Washington [US], October 12 (ANI): A team of astronomers has discovered a unique black hole spewing a fiery jet at another galaxy. The black hole is hosted by a galaxy around one billion light years away from Earth named RAD12.
Galaxies are typically divided into two major classes based on their morphology: spirals and ellipticals. Spirals have optically-blue looking spiral arms with an abundance of cold gas and dust. In spiral galaxies, new stars form at an average rate of one Sun-like star per year. In contrast elliptical galaxies appear yellowish and lack distinct features such as spiral arms. Star formation in elliptical galaxies is very scarce; it is still a mystery to astronomers as to why the elliptical galaxies we see today have not been forming new stars for billions of years. Evidence suggests that supermassive or 'monster' black holes are responsible. These 'monster' black holes spew gigantic jets made of electrons moving at very high speeds at other galaxies, depleting the fuel required for future star formation: cold gas and dust.
The unique nature of RAD12 had been observed in 2013 using optical data from the Sloan Digitised Sky Survey (SDSS) and radio data from the Very Large Array (FIRST survey). However, follow-up observation with the Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope (GMRT) in India was required to confirm its truly exotic nature: The black hole in RAD12 appears to be ejecting the jet only towards a neighbouring galaxy, named RAD12-B. In all cases, jets are ejected in pairs, moving in opposite directions at relativistic speeds. Why only one jet is seen coming from RAD12 remains a puzzle to astronomers.
A conical stem of young plasma is seen being ejected from the centre and reaches far beyond the visible stars of RAD12. The GMRT observations revealed that the fainter and older plasma extends far beyond the central conical stem and flares out like the cap of a mushroom (seen in red in the tricolour image). The whole structure is 440 thousand light years long, which is much larger than the host galaxy itself.
RAD12 is unlike anything known so far; this is the first time a jet has been observed to collide with a large galaxy like RAD12-B. Astronomers are now one step closer to understanding the impact of such interactions on elliptical galaxies, which may leave them with little cold gas for future star formation.
Research lead Dr Ananda Hota says, "We are excited to have spotted a rare system that helps us understand radio jet feedback of supermassive black holes on star formation of galaxies during mergers. Observations with the GMRT and data from various other telescopes such as the MeerKAT radio telescope strongly suggest that the radio jet in RAD12 is colliding with the companion galaxy. An equally important aspect of this research is the demonstration of public participation in making discoveries through the RAD@home Citizen Science research collaboratory." (ANI)

San Francisco, Oct 13 (IANS) With an aim to prioritise security and privacy, encrypted messaging app Signal has announced that it will soon stop supporting SMS messages on Android.

The platform said it has "now reached the point where SMS support no longer makes sense".

"In order to enable a more streamlined Signal experience, we are starting to phase out SMS support from the Android app," the company said in a blogpost.

"You will have several months to transition away from SMS in Signal, to export your SMS messages to another app, and to let the people you talk to know that they might want to switch to Signal, or find another channel if not," it added.

The change will only affect users who use Signal as their default SMS app on Android.

"If you do use Signal as your default SMS app on Android, you will need to select a new default SMS app on your phone. If you want to keep them, you will also need to export your SMS messages from Signal into that new app," the company said.

According to Signal, it is removing SMS support for the Android app to prioritise security and privacy, ensuring people aren't hit with unexpected messaging bills, and creating a clear and intelligible user experience for anyone sending messages on Signal.

"The most important reason for us to remove SMS support from Android is that plaintext SMS messages are inherently insecure. They leak sensitive metadata and place your data in the hands of telecommunications companies," the messaging app said.

"With privacy and security at the heart of what we do, letting a deeply insecure messaging protocol have a place in the Signal interface is inconsistent with our values and with what people expect when they open Signal," it added.

Russia on Tuesday added US tech giant Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, to a list of "terrorist and extremist" organisations, according to a database of the Federal Service for Financial Monitoring (Rosfinmonitoring).

Russia in late March banned Facebook and Instagram for "carrying out extremist activities" after authorities accused Meta of tolerating "Russophobia" during Russia's military campaign in Ukraine.

Meta had announced on March 10 that the platforms would allow statements like "death to Russian invaders" but not credible threats against civilians, before saying the change only applied to users posting from inside Ukraine.

Facebook and Instagram have been inaccessible in Russia since March, but many Russians resorted to VPN to keep using the social media network.Instagram is particularly popular in Russia, and used to be a key platform for advertisement and sales.
Billions of people use Meta's app around the world.

This decision puts Meta on the same list as right-wing nationalist groups, foreign terrorist organisations including the Taliban and Russian opposition groups.

 Washington [US], October 12 (ANI): Published in the journal 'Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences' (PNAS), a new study found links between social disadvantages and fetal brain development.
Researchers examined 289 healthy newborns from socially diverse families in the United States using diffusion MRI scans shortly after birth. The analysis revealed that prenatal exposure to measures of social disadvantage was associated with altered microstructure of white matter in frontolimbic pathways of the brain that are important for socioemotional development. Early life adversity (social disadvantage and psychosocial stressors) is associated with altered microstructure in fronto-limbic pathways important for socioemotional development.
Understanding when these associations begin to emerge may inform the timing and design of preventative interventions. In this longitudinal study, 399 mothers were oversampled for low income and completed social background measures during pregnancy.
Measures were analyzed with structural equation analysis resulting in two latent factors: social disadvantage (education, insurance status, income-to-needs ratio [INR], neighborhood deprivation, and nutrition) and psychosocial stress (depression, stress, life events, and racial discrimination). At birth, 289 healthy term-born neonates underwent a diffusion MRI (dMRI) scan.
Mean diffusivity (MD) and fractional anisotropy (FA) were measured for the dorsal and inferior cingulum bundle (CB), uncinate, and fornix using probabilistic tractography in FSL. Social disadvantage and psychosocial stress were fitted to dMRI parameters using regression models adjusted for infant postmenstrual age at scan and sex. Social disadvantage, but not psychosocial stress, was independently associated with lower MD in the bilateral inferior CB and left uncinate, right fornix, and lower MD and higher FA in the right dorsal CB.
Results persisted after accounting for maternal medical morbidities and prenatal drug exposure.
In moderation analysis, psychosocial stress was associated with lower MD in the left inferior CB among the lower-to-higher socioeconomic status (SES) (INR >= 200 per cent) group, but not the extremely low SES (INR < 200 per cent) group. Increasing access to social welfare programs that reduce the burden of social disadvantage and related psychosocial stressors may be an important target to protect fetal brain development in fronto-limbic pathways. (ANI)

New Delhi, Oct 12 (IANS) As India rolls out 5G in a phased manner starting with key metro cities, Apple on Wednesday said that 5G on its iPhones in the country will be made available in December.

In a statement to IANS, the tech giant said it is working with its carrier partners in India to create the best 5G experience for iPhone users.

"We are working with our carrier partners in India to bring the best 5G experience to iPhone users as soon as network validation and testing for quality and performance is completed," the company told IANS.

"5G will be enabled via a software update and will start rolling out to iPhone users in December," Apple added.

Those using iPhone 14, iPhone 13, iPhone 12 and iPhone SE (third generation) models will get an upcoming software update on 5G.

Apple does extensive testing with carrier partners to ensure a great experience for iPhone users.

iPhone offers users super-fast downloads and uploads, better streaming, and real-time connectivity with 5G to help them stay in touch, share, and enjoy content.

The support for 5G on iPhone has now extended to over 250 carrier partners in over 70 markets around the world, with expanded support for standalone networks.

Meanwhile, with 5G services having been launched in the country earlier this month, the government convened a meeting of handset manufacturers and telecom service providers to ensure a smooth transition towards the new technology.

Prioritising software upgrade would enable early adoption of 5G in India.

Airtel and Jio have rolled out their 5G services in key metros in a phased manner.

 Washington [US], October 11 (ANI): With insect numbers declining, experts at the University of Wyoming found that insects are still causing unprecedented harm to plants.
The first-of-its-kind study compares insect herbivore damage of modern-era plants with that of fossilized leaves from as far back as the late Cretaceous period, nearly 67 million years ago. The research and the findings at the University were published in the journal: 'Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences'. "Our work bridges the gap between those who use fossils to study plant-insect interactions over deep time and those who study such interactions in a modern context with fresh leaf material," says lead researcher, UW PhD graduate Lauren Azevedo-Schmidt, now a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Maine.
"The difference in insect damage between the modern era and the fossilized record is striking," -Schmidt added.
Azevedo-Schmidt conducted the research along with UW Department of Botany and Department of Geology and Geophysics Professor Ellen Currano, and Assistant Professor Emily Meineke of the University of California-Davis.
The study examined fossilized leaves with insect feeding damage from the Late Cretaceous through the Pleistocene era, a little over 2 million years ago, and compared them with leaves collected by Azevedo-Schmidt from three modern forests. The detailed research looked at different types of damage caused by insects, finding marked increases in all recent damage compared to the fossil record.
"Our results demonstrate that plants in the modern era are experiencing unprecedented levels of insect damage, despite widespread insect declines," wrote the scientists, who suggest that the disparity can be explained by human activity.
More research is necessary to determine the precise causes of increased insect damage to plants, but the scientists say a warming climate, urbanization and the introduction of invasive species likely have had a major impact.
"We hypothesize that humans have influenced (insect) damage frequencies and diversities within modern forests, with the most human impact occurring after the Industrial Revolution," the researchers wrote. "Consistent with this hypothesis, herbarium specimens from the early 2000s were 23 per cent more likely to have insect damage than specimens collected in the early 1900s, a pattern that has been linked to climate warming."
But climate change doesn't fully explain the increase in insect damage, they say.
"This research suggests that the strength of human influence on plant-insect interactions is not controlled by climate change alone but, rather, the way in which humans interact with the terrestrial landscape," the researchers concluded. (ANI)

 Washington [US], October 10 (ANI): American tech giant Apple, within the next couple of years, is preparing to adopt USB-C charging across its line of AirPods and Mac accessories.
According to The Verge, a report by Bloomberg's Mark Gurman suggest this shift of the company from its lightning cables. It comes as the European Union looks to mandate USB-C charging on new smartphones, tablets, and headphones released in the region in late 2024. While the legislation still hasn't yet been signed into law, it received approval from the European Parliament last week.
Gurman believes that in order to comply with the rules Apple might bring USB-C to the next-gen AirPods, AirPods Pro, and AirPods by 2024.
Meanwhile Mac accessories, including the Magic Mouse, Magic Keyboard, and Magic Trackpad could make the switch to USB-C as soon as next year.
With a refresh for the new iMac and Mac Pro due next year, their release typically "coincides with accessory updates," reported The Verge.
Gurman says "it's a safe bet that those accessories will move to USB-C in their next incarnation." He similarly believes Apple will swap over its AirPods before the EU's legislation goes into effect.
Earlier this year, a report from Gurman suggested that Apple has already started testing USB-C charging on its iPhones, but they probably would not land on devices until 2023 "at the earliest."
Gurman reiterates this belief in this most recent Power On newsletter, once again adding that he thinks Apple will add a USB-C charging port to the iPhone 15, as well as to the entry-level iPad expected to release by the end of this year.
As per The Verge, even if Apple does make the transition to using USB-C, Gurman expects its presence on Apple devices to be short-lived as according to him Apple will eventually bring inductive charging to the iPhone and iPad to get around the legislation, as it doesn't apply to devices that don't support wired charging. (ANI)

 Washington [US], (ANI): A new study shows how development disrupts deer movements, resulting in the animals losing their ability to match their foraging with the wave of the most-nutritious springtime plants.

That is, in effect, the new discovery of a collaborative study by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the University of Wyoming, which quantified how mule deer miss out on forage when energy development disrupts their migration corridors.

“Mule deer are known for how precisely they match their movements with spring green-up, so this result was particularly striking,” says lead author Ellen Aikens, a UW Ph.D. graduate now with the USGS South Dakota Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit. “The gas wells caused them to let the best food of the year slip away from them.”

The paper “Industrial energy development decouples ungulate migration from the green wave” appears today (Thursday) in the leading science journal Nature Ecology & Evolution.

Each spring, in the American West, mule deer migrate to follow the green-up of plants as they sprout at different elevations. Biologists term this “surfing the green wave.” Mule deer rely on this surfing behaviour to find the youngest and most nutritious plants that allow them to recover from winter and put on fat for the next lean season.

However, the new study shows how development disrupts deer movements, resulting in deer losing their ability to match their foraging with the wave of the most-nutritious springtime plants.

The 14-year study followed a herd of migratory mule deer that winters in sagebrush basins and summers in the Sierra Madre Mountains, about 15 miles southwest of Rawlins.

Over the study period, dozens of new wells were drilled for coalbed methane extraction in the middle of an existing mule deer corridor. The long-term movement data allowed for a before-after comparison of the effects of expanding development on mule deer movements.

Previous research by the team had detailed how mule deer behaviours shifted in response to the new gas wells, causing them to detour, speed through the well pads and stop-over less to forage.

For the new study, the team analyzed the deer movements — alongside daily changes in spring green-up estimated from remote satellite imagery — to measure how well the deer surfed along the corridor, upstream and downstream from the energy development, and over the 14-year period.

“The deer movements in response to the gas field were unmistakable,” Aikens says.

As development intensity increased over time, the deer began to “hold up” when they reached the natural gas wells. They paused their spring migration and let the wave of green vegetation pass them by, becoming decoupled from their best food resources at a crucial time of the year.

Overall, the wells resulted in a 38.65 percent reduction in green-wave surfing through time.

There was no evidence that mule deer acclimatized to development and associated increases in human presence, truck traffic and noise. Small- and large-scale developments altered green-wave surfing behavior to a similar degree.

The study will help wildlife managers understand how intact corridors must be to retain their ecological functionality. In this case, deer were still able to move through the gas field, but a key function of the migration corridor — to track the green wave all along the route at the ideal stage of plant growth — was lost.

The finding is important because, if migratory ungulates can’t maximize foraging, it will reduce the overall benefit of migration, which is often the most profitable strategy for ungulates as diverse as mule deer in Wyoming, caribou in the Arctic or antelope chasing rains across the African plains. The study is a cautionary tale, providing a clear mechanism of how development within corridors can reduce the benefits of migratory behavior, ultimately resulting in loss of migration and population declines on highly impacted landscapes.

The researchers hope the findings can help provide a way forward for sustaining mule deer migrations.

“The impact is quite clear, but also points to conservation solutions that will allow us to retain viable migrations for generations to come,” says co-author Matt Kauffman, of the USGS Wyoming Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at UW. “Once migrations have been mapped, development can be planned in a way that minimizes the disruptions to migrating herds, whether in Wyoming, the American West or wherever landscapes are rapidly changing.”

Additional co-authors of the paper include Teal Wyckoff, of The Nature Conservancy, and Hall Sawyer, of Western EcoSystems Technology Inc.

The work is timely, as numerous state and federal initiatives have been implemented over the last five years in the U.S. to map migration corridors and reduce impacts to them. In Wyoming, state wildlife managers have long sought to map and conserve migration corridors, now guided by state policy. Globally, efforts are underway to map the world’s ungulate migrations for use in conservation and development planning.

“This new research provides the most convincing case, so far, that efforts to minimize development within migration corridors will benefit their long-term persistence amid changing landscapes,” Kauffman says. (ANI)

 Washington [US], (ANI): Instant messaging and calling service WhatsApp premium subscription service has not officially launched yet; however it is now available for beta users.

According to GSM Arena, this means that only the WhatsApp beta program members can access the Premium menu, where all the extra features reside.

The smartwatch continuously monitor unusually high or low heart rates in the background, which could be signs of a serious underlying condition.

Worldwide, heart disease and strokes are among the leading causes of death. Of course, regular exercising improves nearly every aspect of one’s health. A company that has been pointing people in the right direction by motivating us to exercise is Apple with its Watch series. It has been a great year for Apple as it has introduced three smartwatches — Apple Watch SE (2022), Apple Watch Series 8 and Apple Watch Ultra, the last one has the potential to be a game changer for anyone into endurance sports.

The Apple Watch is taking a similar trajectory as the iPhone, which encourages people to take photographs; with the Watch, wearers are encouraged to take fitness seriously. World Heart Day comes once a year (was on September 29) but it’s necessary to take heart health seriously through the year. Here we look at some of the features on the Apple Watch that can help you.

Few things to remember

Apple Watch highlights quite a few health-related parameters but serious health concerns need to be examined by doctors. Over time, Apple Watch has alerted users around the world of potential signs of atrial fibrillation (AFib), and helped many more establish everyday habits to keep their heart healthy over the long term. The company and its CEO Tim Cook receives letters from people around the world as to how the Apple Watch has helped them. To get the maximum out of the Apple Watch, dive into the Health app on the iPhone.