DESI's map of 15 million galaxies strengthens the hint that dark energy may weaken over time. If it holds, the one parameter that governs whether a universe can form galaxies would have to stay finely tuned at every epoch, not just today.

Cambridge chemists found a 45-letter RNA that copies its own strand at 94 percent accuracy, though at 0.2 percent yield over 72 days. Copying a sequence is not the same as originating one, and QT45 itself was found by directed screening, not unguided chemistry.

Harvard physicists measured a 6.2-to-1 gear ratio inside the flagellar motor, the first enmeshed gearwheels described in any living cell. The words motor, rotor, and gear are the researchers' own, because they describe the molecule most precisely.

A CRISPR screen tested 1,000 candidate switches in non-coding DNA and found about 150 that do real work, many controlling genes tied to Alzheimer's. Function keeps turning up where the "junk DNA" label predicted leftovers.

A new Canadian site adds 100-plus Ediacaran fossils just before the Cambrian. We read it straight: the authors say it pushes origins earlier. The deeper tempo question, where the burst of biological information came from, stays open.

In a study of 517 exoplanets, only 0.6 percent met every habitability criterion. It is a preprint, not a verdict, but each new filter makes our own address look less generic. The survey counts planets; the wondering is ours.

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