Lee Billings
@leebillings.bsky.social
CHNOPS in ferruginous saline. Multicellular aerobic chemoheterotroph; symbiont of photosynthetic autotrophs. Descendant of stardust; aspiring good ancestor. Senior Editor, Scientific American. Signal: @lee_billings.81
FYI Science Policy News: More U.S.-trained physicists are leaving the country, an exodus that adds to fears of a U.S. "brain drain" www.aip.org/fyi/physics-... a near-doubling of non-US citizens left the US after receiving their PhD, around 29%, in 2025 @aip.bsky.social
Physics PhDs Are Leaving the US at a Record-high Rate
The exodus of non-US citizens has “certainly” been influenced by science funding and visa policy changes under Trump, a new AIP report says.
aip.org
This is the highest-resolution view of the surface of the Sun. Ever. Taken by the NSF's Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope, features as small as 19 km across can be resolved. The wispy things are magnetic field boundaries formed by Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities. The island of Ireland for scale.
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: Behold! These are the sharpest images of the sun's surface ever obtained, and they reveal something *wild*: never-before-seen whirlpools of plasma called Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities that are fundamental to solar energy flow. www.scientificamerican.com/article/spec...
Spectacular images reveal never-before-seen whirlpools on the sun
Strange whirlpools of plasma seen in the sharpest images ever captured of our star help explain the deep origins of Earth-threatening space weather and more
scientificamerican.com
"One millionth Starlink detected" isn't listed, because it would be like the free space. xkcd.com/3278/
Vera Rubin Observatory
xkcd.com
Spin qubits, which have lagged as candidates for the nuts and bolts of quantum computers, limited in number and quality, have made striking progress in the last year. But the specter of science funding trouble is here, too. My reporting:
Underdog ‘spin qubits’ leap forward in race to a useful quantum computer
Four independent research teams report big advances in devices built with the underestimated quantum bits, including lower error rates.
nature.com
"Jackal then executed fresh burns to reengage and image Puma." I imagine specifics won't be released, but I'd be very curious about the details as to roughly how close they got, what kind of images were made, how long did it take them to reengage Puma, etc. www.trueanomaly.space/newsroom/vic...
VICTUS HAZE Mission Update: Jackal Hunts Puma
trueanomaly.space
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: A spacecraft on a rescue mission to NASA's aging Swift space telescope is in trouble in Earth orbit. Can the mission—and Swift—be saved? www.scientificamerican.com/article/resc...
Rescue mission to save NASA’s Swift space telescope is imperiled in orbit
A private spacecraft launched to boost the decaying orbit of NASA’s Swift Observatory is now suffering from potentially mission-ending malfunctions
scientificamerican.com
If you've enjoyed @nadiadrake.bsky.social's story for @sciam.bsky.social about a key conundrum in the search for life on Mars (or if, heavens forbid, you haven't read it yet!), her thread below offers a bit more insight into the piece's origins and some key considerations.
Nadia Drake@nadiadrake.bsky.social · last wk.A few months ago, I got a bit obsessed with a question about life on Mars: When—or if—“life” becomes the most parsimonious explanation for a handful of potential biosignatures, how will we know? Would we even admit it? This story grew from that question. www.scientificamerican.com/article/has-...
ICYMI, this is the best story you're gonna find about the current status of the search for life on Mars, wrapped up inside a 50th-anniversary retrospective of NASA's epochal Viking missions. And it's only on @sciam.bsky.social.
Lee Billings@leebillings.bsky.social · last wk.Now on @sciam.bsky.social: Has NASA already found life on Mars? A controversial new assessment of half-century-old data suggests the space agency’s life-hunting Mars lander Viking 1 found exactly what it was looking for. By @nadiadrake.bsky.social. www.scientificamerican.com/article/has-...
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: Astronomers just revealed the best-yet images of Betelgeuse's buddy, a ~3x-solar-mass companion star. By @adamjkovac.bsky.social. www.scientificamerican.com/article/scie...
Scientists get best-yet glimpse of Betelgeuse’s companion star
After decades of hints and speculation, scientists have at last unveiled the hidden companion to the iconic star Betelgeuse
scientificamerican.com
A great get for AIP. Congrats all around!!!
Dan Vergano@danvergano.bsky.social · last wk.Some business news: Pleased to announce today was my first day as Director, Science Policy News, at the American Institute of Physics. We're best known for FYI: Science Policy News www.aip.org/fyi the long-running weekly newsletter and news platform for science insiders. More TK.
A fascinating and spicy piece by @nadiadrake.bsky.social about the possibility that we may have already found Martian life, and whether the astrobiology community should reconsider the maxim that “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” www.scientificamerican.com/article/has-...
Has NASA already found life on Mars?
In searches for past and present Martian life, some scientists say we’ve been too cautious to see what’s right in front of us
scientificamerican.com
Even more books recommendations from @sciam.bsky.social this summer! Check out what's been in my beach bag this summer and use #SciAmBookBingo and #SciAmSummerReading to tell us what you've been reading! www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxyA...
Your summer reading list starts here | Science Quickly Podcast
YouTube video by Scientific American
youtube.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: Has NASA already found life on Mars? A controversial new assessment of half-century-old data suggests the space agency’s life-hunting Mars lander Viking 1 found exactly what it was looking for. By @nadiadrake.bsky.social. www.scientificamerican.com/article/has-...
Has NASA already found life on Mars?
In searches for past and present Martian life, some scientists say we’ve been too cautious to see what’s right in front of us
scientificamerican.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: The Fields Medals—math's most prestigious prizes, often compared to the Nobels—have 4 new honorees, for work ranging from the theory of knots to the motion of fluids. Congrats to Hong Wang, Yu Deng, John Pardon & Jacob Tsimerman! www.scientificamerican.com/article/2026...
Math’s latest Fields Medalists are the most diverse group yet
The 2026 Fields Medals recognize breakthroughs in the math of messy fluids, tangled knots, spinning pencils, and more
scientificamerican.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: Unlucky 13? SpaceX's first attempt at launching Starship's 13th test flight ends in a scrub. scientificamerican.com/article/spac...
Unlucky number 13? SpaceX’s latest Starship launch attempt ends in a scrub
SpaceX’s first attempt to launch its Starship megarocket on its thirteenth flight test ended before it could properly begin, aborting just before liftoff
scientificamerican.com
My latest for @science.org: Scientists have discovered a new record-breaking ancient meteorite from Mars, formed more than 4.1 billion years ago. Dubbed Teghaza 001, it provides an unprecedented view of the martian crust from this time, suggesting it was much more complex than once thought.
Oldest known Mars rock offers glimpse of planet’s watery youth
Ancient Teghaza meteorite hints at granitelike crust and shows Mars was already losing its water 4.1 billion years ago
science.org
Via @sciam.bsky.social: The FCC’s approval for launching a controversial sunlight-beaming satellite, Eärendil-1, comes despite astronomers’ concerns about light pollution. To such objections, the FCC essentially had one response: that’s not our problem. www.scientificamerican.com/article/u-s-...
U.S. approval of a controversial satellite has scientists asking: Who’s really in charge of space?
A controversial new ruling from the Federal Communications Commission leaves no one responsible for regulating light pollution and other ill effects from skyrocketing numbers of satellites
scientificamerican.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: A recent paper in the high-profile journal Nature claimed what would've been an epochal revision to our understanding of the cosmos. Instead, independent follow-up work suggests the claim is wrong via a subtle-but-basic mistake. www.scientificamerican.com/article/phys...
Physicist says splashy new cosmology study made ‘elemental’ mistake
A recent study in the journal Nature carries cosmos-quaking implications for our understanding of the universe—except a new preprint says that it’s wrong
scientificamerican.com
Meghan is an editor’s dream. Sharp, fast, and thorough reporting; finely crafted prose; excellent situational awareness and an eagerness to break news and do impactful work. She’s one of the best in the biz, and SciAm is significantly poorer without her.
Meghan Bartels@meghanbartels.bsky.social · last mo.I’m so sad to share that yesterday was my last day at Scientific American. It was an honor to work alongside my incredible colleagues and to speak with researchers across the sciences. If you’re looking to hire staff or freelance, please consider me and my other laid off coworkers (🧵)
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: Heavy-duty machine learning and a surfing mathematician are at the forefront of a millennia-old quest (and a million-dollar prize) to understand how fluids swirl. www.scientificamerican.com/article/huma...
The million-dollar race to ‘blow up’ math’s hardest equations
New results challenge AI’s promise for solving how fluids swirl—and suggest a more human path forward
scientificamerican.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: China’s Tianwen-2 spacecraft is prepping for a close encounter on July 4 with near-Earth asteroid and “quasi-moon” Kamo‘oalewa. Tianwen-2 will seek to grab samples from the small, enigmatic space rock for return to Earth in 2027. www.scientificamerican.com/article/chin...
China’s Tianwen-2 spacecraft will soon grab samples from a ‘quasi-moon’ of Earth
The Tianwen-2 spacecraft is slowly closing in on the near-Earth asteroid Kamo‘oalewa, on a mission that would bring China’s first asteroid samples back to Earth in 2027
scientificamerican.com
Thread on our new paper on arxiv today! We stumbled across a weird sinusoidal systematic that we think appears in every observation from the NIRISS instrument on JWST. We derive a correction and see how much it impacts exoplanet spectra. (1/N) #astro #exoplanets 🔭🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2606.11983
Calibration of an Analog-to-Digital Conversion Nonlinearity in JWST/NIRISS
We quantify an unusual flux-dependent systematic which is periodic in raw counts in flight data from the James Webb Space Telescope's Near Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph (JWST/NIRISS), used...
arxiv.org
The Arrakihs mission has been adopted as ESA's next F-class mission, with an expected launch in 2030! It will look at the low surface brightness outskirts of 80 Milky Way-like galaxies. www.esa.int/Science_Expl...
ESA adopts galactic archaeology mission Arrakihs
The European Space Agency’s (ESA) Science Programme Committee has adopted the Arrakihs mission. Planned for launch by the end of 2030, Arrakihs will capture the faint light from nearby galaxy haloes. ...
esa.int
How to tell if your dog is left-pawed or right-pawed, according to science A step-by-step guide to the “Doginburgh Inventory,” a new pawedness test developed by dog behavior researchers www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-...
How to tell if your dog is left-pawed or right-pawed, according to science
A step-by-step guide to the “Doginburgh Inventory,” a new pawedness test developed by dog behavior researchers
scientificamerican.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: NASA has unveiled its Artemis III astronauts: commander Randy Bresnik, pilot Luca Parmitano, and mission specialists Andre Douglas and Frank Rubio. They'll launch to low-Earth orbit as early as next year. www.scientificamerican.com/article/nasa...
NASA reveals astronauts who will fly Artemis III, its next step toward a moon landing
NASA’s Artemis III crew includes three NASA astronauts and one European Space Agency astronaut
scientificamerican.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: A rare meteorite recovered in 2019 from the Sahara Desert seems to be a half-kilo hunk blasted from the depths of a long-lost planet that roamed the (very) early solar system. Cool story by @jennaahart.bsky.social. www.scientificamerican.com/article/rare...
Scientists found a piece of a lost planet in the Sahara Desert
Hints of high-pressure chemistry within a rare meteorite suggest this fallen space rock comes from a planet gone wrong in the solar system’s early history
scientificamerican.com
Now on @sciam.bsky.social: The most fecund sites for forming planets throughout the cosmos might be... the outskirts of supermassive black holes? What?! Nice piece from @philplait.bsky.social. www.scientificamerican.com/article/plan...
Planets may swarm around supermassive black holes. Could any be habitable?
Planets might exist in the least likely place you’d imagine—around the outskirts of supermassive black holes
scientificamerican.com