In the end, NASA’s Europa Clipper mission is on its means. It launched on October 14 and is now en path to its goal: Jupiter’s ice-covered moon Europa, whose frozen shell virtually definitely conceals a heat saltwater ocean. When the spacecraft will get there, it’ll conduct dozens of shut flybys with a view to decide what that ocean is like and, crucially, the place it may be hospitable to life.
Europa Clipper remains to be years away from its vacation spot—it isn’t slated to succeed in the Jupiter system till 2030. However that hasn’t stopped engineers and scientists from engaged on what would come subsequent if the outcomes are promising: a mission able to find proof of life itself. Learn the complete story.
— Robin George Andrews
GMOs may reboot chestnut bushes
Residing so long as a thousand years, the American chestnut tree as soon as dominated components of the Jap forest cover, with many Native American nations counting on them for meals. However by 1950, the tree had largely succumbed to a fungal blight most likely launched by Japanese chestnuts.
As lately as final 12 months, it appeared the 35-year effort to revive the American chestnut may grind to a halt. Now, American Castanea, a brand new biotech startup, has created greater than 2,500 transgenic chestnut seedlings— doubtless the primary genetically modified bushes to be thought-about for federal regulatory approval as a software for ecological restoration. Learn the complete story.
—Anya Kamenetz
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