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  • 10 Amazing Scientific Discoveries Made Recently

  • 10. Element 117

  • Unless youre a chemistry major or a science geek, you probably don’t even remember half

  • the elements of the periodic table taught to you in school. As a refresher, the number

  • of protons an element has distinguishes it from others, so an atom with eight protons

  • will always be oxygen. The heaviest element that can commonly be found in nature is element

  • 92, uranium, and elements beyond that are mostly man-made. In 2010, element 117 was

  • successfully created by a team of researchers, filling the void between elements 116 and

  • 118.

  • Temporarily being called ununseptium, producing such a heavy element was no easy task. Not

  • only does it need a lot of energy to create, but finding the right combination of elements

  • to get a 117-proton element is also a huge problem. Heavier elements also appear to have

  • shorter half-liveselement 118 only lasted a few milliseconds before decaying. But creating

  • these heavy elements helps ever-curious scientists find out just how large can an atom go.

  • 9. Electron’s Mass

  • Electrons are the negatively-charged particles that orbit a nucleus. Theyre so small that

  • accurately measuring theire mass is no easy task. For years, scientists have been using

  • the Committee on Data for Science and Technology’s recommended value, which was adopted in 2006.

  • But recently the mass has been measured at a more precise value of 0.000548579909067

  • of an atomic mass unit. Or to give you a better idea how small that is, about 9.1 x 10-31

  • kg. Yes, that’s 30 zeros after the decimal place. Although there’s little difference

  • between the previously known mass and the new, more precise mass, it has a huge impact

  • on various fields of science, especially particle physics.

  • 8. From Skin to Liver

  • For years, scientists had been experimenting on transforming skin cells into cells of other

  • organs. So far these experiments have fallen short because the cells produced were immature

  • versions of the organ cells, but a new study found that it could be possible to produce

  • mature liver cells from skin cells. The new liver cells were able to thrive on their own

  • after being transplanted to mice that had been engineered with liver problems.

  • Scientists were able to make the experiment work by using skin cells at an intermediate

  • state which have a potential to mature into working liver cells. Although the new liver

  • cells aren’t 100% matured, tests done on mice with liver problems showed a potential

  • that this experiment could work on humans in the future. This could help solve the huge

  • problem of limited donor organ availability.

  • 7. Nuclear Fusion

  • After decades of wait, we could finally be closer to achieving an unlimited source of

  • energy without the threat of pollution, greenhouse gases and radioactive waste. This would be

  • possible with nuclear fusion, a natural process in stars. Fusion happens when atoms fuse into

  • each other and release energy. When a large quantity of atoms fuse, more energy capable

  • of sustaining the process is released. This is called ignition, and it’s what’s needed

  • for a fusion power plant. Scientists believe that it will take many more years before this

  • could be achieved on a large scale, but recent tiny successes with fusion represent a huge

  • milestone that could benefit future generations.

  • 6. Breast Cancer Research

  • Breast cancer is one of the most common types of cancer in the world, affecting hundreds

  • of thousand people in the United States alone. Recently, a study found a connection between

  • cholesterol level and breast cancer. The study found that women with higher cholesterol levels

  • have a higher risk of acquiring breast cancer.

  • But there may now be a drug that not only lowers your cholesterol, but can also treat

  • your breast cancer. After an anti-cholesterol drug was injected in mice, proteins that cause

  • tumors were exterminated. The drug was also effective in reducing the growth of breast

  • cancer cells and can even kill the cells after it was administered to breast cancer cells

  • outside the human body. Further tests are needed, but hopefully it’s a step in the

  • right direction of fighting both high cholesterol and breast cancer.

  • 5. Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria’s Weakness

  • The world has been facing the ever-growing problem of antibiotic-resistant bacteria,

  • which poses an enormous threat to public health because it renders some antibiotics useless.

  • Antibiotics have been one of the keys that allow us to live longer by fighting bacteria

  • that cause some of the most common infectious diseases. But some of these bacteria have

  • adapted to create barriers against antibiotic drugs.

  • Scientists recently found a possible way to combat these walled bacteria by specifically

  • attacking the walls instead of the bacteria itself, which just causes the organisms to

  • find another defense. This gives us the chance to defeat these bacteria and ensure healthier

  • lives.

  • 4. New Domain of Life

  • In the past, living things were divided into two divisions: prokaryotes (single-celled

  • organisms) and eukaryotes (multi-celled organisms, including us). The prokaryote division was

  • then further divided into two more domains: bacteria and archaea. And for years we thought

  • that all life on earth falls into these three categories.

  • But a fourth domain just might be added after scientists found two viruses in Chile and

  • Australia bigger than anything found before. Pandoraviruses, named after the Greek figure,

  • are so alien to us that only 7% of their genes match with all the previously known lineage

  • in nature. The discovery of these viruses (which are harmless to us) show how little

  • we still know about microscopic life here on Earth.

  • 3. New State of Matter

  • Remember when the states of matter were just solid, liquid and gas? Then came plasma, then

  • Bose-Einstein Condensate, and the list goes on. What could be a new state was recently

  • discovered, and where else would it be found but in your favorite food, chicken. You might

  • feel stupid and weird if you look closely into a chicken’s eye, but some researchers

  • did just that and found the new state of matter known asdisordered hyperuniformity.”

  • It was named that because the cells found in a chicken’s retina appear to be arranged

  • randomly, and yet at the same time appear to be somewhat uniform. The materials in this

  • new state have the efficiency of crystals in the way the density of particles are kept

  • consistent, and they also have the flexibility of liquid. The new discovery will be a great

  • help in the development of light-transmitting devices since the cells found in the bird

  • are light-sensitive.

  • 2. Quantum Teleportation

  • Our lifelong dream of teleportation that we only see in sci-fi movies looks like it’s

  • on the verge of becomingwell, not true, but a very distant possibility. Instant teleportation

  • from the United States to Japan is still impossible, but what scientists achieved was spectacular

  • enough. Physicists from the Netherlands were able to teleport quantum data regarding an

  • electron’s spin state to another election located three meters away.

  • This achievement might be able to prove the existence ofquantum entanglement,” which

  • Albert Einstein calledspooky action at a distanceand implies that our current

  • understanding of quantum mechanics is wrong. This truly spooky action allows quantum data

  • to be transferred from one point to another so fast that it should be even faster than

  • the speed of light. Quantum teleportation could be the key to quantum computing, which

  • could give us groundbreaking computing power.

  • 1. Deep Ocean

  • Our planet is already full of water, covering roughly 71% of our surface. But a new ocean,

  • possibly bigger than all the other oceans combined, could be sitting right underneath

  • us. Evidence suggests that some water became trapped in ringwoodites, a mineral with a

  • sponge-like ability to absorb water, deep below in the mantle. This new discovery could

  • help answer the question on where the water of our planet’s oceans come from. It’s

  • believed that tectonic plate movements cycle the water from beneath the earth, out to the

  • surface, and back.

10 Amazing Scientific Discoveries Made Recently

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最近行われた驚くべき科学的発見トップ10 (Top 10 Amazing Scientific Discoveries Made Recently)

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    kwchu に公開 2021 年 01 月 14 日
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