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SPONSORED BY  | | | | September 11, 2024: The world's first nuclear clock, why voting can be just the beginning of your political involvement, and the Europa Clipper mission gets the green light. —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | | Technicians prepare to install Europa Clipper's 3-meter-wide antenna on the spacecraft on 17 June at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. NASA/Kim Shiflett | | | • NASA's Europa Clipper mission is scheduled to launch in a few weeks. The craft should arrive at Jupiter in 2030. | 4 min read | | | • Clean energy, reproductive health care and extreme weather all got a mention during last night's presidential debate. Here are some of the key science takeaways. | 4 min read | | | • Retinol is a popular skin care ingredient with an impressive research record on its wrinkle-reducing power. | 4 min read | | | • Forensic scientists are still working to identify victims of the 9/11 attacks using advances in technology developed over the past two decades. | 18 min listen | | | Voting in local and national elections is crucial. But after your ballot is cast, jumping into local projects can be a strong antidote to the frustrations of national politics, write the editors of Scientific American. Depending on where you live or what issues interest you, opportunities may abound. For example, many cities have made commitments to reducing carbon emissions. Or perhaps you can work to educate the public and help pass ordinances that ban single-use plastics, as has already happened in many coastal communities.
A hidden benefit: Yes, you will encounter frustrating bureaucracies and personalities on the way. But you may also be surprised by who becomes your ally. "Issues that seem deeply red or deeply blue at the national level aren't always so clear-cut at the local level," write the editors. The best part of local civic engagement is that it brings people together on common goals, no matter how each may vote. "Working together based on your shared values isn't just strategic; it's a balm for these divisive times."
What the editors say: Use your professional strengths to be persuasive. Engineers can evaluate developers' plans, medical professionals can speak to the health impacts from pollution or excessive heat, and media and communications professionals can write press releases and help keep people informed on social media. | | | Scientists have created the world's first nuclear clock. The most precise measurements of time come from the atomic world, using a laser beam to excite atoms with a frequency that can be used as a stable "tick." Current atomic clocks are astonishingly accurate, losing about 1 second every 100 million years. But scientists have long strived to measure time even more precisely by exciting something far smaller than an atom: the nucleus of an atom.
How they did it: Scientists devised a new laser system that could excite the rare isotope thorium-229. The isotope only requires relatively little energy to elevate it to an excited state, so it's the ideal nuclear target for a clock. The team embedded tens of thousands of thorium-229 nuclei in transparent crystals and shot it with their special laser. After weeks without a sign, a faint glow from the excited thorium finally appeared. The researchers synced their frequency measurements with the lab's existing atomic clock, creating the world's first nuclear clock.
Why this matters: The technology could soon set new precision timekeeping records and vastly improve GPS and deep-space navigation. Nuclear clocks could also help scientists understand the strong force–the mysterious power that binds nuclei together. Or advanced nuclear clocks could reveal the nature of dark matter. If dark matter interacts with the nucleus differently than it does the atom as a whole, those differences might show up in comparisons between nuclear and atomic clocks, says José R. Crespo López-Urrutia, a physicist at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, Germany. | | | Styles of Speech Former President Donald Trump's New York accent emerged a few times in last night's presidential debate. Linguistics professor Nicole Holliday explains in this TikTok video that strong emotions or fear can deactivate people's "sociolinguistic monitor" and allow regional accents to break through. Watch the video for more. | | | Melting icebergs in Disko Bay off Greenland. Paul Souders/Getty Images | | | • Climate change poses unique risks to national security. Extreme weather floods navy bases and military outposts, and stymies intelligence-gathering technology. "While we are not, as a nation, adequately prepared for the risks of climate change, the U.S. military today is leading the way," writes Sherri Goodman, secretary general of the International Military Council on Climate and Security. To best mitigate the effects of climate change we must follow the evidence, she says. "Defense decisions are based on science and careful risk assessment. As heat waves, flooding and wildfires become more frequent and severe, defense planners are factoring these climate realities into future strategies and plans. All of society must do the same." | 6 min read | | | SPONSORED CONTENT BY L'ORÉAL GROUPE | Beyond the Curl: Unraveling the Diversity of Hair | Emerging science is revolutionizing hair care for the 40% of the world with curly hair. Discover the latest insights into the unique structure and needs of curly locks. | | | • Behind-the-scenes dirty dealings of Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter. | Vanity Fair | • Blind people play a crucial role in breast cancer detection as medical tactile examiners. | NPR | • Tourists are behaving badly at Yellowstone National Park. Why? | Outside | | | The tragedies of September 11th are still having an impact 23 years later. First responders, office workers, and residents of southern Manhattan to this day have increased rates of certain cancers and other health problems. The events also spurred scientific innovation and change throughout society (not all of it for the better). Having experienced a more recent watershed event--the COVID pandemic--it's remarkable to me that so many ripple effects take years for us to acknowledge and comprehend. | Sending warm wishes to you today if you find yourself melancholy. Reach out anytime to connect with me: newsletters@sciam.com. I love hearing from you. | —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | Subscribe to this and all of our newsletters . | | | | Scientific American
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