Science

WASHINGTON — Roger Mason, President Trump’s nominee to lead the National Reconnaissance Office, told senators that the nation’s spy satellite agency is navigating a period of rapid innovation in commercial space and artificial intelligence that is transforming space-based intelligence. Appearing June 2 before the Senate Intelligence Committee for his confirmation hearing, Mason described the National

To chart how our brains change over the course of our lives, neuroscientists have focused largely on beginnings and endings: the rapid development and pruning of neural connections in childhood and adolescence, and the degeneration associated with old age. “We kind of skipped over middle age,” says Sebastian Dohm-Hansen, a bioinformatician at University College Cork in Ireland. There are

Jessica Dempsey takes up post as head of the Square Kilometre Array Observatory – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

WASHINGTON — Northrop Grumman has partnered with satellite manufacturing startup Apex to develop space-based interceptors for the Golden Dome missile defense program. The companies announced the partnership June 1. Northrop Grumman is one of 12 firms selected by the U.S. Space Force to develop concepts for space-based interceptors, one of the most ambitious elements of

The drug daraxonrasib is being put forward to treat people with advanced pancreatic cancer in clinics REUTERS/Danielle Villasana A daily pill doubles the survival time of people with pancreatic cancer, one of the most aggressive and difficult-to-treat forms of the condition, even after they have stopped responding to chemotherapy. What’s more, the convenient pill has

Physicists create mechanical memory device from slap-bracelet-like structures – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

DUBLIN — Federal Aviation Administration documents have provided new details about a SpaceX project to develop and test reentry vehicles that could be used to support in-space manufacturing projects. The FAA on May 15 issued an environmental assessment for test flights of Starfall, an uncrewed reentry vehicle. The FAA also issued a record of decision

Cutting photons is infinitely weird Muhammad Fawaid/Alamy In Greek mythology, cutting one head off the Hydra of Lerna simply resulted in two more heads growing to replace it – and it turns out it’s even worse for photons. If you try to cut a piece off a particle of light, the result is infinitely many

AI-led solutions of Erdős problems spark debate over the future of mathematics – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

A father mysteriously slips through time in Joseph Eckert’s The Traveler Mikhail Rudenko / Alamy Writing this as the UK swelters under an unprecedented May heatwave, perhaps it’s small wonder that so many science-fiction authors are currently imagining miserable versions of an overheated future in which their characters are struggling to survive. I’m intrigued by

Quiz of the week: CERN may have made a quark–gluon plasma by colliding which nuclei? – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Space Force awarded SpaceX a $4.16 billion contract to build a constellation of satellites designed to track airborne targets from orbit, marking one of the Pentagon’s biggest bets yet on shifting battlefield surveillance missions from aircraft to space. The agreement, announced May 29, covers the first increment of a space-based Air

Setting your sights high can lead to bigger rewards – up to a point Buena Vista Images/Getty Images Shoot for the moon and even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars, so the saying goes. But shooting straight for the stars instead might actually be the more effective option, according to mathematicians. In life,

Molecular spin sensor takes the temperature of cancer cells – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Space Force’s proposed $71 billion budget for fiscal 2027 is drawing attention for its investments in missile-warning satellites, proliferated low Earth orbit constellations and other big-ticket systems. Less visible, but increasingly central to the service’s plans, is a major buildout of the ground infrastructure needed to operate those systems during a

Paul Erdős made many conjectures about numbers in his life Oliver Helbig/Getty Images Just a week after an AI disproved an 80-year-old conjecture and astonished mathematicians, another conjecture that had stood for half a century has fallen, inspired by the same techniques, but this time written entirely by humans. Last week, an unreleased AI model

Open data: the benefits and challenges of sharing a precious resource – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

WASHINGTON — The House Armed Services Committee’s draft fiscal 2027 defense policy bill would eliminate the Space Development Agency and the Space Rapid Capabilities Office as standalone organizations, aligning with the Pentagon’s plan to reorganize Space Force acquisition programs under Portfolio Acquisition Executives. The committee is scheduled to debate the proposed National Defense Authorization Act