【推荐1】A new device works like a solar panel, except it doesn't harvest energy from the sun. It captures energy from the cold night sky.

A prototype （雏形）of the device produced enough electricity at night to power a small light bulb. A bigger version might one day light rooms or charge phones. It could also power electronics in remote or low-resource areas that lack electricity.

The device makes use of the temperature difference between the earth and outer space to create electricity. As long as one side of it is cooler than the other, the generator can produce electricity. The cooler side faces the sky and is attached to an aluminum plate. That plate is sealed beneath a transparent cover and surrounded with insulation （隔热材料）to keep out heat. The bottom of the generator is attached to an exposed aluminum （铝）plate. That plate is warmed by the local air. At night, the top plate can get a couple of degrees Celsius cooler than the bottom of the generator.

Researchers tested a 20-centimeter prototype one clear December night in Stanford University, California. The generator produced up to 25 milliwatts of power per square meter of the device. That was enough power to light a small light emitting diode （发光二极管），or a LED bulb. Further improvements might increase its production to at least 500 milliwatts per square meter. The system might need more insulation around the cool, top plate to do that.

“The device could also help power remote weather stations or other environmental devices, " says Aaswath Raman. He is a material scientist who works on the device at the University of California, Los Angeles. " This may be useful in polar regions where people can't see sunlight for months, “ Raman says. "If you have some low-power devices and you need to power them through three months of darkness, this might be a way. ”

【推荐2】You have never seen the dodo bird in your lifetime. Driven to extinction on the island of Mauritius in 1692, the species has become a thing of legend. But it could soon be brought back to life.   

A company called Colossal Biosciences, which has offices in Austin, plans to “de-extinct the species alongside some other well-known extinct species, the woolly mammoth (猛犸象) and Tasmanian tiger. According to the company, all three will be de-extinct within the next decade.

The dodo bird was a giant, flightless pigeon (鸽子) on the island of Mauritius. The island, off the east coast of Africa, was visited by sailors in the early 1600’s. When sailors arrived there, they would walk around the island and knock the head of the dodos because there was nothing else to do on the island. By 1692, the species was extinct.

“Bringing back extinct animals,” says Forrest Galante, a scientist who serves as a conservation advisor to Colossal Biosciences, “isn’t just because we can. In the case of the dodo, it will put back something at the top of the food chain. Removing the bird created a gap in the ecosystem of the environment. Recovering it, in theory, should help fill that gap. You’re bringing back a creature, an individual and a group of them that will most importantly repair a damaged ecosystem, because they’ve been removed by human beings,” says Galante.

Just like in Jurassic Park, DNA is required to bring back an extinct animal. DNA from species like the dodo bird and woolly mammoth can be recovered. According to Galante, this DNA is then hatched into a related species that is living today. In the case of the dodo bird, a pigeon is used. When the pigeon lays eggs, dodo birds will hatch from the eggs.

The new dodos will not be the exact same type of bird, but close enough to fill the gaps their extinction left behind.

【推荐3】During the outbreak of novel coronavirus, cities are locked down and borders are closed. Science, on the contrary, is becoming more open. And this "open science" is already making a difference.

Soon after the epidemic started in China, a research team from Fudan University in Shanghai successfully sequenced （测定序列）the DNA of the virus. But they didn't keep the information to themselves. Instead, they placed the sequences on GenBank, an open-access data platform, so researchers around the world could download them for free and start studying the virus.

Due to this openness, pharmaceutical （制药的）companies across the globe are now able to work simultaneously （同时地）to develop a vaccine. “There may be room for multiple different vaccines for different purposes and different age groups,”, Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security in the US, told Al Jazeera. "The                    bigger menu we have of vaccines, the more resilient （有适应力的）we'll be against coronavirus outbreaks in the future.”

Major drug companies around the world are also sharing their study results. Remdesivir, a drug originally developed by US company Gilead Sciences to treat Ebola, is found to be promising in fighting against the novel coronavirus. Currently, two trials of the drug are already underway in China, and the results might be available as soon as April, according to The Verge.

This openness in science is going to be even more critical in the future. “With climate change, increasing globalization, and population shifts, epidemics will not go away, and might even become more frequent," Dan Barouch, a Harvard Medical School professor, told Harvard Magazine.

He said, "No one group can do everything. It has to be a coordinated （合作的）approach. But I do think that the world has a greater sense of readiness this time to develop knowledge, drugs, and therapeutics （疗法）very rapidly.”

Every epidemic is indeed a crisis, but it can also be a learning opportunity. One redeeming （补偿的）factor of the COVID-19 outbreak is that it is helping science adapt for the better.

【推荐1】All parents have sky-high hopes for their children. We want them to be confident and satisfied. What can parents do to help their kids grow up to lead happy lives? Experts advise:

Applauding(称赞) their achievements. A study found that students whose parents paid attention to their abilities were far more likely to do well in school—and in life—than students whose parents didn’t show such support. So celebrate your kids’ achievements, no matter how small they are.

Praising their efforts. Kids won’t always come out on top. Still, they are praised for trying their best. Ten-year-old April Cutler, for example, has had trouble with math since the second grade. “She usually gets C’s on her report card, but last year she was determined to get A’s and worked hard at it,” says her mom. “When the first grading period ended, April was disappointed when she got a B in math,” Lueille continues. “But my husband and I told her we were very proud that she’d improved. That inspired her to try even harder. She got a B plus for the next period!”

Letting them make decisions and mistakes. Making his/her own decisions increases a child’s sense of control and builds his/her confidence. And allowing kids to make wrong decisions—so long as doing so won’t harm them—helps kids learn from their mistakes.

Encouraging them to solve their own problems. As they grow, children need practice in communicating and standing up for themselves. One of the best places to learn these skills is at home. So the next time your child runs to tell you that her brother is blaming her, step back and let them work it out.

【推荐2】Teenagers have long been told that being active and taking part in various sports is good for their health. But new research suggests that too much sport for teenagers could negatively affect their well-being just as much as too little sport.

Researchers from Switzerland say their study suggests that 14 hours of physical activity a week is best for promoting good health in teenagers. However, they found that more than 14 hours appears to be detrimental to their health. To reach their findings, the researchers surveyed more than 1,245 teenagers aged between 16 and 20 from Switzerland.

All participants were required to answer questions on height and weight, sports practice, sports injuries and well-being. Their well-being was assessed(评估) using the World Health Organization (WHO) Well-Being Index,and the average well-being score for all participants was 17.

The researchers divided sports participation into low (0—3.5 hours a week), average (3.6— 10.5 hours), high (10.6— 17.5 hours), and very high (more than 17.5 hours).The researchers found that participants in the low and very high activity groups were more than twice as likely to have well-being scores below 13, compared with participants in the average group. The researchers found that the highest well-being scores were gotten by participants who carried cut around 14 hours of physical activity a week, but exercising beyond 14 hours resulted in lower well-being scores.

Commenting on their findings, the researchers say physical activity has been connected with positive emotional well-being, reduced sadness, anxiety and stress disorders, and improved self-respect in teenagers.

The researchers suggest that their study stresses the importance for physicians caring for teenagers to check their level of sports practice and ask them about their well-being. Teenagers probably need a supportive and closer follow-up of their health and well-being. The findings can provide information for guideline groups who produce recommendations on sports practice for teenagers.

【推荐2】An open letter, winning the likes of Tesla CEO Musk and Apple CEO Steve, was released early last week. It advocates a 6-month pause to give Artificial Intelligence (AI) companies and regulators time to make safeguards to protect society from potential risks of the technology.

AI has progressed at a fast speed since the invention of ChatGPT, which reportedly reached over 100 million users by January, 2023. Many technology companies are racing to build AI into their products, which have caught many off guard.

“Many people aren’t well prepared for the pace and scale of these AI models. They are ideal for spreading misinformation, cheating people out of their money and convincing employees to click on dangerous links online,” says Michael, a researcher of AI company, who signed the letter. “I feel that a 6-month pause would give regulators enough time to catch up with the rapid pace of progress.”

Privacy is another growing concern, as critics worry that systems could exactly reproduce personal information from their training sets. Italy’s data protection authority prohibited ChatGPT on 31 March over concerns that personal data are being used to train Open AI’s models. Some experts warn of deeper security threats. ChatGPT-based digital assistants that can read and write emails could offer new opportunities for hackers.

Unfortunately, many problems of today’s AI models don’t have easy solutions. One complex issue is how to make AI-generated content easy to detect. Some researchers are working on “watermarking”—creating a digital mark in the AI’s output. However, a recent research finds that tools, which slightly change AI-produced text, can easily defeat this approach.

Microsoft CEO Bill Gates says that the proposed pause won’t “solve the challenges” ahead. He believes the people behind the letter are heavily involved in the technology world, which he thinks gives them a narrow perspective on the potential risks.