Scientists have designed a striking new contact lens that could revolutionize ophthalmology. It’s based on a spiral pattern that lets the eye focus at different distances and in varying lighting conditions.

Beyond contact lenses, its inventors say the tech could be applied to a range of miniaturized imaging systems, including consumer gadgets like virtual reality headsets, to offer more versatility and flexibility than existing lenses.

The lens, called a spiral diopter, causes incoming light to spin in an optical vortex, making allowances for the various deformations in the cornea of the eye that can happen as we age.

During their recent visit to CERN, Presidents Berset and Macron were given an introduction to the Laboratory by Fabiola. President Macron appeared to be really interested in the origins of the Universe, and explanations went way over time! The entourage were then whisked down to the LHC tunnel and through to the ATLAS cavern. It’s hard not be impressed, the LHC is the LHC and ATLAS is awe inspiring. What they didn’t see, however, was the near miraculous demonstration of technological prowess that underpins all of this. Taking a step back, it’s quite remarkable what we do here. One can weave a number of threads through the accelerator complex, from the chopper of Linac 4 to the PS RF system, the multi-cycling synchronisation of everything, the production of radioactive ion beams, the vacuum systems from ELENA to the LHC, the n_TOF target, stochastic cooling of antiprotons, the power converters, the magnets (from 1959 to 2023), beam instrumentation, the LHC transverse feedback system… and but wonder that it all comes together as well as it does. It’s worth reflecting on this, as we look back on another year in the life of an unparalleled collection of accelerators and facilities, a year that has been very good overall, although somewhat eventful for the LHC. Despite the sophisticated operations involved in producing the multiple beam configurations required for the down-stream machines, Linac4 maintained an impressive 98% availability, with stable running and optimal beam performance. The Proton Synchrotron Booster contributed significantly, as always, supplying beams to ISOLDE, HIE-ISOLDE and MEDICIS, as well as to the PS for the downstream users – all within tight user-dependent specifications. A large fraction of the protons at CERN are sent to ISOLDE, with 11.3e19 protons heading that way in 2023 and around 4.5e19 going on to the PS. To quote Erwin Siesling: “We (ISOLDE) had yet another very successful year, full of the usual issues and problems but with great physics results and lots of happy users!” The PS delivered beams to n_TOF, AD-ELENA, and the East Area experiments and irradiation facilities, which include CLOUD, CHARM, and IRRAD. The AD, back online since 30 July after repairs to a faulty quadrupole, compensated for the late start by extending their run to 12 November. Following optimisation, the AD achieved record intensity antiprotons for ELENA and the experiments. Throughout 2023, the SPS operated very well, with no major faults or prolonged downtimes while achieving an impressive transmission rate of about 95% to the North Area experiments with well optimised beam quality. Besides delivering beam to their regular users, work has continued in the Injectors on the high-intensity, high-brightness beams required by the HL-LHC (the primary mission of the LHC Injector Upgrade (LIU) during LS2). The injector teams have done a great job, with the LHC beams from PSB, PS and SPS meeting the LIU target beam parameters and even showing some margin to surpass the beam intensity and brightness required by HL-LHC. In the first part of the year, the LHC demonstrated outstanding luminosity performance, both peak and integrated. Operationally the teams have established impressive flexibility and sophisticated operational and system-level control. However, the excellent availability was punctuated by some singular faults – in particular, a helium leak into the insulation vacuum of the inner triplet assembly left of point 8 in the middle of July. This was a serious event, but reactivity was fantastic, and the leak repair and all that went with it were widely seen as a remarkable collaborative recovery. The adaptability of the cryogenics team was key to avoiding the need to warm up the adjacent sector. The leak, in an edge-welded bellows, was the result of a quench caused by an electrical disturbance on the grid. An availability analysis will be conducted at the Chamonix meeting in 2024 to address other potential non-conformities dating from construction. The prompt recovery enabled some special runs and the first LHC ion run in five years. Lead ions at the end of the year are always interesting, with preparation of the ion source, Linac3, and LEIR starting months before beam is sent to the PS and the downstream machines. Ions are principally destined for the North Area and the LHC. However, in the last two weeks of the four-week run, the PS provided lead ions to the East Area, where the CHIMERA facility irradiates electronics with high-energy heavy ions to study the effects of cosmic radiation on the electronics used in the CERN accelerators and experiments, as well as for space missions and avionics. In the SPS, the first operational use was made of a technique known as “momentum slip-stacking”, which involves injecting two batches of four lead-ion bunches separated by 100 nanoseconds to produce a single batch of eight lead-ion bunches separated by 50 nanoseconds, an impressive example of “RF gymnastics” and low-level RF control. In the LHC, the lead nuclei were colliding this year with an increased energy of 5.36 TeV per nucleon pair (compared to 5.02 TeV previously). A record number of bunches and high bunch intensities – thanks to the downstream machines – made for a challenging ion run. Again, with concerted effort and adaptability, the teams wrestled down the issues, delivered some record performance and paved the way for the rest of Run 3. As we look back on the year, we should bear in mind the phenomenal job that’s done in the exploitation of the complex. This is difficult stuff and it’s remarkable that it all works as well as it does. President Macron might not have seen it, but he surely sensed the spirit.

A trove of arboreal fossils pushes back the origin of modern forests and sophisticated tree roots.

A new electrocatalyst made of nickel (Ni), iron (Fe) and silicon (Si) that decreases the amount of energy required to synthesize H₂ from water has been manufactured in a simple and cost-effective way, increasing the practicality of H₂ as a clean and renewable energy of the future.

Hydrogen is a highly combustible gas that can help the world achieve its clean energy goals if manufactured in an environmentally responsible way. The primary hurdle to creating hydrogen gas from water is the large amount of energy required for the electrolysis of water, or splitting water molecules into hydrogen gas (H₂) and oxygen (O₂).

Most H₂ produced today is derived from fossil fuels, which contributes to global warming. Manufacturing H₂ from water through the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) requires the use of a catalyst, or agent that lowers the amount of energy required for a chemical reaction. Until recently, these catalysts were made up of rare earth metals, like platinum, reducing the cost-efficiency and practicality of clean hydrogen production.

If you have any form of Arachnophobia, do not read this article. You’ve been warned. Now if you’re like me and have a mad respect for Mother Nature, I posit you this query. Did you know that spiders can fly? And not by the way you may think.

Good news for your nightmares: Spiders can fly. Despite not having wings, new research shows that spiders have the ability to propel themselves using the Earth’s electric field, with little to no help from wind or webs. Because humans can’t feel these electric currents, their role in biology can often go ignored. But if electrostatic is what is helping spiders fly more than two miles high in the air, let’s pay attention.

In a study published in Current Biology on Thursday, Drs. Erica L. Morley and Daniel Robert of the University of Bristol found that when spiders are placed in a chamber with no wind but a small electric field, they were still able to to fly, despite the prevailing idea that a spider’s flight was reliant on wind currents.

When spiders are airborne, a behavior that’s often described as “ballooning,” most observers assumed that their movement is influenced by air streams. However, this prevailing view couldn’t explain why larger spiders are airborne for extended periods of time, nor could any current aerodynamic models explain these vague ballooning mechanisms.

Global warming has severely impacted the supply of fresh water in many parts of the world. Coastal communities have resorted to salination plants while those in the far interior have no option but to extract water from the air. Most of these techniques are energy-intensive or only work under certain conditions. Now, a new technology developed by researchers at ETH Zurich can help humanity access fresh water 24 hours a day and without spending any energy.

The technology might not look so sophisticated at first, and one might just say that it’s just another regular glass pane. But only the researchers who developed it will tell you that this glass pane is coated with special polymers and silver layers that give the glass properties to reflect solar radiation and also emit heat directly into outer space.

Have you seen an unusually bright object moving through the evening sky recently?

Chances are that it wasn’t one of the mysterious objects that the DoD and NASA are currently studying, but was instead one of the growing number of manmade spacecraft taking up residence in Earth’s orbit.

And this one has astronomers particularly concerned.

New images of the Orion Nebula captured by the James Webb Space Telescope have revealed the existence of 150 free-floating objects once considered a scientific impossibility.

South of Orion’s belt is one of the brightest nebulae visible in the night sky, the Orion Nebula, also known as Messier 42, which is home to the Trapezium Cluster of stars. This cluster produces extremely strong ultraviolet radiation fields that cause the surrounding gas to glow, which is the source of the nebulae’s brightness.

Within the cluster is a veritable nursery for the formation of protostars, which the European Space Agency (ESA) recently called “a treasure trove for astronomers studying the formation and early evolution of stars, with a rich diversity of phenomena and objects” that include a mysterious category of celestial phenomena known as free-floating planetary mass objects.

I WOULD SUSPECT IF WE CAN GET OFF THIS PLANET AND FIND SOMEWHERE MORE HABITABLE, THAT WOULD BE MORE PREFERABLE.

The world’s land masses are, a new super-charged climate model suggests, going to form into one giant supercontinent — and if humans manage to survive the shift, we will become like the inhabitants of Arrakis, the desert planet at the heart of the “Dune” series.

A new study led by researchers at the University of Bristol and published in the journal Nature Geosciences predicts that over the next 250 million years, the continents will shift to form what they’re calling “Pangea Ultima,” an uber-hot supercontinent that will be inhospitable to most mammals due to the conditions that made it.

Specifically, the environmental and geophysical researchers predict in their study that the volcanic activity from the tectonic shifting — and the subsequent rise in carbon dioxide to potentially more than double Earth’s current levels — would make most of the land on Pangea Ultima “barren,” according to a Nature summary of the study.

Researchers have utilized Alfvén waves to mitigate runaway electrons in tokamak fusion devices, offering significant implications for future fusion energy projects, including the ITER in France.

Scientists led by Chang Liu of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) is a collaborative national laboratory for plasma physics and nuclear fusion science. Its primary mission is research into and development of fusion as an energy source for the world.