Science

Specialists from the Virgo Consortium, which brings together astronomers from different countries, have set themselves the ambitious task of answering the question of how life in the Universe came about and what preceded the Big Bang. To do this, the scientists are using computer simulations of the entire Universe, in particular the FLAMINGO simulation, which is running on the DiRAC supercomputer in the UK.

It is noted that these simulations are very intense and they are designed to calculate the evolution process of all known components in the universe, including ordinary matter, dark matter, dark energy and many others. The largest of these simulations has a fabulous 300 billion particles with the mass of a small galaxy and the volume of space with edges 10 billion years apart. To make this simulation possible, scientists have developed a new code called SWIFT that ensures efficient distribution of computational activity across more than 30,000 CPUs.

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Brown eye colour is considered one of the most common eye colours. For example, 50 per cent of Americans have eyes of this colour.

Eye colour depends on the amount of melanin pigment in the iris. The less there is, the less light is absorbed. When light scatters, it is reflected differently in the colour spectrum, so eyes that contain the least amount of pigment will be blue. If there is more melanin, the eye colour will be green.
Previously, experts believed that eye colour was determined by just one gene, but recent research shows that up to 16 different genes are responsible. This sheds light on why parents with one eye colour have children with eyes of a different shade.

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According to American experts’ calculations, since 2011, 10,000 people in the United States have crossed the 65-year threshold every day. If forecasts are to be believed, by 2035 this age group will become more numerous than children. By that time, the health care system will be so overloaded that it will not be able to cope with the treatment of chronic ageing diseases.

Professor S. Francis and colleagues developed a 142-question online questionnaire to understand the origins of anxiety about ageing and the impact of gender, social status, physical activity and so on. A total of 1,250 people aged 40 and over took part in the survey.

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The researchers said that polychaete worms in the process of adjusting biorhythms is helped by a special protein called cryptochrome, which is activated by light.

At the same time, its activation occurs fully or partially depending on what kind of light falls on the worms – lunar or solar. Moreover, the scientists pointed out that this protein allows these individuals to feel the change of lunar phases.

In the course of their research, experts have investigated the molecular mechanisms of functioning characteristic directly for this species of protein L-Cry, significantly different from other cryptochromes. For this purpose, they involved cryo-electron microscopy, and protein molecules were considered after shock freezing either in complete darkness or under red light to simulate the conditions of its existence.

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A new study by New Zealand scientists from the University of Otago in Dunedin, presented in Nature Communications, indicates that since 2004 the ozone layer over Antarctica has decreased by 26%. It is noted that the data obtained by the researchers contradict the previously identified trend of recovery in the ozone hole.

Every mid-spring, which is September in the Northern Hemisphere, the ozone layer over Antarctica thins. It does not disappear completely, but its concentration drops below certain levels, creating an ozone hole. Experts previously found indications that there was a 20 per cent decrease in ozone thinning during the winter months between 2005 and 2016, and they predicted that the hole would recover by 2040.

The New Zealanders, for their part, analysed changes in ozone from 2001 to 2022 by examining different layers of the stratosphere during the key period from September to November, when the ozone layer is thinnest. When the scientists examined satellite data from last year, they found that the recovery trend had completely disappeared.

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