ROCKY MOUNTAIN DISPATCH

The Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD) has released a draft elk feedgrounds management plan for public review. The plan is designed to guide the department's overall, long-term approach to elk management as it pertains to the 22 Game and Fish-operated elk feedgrounds in western Wyoming. The plan has three main goals: Reduce elk's reliance on feedgrounds: The plan aims to reduce the number of elk that rely on feedgrounds by increasing the availability of natural winter forage. This will help to reduce the spread of disease and improve the overall health of the elk herd. Increase opportunities for elk to winter away from feedgrounds: The plan also aims to increase the number of elk that winter away from feedgrounds by providing more winter range habitat. This will help to reduce conflict between elk and livestock, as well as the risk of elk-vehicle collisions. Maintain current elk population objectives and associated hunting opportunity: The plan is designed to e...

The Pueblo Chieftain, Colorado's oldest continuously published newspaper, announced that it will be shutting down its printing facility in August. The decision will result in the layoff of 51 employees, who are responsible for printing the Chieftain and other Gannett properties currently printed in Pueblo. The closure of the printing facility is part of a larger cost-cutting effort by Gannett, the parent company of the Chieftain. Gannett has been facing declining revenue in recent years, as more and more people have shifted to reading news online. The company has said that it needs to make changes in order to remain profitable. The decision to close the Pueblo printing facility has been met with mixed reactions. Some people have expressed concern about the loss of jobs, while others have said that it is a necessary step in the newspaper's transition to a digital future. The Chieftain's printing operation has been in operation since 1902. The facility is located ...

Image: Gustav Graeber and Carlos D. Díaz-Marín In a new study published in the journal Nature Materials, engineers at MIT have developed a superabsorbent hydrogel that can absorb an unprecedented amount of moisture from the air, even in desert-like conditions. The material, which is infused with lithium chloride, can hold up to 200 times its weight in water, and it can do so even when the relative humidity is as low as 30%. This makes the hydrogel a potential game-changer for water harvesting in arid regions. Currently, the most common way to harvest water from the air is through the use of atmospheric water generators (AWGs). AWGs work by cooling air below its dew point, causing the water vapor to condense and form liquid water. However, AWGs are expensive and require a significant amount of energy to operate. The MIT hydrogel, on the other hand, is relatively inexpensive and easy to produce. It can also be used in a passive manner, meaning that it does not require any ext...

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has released its first image of Saturn, and it is simply stunning. The image, taken in the near-infrared spectrum, shows the planet in unprecedented detail, revealing its delicate rings and cloud bands in all their glory. The image was taken using JWST's Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), which is one of the telescope's four main instruments. NIRCam is designed to image objects in the near-infrared spectrum, which allows it to see through dust and gas that would otherwise obscure our view of objects in the visible spectrum. This makes it ideal for studying objects like Saturn, which are surrounded by thick atmospheres and rings. In the new image, Saturn's rings appear as a delicate filigree of light, surrounding the planet's bright yellow disk. The rings are made up of billions of small ice particles, which are held in orbit around the planet by its gravity. The particles in the rings range in size from dust grains to small ...

After decades of observations, astronomers have finally detected a pervasive background hum of gravitational waves from merging supermassive black holes. The discovery, published in the journal "Science", was made by the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav), a collaboration of more than 400 scientists from 20 institutions across the United States and Canada. NANOGrav uses a network of radio telescopes to detect gravitational waves, which are ripples in the fabric of spacetime caused by massive objects accelerating. The waves from merging supermassive black holes are extremely low-frequency, meaning they have wavelengths that are billions of times longer than the visible light spectrum. This makes them difficult to detect, but NANOGrav's network is sensitive enough to pick up these faint signals. The team analyzed 15 years of data from NANOGrav's telescopes and found a persistent background signal that they believe is caus...

The James Webb Space Telescope Reveals the Orion Bar in Stunning Detail A team of astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has detected carbon molecules in a galaxy that is 13.4 billion light-years away. This means that the molecules were present just 300 million years after the Big Bang. The molecules, called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), are a type of organic molecule that is thought to be a precursor to life. They are made up of carbon atoms that are bonded together in rings. The discovery of PAHs in the early universe is a significant finding. It provides new evidence that the building blocks of life may have been present very early on in the history of the universe. This could mean that life could have arisen more easily than previously thought. The PAHs were detected by the JWST's Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI). MIRI is designed to detect infrared light, which is invisible to the human eye. Infrared light can penetrate dust and gas, which...