The Lyrids have surprised skygazers in the past with as many as 100 meteors per hour, but it’s not predicted to be as active this time around.

During Tuesday morning’s peak, expect to see around six meteors per hour, said Thaddeus LaCoursiere, planetarium program coordinator at the Bell Museum in St. Paul, Minnesota.

The waning crescent moon will be 40% full, meaning a decent level of visibility under clear and dark conditions.

Viewing lasts until April 26. Here’s what to know about the Lyrids and other meteor showers.

What Is a Meteor Shower?

As the Earth orbits the sun, several times a year it passes through debris left by passing comets and sometimes asteroids. The source of the Lyrids is debris from the comet Thatcher.

When these fast-moving space rocks enter Earth’s atmosphere, the debris encounters new resistance from the air and becomes very hot, eventually burning up.

Sometimes the surrounding air glows briefly, leaving behind a fiery tail — the end of a “shooting star.”

You don’t need special equipment to see the various meteor showers that flash across annually, just a spot away from city lights.

How to View a Meteor Shower

The best time to watch a meteor shower is in the early predawn hours when the moon is low in the sky.

Competing sources of light — such as a bright moon or artificial glow — are the main obstacles to a clear view of meteors. Cloudless nights when the moon wanes smallest are optimal viewing opportunities.

And keep looking up, not down. Your eyes will be better adapted to spot shooting stars if you aren’t checking your phone.

When Is the Next Meteor Shower?

The next major meteor shower, the Eta Aquarids, peaks in early May.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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It will be the second asteroid encounter for Lucy, launched in 2021 on a quest that will take it to 11 space rocks. The close approaches should help scientists better understand our early solar system when planets were forming; asteroids are the ancient leftovers.

Dress Rehearsal Flyby

The upcoming flyby is a dress rehearsal for 2027 when Lucy reaches its first so-called Trojan asteroid near Jupiter.

Cranking up its three science instruments, the spacecraft on Sunday will observe the harmless asteroid known as Donaldjohanson. The encounter will take place 139 million miles (223 million kilometers) from Earth in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, so far away it will take 12 minutes for each bit of data to reach flight controllers in Colorado.

The paleontologist for whom the asteroid is named plans to be at spacecraft builder and operator Lockheed Martin’s Mission Control for all the action. He discovered the fossil Lucy in Ethiopia 50 years ago; the spacecraft is named after the famous human ancestor.

Observing Donaldjohanson

NASA’s Lucy will venture as close as 596 miles (960 kilometers) to this asteroid, an estimated 2 ½ miles (4 kilometers) in length but much shorter in width. Scientists should have a better idea of its size and shape following the brief visit. The spacecraft will zoom by at more than 30,000 mph (48,000 kph).

The asteroid is among countless fragments believed to have resulted from a major collision 150 million years ago.

“It’s not going to be a basic potato. We already know that,” said lead scientist Hal Levison of Southwest Research Institute.

Rather, Levison said the asteroid may resemble a bowling pin or even a snowman like Arrokoth, the Kuiper Belt object visited by NASA’s New Horizon spacecraft in 2019. The other possibility is that there are two elongated but separate asteroids far apart.

Future Trojan Encounters

“We don’t know what to expect. That’s what makes this so cool,” he said.

There will be no communications with Lucy during the flyby as the spacecraft turns its antenna away from Earth in order to track the asteroid. Levison expects to have most of the science data within a day.

Lucy’s next stop — “the main event,” as Levison calls it — will be the Trojan asteroids that share Jupiter’s orbit around the sun. Swarms of Trojans precede and follow the solar system’s largest planet as it circles the sun. Lucy will visit eight of them from 2027 through 2033, some of them in pairs of two.

Lucy’s first asteroid flyby was in 2023 when it swept past little Dinkinesh, also in the main asteroid belt. The spacecraft discovered a mini moon around it.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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The two gases – dimethyl sulfide, or DMS, and dimethyl disulfide, or DMDS – involved in Webb’s observations of the planet named K2-18 b are generated on Earth by living organisms, primarily microbial life such as marine phytoplankton – algae.

This suggests the planet may be teeming with microbial life, the researchers said. They stressed, however, that they are not announcing the discovery of actual living organisms but rather a possible biosignature – an indicator of a biological process – and that the findings should be viewed cautiously, with more observations needed.

Nonetheless, they voiced excitement. These are the first hints of an alien world that is possibly inhabited, said astrophysicist Nikku Madhusudhan of the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Astronomy, lead author of the study published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

“This is a transformational moment in the search for life beyond the solar system, where we have demonstrated that it is possible to detect biosignatures in potentially habitable planets with current facilities. We have entered the era of observational astrobiology,” Madhusudhan said.

Madhusudhan noted that there are various efforts underway searching for signs of life in our solar system, including various claims of environments that might be conducive to life in places like Mars, Venus and various icy moons.

K2-18 b is 8.6 times as massive as Earth and has a diameter about 2.6 times as large as our planet.

It orbits in the “habitable zone” – a distance where liquid water, a key ingredient for life, can exist on a planetary surface – around a red dwarf star smaller and less luminous than our sun, located about 124 light-years from Earth in the constellation Leo. A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, 5.9 trillion miles (9.5 trillion km). One other planet also has been identified orbiting this star.

A ‘Hycean World’

About 5,800 planets beyond our solar system, called exoplanets, have been discovered since the 1990s. Scientists have hypothesized the existence of exoplanets called hycean worlds – covered by a liquid water ocean habitable by microorganisms and with a hydrogen-rich atmosphere.

Earlier observations by Webb, which was launched in 2021 and became operational in 2022, had identified methane and carbon dioxide in K2-18 b’s atmosphere, the first time that carbon-based molecules were discovered in the atmosphere of an exoplanet in a star’s habitable zone.

“The only scenario that currently explains all the data obtained so far from JWST (James Webb Space Telescope), including the past and present observations, is one where K2-18 b is a hycean world teeming with life,” Madhusudhan said. “However, we need to be open and continue exploring other scenarios.”

Madhusudhan said that with hycean worlds, if they exist, “we are talking about microbial life, possibly like what we see in the Earth’s oceans.” Their oceans are hypothesized to be warmer than Earth’s. Asked about possible multicellular organisms or even intelligent life, Madhusudhan said, “We won’t be able to answer this question at this stage. The baseline assumption is of simple microbial life.”

DMS and DMDS, both from the same chemical family, have been predicted as important exoplanet biosignatures. Webb found that one or the other, or possibly both, were present in the planet‘s atmosphere at a 99.7% confidence level, meaning there is still a 0.3% chance of the observation being a statistical fluke.

The gases were detected at atmospheric concentrations of more than 10 parts per million by volume.

“For reference, this is thousands of times higher than their concentrations in the Earth’s atmosphere, and cannot be explained without biological activity based on existing knowledge,” Madhusudhan said.

Scientists not involved in the study counseled circumspection.

“The rich data from K2-18 b make it a tantalizing world,” said Christopher Glein, principal scientist at the Space Science Division of the Southwest Research Institute in Texas. “These latest data are a valuable contribution to our understanding. Yet, we must be very careful to test the data as thoroughly as possible. I look forward to seeing additional, independent work on the data analysis starting as soon as next week.”

Transit Method

K2-18 b is part of the “sub-Neptune” class of planets, with a diameter greater than Earth’s but less than that of Neptune, our solar system’s smallest gas planet.

To ascertain the chemical composition of an exoplanet‘s atmosphere, astronomers analyze the light from its host star as the planet passes in front of it from the perspective of Earth, called the transit method. As the planet transits, Webb can detect a decrease in stellar brightness, and a small fraction of starlight passes through the planetary atmosphere before being detected by the telescope. This lets scientists determine the constituent gases of the planet‘s atmosphere.

Webb’s previous observations of this planet provided a tentative hint of DMS. Its new observations used a different instrument and a different wavelength range of light.

The “Holy Grail” of exoplanet science, Madhusudhan said, is to find evidence of life on an Earth-like planet beyond our solar system. Madhusudhan said that our species for thousands of years has wondered “are we alone” in the universe, and now might be within just a few years of detecting possible alien life on a hycean world.

But Madhusudhan still urged caution.

“First we need to repeat the observations two to three times to make sure the signal we are seeing is robust and to increase the detection significance” to the level at which the odds of a statistical fluke are below roughly one in a million, Madhusudhan said.

“Second, we need more theoretical and experimental studies to make sure whether or not there is another abiotic mechanism (one not involving biological processes) to make DMS or DMDS in a planetary atmosphere like that of K2-18 b. Even though previous studies have suggested them (as) robust biosignatures even for K2-18 b, we need to remain open and pursue other possibilities,” Madhusudhan said.

So the findings represent “a big if” on whether the observations are due to life, and it is in “no one’s interest to claim prematurely that we have detected life,” Madhusudhan said.

—

(Reporting by Will Dunham in Washington; Additional reporting by Stuart McDill in London; Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)

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The National Institutes of Health reversed its termination of a $36 million grant to a UC Davis researcher studying dementia, a day after CalMatters wrote about the cancelled grant and the researcher filed an appeal.

The National Institutes of Health cancelled the grant last month, following the Trump administration’s ban on federal spending on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

Charles DeCarli, a neurologist at UC Davis and lead researcher on the project, got a notice from the agency Friday morning that he could again use the grant’s funds and conduct his research. The agency gave no reason for the reversal. The project included 1,700 participants with mild cognitive impairments plus 28 research and clinical sites across the country.

The notice came after DeCarli and UC Davis officials submitted an appeal contesting the termination Wednesday night. A CalMatters story detailing the fallout from his grant’s cancellation ran Thursday morning.

DeCarli’s grant was among the roughly 30 projects that the National Institutes of Health cut at the University of California since February. Those projects included developing a coronavirus vaccine, studying HIV prevention and assessing how racial discrimination affects the health of older gay men. The UC grants were worth $173 million and the terminated portions totalled $38 million. Nationally, the agency killed off more than 700 grants. The NIH is the world’s largest funder of health science research.

On March 21 the agency canceled DeCarli’s grant and froze about $10 million in remaining funds it awarded the project last September. With the grant funds frozen, the ongoing work of evaluating the current participants through MRI imaging and blood analysis ceased.

The NIH’s termination letter said that DeCarli’s work “does not effectuate NIH priorities” — a phrase used in letters to other researchers whose grants were terminated.

DeCarli’s research project focused on understanding how dementia affects all Americans and considered demographic details that included not just race and ethnicity but also education levels and where in the U.S. individuals live. The NIH awarded him the grant in Trump’s first term. The grant application required that projects reflect the “gender, racial, and ethnic diversity in the United States.”

State, National Lawsuits Against NIH Cuts

California’s attorney general sued the NIH over the cancellations on April 4, joining a coalition of 15 other state attorneys general trying to force the agency to reverse their rescissions. The lawyers argue that the cuts violated a law passed by Congress and are unconstitutional. It’s one of the growing list of legal actions the state has taken against the Trump administration in response to federal funding cuts, including health research. Other groups have also sued the NIH, arguing that the agency is illegally conducting an “ongoing ideological purge” by stripping funding from grants it perceives as focused on DEI.

The often-conservative editorial board of the Wall Street Journal wrote last week that “taking a machete to research funds and contracts will undermine public support for the (Trump) Administration’s goals.”

An article in the highly respected Journal of the American Medical Association warned that President Donald Trump’s campaign to gut research that examines health issues in women and diverse demographic groups may lead to harmful drug side effects. That’s because studies with less diverse participants may not catch genetic or other biological differences that make a drug safe for one group but lead to defects for another. In one infamous case, a medicine whose drug trial excluded pregnant women resulted in thousands of babies born with deformed or missing limbs. The NIH only required that women be included in research it funds between 1989 and 1993, the article said.

Dementia Project Still Compromised

In addition to DeCarli’s, other grants at the University of California were reinstated, said UC office of the President spokesperson Stett Holbrook on Saturday. He didn’t indicate which ones were brought back or when those notices appeared. But at least one notable grant has yet to be restored: a project studying the benefits and risks of the shingles vaccine at UC San Francisco that received national media attention, said Kristen Bole, a spokesperson for UCSF, on Friday.

Even with the funds returned, DeCarli said it’ll take a month to restore the project’s operations and that the research will likely be permanently limited. His team needed roughly 500 more participants to bolster the scientific analysis. “I’m not sure we’re going to meet that number,” he said. Just before the grant was terminated, his team was recruiting about 90 participants a month. He and his colleagues will lead webinars for individuals who were already participating in the study to explain the pause in research. DeCarli expects some participants won’t return to the study.

He’ll also need to reestablish subcontracts with other university sites to continue the research. Those include the clinical work at UC San Diego and University of Southern California to recruit participants, draw blood and conduct MRIs; statistical analysis at UC San Francisco and work at UCLA reviewing blood samples.

He’s grateful for the legal and administrative work UC Davis and the UC Office of the President provided him in contesting the termination. His appeal was 18 pages and took three weeks to write. In it, he argued that the grant reflected major scientific priorities, including a law Congress passed more than a decade ago to study dementia. He received input from other scientists across the country on how to rebut the NIH.

“I have a very strong faith, and it helps to say, OK, God, what do I do here?” he added. “No magic answer” appeared, but the message he felt was, “just hang in there, you know, just help me to let go of something.”

Five million Americans suffer from dementia, which is a loss of the ability to think and remember. While Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, there are others. DeCarli’s work examines the role vascular problems, such as injury to blood vessels in the brain, plays in dementia. At its most serious, dementia causes people to rely on others for basic tasks, such as eating and bathing.

In its original cancellation letter, the NIH wrote that “research programs based primarily on artificial and non-scientific categories, including amorphous equity objectives, are antithetical to the scientific inquiry, do nothing to expand our knowledge of living systems, provide low returns on investment, and ultimately do not enhance health, lengthen life, or reduce illness.”

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

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It was the latest wave in space tourism, where more of the rich and famous than ever before — or lucky and well-connected — can enter the zero-gravity realm traditionally dominated by professional astronauts.

The New Shepard rocket blasted off on the quick up-and-down trip from West Texas. The fringes of space beckoned some 65 miles (105 kilometers) up, promising a few precious minutes of weightlessness.

Sanchez, a helicopter pilot and former TV journalist, invited the others along for the 10-minute, fully automated flight, packing on the star power with singer-songwriter Perry and “CBS Mornings” co-host King.

Also sharing the ride were film producer Kerianne Flynn; Aisha Bowe, a former NASA engineer who started her own companies to promote science education; and Amanda Nguyen, a scientist who studied planets around other stars and now advocates for survivors of sexual violence.

Blue Origin Decline to Speak on Cost

Blue Origin declined to say how much the flight cost or who paid what. The trip came two months before Sanchez and Bezos marry in Venice.

It was the 11th human spaceflight for the Washington state-based company, founded by Bezos in 2000 after making a fortune with Amazon. Bezos strapped in for Blue Origin’s first space tourist flight in 2021 and accompanied the latest crew to the pad.

The celebrity launch was the nation’s first spaceflight where women filled each seat. The only other all-female crew in 64 years of human spaceflight was back in 1963. That’s when Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova launched by herself, becoming the first woman in space. Tereshkova spent three days off the planet.

Even after the latest launch, women represent barely 15% of the more than 700 people who have traveled into space. Sanchez said she deliberately chose women to launch with her, each of them eager to inspire both the young and old to dream big, and even commissioned special flight suits.

“It’s an important moment for the future of commercial space travel and for humanity in general and for women all around,” Perry told The Associated Press last week.

The launch brought out VIPs to West Texas including Oprah Winfrey, Kris Jenner and other members of the Kardashian family, and several women who previously have flown on private flights. Winfrey, a close friend of King, wiped away tears when the capsule reached space and the passengers were heard marveling at the moon and shouting with joy.

As the women were buckling up after a few minutes of weightlessness, Perry sang a few lines of “What a Wonderful World,” King said in a post-launch televised interview.

Bezos Opens Capsule Hatch After Landing

Bezos opened the capsule’s hatch minutes after touchdown, embracing Sanchez, the first one out. As they emerged, Perry and King kneeled and kissed the ground. “Oh my God, that was amazing,” said King, who considers herself an anxious airplane flyer.

This wasn’t the first Blue Origin launch with marquee names.

“Star Trek” actor William Shatner caught a lift to space with Blue Origin in 2021 at age 90, soon after Bezos’ inaugural trip. He was followed by former New York Giants defensive end and TV host Michael Strahan and Laura Shepard Churchley, the eldest daughter of Mercury astronaut Alan Shepard, for whom the rocket is named. Two aviation pioneers who missed out on space when they were younger — Wally Funk and Ed Dwight — also rocketed away at ages 82 and 90, respectively.

Most of Blue Origin’s passengers — 58 counting the latest launch — have been business or science types, TV hosts or YouTubers. Ticket prices are not disclosed.

The Russian Space Agency also has launched its share of space tourists, beginning with a California financier in 2001. Two decades later, a Russian actress filmed aboard the International Space Station.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX also sells multi-day trips to private customers. SpaceX’s first client to fly, billionaire tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman already has launched twice and performed the first private spacewalk. He’s now set to become NASA’s next administrator if confirmed by the Senate.

Chinese-born bitcoin investor Chun Wang just returned from the first spaceflight to carry people over the north and south poles. Wang picked up the whole SpaceX tab for himself and three polar explorers for an undisclosed sum.

“In this exciting new era of commercial spaceflight, the dream of becoming an astronaut is no longer limited to a select few,” Wang said via X last week.

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Scientists there fused two hydrogen isotopes, creating helium and created more energy than the experiment required.

Much like the atomic race and the space race, countries around the world want to be the first to harness fusion energy and apply it to their power grids.

The first to do so will have access to a plentiful, clean energy source without the same radioactive waste or dangers as traditional fission facilities, said Mike Campbell, owner of MCM Consultants and professor of practice at UC San Diego.

A single milligram of the two hydrogen isotopes in the reaction can create 100 kilowatt-hours of energy, Campbell said.

“Fusion is nature’s way of making energy — it’s God’s way, or nature’s, whatever you want to say,” said Campbell. “And we’re trying to do this on earth. Something that God or nature has made isn’t easy.”

Public Funding Encourages Cooperation in Fusion Research

Campbell helped build the ignition device at Lawrence Livermore that fired 192 lasers to heat hydrogen to 3 million degrees Celsius.

Now, China is well on its way to outdoing that laser built in the 1990s. However, there is no evidence that China has achieved ignition such as was done at Lawrence Livermore, according to a February report from the U.S. Commission on the Scaling of Fusion Energy.

But that country’s $1.5 billion in public funding in 2024 doubles U.S. funding, and they have several significant developments coming later this year and next.

The Chinese unified approach differs from the U.S., the commission said.

Since 2022, at least 12 U.S. startups have joined the race, according to the Fusion Industry Association.

Researchers say the U.S.’s disparate approach allows scientists to tackle the multitude of problems still besetting fusion energy. The $6 billion in American private investment outpaces Chinese funding, but researchers fear an overreliance on private money could stifle information sharing.

Now California legislators want to make sure the Golden State continues at the forefront.

State Sen. Anna Caballero, D-Merced, now has a bill with Sen. John McNerney, D-Stockton, to fund $100 million annually for labs and startups.

SB 80 creates a commission to approve and distribute funds to eligible recipients. The goal: to have commercial fusion energy in the state by the 2030s.

“Fusion energy is key to our clean energy future,” Caballero said in a statement. “This technology has the potential to provide California with carbon-free, reliable power while growing our economy and creating thousands of high-paying jobs.”

Fusion Is a Safe, High-Yielding Power Source: Campbell

While fission releases energy by splitting an atom, fusion does so by combining atoms.

Scientists theorized both processes in the 1930s, Campbell said. But it only took three or four years to recreate fission.

When two hydrogen isotopes come together to create helium — the process that happens in the sun — a massive amount of energy is released. But hydrogen’s positive charge causes it to repel itself.

So to combine them, scientists have to perform the process at millions of degrees Celsius, using the fourth state of matter, plasma.

“I need to heat something up so fast, that the particles are moving so fast that they can get close enough and finally the strong force grabs them and pulls them in,” Campbell said. “And then I have a new element — then I make helium. And then I get energy release.”

What’s more, fusion is safe, Campbell said. When something goes wrong in a fusion reaction, the process simply stops working. The meltdowns at Chernobyl, Fukushima, and Three-Mile Island wouldn’t happen with fusion power.

Fusion Race Neck-at-Neck Among Global Competitors

The process sounds straightforward but how to control those temperatures and what method to utilize are still unclear. Which fuel is best is still to be determined. One of the most commonly used — tritium — is very rare and requires lithium to be made.

The National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore merely provided a proof of concept, Campbell said. It’s not efficient enough to yield the kind of results researchers want to see.

Scientists have settled on two distinct methods to reach ignition. The U.S. uses an approach called inertial fusion, Campbell said.

China’s approach uses magnetic confinement involving a donut-shaped container called a tokamak. They both have advantages and disadvantages, he said.

This year, Chinese scientists achieved a significant breakthrough by conducting the longest burn recorded, according the U.S. fusion commission. The goal is to have another facility operational by 2027.

China also graduates 10 times more fusion Ph.D graduates than the U.S. and filed more fusion patents in 2023.

In Naka, Japan, that country partnered with the E.U. to create the world’s largest tokamak.

“Fusion is a very competitive field right now, and China is committed to being the first one there,” Campbell said. “So hopefully, that will inspire our government to work with the private sector, to have the patience and funding to make fusion real.”

Multifaceted Approach Means Tackling Many Problems At Once

Caballero’s SB 80 has gained support from San Diego-based General Atomics, the Livermore Lab Foundation, and Bakersfield-based B3K Prosperity.

It would divide the state into three different hubs — northern California, southern California and the Central Valley. A commission would review and approve funding requests from the regions.

The ignition experiment at Lawrence Livermore justified the decades of work scientists have put into fusion research, said Javier Garay, director of UC San Diego’s Fusion Engineering Institute. General Atomics has long partnered with UCSD on fusion research.

“We’re poised to use those findings…for commercial reasons,” Garay said. “Now, going from science experiments to the engineering work. Research needs to be done for actually doing the power plants and energy.”

But so many unknowns exist that research needs to be parallel, with different companies tackling different problems, he said. Materials also need to be found that can handle the millions of degrees of temperature. And, more efficient lasers need to be developed.

AI’s Potential Impact

Many of those discoveries begin with artificial intelligence, said Frank Wurthwein, director of the San Diego Supercomputer Center. It takes supercomputing to efficiently model the reaction. AI can also help scientists find materials capable of controlling the extreme heat.

While still in an early discovery phase itself, research into AI has to be done concurrently with fusion energy.

Having dozens of labs, startups, and longstanding companies work to solve these mysteries means tackling multiple issues simultaneously.

But private investment often comes with caveats. Intellectual property means financial returns for investors, but it can come at the cost of sharing findings.

“A field would progress fast when research is open and shared and therefore a lot of brains can be informed of what’s being understood,” Wurthwein said. “And then there is a point when you need industry investment, but industry investment always comes with some kind of commercial intent.”

AI, Quantum Computing, Fusion Energy National Security Issues: Ellis

A newly elected assemblymember, Stan Ellis, R-Bakersfield, comes from the world of quantum computing. Before he sold it, his company used advanced computing for cybersecurity, health care, and other applications.

Private investment is essential for advanced research, he said, but financiers need returns. And the still-nascent AI, quantum computing and fusion energy fields may not yield real returns for a long time. But the development is essential to national security, he said, especially when in concert with each other.

“Oil and gas are finite,” Ellis said. “So my futuristic thought is, if it’s finite, we need alternative energy sources.”

He considers $100 million to be a “drop in the bucket.”

Quantum computing means advancing artificial intelligence, he said. Artificial intelligence means advancing fusion power. Fusion powers those all.

“In a few years, when these systems are functioning, you’re going to see life-changing experiences,” Ellis said. “Whoever wins the quantum race wins the world.”

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The researchers also said they were told to remove the words “gender,” “cisgender” and “equitable” from their paper, which looked at smoking among rural young adults.

The reason given for the changes was to comply with an executive order from President Donald Trump, researchers Tamar Antin and Rachelle Annechino said in a blog post where they included screenshots of the revisions.

Researchers Plan to Publish Findings Elsewhere

Instead of complying, the researchers withdrew their paper from Public Health Reports, the official journal of the U.S. Surgeon General and U.S. Public Health Service.

On his first day back in office, Trump signed an executive order directing government agencies to remove “gender ideology” from publications. He has signed other orders targeting diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

The researchers plan to publish their findings elsewhere, Antin told The Associated Press. In the blog post, Antin and Annechino urged other researchers to refrain from publishing in journals published by the federal government to avoid political interference.

“In normal times, this would never happen,” said Antin, director of the Center for Critical Public Health, a California-based research group. “I have never been asked to censor any articles for publication, nor, to my knowledge, have any of my colleagues ever been asked to censor words, word choice, or remove data from a publication in response to an executive order from the White House. This is extremely unusual.”

Screenshots in the blog post show suggested deletions of data in categories labeled “straight or heterosexual,” “gay or lesbian,” “bisexual” and “unknown.” A note says: “Per the Executive Order, we cannot include language surrounding gender.”

Demographics Vital to Crafting Public Health Messages

Understanding how smoking fits into the lives of rural young adults of all genders and sexual orientations can help tailor more effective public health messages, Antin said. And it’s a longstanding practice to include these demographic variables in research.

Antin said censorship threatens scientific integrity and, in this case, appears to violate the policy of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which says that scientific findings should not be “unduly suppressed, delayed, or altered for political purposes.”

An HHS spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Their SpaceX capsule parachuted into the Gulf of Mexico in the early evening, just hours after departing the International Space Station. Splashdown occurred off the coast of Tallahassee in the Florida Panhandle, bringing their unplanned odyssey to an end.

It all started with a flawed Boeing test flight last spring.

Unexpected Extended Stay in Space

The two expected to be gone just a week or so after launching on Boeing’s new Starliner crew capsule on June 5. So many problems cropped up on the way to the space station that NASA eventually sent Starliner back empty and transferred the test pilots to SpaceX, pushing their homecoming into February. Then SpaceX capsule issues added another month’s delay.

Sunday’s arrival of their relief crew meant Wilmore and Williams could finally leave. NASA cut them loose a little early, given the iffy weather forecast later this week. They checked out with NASA’s Nick Hague and Russia’s Alexander Gorbunov, who arrived in their own SpaceX capsule last fall with two empty seats reserved for the Starliner duo.

Wilmore and Williams ended up spending 286 days in space — 278 days longer than anticipated when they launched. They circled Earth 4,576 times and traveled 121 million miles (195 million kilometers) by the time of splashdown.

“On behalf of SpaceX, welcome home,” radioed SpaceX Mission Control in California.

“What a ride,” replied Hague, the capsule’s commander.

Related Story: SpaceX Delays Flight to Replace NASA’s Stuck Astronauts After Launch Pad Problem

Capturing Public Attention

The two astronauts’ plight captured the world’s attention, giving new meaning to the phrase “stuck at work” and turning “Butch and Suni” into household names. While other astronauts had logged longer spaceflights over the decades, none had to deal with so much uncertainty or see the length of their mission expand by so much.

Wilmore and Williams quickly transitioned from guests to full-fledged station crew members, conducting experiments, fixing equipment and even spacewalking together. With 62 hours over nine spacewalks, Williams set a record: the most time spent spacewalking over a career among female astronauts.

Both had lived on the orbiting lab before and knew the ropes, and brushed up on their station training before rocketing away. Williams became the station’s commander three months into their stay and held the post until earlier this month.

Political Twist and Unwavering Professionalism

Their mission took an unexpected twist in late January when President Donald Trump asked SpaceX founder Elon Musk to accelerate the astronauts’ return and blamed the delay on the Biden administration. The replacement crew’s brand new SpaceX capsule still wasn’t ready to fly, so SpaceX subbed it with a used one, hurrying things along by at least a few weeks.

Even in the middle of the political storm, Wilmore and Williams continued to maintain an even keel at public appearances from orbit, casting no blame and insisting they supported NASA’s decisions from the start.

NASA hired SpaceX and Boeing after the shuttle program ended, in order to have two competing U.S. companies for transporting astronauts to and from the space station until it’s abandoned in 2030 and steered to a fiery reentry. By then, it will have been up there more than three decades; the plan is to replace it with privately run stations so NASA can focus on moon and Mars expeditions.

Both retired Navy captains, Wilmore and Williams stressed they didn’t mind spending more time in space — a prolonged deployment reminiscent of their military days. But they acknowledged it was tough on their families.

Wilmore, 62, missed most of his younger daughter’s senior year of high school; his older daughter is in college. Williams, 59, had to settle for internet calls from space to her mother and relatives.

Related Story: NASA Astronauts Finally Closing in on Return to Earth After 9 Months in Space

“We have not been worried about her because she has been in good spirits,” said Falguni Pandya, who is married to Williams’ cousin. “She’s been healthy and we’ve been in touch with her right until they left. She was definitely ready to come home.”

Prayers for Williams and Wilmore were offered up at 21 Hindu temples in the U.S. in the months leading up to their return, organizer Tejal Shah, president of World Hindu Council of America said. Williams has spoken frequently about her Indian and Slovenian heritage. Prayers for their safe return also came from Wilmore’s Baptist church in Houston, where he serves as an elder.

After returning in the gulf — Trump in January signed an executive order renaming the body of water Gulf of America — Wilmore and Williams will have to wait until they’re off the SpaceX recovery ship and flown to Houston before reuniting with their loved ones. The three NASA astronauts will be checked out by flight surgeons as they adjust to gravity, officials said, and allowed to go home after several days.

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AP journalist Deepa Bharath contributed to this report.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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The new crew needs to get to the International Space Station before Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams can head home after nine months in orbit.

Concerns over a critical hydraulic system arose less than four hours before the Falcon rocket’s planned evening liftoff from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. As the countdown clocks ticked down, engineers evaluated the hydraulics used to release one of the two arms clamping the rocket to its support structure. This structure needs to tilt back right before liftoff.

Related Story: SpaceX Loses Contact With Spacecraft During Latest Starship Test Flight

Already strapped into their capsule, the four astronauts awaited a final decision, which came down with less than an hour remaining in the countdown. SpaceX canceled for the day. The company did not immediately announce a new launch date, but noted the next try could be as early as Thursday night.

Once at the space station, the U.S., Japanese and Russian crew will replace Wilmore and Williams, who have been up there since June. The two test pilots had to move into the space station for an extended stay after Boeing’s new Starliner capsule encountered major breakdowns in transit.

Starliner’s debut crew flight was supposed to last just a week, but NASA ordered the capsule to return empty and transferred Wilmore and Williams to SpaceX for the return leg.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

The post SpaceX Delays Flight to Replace NASA’s Stuck Astronauts After Launch Pad Problem appeared first on GV Wire.

The best views will be from North America and South America. Parts of Africa and Europe may catch a glimpse.

Lunar eclipses happen when the moon, Earth and sun align just so. The Earth casts a shadow that can partially or totally blot out the moon.

During a partial lunar eclipse, Earth’s shadow appears to take a bite of the moon. The full moon is covered during a total eclipse and blushes coppery red because of stray bits of sunlight filtering through Earth’s atmosphere.

Lunar and solar eclipses happen anywhere from four to seven times a year, according to NASA. A partial lunar eclipse graced skies in the Americas, Africa and Europe last September and the last total lunar eclipse was in 2022.

How to See the Lunar Eclipse

The so-called blood moon will be visible for about an hour starting at 11:26 p.m. PDT, Thursday. Peak viewing will be close to midnight.

To see it, venture outside and look up — no need for eclipse glasses or any special equipment.

“As long as the sky is clear, you should be able to see it,” said Shannon Schmoll, director of Abrams Planetarium at Michigan State University.

The setting of the moon may make it harder to see the eclipse in Europe and Africa.

“This is really an eclipse for North and South America,” said astronomy expert Michael Faison from Yale University.

If you miss out, mark your calendar for Sept. 7. Another total lunar eclipse will sweep across parts of Asia, Africa, Australia and Europe. Parts of the Americas will get their next taste in March 2026.

Related Story: US Military’s Space Shuttle Returns After Orbiting for 434 Days on Secret Mission

History of Eclipses

Civilizations have viewed and interpreted lunar eclipses for thousands of years. Ancient people knew more about the celestial bodies than we give them credit for, said historian Zoe Ortiz.

“They were looking at the night sky and they had a much brighter vision than we do today,” said Ortiz with the University of North Texas.

Aristotle noticed that the shadow the Earth cast on the moon during a lunar eclipse was always curved, observations proving that the Earth is round.

And a civilization in ancient Mesopotamia saw the blood red moon as a bad omen for the king. The people installed a substitute king on the throne around the time of the eclipse to protect their ruler from any bad will.

“If there’s ever a movie plot,” said Ortiz, “that’s the one.”

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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