184 articles from FRIDAY 27.3.2020

Quantum copycat: Researchers find a new way in which bosons behave like fermions

Bosons and fermions, the two classes into which all particles—from the sub-atomic to atoms themselves—can be sorted, behave very differently under most circumstances. While identical bosons like to congregate, identical fermions tend to be antisocial. However, in one dimension—imagine particles that can only move on a line—bosons can become as stand-offish as fermions, so that no two...

SpaceX wins NASA contract to send cargo to lunar Gateway with new Dragon XL craft

NASA has tapped a type of SpaceX cargo craft that hasn't yet been built to deliver supplies to a moon-orbiting outpost that hasn't yet been launched. SpaceX's robotic Dragon XL, a cylindrical, supersized version of its workhorse Dragon spacecraft, will handle shipments to the Gateway space platform as the first commercial provider to receive a Gateway Logistics Services contract from...

Frontline NHS staff first to receive new Covid-19 antigen tests

Tests due next week will confirm whether self-isolating healthcare workers can return to workCoronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coverageTests for healthcare workers will be rolled out next week, allowing them to confirm whether they have been infected or are safe to work, the government has announced.Michael Gove – standing in for the prime minister at the daily briefing after...

In Earth's largest extinction, land animal die-offs began long before marine extinction

Because of poor dates for land fossils laid down before and after the mass extinction at the end of the Permian, paleontologists assumed that the terrestrial extinctions from Gondwana occurred at the same time as the better-documented marine extinctions. But a new study provides more precise dates for South African fossils and points to a long, perhaps 400,000-year period of extinction on land...