Knowridge Science Report

1 week ago | knowridge.com | Carolyn Collins Petersen

The search for life involves the most sophisticated observational machines known to humanity. They peer out across the light-years, looking for some proof – any proof – that other life exists, out there. What if, despite all our efforts, those observations turn up NO evidence of life elsewhere in our Milky Way Galaxy? That’s a scary question. What if we continue building more and more sensitive telescopes to survey temperature exoplanets and still find nothing?

1 week ago | knowridge.com | Kate Cole |Renee Carey |Tim Driscoll

Around 10% of underground tunnel workers in Queensland could develop silicosis, our new study has found. Silicosis is a serious, incurable lung disease caused by inhaling small particles of silica dust. You might have heard about it in people who work with engineered stone. But silica is more widespread. Silica is found in rocks and concrete, so workers in industries such as construction, mining and tunneling are at high risk if proper safety measures aren’t in place.

3 weeks ago | knowridge.com | Misha Ketchell

More than five years since COVID was declared a pandemic, we’re still facing the regular emergence of new variants of the virus, SARS-CoV-2. The latest variant on the rise is LP.8.1. It’s increasing in Australia, making up close to one in five COVID cases in New South Wales. Elsewhere it’s become even more dominant, comprising at least three in five cases in the United Kingdom, for example. So what is LP.8.1? And is it cause for concern? Let’s look at what we know so far.

3 weeks ago | knowridge.com | Evan Gough

Dark matter is a confounding concept that teeters on the leading edges of cosmology and physics. We don’t know what it is or how exactly it fits into our understanding of the universe. We only know that its unseen mass is a critical part of the cosmos. Astronomers know dark matter exists. They can tell by the way galaxies rotate, by exploiting gravitational lensing, and by analyzing fluctuations in the Cosmic Microwave Background.

3 weeks ago | knowridge.com | Matt Williams

In the 1970s, NASA’s Voyager probes passed through Jupiter’s system and snapped pictures of its largest moons, also known as the Galilean Moons. These pictures and the data they gathered offered the first hints that a global ocean may be beneath Europa’s icy crust. Moreover, planetary models indicated that Europa’s interactions with Jupiter’s powerful gravity could lead to tidal flexing in the moon’s interior.