Here are three scientific discoveries that occurred in February.
Vera C. Rubin Observatory:
On Feb. 24, a wide-field telescope on the Chilean mountain Cerro Pachón, fitted with the world’s largest digital camera, recorded 800,000 cosmic changes in a single night. It flags everything from black holes and supernovae to asteroids and planets within two minutes. Its 3,200-megapixel Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) camera contains 189 sensors across a two-foot focal plane, with six filters to observe the universe in different wavelengths of light. Luca Rizzi, a program director for the research infrastructure at NSF, said, “By connecting scientists to a vast and continuous stream of information, NSF–DOE Rubin Observatory will make it possible to follow the Universe’s events as they unfold, from the explosive to the most faint and fleeting.”
Funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the $473 million observatory will potentially run seven million alerts and create a decade-long time-lapse of space from the Southern Hemisphere.
New Spinosaurus species found in the Sahara:
Classified as the “hell heron” Spinosaurus species, the reconstructed skull was found in the remote Sahara in Niger. Paleontologists found the skull of the new species in a fossil site that hads not been revisited in 70 years. The dinosaur, with a distinctive curved crest and a sail along its back, dominated the ancient wetlands of north Africa. Scientists found jaw fragments from approximately 95 to 100 million years ago in 2019 and two additional crests in 2022. Paul Sereno, Ph.D., believed the dinosaur “had no problem wading on its sturdy legs into two meters of water but probably spent most of its time stalking shallower traps for the many large fish of the day.”
Based on their findings in February and previous discoveries, it is believed that the crest was sheathed in keratin, a tough, insoluble, fibrous structural protein that serves as the essential building block of skin. Another feature of the species, its lower jaw extends further outward to catch fish and other prey.
Scientists turn methane into pharmaceutical compounds:
A research team led by Martín Fañanás at the Centre for Research in Biological Chemistry and Molecular Materials (CiQUS) at the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain has developed a new method to convert methane and other components of natural gas into chemical compounds used in pharmaceuticals.
They created a compound called dimestrol, which is used in hormone therapy. Dimestrol is a highly complex molecule, and this development represents an important step toward converting methane into more complex and valuable chemicals for real-world applications.
Scientists directed research into a reaction called allylation. The process used an allyl group as a “handle” in a gas molecule. With this in place, the molecule can transform into a range of molecule products. However, the process can undergo unwanted chlorination reactions that reduce efficiency and must be controlled to make it practical for the production of pharmaceuticals. The process itself uses iron, hydrogen bonds and collidinium cations under LED light to induce the reaction.