Two science stories in one video. A tiny microbe might one day help build homes on Mars. And far away in space, dead stars seem to be breaking a rule that stood for decades.
A Microbe That Could Build Homes on Mars
Building a home on Mars sounds like pure science fiction. But a tiny microbe might one day do the heavy lifting. Researchers at Pioneer Labs in California have created a modified microbe, known as sPL.001. It can grow using materials similar to Martian soil.
That is no small trick. Real Martian soil is laced with perchlorates. These toxic chemicals make the soil hostile to most Earth life. The engineered microbe, however, can thrive on a diet of prepared Mars-like soil, water and air. These are ingredients that settlers could gather or produce on the Red Planet.
While it grows, sPL.001 produces something very useful: bioplastic. This living factory could supply raw material for cups, feedstock for 3D printers, and building materials for shelters and habitats.
The bigger idea is independence. Every kilogram shipped from Earth to Mars costs a fortune. So future settlers who can grow what they need locally will be far more self-sufficient. They will not have to wait on supply rockets. As Pioneer Labs CEO Erika DeBenedictis puts it, on Mars nature will do the same jobs it does on Earth: creating fertile soil, shelter, oxygen and food.
There is still a long road between a laboratory microbe and a Martian neighbourhood. But sPL.001 is an early glimpse of how biology, not just engineering, may help humanity live on another world.
Dead Stars Are Breaking Their Size Limit
For decades, astronomers thought dead stars had a strict weight limit. A white dwarf is the dense, burnt-out core left when a star like the Sun dies. It was never supposed to exceed about 1.4 times the mass of the Sun. Pass that threshold, known as the Chandrasekhar limit, and the star should blow itself apart.
New computer simulations suggest that rule has a loophole: magnetism. In research published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, scientists at the Indian Institute of Science and their collaborators followed stars through their entire evolution, tracking a white dwarf pulling in extra material from a companion.
As the white dwarf gains mass, it compresses, and that strengthens the magnetic field buried inside it. The field acts like an internal scaffold, holding up far more weight than the classic limit allows. In one simulation, the white dwarf kept growing until it reached roughly 2.4 times the mass of the Sun.
The finding could solve a long-standing mystery. Astronomers have spotted exploding stars that shine far more brightly than a normal white-dwarf supernova should. These are called super-Chandrasekhar supernovae. If some white dwarfs really can grow well past 1.4 solar masses before exploding, those extra-bright blasts suddenly make sense. Dead stars still have surprises left in them.
Watch the video: A Microbe That Builds Homes on Mars! + Dead Stars Breaking the Rules on YouTube. This article is the full written version of the video, in simple English. See all articles on the Blogs page and more videos on the Science & Tech page.