Weekly Science Picks
FollowGood day to everyone! It’s the end of one more scientific week. Let us see what have happened during the last 7 days. First of all, this week sounds so futuristic and promises the exciting time in many areas of science and technology. The crucial questions we got at the moment are as follows. Will we eat the insects in the future? What is the tomorrow of genetics? How will the solar research look like in the coming period? Are we going quantum? Let us see what our this week’s choice says about that.
How insects could feed the food industry of tomorrow
Millions of maggots squirm over blackened pieces of fruit and bloody lumps of fetid flesh. A pungent stench of festering decay hovers over giant vats of writhing, feasting larvae. It’s more than enough to put most people off their lunch. Yet these juvenile flies could soon be just one step in the food chain away from your dinner plate.
Genetic treatment using three-parent embryo may be ready in two years
A controversial technique involving three-parent embryos, designed to prevent incurable genetic diseases, could be ready within two years but unless the government changes the law, prospective parents will be prevented from using it, scientists say.
Our solar team sets a hot and steamy world record
A team of solar thermal engineers and scientists at our Energy Centre in Newcastle have used the ample sunlight flooding their solar fields to create what’s called ‘supercritical’ steam – an ultra-hot, ultra-pressurised steam that’s used to drive the world’s most advanced power plant turbines – at the highest levels of temperature and pressure EVER recorded with solar power.
Quantum criticality observed in new class of materials
Quantum criticality, the strange electronic state that may be intimately related to high-temperature superconductivity, is notoriously difficult to study, but the first findings of a ‘quantum critical point’ in a category of materials known as ‘oxypnictides’ could lead to a broader understanding of the quantum phenomenon.
These would be everything for this week, mates! Hope you enjoy this weekly review as I do.