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APOLLO 11
THE PAST AND FUTURE OF PAGE
50
HUMANS ON THE MOON 50
years
SPE
CIAL REPORT
HOW
THE
MIND
ARISES
Network
interactions
in the brain
create thought
S
PLU
INVINCIBLE CELLS
Synthetic cells that are
impervious to virus attacks PAGE 34
DISASTER IN MADAGASCAR
JULY 2019
ScientificAmerican.com
The perils of mining a pristine landscape PAGE 42 © 2019 Scientific American
J u ly 2 0 1 9
VO LU M E 3 2 1 , N U M B E R 1
74
NEUROSCIENCE
26 How Matter Becomes Mind
The new discipline of network neuroscience
yields a picture of how mental activity arises
from interactions among different brain areas.
By Max Bertolero and Danielle S. Bassett
B I O LO G Y
34 The Invulnerable Cell
Biologists are building an organism that can
shrug off any virus on the planet. Impervious
human cells may be next. By Rowan Jacobsen
C O N S E R VAT I O N
42 Broken Promises
Mining giant Rio Tinto made a high-profile
pledge to improve the ecology of its ilmenite
sites in Madagascar. Then its bottom line
began to suffer. By Rowan Moore Gerety
SPECIAL REPORT
50 T H ANNIVER SARY
OF APOLLO 11
50 ONE SMALL STEP BACK IN TIME
How humans achieved the impossible and
the case for doing it again. By Clara Moskowitz
56 MAPPING THE MISSION
Modern satellite imagery and 3-D modeling
provide a dramatic new view of how the first moon
landing really happened.
Text and graphics by Edward Bell
60 LUNAR LAND GRAB
The legally dubious race to claim terrain on the
moon. By Adam Mann
66 MISSIONS TO THE MOON
All 122 attempts, visualized. Graphic by Set Reset
68 ORIGIN STORY
A new class of astronomical object may help solve
the lingering mysteries of the moon’s formation.
By Simon J. Lock and Sarah T. Stewart
74 APOLLO’S BOUNTY
How moon rocks changed our understanding of the
solar system and why we should go back for more.
By Erica Jawin
ON THE C OVE R
80 COME ONE, COME ALL The frenzied buzzing of networks scattered across the brain
The director general of the European Space Agency somehow produces our ability to sense, think and act. Network
neuroscientists are now using sophisticated mathematical tools to
argues for international cooperation on the moon. model the ungraspable complexity by which the activation of the
By Clara Moskowitz brain’s 100 trillion connections produces what we call the mind.
Illustration by Mark Ross Studios.
10 Forum
Cannabis may treat opioid addiction. By Jonathan N. Stea
12 Advances
Finding hints of life in the Dead Sea. Colorful lamps
made from germs. What it’s like to spend a year in space.
Tracing the universe’s missing antimatter.
8
22 The Science of Health
Mandatory genomic surveillance will stop malaria
resurgence. By Ify Aniebo
24 Ventures
Climate change is getting scarier than nuclear power.
y Wade Roush
B
84 Recommended
LEGO block rocket model. Inside scoop on Apollo 11. Moon
romances and representations.By Andrea Gawrylewski
86 The Intersection
Emotion- and facial-recognition software may reveal
too much information. By Zeynep Tufekci
15
88 Anti Gravity
Never waste a good crisis, the saying goes, and
we’ve got plenty. By Steve Mirsky
Apollo, 50 Years On
An interactive video and photo album commemorates
the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 l unar landing.
Go to www.ScientificAmerican.com/jul2019/apollo-50
86
Scientific American (ISSN 0036-8733), Volume 321, Number 1, July 2019, published monthly by Scientific American, a division of Springer Nature America, Inc., 1 New York Plaza, Suite 4600, New York, N.Y. 10004-1562.
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of Science
chosen not to vaccinate out of misplaced health fears. By train-
ing immune systems, however, vaccines have the means to pre-
vent illness as one of the most remarkable and far-reaching
medical benefits humanity has ever seen. But what if, asks jour-
We live in a world of networks, w rite University of Pennsylva- nalist Rowan Jacobsen, we could create virus-proof cells? Turn
nia physicist and MacArthur Fellow Danielle S. Bassett and Max to “The Invulnerable Cell,” on page 34.
Bertolero of Bassett’s Complex Systems Group in this issue. Con- Advances in discoveries often draw our attention to a time
sider the interstate highway system, the World Wide Web, the when we’ll be enjoying the next fruits of science
power grid, to name just a few. Our inner world is and technology. But there’s great value in
also networked—specifically, in the brain. In appreciating the lessons of the past as
their article, “How Matter Becomes well. In our special report, starting on
Mind,” the authors de scribe how page 50, we do just that as we take
“what the brain is—and thus who we “One Small Step Back in Time.”
are as conscious beings—is, in fact, Half a century ago Neil Arm
defined by a sprawling network of 100 strong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin
billion neurons with at least 100 trillion became the first humans to visit the surface
connecting points, or synapses.” of the moon while Michael Collins piloted the orbit
Until recently, neuroscientists have ing A pollo 11 c ommand module—supported by thousands
looked at the different regions of the brain of nasa engineers, scientists and mission controllers back on
in relative isolation. Just as an orchestra Earth. Back then, I remember thinking it would be no time at all
requires all instruments to play together, Bassett and Bertolero before we moved on to Mars and beyond. Yet nobody has re
note that “living brains are massive orchestras of neurons that turned to the lunar surface since the last astronaut left in 1972.
fire together in quite specific patterns.” Researchers studying The Apollo missions demonstrated the power of big dreams to
these networks could lead to a clearer picture of cognitive func- motivate and unify a nation amid social and political strife.
tioning, better diagnoses for psychiatric diseases and new ther- Today we face other challenges. But perhaps, inspired by this
apeutics. To learn more about them, an allegro tempo to page 26 past triumph, we might again summon the will to create for our-
might be in order. selves a better, more hopeful future.
BOARD OF ADVISERS
Leslie C. Aiello Drew Endy Alison Gopnik Satyajit Mayor Daniela Rus
President, Wenner-Gren Foundation Professor of Bioengineering, Professor of Psychology and Senior Professor, Andrew (1956) and Erna Viterbi Professor
for Anthropological Research Stanford University Affiliate Professor of Philosophy, National Center for Biological Sciences, of Electrical Engineering and Computer
Robin E. Bell Nita A. Farahany University of California, Berkeley Tata Institute of Fundamental Research Science and Director, CSAIL, M.I.T.
Research Professor, Lamont-Doherty Professor of Law and Philosophy, Lene Vestergaard Hau John P. Moore
Earth Observatory, Columbia University
Eugenie C. Scott
Director, Duke Initiative for Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics and Professor of Microbiology and Chair, Advisory Council,
Emery N. Brown Science & Society, Duke University of Applied Physics, Harvard University Immunology, Weill Medical College
Edward Hood Taplin Professor of Medical National Center for Science Education
Edward W. Felten Hopi E. Hoekstra of Cornell University
Engineering and of Computational Neuro Director, Center for Information Terry Sejnowski
Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology, Priyamvada Natarajan
science, M.I.T., and Warren M. Zapol Prof Technology Policy, Princeton University Professor and Laboratory Head of
Harvard University Professor of Astronomy and Physics,
essor of Anesthesia, Harvard Medical Computational Neurobiology Laboratory,
Jonathan Foley Ayana Elizabeth Johnson Yale University
School Salk Institute for Biological Studies
Executive Director and William R. and Founder and CEO, Ocean Collectiv Donna J. Nelson
Vinton G. Cerf Gretchen B. Kimball Chair, California
Chief Internet Evangelist, Google Christof Koch Professor of Chemistry, Meg Urry
Academy of Sciences Israel Munson Professor of Physics
Emmanuelle Charpentier President and CSO, University of Oklahoma
Jennifer Francis and Astronomy, Yale University
Scientific Director, Max Planck Institute Allen Institute for Brain Science Robert E. Palazzo
Senior Scientist,
for Infection Biology, and Founding
Woods Hole Research Center
Morten L. Kringelbach Dean, University of Alabama at Michael E. Webber
and Acting Director, Max Planck Unit Associate Professor and Birmingham College of Arts and Sciences Co-director, Clean Energy Incubator,
for the Science of Pathogens Kaigham J. Gabriel
Senior Research Fellow, The Queen’s Rosalind Picard and Associate Professor,
President and Chief Executive Officer,
George M. Church College, University of Oxford Professor and Director, Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Charles Stark Draper Laboratory
Director, Center for Computational Robert S. Langer Affective Computing, M.I.T. Media Lab University of Texas at Austin
Genetics, Harvard Medical School Harold “Skip” Garner
Executive Director and Professor, Primary David H. Koch Institute Professor, Carolyn Porco George M. Whitesides
Rita Colwell Department of Chemical Engineering, Leader, Cassini Imaging Science Team,
Care Research Network and Center for Professor of Chemistry and Chemical
Distinguished University Professor, M.I.T. and Director, CICLOPS, Space Science
University of Maryland College Park Bioinformatics and Genetics, Edward Via Biology, Harvard University
College of Osteopathic Medicine Meg Lowman Institute
and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School Amie Wilkinson
of Public Health Michael S. Gazzaniga Director and Founder, TREE Foundation, Lisa Randall
Rachel Carson Fellow, Ludwig Maximilian Professor of Physics, Harvard University Professor of Mathematics,
Kate Crawford Director, Sage Center for the Study of
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN
Brendan Kelly T rinity College Dublin PRODUCT MANAGER Ian Kelly WEB PRODUCER Jessica Ramirez
CONTRIBUTOR S
EDITORIAL David Biello, Lydia Denworth, W. Wayt Gibbs, Ferris Jabr,
DECIDING WEATHER Anna Kuchment, Robin Lloyd, Melinda Wenner Moyer, George Musser,
Christie Nicholson, John Rennie, Ricki L. Rusting
Based on personal experience of the threat ART Edward Bell, Bryan Christie, Lawrence R. Gendron, Nick Higgins
of Hurricanes Florence and Michael,
EDITORIAL ADMINISTRATOR Ericka Skirpan SENIOR SECRETARY Maya Harty
Zeynep Tufekci argues in “Big Data and
Small Decisions” [The Intersection] that
when one is presented with a deluge of PRESIDENT
Dean Sanderson
data, even a simple binary choice (stay or
EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT Michael Florek
go, in her case) can be difficult. Unable to
CLIENT MARKETING SOLUTIONS
make a data-driven decision, she notes that VICE PRESIDENT, COMMERCIAL Andrew Douglas
she followed the advice of her neighbors. PUBLISHER AND VICE PRESIDENT Jeremy A. Abbate
MARKETING DIRECTOR, INSTITUTIONAL PARTNERSHIPS AND CUSTOMER DEVELOPMENT Jessica Cole
Another way to frame this dilemma PROGRAMMATIC PRODUCT MANAGER Zoya Lysak
DIRECTOR, INTEGRATED MEDIA Jay Berfas
would be through the decision-making DIRECTOR, INTEGRATED MEDIA Matt Bondlow
framework proposed by David Snowden, SENIOR ADMINISTRATOR, EXECUTIVE SERVICES May Jung
MAGA on
the Moon
Do not make the U.S.’s lunar return
an international clash
By the Editors
Can Cannabis have evaluated cannabis specifically for treating opioid addiction.
Further, as argued by Keith Humphreys of Stanford Universi-
M I C R O B I O LO G Y
ment. It was proof that these organisms remains of archaea. That survival mech underground biosphere, Weber argues.
could survive both within the lake itself anism would explain how the community And as scientists continue charting the
and in the sediment below, where condi managed to thrive in such seemingly deso extreme environments in which life can
tions are even more hostile. But Thomas late conditions. “Although we know there’s survive, they will better understand how
still thought it was unlikely that anything a ton of diversity in the microbial biomass, and where it arises on Earth and other
other than archaea could survive there. it’s always exciting to see what strategies planets, he says.
“I was thinking, ‘It’s an extreme environ these microbial communities use to sur Take Mars—in 2011 nasa’s Opportuni
ment, and it’s only for the extreme guys,’” vive in different environments,” says Yuki ty rover stumbled on gypsum, the same
he says. Weber, a biochemist at Harvard Universi mineral that Thomas found in the Dead
The team’s most recent finding upends ty, who was not involved in the study. Sea sediments. Its presence suggests that
that notion. Thomas and his colleagues “There’s still a lot that has to be learned as the Red Planet warmed, its oceans and
analyzed layers of gypsum (a mineral about the microbial metabolism.” lakes evaporated. But before they did,
left behind when saltwater evaporates) Furthermore, Thomas and his colleag these bodies of water probably would have
that were deposited 12,000, 85,000 and ues found tantalizing hints that bacterial life looked a lot like the Dead Sea—maybe
120,000 years ago. Entombed within them, may exist in the Dead Sea ecosystem even even down to the biological processes,
they discovered wax esters—energy-rich today. When they first opened a large vial says Tomaso Bontognali, a scientist at the
molecules that small organisms create and of contemporary sediments, for example, Space Exploration Institute in Switzerland,
store when food becomes scarce. Because they smelled rotten eggs—a telltale sign who was not involved in the Dead Sea
archaea cannot produce these molecules, of hydrogen sulfide gas, which is often pro study. Bontognali works on the European
and multicellular organisms are very un duced by bacteria. But the gas can also Space Agency’s ExoMars rover, which is
likely to survive such hostile conditions, have a nonbiological origin, such as geo set to land in 2021 in an ancient ocean bed
the team concludes that ancient bacteria thermal activity (for which Yellowstone on Mars. It will analyze sediment cores
must have produced the compounds. National Park is famous), so the research with a simplified version of the method
But how did these bacteria survive? ers are not certain that bacteria continue used by Thomas’s team. The Dead Sea
The wax esters carried traces of archaea to reside below the salty lake. evidence “makes the hypothesis that life
cell membranes, so the researchers Even if they do not, bacteria most likely may have existed on Mars more plausible,”
hypothesize that the bacteria scavenged live in similar conditions across Earth’s vast Bontognali says. —Shannon Hall
Glimmering
the Z oological Journal of the Linnean
Society. Using the UV technique, the
Gonopods
researchers identified eight species—
which had previously been mis
categorized as 12—within the North
Millipedes’ genitalia fluoresce American genus Pseudopolydesmus.
under ultraviolet light Sierwald says this kind of imaging
could have applications in soil science
Millipedes are hard t o tell apart. Differ and conservation, helping researchers
ent species of the many-legged crea quickly assess whether certain milli
tures often share the same dull colors pede species are present in a habitat.
and tend to blend in with the gloom of “Millipedes are very good indicators
the forest floor. But under ultraviolet Genitals of the millipede P
seudopolydesmus for soil health because they recycle
light, some millipedes display a striking caddo glow brightly in UV light. rotting leaf litter,” she says.
characteristic: their genitals glow brightly. Yet scientists still have no idea why
Stephanie Ware, a research assistant these animals’ genitals fluoresce. “The
at Chicago’s Field Museum, and her col graphs, “it’s really hard to pick out differ order Polydesmida can’t even see—they
leagues have used this strange fluores ent structures” on the millipedes, she says. don’t have eyes,” Sierwald says. M. Gabri
cence to help identify the leggy arthro “But under UV, there were different pat ela Lagorio, a chemist who studies photo
pods. Ware rigged up a camera with inex terns and colors that made them really biology at the University of Buenos Aires
pensive UV flashlights to capture images pop out.” and was not involved in the study, says
STEPHANIE WARE F ield Museum
of millipedes’ glimmering “gonopods,” This technique makes it easier to dis the feature may or may not have an evolu
specialized appendages used for copula tinguish between similar-looking species, tionary purpose. She notes that it may
tion. The camera took multiple pictures according to Petra Sierwald, a zoologist be “simply a nonfunctional consequence
that Ware stitched together to create a at the Field Museum. She and Ware and of the chemical structure of a substance
composite image. In visible-light photo their colleagues co-authored a study on present in the tissue.” —Jim Daley
Cultured Art
A designer uses bacteria
to create stunning lamps
1 2
on a loved one, pet or object. (Klingler him- After the bacteria multiply
self swabbed the subway station pillar the species and growth medium. This ap for a day or two, he encases them in resin,
where he met his partner.) The customer proach creates flamboyant shapes “growing making what he calls “modern fossils.” The
will send the sample back to Klingler, who into each other and melting together in resin disks are then embedded in blown-
will culture it in a petri dish. interesting patterns,” he says. Klingler and glass structures that resemble laboratory
Bacterial colonies erupt in different col- his collaborator Volkan Özenci, a microbiol- equipment. Finally, bright LEDs bring the
ors, which Klingler can customize by varying ogist at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, colors and patterns to life. —Prachi Patel
© 2019 Scientific American
s & To o ls!!
Fllu ids & Tools
F id
u
A Year
in Orbit
Astronaut Scott Kelly describes
the hardships of life in space
Onboard the International Space Station:
Scott Kelly is the first American t o spend
nasa astronaut Scott Kelly in July 2015.
almost a year in space. The nasa astronaut
lived for a record 340 days onboard the In
ternational Space Station (ISS) from 2015 to the difficulties of prolonged spaceflight and tional necessity,” but research supports
2016. Like other astronauts, he endured the the implications for future long-term mis these levels as safe.
stresses of microgravity, cosmic radiation sions. An edited excerpt f ollows.
and “headward fluid shift,” in which blood — Jim Daley What physical changes did you
and tissue fluid collect in the head. But Kel experience back on Earth?
ly’s experience was unique in that research What were the biggest physiological In the absence of gravity, not only is your
ers painstakingly documented his physiolo challenges you faced in orbit? heart less fit, but your veins and arteries are
gy and cognitive performance while in or That headward fluid shift is the worst in also not as strong. And once you get back
bit—and simultaneously monitored his the beginning. Your body adjusts to it to Earth, all the blood just wants to pool in
identical twin brother, Mark Kelly, as an over time, but it never adjusts completely. your legs. That lasted for weeks. I would
earthbound control. I always felt pressure in my head. Another stand up, and my legs would swell up like
The nasa Twins Study, a groundbreak thing that varied from high to too high water balloons. I had rashes and hives on
ing analysis of the effects of life in space, was was the carbon dioxide. When it was at its my skin whenever it had any pressure on
published in April in S cience. It revealed lowest, it was 10 times what it would be it: on my butt, the back of my legs, my el
that Kelly underwent changes (which his on Earth. When it was at its highest, it was bows. That was surprising. I was sore.
twin did not experience) in his eyes, carot about 30 times what it is on Earth. It would I was tired for a long time. From a mental
id artery, DNA expression and cognitive burn your eyes. I was able to tell what the state, your schedule is so tightly controlled
performance during the mission. Most CO2 level was pretty accurately without onboard the ISS—then, when you get back,
measurements returned to preflight levels having to look at the measurement. you don’t have anyone telling you what to
after he returned to Earth—although some EDITORS’ NOTE: According to a 2012 nasa do anymore. You feel a little lost for a bit.
GETTY IMAGES
of his cognitive scores worsened. Scientific study, the ISS functions at higher than nor- When you don’t have that structure, it’s
American spoke with Kelly about the study, mal concentrations of CO2 “out of opera- kind of hard to be motivated at first.
Interactive IQ
into a coherent pattern by clicking and
dragging them on a computer screen.
HTTPS://EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG/WIKI/RAVEN%27S_PROGRESSIVE_MATRICES#/MEDIA/FILE:RAVEN_MATRIX.SVG
The new test’s creators gave 495 Dutch
A “click and drag” intelligence university students either the old or new
test predicts real-world success assessment. Their scores on the original
test correlated with their exam grades,
Imagine playing Scrabble w ithout being but scores on the click-and-drag test pre
able to rearrange the tiles on your rack or dicted grades even better—by one mea
designing a building without sketching ideas sure more than twice as well as the origi
or making models. Such a thought exercise nal version, according to the study, which
shows the importance of environmental in was published in the February issue of
teraction in human thinking. But many cog Nature Human Behaviour.
nitive tests meant to predict real-world The researchers also tracked people’s
achievement measure only what people can movement of shapes during the test and
Question in the style of a static Raven’s
process inside their head. A new type of IQ found that those who performed best
Progressive Matrices test.
test that lets takers “externalize” their prob tended to exhibit flurries of activity, with
lem-solving predicts school grades better lulls in between. The study authors suspect
than the original version it was based on, participants a three-by-three grid of shapes that rather than randomly moving shapes
a recent study found. in which one is missing and asks them to until they fit a pattern, successful students
In a common IQ test called Raven’s Pro select a shape that best completes the were forming ideas, testing them and then
gressive Matrices, each question shows overall pattern. In the updated version, they pausing to reflect before trying a new one.
In
SCIENCE Juvenile Murray River turtle (Emydura
macquarii). Such turtles are growing rarer.
We C O N S E R VAT I O N
Trust Slow-Motion
turtle—at 52 sites along the southern
reaches of the river. The researchers in
Extinction
ferred the species’ population sizes from
the number of individuals they trapped in
Join the nation’s a given amount of time. They found the
largest association of Turtles’ famed longevity can mask turtles have been extirpated in places
freethinkers, atheists their decline—until it is too late where they were previously abundant, and
most of the specimens they managed to
and agnostics working Nearly four decades agozoologist Mi capture elsewhere were large—and likely
chael Thompson, then at the University of old—adults. Spencer and his colleagues
to keep religion Adelaide in Australia, made an alarming blame the losses on ongoing nest predation
out of government. discovery: invasive red foxes were gobbling by foxes, compounded by other problems,
up more than 90 percent of all the turtle including environmental degradation and
For a free sample of eggs laid along the banks of Australia’s severe drought in the 2000s.
Murray River. Thompson’s surveys also re “We have known about [the turtle die-
FFRF’s newspaper, vealed a disproportionate number of older off] for decades, and despite intense media
Freethought Today: turtles, suggesting that fox predation had hype in Australia about the ‘plight of our riv
already reduced the amount of juveniles in ers,’ nothing has been done to reverse that
the river. If no one took action, he warned, decline,” says Rick Shine, a herpetologist at
the formerly abundant turtles would even Macquarie University in Sydney, who was
tually disappear. not involved in the research. “This paper is
Call 1-800-335-4021 Very little was done, and Thompson’s a wake-up call that unless we begin to do
prediction now appears to be on its way to something about turtle conservation on a
ffrf.us/reason coming true. A recent study confirms that landscape scale, we may lose a fascinating
several turtle species have either drastically component of our native fauna.”
declined or disappeared from various sec The turtles could recover quickly if
tions of the Murray River. “The problem is action is taken to protect nests from foxes
that the longevity of turtles gives the per and restore habitat, Spencer notes. But
ception of persistence,” says Ricky Spencer, governments tend to respond only when
an ecologist at Western Sydney University losses reach crisis levels, and the Murray
ffrf.org
and a co-author of the study, which was River species currently lack federal protec
published in February in S cientific Reports. tion, he says. He and his colleagues have a
“It’s human nature that only when some work-around, however: “Our next step
thing is gone do we start missing it.” is to start designing community conserva
DANITA DELIMONT A lamy
FFRF is a 501(c)(3) educational charity. Spencer and his colleagues tallied pop tion efforts for common turtle species,”
Deductible for income tax purposes. ulations of three once common turtle spe he explains, “so people can actually do
cies—the broad-shelled turtle, the eastern things without having to wait for gov
long-necked turtle and the Murray River ernment funding.” —Rachel Nuwer
Lucky Charms
New evidence hints at what happened to the universe’s antimatter
Large Hadron Collider Beauty
(LHCb) experiment at CERN.
that initially existed in the cosmos. But they searches going on.” —Clara Moskowitz
Detective
cal and computer engineering at the Univer
sity of Massachusetts Amherst, who was
not involved in the study. Whereas many
A new sensor system warns when academic NILM projects can be esoteric,
an electrical device is about to fail Irwin says, Leeb’s team has focused on real-
world use, successfully adapting a sensor for
From the outside, t he main diesel engines commercial applications.
on the U.S. Coast Guard cutter vessel S pen- The system relies on a technology A similar dashboard interface can warn
cer looked normal. But a newly developed called nonintrusive load monitoring homeowners of failing appliances—and
sensor system indicated that a bank of heat (NILM). In ships and buildings alike, could be critical in industrial or military
ers, used to warm up the engines before they many devices are often connected to a sin settings. “The diagnostics work is directed
rumble into action, had failed. When the gle power supply, and each one creates toward detecting when things break—and
crew members removed the heaters’ metal unique changes in the flow of current. even better, prognosticating when they
cover, they found smoking, corroded wires. A NILM sensor installed at one point in may b reak,” Leeb says. Early detection of
Not only were the heaters incapacitat the electrical network can extract these the S pencer’s faulty engine component
ed, “their electrical insulation was starting distinct “fingerprints” to determine how enabled the Coast Guard to replace it
to fray and crack, on the verge of starting a much energy each device is using. Al while the vessel was still docked.
fire,” says Massachusetts Institute of Tech though NILM dates back to the 1980s, “Almost nobody likes having something
nology professor Steven Leeb, who was practical applications have emerged only be broken,” he says, but on cutters—or in
senior author of a study published in March in the past few years as utilities and inde refineries, chemical-processing operations,
in IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics pendent start-ups began developing smart manufacturing plants or commercial build
describing the new system. “Our power meters to monitor energy usage in homes ings—one broken part can take down a
monitor was able to detect the gradual and buildings. much larger system in a so-called mission
changes over the course of a year and saw The new system processes NILM data cripple, causing serious and wide-ranging
a time when it failed severely.” and displays the information via dashboards consequences. —Sophie Bushwick
Illustration by Thomas Fuchs
NEPAL CHINA
IN THE NEWS
Researchers confirmed the nation’s first recorded The Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory on
Quick tornado, which occurred during a devastating storm
in March. The team relied on satellite imagery and
the eastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau began operating
in April. Located some 4,400 meters above sea level, the
Hits posts on social media to make the identification. observatory will study high-energy cosmic rays.
GUATEMALA AUSTRALIA
Archaeologists unearthed The government announced it
the largest known Mayan will not regulate gene-editing
figurine factory. The more technology provided it does
than 1,000-year-old not introduce new genetic
workshop mass-produced material to target sites in
intricate statues that were the genome. Editing human
likely used in diplomacy embryos used for reproduction
as gifts to allies. is still banned, however.
ANTARCTICA KENYA
Emperor penguins have abandoned one of their biggest Paleontologists have identified a fossil jawbone in
breeding colonies, possibly because of sea-ice loss. the Nairobi National Museum that came from a
Biologists found that the population, which reached about previously unknown giant carnivore, which roamed
For more details, visit
www.ScientificAmerican.com/
25,000 breeding pairs of birds in 2010, collapsed in 2016 Africa 22 million years ago. The predator was likely
jul2019/advances and has not rebounded since. larger than a polar bear and had banana-sized fangs.
span of seven to 10 years, and replacing are significant, and the pacemaker’s effec-
them entails expensive surgery. tiveness in a less dynamic, diseased heart
The new “symbiotic pacemaker” con- is yet to be determined.
sists of three components: a wafer-sized Another drawback is that the unit must
generator attached to the heart that con- be attached directly to the heart’s surface
verts the organ’s mechanical energy into and could interfere with the organ’s func
electrical energy; a power-management tions. A group at Dartmouth College and
unit that has a capacitor to store that ener- the University of Texas at San Antonio
gy; and the pacemaker itself, which stimu- previously designed a pacemaker that
lates and regulates the heart muscle. instead harnesses kinetic energy from its
Zhou Li of the Beijing Institute of own lead wire, which moves when the
Nanoenergy and Nanosystems and Zhong heart pulses. The team is currently testing
Lin Wang of the Georgia Institute of Tech- it in dogs.
nology and their colleagues implanted “The development of these battery-
their device in two adult male pigs. In the free technologies will revolutionize im
first animal (which had a healthy heart), plantable devices,” says Ramses Martinez,
the team tested how well the generator a researcher in industrial and biomedical
harvested energy; it powered the pace engineering at Purdue University, who
maker for a total of nearly three and a half was not involved in either study. “Soon
hours. The pig’s heart generated more traditional rigid implants will evolve into
than enough energy to power a human conformable systems capable of harvest Scientific American is a registered trademark of Springer
version of the pacemaker, the scientists ing the energy they need to function from Nature America, Inc.
reported in April in N
ature Communica- the patient.” —Harini Barath
Surveillance
us understand how different mosquito species arise and transmit
malaria to humans, which in turn has led to a better targeting of
interventions as vectorial capacity becomes better understood.
for Malaria
Such surveillance has enabled greater knowledge of changing
transmission intensity and parasite gene flow, including drug-
resistant genes, and has aided in quantifying the risks of import-
ing malaria from a country that is burdened with the disease. But
It can flag pathogens long before work using genomic surveillance as a tool has mostly transpired
patients show up in clinics within the realm of research, with only a few examples of its appli-
By Ify Aniebo cation in the field where malaria burden remains high.
Genomic surveillance has been used in countries that have
In 2018 the World Health Organization proposed a “10+1” ini- eliminated malaria to prevent its resurgence and in countries that
tiative for malaria control and elimination that targets 10 Afri- are in a malaria-elimination phase. It should not be any different
can countries plus India, which together host 70 percent of for the African countries that have the highest malaria burden.
global cases. Although this approach is promising, it is missing Lessons learned from poliomyelitis show that genomic surveil-
an im portant component: genomic surveillance. Drug resis- lance played a huge role in controlling the infection. Public health
tance threatens all of the progress made so far against malaria, officials have been able to use quality data to learn where this
but genomic surveillance can detect resistance years before the virus emerged from, map the transmission network and deter-
first warning signs appear in clinics. It can answer critical ques- mine where to direct their vaccination efforts.
tions about how resistance emerges and spreads and can help It is time for genomic surveillance to move from mainly aca-
control the balance of interventions, preserve the useful life of demic research into the field where malaria deaths occur. I pro-
already existing drugs and ensure effective treatment. pose that the WHO should incorporate a new “tool kit” that
I call on the WHO, global health partners and the malaria includes malaria genomics in its eradication plans. Such a kit
community to incorporate mandatory genomic surveillance by would provide valuable information that would make national
making it a major intervention in countries that have the highest programs fighting the disease, especially in the African countries
malaria burden. This genomic information can help malaria-con- included in the 10+1 initiative, far more effective. As with any pub-
trol programs use quality data sets for regular monitoring of drug lic health crisis, the more we know, the better.
resistance, provide evidence-based decision-making around
malaria policy and assist in managing the spread of resistance. Claudia Wallis will return next month.
I’ve Come
Around on
Nuclear Power
Climate change scares me more
than the risk of meltdowns
By Wade Roush
matter
becomes
mınd
N
The new discipline of network neuroscience
yields a picture of how mental activity arises
from carefully orchestrated interactions
among different brain areas
By Max Bertolero and Danielle S. Bassett
Illustration by Mark Ross Studios
IN BRIEF
How does the brain g ive rise to who we are? This Graph theory, which is also used by chemists, By understanding networks a t increasing levels of
question has led to the new field of network neuro- quantum field theorists and linguists, models the abstraction, researchers have begun to bridge the
science, which uses a branch of mathematics, graph physical pathways that build functional networks gap between matter and mind. Practical benefits
theory, to model the brain connections that let us from which our cognitive capacities emerge, could entail new ways of diagnosing and treating
read, calculate, or simply sit and tap our fingers. whether for vision, attention or self-control. disorders such as depression.
The Milky Way has hundreds of billions of stars—just a fraction of the 100 trillion connec-
tions in our brains that enable us to sense, think and act. To unravel this complexity, net-
work neuroscientists create a map, or “graph,” consisting of nodes linked by edges that fit
Local hub
into modules, which are tethered to one another with highly connected nodes called hubs.
Connector hub
Brain Modules
Visual
Attention
Frontoparietal control
Somatic motor
Salience
B Connector hubs
Default with the strongest
links to multiple other
Limbic
modules appear in this
side view, colored to
A Seven key modules, indicate the seven
denoted by colors, pivotal brain modules.
spread across sometimes
disconnected areas
of the brain.
C A graph of the human brain’s nodes and edges shows the strongest connector hubs
represented as large circles. Each node’s color represents the module it belongs to.
Nodes can be visualized as repelling magnets with edges between nodes acting
as springs that hold them together. Tightly connected nodes cluster together.
Connector hubs occupy the center because they are well connected to all modules.
Strongest
functions are dedicated to specific tasks, often rep Visual tracking relationship
resented here by psychological tests. The most active Action observation
tasks rise to the top. The visual module, for instance,
Picture naming (silently)
is involved with naming, reading and observing. Many
tasks require multiple modules. For example, a mental Brightness perception
Visual
rotation task recruits both the visual and the attention Picture naming (out loud)
modules. Some modules are entrusted with more Silent reading
abstract tasks. The frontoparietal module engages Visual attention
in switching tasks or recalling lists. The default mode Drawing
module attends to subjective emotional states or passive
Controlling eye movement
listening when a person is at rest.
Mental rotation
Visual control Attention
Pointing
Writing
Imagined movement
Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (reasoning)
Counting
Tower of London (complex planning task)
n-back working memory task
Sternberg working memory task Frontoparietal
Task switching control
Word stem completion (out loud)
Free word list recall
Stroop task
Flanker response inhibition task
Detecting vibrations through touch
Finger tapping
Vocal rehearsing Somatic
Small hand movements motor
Whistling
Grasping
Isometric force
Awareness of need to urinate
Stimulation monitoring
Nonpainful electrical stimulation
Breath holding Salience
Word stem completion (silent)
Playing music
Imaging what others think
Categorizing emotional scenes
Passive listening
Lying
Pitch detection
Event recall (episodic memory) Default
Delayed gratification
Word generation (out loud)
Word meaning discrimination
Grammar
Face-emotion identification
Scent detection
Video games
Classical conditioning Limbic
Eating/drinking
Passive viewing
Monetary reward task
Graphics by Max Bertolero (brains and network diagram) and Jen Christiansen (task chart)
July 2019, ScientificAmerican.com 31
networks develop through childhood and adolescence and into widely across the entire organ. The so-called disconnectivity
adulthood. These processes are driven by underlying physiolog- hypothesis for schizophrenia holds that there is nothing abnor-
ical changes, but they are also influenced by learning, exposure mal about the individual modules. Instead the disarray relates
to new ideas and skills, an individual’s socioeconomic status to an overabundance of connections between modules.
and other experiences. In a healthy brain, modules are mostly autonomous and segre-
Brain-network modules emerge very early in life, even in the gated, and the ability to bring about flexible changes in network
womb, but their connectivity is refined as we grow up. Consistent connections is beneficial for cognitive functioning—within certain
strengthening of the structural connections to hubs throughout limits. In our lab, we found that in the brains of people with schizo-
the course of childhood is associated with an increase in the seg- phrenia and their first-degree relatives, there is an overabundance
regation between modules and an augmentation in the efficiency of flexibility in how networks reconfigure themselves. Auditory
with which young people perform executive tasks such as complex hallucinations might result when nodes unexpectedly switch links
reasoning and self-regulation. We have also found that the extent between speech and auditory modules. The uninvited mix can
The
Cell
Invulnerable
Biologists are building an organism that can shrug off any virus
on the planet. Impervious human cells may be next
By Rowan Jacobsen
he virus touches down on the cell like a spider landing on a balloon 1,000 times
its size. It has six thin legs splayed underneath a body that resembles a syringe with
a bulbous head. This is a predator named lambda, and its prey is an Escherichia
coli b acterium. Having found its victim, lambda now does what uncountable tril-
lions of viruses have done since life first emerged: it latches onto the cell mem-
brane with its legs, attaches its syringelike part to a pore and contracts, injecting its DNA inside.
The DNA contains the instructions for making more viruses, and that is pretty much all a virus
is: a protein capsule holding blueprints for building more copies of itself. Viruses do not have the
molecular machinery to build new things. Instead they break into cells and hijack cellular
equipment, using it to replicate until there are so many viruses, they burst through the cell walls.
They can do this because all organisms, from rhinoceroses on African plains to rhinoviruses
infecting your nose, use the same coding system, which is based on nucleic acids such as DNA.
Feed the code into the cell, and it will use those instructions to build proteins.
In the infected bacterium, that process starts. New changes necessary to make the cell virus-proof. Ostrov’s
viral proteins take shape. Things are looking good for team had completed 63 percent of them, she and her col-
lambda. Within minutes the cell will be bursting at the leagues reported, and the beast was doing fine.
seams with a multitude of brand-new viruses. When Three years later the rebuilt cell is almost ready.
they break out, each one will head for another bacteri- Sometime soon the scene just envisioned will take place
um, aiming to repeat this cycle over and over again. with not just one but hundreds of viruses in a petri dish.
Then the cellular machinery freezes. It simply can- If rE.coli-57 survives, it may forever change the relation
not read the virus’s DNA. In the seemingly eternal duel between viruses and their prey—including us.
between virus and cell, this failure has never happened. Viruses are incredibly abundant, with 800 million of
And now it means lambda is doomed. them covering every square meter of this planet. They
IN BRIEF
The reason for its demise is that this strain of E . coli vex us with illness, but they also torment industries that
Viral attacks on cells has been reprogrammed to use a DNA operating system use cells to manufacture products from yogurt to phar-
cost pharma—which that has never existed on earth, and the viral code is maceuticals. The biotech giant Genzyme (now part of
uses bacterial cells to incompatible with it. The differences leave lambda as Sanofi), which uses bacteria to make drug molecules,
make drugs—and
helpless as a Windows computer virus inside a Mac. lost half its market value after a 2009 virus infection in
other industries
billions. They also The same fate will befall other viruses that attack. The its Allston, Mass., plant sabotaged its production line,
harm health. people who made this bacterium and its new code triggering critical pharmaceutical shortages. Viruses
A project to recode believe the feature will make it immune to all viruses. are also an expensive scourge in the dairy industry,
the DNA o f a bacte- They call it rE.coli-57. A nd they have big plans for it. which employs bacteria to ferment cheese and yogurt—
rial cell is removing rE.coli-57 is being built in a laboratory at Harvard these products have to be dumped when the bacteria
all genetic path- Medical School by a team led by a young biologist named are hit by viral contamination. A virus-proof bacterium
ways that make Nili Ostrov. For the past five years Ostrov has obsessed could be a billion-dollar bug.
it vulnerable.
over every detail of the bacterium’s genetic reconstruc- Such a cell could also open up a new world of design-
The redesigned cell
should work n or- tion, putting in grueling hours under the fluorescent er medicines. “If we want to make fancy antibodies and
mally and pave the lights of the wet lab. It is the most elaborate gene-editing fancy protein drugs, we need to incorporate different
way for virus-safe project in history and was the subject of a 2016 land- chemistry into them,” Ostrov says. “That would be a
human cells. mark paper in S cience that identified 148,955 DNA game changer for drug companies.” All natural proteins
A virus lands on a bacterial cell and injects its own The virus DNA is transcribed into a
DNA inside. That DNA is made of the same “letters” strand called mRNA, which contains
as bacterium DNA so the cell treats both equally. instructions to make virus proteins.
2 Hijacking
That virus mRNA moves into the cell’s protein
assembly plant, or ribosome. There each group
of three mRNA letters, known as a codon, pairs
with a specific complementary molecule called
tRNAs string the amino
a tRNA (blue). Each one of those is attached to
acids together in sequence
a particular protein building block known as an
to form a protein.
amino acid (yellow).
Amino acid
tRNA
tRNA
U C U
A G A
no scientific literature on these recoded DNA stretches will be to eliminate the tRNAs associated with the miss-
to guide Ostrov—her team was the first to reshape ing codons. The cell will be just fine because its genes
them—she carefully analyzed the performance of all the will use synonymous tRNAs that still exist. But an
ın
Prosperity in Mozambique ( The New Press, 2018). His reporting
trip for this story was paid for with a grant from Mongabay.
Mandena,
Madagascar, specialized symbiotic niches. The country’s 83 species of screw
banana-leafed Ravenala t rees crowd out the pine alone serve as breeding grounds for dozens of different
sun, their electric blue seed pods dotting the reptiles and amphibians. But the ballet between this particular
leaf litter and white sand below. When night tree and frog is now confined to a tiny collection of forest frag-
ments, like the one in Mandena, that are spread along Madagas-
falls, gray mouse lemurs emerge from tree car’s southeastern coast. Two of the three smatterings of forest
hollow dens to feed on insects, flowers and where the frog is still found lie inside a concession belonging to
fruit. During the rainy season, pools of water Rio Tinto, one of the largest mining companies in the world.
Rio Tinto came to Madagascar in the 1980s, looking for il
form where screw pines’ pom-pom-like clus- menite, a mineral used to make titanium dioxide, which pro-
ters of long leaves meet their trunks, the base vides the white pigment found in products ranging from paint
of each leaf forming a reservoir just large and plastics to toothpaste. Test pits hit pay dirt near Tolagnaro
(Fort Dauphin), at the southeastern tip of the island. The ilmen-
enough to nurture small schools of tadpoles ite deposits that interest the company lie underneath the rem-
to maturity before the puddles dry out every nants of dense evergreen forests that once grew on sand dunes
April. There ring-wearing tree frogs—named along most of Madagascar’s eastern coast, forming a continu-
ous band covering perhaps 465,000 hectares. Since human col-
for the bright-white bands that mark each onization of the island some 2,000 years ago, these littoral for-
webby finger—find a perfect spot to nurture ests, as they are known, have dwindled to at most 10 percent of
their next generation, high above would-be their original expanse. As such, Rio Tinto’s concession weaves
through one of the most threatened ecosystems on the planet.
predators. Leopard-spotted and no bigger Ordinarily, the discovery of so much buried wealth under-
than a child’s thumb, the frogs lay their eggs neath an already vulnerable ecosystem would spell doom for
in a sticky clutch above the water and stand most of what lives there. But in 2004 executives at Rio Tinto,
which is headquartered in London, flew to the International
watch for nearly a week, until their offspring Union for Conservation of Nature’s World Conservation Con-
drop into the tiny pool and begin to swim. gress in Bangkok, a major gathering of scientists, environmen-
talists, and government and business leaders, to unveil what
At close range, this corner of Mandena feels like you could amounted to a radical rethinking of mining’s relationship with
get lost in it. But above the canopy reality looms into view. For- the natural world. Going forward, they pledged, the company
est once stretched to the horizon. What’s left of it is now small- would seek not just to limit the environmental damage it caused
er than Brooklyn’s Prospect Park—less than a half-hour walk but to actively improve the ecology of its most sensitive mine
from end to end, sandwiched between a mine on one side and a sites. And it would start with the mining concession in south-
steadily expanding village on the other. eastern Madagascar.
Madagascar broke free of the land that makes up Africa and Conservationists met the proposal with enthusiasm. They had
India nearly 100 million years ago. Across the eons, evolution in reason to be optimistic: Rio Tinto and its predecessor had already
isolation has given the island unparalleled ecological richness: been collaborating with scientists from the Missouri Botanical
Four out of five plants and animals there are found nowhere Garden for more than a decade, funding and conducting botani-
else, the sweeping cast of characters in a wide array of highly cal surveys and studies of the new species discovered throughout
PRECEDING PAGES: ED KASHI R edux Pictures
IN BRIEF
In 2004 mining company Rio Tinto vowed to Conservationists working in Madagascar, which Eventually Rio Tinto retreated from its promise,
improve the ecology of its most sensitive sites. It is rich in species that are found nowhere else in the raising questions about whether mining companies
would start in Madagascar, where the company was world, partnered with Rio Tinto to help the compa- and conservationists can collaborate effectively on
working to extract the mineral ilmenite. ny make good on its pledge. environmental stewardship.
that QMM was running out of ways to offset future damage calyptus and acacia saplings formed a grid over the sandy ex-
done by the mine. panse where the mining dredge had passed. Over time QMM
Meanwhile a series of technical snafus in Madagascar and a hopes these trees will provide a source of wood and charcoal for
costly investment blunder in Mozambique, where Rio Tinto communities that currently depend on forest fragments that
overpaid for a stake in a massive new coal mine, ate into the will soon be mined. Just behind the company’s headquarters,
company’s bottom line, prompting cost-cutting measures QMM maintains a nursery that supplies it with acacia and eu-
across the enterprise. Although the environmental program’s calyptus, along with native plants it is using in experiments
Local farmers, whose land was flooded to create a water thousands of snow geese were killed when a storm drove them
source for the mine, had another grievance. For years they pro- into a toxic reservoir left behind by an open-pit copper mine that
tested that they had not received fair compensation for the had ceased operations decades earlier. In the Niger River delta,
amount of land they lost. When QMM finally agreed to assess oil exploration has brought the equivalent of an Exxon Valdez
1969
50years
2019
ANNIVERSARY
PRECEDING PAGES: NASA (firing room); ALAMY (launch);
Neil Armstrong thought he had a 50–50 shot at pulling it off. “There are so many
THIS PAGE: NASA (Aldrin on lunar surface);
unknowns,” the first man to set foot on the moon said in a 2011 interview with an Australian accounting firm.
“There was a big chance that there was something in there we didn’t understand properly and we [would
have] to abort and come back to Earth without landing.” That he, Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Michael Collins—
GETTY IMAGES (footprint)
with the help of thousands of nasa engineers, scientists and mission controllers on Earth—did pull off a
moon landing remains one of humanity’s most incredible achievements.
Consider that 50 years ago this month a 36-story-tall Saturn V rocket weighing as much as 400 elephants
climbed away from Earth atop an explosion more powerful than the output of 85 Hoover Dams. Once in
NEIL ARMSTRONG’S
s hadow is visible in this
photo he took of the lunar
module in the distance.
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: NASA (A ldrin; lunar module and Armstrong;
space, the astronauts escaped Earth orbit, traveled to lunar orbit, then undocked part of their spacecraft and
steered it down for a soft impact on an alien land. Perhaps even more impressive, after taking a walk around,
they climbed back in their lunar lander, launched off the surface of another planetary body (another first),
rejoined the command module orbiting roughly 60 miles above the lunar surface, and then flew back to
crewmates); GETTY IMAGES (mission control)
Earth, splashing down safely in the Pacific Ocean two days later.
After that heady feat, dreamers worldwide imagined it would be only a hop, skip and jump to colonies on
the moon and vacations on Mars. Yet no human has been back to the lunar surface since the last Apollo
astronaut left it in 1972, and plans to put people on Mars or anywhere else in the solar system are barely
more defined than they were back then. It seems that every subsequent president promises to send another
crew to the moon, but by now those calls have begun to sound like fanciful, unfeasible optimism. When Vice
President Mike Pence announced in March that the Trump administration wants to land astronauts on the
1969
50years
2019
ANNIVERSARY
ALDRINdeploys
the Passive Seismic
Experiment on the moon.
ONBOARD THE
LUNAR MODULE,Aldrin
listens in on his headset.
lunar surface by 2024, the public reaction was incredulity. But the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 reminds us
that this laughably ambitious goal has in fact already been proved doable—on a short deadline, at a time
when computers were the size of rooms, the U.S. was losing the war in Vietnam, women were marching in
the streets for equality, and African-Americans were fighting, often sacrificing their lives, for the right to be
treated as full human beings.
People often remember the time of the moon landing as one of the country’s finest moments, an age when
things were simpler, better, more hopeful. Yet A
pollo 11 w
as not the embodiment of a grand era—it was a tes-
tament to the fact that we can do great things in terrible times. That even when we are struggling, when our
country is divided and our world is scary, we should chase big dreams. Apollo 11 showed us, just when we
needed it, the best of humanity. Now, when our planet is facing similar strife, we could really use another
moon shot, whether we go back to the moon or not. —Clara Moskowitz
MAPPING
SOURCES: NASA/GSFC/ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY (m oon) ;
NASA (a stronauts a nd e quipment)
Double Crater
TV camera
TRANQUILIT
Y BASE
THE MISSION
When Apollo 11 h appened in real time, moon where Neil Armstrong and Buzz
people back home could follow along with Aldrin traveled, as well as the positions
grainy, though exhilarating, video footage. of the lander, the experiments and even
Yet they had little sense of where on the the astronauts’ footpaths.
moon the action was happening and how Satellite imagery helps to preserve
far the astronauts explored. Now three- details of the mission that will ultimately
dimensional computer models based on be lost to time: extreme temperatures,
recent satellite imagery can re-create each solar radiation and the unrelenting
step of the mission and the terrain it bombardment of micrometeorites on the
covered. Based on a 2012 photograph of lunar surface are eroding the footprints
the landing site from nasa’s Lunar Recon- and will eventually wipe out even the
naissance Orbiter (LRO), a height map of machinery. Little by little, Tranquility Base
the surface shows the contours of the is disappearing.
600 feet
540
520
400
330
West Crater
Double Crater
CENTER (b ase map); THOMAS SCHWAGMEIER AND ERIC M. JONES (f ootpath reference)
Lunar module
SOURCES: NASA (West Crater and boulder field); NASA’S GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT
Television camera
300
270
250 Little West Crater Double Crater
220
200
120
100
75
Graphics by Edward Bell (landing path) and Eléonore Dixon-Roche ( footpath) July 2019, ScientificAmerican.com 59
1969
50 years
2019
ANNIVERSARY
Back in the 1960s, it seemed like just a matter of quire all signatories to avoid causing harm to anoth
time before humanity would slip the bonds of Earth er’s probes or outposts—for instance, by landing near
and begin a slow crawl out into the universe. Although or on top of them. This sounds reasonable enough,
it has taken longer than many expected, something but it also creates an opening for a nation or private
like that moment may soon arrive. Around half a doz entity to monopolize a desirable spot simply by arriv
en governments, as well as a handful of private com ing there first.
panies, all have moon missions planned for the near Should one nation or entity try to stake a claim, it
future—a situation ripe for conflict. “might trigger a ‘scramble for the Moon’ comparable
The Outer Space Treaty, which the U.S., the U.K. in some respects to the ‘scramble for Africa’ which
and the Soviet Union signed less than two years be began with the identification of mineral resources in
fore A pollo 11 ( and which now has 109 countries par the Congo in the 1880s,” wrote astrophysicist Martin
ty to it), stipulates that space exploration must be Elvis of the Center for Astrophysics at Harvard Uni
conducted peacefully and for the benefit of all versity and the Smithsonian Institution and his co-
nations. It also holds that no one can claim territory authors in a 2016 paper in the journal S pace Policy.
on a celestial body. But lower down in the treaty is a Sure enough, several missions scheduled to take
loophole: two “noninterference clauses,” which re place in the next few years all target the same terri
IN BRIEF
A large number of countries a nd private compa- International law s ays no one can own property in This loophole creates the potential for a race
nies are aiming to launch missions to the moon space—yet it also says that once an entity has landed to stake claims on some of the moon’s highest-
in the coming decade. somewhere, others should avoid disturbing that site. value real estate.
2
tory. India’s Chandrayaan-2 mission, due to launch
in July, will aim for the lunar poles. The China
National Space Administration has said that at least
its next three probes will head to the poles as well.
The Russian space agency Roscosmos is developing
its Luna-Glob program, which would touch down
near the Boguslawsky crater near the south pole per
haps as early as 2021. That same year Japan intends
to launch the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon,
or SLIM, which could demonstrate extremely high
landing accuracy on small lunar features. nasa, the
European Space Agency and more private interests
are looking moonward as well. In May, Amazon CEO
Jeff Bezos, who founded the spaceflight company
Blue Origin, unveiled plans for its Blue Moon lunar
lander, which, he said, could be ready to carry crews
within the next five years. Some landforms, such as certain crater pits, could offer IRON concen-
Moon Express aims to land at the lunar south pole radiation protection to astronauts, and sites on the tration on the
in 2021. And if its spacecraft arrives before anyone lunar far side that are shielded from Earth’s radio noise moon (1), as
else, Richards says, the company wants it to count for would be especially well suited to hosting telescopes. mapped by
something. “One of our drivers is to get there first,” he In the near term, the most desirable resource of all the Clementine
says. “And we expect our rights of noninterference is water. Astronauts can drink water, or they can break spacecraft in
will be respected.” it into its constituent elements and transform them 1994. A mockup
into rocket fuel. For the first off-planet explorers, (2) of the Blue
THE OIL OF SPACE water has been called the oil of space. Moon lunar
There is plenty of real estate o n the moon to go Some of the most promising sites for water extrac lander being
around—the total surface area is about the size of tion are the so-called Peaks of Eternal Light at the developed by
Africa—but the resources there are unevenly distri north and south lunar poles. These are crater peaks, Blue Origin.
NASA (1); SAUL LOEB Getty Images (2)
buted. Iron and titanium, which could be useful for geographical features that often form at or near the
building moon habitats and technologies, are abun edges of impact craters when an asteroid strikes the
dant in different regions of the lunar surface. The heli surface and pushes material to the side, where it rises
um 3 deposits common in areas of the top layer of up to form a ridge at the rim. Because of the moon’s
lunar regolith could power fusion reactors. And orbital mechanics, the sun shines almost perpetually
“resources” are not limited to extractable materials. at these peaks, offering a nearly constant source of
RISKS AND REWARDS Richards is eager to play his part in bringing the
Although plans are afoot to grab lunar real estate, moon within Earth’s economic sphere. Yet so far even
extracting resources such as rare elements and ship he has struggled to get above the atmosphere. When
ping them back to Earth is a long-term goal. Some Richards co-founded Moon Express in 2010, the com
would even say it is a fantasy. Given the incredible cost pany was one of 16 teams competing for the Google
and technological hurdles involved in simply getting Lunar XPRIZE, which challenged a privately funded
to space, let alone landing on the lunar surface, it is robotic spacecraft to land on the moon, drive around,
hard to imagine that transporting materials back to and send back pictures and data. The original 2012
Earth would be profitable any time soon. Deep Space deadline was extended several times, ultimately to
Industries and Planetary Resources, two private busi March 2018, but in January of that year the XPRIZE
nesses that were set up in the early part of the 21st Foundation admitted that no one would be able to
century to pursue asteroid mining, both failed to claim the $30-million purse.
attract enough investment to attempt any deep-space Moon Express now plans to send its first vehicle
resource extraction; they were eventually acquired by into lunar orbit in 2020. It remains to be seen, however,
a satellite manufacturer and a cryptocurrency compa whether its business model—offering space agencies
ny, respectively. “It’s different than the gold rush days, and private companies payload rides to the moon—will
when anybody with a mule or a pickax could go and be viable in the long run. When asked if he sees any
try to find gold,” says George Sowers, a space resourc conflict between his desire to stake a claim and the
es expert at the Colorado School of Mines. need for an equitable solution for everyone, Richards
Still, if economic activities in space take off, min turns philosophical. The tensions in the Outer Space
ing could follow, experts say. Elvis points to private Treaty reflect the tensions between the belief systems of
rocket companies, such as Elon Musk’s SpaceX, that the two countries that wrote it, he says. The Commu
are driving down the cost of launching vehicles into nist Soviets saw the world from a collective perspective
orbit. The cheaper and easier it is to get to space, the in which goods should be equally distributed, whereas
more common missions will become. Demand for fuel the capitalist Americans believed in greater personal
and other resources could follow, and launching mate freedom and an unfettered private sector. “That’s why
rials from the relatively low gravity of the moon would the treaty is open to interpretation,” he says. “I think
be more cost-effective than from the deep gravitation we have a chance as a species to conquer these new
NASA
al well of our own planet. frontiers without having to conquer each other.”
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50years
2019
ANNIVERSARY
O
Sarah T. Stewart is a professor of planetary science and
geophysics at the University of California, Davis. In 2018
the MacArthur Foundation awarded her a “genius” grant
for her work on synestias.
n August 1, 1971, while exploring the eastern edge of the lava plain
known as Mare Imbrium on the silent, serene lunar surface, A pollo 15
astronauts David Scott and James Irwin found something remarkable:
a profoundly old piece of lunar crust, a relic more than four billion
years old that carried clues to the moon’s formation. Seeing the glint
of ancient crystals embedded in what would later be called the Genesis
rock, Scott immediately knew its potential importance for solving the
mystery of how the moon was made. “I think we found what we came for,” he radioed to mis-
sion control as he and Irwin retrieved the rock and placed it in a bag. It would become a key
part of what is the Apollo program’s greatest scientific legacy.
Studies of the Genesis Rock and the nearly 400 kilograms of Earth and the moon. These two bodies are made from the same
other samples hauled back to Earth by the Apollo astronauts source material, as if they are planetary twins, whereas the canon-
overturned our understanding of lunar history. In what amount- ical hypothesis predicts the moon should mostly be made of its
ed to a scientific reboot, these precious samples nullified the Mars-size progenitor. That progenitor should differ in composi-
then prevailing theories—that the moon had been gravitational- tion from the proto-Earth because planets growing from the disk
ly captured by Earth or had formed alongside it—while reveal- of gas and dust around the young sun would each incorporate dis-
ing important new details, such as the fact that the newborn sat- tinctive mixes of building blocks based on their orbital location.
ellite had been covered by a magma ocean. Scientists can discern these differences by making very precise
The immense energy required to form the moon’s magma measurements of the relative abundances of isotopes in rocks,
ocean pointed to a radical new idea for lunar origin: the notion yielding unique “isotopic fingerprints” for every planetary body in
that Earth’s closest companion had formed from a giant impact, the solar system—except for Earth and the moon, which, bizarre-
a collision between the proto-Earth and another planetary body. ly, appear to be almost the same.
The concept built on calculations showing that growing planets This isotopic crisis has haunted the giant impact hypothesis
would collide with one another, as well as the curious fact that for decades, but no better explanation has emerged for the lunar
the moon’s composition is uncannily similar to that of Earth’s origin. Now, however, in another scientific reboot we have discov-
rocky mantle. Some researchers even proposed that such an ered that most giant impacts do not make a planet surrounded by
impact had set the young Earth’s spin, establishing what would a debris disk. In fact, most giant impacts do not make a planet at
become our planet’s 24-hour cycle of day and night. The canoni- all. Instead they make an entirely new class of astronomical object,
cal giant impact hypothesis that emerged from these early stud- a transient hybrid between planet and disk called a synestia that
ies proposes that a glancing collision with a Mars-size body cre- could explain many of the moon’s most mysterious features.
ated a hot disk of rocky debris around Earth. The moon then
coalesced from the disk—a scenario that can explain the moon’s HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT
large mass and dearth of water and other volatiles. The discovery of synestias traces back to a few years ago, when
Yet the giant impact hypothesis is not without flaws. Chief we (Lock and Stewart) were puzzling over whether or not a giant
among them is the astounding chemical relationship between moon-forming impact had set the length of Earth’s day. That
IN BRIEF
Earth’s moon f ormed nearly 4.5 billion years ago, in because it neatly explains the moon’s large size and planet and a disk—is an entirely new class of astro-
the aftermath of a cataclysmic collision between the lack of water. But the current theory cannot easily nomical object proposed to explain the moon’s birth
proto-Earth and another protoplanet. account for other lunar properties, such as its uncan- and curious compositional similarity to Earth. Synes-
The giant impact hypothesis h as dominated scien- ny resemblance to Earth in terms of composition. tias may be regular outcomes of the planet-formation
tific discussions of lunar origins for decades, in part A synestia—an impact-generated hybrid between a process throughout the cosmos.
Proto-Moon Proto-Moon
Proto-Earth core
We are still learning from the cream-filled pastries. Armed with a better under-
standing of how these objects arise and manifest,
samples collected by the Apollo we began digging through all our previous simula-
tions of giant impacts and finding synestias there,
missions, but they are a limited too. It turned out that we had been making synestias
1969
50 years
2019
ANNIVERSARY
evidence collected during the Apollo program, is that MAGMA OCEAN: One of the most influential hypothe-
some 4.5 billion years ago, a body about the size of ses to come from the lunar samples is the idea that
Mars (referred to as Theia) hit Earth, fragmenting itself there was an ocean of magma on the early moon. Apol-
and ejecting part of Earth’s crust and mantle into space. lo 11 samples showed that the lunar highlands (bright,
Eventually the ejected terrestrial material mixed with high-standing regions as opposed to the dark lunar
the remnants of Theia, accumulating into a satellite maria in low-lying areas) contain high concentrations
that cooled and became the moon. of the mineral plagioclase. The texture of the rocks con-
This model has been influenced by many observa- taining this mineral suggested that it formed from a
tions from the Apollo samples and surface experiments, large body of molten rock that cooled, and the light pla-
which include: gioclase crystals floated to the top. Because similar
rocks had been found by previous robotic missions at
IRON: The moon has surprisingly little iron. Surface other locations, and the lunar highlands are wide-
geophysics experiments deployed by Apollo missions spread, the layer of magma must have covered most, or
showed that compared with the terrestrial planets, all, of the moon’s surface. Two independent groups pro-
the moon’s core comprises a very small portion of its posed the idea of this early magma ocean in 1970, just
volume compared with the terrestrial planets—just six months after the return of the first Apollo samples.
25 percent of its total radius. The relative lack of iron Several additional lines of evidence from geochemistry
suggested by the moon’s small core is evidence that and geophysics support the magma ocean model, which
Earth had already formed an iron-rich center when is still being developed today.
the giant impact occurred, leaving little iron to form
the moon. One piece of evidence that complicates the giant
impact model is the concentration of various iso-
DRYNESS: The lunar samples proved to be extremely topes—atoms of an element that have a different mass
dry and almost entirely depleted of volatiles—ele- from the “regular” atoms—in Apollo samples. Using a
ments or molecules with low boiling points that easily process called laser fluorination, in 2001 and 2012
evaporate, such as water, carbon dioxide, nitrogen researchers found that the compositions of both oxy-
and hydrogen. To explain this depletion, scientists gen and titanium isotopes are almost identical
suggest the massive amount of energy and heat gener- between the moon and Earth. If the moon formed
ated from the giant impact may have driven volatiles from a mixture of Theia and Earth materials, why
from the fragments of the proto-moon. does it have an Earth-like isotopic composition? This
1969
50 years
2019
ANNIVERSARY
COME ONE,
COME ALL
HUMANITY FIRST WENT TO THE
MOON TO MAKE A POINT. NOW
IT’S TIME TO OVERCOME RIVALRIES
AND PITCH IN TOGETHER
By Clara Moskowitz
ing at the TV; I saw the first steps of Neil such as Mars? But the moon is a good playground
Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin. The transmis- I’m in favor of also thinking about Mars, for technology development. For instance,
sion ended, and I went out of my home, but I believe the moon is the right way we can use the resources of the surface
into the fresh air. I was breathing deeply to go forward. We cannot talk today of the moon to build structures to shel-
and thinking, “We are doing the future.” about human missions to the surface ter the astronauts, to build observatories
MORE TO EXPLORE
Forming a Moon with an Earth-like Composition via
a Giant Impact. Robin M. Canup in Science, Vol. 338,
pages 1052–1055; November 23, 2012.
Tidal Evolution of the Moon from a High-Obliquity,
High-Angular-Momentum Earth. M atija Ćuk et al.
in Nature, V
ol. 539, pages 402–406; November 17, 2016.
The Origin of the Moon within a Terrestrial Synestia.
Simon J. Lock et al. in J GR Planets, V
ol. 123, No. 4,
pages 910–951; April 2018.
or to produce fuels of hydrogen and Forward, sorry. But why do you Apollo Next Generation Sample Analysis Program:
https://sservi.nasa.gov/articles/
oxygen. Therefore, the moon is a step- think now is the right time?
apollo-next-generation-sample-analysis-program
ping-stone to go farther: to Mars. I see, worldwide, the readiness to work Moon Village Association: https://moonvillage
But this is far in the future—it will together. I had discussions with the association.org
take decades. Even though some are Chinese, with the Americans, with the Transcripts from Apollo 11: w ww.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/
a11trans.html
announcing goals of shorter periods, Japanese, with the Russians, and all
Outer Space Treaty of 1967: w ww.state.gov/t/isn/5181.htm
we will see that this is not possible. of them are looking to work together
in the exploration of the moon, Mars FROM OUR ARCHIVES
1969
50years
2019
ANNIVERSARY
One Giant Leap: The Impossible The Moon: A History for the Future Apollo’s Muse:
Mission That Flew Us to the Moon by Oliver Morton. Economist Books, 2019 ($28) T he Moon in the Age of Photography
by Charles Fishman. Simon & Schuster, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.
2019 ($29.99) Humankind’s f ascination On exhibit July 3–September 22, 2019
with the moon came long (general admission, $25)
Landing astronauts o n the before two American astro-
moon was, by some estimates, nauts first walked on its When Italian s cientist Galileo
the greatest achievement of surface. “It defines the sky,” Galilei peered at the moon
the 20th century and has been science writer Morton says in The Moon. “ It through his homemade tele-
painstakingly chronicled. But completes the Earth.” In tribute, he thoughtfully scope, he sketched its surpris-
many of the behind-the-scenes stories of the A pol- describes the history of this intimate relation, from ingly craggy surface, published
lo 11 mission remain surprisingly unknown. Journal- earlier generations that depended on the natural his drawings in 1610 and launched a new field of
ist Fishman shares details such as the fact that the satellite as a utility to illuminate the night sky to astronomy called selenography. They were cer-
moon smells like wet ashes or that while Buzz Aldrin the triumph of the Apollo missions and the possi- tainly not the first pictures of the moon but per-
took the first moon walk, one of the engineers who bility of commercial space travel. Morton also haps a more scientific iteration of the age-old hu
© 2019 THE LEGO GROUP, USED BY PERMISSION
developed his spacesuit watched in silent horror, reflects on the influence of science fiction in soci- man captivation with Earth’s satellite. This summer
fearing Aldrin would trip, tear the suit and doom the ety before the moon landing—lunar-settlement the Metropolitan Museum of Art will display an
mission. Fishman also gives an account of heated stories represented the future, he writes, some- enchanting collection of moon images, from
conversations in late 1962 between President John F. times idyllic, sometimes terrible. Today the moon daguerreotypes—including two from the 1840s
Kennedy and nasa chief James E. Webb, revealing continues to inspire us: our species harbors new that were previously undiscovered—to the epic
that Kennedy was annoyed by the budget and diffi- ambitions to return to our planet’s closest com- portrait of Buzz Aldrin in his mirror-faced space hel-
culties of the Apollo program. In the end, the lunar panion and use it as a stepping-stone for further met taken by Neil Armstrong on the lunar surface in
mission succeeded against the odds. —Jim Daley exploration of the universe. —Sunya Bhutta 1969. And, of course, Galileo’s famous originals.
“Emotional AI” also be used in principle for pricing and marketing in ways that
just couldn’t be done before. As you stand before that vending
Sounds Appealing
machine, how thirsty do you look? Prices may change according-
ly. Hungry? Hot dogs may get more expensive.
This technology will almost certainly be used along with
facial-recognition algorithms. As you step into a store, cameras
But its consequences could be troubling could capture your countenance, identify you and pull up your
By Zeynep Tufekci data. The salesperson might get discreet tips on how to get you
to purchase that sweater—Appeal to your ego? Capitalize on your
Perhaps you’re familiar with Data from S tar Trek: The Next insecurities? Offer accessories and matching pieces?—while cou-
Generation, a n android endowed with advanced artificial intel- pons customized to lure you start flashing on your phone. Do the
ligence but no feelings—he’s incapable of feeling joy or sadness. databases know you have a job interview tomorrow? Okay, here’s
Yet Data aspires to more. He wants to be a person! So his creator a coupon for that blazer or tie. Are you flagged as someone who
embarks on a multiseason quest to develop the “emotion chip” shops but doesn’t buy or has limited finances? You may be
that would fulfill that dream. ignored or even tailed suspiciously.
As you watch the show, it’s hard not to wonder about the end One potential, and almost inevitable, use of emotion-recogni-
point of this quest. What would Data do first? Comfort a griev- tion software will be to identify people who have “undesirable”
ing person? Share a fellow crewmate’s joy? Laugh at a joke? behaviors. As usual, the first applications will likely be about secu-
Make a joke? Machine learning has already produced software rity. At a recent Taylor Swift concert, for example, facial recognition
that can process human emotions, reading micro expressions bet- was reportedly used to try to spot potential troublemakers. The
ter than humans can and generally cataloguing what may be software is already being deployed in U.S. airports, and it’s a mat-
going on inside a person just from scanning his or her face. ter of time before it may start doing more than identifying known
And right out of the gate, advertisers and marketers have security risks or stalkers. Who’s too nervous? Who’s acting guilty?
jumped on this technology. For example, Coca-Cola has hired a In more authoritarian countries, this software may turn to
company called Affectiva, which markets emotion-recognition identifying malcontents. In China, an app pushed by the Com-
software, to fine-tune ads. As usual, money is driving this not so munist party has more than 100 million registered users—the
noble quest: research shows that ads that trigger strong emo- most downloaded app in Apple’s digital store in the nation. In a
tional reactions are better at getting us to spend than ads using country already known for digital surveillance and a “social
rational or informational approaches. Emotional recognition can credit system” that rewards and punishes based on behavior the
party favors or frowns on, it’s not surprising that so many peo-
ple have downloaded an app that the New York Times describes
as “devoted to promoting President Xi Jinping.” Soon people in
China may not even be able to roll their eyes while they use the
app: the phone’s camera could gauge their vivacity and happi-
ness as they read Xi’s latest quotes, then deduct points for those
who appear less than fully enthusiastic.
It’s not just China: the European Union is piloting a sort of
“virtual agent” at its borders that will use what some have called
an “AI lie detector.” Similar systems are being deployed by the U.S.
government. How long before companies start measuring wheth-
er customer service agents are smiling enough? It may seem like
a giant leap from selling soda to enforcing emotional compliance,
and there can certainly be some positive uses for these technolo-
gies. But the people pushing them tend to accentuate the positive
and downplay the potential downside. Remember Facebook’s
feel-good early days?
If Data had ever been able to feel human emotions, he might
have been surprised by how important greed and power are in
human societies—and “emotional AI,” unless properly regulated,
could be a key tool for social control. That should give us all
unhappy faces.
J O I N T H E C O N V E R S AT I O N O N L I N E
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us, aka the U.S., as the convenient abbreviation would have it.
We and the world are facing big problems, and Diamond
points out that we’re never going to solve those problems with-
out acknowledging their existence. In fact, he sets up his argu-
ments by examining how individuals in personal crises do or do
not deal with those situations successfully and then drawing
analogies, when possible, to countries.
In such a framework, a decision by a smiling Senator James
Inhofe of Oklahoma in 2015 to display a snowball on the Senate
floor to somehow refute the reality of climate change could be
considered a symptom of a national delusional disorder.
Of course, that disorder has really bloomed in the years since.
“Not enough American citizens and politicians take our current
major problems seriously,” Diamond writes, regarding the dete-
rioration of political compromise, the increase in incivility, taint-
ed elections (including by voter suppression) and economic
inequality. (Climate change is in the section on global threats.)
The U.S. is also hampered by what I think is a misinterpreta-
tion of the idea of American Exceptionalism—a term first coined,
ironically, by Joseph Stalin, when he wasn’t busy attacking Fin-
land. The notion of exceptionalism dates to Alexis de Tocqueville
in the 19th century and originally covered the country’s democ-
racy and personal freedoms. But in more recent times it often
seems (especially if you tune for a moment to Fox News) like
What, Us Worry?
exceptionalism has come to signify a belief that the U.S. is sim-
ply special—and shame on you if you question that specialness.
Nevertheless, Diamond notes, “although per-capita income is
somewhat higher in the U.S. than in most European countries,
Fixing a problem first requires life expectancy and measures of personal satisfaction are consis-
recognizing that it exists tently higher in Western Europe. That suggests that Western
European models may have much to teach us.”
By Steve Mirsky
But we seldom even bother to see if there’s anything to learn.
Perhaps the only funny item in Jared Diamond’s new book “That’s because we are convinced that . . . the U.S. is such a spe-
pheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis is an anecdote
U cial case that Western European and Canadian solutions could
about what was known as the Winter War. When the Soviet have nothing relevant to suggest to us. That negative attitude
Union invaded Finland in late 1939, the Finns resisted against deprives us of the option that so many individuals and countries
the much larger Soviet forces until the two countries compro- have found useful in resolving crises: learning from models of
mised on an uneasy peace. how others have already resolved similar crises.”
Various countries sent equipment to help Finland defend itself. Perhaps the only hope of curing that particular flight of fan-
One such gift was World War I artillery from Italy. “Each artil- cy can be found in this hypothetical exchange that Diamond
lery piece requires not only a gunner . . . but also someone called quotes: “QUESTION: When will the U.S. take its problems seri-
a spotter stationed some distance in front of the gun, in order to ously? ANSWER: When powerful rich Americans begin to feel
spot where the shell lands and thereby to correct the range set- physically unsafe.”
ting for the next shot,” Diamond explains. Of course, these large Finally, and perhaps of most concern to this audience, Dia-
guns have hefty recoils—and they were not designed well for mond delivers a solar plexus punch: “Skepticism about science
absorbing that jolt. So the Finns wound up using two spotters: is increasingly widespread in the U.S., and that’s a very bad por-
the usual one in front to see where the shell landed, “plus anoth- tent, because science is basically just the accurate description
er spotter behind the gun to see where the gun landed!” and understanding of the real world.” But as the muckraking
Other than that story, the book ranges from unemotionally writer Upton Sinclair put it in 1934, “It is difficult to get a man to
informational to somewhat grim—but necessarily so. Diamond— understand something, when his salary depends upon his not
a professor of geography at the University of California, Los understanding it.” Especially if that man is a U.S. senator.
Angeles, National Medal of Science honoree, recipient of a
JOIN T HE CONVERSAT ION ONLINE
MacArthur “genius grant” and winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Visit Scientific American on Facebook and Twitter
nonfiction—focuses on seven countries he knows well, including or send a letter to the editor: editors@sciam.com
J U LY
1969 Neutrino
Puzzle
“Most physicists and astronomers
by the Germans on the fields of
Belgium. If the vanquished nations
who set their hand and seal to the
Natural History, who have done so
much traveling and collecting in
South America, have suggested
believe that the sun’s heat is pro- covenant of peace did so with a a plausible origin for such tales.
duced by thermonuclear reactions hatred, blind, unreasoning and They think that the story of the
that fuse light elements into heavi- implacable in their hearts, it will ‘monkey bridge’ has come about
er ones. To demonstrate the truth be merely a question of time and through observation of a procession
of this hypothesis, however, is still opportunity before the armed 1969 of monkeys crossing a ravine or
not easy, nearly 50 years after it multitudes will be on the march, stream on a pendent liana [vine].”
was suggested by Sir Arthur Edding- and red ruin will stride again
ton. Of the particles released by
the hypothetical reactions in the
solar interior, only one species has
across the world. It is our firm
belief—for there is no evidence
to the contrary—that the nations
1869 Industrial
Hazard
“The British Medical Journal s ays:
the ability to penetrate to the sur- of the Entente, in this the supreme ‘Owing to the impossibility of keep-
face (a distance of some 400,000 hour of accomplishment, are more ing paint from coming into con-
miles) and escape into space: concerned with the healing of the tact with the skin while they are
the neutrino. Within the past world than with the humiliation 1919 at work; and to the almost univer-
year a giant neutrino trap has of the enemy.” sal practice among them of touch-
begun operating in a rock cavity Economist John Maynard Keynes ing their food with unwashed
deep below the surface in the predicted at the time, correctly, that the hands; and to the habit of some
Homestake Mine in Lead, S.D. harsh punitive measures in the treaty of them of wearing corduroy, fus-
The initial results published have would cripple the German economy. tian, and other clothes difficult to
left astronomers and astrophysi- cleanse, painters absorb large
cists somewhat puzzled because A Monkey’s Tale quantities of the hurtful metal
the neutrino flux rate seems “An interesting article by Prof. E. W. [lead], and suffer gravely in conse-
low.—John N. Bahcall” Gudger, in a recent issue of Natu- 1869 quence. If he continue to follow
ral History, d eals with the time- his trade, the more serious diseas-
#scotch
Social media bots promote unproved
#nowsmoking
benefits of e-cigarettes #cigars
#addiction#smoker #blu
#tobacco
Vaping is hot. A clever analysis of #cigarettes
Twitter posts reveals one possible
#smokers #vapeclub #atomizer
#hookah #smoke
reason: automated accounts, or bots,
may be convincing people that elec-
#marijuana
tronic cigarettes are beneficial.
Researchers analyzed 2.2 million #bigtobacco #eliquid #vapors
tweets about vaping and discov-
#cannabis
ered that hash tags used in Vaping Hashtags Used by Humans
#vapes #ejuice #vapestagram
tweets by humans differ from Numerous
those in tweets by bots. Bots #ejuice #vaping human
#vape #instavape hashtags refer
focus on new products and
#vapelife #ecigs #vapesociety to e-cigarettes
on vaping as an effective way
#vapeporn and vaping. No
to stop smoking tobacco even pairs of hashtags
#vapeorizer
though “there is limited scien- #vapenation dominate, so the
tific evidence for that,” says usage pattern is
study leader Jon-Patrick Allem, spread somewhat
an assistant professor of research evenly. Color clusters
#ecig represent general topics of
at the University of Southern Califor- conversation, which often
#vapecommunity
nia. Hashtags written by humans em- #vaper overlap. Terms near the center are most
#weed
phasize people’s lifestyles—vaping is cool, common to all three topic clusters. Researchers
vapers are a community. Allem speculates the found 238 hashtags (dots) used in 5,203 pairs (lines).
#buzz
bots are propagated by manufacturers or by orga- Behaviors and community
nizations that promote vaper rights or that are Human topic clusters Products and community
generally against government regulation. Multiple-substance use
#modbox
#online
#mobile #ismog
#esmoker #cigpet
#cigarette
#cigaratte #quality #esmoke
#tobacco
#bongs
#photography #cheap
SOURCE: “E-CIGARETTE SURVEILLANCE WITH SOCIAL MEDIA DATA: SOCIAL BOTS, EMERGING TOPICS, AND TRENDS,”
BY JON-PATRICK ALLEM ET AL. IN J MIR PUBLIC HEALTH AND SURVEILLANCE, VOL. 3, NO. 4, ARTICLE E98; 2017
92 Scientific American, July 2019