Perseverance Finds Complex Carbon on Mars, Bolstering Hopes for Ancient Life

NASA's Perseverance rover has detected macromolecular carbon compounds in Martian rocks that also display leopard-spot patterns similar to microbial traces on Earth, marking one of the strongest organic detections yet. In other breakthroughs, AI-designed proteins that bind drug molecules with nanomolar affinity were created from scratch, and the Euclid telescope captured the most detailed image ever of the Milky Way's crowded heart, featuring 60 million stars.

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Perseverance detects complex carbon alongside potential life markers on Mars Using its SHERLOC instrument, NASA's Perseverance rover found large, complex carbon-containing molecules on rocks in Jezero Crater's Bright Angel formation, which also exhibit dark spotted markings reminiscent of ancient microbial activity on Earth. While the carbon could have a non-biological origin, it represents some of the strongest evidence yet for past habitable conditions on Mars. 1 2

AI-designed proteins bind drug molecules with unprecedented precision A new neural-network algorithm called NISE designed proteins from scratch that bind two different small-molecule drugs with up to picomolar affinity, outperforming existing methods by up to 10,000-fold. The approach could accelerate drug delivery, sensing, and catalysis by eliminating the need for experimental screening. 3

Euclid telescope reveals most detailed image of Milky Way's bright core The ESA's Euclid space telescope captured a mosaic of 60 million stars in the Milky Way's bulge, the largest and most detailed photo of our galaxy's heart ever taken. The image will enable micro-lensing studies to measure the mass of exoplanets and probe dark matter and dark energy. 4

Astronomers discover two super-puff planets lighter than cotton candy Two giant exoplanets orbiting a star 1,110 light-years away have densities comparable to shaving foam—the lightest known planets of their size, with Jupiter being up to 35 times denser. These rare 'super-puffs' are thought to form in gas-rich disks and may provide new insights into planet formation. 5

Massive mutational map reveals how STING immunity is tuned Researchers profiled thousands of single-amino-acid variants of the immune protein STING, identifying mutations that can boost interferon signaling or decouple it from other pathways. The atlas reveals new regulatory principles and has implications for cancer immunotherapy and inflammation treatment. 6

Self-driving chemistry lab discovers tunable industrial catalysts The Flex-Cat platform, combining robotics and AI, autonomously sifted through hundreds of catalyst recipes to find recipes that can switch between different chemical products by changing reaction conditions. The breakthrough could accelerate catalyst discovery for pharmaceuticals, plastics, and fuels. 7

Goblin shark seen alive in its natural habitat for first time A University of Hawaii-led team captured the first live footage of the elusive goblin shark in the deep Central Pacific, including a sighting nearly 700 meters deeper than its known depth range. The observations expand the species' known range and set a new depth record for mackerel sharks. 8