Short Takes – 1-25-24

A Viral Solution to Farming’s Antibiotic Addiction. Ambrook.com article. Pull quote: “However, he believes phages can scale, given the right investment. Making phages is relatively easy — you can create 10,000 gallons of them in just a few days. That said, infrastructure for storage and transport remains a barrier. While antibiotics have had 100 years of application, phages are still in their early days, at least when it comes to widespread use. “We haven’t brought down the cost to have it [widely] adopted,” Roach added. “But the price will come down, it’s inevitable.””

Recent Postings of Broadly Applicable Alternative Test Methods. Federal Register EPA notice. Summary: “This notice announces the broadly applicable alternative test method approval decisions that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) made under and in support of New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) and the National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants (NESHAP) between January 1, 2023, and December 31, 2023.” List of test methods here.

The amazing helicopter on Mars, Ingenuity, will fly no more. ArsTechnica.com article. Broken rotor blade. Pull quote: “But it turns out that Ingenuity had other ideas. Since its deployment from the Perseverance rover in April 2021, the helicopter has flown a staggering 72 flights. It has spent more than two hours—128.3 minutes, to be precise—flying through the thin Martian air. Over that time, it flew 11 miles, or 17 km, performing invaluable scouting and scientific investigations. It has been a huge win for NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, one of the greatest spaceflight stories of this decade.”

News Release: DHS S&T Announces Track 3 of the Remote Identity Validation Tech Demo Challenge. DHS.gov press release. Pull quote: “RIVTD challenges industry to deliver secure, accurate, and easy-to-use remote identity validation technologies to address identity fraud. While millions of people apply for government services or open bank accounts by summitting identity information online, independent or objective data characterizing the performance of these verification technologies, and the degree to which they may reduce fraud is still limited. In an age of widespread increasingly believable phony media, the RIVTD fills a critical gap.” Applications for Track 3 are due by February 29, 2024.

NASA System Predicts Impact of a Very Small Asteroid Over Germany. NASA.gov article. Pull quote: “A small asteroid about 3 feet (1 meter) in size disintegrated harmlessly over Germany on Sunday, Jan. 21, at 1:32 a.m. local time (CET). At 95 minutes before it impacted Earth’s atmosphere, NASA’s Scout impact hazard assessment system, which monitors data on potential asteroid discoveries, gave advance warning as to where and when the asteroid would impact. This is the eighth time in history that a small Earth-bound asteroid has been detected while still in space, before entering and disintegrating in our atmosphere.”

A fiber inspired by polar bears traps heat as well as down feathers do. ScienceNews.org article. Pull quote: “The Arctic’s extreme cold is no match for a polar bear’s super-insulating fur. Humans could one day benefit from a similar material, thanks to a new fiber that mimics the bears’ porous hairs. A sweater knit from the fiber is about one-fifth the thickness of a down coat but similarly warm, researchers report in the Dec. 22 Science.”