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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 10h

Now on @sciam.bsky.social: Quantum tunneling is a big deal—literally. Here’s @dangaristo.bsky.social explaining the science behind yesterday’s announcement of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics.

www.scientificamerican.com/article/this...

Quantum Tunneling Is a Big Deal. This Year's Nobel Physics Prize Shows Why

The Nobel Prize in Physics for 2025 honors scaled-up quantum physics—while sidestepping controversies swirling around quantum computing

www.scientificamerican.com

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 1d

Hey just FYI I *think* the post to reply to for quantum physics isn't available anymore/has been deleted/is borked? From here: bossett.io/science-feed/. Just tried to reply to get on the science feed and got an error.

bossett.io

Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 1d

Now on @sciam.bsky.social: This year’s physics Nobel goes to 3 researchers who demonstrated quantum tunneling on a superconducting chip. By bringing this microscopic effect into the macroscale world, they laid important foundations for quantum computing.

www.scientificamerican.com/article/2025...

This Year’s Nobel Prize in Physics Is Awarded to Three Scientists for Work in Quantum Mechanics

John Clarke, Michel H. Devoret and John M. Martinis shared the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work showing how bizarre microscopic quantum effects can infiltrate our large-scale, everyday world

www.scientificamerican.com

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 7d

lol, this mental image is exactly what I needed today. 😆

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 7d

Now on @sciam.bsky.social: A fresh look at old Cassini data shows surprising chemical complexity brewing within Enceladus. This time we've found oodles of chonky organic molecules that could be precursors to (or byproducts of) even chonkier biomolecules.

www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-l...

Is Life inside Enceladus? Saturn’s Ocean Moon Is Awash with Biology’s Raw Ingredients

A fresh analysis of old data has found rich organic chemistry within the hidden ocean of Saturn’s moon Enceladus

www.scientificamerican.com

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Reposted by Lee Billings

Casey Dreier @caseydreier.bsky.social · 25d

In my latest piece for The Planetary Report, I argue that we’ve largely lost the rhetorical ability to defend the unquantifiable values of space exploration—beauty, curiosity, discovery—in the face of an unrelenting focus on utilitarian pragmatism.

www.planetary.org/articles/a-c...

A cosmic perspective worth fighting for

NASA's science budget is under threat. Here's what that could mean to the human endeavor of exploration.

www.planetary.org

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 8d

Thank you for the kind words, Phil!!!

Reposted by Lee Billings

Phil Plait @philplait.bsky.social · 8d

This is a great article by my friends and colleagues Nadia and Lee.

Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 8d

Now on @sciam.bsky.social: NASA’s next-gen Habitable Worlds Observatory may be our best chance to find alien life. But can a nation busy ripping itself apart unite to launch a mission to solve life’s cosmic mysteries? By @nadiadrake.bsky.social (and me).

www.scientificamerican.com/article/are-...

NASA’s First-Ever Alien-Hunting Space Telescope Could Enlighten Our New Dark Age

The Habitable Worlds Observatory is poised to tell us whether Earthlike planets are common—if it can get off the ground

www.scientificamerican.com

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 8d

Now on @sciam.bsky.social: NASA’s next-gen Habitable Worlds Observatory may be our best chance to find alien life. But can a nation busy ripping itself apart unite to launch a mission to solve life’s cosmic mysteries? By @nadiadrake.bsky.social (and me).

www.scientificamerican.com/article/are-...

NASA’s First-Ever Alien-Hunting Space Telescope Could Enlighten Our New Dark Age

The Habitable Worlds Observatory is poised to tell us whether Earthlike planets are common—if it can get off the ground

www.scientificamerican.com

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Reposted by Lee Billings

Dan Vergano @danvergano.bsky.social · 15d

"Millennia ago a piece of the sky fell toward East Africa, streaking overhead, born of an ancient collision..."

www.scientificamerican.com/article/insi...

Shiid-birood, a fabled iron meteorite taken amid reports of violence, revealed tantalizing mysteries before vanishing into a shady underworld

The Meteorite That Vanished: A Tale of Lies, Death and Smuggling

How a space rock vanished from Africa and showed up for sale across an ocean

www.scientificamerican.com

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Reposted by Lee Billings

Meghan Bartels @meghanbartels.bsky.social · 15d

We posted some of our favorite #SciAmInTheWild submissions and honestly, these make me so dang happy: www.scientificamerican.com/article/anno...

Announcing the #SciAmInTheWild Photography Contest Short List

To celebrate Scientific American’s 180th anniversary, we invited readers to place our magazine covers in the wild. See our staff’s favorite submissions

www.scientificamerican.com

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 17d

For Artemis III before taikonauts make moonfall, yeah, Starship’s the bigger concern there.

But more broadly problematic is this: the US has spent big $$$ supporting/building hardware for lunar return (Obama era counts, IMO) for decades on end—only to be here, reliant on a wild Hail Mary via SpaceX

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 17d

Possible, sure.

But is it more possible than, say, any alternative from “legacy” US aerospace firms eventually being an order of magnitude pricier than that?

😅

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 17d

Not trying to excuse or defend SpaceX; just noting how remarkably gently the NYT piece treats these other very problematic parts of the Artemis program.

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 17d

Lol’d at the NYT piece’s framing of SpaceX’s lunar lander as “riskiest”—something which is certainly true for Artemis III.

But meanwhile SLS and Orion are what make Artemis I-IV launches cost >$4 billion *apiece*.

That’s unsustainable—*riskily* so—and is why NASA went to SpaceX in the 1st place.

Dan Vergano @danvergano.bsky.social · 18d

Some interesting sociology of space news to watch with the NYT dropping a fairly thin, but obvious piece by one of their anointed today www.nytimes.com/2025/09/20/u... saying the obvious: NASA's SpaceX lunar landing plans are unlikely to work anytime soon despite a lot of U.S. chest beating. 1/n

U.S. Is Losing Race to Return to Moon, Critics Say, Pointing at SpaceX

www.nytimes.com

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Reposted by Lee Billings

Sarah Lewin Frasier @sarahexplains.bsky.social · 19d

We've reached 6,000 confirmed exoplanets! I talked with @aussiastronomer.bsky.social about where things go from here. (A great graphic by @unamandita.bsky.social visualizes the amazing jumps in planet finds since the first ones were confirmed in the 1990s.)

Want to Get Away? NASA Now Offers More Than 6,000 Alien Worlds to Daydream About

It’s a crowded galaxy, the latest exoplanet tally shows

www.scientificamerican.com

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Reposted by Lee Billings

David Grinspoon @drfunkyspoon.bsky.social · 22d

Tomorrow!
NASA HQ 3 PM.
Free & open to the public.

David Grinspoon @drfunkyspoon.bsky.social · 26d

ASTROBIOLOGY AND…
Life, The Cosmos & the Human Story

Short talks by all the NASA/Library of Congress Astrobiology Chairs

DC area folks - This will be an amazing event next Wednesday (9/17) afternoon at NASA HQ - open to the public, not live-streamed. Attendance limited. Please RSVP & attend!
🧪

Astrobiology And…
Life, the Cosmos, the Human Story

Wednesday, September 17, 2025
3-5pm EDT
Please RSVP here to attend
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeLMcW07jemIFTGOEoaeQzYO6f8PmZLvGChi28QAVqKHJ3WzQ/viewform

NASA Headquarters
300 Hidden Figures Way SW, Washington, D.C.
Webb Auditorium

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 27d

Good thread.

Popehat Agitates And Irritates @kenwhite.bsky.social · 27d

I have a couple of comments about the "free speech hero" narrative about Charlie Kirk.

First, was Charlie Kirk really notable for supporting the free speech of people he disagreed with? I haven't noticed that, though I could have missed it.

/1

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Phil Plait @philplait.bsky.social · 28d

So what I glean about this Mars announcement is that chemicals were found on Mars that on Earth are due to life, and no one knows any other way to make them on Mars. However, this is very far from knowing they *were* made by life. Reminds me of phosphine on Venus; "we don't know" doesn't mean life.

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Alexandra Witze @alexwitze.bsky.social · 28d

To sum up: we have

🪨 A cool rock from #Mars that may or may not hold evidence of ancient life

🛰️ An internal fight over whether NASA should spend its money on science or human exploration, and on what planet

🤔 A totally uncertain future for this amazing rock

🧪

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 28d

If an exciting Mars rock isn't your cuppa, try this news from (much) farther afield. Now on @sciam.bsky.social: The best-yet measurement of gravitational waves from merging black holes confirms theories from Einstein and Hawking. By @clarakm.bsky.social.

www.scientificamerican.com/article/best...

A Black Hole Collision Shows Einstein and Hawking Were Right

Spacetime ripples from a black hole collision across the cosmos have confirmed weird aspects of black hole physics

www.scientificamerican.com

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Reposted by Lee Billings

Humberto Basilio @humbertobasilio.bsky.social · 28d

In the middle of the “second space race,” NASA scientists say we may be looking at the closest evidence yet of ancient life on Mars 🔭🧪

My story for @sciam.bsky.social with edits from @leebillings.bsky.social

www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-t...

This Martian Rock Might Be the Closest We’ve Come to Finding Alien Life

The Perseverance rover’s new findings set the stage for bringing Martian samples back to Earth to test whether microbes once inhabited the Red Planet

www.scientificamerican.com

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Reposted by Lee Billings

Alexandra Witze @alexwitze.bsky.social · 28d

Fundamentally the #Mars announcement NASA is making today boils down to: there could have been some chemical reactions in these ancient rocks that could have been mediated by living organisms. The word "could" is doing a LOT of heavy lifting there. 🧪

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 28d

Nice piece by @humbertobasilio.bsky.social.

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Lee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 28d

Now on @sciam.bsky.social: The Mars rock that made headlines last year is still worth getting excited about. A new study says the case remains strong for potential biosignatures in the "Cheyava Falls" rock studied and sampled by the Perseverance rover.

www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-t...

This Martian Rock Might Be the Closest We’ve Come to Finding Alien Life

The Perseverance rover’s new findings set the stage for bringing Martian samples back to Earth to test whether microbes once inhabited the Red Planet

www.scientificamerican.com

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