Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 5d

Although the heartwood of a tree technically is dead (the living bits are only the outside layers), that heartwood is what's holding the tree up. I've always thought it was a very strange phrase - heartwood is jolly useful. We make ships & houses & furniture out of it. And it holds trees up.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 6d

On Oct 31st, the London Philharmonic Orchestra will be celebrating the ocean, and the ace @lizbonnin.bsky.social and I will be speaking on stage beforehand about all things ocean. Tickets are available here, if you'd like to join us and immerse yourself in our water world: lpo.org.uk/event/harmon...

Photos of Liz and Helen and this text: The performers

Liz Bonnin biologist & broadcaster
Helen Czerski physicist & oceanographer

Wildlife biologist and environmental broadcaster Liz Bonnin joins physicist and oceanographer Helen Czerski to explore the wonder and fragility of our oceans.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 6d

Still active, an inspiration, and doing conservation work right up to the end. Thank you for being a great and wonderful citizen of this planet, Jane Goodall.

www.theguardian.com/science/2025...

Jane Goodall, world-renowned primatologist, dies aged 91

Jane Goodall Institute says ‘tireless advocate’ for natural world died in California during US speaking tour

www.theguardian.com

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 7d

Fluorescent cycling jackets have dyes that absorb invisible ultraviolet (UV) light and re-emit visible light. This UV can pass through clouds & there's lots on a dull day. So the jacket gets a brightness boost. This is also what "optical brighteners" in laundry powder do (see pic). Also scorpions!

Left side: two laundry tabs at the top in natural light, and in the bottom picture, illuminated by UV, one is just dull purple and one is very bright light blue.
Right side: Hard to see black scorpion in a black box at the top, brightly fluorescing blue scorpion at the bottom.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 7d

I was a bit distracted from all that by learning that John Tyndall died from an accidental overdose of sedative, given by his wife. He realised the mistake, but nothing could be done. Way ahead of her time, she called a photographer to the deathbed to take pics (150 years before social media!).

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 7d

A real treat today to see the original work of John Tyndall, all still kept at the Royal Institution. He demonstrated the greenhouse effect (using this kit) in 1859, during a very active scientific and mountaineering life.

Two old books with scientific diagrams and a picture of a mountain

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 10d

The first steam-powered passenger rail trip was on 27th Sept 1825 (200th bday is nuanced - regular passenger steam slightly later). Here's transport carbon footprint today - Eurostar easily cleanest cos fully electrified. I hope the next 200 yrs has even more (electric) trains! With lower prices...

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 11d

In the discussion with this guy we talked about systems (specialised research systems) that have *only* been trained on a specific set of verified data, and they still make things up. That's a feature, not a bug - they're not there to copy, they're there to infer.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 11d

I asked him about that. He said that it's very useful for coding "up to a certain level", but not beyond that. You still have to know the code to be able to do anything sophisticated. So it's useful for simple tasks, but can't be trusted with detailed analysis.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 11d

I generally do refer to it as machine learning, if that's what it's doing. I dislike the phrase "AI" intensely, partly because its misleading (no intelligence there), but also because it's a useless umbrella term that covers many different things. But even I sometimes use it as the default shorthand

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 11d

In discussion with a computer scientist from the University of Cambridge last night:

Me: "you've described some of the things that AI is good at. How would you describe the category of things it's not good at?

**pause**

Him: "Anything where it has to be right".

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 12d

Glad you like it :)

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 12d

About to start on BBC R4 (and available right afterwards as a podcast): the last episode of this series of Rare Earth, on TRAINS.
It's 200 years since the first passenger train journey, but what is their environmental legacy & what exciting new innovations could shape their future? Find out here:

BBC Radio 4 - Rare Earth, Trains on Trial

Is train travel part of a green future, not just our industrial past?

www.bbc.co.uk

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 12d

There's a really nice explanation (with clear graphics) in this @quantamagazine.bsky.social article of why most molecules in the atmosphere (oxygen & nitrogen) don't act as greenhouse gases, but a lot of the far less numerous ones (like carbon dioxide and methane) do. A great teaching aid :)

The Quantum Mechanics of Greenhouse Gases | Quanta Magazine

Earth’s radiation can send some molecules spinning or vibrating, which is what makes them greenhouse gases. This infographic explains how relatively few heat-trapping molecules can have a planetary ef...

www.quantamagazine.org

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 13d

It's a huge honour to receive the Athelstan Spilhaus Award from the AGU for public engagement. But it's particularly pleasing because the Spilhaus projection was the original UK hardback cover of Blue Machine, and still the best of them all. Kudos to @davidho.bsky.social for the original suggestion.

AGU award graphics, the Spilhaus ocean map and seven Blue Machine book covers, two showing the Spilhaus projection

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 13d

But I think it says it started as parasitism, so they were originally completely independent species.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 13d

The point where one species becomes another isn’t clearly defined. There are many genetic changes over huge periods of time. But at each point in the chain the offspring is the same species as the parent by anything measurable, I think. That’s not true with these ants.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 13d

It's never occurred to me that it IS an assumption. This is the most astonishing start to a paper I've read in years:

"Living organisms are assumed to produce same-species offspring. Here, we report a shift from this norm in Messor ibericus, an ant that lays individuals from two distinct species."

One mother for two species via obligate cross-species cloning in ants - Nature

In a case of obligate cross-species cloning, female ants of Messor ibericus need to clone males of Messor structor to obtain sperm for producing the worker caste, resulting in males from the same mother having distinct genomes and morphologies.

www.nature.com

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 13d

Reason No. 324 why no-one should think that "AI" (artificial but certainly not intelligent) is an unmitigated Good Thing: it's mathematically inevitable that AI will hallucinate.

We need far more discussion of the risks of all this and less frantic hype. I mean, really, what's the hurry?

OpenAI admits AI hallucinations are mathematically inevitable, not just engineering flaws

In a landmark study, OpenAI researchers reveal that large language models will always produce plausible but false outputs, even with perfect data, due to fundamental statistical and computational limi...

www.computerworld.com

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 14d

They were playing the original, apparently recorded in Barnes in SW London (so it has a local home in spite of being a US band).

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 14d

I generally assume I’m a bit behind the times of modern culture, but it’s the start of the university term here at UCL and the park outside has a fresher’s week event blasting the Eagles “Taking it Easy”, I’m singing along on my way past, and it could be any decade out of the last four.

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 16d

In this week's edition of Rare Earth on animal migration, @tomheap.bsky.social and I had a great time finding out about the incredible things we're learning as tech improves and what the future holds.

Available now on BBC Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

BBC studio with two guests and two presenters: Will Hawkes, David Barrie, Helen Czerski and Tom Heap

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Reposted by Helen Czerski

The Cosmic Shambles Network @cosmicshambles.com · 17d

New Science Shambles podcast and video out for your enjoyment. Go on a hunt for Dark Matter with @helenczerski.bsky.social, @jengupta.bsky.social, @particleclara.bsky.social & Maggie Aderin-Pocock. Recorded live at @latitudefestival.bsky.social www.youtube.com/watch?v=knQq...

We're Going on a Dark Matter Hunt | Clara Nellist, Maggie Aderin-Pocock, Jen Gupta & Helen Czerski

YouTube video by The Cosmic Shambles Network

www.youtube.com

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 18d

If you're in London today (Sat 20th), don't miss the spectacle that is the Great River Race! This historic race is a fabulous way to see all sorts of traditional (from many traditions) boats - skiffs, coracles, gigs & more - race through central London. You can keep up here: greatriverrace.org.u...

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Helen Czerski @helenczerski.bsky.social · 18d

That's what the engineer said to me - it's the significant costs of either routing them safely around obstacles (like trees/buildings) or through tunnels that need extensive extra engineering. Batteries sound like a pretty sensible gap-filler in those cases, and even a small battery would do.

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