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Mass spectrometry imaging: principles and applications in plant research

A Research review by Sun et al. 👇

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Mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) is an advanced analytical technique that combines mass spectrometry with spatial mapping, enabling the direct, label-free detection and visualization of molecular distributions within biological tissues. This review comprehensively outlines the fundamental principles, major technological platforms, and recent applications of MSI in plant science. We detail key ionization techniques – matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI), desorption electrospray ionization (DESI), and secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) – focusing on their ionization mechanisms and instrumental characteristics.

How AI could unlock deep-sea secrets of marine life

The reef is a home and feeding ground for dozens of species that depend on it the way a woodland creature depends on trees. It has survived ice ages – but whether it will survive increasing pressures from industrial fishing, deep-sea mining and climate change is, in part, a question about data. If we don’t know it exists, how can we protect it?

A new project called Deep Vision could fundamentally transform our understanding of the deep ocean by digging into pictures and videos sat largely unexamined in research archives around the world. By using AI, thousands of hours of seafloor footage can be analysed to produce the first comprehensive maps of vulnerable marine ecosystems across the entire Atlantic basin.

Over the past two decades, robotic and autonomous underwater vehicles have collected vast quantities of footage from the deep sea. This represents an extraordinary resource – a record of ecosystems that most humans will never see.

Electron microscopy maps protein landscapes that drive photosynthesis

Research led by scientists at Washington State University has revealed insights on how plants form a microscopic landscape of proteins crucial to photosynthesis, the basis of Earth’s food and energy chain. The discovery provides a new view of the molecular engine that converts sunlight into bioenergy and could enable future fine-tuning of crops for higher yields and other useful traits.

Colleagues at WSU, the University of Texas at Austin, and the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel used a novel, technology-powered approach to peer inside plant leaf cells and visualize the landscape of the photosynthetic membrane—the ribbon-like structure where plants harvest sunlight. The findings were recently published in the journal Science Advances.

“These membranes are highly efficient biological solar cells,” said the study’s principal investigator and corresponding author, Helmut Kirchhoff. “They convert sunlight energy into chemical energy that fuels not only the plant’s metabolism but that of most life on Earth.”

Largest ever radio sky survey maps the universe in unprecedented detail

An international collaboration using the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) has published an exceptionally detailed radio sky map, revealing 13.7 million cosmic sources and delivering the most complete census yet of actively growing supermassive black holes. It showcases an extraordinary variety of systems powered by these black holes, whose radio emission can extend for millions of light-years.

The newly released LOFAR Two-meter Sky Survey (LoTSS-DR3) marks a major milestone in radio astronomy and international scientific collaboration. The results will be published in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

By observing the sky at low radio frequencies, the survey reveals a dramatically different view of the universe than that seen at optical wavelengths. Much of the detected emission arises from relativistic particles moving through magnetic fields, allowing astronomers to trace energetic phenomena such as powerful jets from supermassive black holes and galaxies undergoing extreme star formation across cosmic time.

Expanded Seq-Scope method boosts gene-mapping resolution within tissues

In 2021, a technology developed at University of Michigan, called Seq-Scope, revolutionized the ability to map gene activity within intact tissue at microscopic resolution, enabling researchers to measure all expressed mRNA molecules and determine precisely where they are located within the tissue, using an Illumina sequencer machine.

The team behind the Seq-Scope method, led by Jun Hee Lee, Ph.D., has recently taken the technology even further.

Their findings are described in Nature Communications.

JWST Just Found Something That Shocked Scientists

The release of the 2026 dark matter map marks a definitive shift in how we approach the cosmos. For decades, we were in the hunting phase, trying to prove that dark matter existed and attempting to catch a single particle in a laboratory. While we still haven’t touched a dark matter particle, we have moved into the surveying phase. We are no longer asking if it is there; we are busy measuring its dimensions, its density, and its influence on the growth of everything we can see. This map of the Sextans field is essentially the first page in a new atlas of the invisible universe.

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Timestamps:
0:00 Dark Matter.
1:05 The Cosmic Lens.
4:20 The COSMOS-Web Survey.
7:15 Mapping the Filaments.
10:22 Beyond the Standard Model.
13:15 The Architect of Life.

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Fexl Spanish: / @fexl_es.
Fexl Portuguese: / @fexlpt.
Fexl Ukraine: / @fexl_ua.

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References:
Nature Astronomy (January 2026): An ultra-high-resolution map of (dark) matter: https://www.nature.com/articles/s4155
 Pre-print (Technical Breakdown): COSMOS-Web: The ultra-deep weak lensing survey: https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.17239 NASA Webb Mission Page: Webb Unveils the Dark Matter Scaffolding of the Universe: https://www.nasa.gov/missions/webb/na
 COSMOS-Web Collaboration Official Site: https://cosmos.astro.caltech.edu/ NASA JPL Press Release: Seeing the Unseen: 800,000 Galaxies Mapped: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-re
 #fexl #space #jwst.

ArXiv Pre-print (Technical Breakdown): COSMOS-Web: The ultra-deep weak lensing survey: https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.

Finally Released! The James Webb Telescope Has Found The Object That Holds Our Universe Together

#jameswebbspacetelescope #jwst.
Finally Released! The James Webb Telescope Has Found The Object That Holds Our Universe Together.

Containing nearly 800,000 galaxies, this image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is overlaid with a map of dark matter, represented in blue. Researchers used Webb data to find the invisible substance via its gravitational influence on regular matter.

You see, Scientists using data from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have made one of the most detailed, high-resolution maps of dark matter ever produced. It shows how the invisible, ghostly material overlaps and intertwines with “regular” matter, the stuff that makes up stars, galaxies, and everything we can see.

Published Monday, Jan. 26, in Nature Astronomy, the map builds on previous research to provide additional confirmation and new details about how dark matter has shaped the universe on the largest scales — galaxy clusters millions of light-years across — that ultimately give rise to galaxies, stars, and planets like Earth.

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What does it mean to compute? Framework maps hidden computations running inside natural dynamic systems

Some computers are easy to spot. Artificial, human-built computers like those found in smartphones and laptops are abstract dynamic systems with observable computational elements like input, output, energy cost, and logical processes. Other computers aren’t so readily recognized.

Scientists have argued that many natural dynamic systems—from cells to brains to turbulence in fluids—carry out computations, too. However, it’s not always been clear what these dynamic systems are computing, or how they might be harnessed to solve tasks, says SFI Professor David Wolpert.

Previously harmless Google API keys now expose Gemini AI data

Google API keys for services like Maps embedded in accessible client-side code could be used to authenticate to the Gemini AI assistant and access private data.

Researchers found nearly 3,000 such keys while scanning internet pages from organizations in various sectors, and even from Google.

The problem occurred when Google introduced its Gemini assistant, and developers started enabling the LLM API in projects. Before this, Google Cloud API keys were not considered sensitive data and could be exposed online without risk.

Mars volcano formed through multiple eruptive phases

“Our results show that even during Mars’ most recent volcanic period, magma systems beneath the surface remained active and complex,” said Dr. Bartosz Pieterek. [ https://www.labroots.com/trending/space/30240/mars-volcano-f
e-phases-2](https://www.labroots.com/trending/space/30240/mars-volcano-f
e-phases-2)

How did young volcanoes on Mars form? This is what a recent study published in the journal Geology hopes to address as a team of scientists investigated the complex geological processes responsible for forming the first volcanoes on Mars. This study has the potential to help scientists better understand the recent environment on Mars over the last several million years and what this could mean for finding signs of life on the Red Planet.

For the study, the researchers used a combination of mapping and orbital data to analyze the mineralogical and geological volcanic features near one of Mars’ largest volcanoes, Pavonis Mons. The goal of the study was to ascertain the eruption history of these volcanoes, specifically whether they formed from single, short-lived eruptions or perhaps something that lasted longer and was more complex. In the end, the researchers found that the processes involved in forming the volcanoes were far more complex than previously thought. Specifically, the interior volcanic activity consisted of several magma chambers that grew and developed over time, resulting in multiple eruption events and several types of minerals that erupted onto the surface over several eruption cycles.

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