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India Today
03-08-2025
- Science
- India Today
Chinese scientists turn Moon soil into oxygen and water needed for life
In a breakthrough that could transform the future of space exploration, Chinese scientists have developed a technology that can extract water from lunar soil and use it to produce oxygen and chemicals vital for fuel, dramatically reducing the need to transport life-sustaining resources from Earth to the research, published in the Cell Press journal Joule on July 16, demonstrates how lunar resources could be harnessed to create 'miniature life support systems' for astronauts, a challenge that has long hindered plans for a sustained human presence on the never fully imagined the 'magic' that the lunar soil possessed,' said Lu Wang, a researcher at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen. According to Wang, the team's greatest surprise was the 'tangible success' of integrating water extraction from lunar soil with a process that uses light (via a photothermal catalyst) to transform carbon dioxide exhaled by astronauts into oxygen and fuel precursors—all in one step. 'This approach enhances energy utilization efficiency and decreases the complexity of lunar infrastructure,' Wang practical barrier to Moon colonisation remains the immense cost and logistics of shipping water and fuel for astronauts. With a single gallon of water costing about $83,000 to transport from Earth, a lunar base would quickly become analysis of soil from China's Chang'E-5 mission has proven the presence of water-bearing minerals, offering hope that future explorers could tap into these lunar water extraction techniques required several complicated, energy-hungry steps, failing to recycle CO2 for further essentials like fuel. The Chinese team's technology brings new efficiency, using lunar ilmenite—an abundant, water-storing black mineral—and ingenious photothermal reactors to tap both water and sunlight for a simpler, more sustainable challenges remain: the harsh lunar environment, varying soil compositions, intense radiation, and unpredictable temperature swings all pose significant the current technology's efficiency is insufficient to fully support a lunar habitat, and the volume of CO2 from astronaut respiration alone may not meet ongoing demand for water and Chinese team acknowledges that 'overcoming these technical hurdles and significant associated costs in development, deployment, and operation will be crucial to realising sustainable lunar water utilisation and space exploration.'Nonetheless, their work marks a bold step toward making long-term Moon missions—and perhaps eventual space colonies—a closer reality.- EndsMust Watch
Washington Post
31-07-2025
- Science
- Washington Post
Where did the potato come from? Tomatoes, 9 million years ago, apparently.
They're one of the world's most important food crops and delicious roasted, mashed or fried, but the exact genetic origins of the humble potato have long been something of a mystery to scientists. Now, researchers say the modern-day potato evolved from hybridization of the ancestors of tomato plants and another potato-like plant, known as etuberosum, in South America up to 9 million years ago. The hybridization created the petota lineage — which includes the cultivated potato seen in supermarkets around the world, as well as 107 wild potato species. Sandra Knapp, a plant taxonomist at the Natural History Museum in London and an author of the study, said in an interview Thursday that while scientists had known potatoes, tomatoes and etuberosum were closely related, the exact relationship had been unclear as 'different parts of the genome told us different stories.' The new research, published Thursday in the journal Cell Press, was carried out by a team of scientists in China, the United States and United Kingdom who focused on untangling this relationship. Scientists conducted intricate analysis of 128 genomes and found that 'all members of Petota exhibit a stable mixed genomic ancestry, derived from Etuberosum and Tomato lineages.' Researchers said they believe tomato and etuberosum share a common ancestor but diverged around 14 million years ago, before hybridization between them resulted in the origin of petota around 8 to 9 million years ago. The combination of two distinct genes in this 'hybrid speciation' event led to a key innovation — the development of tubers in petota. Tubers, the edible part of the potato, allow the plant to reproduce without seeds or pollination as well as storing water and carbohydrates, meaning petota was able to thrive in different geographic niches and diversify into a large number of species, scientists added. Knapp said while hybridization in plants is nothing new, the resulting plants are often sterile and it had previously been thought of as an 'evolutionary dead-end.' The latest research showed that, in fact, 'hybridization is a really potent force in evolution,' she added. Cultivated potatoes (Solanum tuberosum), along with maize, rice and wheat make up around 80 percent of human calorie intake, the researchers said, and are renowned for being cheap, versatile and packed with carbohydrates. However, wild potatoes are difficult to sample, and the study is the 'most comprehensive collection of wild potato genomic data ever analyzed,' lead co-author Zhiyang Zhang, a genomics expert from the Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen, said in a statement. Scientists detailed how this hybridization event led to the creation of tubers through genes known as SP6A and IT1, derived from tomato and etuberosum respectively. The changes came at the same time as the Andes Mountains emerged between 6 and 10 million years ago, researchers said. Having a tuber to store nutrients allowed potatoes to survive harsh weather and spread throughout cold climates in the Andes and central Mexico. While both petota and etuberosum have underground resprouting organs which allow them to reproduce without seeds, petota became more widespread than tomato or etuerosum species, as it was able to grow in areas such as grasslands, Alpine meadows and seasonally dry rainforests, the researchers added. Now, scientists want to understand the effect of tuber-related genes on plants and how the exact 'reshuffling' of genes in this case led to tuber formation, Knapp said, adding that it also raises the prospect of creating plants that can grow food faster, are more disease resistant and environmentally friendly. Studying the evolution of the potato also allows scientists to think about how the traits of wild species could be used on cultivated plants to boost biodiversity and mitigate the environmental impacts of agriculture, she said. Zhang, meanwhile, said in an interview that he hoped the findings could help 'generate a new species that maybe have a harvested fruit on the ground and a tuber in the ground.' One of his fellow researchers has joked that such a new species could be called 'tomtatoes.' Knapp suggested that the main benefit of the findings would be to build 'better potatoes instead of building cool weird things.' 'If we're going to optimize crops, what we want to do is optimize the thing we want from them and usually when you get something that does two things, those two things are not as good as the one that does the one thing better,' she said.
Euronews
20-07-2025
- Science
- Euronews
Soil on the Moon could sustain human life, study finds
The soil on the Moon might be able to sustain life, according to a new study. Researchers from the Chinese University of Hong Kong developed a technology to extract water from lunar soil and used it to convert carbon dioxide into oxygen and chemical fuel. The technology does this by converting light from the Sun into heat. According to the study, published in the Cell Press journal Joule, the research could 'potentially open new doors for future deep space exploration' because it could mitigate the expensive costs needed to bring essential resources such as water to the Moon. A single gallon (3.78 litres) of water costs $83,000 (€71,230) to ship up by rocket, the study continued, with one astronaut drinking roughly four gallons (15.14 litres) a day. 'We never fully imagined the 'magic' that the lunar soil possessed,' said lead researcher Lu Wang. However, the study notes that any strategies that are already in place to extract water from the surface of the Moon involve multiple 'energy-intensive' steps and do not break down how much CO2 is used by fuel. The Moon's extreme lunar environment will still make it challenging to harvest more oxygen and water from the land, the study continued, because there are 'drastic temperature fluctuations,' radiation and low gravity to deal with. The CO2 emitted from the breaths of the astronauts won't be enough to supply all the water, fuel and oxygen that the team of astronauts might need.
Time of India
17-07-2025
- Science
- Time of India
China's new space tech could help Astronauts survive on the moon without resupply missions
Researchers in China have discovered a new way to make the Moon more livable. The team extracts water from lunar soil. They use it to convert carbon dioxide into oxygen and fuel. This process could make Moon missions more efficient. It will also reduce costs. The technology uses sunlight and lunar soil to produce essential resources. Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads How it will work? Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Challenges Toward a Lunar base? Researchers in China say they have discovered a new way to make the Moon more livable. The team was able to extract water from lunar soil and use it to convert carbon dioxide (CO₂) into oxygen and chemicals that can be used as fuel. The findings were published in the Cell Press journal Wang from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, called the results 'magical' and said the one-step process could make future Moon missions more efficient and less water to the Moon is incredibly costly. According to the study, it costs around US$83,000 (about A$126,000) to ship just one gallon of water into space. Each astronaut needs about four gallons per day. That makes long-term Moon missions hard to new technology will solve this problem by using the Moon's own soil and sunlight to produce essential scientists created a system that uses sunlight to heat lunar soil and release water. This water is then used to break down CO₂, the gas astronauts exhale, into carbon monoxide and hydrogen. These gases can then be used to make fuel and process uses a technique called photothermal catalysis, which turns sunlight into heat to drive chemical the lab results are promising, real-world use on the Moon will be much harder. The Moon's surface experiences extreme temperatures, strong radiation, and low gravity, which could affect how well the system works outside the lunar soil is not the same everywhere, and the amount of CO₂ that astronauts produce may not be enough to meet all needs for fuel and researchers say more work is needed to improve the technology's performance and to make it practical for space years, space agencies have talked about building a base on the Moon to support missions deeper into space. This breakthrough could bring that goal one step closer. But before humans can live and work on the Moon, scientists will need to overcome several technical and environmental challenges.
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Scientists develop breath test to ID people and check health
Breathing into a bag or tube usually means you've been pulled over by police who want to check for drinking and driving can lead to the loss of a driving licence or even imprisonment. But a team of scientists have found every breath you take to be like a fingerprint that discloses who you are with 97% accuracy and can be assessed for "insights" into physical and even mental health. "You would think that breathing has been measured and analyzed in every way," said Noam Sobel, one of a team of researchers based at the Weizmann Institute of Science near Tel Aviv who said they "stumbled upon a completely new way to look at respiration" they describe as "a brain readout." The researchers tracked breathing in 100 "healthy young adults" over 24 hours using a "lightweight wearable device" they made and found that the "high-level accuracy" of the tests "remained consistent across multiple retests conducted over a two-year period." Most breathing tests last less than half an hour, meaning such "brief snapshots" cannot assess "subtle patterns," according to the team, which had its findings published in the Cell Press journal Current Biology. "I thought it would be really hard to identify someone because everyone is doing different things, like running, studying, or resting," said researcher Timna Soroka. But according to the team, the breathing test rivals "the precision of some voice recognition technologies." "It turns out their breathing patterns were remarkably distinct," Soroka said, following the longer-than-usual test, which not only could identify people but provide signals related to health. The Israel-based team said that the tests showed breathing to be "correlated with a person's body mass index, sleep-wake cycle, levels of depression and anxiety, and even behavioural traits." "For example, participants who scored relatively higher on anxiety questionnaires had shorter inhales and more variability in the pauses between breaths during sleep," the researchers reported. The team's laboratory's prior investigations of olfaction in animals got them thinking that since mammals' brains process odour information during inhalation, there could be some value in testing whether there people have a unique breathing pattern in the same way each brain is unique. The findings follow the development over the past decade of gadgets that can identify people by how they walk, with so-called gait recognition technology used by police in China in street cameras since at least 2018. It all means that with every breath you take and every move you make, they might some day be watching - and identifying - you.
