The brightest take on this week’s science
Hello, my fellow carbon-based life forms! I have some very exciting news to share…
The Perseverance rover on Mars has delivered the best evidence yet that life once existed on other planets. Read on.
Plus, this week as a Spark subscriber, you’re getting a special, exclusive interview on another Martian discovery: a big surprise that lurks at the very core of the red planet.
Also in this issue:
🤯 A mind-blowing science fact
🔬 A microscope mystery
Let’s see where the science takes us!
LOOK UP
Mars rover spots signs of ancient life
(Kevin Gill/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)
The Perseverance rover on Mars has delivered the goods.
Scientists at NASA just announced that a spotted rock sampled by Percy over a year ago is compelling evidence of fossilized microbes.
Until the sample is brought home to Earth, we can’t know for certain, but…
It’s the best evidence yet for life on Mars.
Some minerals in the rock look like they are the product of 'redox' reactions, which may have involved organic carbon.
Plus, the rock shows no signs it was exposed to the right heat or acidity to match a non-biological source.
If this really is a sign of fossilized microbes, then it suggests Earth and Mars once hosted similar life forms, billions of years ago.
Twins!
HEADLINES
What else we're watching
🏅This week’s most read: 4 powerful telescopes agree: Interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS really is bizarre
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
A surprise lurks at the very core of Mars
(Mark Garlick/Science Photo Library/Getty Images)
The inner core of Mars is hiding quite the surprise.
New seismic data from a robotic lander suggests that the Martian core is not as squishy as scientists previously thought.
Evidence suggests it actually has a hard heart.
Our head journalist Michelle Starr chatted to the scientists behind the unexpected discovery to find out what’s going on.
It's only in the last few years that researchers have been able to map Mars’ interior, and what they are finding is not what they bargained on.
As a newsletter subscriber, you get an exclusive peek at Michelle’s interview… lucky you!
ZOOM ZONE
Microscope mystery: What do you see?
(Steve GSchmeissner/Science Photo Library/Getty Images)
A) Velcro
B) Cotton
C) Nylon
D) World’s smallest spaghetti
Answer at the bottom.
LOW-KEY GENIUS
A cheerful tune may help your car sickness
(Justin Paget/Getty Images)
If you suddenly start to feel queasy in the car, there’s a trick that could make you feel better, sooner.
A new neuroscience study suggests that joyful or relaxing music is a surprisingly effective intervention for reducing nausea and dizziness from travel.
In the study, joyful music alleviated symptoms of carsickness by 14 percent compared to a control group.
Weirdly, though, one type of music made the nausea worse…
WOW FACTOR
Science fact of the week
Lasers are powerful beams of light, but even they can’t escape the tight grip of flowing water.
Thanks to a quirk of physics, it’s possible to 'trap' a laser beam in a cascading stream of liquid.
As light bounces back and forth within the stream, it turns the spout into a brilliant, gleaming waterfall.
READER CHALLENGE
Before you go…
Do you have a cool photo of a natural event, like last week’s stunning Blood Moon, or your very own microscope mystery?
We want to see it!
Share your picture with us by replying to this email, and you might see it featured in an upcoming edition of Spark.
September 7’s Blood Moon over the ancient Greek goddess statue of Irene. (Angelos Tzortzinis/Getty Images)
Microscope answer: Nylon tights. (Although… nanometer-thick spaghetti really is a thing.)
Nylon was the first fully synthetic fiber ever created, and in the 1940s, it quickly took the world by storm. Customers loved nylon stocks so much, they caused riots to get their hands on limited supplies.
That’s all for today… see you next week!
- Carly
