Measles Outbreaks, Asteroid Risks and Fish Friends
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The PC gave us computing power at home, the internet connected us, and mobile let us do it pretty much anywhere. Now generative AI lets us communicate with technology in our own language, using our own senses. But figuring it all out when you're living through it is a totally different story. Welcome to Leading the Shift.

a new podcast from Microsoft Azure. I'm your host, Susan Etlinger. In each episode, leaders will share what they're learning to help you navigate all this change with confidence. Please join us. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Happy Monday, listeners. For Scientific American Science Quickly, this is Alison Partial filling in for Rachel Feltman. Let's get the week started by catching up on some of the latest science news.

First, a quick update on our favorite ominous asteroid. The rock dubbed 2024 YR4 briefly had an even higher probability of hitting Earth than the last time we mentioned it. Early last week, NASA pegged the rock's chances of smashing into us in 2032 at more than 3%. That was the highest impact probability ever recorded for an asteroid of its size or larger, but you can relax because as of last Thursday, that estimate had fallen back down to a reassuring 1.5%. It's

It's totally understandable if you find all of this wishy-washiness a bit disconcerting, but rest assured that things are playing out more or less exactly the way that scientists told us to expect. For more information on 2024 YR4 and why its chances of hitting us just keep changing so rapidly, check out our February 12th episode.

And speaking of space, new observations from the James Webb Space Telescope suggest that the black hole at the center of our galaxy is having something of a constant cosmic rager.

Sagittarius A*, which is the black hole that sits at the center of the Milky Way, our galaxy, is apparently emitting flares of light pretty much all the time. The black hole's accretion disk, which is that swirl of gas and dust that surrounds it, seems to be always bubbling with random bursts of activity, from like the briefest of faint flickers to bright daily eruptions.

And based on observations taken in 2023 and 2024, the black hole doesn't ever seem to settle into a steady state, according to the research's lead author. The scientists hope to continue studying Sagittarius A* with JWST so they can learn more.

In other space news, for the first time, an astronaut candidate with a physical disability has been cleared to go to the International Space Station. John McFall had his right leg amputated above the knee following a motorcycle accident when he was 19. He's a Paralympic medalist and an orthopedic surgeon. And in 2022, he joined the European Space Agency, or ESA's Reserve Astronaut Corps.

The ESA conducted an extensive feasibility study to prove that there were no medical or technical reasons to keep McFall from going into orbit. He isn't guaranteed to get assigned to an ISS mission, but he told The Guardian that thanks to the detailed and methodical nature of the ESA's study, the agency's international partners have accepted his eligibility to fly.

Now let's catch up on some health stories. A troubling measles outbreak continues to grow in West Texas, with some 58 cases identified as of last Tuesday, according to the state health department. Measles is highly contagious and can be fatal. And in this outbreak, most of the cases have been reported in children and young adults.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services says that 95% of children in kindergarten should be protected with two doses of the MMR vaccine to prevent measles outbreaks. In Gaines County, though, which is the epicenter of the Texas outbreak, nearly 20% of incoming kindergarten students for the 2023-2024 school year were unvaccinated. The U.S. as a whole has fallen short of the 95% vaccination threshold for several years now. Let's wrap things up with some fascinating animal research.

First, a recent study could help explain why humans have such unique powers of speech. In a paper published last Tuesday in Nature Communications, scientists reported that a gene variant specific to modern humans may have played a role in the development of language. Modern humans have a unique variant of a gene called NOVA1 compared to Neanderthals and Denisovans.

Previous research has suggested that this variant can impact brain development. In the new study, researchers used CRISPR gene editing to swap the NOVA1 gene typically found in mice with the modern human variant. When the mice with the swapped gene vocalized, they made slightly different sounds than their counterparts.

While the development of human speech is probably tied to many different genes, researchers say that they hope this study will help us better understand the evolution of language and perhaps allow us to improve our detection of and intervention in human speech development issues. Meanwhile, a study published last Tuesday in Biology Letters suggests that fish really can be our friends.

Researchers diving in the Mediterranean Sea have noticed that local fish seem to pick up on which scientists carry the food to use as experimental rewards. The fish apparently have a tendency to follow divers who've previously offered them snacks while ignoring their colleagues. So scientists decided to try and figure out whether these wild fish really can actually recognize individual humans.

The researchers started by training fish to follow one diver in particular. She initially wore a bright red vest during her dives and offered just tons of snacks. Eventually, even wearing plain diving gear, hiding the food, and only feeding the fish after they'd been following her for 50 meters, she had about 20 saddled sea bream and black sea bream that knew her and swarmed her once she hit the water.

Then, to make a long story short, the scientists demonstrated that fish could learn to distinguish her from a colleague, at least when they were wearing distinctive gear. That suggests that some fish, at least, can pick up on visual cues to tell humans apart. So if you're certain that your goldfish adores you specifically, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. That's all for this week's News Roundup. Rachel will be back on Wednesday to tell you all about an unsung hero in our quest to understand the cosmos.

Science Quickly is produced by me, Alison Partial, Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper, Madison Goldberg, Naeem Amarsi, and Jeff DelVisio. Shaina Poses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check our show. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Subscribe to Scientific American for more up-to-date and in-depth science news. For Scientific American, this is Alison Partial, filling in for Rachel Feltman. Have a great week!