Here are a few I have come across the last week or so. Note: Each link is followed by a title and a few paragraphs. For the full article click on the link above title of the article. Note also that full access to some links may require site registration or subscription payment.
General Comment
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Aged Care had a good run this week with lots of discussion on just how useful it could be and where the priorities lay. Some fools were wittering on about how helpful the #myHR can be in this setting!
Telehealth went and came back!
The James Webb Telescope humbled us all with images for an age!
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Monday, 11 July 2022 11:31
‘Concerning lack’ of digital health systems in residential aged care, survey reveals
By Staff Writer
A nationwide survey of residential aged care staff has found almost one in ten works in a facility reliant on paper records for care management, while “critical digital systems” are yet to be widely implemented in a sector in “dire need of disruption”.
Conducted by the Aged Care Technology Consortium – a collaboration by Australian technology companies working to modernise the nation's aged care system – the survey found only 8% of residential aged care workers have access to a digital incident management system.
And within the results, 3% said their facility had implemented a visitor management platform, despite the need to monitor contacts and keep residents and staff members safe during the COVID-19 pandemic.
More than half (53%) said their facility uses a digital medication management system and 29% said a pain management platform is in place, while 8.7% reported using a paper-based care management system.
These results are concerning. There is no need for paper care records to be used in aged care when they come with unnecessary risks for residents. Especially as digital systemare available that can provide safer, more efficient and coordinated care," Humanetix CEO Arthur Shih said.
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Critical digital systems yet to be implemented across Australia's residential aged care sector: survey
Nearly a tenth of staff polled said they still use a paper-based care management system.
By Adam Ang
July 12, 2022 12:23 AM
The Aged Care Technology Consortium in Australia has noted the dearth of critical digital system implementations across the residential aged care sector in a recent nationwide survey.
FINDINGS
The survey, which was conducted in June, gathered responses mostly from facility managers (37%), followed by nursing directors (20%), CEOs (13%) and care managers (7%).
It was found that most respondents (53%) are working in a facility with a digital medication management system while 29% said they have implemented a pain management platform.
About 9% of respondents reported being reliant on paper records for care management; 8% said their workers have access to a digital incident management system; and only 3% said their facility has implemented a visitor management platform.
The survey also revealed staff's major workplace challenges, including documentation completeness (29%), incident management (19%), shift handover and ease of administration (18%), monitoring care quality and managing escalations (16%), and compliance and auditing activities (15%).
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https://medicalrepublic.com.au/tele-clinic-aims-to-cut-mental-health-wait-times/73181
15 July 2022
‘Tele-clinic’ aims to cut mental health wait times
A pilot collaboration led by insurer Medibank could help GPs get their patients into virtual psychological care faster.
A “telepsychology clinic” designed to cut waiting times for referred patients could be available to GP practices nationally if a trial is successful.
The launch of the pilot comes as the lead partner, Medibank, continues to expand its operations beyond its traditional role as a health insurer.
Announced earlier this week, the pilot is a collaboration between Medibank, Medinet and the MyHealth clinic network. It allows GPs to develop a care plan then refer mental health patients to one of the network of psychologists signed up to the trial. The GP and/or patient pick a practitioner by reviewing their profile then the patient books a virtual consult.
The service is currently only available through GPs at MyHealth clinics, although Medibank said it envisaged making it available to practices outside the network if it proves successful.
A web-based “concierge service” helps patients manage the referral, payment and Medicare claims as well as booking their appointments.
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https://www.itnews.com.au/news/deakin-university-reveals-breach-of-47000-students-details-582563
Deakin University reveals breach of 47,000 students' details
By Ry Crozier on Jul 13, 2022 6:30AM
Subset targeted with smish sent via officially-used SMS channel.
Deakin University has revealed a data breach impacting almost 47,000 current and past students, along with a ‘smishing’ attempt that compromised a legitimate communications channel to target 10,000 current students
The Victorian university said it had been “targeted in a cyber attack” where a single staff member’s login credentials were compromised.
The credentials allowed the attacker “to access information held by a third-party provider” that Deakin pays “to forward messages prepared by the university to students via SMS.”
“The information accessed by the unauthorised person was then used to send an SMS, as if from Deakin, to 9997 Deakin students,” the university said in a statement.
The smish was a parcel delivery scam that directed students to a webform that sought additional information, such as a payment card, to free a fake parcel from customs.
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Central Adelaide Local Health Network introduces digital 'pre-hab' for surgery patients
It seeks to decrease instances of surgical complications which happen in one in five patients.
By Adam Ang
July 14, 2022 01:09 AM
The Central Adelaide Local Health Network has launched a new digital programme which aims to help make a patient fit for surgery.
The surgical pre-rehabilitation programme dubbed My Prehab was developed in partnership with Health Translation SA, The Hospital Research Foundation, and healthcare tech company Personify Care.
According to a media release, it includes a comprehensive health screening questionnaire and provides a personalised checklist of items which patients can discuss with their GP to prepare for their surgery.
Referred patients are invited to self-screen for manageable risk factors, such as smoking, weight, frailty and poor nutrition. Their risk factors then inform a personalised guide in optimising their health before going to surgery.
My PreHab is conducted during the waiting time between the point of referral and the patient's first appointment. By actively using this time, patients are given an opportunity to still make changes to get themselves fit for surgery.
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https://www.ama.com.au/media/ama-and-racgp-call-urgent-reinstatement-covid-19-telehealth-items
AMA and RACGP call for urgent reinstatement of COVID-19 telehealth items
Published 12 July 2022
The Australian Medical Association and Royal Australian College of General Practitioners have asked federal Health Minister Mark Butler to meet with them to discuss the reinstatement of COVID-19 telehealth items cancelled on 1 July.
In letters to the Minister, the AMA and RACGP urged the Government
to immediately reverse the decision to let the telehealth items lapse, saying
the telephone is a safe and effective means of delivering essential care to all
Australians, especially during the worsening pandemic.
“These changes undermine the ability of patients to access their doctors, and
in particular for GPs to prescribe antivirals for COVID-positive patients and
will lead to costs elsewhere in the health system, including in overstretched
hospitals,” AMA President, Dr Omar Khorshid said.
“This decision means telephone access to doctors will be significantly limited, hitting vulnerable patients hardest, including those who do not have access to high bandwidth internet and those who can’t operate the necessary IT systems.”
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Telehealth cut ‘puts elderly at risk’
7:02PM July 12, 2022
Doctors are warning that many thousands of vulnerable older and rural patients at high risk of severe disease will miss out on being prescribed antiviral medication because of cuts to telehealth funding.
The Australian Medical Association and the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners have written to federal Health Minister Mark Butler requesting an urgent reinstatement of Medicare rebates for long telephone consultations, arguing that the telehealth cuts will inevitably increase the burden on the hospital system when some patients who missed out on antivirals become severely ill.
Widely rolled out during the pandemic, telehealth is now funded on a permanent basis but some item numbers, including phone consultations of more than 20 minutes with a GP, initial consultations with a specialist and some disability and mental health services, were discontinued at the beginning of July.
Doctors say it makes no sense that the government is happy to fund video consultations longer than 20 minutes but won’t fund a Medicare item number for telephone consults longer than 20 minutes. This item number was claimed more than a million times by patients between July 2021 and May 2022.
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https://wildhealth.net.au/fears-for-mental-health-patients-after-mbs-cuts/
12 July 2022
Fears for mental health patients after MBS cuts
By Holly Payne
With the bulk of GP and psychiatry phone telehealth items wiped, people
struggling with mental health could be among the first to feel the pinch.
Last week, the Department of Health gave the final remaining temporary telehealth items the boot, even as covid numbers begin to tick up once again.
Most video items were made permanent at the end of last year, and some phone items will remain available for patients in MMM6 and 7 regions.
Items numbers which hit the cutting room floor include 92746, which covered Level C GP phone consults, as well as 91840 and 91841, which covered phone consults with psychiatrists lasting longer than 45 minutes.
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https://wildhealth.net.au/podcast-indigenous-digital-health-design-should-lead-with-authenticity/
12 July 2022
Podcast: Indigenous digital health design should lead with authenticity
By Wendy John
PODCAST: The CSIRO have heard the calls for advice on how to design ehealth solutions for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. But the key is not designing for any particular community, it’s designing with them, over a long period and with authentic relationship.
In today’s podcast we chat Georgina Chelberg from the CSIRO’s Indigenous eHealth Research Centre. The centre is creating a best practice guide for designing digital health solutions with Indigenous peoples
Ms Chelberg says that at the core of good design are community priorities and the need to be honest about structural racism.
“We speak about the social determinants of health and that the disadvantage caused by policies and governance that are embedded with racism. When we don’t address that authentically in the way that we do our research, the health of people continues to suffer,” Ms Chelberg says.
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Something phishy about ‘highly sophisticated’ cyber attack that’s not after money
7:57AM July 16, 2022
Australian government, healthcare and energy are among the sectors being targeted by a massive phishing campaign identified by cyber security experts at CyberCX, who say the group behind the attacks is “an at least moderately resourced threat actor with sustained intent to target Australian organisations”.
The phishing campaign harvested information from 25 organisations across the country, including state and local governments, by masquerading as a legitimate e-learning website and prompting users to fill out their credentials.
“We assess that the threat actor abused the online learning provider to generate legitimate-looking domains that were likely to deceive intended victims,” CyberCX said in a threat advisory seen by The Weekend Australian.
However, CyberCX identified no financial motive, which is often the driver of cybercrime.
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https://wildhealth.net.au/practice-softwares-role-in-the-payroll-tax-compliance-crisis/
12 July 2022
Practice software’s role in the payroll tax compliance crisis
‘Nothing to see here’ is the response so far from most of the key vendors, but can they really wash their hands entirely?
Google and Facebook (now Meta) famously attempted for many years to weasel their way out of responsibility for any legal issues arising from content being posted on their sites by saying they were not media companies, they were simply data conduits of some description.
They very clearly are media companies. Advertising is their main revenue model.
And that’s the position most governments and regulators are starting to take in managing these digital platforms.
In the last week, Wild Health asked most of the major practice management system (PMS) vendors in the country whether they felt they had a role in helping their clients work out issues with payroll tax by, say, reconfiguring how data flows into in their products and various downstream systems, and, into their own limited financial reporting and invoice generating modules.
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https://hellocare.com.au/technology-needed-to-ease-workload-pressures/
Jul 11, 2022
Technology needed to ease workload pressures
The Australian residential aged care sector is staring down the barrel of two complex challenges: significant workforce shortages and the need for increased resident care time, which is where unique technology solutions need to keep the sector ahead of the curb.
The 2020 Aged Care Workforce Census found that 29% of workers employed in November 2019 had left their role 12 months later. The need for more Personal Care Workers (PCW) was particularly felt, with over 50% of providers reporting that they had at least one PCW vacancy.
On the other side of the equation, the Department of Health is set to introduce mandatory care minutes, with an average of 200 minutes of care required per resident per day from October 1, 2023.
While the workforce planning recommendations set out by the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety may address some of these challenges, providers should turn to technology to help free up staff members’ precious time.
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Monday, 11 July 2022 11:51
900,000 households do not have an in-home internet connection: ACCAN
Approximately 900,000 Australian households still do not have an in-home internet connection despite an increase in remote learning, telehealth services, and work from home arrangements in the last two years, the Australian Communications Consumer Action Network has revealed.
Its latest policy position The Future of Broadband warns enduring provisions that safeguard the interests of Australians are needed to protect consumers.
Australians have endured lockdowns, natural disasters, and significant increases to cost of living since the National Broadband Network (NBN) was declared ‘built’ by the Federal Government.
“Such experiences have highlighted just how essential communications technologies are, and how important it is that these technologies are reliable, resilient, and affordable,” comments Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN) CEO Andrew Williams.
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https://nwmphn.org.au/news/my-health-record-supports-better-care-for-older-australians/
My Health Record supports better care for older Australians
11 July 2022
NWMPHN
My Health Record offers significant potential to improve care coordination and health outcomes, particularly for older Australians.
This is because older Australians generally experience a higher prevalence of chronic and complex conditions, polypharmacy and interact more frequently with the healthcare system.
One way to support your older patients is to confirm their key health information is available in My Health Record by uploading an accurate and up-to-date shared health summary. This will help ensure your patients get the best possible care when they are visiting other health care providers or if they go to hospital.
For patients with cognitive issues, having medicines information available in their My Health Record, including brand name, active ingredients, strength and dosage instructions, can decrease the burden on patients and reliance on their memory. Having key information available in My Health Record can also save your practice time, by reducing the number of requests for information from your practice. Consider making the upload of shared health summaries for older patients’ part of routine practice, such as on completion of a 75+ health assessment.
To learn more, register for a My Health Record practical demonstration session on the Australian Digital Health Agency website.
For further support on using My Health Record in your practice, contact primarycare@nwmphn.org.au or phone (03) 9347 1188.
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https://developer.digitalhealth.gov.au/specifications/ehealth-foundations/ep-3659-2022
Electronic Prescribing - Conformance Test Specifications v3.0.2
This package contains the conformance test specifications for Prescribing systems, Dispensing Systems, Open Prescription Delivery Services (PDS), Mobile Intermediary Systems, Mobile Channel, Active Script List Registry Systems, and all associated test data. The test cases in the worksheets have been written against the specified requirements in the Electronic Prescribing Conformance Profile document.
For more information on the Electronic Prescribing Conformance Process refer to: https://developer.digitalhealth.gov.au/electronic-prescribing/conformance-process
For more information on the Electronic Prescribing - Technical Framework Documents refer to: https://developer.digitalhealth.gov.au/specifications/ehealth-foundations/ep-3543-2021
Identifier: EP-3659:2022
Date: 15-07-2022
Size: 2.26 MB
Type: application/zip
SHA256 Checksum:
6b3bdb6c9949a89ecb3a826525ee48f2d292bfeab5329e49c009bd2b82ad9bab
Electronic Prescribing - Conformance Test Specifications - Release Note v3.0.2
This release of the end product EP-3659:2022 updates and merges test data for subject of care, HPI-I and HPI-O and added instructions for Transitional eNRMC software vendors.
DH-3660:2022
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https://www.digitalhealth.gov.au/careers/secretariat-advisor-25072022
Secretariat Advisor
APS6
($101,757 - $114,800)
Corporate
Services Division > Project Management
Brisbane,
Canberra, Sydney
Closing - 25 Jul 2022
Division Overview
Office of the CEO – the Chief Executive Officer is responsible for the overall management of the Agency and is supported by four Division Heads, an independent Chief Clinical Adviser, and assisted by the Secretariat Services Branch.
Primary Purpose of Position
The APS6 Secretariat Advisor is responsible, under limited direction, for provision of Secretariat services, and the management of Board and Advisory Group business.
The Secretariat Advisor’s duties will include:
- Working collaboratively with the Director, Board Secretary, and the Office of the CEO to deliver professional corporate secretariat and administrative support to the Agency Board, Board advisory committees and other Agency groups.
- Management of logistic and operational matters relating to Board and Advisory Committee business, including scheduling and sequencing of meetings, management reporting, member engagement and remuneration arrangements, travel, technology, finance, and event planning.
- Preparing and manage the release of briefs to inform executive decision making.
- Ensuring Agency, Board and Advisory Committee business occurs in a manner consistent with the relevant legislative, regulatory and best practice requirements, including proactive identification of emerging areas of risk or responsibility.
- Handling a large volume of complex and sensitive information, with a demonstrated capacity for discretion and awareness of security requirements.
To be successful in this role you will have demonstrated experience in providing parliamentary, business management or secretariat services to senior executive and high-level committees. Experience in preparing and managing the release of briefs to inform executive decision making, with the ability to communicate with influence with senior executives is key to your success. In addition, the successful applicant will demonstrate:
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ANDHealth - Special Announcement: 14 July 2022
ANDHealth, Australia’s leading digital health commercialisation organisation, today announced the extension of its partnership with the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) to support Australia’s fast-growing digital health sector.
The extended partnership will see TGA fund ANDHealth to
deliver industry-wide training to over 350 participants from the Australian
digital health sector in the next 12 months. The program includes 10 virtual
workshops and over 150 hours of direct one-to-one coaching for digital health
SMEs seeking to navigate Australia’s Software as a Medical Device (SaMD)
regulatory environment, supporting them to accelerate the commercialisation of
their products.
The announcement is in response to the growing investment from global
governments, pharmaceutical companies, and healthcare providers into digital
health solutions, and an increased focus from regulators on the clinical claims
made by these new innovations.
ANDHealth CEO and Managing Director Bronwyn Le Grice said, “Pursuing
appropriate regulatory pathways can be a real strategic advantage for companies
both locally and globally. Global regulators are increasingly focusing on
clinical claims made by digital health products and, as with any clinical
claim, it’s critical that a company has appropriate evidence to substantiate
those claims. In fact, for customers and users, it’s a prerequisite that digital
health products can point to their safety and efficacy.”
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Thursday, 14 July 2022 11:40
E-prescription specialist ScalaMed falls to foreign ownership
Australian e-prescription specialist ScalaMed, a HIPAA-compliant platform that transfers prescriptions to patients via mobile app, will be acquired by US-based healthcare company Cardinal Health.
ScalaMed’s technology and assets will be transferred to Outcomes, a Cardinal Health company.
ScalaMed pivots prescription management from provider to patient. Patients can send prescriptions directly to any pharmacy.
The platform offers patients flexibility, access, and price comparison to select the pharmacy of their choice.
The platform eliminates the manual transferring of prescriptions saving the average clinician 40 hours per year, and helps improve health outcomes with adherence and increase patient satisfaction, benefiting providers.
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EMVision confirms clinical trial sites for NSW, Vic
Tuesday, 12 July, 2022
EMVision Medical Devices, an Australian-listed medical device company, has signed in-principle agreements with Royal Melbourne Hospital and Liverpool Hospital for its upcoming clinical trials.
The company is developing and seeking to commercialise a medical imaging device using electromagnetic microwave imaging for diagnosis and monitoring of stroke and other medical applications. The technology is the result of over 10 years of development by researchers at The University of Queensland. The team of approximately 20 researchers is led by co-inventor Professor Amin Abbosh.
EMVision CEO Dr Ron Weinberger said, “We are pleased with the progress being made and look forward to collaborating with our study sites to advance the clinical development of our novel portable brain scanner as we seek to fulfil our mission of improving stroke patient outcomes.”
The Royal Melbourne Hospital is a stroke care centre with a tertiary academic unit that provides care for patients across Victoria. Liverpool Hospital is said to be one of the largest stroke referral centres in NSW, including an active endovascular clot retrieval service. The sites will be activated progressively, commencing with Liverpool Hospital.
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iCognition transitions another Federal Government department to cloud
Tuesday, July 12, 2022 - 13:57
Information Management and Governance (IMG) specialist, iCognition, has transitioned another Federal Government department to iCognition’s fully hosted and managed Content Manager cloud service, EDRMSaaS.Cloud, replacing the department’s existing on-premises Content Manager system.
“This follows on from iCognition’s success in transitioning the Australian Digital Health Agency to our cloud service and proves that such a transition is cost effective when comparing our cloud service to managing on-premises Content Manager system”, said Joe Mammoliti, iCognition CEO.
“When you consider the cost of managing a complex application such as Content Manager that manages a department’s vital information assets, much of which is security sensitive, you need to consider all aspects of security management, as well as service level assurances, performance optimisation, integrations, disaster recovery, and keeping the application up to date. When you add up all these internal costs, along with the risk profile, you are much better off getting a specialist organisation to take responsibility for ensuring the solution is provided as a service, making it highly available, evergreen, and secure.”
The new iCognition customer assessed that iCognition had the security profile required to manage the application as a service in the cloud. In addition to having strong support capability for security sensitive organisations, iCognition’s EDRMSaaS is ISO27001 Information Security Management certified, and has completed IRAP assessment at PROTECTED classification.
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Monday, 11 July 2022 11:48
NBN Co constructs new solar farm in Wyalong, NSW
The construction of a new solar farm in regional New South Wales marks NBN Co’s commitment to 100% renewable electricity purchases from December 2025.
NBN Co chief development officer regional and remote Gavin Williams and Minister for Communications Michelle Rowland graced a turning ceremony to kickstart work on the 260-hectare solar farm near Wyalong, NSW.
Power generation is expected to begin in late 2022 and electricity generated will be enough to power the equivalent of 27,000 Australian homes, claims NBN Co.
NBN’s first Renewable Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) has powered the construction of the solar farm.
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AI tool could help predict heart attacks
Wednesday, 13 July, 2022
Professor Natalia Trayanova, Johns Hopkins University, USA, has developed an artificial intelligence and bioengineering tool that could prove to be life-saving for more than four million Australians affected by cardiovascular disease (CVD).
The tool was showcased at the Bionics Institute 2022 Graeme Clark Oration in Melbourne.
Using data-driven machine learning and biophysics-based modelling, Trayanova has created ‘digital heart twins’ — virtual replicas of a person’s heart that can be used to forecast progress of heart disease, estimate the risk of heart attacks and inform treatment decisions.
“My AI technology uses algorithms created from MRIs and PET scans, in combination with deep learning of clinical data, to predict a patient’s risk of sudden cardiac death over a period of 10 years,” Trayanova said.
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Five jaw-dropping James Webb Space Telescope images stun scientists
The highly-anticipated first full-colour images captured by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have been released, stunning scientists.
July 13, 2022 - 11:38AM
The cosmic cliffs of a stellar nursery and a quintet of galaxies bound in a celestial dance: NASA released the next wave of images from the James Webb Space Telescope Tuesday, heralding a new era of astronomy.
“Every image is a new discovery,” said NASA administrator Bill Nelson. “Each will give humanity a view of the universe that we’ve never seen before.”
Released one by one at the Goddard Space Flight Center, the new images demonstrated the full power of the $10 billion observatory, which uses infrared cameras to gaze into the distant universe with unprecedented clarity.
“They’re beautiful and they’re full of wonderful discoveries and science, and lots of things we haven’t identified are in there,” Nobel-winning cosmologist and Webb senior project scientist John Mather told AFP.
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First James Webb telescope image looks further into space – and time – than ever
By Seth Borenstein
July 12, 2022 — 8.32am
Washington: Our view of the universe just expanded: the first image from NASA’s new space telescope is brimming with galaxies and offers the deepest look of the cosmos ever captured.
The “deep field” image from the $US10 billion ($14.85 billion) James Webb Space Telescope shows the farthest humanity has ever seen in both time and distance, closer to the dawn of the universe and the edge of the cosmos.
“It’s really hard to not look at the universe in new light and not just have a moment that is deeply personal.”
Released on Tuesday morning (AEST) at a White House event, it is filled with stars, with massive galaxies in the foreground and faint and extremely distant galaxies peeking through here and there. Part of the image is light from not too long after the Big Bang, which was 13.8 billion years ago.
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Ten years on from the God particle, we may have found a fifth force of nature
It took four decades to find. Homer Simpson predicted it. And, depending on who you ask, it could one day destroy the universe. What’s the Higgs Boson? And what is left to discover?
July 10, 2022
Beneath the Alps, there’s an elevator that leads deep underground. It used to be a joke that it led down to Hell. There is an inferno at the end, after all, but it’s a fireball on a different scale. Imagine the energy of a train at high speed squeezed through a beam narrower than a hair’s breadth. This is the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) – the world’s biggest machine spanning a 27-kilometre racetrack. It smashes together subatomic particles at close to the speed of light and then hunts for the secrets of our universe in the debris.
When it was first turned on in 2010, some feared it really would open the gates of Hell, or at the very least unleash a planet-guzzling black hole at its centre. Fortunately, the LHC didn’t destroy the world, and, from its fiery collisions, the Higgs boson – that elusive “God particle” which gives things mass – was at last found 10 years ago this month.
Now an even bigger discovery could be on the horizon. The collider has just been switched back on, more powerful than ever after a three-year upgrade, and scientists expect this run will confirm whether recent anomalies in their data are a fluke or a sign of something else: a fifth force of the universe, no less. Dr Mitesh Patel, a lead physicist on one of the LHC experiments for CERN, Europe’s particle physics lab, calls them the most exciting results he’s seen in his career, even as he urges caution. “My colleagues were ribbing me when I said I was shaking [seeing the data] but it’s true, I got that lurch in your stomach. If it holds up, this is huge.”
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Enjoy!
David.
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