This series highlights the written work of scientists, engineers, analysts, and other experts. Have something to say? Email perspectives@popsci.com. Grace Huckins is a Ph.D. student in neuroscience and philosophy at Stanford University. She holds two master’s degrees, in neuroscience and gender studies, which she obtained from the University of Oxford with the support of a Rhodes Scholarship. She currently writes and produces a podcast for NeuWrite West, an online outlet dedicated to the communication of neuroscience, by neuroscientists, to a public audience....

For years, researchers have been trying to model the impacts of switching over to plant-based mean plans. What they’ve found, though, is that the outcomes aren’t the same in developed nations with plentiful food versus those with chronic shortages. Now, a group of researchers mainly from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health shows those discrepancies on a country-by-country level in a recently published analysis in the journal Global Environmental Change....

The estimate comes from numerous former company engineers speaking out in the wake of Elon Musk’s most recent ultimatum sent to the remaining staff, as well as the firing of several veteran engineers who have been critical of Musk in internal Slack channels. “You’re seeing you can only push the workers so far before they’re going to revolt,” Melissa Ingle, a senior data scientist contractor recently laid off by Musk, told MIT Technology Review earlier today....

The Universal Audio SD-1 is the flagship dynamic mic in a line that stretches from the approachable Standard Series all the way to high-end condensers like the $1,499 Sphere L22 Modeling Mic, which I’ll be reviewing in August, and the multi-thousand dollar UA Bock 251 Large-Diaphragm Tube Condenser (coming fall 2022). The $299 SD-1, however, is marketed primarily as an affordable workhorse mic with an intuitive design and natural sound suited for all-around studio duties and everyday use....

For DeSantis, an MVP to local ­greening outfits, the routine began as a form of therapy. The Baltimore native spent some of his childhood in Los Angeles, with an alcoholic stepfather and drug-addicted mother. On the nights his stepfather’s drunkenness turned violent, the young DeSantis climbed trees in the yard to find peace. “Trees became my friends,” he says. “You could say I kind of grew up there.” One night in 1976, his stepfather shot and killed his mother and then himself....

“The benefits of instant payments are increasingly important to consumers and businesses, and the ability to provide this service will be critical for financial institutions to remain competitive,” explained Ken Montgomery, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston first vice president and FedNow Service program executive, in this week’s statement. Consumers already have numerous digital transaction systems from both banks and third-party businesses available to them, but none of us have direct access to central bank funds like those intermediaries....

This is happening because of a sweeping digital privacy initiative called the General Data Protection Regulation that goes into effect in Europe starting on May 25—tomorrow. While the regulations only technically apply to citizens of the EU, they has prompted many companies to issue sweeping updates to their privacy policies and user agreements in advance to avoid the hefty fines that can occur if they run afoul of GDPR. For some companies, it’s also simpler just to have one set of documents in place for all users....

The White Knight 2 is a four-engine jet that will carry an 8-seat spaceship called SpaceShipTwo to an altitude of 48,000 feet so that the spaceship can drop off and fire its rocket engine for a brief run to suborbital space. Branson’s Virgin Galactic hopes to begin regularly scheduled passenger service to space in 2010. Rutan’s company Scaled Composites made history in 2004 with the world’s first privately funded manned spaceflights by its three-seat SpaceShipOne, which was carried aloft by the original White Knight....

The remains, known as Omo I, were discovered in sediments sandwiched between layers of volcanic ash in Ethiopia in the late 1960s. Previous estimates dated the fossils to around 197,000 years old. However, a detailed examination of ash from the site and from distant volcanoes indicates that Omo I is even more ancient, an interdisciplinary group of scientists reported in Nature today. “This work is important in demonstrating that the Omo I skeleton is pretty certainly more than 230,00 years old,” Chris Stringer, a paleoanthropologist at the Natural History Museum in London who has also studied the remains, said in an email....

Meteorites fall through our skies constantly, landing all over the world. Occasionally little pieces of Mars survive the entry through our atmosphere and are discovered—mostly in the Saharan desert and Antarctica—where researchers collect them for future study. A new paper released today in Nature Communications says that these Martian meteorites could be formed from the same volcanic processes that create volcanoes in Hawaii. The islands’ fiery mountains are created by what is called a “hot spot,” or when material from the earth’s mantle comes up toward the surface and creates melting....

A-list actors? Check (Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy). Director a creative genius? Ditto (Alejandro González Iñárritu, who directed Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), Compelling tale? In spades. (DiCaprio plays the real life Hugh Glass, a 19th century fur trapper mauled by a bear in the Dakotas and left for dead. He survives and crawls and stumbles his way to civilization to avenge the murder of his son.) What makes the film so lush, however, is the cinematography, and that credit goes to Emmanuel Lubezki....

United States President Donald Trump tweeted this week that wearing face masks to prevent the spread of COVID-19 is “patriotic.” The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word patriotic as, “having or expressing devotion to and vigorous support for one’s country.” With cases of COVID-19 surging in many US states, wearing a protective face covering is indeed a simple and effective way to help protect your country from sickness, death, and further economic upheaval....

Hopkins added in the statement: “The real financial value behind this deal is the treasure trove of IP in the deep catalog that we plan to reimagine and develop together with MGM’s talented team.” 

What I found was surprising: not one game but an eclectic and varied collection of experiences to fit any taste, all running on a simple, if a bit clunky, user interface. As an adult, there’s not much about Roblox that I enjoy more than say, Assassin’s Creed, Apex Legends, or Fortnite, but there are few gems there. That said, I can see why kids, especially those not yet old enough for more advanced games, absolutely love the simplicity and straightforward approach of most games within the Roblox ecosystem....

Though it might come as a surprise to some people, the video clearly shows that the Earth is, in fact, round. Astronauts on the space station regularly take pictures and video of their incredible view, including these of the recent blizzard that struck the East Coast. Peake, a British astronaut, is a little over a month into his six-month scientific mission, a time in which he will be working on 30 experiments for the European Space Agency, and participating in about a dozen other research projects....

A spare layer will help you weather unexpected chills. The Uniqlo Fluffy Yarn Fleece Full-Zip Jacket also bunches up nicely into a comfy pillow if you have to spend the night on the floor or in a vehicle. Dental care Your companions will thank you for minding your hygiene. For clean storage after you brush, the head of the Radius Tour folds backward into its 4-inch handle, which is made from a plastic that began its life as wood....

Fear, it seems at first, should be easy to identify and define. To borrow from that old judicial decision about the definition of obscenity: we know it when we feel it. Putting that feeling into words can be harder. G. Stanley Hall, the nineteenth-century founder of the American Journal of Psychology and the first president of the American Psychological Association, described fear as “the anticipation of pain,” and that seems like a pretty good general definition to me....

History has left only a vague sketch of Eliza Ann Youmans. A February 1889 passport application paints her, at age 62, as an average-height woman with graying hair, black eyes, a wide mouth, medium forehead and chin, and a light, sallow complexion. Public records hold no photos of her. Even most written references to Eliza focus on her brother, Edward Livingston Youmans, who founded Popular Science (as The Popular Science Monthly) in 1872....

The sit and reach is essentially a modified version of another popular stretching exercise: touching your toes. For many people, such a maneuver is an easy way to begin or end any sort of workout. It’s part of the warm up or cool down routine in countless youth sports programs and gym classes. And for good reason. For most people, toe touching is among the easiest stretching exercises to do, and it incorporates a number of different muscle and joint groups....

By the mid-18th century, a narrow foot trail that once rose from its marshy source had been widened into a cobbled avenue, running from busy docks along the island’s southern end. It circuited past tree-lined shops and tall Dutch-eave houses, bell-towered churches and small public gardens, traders with handcarts and open-air markets, and even a crowded bowling green, until, to the north, the broad way’s roadbed eventually faded back to dirt and vanished into a forest that cloaked the island’s spine....