This discovery helps scientists understand how objects in the outer solar system behave and how they got there. It supports the idea that many distant objects are temporarily “caught” in Neptune’s gravity as they drift through space.

“This is a big step in understanding the outer solar system,” said Rosemary Pike, lead researcher from the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. “It shows that even very distant regions influenced by Neptune can contain objects, and it gives us new clues about how the solar system evolved.”

The finding was published this month in The Planetary Science Journal, a publication of the American Astronomical Society.

The discovery was made by the Large inclination Distant Objects (LiDO) survey, which searched for unusual objects in the outer solar system. This survey used the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope for the main survey operations, and Gemini Observatory and Magellan Baade for additional observations.

The survey was designed to search for bodies with orbits that extend far above and below the plane of the Earth’s orbit around the sun, part of the outer solar system that hasn’t been well-studied.

“It has been fascinating to learn how many small bodies in the solar system exist on these very large, very tilted orbits,” said Dr. Samantha Lawler (University of Regina), a core member of the LiDO team. The object’s average distance is about 140 times farther from the sun than Earth and follows a very tilted path around the solar system.

What makes 2020 VN40 even more interesting is how it moves compared to Neptune. Most objects with a simple ratio of the duration of their orbit compared to the duration of Neptune’s orbit always come closest to the sun when Neptune is far away. In contrast, 2020 VN40 comes closest to the sun when Neptune is very close by, if you look at their positions from above the solar system. The tilt of 2020 VN40’s orbit means that the objects are not actually close, because 2020 VN40 is actually far below the solar system- they only appear close when flattened onto a map. All other known resonant trans-Neptunian objects orbit such that they avoid this alignment at their closest approach to the sun, even in the flattened view.

“This new motion is like finding a hidden rhythm in a song we thought we knew,” said Ruth Murray-Clay (University of California Santa Cruz), co-author of the study. “It could change how we think about the way distant objects move.”

These findings suggest that highly tilted orbits can lead to new and unexpected types of motion. The LiDO survey has already found over 140 distant objects, and more discoveries are expected from future surveys. With telescopes like the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, scientists hope to find many more objects like 2020 VN40.

“This is just the beginning,” said Kathryn Volk of the Planetary Science Institute. “We’re opening a new window into the solar system’s past.”

“For the first time, we have identified the earliest moment when planet formation is initiated around a star other than our Sun,” says Melissa McClure, a professor at Leiden University in the Netherlands and lead author of the new study, published on July 16 in Nature.

Co-author Merel van ‘t Hoff, a professor at Purdue University, USA, compares their findings to “a picture of the baby Solar System,” saying that “we’re seeing a system that looks like what our Solar System looked like when it was just beginning to form.”

This newborn planetary system is emerging around HOPS-315, a ‘proto’ or baby star that sits some 1300 light-years away from us and is an analogue of the nascent Sun. Around such baby stars, astronomers often see discs of gas and dust known as ‘protoplanetary discs’, which are the birthplaces of new planets. While astronomers have previously seen young discs that contain newborn, massive, Jupiter-like planets, McClure says, “we’ve always known that the first solid parts of planets, or ‘planetesimals’, must form further back in time, at earlier stages.”

In our Solar System, the very first solid material to condense near Earth’s present location around the Sun is found trapped within ancient meteorites. Astronomers age-date these primordial rocks to determine when the clock started on our Solar System’s formation. Such meteorites are packed full of crystalline minerals that contain silicon monoxide (SiO) and can condense at the extremely high temperatures present in young planetary discs. Over time, these newly condensed solids bind together, sowing the seeds for planet formation as they gain both size and mass. The first kilometer-sized planetesimals in the Solar System, which grew to become planets such as Earth or Jupiter’s core, formed just after the condensation of these crystalline minerals.

With their new discovery, astronomers have found evidence of these hot minerals beginning to condense in the disc around HOPS-315. Their results show that SiO is present around the baby star in its gaseous state, as well as within these crystalline minerals, suggesting it is only just beginning to solidify. “This process has never been seen before in a protoplanetary disc — or anywhere outside our Solar System,” says co-author Edwin Bergin, a professor at the University of Michigan, USA.

These minerals were first identified using the James Webb Space Telescope, a joint project of the US, European and Canadian space agencies. To find out where exactly the signals were coming from, the team observed the system with ALMA, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, which is operated by ESO together with international partners in Chile’s Atacama Desert.

With these data, the team determined that the chemical signals were coming from a small region of the disc around the star equivalent to the orbit of the asteroid belt around the Sun. “We’re really seeing these minerals at the same location in this extrasolar system as where we see them in asteroids in the Solar System,” says co-author Logan Francis, a postdoctoral researcher at Leiden University.

Because of this, the disc of HOPS-315 provides a wonderful analogue for studying our own cosmic history. As van ‘t Hoff says, “this system is one of the best that we know to actually probe some of the processes that happened in our Solar System.” It also provides astronomers with a new opportunity to study early planet formation, by standing in as a substitute for newborn solar systems across the galaxy.

ESO astronomer and European ALMA Program Manager Elizabeth Humphreys, who did not take part in the study, says: “I was really impressed by this study, which reveals a very early stage of planet formation. It suggests that HOPS-315 can be used to understand how our own Solar System formed. This result highlights the combined strength of JWST and ALMA for exploring protoplanetary discs.”

The team is composed of M. K. McClure (Leiden Observatory, Leiden University, The Netherlands [Leiden]), M. van ‘t Hoff (Department of Astronomy, The University of Michigan, Michigan, USA [Michigan] and Purdue University, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Indiana, USA), L. Francis (Leiden), Edwin Bergin (Michigan), W.R. M. Rocha (Leiden), J. A. Sturm (Leiden), D. Harsono (Institute of Astronomy, Department of Physics, National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan), E. F. van Dishoeck (Leiden), J. H. Black (Chalmers University of Technology, Department of Space, Earth and Environment, Onsala Space Observatory, Sweden), J. A. Noble (Physique des Interactions Ioniques et Moléculaires, CNRS, Aix Marseille Université, France), D. Qasim (Southwest Research Institute, Texas, USA), E. Dartois (Institut des Sciences Moléculaires d’Orsay, CNRS, Université Paris-Saclay, France.)

Scientists based in the U.S., Italy, and Spain, set their sights on a mysterious cosmic duo called PSR J1023+0038, or J1023 for short. The J1023 system is comprised of a rapidly rotating neutron star feeding off of its low-mass companion star, which has created an accretion disk around the neutron star. This neutron star is also a pulsar, emitting powerful twin beams of light from its opposing magnetic poles as it rotates, spinning like a lighthouse beacon.

The J1023 system is rare and valuable to study because the pulsar transitions clearly between its active state, in which it feeds off its companion star, and a more dormant state, when it emits detectable pulsations as radio waves. This makes it a “transitional millisecond pulsar.”

“Transitional millisecond pulsars are cosmic laboratories, helping us understand how neutron stars evolve in binary systems,” said researcher Maria Cristina Baglio of the Italian National Institute of Astrophysics (INAF) Brera Observatory in Merate, Italy, and lead author of a paper in The Astrophysical Journal Letters illustrating the new findings.

The big question for scientists about this pulsar system was: Where do the X-rays originate? The answer would inform broader theories about particle acceleration, accretion physics, and the environments surrounding neutron stars across the universe.

The source surprised them: The X-rays came from the pulsar wind, a chaotic stew of gases, shock waves, magnetic fields, and particles accelerated near the speed of light, that hits the accretion disk.

To determine this, astronomers needed to measure the angle of polarization in both X-ray and optical light. Polarization is a measure of how organized light waves are. They looked at X-ray polarization with IXPE, the only telescope capable of making this measurement in space, and comparing it with optical polarization from the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope in Chile. IXPE launched in Dec. 2021 and has made many observations of pulsars, but J1023 was the first system of its kind that it explored.

NASA’s NICER (Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer) and Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory provided valuable observations of the system in high-energy light. Other telescopes contributing data included the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array in Magdalena, New Mexico.

The result: scientists found the same angle of polarization across the different wavelengths.

“That finding is compelling evidence that a single, coherent physical mechanism underpins the light we observe,” said Francesco Coti Zelati of the Institute of Space Sciences in Barcelona, Spain, co-lead author of the findings.

This interpretation challenges the conventional wisdom about neutron star emissions of radiation in binary systems, the researchers said. Previous models had indicated that the X-rays come from the accretion disk, but this new study shows they originate with the pulsar wind.

“IXPE has observed many isolated pulsars and found that the pulsar wind powers the X-rays,” said NASA Marshall astrophysicist Philip Kaaret, principal investigator for IXPE at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. “These new observations show that the pulsar wind powers most of the energy output of the system.”

Astronomers continue to study transitional millisecond pulsars, assessing how observed physical mechanisms compare with those of other pulsars and pulsar wind nebulae. Insights from these observations could help refine theoretical models describing how pulsar winds generate radiation – and bring researchers one step closer, Baglio and Coti Zelati agreed, to fully understanding the physical mechanisms at work in these extraordinary cosmic systems.

More about IXPE

IXPE, which continues to provide unprecedented data enabling groundbreaking discoveries about celestial objects across the universe, is a joint NASA and Italian Space Agency mission with partners and science collaborators in 12 countries. IXPE is led by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. BAE Systems, Inc., headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, manages spacecraft operations together with the University of Colorado’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder.

But new University of Colorado Boulder research shows the popular sugar substitute and specialty food additive comes with serious downsides, impacting brain cells in numerous ways that can boost risk of stroke.

The study was published in the Journal of Applied Physiology.

“Our study adds to the evidence suggesting that non-nutritive sweeteners that have generally been purported to be safe, may not come without negative health consequences,” said senior author Christopher DeSouza, professor of integrative physiology and director of the Integrative Vascular Biology Lab.

First approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2001, erythritol is a sugar alcohol, often produced by fermenting corn and found in hundreds of products. It has almost no calories, is about 80% as sweet as table sugar, and has negligible impact on insulin levels, making it a favorite for people trying to lose weight, keep their blood sugar in check or avoid carbohydrates.

But recent research has begun to shed light on its risks.

One recent study involving 4,000 people in the U.S. and Europe found that men and women with higher circulating levels of erythritol were significantly more likely to have a heart attack or stroke within the next three years.

DeSouza and first author Auburn Berry, a graduate student in his lab, set out to understand what might be driving that increased risk.

Researchers in the lab treated human cells that line blood vessels in the brain for three hours with about the same amount of erythritol contained in a typical sugar-free beverage.

They observed that the treated cells were altered in numerous ways: They expressed significantly less nitric oxide, a molecule that relaxes and widens blood vessels, and more endothelin-1, a protein that constricts blood vessels. Meanwhile, when challenged with a clot-forming compound called thrombin, cellular production of the natural clot-busting compound t-PA was “markedly blunted.” The erythritol-treated cells also produced more reactive oxygen species (ROS), a.k.a. “free radicals,” metabolic byproducts which can age and damage cells and inflame tissue.

“Big picture, if your vessels are more constricted and your ability to break down blood clots is lowered, your risk of stroke goes up,” said Berry. “Our research demonstrates not only that, but how erythritol has the potential to increase stroke risk.”

DeSouza notes that their study used only a serving-size worth of the sugar substitute. For those who consume multiple servings per day, the impact, presumably, could be worse.

The authors caution that their study was a laboratory study, conducted on cells, and larger studies in people are needed.

That said, De Souza encourages consumers to read labels, looking for erythritol or “sugar alcohol” on the label.

“Given the epidemiological study that inspired our work, and now our cellular findings, we believe it would be prudent for people to monitor their consumption of non-nutrient-sweeteners such as this one,” he said.

The Longstanding Puzzle: Why Can’t We See the Optical Hall Effect?

For over a century, scientists have known that electric currents bend in a magnetic field—a phenomenon known as the Hall effect. In magnetic materials like iron, this effect is strong and well understood. But in ordinary, non-magnetic metals like copper or gold, the effect is much weaker.

In theory, a related phenomenon—the optical Hall effect—should help scientists visualize how electrons behave when light and magnetic fields interact. But at visible wavelengths, this effect has remained far too subtle to detect. The scientific world has known it was there, but lacked the tools to measure it.

“It was like trying to hear a whisper in a noisy room for decades,” said Prof. Amir Capua. “Everyone knew the whisper was there, but we didn’t have a microphone sensitive enough to hear it.”

Cracking the Code: A Closer Look at the Invisible

Led by Ph.D. candidate Nadav Am Shalom and Prof. Amir Capua from the Institute of Electrical Engineering and Applied Physics at Hebrew University, in collaboration with Prof. Binghai Yan from the Weizmann Institute of Science, Pennsylvania State University, and Prof. Igor Rozhansky from the University of Manchester, the study focuses on a tricky challenge in physics: how to detect tiny magnetic effects in materials that aren’t magnetic.

“You might think of metals like copper and gold as magnetically ‘quiet’—they don’t stick to your fridge like iron does,” explained Prof. Capua. “But in reality, under the right conditions, they do respond to magnetic fields—just in extremely subtle ways.”

The challenge has always been how to detect these tiny effects—especially using light in the visible spectrum where laser sources are readily available. Until now, the signal was simply too faint to observe.

Turning Up the Volume on Magnetic Whispers

To solve this, the researchers upgraded a method called the magneto-optical Kerr effect (MOKE), which uses a laser to measure how magnetism alters light’s reflection. Think of it like using a high-powered flashlight to catch the faintest glint off a surface in the dark.

By combining a 440-nanometer blue laser with large-amplitude modulation of the external magnetic field, they dramatically boosted the technique’s sensitivity. The result: they were able to pick up magnetic “echoes” in non-magnetic metals like copper, gold, aluminum, tantalum, and platinum—a feat previously considered near-impossible.

Why It Matters: When Noise Becomes a Signal

The Hall effect is a pivotal tool in the semiconductor industry and in studying materials at the atomic scale: it helps scientists figure out how many electrons are in a metal. But traditionally, measuring the Hall effect means physically attaching tiny wires to the device, a process that is time-consuming and tricky, especially when dealing with nanometer-sized components. The new approach, however, is much simpler: it merely requires to shine a laser on the electrical device, no wires needed.

Digging deeper, the team found that what appeared to be random “noise” in their signal wasn’t random at all. Instead, it followed a clear pattern tied to a quantum property called spin-orbit coupling, which links how electrons move to how they spin—a key behavior in modern physics.

This connection also affects how magnetic energy dissipates in materials. These insights have direct implications for the design of magnetic memory, spintronic devices, and even quantum systems.

“It’s like discovering that static on a radio isn’t just interference—it’s someone whispering valuable information,” said Ph.D. candidate Am Shalom. “We’re now using light to ‘listen’ to these hidden messages from electrons.”

Looking Ahead: A New Window into Spin and Magnetism

The technique offers a non-invasive, highly sensitive tool for exploring magnetism in metals—without the need for massive magnets or cryogenic conditions. Its simplicity and precision could help engineers build faster processors, more energy-efficient systems, and sensors with unprecedented accuracy.

“This research turns a nearly 150-year-old scientific problem into a new opportunity,” said Prof. Capua.

“Interestingly, even Edwin Hall, the greatest scientists of all, who discovered the Hall effect, attempted to measure his effect using a beam of light with no success. He summarizes in the closing sentence of his notable paper from 1881: “I think that, if the action of silver had been one tenth as strong as that of iron, the effect would have been detected. No such effect was observed.” (E. Hall, 1881).”

“By tuning in to the right frequency—and knowing where to look—we’ve found a way to measure what was once thought invisible.”

Co-authored by Renata Ivanek, a professor in the department of population medicine and diagnostic sciences, and Martin Wiedmann, professor in food safety, the paper outlines interventions likely to make a concrete difference in the safety of the nation’s romaine.

“This study supports that interventions should focus on reducing produce contamination via contaminated irrigation water, on assuring that produce washes applied during processing consistently deliver reasonably high reductions of bacterial numbers, and on improving temperature control during distribution,” Wiedmann said.

“We tried to describe the system as holistically as possible to account for different risk factors and how they could have interactions,” Ivanek said. “There’s not just one intervention that will save us all. We spent a lot of time trying to understand the preharvest component, especially the irrigation water piece and how much risk can be explained by that.”

Study results suggested that much contamination originates from irrigation with untreated surface water applied through overhead spray irrigation systems. They found that risk from irrigation was reduced either through water treatments or by switching to furrow or drip irrigation.

“While not the most common system, spray irrigation is used in a number of fields for its benefits during germination, its cooling effect on plants and other reasons. But drip or furrow irrigation reduces the probability that water directly touches the leaves,” Ivanek said, acknowledging that switching to these other irrigation systems introduces significant potential additional costs to grower.

Ivanek and her co-authors also explored the importance of maintaining proper cold storage temperatures along the entire supply chain to romaine’s final destination.

“Time and temperature play a role in food safety, and also in food quality and shelf life,” she said, describing a “perfect storm” if contamination happens at the farm or processing level and then improper transportation temperatures allow bacteria to grow.

The comprehensive practices and interventions explored in this study intend to aid decision-makers in establishing and enhancing food safety best management practices, Ivanek said.

“The big message is the American food supply chain is extremely safe compared to other countries,” she said. “We’re exploring how can we make it even safer and where we should put additional effort.”