Crystal structure prediction (CSP) of organic molecules is a critical task, especially in pharmaceuticals and materials science. However, conventional methods are computationally intensive and time-consuming. Now, researchers from Japan have developed a new workflow: SPaDe-CSP that accelerates CSP by machine learning-based prediction of most probable space groups and crystal densities and employing an efficient neural network potential for structure refinement. It achieved faster and more reliable CSP than conventional methods.

When you think about it, baran, those little plastic grass dividers found in bentos, save space by allowing bento makers to combine foods without mixing their flavors into a single bento box. Much like baran, researchers from Tohoku University have come up with a way to combine two chemical reactions inside a single electrolytic cell, thereby reducing waste and energy consumption associated with traditional chemical reactions.

Astronomers from the International Centre of Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) have produced the largest and most detailed low-frequency radio image of the Milky Way to date, using data from the Murchison Widefield Array telescope in Western Australia. The new image, assembled from years of survey data and advanced supercomputing, offers unprecedented sensitivity and resolution, allowing scientists to study the structure and evolution of our Galaxy in remarkable detail. It reveals new insights into star formation, supernova remnants, and pulsars, and marks a significant milestone in radio astronomy.

The SETI Institute announced that it will incorporate the new NVIDIA IGX Thor platform to enhance its real-time search for signals from space at the Allen Telescope Array (ATA) in Northern California. The collaboration brings cutting-edge AI technology—built for demanding real-world environments—into radio astronomy for the first time at this scale.

The ATA’s 42 antennas scan the sky for radio signals that may reveal cosmic events or, one day, evidence of intelligent life. Using the NVIDIA IGX Thor platform, the SETI Institute will be able to process and interpret these signals directly at the telescope, dramatically reducing the time it takes to recognize unusual or promising data.

“NVIDIA IGX Thor enables us to run AI inference and GPU-accelerated signal processing workloads closer to the edge,” said Luigi Cruz, Staff Engineer at the SETI Institute. “Its compact form factor and power efficiency makes it an ideal development platform for our next-generation pipeline, which is based on NVIDIA Holoscan.”

UMD astronomer Megan Weiner Mansfield co-led the creation of the first-ever 3D temperature map of WASP-18b, a gas giant located 400 light-years from Earth. The new technique lays the groundwork for more detailed future explorations of faraway planets.

In the quest for more targeted lung cancer treatments, a researcher at the University of Missouri thinks the solution may lie in tiny bubble-shaped packages that cells use to talk to each other.