News at a glance: Webb telescope looking sharp, Omicron’s burden, and statues of female scientists

ASTRONOMY

In stellar test, Webb space telescope shows pin-sharp vision

A crisp image of a bright star shows the James Webb Space Telescope’s complex, segmented mirror is functioning flawlessly, NASA announced last week. After launching the $10 billion Webb in December 2021, engineers have spent weeks delicately tweaking the position and curvature of each of the mirror’s 18 segments (which had been folded up during launch) until they behaved as a single, 6.5-meter reflector. Operators tested the mirror by using Webb’s Near Infrared Camera to observe a star in the Ursa Major constellation 2000 light-years away. “Performance is everything we dared hope,” says Webb operations scientist Jane Rigby—and a sign that NASA’s gamble on Webb’s design, a first for any space telescope, is paying off. Operators will next test the mirror’s alignment with the telescope’s three other observational instruments. The science campaign is expected to begin in July after the instruments are calibrated.

PLANETARY SCIENCE

Russian space launches nixed

The European Space Agency (ESA) formally suspended its ESA-Russian ExoMars mission last week, citing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The payload, a European-built rover and a Russian landing craft, was due to launch in September on a Russian Proton rocket; instead, ESA is considering the European Ariane 6, which is under development. Substituting a new lander could force ESA to skip the next launch window in 2024 in favor of one in 2026 or even 2028. ESA is also seeking alternatives for five other missions that had been slated for rides on Russian launchers, including the Euclid cosmology telescope and the EarthCARE atmospheric sensor. Options include ESA’s smaller Vega-C, due for its inaugural flight in May.

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This event is completely unprecedented and upended our expectations about the Antarctic climate system.

BIOMEDICINE

U.S. shares 100,000 genomes

All of Us, the largest study by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) of links between genes, health, and the environment, last week gave U.S. researchers access to nearly 100,000 whole genome sequences, the first of many releases planned. The data will add to those gathered for similar studies by other DNA “biobanks,” such as the 500,000-volunteer UK Biobank and the U.S. Million Veteran Program. But some researchers are disappointed that for now, only scientists at U.S. institutions can see the All of Us data; NIH is still working out policies for data sharing with researchers in other countries. In most cases, the DNA data link to anonymized electronic health records, clinical exam details, and survey responses. Half the study’s participants are from groups underrepresented in research, including people identifying as Black or African American (22%) and Hispanic or Latino (17%). The study has enrolled about 330,000 participants and hopes to reach 1 million by the end of 2026.

DRUG DEVELOPMENT

Alzheimer’s drug data out at last

Biogen last week published data from two pivotal clinical trials of its controversial Alzheimer’s drug, Aduhelm, more than 2 years after it first announced their outcomes. The company faced criticism for both the long delay and its choice of outlet—the low-profile Journal of Prevention of Alzheimer’s Disease. The journal’s editor-in-chief, Paul Aisen, is also the second author on the study and has consulted for Biogen. (Aisen says he was not involved in the review of Biogen’s manuscript or the publication decision, and the company is one among many he has consulted for.) The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the drug against the recommendation of an independent advisory group. FDA cited evidence that the treatment removes Alzheimer’s-associated protein plaques from the brain, even though only one of the two large trials showed clinical benefits from Aduhelm over a placebo.

DIVERSITY

Statues honoring female scientists throng Washington, D.C.

orange statues of women in STEM
Statues honor (from left) science exhibit designer Olivia Castellini, computer scientist Gracie Ermi, particle physicist Jessica Esquivel, medical physicist Jessica Fagerstrom, and telescope specialist Miriam Fuchs. ALEX WONG/GETTY IMAGES

Visitors to the U.S. National Mall in Washington, D.C., during March have encountered 120 statues of female trailblazers in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), displayed to help mark Women’s History Month. #IfThenSheCan—The Exhibit includes, for example, the likeness of Jessica Esquivel (above, third from left), one of only 150 Black women in the United States with a physics Ph.D. The statues, 3D printed using acrylic by Amaze Design, were funded by Lyda Hill Philanthropies. Working with AAAS (which publishes Science), it selected the women depicted in the statues as part of a related project to encourage middle school girls to pursue studies and careers in STEM fields.

REFUGEES

Afghan scientists’ limbo ends

Seven months after Afghan agricultural scientists were whisked out of the country during the Taliban takeover, their limbo ended this week when they and their families received U.S. visas and flew to Washington, D.C. In August 2021, the scientists, affiliated with Michigan State University’s Grain Research and Innovation project, and their relatives—75 people altogether—were flown to Tirana, Albania, only hours before the window for evacuations from Kabul’s airport slammed shut. The move to the United States is “a big relief,” says an economist in the group who asked to be identified only by his family name, Halimi. But he adds that many other scientists still want to leave Afghanistan. “They’ve been begging us for help,” he says. “Life there is very, very difficult.”

COVID-19

Variant hits Black Americans hard

Black adults in the United States were hospitalized for COVID-19 at a rate more than four times that of white adults during the Omicron variant’s winter surge, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said last week. It noted differences between the two groups in receiving the primary series of two vaccinations (40% versus 47%) and a booster (44% versus 55% of those eligible). But among all adults, hospital stays for Omicron were shorter than when the Delta variant was common last year (5 days versus 4 days), and fewer patients needed intensive care.

In other news

LOSS FOR SOLAR PHYSICS Pioneering heliophysicist Eugene Parker died last week at the age of 94. In the mid-1950s, he predicted the existence of solar wind—soon proved by early space missions. He also thought myriad “nanoflares,” too small to see, heat the Sun’s atmosphere, another idea that has gained credence. The Parker Solar Probe, now in close orbit around the Sun, is named in his honor, the first NASA spacecraft to be dedicated to a living person.

NEW COVID-19 COORDINATORPresident Joe Biden has named Ashish Jha, a physician who has been dean of Brown University’s School of Public Health, as his administration’s pandemic response coordinator. Jha, who has frequently commented about COVID-19 in media interviews and on social media, will bring experience in infectious disease research to a job that has been held for a year by Jeffrey Zients, who has a background in business and government.

CARBON’S SOCIAL COSTIn a rebuke to opponents of U.S. government action to curb climate change, a federal appeals court reversed a lower court ruling that blocked the Biden administration from putting a price on the damage caused by greenhouse gas emissions. The “social cost of carbon” is used to evaluate costs and benefits of new regulations. Fossil fuel producing states had claimed that the federal government lacks authority to set the cost figure.

source: sciencemag.org