NASA: What We Know About Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS - NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

 

NASA Discovers Interstellar Comet Moving Through Solar System - UNIVERSE

This diagram shows the trajectory of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS as it passes through the solar system. It will make its closest approach to the Sun in October.

NASA/JPL-Caltech

On July 1, the NASA-funded ATLAS (Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System) survey telescope in Rio Hurtado, Chile, first reported observations of a comet that originated from interstellar space. Arriving from the direction of the constellation Sagittarius, the interstellar comet has been officially named 3I/ATLAS. It is currently located about 420 million miles (670 million kilometers) away.

Since that first report, observations from before the discovery have been gathered from the archives of three different ATLAS telescopes around the world and the Zwicky Transient Facility at the Palomar Observatory in San Diego County, California. These “pre-discovery” observations extend back to June 14. Numerous telescopes have reported additional observations since the object was first reported.

The comet poses no threat to Earth and will remain at a distance of at least 1.6 astronomical units (about 150 million miles or 240 million km). It is currently about 4.5 au (about 416 million miles or 670 million km) from the Sun. 3I/ATLAS will reach its closest approach to the Sun around Oct. 30, at a distance of 1.4 au (about 130 million miles or 210 million km) — just inside the orbit of Mars.

The interstellar comet’s size and physical properties are being investigated by astronomers around the world. 3I/ATLAS should remain visible to ground-based telescopes through September, after which it will pass too close to the Sun to observe. It is expected to reappear on the other side of the Sun by early December, allowing for renewed observations. 

Source: NASA Discovers Interstellar Comet Moving Through Solar System - NASA Science 

Striking parallels between biological brains and AI during social interaction suggest fundamental principles - Machine learning & AI

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

UCLA researchers have made a significant discovery showing that biological brains and artificial intelligence systems develop remarkably similar neural patterns during social interaction. This first-of-its-kind study reveals that when mice interact socially, specific brain cell types synchronize in "shared neural spaces," and AI agents develop analogous patterns when engaging in social behaviors.

The study, "Inter-brain neural dynamics in biological and artificial intelligence systems," appears in the journal Nature.

This new research represents a striking convergence of neuroscience and artificial intelligence, two of today's most rapidly advancing fields. By directly comparing how biological brains and AI systems process social information, scientists reveal fundamental principles that govern social cognition across different types of intelligent systems.

The findings could advance understanding of social disorders like autism, while simultaneously informing the development of socially-aware AI systems. This comes at a critical time when AI systems are increasingly integrated into social contexts, making understanding of social neural dynamics essential for both scientific and technological progress.

A multidisciplinary team from UCLA's departments of Neurobiology, Biological Chemistry, Bioengineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Computer Science across the David Geffen School of Medicine and the Henry Samueli School of Engineering used advanced brain imaging techniques to record activity from molecularly defined neurons in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex of mice during social interactions.

Mice serve as an important model for understanding mammalian brain function because they share fundamental neural mechanisms with humans, particularly in brain regions involved in social behavior. The researchers developed a novel computational framework to identify high-dimensional "shared" and "unique" neural subspaces across interacting individuals.

The team then trained artificial intelligence agents to interact socially and applied the same analytical framework to examine neural network patterns in AI systems that emerged during social versus non-social tasks.

The research revealed striking parallels between biological and artificial systems during social interaction. In both mice and AI systems, neural activity could be partitioned into two distinct components: a "shared neural subspace" containing synchronized patterns between interacting entities, and a "unique neural subspace" containing activity specific to each individual.

Remarkably, GABAergic neurons—inhibitory brain cells that regulate neural activity—showed significantly larger shared neural spaces compared to glutamatergic neurons, the brain's primary excitatory cells. This represents the first investigation of inter-brain neural dynamics in molecularly defined cell types, revealing previously unknown differences in how specific neuron types contribute to social synchronization.

When the same framework was applied to AI agents, shared neural dynamics also emerged as artificial systems developed social interaction capabilities. Most importantly, when researchers selectively disrupted these shared neural components in artificial systems, social behaviors were substantially reduced, providing the direct evidence that synchronized neural patterns causally drive social interactions.

The study also revealed that shared neural dynamics don't simply reflect coordinated behaviors between individuals, but emerge from representations of each other's unique behavioral actions during social interaction.

The research team plans to further investigate shared neural dynamics in different and potentially more complex social interactions. They also aim to explore how disruptions in shared neural space might contribute to social disorders and whether therapeutic interventions could restore healthy patterns of inter-brain synchronization.

The artificial intelligence framework may serve as a platform for testing hypotheses about social neural mechanisms that are difficult to examine directly in biological systems. They also aim to develop methods to train socially intelligent AI.

"This discovery fundamentally changes how we think about social behavior across all intelligent systems," said Weizhe Hong, Ph.D., professor of Neurobiology, Biological Chemistry, and Bioengineering at UCLA and lead author of the new work.

"We've shown for the first time that the neural mechanisms driving social interaction are remarkably similar between biological brains and artificial intelligence systems. This suggests we've identified a fundamental principle of how any intelligent system—whether biological or artificial—processes social information.

"The implications are significant for both understanding human social disorders and developing AI that can truly understand and engage in social interactions." 

by University of California, Los Angeles

edited by Sadie Harley, reviewed by Robert Egan 

Source:  Striking parallels between biological brains and AI during social interaction suggest fundamental principles    

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NASA’s LRO Views ispace HAKUTO-R Mission 2 Moon Lander Impact Site - UNIVERSE

On June 11, NASA’s LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) captured photos of the site where the ispace Mission 2 SMBC x HAKUTO-R Venture Moon (RESILIENCE) lunar lander experienced a hard landing on June 5, 2025, UTC.

RESILIENCE lunar lander impact site, as seen by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC) on June 11, 2025. The lander created a dark smudge surrounded by a subtle bright halo.

Credit: NASA/Goddard/Arizona State University.

RESILIENCE was launched on Jan. 15 on a privately funded spacecraft.

LRO’s right Narrow Angle Camera (one in a suite of cameras known as LROC) captured the images featured here from about 50 miles above the surface of Mare Frigoris, a volcanic region interspersed with large-scale faults known as wrinkle ridges.

The dark smudge visible above the arrow in the photo formed as the vehicle impacted the surface, kicking up regolith — the rock and dust that make up Moon “soil.” The faint bright halo encircling the site resulted from low-angle regolith particles scouring the delicate surface.

This animation shows the RESILIENCE site before and after the impact. In the image, north is up. Looking from west to east, or left to right, the area pictured covers 2 miles.

Credit: NASA/Goddard/Arizona State University. 

LRO is managed by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. Launched on June 18, 2009, LRO has collected a treasure trove of data with its seven powerful instruments, making an invaluable contribution to our knowledge about the Moon. NASA is returning to the Moon with commercial and international partners to expand human presence in space and bring back new knowledge and opportunities. 

Source: NASA’s LRO Views ispace HAKUTO-R Mission 2 Moon Lander Impact Site - NASA 

A New Alloy is Enabling Ultra-Stable Structures Needed for Exoplanet Discovery

A unique new material that shrinks when it is heated and expands when it is cooled could help enable the ultra-stable space telescopes that future NASA missions require to search for habitable worlds.

Advancements in material technologies are needed to meet the science needs of the next great observatories. These observatories will strive to find, identify, and study exoplanets and their ability to support life.

Credit: NASA JPL

One of the goals of NASA’s Astrophysics Division is to determine whether we are alone in the universe. NASA’s astrophysics missions seek to answer this question by identifying planets beyond our solar system (exoplanets) that could support life. Over the last two decades, scientists have developed ways to detect atmospheres on exoplanets by closely observing stars through advanced telescopes. As light passes through a planet’s atmosphere or is reflected or emitted from a planet’s surface, telescopes can measure the intensity and spectra (i.e., “color”) of the light, and can detect various shifts in the light caused by gases in the planetary atmosphere. By analyzing these patterns, scientists can determine the types of gasses in the exoplanet’s atmosphere.

Decoding these shifts is no easy task because the exoplanets appear very near their host stars when we observe them, and the starlight is one billion times brighter than the light from an Earth-size exoplanet. To successfully detect habitable exoplanets, NASA’s future Habitable Worlds Observatory will need a contrast ratio of one to one billion (1:1,000,000,000).

Achieving this extreme contrast ratio will require a telescope that is 1,000 times more stable than state-of-the-art space-based observatories like NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and its forthcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. New sensors, system architectures, and materials must be integrated and work in concert for future mission success. A team from the company ALLVAR is collaborating with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to demonstrate how integration of a new material with unique negative thermal expansion characteristics can help enable ultra-stable telescope structures.

Material stability has always been a limiting factor for observing celestial phenomena. For decades, scientists and engineers have been working to overcome challenges such as micro-creep, thermal expansion, and moisture expansion that detrimentally affect telescope stability. The materials currently used for telescope mirrors and struts have drastically improved the dimensional stability of the great observatories like Webb and Roman, but as indicated in the Decadal Survey on Astronomy and Astrophysics 2020 developed by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, they still fall short of the 10 picometer level stability over several hours that will be required for the Habitable Worlds Observatory. For perspective, 10 picometers is roughly 1/10^th the diameter of an atom. 

_{NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope sits atop the support structure and instrument payloads. The long black struts holding the telescope’s secondary mirror will contribute roughly 30% of the wave front error while the larger support structure underneath the primary mirror will contribute another 30%.}

_{Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn}

Funding from NASA and other sources has enabled this material to transition from the laboratory to the commercial scale. ALLVAR received NASA Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) funding to scale and integrate a new alloy material into telescope structure demonstrations for potential use on future NASA missions like the Habitable Worlds Observatory. This alloy shrinks when heated and expands when cooled—a property known as negative thermal expansion (NTE). For example, ALLVAR Alloy 30 exhibits a -30 ppm/°C coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) at room temperature. This means that a 1-meter long piece of this NTE alloy will shrink 0.003 mm for every 1 °C increase in temperature. For comparison, aluminum expands at +23 ppm/°C.

_{While other materials expand while heated and contract when cooled, ALLVAR Alloy 30 exhibits a negative thermal expansion, which can compensate for the thermal expansion mismatch of other materials. The thermal strain versus temperature is shown for 6061 Aluminum, A286 Stainless Steel, Titanium 6Al-4V, Invar 36, and ALLVAR Alloy 30.}

Because it shrinks when other materials expand, ALLVAR Alloy 30 can be used to strategically compensate for the expansion and contraction of other materials. The alloy’s unique NTE property and lack of moisture expansion could enable optic designers to address the stability needs of future telescope structures. Calculations have indicated that integrating ALLVAR Alloy 30 into certain telescope designs could improve thermal stability up to 200 times compared to only using traditional materials like aluminum, titanium, Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymers (CFRPs), and the nickel–iron alloy, Invar.

The hexapod assembly with six ALLVAR Alloy struts was measured for long-term stability. The stability of the individual struts and the hexapod assembly were measured using interferometry at the University of Florida’s Institute for High Energy Physics and Astrophysics. The struts were found to have a length noise well below the proposed target for the success criteria for the project.

Credit: (left) ALLVAR and (right) Simon F. Barke, Ph.D.

To demonstrate that negative thermal expansion alloys can enable ultra-stable structures, the ALLVAR team developed a hexapod structure to separate two mirrors made of a commercially available glass ceramic material with ultra-low thermal expansion properties. Invar was bonded to the mirrors and flexures made of Ti6Al4V—a titanium alloy commonly used in aerospace applications—were attached to the Invar. To compensate for the positive CTEs of the Invar and Ti6Al4V components, an NTE ALLVAR Alloy 30 tube was used between the Ti6Al4V flexures to create the struts separating the two mirrors. The natural positive thermal expansion of the Invar and Ti6Al4V components is offset by the negative thermal expansion of the NTE alloy struts, resulting in a structure with an effective zero thermal expansion.

The stability of the structure was evaluated at the University of Florida Institute for High Energy Physics and Astrophysics. The hexapod structure exhibited stability well below the 100 pm/√Hz target and achieved 11 pm/√Hz. This first iteration is close to the 10 pm stability required for the future Habitable Worlds Observatory. A paper and presentation made at the August 2021 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers conference provides details about this analysis.

Furthermore, a series of tests run by NASA Marshall showed that the ultra-stable struts were able to achieve a near-zero thermal expansion that matched the mirrors in the above analysis. This result translates into less than a 5 nm root mean square (rms) change in the mirror’s shape across a 28K temperature change.

The ALLVAR enabled Ultra-Stable Hexapod Assembly undergoing Interferometric Testing between 293K and 265K (right). On the left, the Root Mean Square (RMS) changes in the mirror’s surface shape are visually represented. The three roughly circular red areas are caused by the thermal expansion mismatch of the invar bonding pads with the ZERODUR mirror, while the blue and green sections show little to no changes caused by thermal expansion. The surface diagram shows a less than 5 nanometer RMS change in mirror figure.

Credit: NASA’s X-Ray and Cryogenic Facility [XRCF]

Beyond ultra-stable structures, the NTE alloy technology has enabled enhanced passive thermal switch performance and has been used to remove the detrimental effects of temperature changes on bolted joints and infrared optics. These applications could impact technologies used in other NASA missions. For example, these new alloys have been integrated into the cryogenic sub-assembly of Roman’s coronagraph technology demonstration. The addition of NTE washers enabled the use of pyrolytic graphite thermal straps for more efficient heat transfer. ALLVAR Alloy 30 is also being used in a high-performance passive thermal switch incorporated into the UC Berkeley Space Science Laboratory’s Lunar Surface Electromagnetics Experiment-Night (LuSEE Night) project aboard Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 2, which will be delivered to the Moon through NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative. The NTE alloys enabled smaller thermal switch size and greater on-off heat conduction ratios for LuSEE Night.

Through another recent NASA SBIR effort, the ALLVAR team worked with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to develop detailed datasets of ALLVAR Alloy 30 material properties. These large datasets include statistically significant material properties such as strength, elastic modulus, fatigue, and thermal conductivity. The team also collected information about less common properties like micro-creep and micro-yield. With these properties characterized, ALLVAR Alloy 30 has cleared a major hurdle towards space-material qualification.

As a spinoff of this NASA-funded work, the team is developing a new alloy with tunable thermal expansion properties that can match other materials or even achieve zero CTE. Thermal expansion mismatch causes dimensional stability and force-load issues that can impact fields such as nuclear engineering, quantum computing, aerospace and defense, optics, fundamental physics, and medical imaging. The potential uses for this new material will likely extend far beyond astronomy. For example, ALLVAR developed washers and spacers, are now commercially available to maintain consistent preloads across extreme temperature ranges in both space and terrestrial environments. These washers and spacers excel at counteracting the thermal expansion and contraction of other materials, ensuring stability for demanding applications.

For additional details, see the entry for this project on NASA TechPort.

Project Lead: Dr. James A. Monroe, ALLVAR

The following NASA organizations sponsored this effort: NASA Astrophysics Division, NASA SBIR Program funded by the Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD). 

Source: A New Alloy is Enabling Ultra-Stable Structures Needed for Exoplanet Discovery - NASA Science  

Tough fuel cell can stabilize power grid by making and storing energy in extreme industrial conditions - Engineering - Energy & Green Tech

Materials characterization. Credit: Nature Energy (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41560-025-01800-1

To build a modern-day electrical grid with the flexibility and resilience to handle ebbing and flowing energy sources like solar and wind power, West Virginia University engineers have designed and successfully tested a fuel cell that can switch between storing or making electricity and also generate hydrogen from water.

Unlike similar technologies, the fuel cell can withstand the heat and steam generated when running on an industrial scale for long periods at high power. Additionally, it addresses the three big problems with existing designs for a potentially valuable energy technology called a "protonic ceramic electrochemical cell."

The study is published in the journal Nature Energy.

Researcher Xingbo Liu, materials science professor and associate dean for research at the WVU Benjamin M. Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources, explained that because PCECs switch between energy storage and power production, they could be a lifesaving technology for an overwhelmed U.S. electrical grid struggling to incorporate the energy it receives at uncertain intervals from multiple sources—conventional power plants and hydropower dams as well as residential solar panels and even ocean waves.

However, Liu said that current PCEC designs "are unstable in high steam environments, with weak connections between layers and they perform poorly at the critical task of conducting protons. In response, our group built a 'conformally coated scaffold' design by connecting electrolytes, and we coated and sealed it with an electrocatalyst layer that's stable in steam, absorbs water and stays intact as temperatures rise and fall. Protons, heat and electricity can all move through the structure."

A research team led by Xingbo Liu, a WVU materials engineer, developed a device that can make and store electricity despite intense heat and steam. Their fuel cell design could help build an electric grid capable of adapting to changes in energy supply and demand. Credit: WVU / Micaela Morrissette

Their prototype did its job for over 5,000 hours, at 600 degrees Celsius and 40% humidity, breaking apart molecules to produce electricity and hydrogen through the process of electrolysis. The previous longest time a small PCEC continuously performed the same process was 1,833 hours, and in that case, performance degraded over time, Liu said.

"That technology wasn't ready for large-scale applications," he said. "By comparison, our conformally coated scaffold design did so well in both energy storage and energy production modes that we also built a test version of a system that uses CCS cells to store hydrogen and use it in electrolysis reactions. Our system stayed stable while switching smoothly and frequently back and forth between those modes, even over long 12-hour cycles. This is how we achieve balance in a power grid that's evolving to incorporate intermittent, sustainable sources of energy."

The work was led by Hanchen Tian, a WVU doctoral student and postdoctoral researcher at the time of the study, and Wei Li, then a WVU research assistant professor. Additional WVU contributors included Qingyuan Li, postdoctoral research fellow; Debangsu Bhattacharyya, GE Plastics Material Engineering professor; and Wenyuan Li, assistant professor.

"PCECs use membranes called electrolytes and conductors called oxygen electrodes to move protons through their layers," Tian said. "But steam has been getting to the electrolytes in current PCEC designs and causing them to fail over time. Another problem is that the electrolytes and electrodes expand differently under heat, so the connections between them weaken during use."

The WVU team incorporated the barium ion to help the coating hold water, which facilitates proton movement. They also incorporated nickel ions to manufacture larger CCS cells that stayed stable and flat. And because their PCEC runs on water vapor, it can be powered with saltwater or low-quality water, rather than purified water.

"All that shows promise for scaling up to industrial levels," Tian said. "We showed that it's possible to make, on a large scale, CCS fuel cells that will stay strong and stable under intense conditions." 

by Micaela Morrissette, West Virginia University

edited by Stephanie Baum, reviewed by Robert Egan 

Source: Tough fuel cell can stabilize power grid by making and storing energy in extreme industrial conditions  

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