
Huge Mars sculpture to be go on show at Leicester Cathedral
A huge replica of the planet Mars is to be suspended from the ceiling of Leicester Cathedral.The 7m (23ft) piece of art will go on display between 16 May and 8 June.The cathedral said the sculpture, created by artist Luke Jerram, was an opportunity to "consider the mysteries of creation in a place where faith, art, and science converge".NASA imagery has been used to recreate the installation's Martian landscape, the cathedral added.
Tickets to see the display can be booked for free, but the cathedral has asked visitors to consider making a voluntary donation.The cathedral is hosting a series of events, talks, concerts, dinners, and soft play sessions to take place below the sculpture, which will also require bookings.

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Daily Mail
2 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Shock Covid warning: Ultra-catchy 'Nimbus' variant could trigger summer wave amid 97 per cent infection surge
A new highly contagious Covid variant could spark a wave of infections this summer, scientists have warned. Dubbed 'Nimbus', the strain is descended from the already super virulent Omicron and has already triggered a surge in cases in China, Singapore and Hong Kong. Data from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) also shows 13 cases of Nimbus, known scientifically as N.B.1.8.1, have already been detected in England. And 25 British samples of the strain have been submitted to an international Covid database since the end of March. However, both figures are likely an underestimation of how far the variant has spread given how testing has been massively reduced from the height of the pandemic. Other UKHSA data show the percentage of people testing positive for Covid has risen to its highest point this year, and is already 97 per cent higher than the level recorded in March. Now, British scientists have warned Nimbus could lead to a surge in Covid cases in a matter of weeks, and have urged the vulnerable to get vaccinated. They warn that many people's immunity to the virus, built up from previous infections and older jabs, has likely faded meaning they could be at higher risk of falling ill. Professor Lawrence Young, a virologist at Warwick University, said Nimbus had the potential to drive a surge in cases as the weather warms up and people become more sociable. 'We are very likely to see a spike of infections over the next couple of months, possibly by later this month or in July. But it's difficult to predict the level of this infection wave,' he told The i Paper. 'Population immunity, either from vaccination or previous infection, is waning and, unlike other respiratory viruses such as flu, the Covid virus continues to spread in hot and humid weather,' he said. He added lab studies suggest Nimbus can infect human cells more efficiently than previous strains, and that it may have increased ability to dodge the immune system, making it more likely to infect people. There is currently no evidence that the strain is more likely to cause severe illness or death in those it infects, compared to previous strains. However, infection with the virus can still be deadly for more vulnerable groups. Covid was a factor in the deaths of just over 300 people in England in May, according to the latest official figures. Nimbus now accounts for 10.7 per cent of Covid infections worldwide, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), compared to just 2.5 per cent a month prior. Last month the UN-body declared the strain a 'variant under monitoring'. This means that the WHO is tracking the virus, watching for signs it could pose a significant threat to the public which would promote it to a 'variant of concern'. Experts have also said that current Covid vaccines, which have been reformulated to combat Omicron descendants, are expected to remain effective against Nimbus. Symptoms of Nimbus do not appear to differ from other Covid variants and include fatigue, fever, muscle ache and a sore throat. UKHSA data on Covid tests, which goes up to June 1, show 6.1 per cent of the people who were tested that week were positive for the virus, the highest figure for 2025 so far. This is a seven per cent rise from last week's figure and a 97 per cent increase from that recorded at the beginning of March. Dr Gayatri Amirthalingam, UKHSA's deputy director, said the organisation was keeping a close eye on Nimbus. 'UKHSA is monitoring all available data relating to SARS-CoV-2 variants in the UK and abroad, and we continue to publish our findings in our regular Flu and Covid-19 surveillance reports,' she said. 'NB.1.8.1 has been detected in small numbers in the UK to date, but international data suggests that it is growing as a proportion of all Covid-19 cases.' Currently adults over the age of 75, care home residents staff as well as people with a weakened immune system are eligible for a free Covid vaccine in Britain. UKHSA data suggests people who had a Covid jab as part of last spring's booster campaign were 45 per cent less likely to need hospital care for the virus in the weeks that followed compared to the unvaccinated. The agency has urged all people eligible for a vaccine to get jabbed to protect themselves from both NB.1.8.1 and Covid in general.


NBC News
3 hours ago
- NBC News
These cosmic monsters are creating the biggest explosions since the big bang
The vast emptiness of space is growing emptier one star at a time. That's because 80 billion lightyears from Earth, three cosmic beasts are devouring stars ten times the size of the sun. In a new study by the University of Hawaii, among others, astronomers scouring through NASA and European Space Agency's data said they had discovered three supermassive black holes. Those behemoths feast on stars of such a size that make the one at the center of the solar system look like a light snack. The explosions those scientists have recorded, which happened when those black holes shredded and sucked up the fabric of those stars, are the largest since the big bang that created the universe. 'What I think is so exciting about this work is that we're pushing the upper bounds of what we understand to be the most energetic environments of the universe,' Anna Payne, a staff scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute and a co-author of the study, said in the NASA article. Black holes are astronomical objects invisible to the human eye. They have a gravitational pull so strong that they swallow everything, including light. A supermassive black hole is the biggest of all black holes, sitting at the center of galaxies like the one at the heart of the Milky Way slowly sucking planets and all other matter toward it. When a star gets trapped in the pull of a supermassive black hole, it can disintegrate with a spectacular explosion in a cosmic event that scientists in a new study published this week in the journal Science Advances call 'extreme nuclear transient.' 'These events are the only way we can have a spotlight that we can shine on otherwise inactive massive black holes,' University of Hawaii graduate student Jason Hinkle said in a separate NASA article. Hinkle is the lead author of the new study that describes for the first time two such events that took place over the past decade. Two of the three supermassive black holes were detected in 2016 and 2018 by an ESA mission and are documented for the first time in the study. The third, nicknamed 'Barbie' because of its catalog identifier ZTF20abrbeie, was identified in 2020 by a Caltech observatory in California and subsequently documented in 2023. The blasts are so powerful that the only cosmic event larger in magnitude has been the big bang that sparked the dawn of the universe. Unlike in other stellar explosions, though, the way X-ray, optical light and ultraviolet rays dimmed and brightened in these incidents made it clear this event was a 'black hole ripping a star apart,' the NASA article said. NASA says black holes actually brighten during these cosmic events and that brightness lasts for several months. That brightness has given scientists a new way to find more black holes in the early distant universe. When astronomers peer into space, they are looking back in time because the further away they look, the older the light is reaching them — the light reaching Earth from the sun, for example, is eight minutes old. 'We can take these three objects as a blueprint to know what to look for in the future,' Payne said.


Daily Mail
3 hours ago
- Daily Mail
The influential Trump advisor who triggered the president's spectacular split with Elon Musk
President Donald Trump 's surprise decision to change Elon Musk 's preferred pick to lead NASA may have done more to fuel the historic blowup between the two men than previously known. The president canceled his nomination of Jared Isaacman as NASA's administrator after Musk officially left the White House on Friday. Isaacman, a billionaire, pilot, and astronaut, was close with Musk and even flew to space with Musk's Dragon program on Operation Polaris Dawn in 2024. But he had a history of donating funds to Democrats, including recent Democratic candidates who ran against GOP senators Tim Sheehy of Montana and Bernie Moreno of Ohio in 2024. Despite his donations, Isaacman was approved by the Senate committee in April and was expected to get confirmed this week in the Senate. But Trump's advisor Sergio Gor, in charge of managing the White House personnel office, reportedly delivered Trump a list of Isaacman's donations to Democrats according to reporting from Axios. Gor did not appreciate Musk's involvement in personnel matters, the report noted, as they had a tense relationship. 'This was Sergio's out-the-door 'f**k you' to Musk,' one White House official said. Trump and Musk spoke about Issacson's record prior to their press conference last Friday. Despite their conversation, Trump pulled Issacson's nomination on Saturday. 'After a thorough review of prior associations, I am hereby withdrawing the nomination of Jared Isaacman to head NASA,' Trump wrote on his Truth Social site. Musk responded to the news with disappointment 'It is rare to find someone so competent and good-hearted,' Musk wrote of Isaacman on X. The president mused Thursday that Musk's personal attacks might have been trigged by his decision. 'I know that disturbed him He wanted and rightfully recommended somebody that I guess he knew very well. I'm sure he respected him, to run NASA. But I didn't think it was appropriate. He happened to be a Democrat, like totally Democrat,' Trump said, adding that the administration had the right to nominate a Republican to the position.