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By the 2030s, the world will generate around a yottabyte of data per year—that’s 1024 bytes, or the amount that would fit on DVDs stacked all the way to Mars. Now, the booming growth of the data sphere has prompted the governors of the metric system to agree on new prefixes beyond that magnitude, to describe the outrageously big and small. Representatives from governments worldwide, meeting at the General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM) outside Paris on 18 November, voted to introduce four new prefixes to the International System of Units (SI) with immediate effect....

Can NASA’s next big space telescope take a picture of an alien Earth-like planet orbiting another star? Astronomers have long dreamed of such pictures, which would allow them to study worlds beyond our solar system for signs of habitability and life. But for as long as astronomers have dreamed, the technology to make those dreams a reality has seemed decades away. Now, however, a growing number of experts believe NASA’s Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST) could take snapshots of “other Earths”—and soon....

In a 1962 letter, as a last-ditch effort for clemency, Holocaust organizer Adolf Eichmann wrote that he and other low-level officers were “forced to serve as mere instruments,” shifting the responsibility for the deaths of millions of Jews to his superiors. The “just following orders” defense, made famous in the post-WWII Nuremberg trials, featured heavily in Eichmann’s court hearings. But that same year Stanley Milgram, a Yale University psychologist, conducted a series of famous experiments that tested whether “ordinary” folks would inflict harm on another person after following orders from an authoritative figure....

Standing on the north roof of the James Forrestal building in Washington, D.C., Brian Costlow gestures to the black solar photovoltaic array lying flat against the cement tiles. The system generates 235 megawatt-hours of electricity annually in an effort to boost the energy efficiency of this office complex, the headquarters for the U.S. Department of Energy. Toward the south, the adjoining building takes a different tack. Framed by gray concrete, the west office’s 66,000-square-foot roof is painted a stark white....

Cracking the Cube: Going Slow to Go Fast and Other Unexpected Turns in the World of Competitive Rubik’s Cube Solving by Ian Scheffler Touchstone, 2016 ($26) To those who know how, the Rubik’s cube can be solved easily in less than 20 seconds. For the rest of us, unscrambling the puzzle at all is next to impossible. Writer Scheffler, who achieved his first “sub-20” time in 2015, takes us inside the world of competitive cubing....

The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes AIDS prospers by hijacking our immune system cells and forcing them to manufacture more copies of itself rather than tend to their infection-fighting duties. But in order to hijack these T cells or macrophages HIV must first penetrate their innermost walls. New research shows that HIV requires a particular protein in the envelope surrounding a macrophage’s nucleus in order to slip in and reconfigure the cell’s DNA....

A common argument for expanding renewable energy sources is that technologies such as solar panels and wind turbines are responsible for far less carbon dioxide than power plants that burn fossil fuels. But two other powerful benefits should also be getting much more attention: the switch can save vast quantities of freshwater, and can create a large number of new, high-paying jobs. Want proof? Let’s look at the data that our detailed research has revealed....

Since 1994, a more than 26-mile- (42-kilometer-) long tunnel has been keeping Milwaukee’s sewage from spilling into Lake Michigan. This deep water tunnel—a holding tank on steroids—comprises two legs roughly 300 feet (90 meters) belowground that can hold nearly 500 million gallons (1.9 billion liters) of sewage and storm water during a downpour. And for the last 14 years it has kept 74 billion gallons (280 billion liters) of wastewater out of Lake Michigan, according to Bill Graffin, a spokesman for the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District....

Some of the nation’s most exposed states to climate disasters, including half of the hurricane-battered Gulf Coast and wildfire-ravaged California, are laggards in health emergency planning and preparedness, according to a new national index. The findings from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation come amid what researchers say is a general improvement in U.S. health security over the last six years based on 129 measures. They include condition of critical infrastructure, hazard planning in nursing homes, numbers of health emergency workers and volunteers, and health care access....

In this 10th edition of the “Top 10 Emerging Technologies,” created by Scientific American and the World Economic Forum, that interlinking is front and center. With the acceleration of government and industry commitments for decarbonization, we will see an array of novel approaches in low-emission transportation, residential and commercial infrastructure, and industrial processes. Two such technologies—the production of “green” ammonia and engineered crops that make their own fertilizer—will improve agricultural sustainability....

Viruses are notorious for their ability to cause disease, but they also shape human biology in less obvious ways. Retroviruses, which insert their genetic material into our genomes to copy themselves, have left behind genes that help to steer our immune systems and mold the development of embryos and the placenta. Now researchers report in PLOS Genetics that syncytin, a viral protein that enables placenta formation, also helps to increase muscle mass in male mice....

Scientific American presents Tech Talker by Quick & Dirty Tips. Scientific American and Quick & Dirty Tips are both Macmillan companies. Well, my friends, internet history has been made – and no, I’m not talking about the number of hits on that latest viral video of cats playing the drums. This past week the largest distributed denial of service attack was carried out. It was so massive that it affected a large chunk of the internet....

A rare set of nearly 10,000-year-old human bones found in 1976 on a seaside bluff in La Jolla, Calif., may soon be removed from the custody of the University of California, San Diego, and turned over to the local Kumeyaay Nation tribes. The Kumeyaay have long sought control over the bones, which they contend are the remains of their ancestors. In accordance with new federal regulations, the university has initiated the legal process to transfer the remains to the Kumeyaay in the absence of other claimants....

On August 9, 2017, paleontologists at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City unveiled the largest animal ever to walk the earth. Dubbed Patagotitan mayorum, the reconstructed skeleton of the 100-million-year-old dinosaur was so huge that it didn’t even fit wholly inside the room in which it stood. The dinosaur’s long neck, bulging body and long tail stretched about 120 feet long, with the living animal estimated to weigh in at more than 70 tons....

If Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock wants to win next month’s Senate runoff election, he should lean into climate policy, exit polling suggests. In his first matchup against Republican Herschel Walker—in which neither candidate cracked 50 percent, leading to the Dec. 6 runoff—Warnock attracted significant support from young people, the voting bloc most likely to be concerned about climate change. That’s according to post-election research from Tufts University. And it’s part of a national trend that shows voters younger than 30 helped turn the tide for Democrats in key swing states and blunt an expected Republican wave in the midterm elections....

“What is it that decides what organs shall suffer a case of disseminated cancer?” asked London surgeon John Paget, exploring the deadly phenomenon of tumor metastasis in an 1889 edition of the journal Lancet. Cancer cells could spread with equal ease to any part of the body, he speculated, yet metastatic colonies seemed to favor certain organs, such as the lungs and liver. Paget imagined that the malignant cells might be like plant seeds that are carried by the winds in all directions but “can only live and grow if they fall on congenial soil....

Researchers say that they have found a way to smuggle drug-carrying nanoparticles past the body’s immune system: by camouflaging them to look like cell fragments found in human blood. Man-made nanoparticles — created from plastic or metal — can be designed to deliver a cargo of drugs to specific areas of the body. But they are often attacked and swallowed up by the body’s natural defence system, which sees them as foreign invaders....

Running vehicles on ethanol rather than petrol can increase ground-level ozone pollution, according to a study of fuel use in São Paulo, Brazil.Ozone (O3) is a major urban pollutant that can cause severe respiratory problems. It can form when sunlight triggers chemical reactions involving hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides (NOx) emitted by vehicles. Ethanol has been promoted as a ‘green’ fuel because its combustion tends to produce lower emissions of carbon dioxide, hydrocarbons and NOx than petrol....

Despite medical advances, the treatment of many chronic diseases remains haphazard and inconsistent. Teenagers with Crohn’s disease, a painful digestive disorder often diagnosed in adolescence, for example, sometimes get conflicting information regarding medications, diet modifications and alternative therapies. To help improve the care these patients receive, a team of pediatricians and computer scientists is developing a new type of social network that turns doctors and patients into research collaborators. Here is how it works: With each therapy or treatment modification, doctor and patient participate in a mini clinical trial....

The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research. With more than half of its 1.4 billion people online, the world’s most populous country is home to a slew of cyberspies and hackers. Indeed, China has likely stolen more secrets from businesses and governments than any other country. Covert espionage is the main Chinese cyberthreat to the U.S. While disruptive cyberattacks occasionally come from China, those that cause overt damage, like destroying data or causing power outages, are more common from the other top state threats, namely Russia, Iran and North Korea....