radio station equivalent had it been on the surface of 3I/ATLAS,” Sheik said.

In other words, no technosignatures were detected. The SETI observation ruled out signals stronger than approximately 10 to 110 watts across the observed frequencies (comparable to the power consumption of a household appliance).

Chrissy Newton is a PR professional and the founder of VOCAB Communications. She currently appears on The Discovery Channel and Max and hosts the Rebelliously Curious podcast, which can be found on YouTube and on all audio podcast streaming platforms. Follow her on X: @ChrissyNewton, Instagram: @BeingChrissyNewton, and chrissynewton.com. To contact Chrissy with a story, please email chrissy @ thedebrief.org.

Scientists have uncovered the genetic secrets behind a novel energy-use strategy that allows a deep-sea “giant” to survive without food for over five years, in one of nature’s most stunning survival stories.

Supergiant bathynomids, also known as giant isopods, present a bizarre biological paradox: they exhibit pronounced body gigantism as megafaunal species yet inhabit a deep-sea habitat with extremely sparse nutrient availability.

In a recent paper in Cell, researchers from the Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IOCAS) revealed how these large deep-sea creatures subsist on such limited food, using a novel genetic strategy unique to bathynomids.

A Complex Genetic Approach

The IOCAS team employed a multi-omic strategy to address the problem, combining genomics with other disciplines, such as morphology, physiology, behaviorology, and metagenomics. Doing so led to a novel discovery: that supergiant bathynomids don’t have just one, but two techniques to manage their limited access to nutrients.

First, isopods have a massive stomach that can store vast amounts of nutrients for later use. Second, they have an exceptionally low basal metabolic rate (BMR), which is genetically driven.

To diversify their research, the team focused on two species that occupy different depths. At around 300 meters, the Bathynomus doederleini is the shallower of the two, while the Bathynomus jamesi is found at 898 meters. Despite the difference in depth, both are technically considered “deep-sea” inhabitants, as the boundary is defined at 200 meters.

A Powerful Stomach

Roughly two-thirds of a bathynomid’s body is stomach—a figure far beyond that of related intertidal and shallow water species. The contents of those enormous stomachs are also unusual, filled with a mud-like mixture of highly digested food. This finely ground nutrient sludge has a low proportion of digestive bacteria, but a high amount of lipid-storing Chlamydiae. 

With a bacterial ratio leaning toward preservation rather than just digestion, this creates a food reserve that can be slowly digested and utilized as the creatures lower their BMR to endure long periods between feedings.

Genetic Findings

Another major finding was that bathynomids benefit not only from vertically transferred genes between parents and offspring, but from the horizontally transferred ND1 gene they acquired from an exogenous symbiotic bacterium. Intriguingly, the transfer defied typical horizontal transfer limitations, achieving an ultra-high level of expression in the bathynomid genome. 

These isopods use epigenetic histone modifications to regulate energy-related gene expression, thereby improving efficiency, conservation, and control. An example of this is histone acetylation regulating ND1 expression at an ultra-high level, which the team investigated in a laboratory test. Researchers suspected this gene was essential to energy metabolism, as it is a component of Complex I in the electron transport chain.

ND1 Genetic Tests

Using zebrafish, nematodes, and human 293T cells, the IOCAS team tested the gene’s impact on energy usage. At normal temperatures, the team found that ND1 actually decreased starvation tolerance by increasing energy metabolism. Yet when the team lowered temperatures to reflect those found in a typical deep sea environment, they found the opposite effect, with ND1 decreasing mitochondrial activity and energy metabolism rates, to improve zebrafish starvation tolerance an astounding 37%.

The IOCAS team concluded that ND1 provides a solution to the long-standing paradox of bathynomid gigantism in the context of their nutrient-poor environment. By fine-tuning the degree of metabolic depression, the gene can adjust the mitochondrial metabolic network to preserve energy during extended periods without sustenance.

Never before has such a strategy for energy efficiency, combining horizontal gene transfer and epigenetic optimization, been identified in a deep-sea megafaunal species.

“Our work not only deciphers the mystery of ultra-long starvation tolerance in deep-sea isopods,” said lead author Yuan Jianbo, “but also provides an important paradigm for understanding how life balances growth and survival in extreme environments.”

The paper, “Deep-Sea Megafauna Co-Opts Microbial Energy Metabolism Genes to Withstand Ultra-Long Starvation,” appeared in Cell on June 5, 2026.

Ryan Whalen covers science and technology for The Debrief. He holds an MA in History and a Master of Library and Information Science with a certificate in Data Science. He can be contacted at ryan@thedebrief.org, and follow him on Twitter @mdntwvlf.

For more than a century, musicians have maintained that the way a pianist touches a key influences the sound that emerges. Many scientists, however, have argued that after the hammer strikes the string, the instrument itself determines the outcome, making the pianist’s touch irrelevant.

Now, a recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences provides some of the strongest evidence yet in support of the musicians’ perspective.

A research team led by Dr. Shinichi Furuya of the NeuroPiano Institute and Sony Computer Science Laboratories developed a custom sensor system called HackKey. This system can record the movement of all 88 piano keys at 1,000 frames per second, with a spatial precision of 0.01 millimeters. The team invited 20 internationally recognized pianists to play notes while intentionally aiming for contrasting timbres, such as bright versus dark and light versus heavy. Listeners were able to distinguish among the different timbres, even individuals with no experience playing the piano.

The Movements Behind the Sound

The researchers identified a series of micro-movements beneath each keystroke. These movements are so subtle that they are almost impossible to see, but precise enough for listeners to perceive differences in sound.

Small changes in how quickly a key accelerates, slight overlaps between notes, and variations in the speed of initial contact with the key all influenced how listeners described the resulting sound. When each of these factors was adjusted individually, the perceived timbre changed. Adjusting a single movement feature was enough to reliably change how listeners perceived timbre. The results show that touch has a direct effect on sound, independent of factors such as volume or tempo.

The study describes these micro-movements as a motor skill developed through years of advanced training. The researchers call the emerging science of mapping movement to musical experience “dynaformics.”

A Debate as Old as the Modern Piano

The debate over whether touch can alter piano timbre dates back to at least the early 1900s, when music educators began discussing what distinguishes one performer’s sound from another. The piano’s mechanical action appeared to support the skeptics, since the hammer, once released, moves independently before striking the string and is not directly contacted by the pianist’s finger.

As a result of this mechanical process, many acousticians concluded that any reported differences in tone were psychological, influenced by context, volume, or timing rather than by touch. Musicians maintained their position but did not have the scientific tools to prove it.

To settle this debate, Furuya’s team developed a custom biometric contact-sensing system called HackKey, capable of recording the movement of all 88 piano keys at 1,000 frames per second with sub-millimeter precision. The system captured in-depth piano movement data that previous technology could not. For the first time, researchers could observe the specific actions of elite pianists and relate those movements to listeners’ descriptions of sound.

What It Means Beyond the Concert Hall

Piano teachers have often used general phrases like “play warmer” or “use a softer touch” because the specific movements that create certain sound qualities were not well understood. This study now offers a guide to those movements.

Future training tools may allow students to see precisely what their fingers are doing when a note is played successfully or not. Instead of relying on a teacher’s metaphor, students could compare their own keystrokes to a standard and work to improve their technique. The researchers suggest that this approach could make expressive technique easier to teach and visualize, especially for students who find it difficult to translate verbal instructions into physical actions.

The research may also apply to rehabilitation, robotics, and human-computer interaction. Discovering that small differences in movement can shape auditory perception offers new insight into how the brain links movement and sensory experience. Some researchers are exploring whether systems based on expressive musical movement could help patients recover dexterity and coordination after injury.

Most scientific research on music has focused on elements that are easier to measure, like pitch, loudness, and rhythm. Timbre, or the quality or “color” of a sound that makes one instrument or voice different from another, has been harder to measure. This study offers a new way to understand the mechanics behind this concept. The findings suggest that some of the most expressive parts of music come from movements too small to see, developed through years of practice.

Austin Burgess is a writer and researcher with a background in sales, marketing, and data analytics. He holds an MBA, a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, and a data analytics certification. His work focuses on breaking scientific developments, with an emphasis on emerging biology, cognitive neuroscience, and archaeological discoveries.

The search for a ninth planet in our solar system could reach a turning point as soon as this year, according to a planetary scientist involved in the hunt for a mysterious object believed to be lurking in the outer reaches of the Solar System.

For the past decade, astronomers around the world have been searching for evidence of another resident in our planetary neighborhood. As far back as 2016, there were already hints that something might be out there, given the odd orbits of distant objects like Sedna, discovered in 2003. 

Now, two astronomers—California Institute of Technology (Caltech) researchers Konstantin Batygin, a professor of planetary science, and his colleague, Dr. Michael E. Brown—believe there is a high probability that the confirmation of a ninth planet in our solar system could be on the horizon. 

Batygin and Brown’s findings suggest Planet Nine may have a mass roughly 5 to 10 times that of Earth and orbit, on average, about 20 times farther from the Sun than Neptune, which circles the Sun at an average distance of 2.8 billion miles. If it exists, the distant world would take between 10,000 and 20,000 years to complete a single orbit around the Sun.

“This would be a real ninth planet,” says Brown, the Richard and Barbara Rosenberg Professor of Planetary Astronomy, in a 2016 statement. “There have only been two true planets discovered since ancient times, and this would be a third. It’s a pretty substantial chunk of our solar system that’s still out there to be found, which is pretty exciting.”

Evidence for Planet Nine comes from a small group of distant Kuiper Belt objects whose highly elongated orbits appear clustered in the same direction and share similar orbital tilts relative to the plane of the known planets.

Researchers argue that this type of alignment is unlikely to occur by chance. Alternative explanations involving the Kuiper Belt itself have also been explored, but models suggest the belt would require far more mass than has been observed to produce the effect.

Brown’s excitement shines through: “It’s almost like having six hands on a clock all moving at different rates, and when you happen to look up, they’re all in exactly the same place,” he says, adding that the odds of having that happen are something close to one in 100.

Computer simulations suggest that a large, unseen planet in the outer Solar System could maintain these orbital alignments through its gravitational influence. The models also demonstrate how mean-motion resonances could keep the distant objects in stable orbits while preventing collisions with the proposed planet.

The hypothesis may also explain the unusual trajectories of objects such as Sedna and 2012 VP113, whose highly elongated orbits do not bring them close to Neptune.

Japanese Scientists Find More Evidence 

In July, additional data relevant to the Planet Nine debate emerged with the discovery of a newly identified object nicknamed “Ammonite,” found by Japanese astronomers using the Subaru Telescope on Maunakea, Hawaii. The object is only the fourth known sednoid, joining a rare class of distant celestial bodies with unusual orbits beyond Pluto.

“The fact that Ammonite’s current orbit does not align with those of the other three sednoids lowers the likelihood of the Planet Nine hypothesis,” said Dr. Yukun Huang of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, who conducted simulations of Ammonite’s orbit in a July interview with The Debrief.

“It is possible that a planet once existed in the Solar System but was later ejected, causing the unusual orbits we see today,” says Huang.

How Planet Nine Could be Found This Year

Astronomy is often a science of probabilities and competing hypotheses, but Planet Nine presents a relatively rare case where new observations may soon provide a clear answer. The Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile recently began scientific operations and could provide the data needed to confirm—or rule out—the existence of Planet Nine.

Perched atop a mountain in Chile, the NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory observes the night sky in extraordinary detail. Equipped with the largest digital camera ever built for astronomy, it will repeatedly survey the sky over ten years, producing an unprecedented time-lapse record of the Universe.

In a recent podcast interview, Batygin told The Debrief how his and Brown’s theory could soon be tested.

“The Planet Nine hypothesis is kind of readily refutable, right? I find that to be quite important,” says Batygin. “There’s a new telescope that came online called the Vera Rubin Observatory, and as it collects data this year, we will, I think, know one way or another whether Planet Nine is really out there or not.”

Batygin says Rubin’s greatest strengths are its survey efficiency and extensive sky coverage. By repeatedly imaging vast portions of the sky, Rubin is uniquely suited to detecting a faint, distant, and slowly moving object like Planet Nine.

“If Rubin detects an object at hundreds of astronomical units from the Sun, and its orbit is consistent with the predicted Planet Nine parameter space, that would essentially be it,” Batygin explained, in terms of what kind of observation would provide a definitive answer regarding Planet Nine’s existence.

“At that distance, anything visible to Rubin would have to be very large, so a direct detection would be the decisive confirmation,” he added, although suggesting that “whenever you find some interesting pattern in the data, the first thing you have to ask is, ‘will it hold up to additional scrutiny from [some] fresh kind of unbiased data?”

He points to this summer being a turning point in his research: “We will get that new batch of discoveries basically starting this summer, starting summer twenty twenty-six.  It will be a direct test of all lines of evidence that we have for the existence of Planet Nine.”

“ You can imagine Vera Rubin comes online, looks at the sky for a few months, finds an object that it can see that is far away, that is hundreds of astronomical units away, meaning hundreds of times the distance between the Earth and the Sun, as far away from the Sun as the Earth,” adds Batygin. “That’s Planet Nine. Like, that’s direct confirmation, right? Then you close the book and move on to the more interesting question of like characterization.”

Batygin suggests it would solidify many of the lines of evidence for Planet Nine, even if his team does not discover the object itself. “Nevertheless, that would lend support to its existence because, if the solar system is structured in this way, then something must be sculpting that structure.”

Although he has devoted years to the Planet Nine hypothesis, Batygin says he remains open to the possibility that the planet does not exist and believes the data must ultimately determine the outcome.

“It would definitely suck,” Batygin told The Debrief of this possibility, though noting that scientists have to “go where the data takes you, right?”

Planet Nine and Nibiru, “The Destroyer” Sumerian Folklore 

Over the decades, the Planet Nine hypothesis has inevitably drawn comparisons to “Nibiru,” a supposed hidden world popularized in modern pseudoscientific interpretations of ancient Mesopotamian texts.

The idea gained widespread attention through the writings of Zecharia Sitchin, who argued that ancient Sumerian records described a rogue planet that periodically enters the inner Solar System and causes catastrophic events on Earth. However, mainstream historians and archaeologists reject these interpretations, noting that ancient Mesopotamian flood traditions, including the story of Utnapishtim in the Epic of Gilgamesh, do not identify Nibiru as the cause of a global catastrophe.

When asked on the podcast whether Planet Nine could pose any threat to Earth, Batygin dismissed the idea.

“The important thing to understand about Planet Nine is that if you’re worried about Planet Nine’s gravity destroying things, I would encourage you to revisit the inverse square law of gravity, right?

He explains that gravity increases with mass and falls off as the distance between objects squared, and that Planet Nine is estimated to be five Earth masses, and at a distance of 500-600 astronomical units away. By comparison, Jupiter is 300 Earth masses and only around four astronomical units away.

“So if you’re worried about Planet Nine, you should really, really worry about Jupiter,” Batygin says. “I mean, this is one of the intriguing, frankly humbling things about learning celestial mechanics and understanding how the solar system works at a large scale,” Batygin added.

How Planet Nine Could Change Astronomy and CULTURE 

The confirmation of Planet Nine would be one of the most significant astronomical discoveries of the century, reshaping our understanding of the Solar System and its formation. Textbooks, educational materials, and scientific models would need updating to account for a previously unknown major planet residing far beyond Pluto. More importantly, its discovery could reveal new insights into how planetary systems form and evolve.

Batygin also thinks the influence of such a discovery also might impact science in ways we haven’t yet considered.

“Until we really take a look, we don’t know what kind of awesome and exciting information we’ll discover. This has been true along the way in all planetary exploration. We have been surprised time and time again,” says Batygin.

Batygin also surmises that astronomers “will discover interesting constraints about the birth environment of the Sun itself by studying Planet Nine.”

An exciting future may indeed lie ahead if Planet Nine is soon discovered. Astronomers could eventually determine whether it is a gas giant, an icy world, or something entirely unexpected. Future observations may even reveal details about its atmosphere and composition.

When Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 returned the first close-up images of the outer planets, it marked one of humanity’s greatest scientific achievements. For the first time, people saw distant worlds in remarkable detail rather than as tiny points of light in the night sky.

Now, in 2026, humanity may once again stand on the brink of a major planetary discovery, thanks to the Vera C. Rubin Observatory.

Fundamentally, confirmation of a ninth planet would not only be a cosmic discovery: it would also offer a reflection of humanity, and a reminder of how much remains unknown, even within our own cosmic backyard.

Chrissy Newton is a PR professional and the founder of VOCAB Communications. She currently appears on The Discovery Channel and Max and hosts the Rebelliously Curious podcast, which can be found on YouTube and on all audio podcast streaming platforms. Follow her on X: @ChrissyNewton, Instagram: @BeingChrissyNewton, and chrissynewton.com. To contact Chrissy with a story, please email chrissy @ thedebrief.org.

Days after successfully flying its Quarterhorse unmanned aircraft at supersonic speeds, an industry-first defense aviation company, Hermeus, has received the largest-ever contract awarded by the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) to demonstrate high-Mach flight combined with high-Mach payload release.

The new $ 159 million award, which increases the original contract to a total of $219 million, will allow Hermeus’ engineers to expand on previous high-Mach test flight milestones in direct partnership with the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Navy, with the goal of providing the American warfighter with the most advanced arsenal capable of delivering munitions and payloads around the world at record-setting speeds.

“By delivering flight-ready aircraft and demonstrating payload release at speed, we will prove this technology can create a decisive military advantage on a timeline that matters,” explained Hermeus CEO and co-founder, AJ Piplica. “Our focus is on providing the Air Force and Navy with the validated data they need to transition these platforms into the future force.”

High Mach Payload Release: “A Game Changing Warfighting Capability”

When announcing the new DIU award, Hermeus executives noted that the program will include a series of “intensive flight tests.” The first is expected later this year, while the final flights are expected sometime in 2027.

Although few specifics were provided, the company said the flights will “prove the aircraft can maintain high speeds and expand its performance limits” while also demonstrating the successful carry and release of payloads at high velocity. The company also noted that all flight data gathered during the development and testing phases “will directly inform service experimentation and future acquisition decisions.”

Although the U.S. Military has several aircraft capable of exceeding the speed of sound, and several more hypersonic (exceeding five times the speed of sound) aircraft and missile prototypes, delivering payloads from high-Mach aircraft has remained a challenge. However, some military experts argue that the U.S. would benefit greatly from the capability.

When discussing the need for high-speed payload release, DIU Military Deputy Major General Joe “Solo” Kunkel said that the largest problems the military is facing in the future are “generally around time and distance,” and the associated challenges with getting to distant locations “in a timeframe that matters.”

“I care about the warfighting capability, providing advantage to our partners and us in the fight, and making sure that we can walk into every fight with swagger,” General Kunkel said, adding that mass producing the technology developed by Hermeus could move it from a test platform to a “game-changing warfighting capability.”

“I think we found a significant number of use cases where it can be used as a weapon,” the General added. 

Moving High-Mach Capability Out of the Lab

When discussing the company’s approach that convinced the DIU to offer its largest award in the organization’s history, including what they describe as “reclaiming the lost art of rapid iterative prototyping to build the fastest aircraft in the world today,” Hermeus noted that directly partnering with the USAF and USN allows their engineers to align tests with future mission needs and shorten the path from testing to deployment.

“By prioritizing relentless hardware iteration, we deliver high-speed systems at the pace of the modern battlefield,” the company’s statement explained. “We work with the Department of War to provide the high-speed capabilities our nation and its allies need to maintain a durable, asymmetric advantage.”

When discussing the significance of the upcoming tests and the overall need for high-Mach flight payload deployment, including the benefit of the performance data, the company CEO heralded the DIU’s award, noting that the financing will help them move their successful demonstrations into real-world high-Mach platforms.

“This program is about moving high-Mach capability out of the lab and into an operationally relevant environment,” Piplica said. 

Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.