Science
SpaceX targets 19 May for Starship V3 debut from Launch Pad 2
SpaceX announced on 12 May 2026 that it is officially targeting 19 May for the debut flight of Starship Version 3, the third-generation iteration of the largest and most powerful rocket ever built. It will be Starship’s twelfth flight overall — and the first to fly from the newly commissioned Launch Pad 2. Version 3 […]
Japanese physicists detect elusive quantum ‘W states’ in a single shot
A team of Japanese researchers reported in May 2026 a new technique to detect quantum W states instantaneously — a long-standing milestone for quantum information science. W states are a particular form of multi-particle entanglement that, unlike the more famous GHZ states, survive the loss of a single particle. That robustness makes them attractive building […]
Physicists create exotic quantum matter by ‘driving’ materials with magnetic pulses
Reported on 4 May 2026, a team of physicists has created exotic new phases of quantum matter by carefully driving materials with precisely timed magnetic shifts — a technique that coaxes systems into states that don’t exist in equilibrium. The interesting twist isn’t just the existence of these states but their stability. One of the […]
SpaceX Dragon CRS-34 hauls 6,500 lb of science to the ISS
After two weather scrubs, SpaceX successfully launched its CRS-34 cargo mission to the International Space Station from Florida on 15 May 2026. Dragon carried about 6,500 pounds (2,950 kg) of supplies, hardware, and scientific experiments, with autonomous docking to the forward port of the Harmony module scheduled for 17 May around 7:05 a.m. EDT. CRS-34 […]
New CRISPR variant Cas12a2 selectively kills cancer cells without harming healthy ones
A paper published in Nature on 6 May 2026 describes a new class of CRISPR tool, Cas12a2, that destroys cells displaying a target RNA signature rather than editing DNA. The mechanism — “RNA-triggered cell killing” — opens a precision-medicine route to cancers and viral infections that has been hard to reach with conventional gene-editing. In […]
NASA tests AI space chip 500x more powerful than current spacecraft processors
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory shared on 15 May 2026 that its new High Performance Spaceflight Computing (HPSC) processor is performing as designed in early testing — and is running at roughly 500 times the performance of the radiation-hardened chips currently flying. Small enough to fit in the palm of a hand, the HPSC packs a […]
Science in Overdrive: The Most Important Discoveries of March–April 2026
Science rarely pauses, but some months feel more electric than others. The past thirty days have delivered a remarkable cluster of breakthroughs — humans venturing beyond low Earth orbit for the first time in half a century, living tissue grown in a laboratory restoring a child’s ability to swallow, a new understanding of what may […]