In the spotlight: the father of "the particle of God", the rivers of stars and Nobel prizes | Science

Leon Lederman, father of "the particle of God", dies

Leon Lederman, Nobel laureate physicist and passionate advocate of science education, who coined the term "God particle", died this week at the age of 96. Lederman also led the team that discovered a particle called the bottom quark and headed the national Fermi newspaper. Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Illinois, one of the most prominent high energy particle physics laboratories in the world, for more than a decade.

Streams of stars reveal the violent history of the galaxy – and perhaps its invisible dark matter

Stellar streams, the filamentous remains of galaxies and star clusters that once fell into the gravitational grip of the Milky Way, usher in a new era of "galactic archeology", allowing scientists to go back in time the cosmic clock to rebuild the assembly of the Milky Way. . The streams, of which 60 have been discovered so far, are also used as extremely sensitive scales to measure the mass of the galaxy and reveal the presence of dark matter.

Pioneers of cancer immunotherapy win Nobel drug

James Allison of the MD Anderson Cancer Center at the University of Texas at Houston and Tasuku Honjo of Kyoto University in Japan won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. Both have discovered ways to eliminate the "brakes" of the immune system that prevent it from attacking cancer cells. These discoveries have led to the development of immunotherapies that have revolutionized the treatment of certain types of cancer, leading in some patients tumors hitherto impossible to treat to disappear almost completely.

The recently discovered 'Goblin' world hints at the presence of Planet Nine

Far beyond Pluto, astronomers have discovered a new dwarf planet that follows the most distant orbit ever confirmed, reaching about 2300 times the distance of the sun from that of the Earth. Nicknamed "The Goblin" because of its discovery around Halloween 2015, the dwarf planet joins a small group of objects from the extreme solar system whose orbits evoke tugboats from an assumed but not yet observed planet. Planet Nine, hidden in the margins of the solar system. .

Injections of bacteria into tumors are promising for cancer treatment

Researchers have reported this week that some living bacteria seem to block tumor growth when injected into cancerous masses. Injections appear to activate an immune response that also targets the tumor. Despite the unanswered questions about the safety of the approach, such injections have generated enough interest to be included in a new clinical trial involving bacteria with established immunotherapy, known as the control point inhibitor.