SETI Finds No Alien Signal From Interstellar Comet: SETI researchers say the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS appears entirely natural, after radio observations found no evidence of alien technology. The object, discovered last summer, is only the third known visitor from another star system to pass through the solar system. Using the Allen Telescope Array in Northern California, scientists observed the comet for more than seven hours in July and searched a wide range of radio frequencies. Although the team initially detected nearly 74 million narrow-band signals, almost all were filtered out as human interference or mismatches with the comet’s motion. The remaining 200-plus signals traced back to Earth or satellites. Researchers said the null result still shows today’s instruments can test technosignature claims quickly, even for unexpected targets like interstellar comets. (AP)

Astrobiologists Remain Skeptical of K2-18b Life Claim: A new Nature Astronomy paper finds that most astrobiologists were unconvinced by last year’s high-profile claim that the exoplanet K2-18b showed promising signs of life. Eight days after the announcement, researchers surveyed 496 astrobiologists and found that only 6.6% agreed or strongly agreed that scientists had probably found extraterrestrial life there. The survey was conducted by C-SCOPE, a Durham University-based effort to rapidly measure scientific consensus on headline-making research claims. Supporters say such polling could help the public distinguish between exciting but uncertain findings and genuine expert agreement. The project has also surveyed astrobiologists on extraterrestrial life more broadly, finding strong agreement that basic life likely exists somewhere in the universe, even if K2-18b evidence remains weak. (Science)

Webb Finds Methane on Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS: NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has made the first mid-infrared chemical fingerprint of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS, detecting methane gas from an object that formed around another star. The observations, made with Webb’s MIRI instrument after the comet passed closest to the Sun, showed methane emerging later than expected, suggesting that the volatile compound may have been buried beneath the surface before solar heating released it. Webb also found unusually high carbon dioxide relative to water, hinting that 3I/ATLAS formed in a chemically different environment from many solar-system comets. The result turns a passing interstellar visitor into a rare laboratory for comparing planet-forming chemistry across star systems. (NASA Science)

SETI Checks 3I/ATLAS for Alien Signals: The SETI Institute moved quickly after the discovery of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS, using the Allen Telescope Array to search for narrowband radio signals that could indicate technology. Over more than seven hours of observing time across 1–9 GHz, the array initially logged about 74 million detections, then narrowed the candidates to roughly 200. All surviving signals were traced to human-made sources, including Earth-based transmitters or satellites. The search did not find evidence of technology, but it placed useful limits on any transmitter associated with the comet, ruling out signals stronger than about 10–110 watts in the observed bands. For astrobiology, the value is methodological: rapid-response SETI can now follow interstellar objects almost immediately. (SETI Institute)

Jupiter May Explain How Cosmic Rays Form: NASA’s Juno spacecraft has turned Jupiter into a nearby test case for one of astrophysics’ biggest acceleration problems: how ordinary charged particles become cosmic rays. New observations from Jupiter’s foreshock region, where the solar wind piles up against the planet’s powerful magnetic field, found high-speed electrons behaving in ways that match predictions for particle acceleration at much larger cosmic shocks. The study, published in Nature, suggests that processes at Jupiter’s immense bow shock scale up to the shock fronts around supernovas, where many galactic cosmic rays are thought to originate. Because Jupiter is close enough for in situ measurements, Juno offers a rare bridge between local plasma physics and extreme high-energy astrophysics elsewhere in the galaxy. (NASA Science)

Early Earth’s Life Ingredients May Have Come From Nearby: A NASA-supported study offers a new path for how Earth acquired key life-related elements, especially nitrogen and phosphorus. Rather than relying heavily on material from the outer solar system, the researchers argue that Jupiter’s early influence helped distribute these elements from inner solar system reservoirs. That matters because nitrogen and phosphorus are part of the CHNOPS suite of elements essential to known biology, and their delivery has long been a puzzle in origin-of-life studies. The work uses meteorites as chemical records of early solar system formation, comparing iron meteorites and chondrites to reconstruct where volatile and bioessential elements likely came from. The result reframes habitability as a product not only of Earth’s chemistry, but also of giant-planet architecture. (NASA Science)

Sagittarius A Is Quiet, Not Still: The Milky Way’s central black hole may be far calmer than active galactic nuclei, but new observations suggest it still shapes its surroundings. Using more than 100 hours of ALMA data collected over five years, astronomers found evidence of a mild wind blowing from Sagittarius A*. Improved processing revealed faint gas and dust structures, including a cone-shaped region unusually empty of cold carbon monoxide. The geometry, combined with X-ray evidence, points to a hot outflow from the black hole. The finding matters because even weak black-hole winds can influence nearby gas, star formation, and the long-term evolution of a galaxy’s center. It also adds nuance to Sagittarius A*: dormant by cosmic standards, but not dynamically irrelevant. (Science News)

A Cosmic Dawn Quasar Flickers Into View: A new Nature Astronomy paper reports decade-long multiwavelength evidence for quasar variability from just 850 million years after the Big Bang. The object flickers in infrared and X-rays, offering a rare direct constraint on how accretion disks behaved around early supermassive black holes. That is important because quasars in the young universe remain one of cosmology’s stubborn problems: their black holes appear massive too soon after the Big Bang for simple growth models to explain comfortably. Variability gives astronomers a way to probe the structure and feeding behavior of those disks rather than merely measuring brightness at one moment. The result adds a dynamic view to cosmic dawn, when black holes and galaxies were rapidly assembling. (Nature)

Little Red Dots May Be Baby Quasars: JWST has uncovered many compact “little red dots,” mysterious early-universe objects with unusual spectra and signs of active galactic nuclei. A new Nature Astronomy study reports two especially revealing examples at redshifts 2.871 and 2.930 that appear to be transitioning toward more typical quasars. Unlike most little red dots, these objects show strong X-ray, radio, and mid-infrared emission, suggesting that dense gas around their central black holes may be dispersing while a dust torus forms. That hybrid behavior helps connect a puzzling JWST population to the broader life cycle of supermassive black hole growth. The finding does not solve the mystery of all little red dots, but it provides a plausible evolutionary pathway for at least some of them. (Nature)

Alien Weather Reveals Exoplanet Magnetic Fields: Astronomers studying seven ultra-hot Jupiters have found some of the strongest evidence yet for magnetic fields on planets beyond the solar system. These worlds are tidally locked gas giants with enormous day-night temperature contrasts, producing winds far faster than anything on Jupiter. But the hottest planets showed slower winds than hydrodynamic models predicted. Using data from Gemini North and the Very Large Telescope, researchers concluded that magnetic drag is likely braking the atmospheric flow. The estimated magnetic fields are broadly comparable to those of solar-system giant planets, from several times Saturn’s field to about half Jupiter’s. The result matters for astrobiology because magnetic fields can shape atmospheric loss, water retention, and long-term planetary habitability. (Universe Today)

Astronomers Watch a Planetary Nursery Turn: Astronomers have directly measured the rotation of the protoplanetary disk around the young star AB Aurigae, using the SPHERE instrument on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope. Protoplanetary disks are the birthplaces of planets, but their internal motions are hard to capture in real time. In this case, dust-grain emissions allowed researchers to trace the disk’s motion and identify regions that do not rotate exactly as theory predicts. Those anomalies may mark the influence of giant planets currently forming inside the disk. AB Aurigae is already famous for signs of a developing gas giant, AB Aurigae b, and the new observations deepen the picture of a system where planets are actively sculpting their birthplace. (Universe Today)

A Moon-Mass Black Hole Candidate Enters the Dark Matter Debate: Scientific American reports on a controversial candidate primordial black hole nicknamed “Phoebe,” inferred from a brief microlensing-like brightening of a star in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Researchers led by Renee Key argue in two arXiv preprints that the event could have been caused by an object about three times the mass of Earth’s moon, drifting through the Milky Way’s halo. If correct, it would be extraordinary: primordial black holes formed in the early universe remain a possible dark matter candidate and may also help explain how some supermassive black holes grew so quickly. But skepticism is high. Alternative explanations include stellar variability or a free-floating planet, and other surveys have not seen the expected abundance of similar events. (Scientific American)

U.S. Measles Cases Pass 2,000 in Five Months: U.S. measles cases have surpassed 2,000 just over five months into the year, with the CDC confirming 2,030 infections after 57 new cases. The milestone arrived far earlier than last year, when the country did not pass 2,000 cases until around Christmas. Nearly all 2026 infections have been locally acquired, and 92% of patients were unvaccinated or had unknown vaccination status. Children and young adults account for most cases, including 21% in children younger than 5. No deaths have been reported this year, though 6% of patients have been hospitalized. CIDRAP also highlighted a CDC report on a Texas childcare outbreak, where one unvaccinated child led to eight cases, underscoring measles’ rapid spread and the importance of vaccination. (CIDRAP)