Friday, August 1, 2025

Polaris of Enlightenment

Starlink expansion threatens astronomy – scientists warn of increased interference

Published 27 October 2024
– By Editorial Staff
One of the SpaceX factories in the US.
3 minute read

Scientists at the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy warn that Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites are causing severe radio interference in Earth’s orbit, hampering astronomers’ observations of distant planets and stars. They are now calling for action to tackle the problem before it gets any worse.

Since 2012, the European Low-Frequency Array radio telescope network (LOFAR) has been probing faint and distant objects in the universe to detect black holes and look for exoplanets.

However, since SpaceX began launching its Starlink satellites five years ago, increased radio wave emissions have made it much more difficult for LOFAR to carry out its observations.

Jessica Dempsey is the Scientific Director and Director General of the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy.

– Last year, we started to see interference signals in the sky, we managed to trace them to some of the Starlink satellites from the first generation that were orbiting above the Earth, she said in an interview with The Independent.

6 000 satellites

SpaceX currently has a string of over 6 000 satellites in orbit, enabling high-speed internet access to almost anywhere on Earth. The satellites have been inadvertently emitting electromagnetic radiation, which the LOFAR astronomers initially thought was due to faulty batteries.

Dempsey says that last year they discussed solutions with SpaceX engineers to reduce the radiation and were optimistic that the problem could be solved.

But when the astronomers conducted new observations in July, they discovered that SpaceX’s updated Starlink V2 Mini satellites were causing even more interference. The company has also launched more satellites since then.

Starlink [was] emitting over 30 times more emissions, and now not just a few, all of [the satellites]. Frankly, we were shocked.

– The brightness in this particular frequency band of these new satellites, compared to what we’re looking at [is] about 10 million times brighter. The equivalent would be you’re trying to look at that beautiful, faintest star you can see with your eye on a dark night. And then, the full moon rises next to it, says Dempsey.

SpaceX Starlink satellit
6,000 Starlink satellites currently in orbit above the Earth.

The problem is increasing

The most worrying thing, according to Dempsey, is that the problem just keeps growing. Despite previous talks with SpaceX to reduce interference, their updated Starlink satellites have created even more radio interference.

The company is currently launching around 40 new satellites a week, and with plans to have 100,000 satellites in orbit in the future, scientists fear that ground-based astronomy will eventually become impossible.

– They’re launching 40 of these ‘full moons’ every week. Right now, there’s about 6,000 Starlink satellites up there but there’s an intended 100,000 [total future satellites]. So imagine 100,000 full moons up there. Then we can really say goodbye to any kind of astronomy that we would hope to do from the ground.

Dempsey and her colleagues recently published results in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics showing that almost all the Starlink satellites they observed emitted electromagnetic radiation that could interfere with the observations.

– The UN has regulations on the protected bands of frequencies. And, those protected bands are there so that astronomy can do its work. It’s a matter of whether those regulations are supported by anyone who has the power to do so.

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Researchers’ new IVF method: Children born with DNA from three people

Published 20 July 2025
– By Editorial Staff
Archive image.
2 minute read

Eight children are reported to have been born in the United Kingdom with DNA from a mother and a father – and an additional person. The method has been justified as preventing the risk of inheriting life-threatening genetic diseases from parents.

The intervention technique is described in British media as groundbreaking and became possible after the UK changed legislation in the area in 2015. The UK’s fertility authority granted the first license in 2017 to a clinic at Newcastle University, where doctors were the very first to use the technique that reportedly aims to help women with mitochondrial diseases give birth to healthy children through artificial insemination.

Four boys and four girls, including a pair of identical twins, have been born through the method technically called mitochondrial donation therapy. The children currently show no signs of the mitochondrial diseases they risked inheriting. Another pregnancy is still ongoing.

Third person’s genes are passed on

As parents, all we ever wanted was to give our child a healthy start in life. After years of uncertainty this treatment gave us hope – and then it gave us our baby … we’re overwhelmed with gratitude. Science gave us a chance“, says the mother of one of the girls according to the British liberal newspaper The Guardian.

The mitochondria affected by the treatment constitute 0.02 percent of human total DNA, which is why the researchers behind the technique do not fully embrace the description of the technique as giving rise to “three parents”. At the same time, mitochondria have their own genetic code and girls born with the help of this technique – and who carry the healthy third person’s/donor’s mitochondria – will pass on these genes to their potential children as well.

Study: Fluoride in drinking water may impact children’s cognitive ability

Published 6 July 2025
– By Editorial Staff
According to the study, higher fluoride levels in pregnant women were linked to impaired cognitive abilities in their children at the ages of five and ten.
2 minute read

A study from Karolinska Institutet links fluoride in drinking water to impaired cognition in children. In particular, the researchers saw a negative impact on children’s verbal abilities.

In Sweden, fluoride is found naturally in low levels in drinking water, while in several countries, such as the United States, Canada and Australia, it is added to municipal water to prevent tooth decay. It is also used in toothpaste to protect teeth against decay.

Researchers at the Karolinska Institutet have investigated how early exposure to fluoride affects children’s cognitive abilities. The study involved 500 mothers and their children in rural Bangladesh, where fluoride is naturally present in drinking water at levels comparable to Sweden. The researchers measured fluoride levels in the mothers during pregnancy and later in the children via urine samples. The children’s cognitive abilities were then tested by psychologists at ages five and ten.


The article was originally published in The Nordic Times on March 23, 2025.


The study, published in Environmental Health Perspectives, found that higher fluoride levels in pregnant women were linked to impaired cognitive abilities in their children at ages five and ten. The impact was most evident on children’s verbal comprehension and their ability to interpret and process sensory input. In contrast, the researchers found no statistically significant link between fluoride levels in the urine of five-year-olds and their cognition.

–  This could be due to the shorter exposure, but also because the measurements are not as reliable in younger children due to greater variations in how fluoride is absorbed and accumulated in the body, especially in the skeleton, says Maria Kippler, associate professor at the Institute of Environmental Medicine at Karolinska Institutet, in a press release.

Even low levels can have negative effects

The fluoride levels that were linked to poorer cognitive development were below the WHO and EU limits for drinking water. However, the researchers point out that toothpaste is rarely a significant source of exposure, as it is not intended to be swallowed, but emphasize the importance of children learning to spit it out.

Our results support the hypothesis that even relatively low levels of fluoride can have negative effects on children’s early development, says Kippler.

However, the researchers emphasize that this is an observational study and therefore no firm conclusions can be drawn about cause and effect. It is therefore important to assess the overall results of several similar studies.

– Further research is important to inform the assessment of appropriate fluoride limits. Even small changes in cognition at the population level can have large consequences for public health, says Kippler.

Study: Dog relationships more reliable than best friends

Published 1 June 2025
– By Editorial Staff
2 minute read

Dog owners consider their relationship with their dogs to be stronger than that with their best friend or romantic partner, according to a new study from Hungary. The only relationship they value more is that with their own children.

Researchers from Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary recruited 717 dog owners during two different periods, from April 2011 to February 2013 and from January 2022 to December 2023. Around 20 percent of participants had children and around 80 percent had a romantic partner.

Dog owners were asked to rate several statements about their relationships with their pets, children, romantic partners, closest relatives, and best friends based on characteristics such as reliability, support, and companionship. Participants were also asked to indicate how often they took care of the person or pet, spent fun time with them, or argued with them. This was done on a scale of 1 to 5, which gave average values for different scales. The researchers then compared these average values between dog relationships and human relationships using statistical tests to see if the differences were significant.

The researchers found that owners gave their dogs higher ratings for companionship than their closest relatives, best friends, and romantic partners. Dogs received an average rating of 4.3, while best friends and partners scored 3.8 and 4 on the scale, respectively. The only ones who were considered slightly better company were one’s own children, with an average rating of 4.5 on the scale.

In general, the owners had very little conflict with their dogs (1.5), but more with their partners (2.3) and best friends (2). Parents also had more conflicts with their children than with their dogs, with conflicts with children averaging 1.8 on the scale. When it came to care, both giving and receiving, dogs and children also received the highest ratings, with 4.1 and 4.4 on the scale, respectively.

Children topped the ratings when it came to love (4.7), reliability (4.5), and support (4.4). However, dogs were not far behind, coming in a respectable second place compared to relatives, partners, and best friends. Dogs were rated 4.4 for love, while partners scored 4.3. Dogs were also considered more reliable than best friends, with 4.2 and 3.8, respectively. When it came to feeling supported, dogs scored an average of 4, while partners scored 3.9 and best friends 3.7. Furthermore, dog owners were also more satisfied with their relationships with their dogs than with their closest relatives and best friends.

According to the researchers, dogs are not just “fur babies” or best friends, but a mixture of both. However, the researchers did not find that the bond between owner and dog was stronger in people with weaker human relationships.

Dogs offer a highly positive relationship with minimal conflict, strong social support, and the unique opportunity to have full control over another living being’s life, Professor Enikő Kubinyi told British newspaper The Guardian.

The first patient in the world treated with a new gene editing technology

Published 26 May 2025
– By Editorial Staff
The only CRISPR-based treatment approved for clinical use so far costs around $2 million per treatment session.
3 minute read

A teenager with a rare immune disorder has become the first in the world to be treated with the new gene editing technique prime editing. The aim: to restore the function of the body’s white blood cells.

One month after the procedure, the first results show that the technique seems to work – apparently without any serious side effects.

The treatment was performed on a teenager with chronic granulomatous disease – a rare, inherited condition in which the immune cells lack an enzyme that normally helps kill bacteria. This makes it difficult for the body to fight infections. Through prime editing, the researchers were able to correct the mutation in the DNA that causes the disease.

According to the biotech company Prime Medicine, which developed the treatment, after one month, enzyme function was restored in two-thirds of the patient’s neutrophils – a type of white blood cell that plays an important role in the body’s defense against bacteria. This was announced by the company on May 19.

Prime editing is a new and more precise variant of the well-known CRISPR technique, often described as a “gene scissors”. While traditional CRISPR cuts out parts of DNA and replaces them, prime editing works more like a text editor that can correct errors in the genetic code without making major changes to the genome. The technique was developed in 2019 and is considered both safer and more versatile than previous methods.

Extremely expensive method

Despite the promising results, Prime Medicine says it does not plan to continue developing the treatment, known as PM359, on its own.

– The science has moved far enough that many patients would benefit from these gene-editing treatments. But it boils down to an issue not just of science and technology, but of economics, says David Liu, a chemical biologist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, and co-founder of the company.

For very rare diseases, development costs are often high relative to the limited number of patients. The only CRISPR-based treatment approved for clinical use so far, for blood disorders such as sickle cell anemia, currently costs more than $2 million per treatment.

– It’s like upgrading your iPhone. NThere are new versions coming out all the time and the tools are constantly being refined, says Joseph Hacia, a medical geneticist at the University of Southern California.

Longer follow-up needed

Prime editing is one of several emerging techniques developed as alternatives to classical CRISPR. It has the potential to treat more diseases with greater precision, but time and follow-up are needed before firm conclusions can be drawn about its long-term effects.

It will take between six months and a year to be certain that the edited stem cells are thriving, says Annarita Miccio, a gene therapy expert at the Imagine Institute in Paris.

Critics have also raised several ethical concerns about prime editing and similar techniques, even though they are described as highly accurate. A recurring objection is the risk of genetic changes occurring in the wrong place in the genome and thus causing unwanted side effects and mutations.

Concerns have also been raised that the technology could be used in the future to modify traits rather than treat diseases – raising the debate about so-called ‘designer babies’ and how far we are prepared to go in altering the human genetic code.

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