8 great scientific discoveries of 2022

2022 was a year of scientific progress.Here are the eight "steps forward" that marked this year, in the scientific, technological and medical fields.

2022 has been a surprising year, at least from the perspective of scientific progress.After two years spent chasing the vaccine for Covid-19, the year that is about to end was supposed to mark a restart, the proverbial return to normality.And so it was, at least in part.According to the magazine New Yorker, was marked by eight major events or discoveries with which the scientific community exceeded expectations, achieving breakthroughs of historic significance.

2022:nuclear fusion, artificial intelligence and crypto

Let's start with the most recent one, dating back to mid-December, when some representatives of the Department of Energy of the United States have announced a success in the field of nuclear fusion.A team of scientists has in fact managed for the first time to generate more energy from a nuclear fusion reaction compared to that used to trigger it.Approximately two mega joules of energy were consumed during the experiment, “enough to keep a 100-watt light bulb on for five hours,” releasing more than 3 mega joules.It seems like little but it could be the first step towards a very powerful and completely sustainable energy source.

Another historical moment concerned the artificial intelligences, a topic that has monopolized the attention of many in the last months of the year, thanks to products such as ChatGPT, Dall-E, Stable Diffusion and MidJourney AI.However, the US weekly does not refer to the progress of these AIs, but rather to those of Noam Brown, programmer at Meta, who in 2019 decided to test an artificial intelligence with a game.In past years, AIs have learned board games like Go or strategy video games like StarCraft II.Looking for something even more complex, Brown finally decided to set his sights on Diplomacy, a complex board game of strategy and subterfuge in which players (up to seven people) are often double-crossed.A complex set of rules to teach a machine, but which Meta's AI managed to learn with great success, proving he can lie and betray other players.

2022 was supposed to be the turning point year for the sector crypto: after a long phase of growth, driven by Bitcoin, Ethereum, minor cryptocurrencies and NFTs, many expected a consecration of the blockchain-based economy.The first cracks in the billionaire bubble appeared in November 2021 but it was last spring that the stage collapsed.Slowly, then suddenly.First the implosion of the Earth and Moon, then that of Celsius, the disappearance of NFTs and finally it Ftx scandal and the arrest of its founder Sam Bankman-Fried, former guru and good face of crypto.Result:since January 1, 2022, Bitcoin has lost 62 percent of its value and it is a difficult task to find a profit in the sector (also due to an unfavorable economic-financial situation).

Despite the credibility crisis, however, the year brought good news on the blockchain front, a complex technology that has long been criticized for its environmental impact (the mining with which new cryptocurrencies are created is notoriously very polluting).Last September, however, Ethereum, the second best-known blockchain in the world, has completed an ambitious conversion from the particularly energy-intensive "proof of work" system to the "proof of stake" system, reducing the energy required by 99.95 percent.A rather appreciated novelty, in light of the dramatic environmental and climatic situation of our planet, which has become more evident than ever this year, between drought, mega-fires and ever higher temperatures.Just last summer, a paper published by the magazine Proceedings of the National academy of sciences explored some of the more pessimistic scenarios that increasingly likely await us.The fact that southern Europe enjoyed temperatures above twenty degrees on Christmas Day can only confirm the fears of the scientific community.

News also in the medical and aerospace fields

Decidingly changing tone, over the course of the year experiments with hallucinogenic mushrooms as an antidepressant continued, with notable results.Several papers have been published on the function of psilocybin, substance contained in many mushrooms of this type, which would have performed better than a drug antidepressant like Lexapro.Much work remains to be done but many researchers would be surprised by the effectiveness of this substance, while legislative initiatives to decriminalize (or legalize) the cultivation and consumption of hallucinogenic mushrooms multiply.

During 2022, confirmations of a nineties apocalyptic film topos also arrived, thanks to the NASA Dart mission, launched with the aim of diverting the trajectory of two asteroids, Didymos and Dimorphos (800 and 152 meters respectively).The experiment aimed to verify and test the possibility of deflecting a body of this type on a collision course with our Planet, and it was a success.Last September 26, the NASA probe (launched by SpaceX) impacted the largest asteroid traveling at a speed exceeding twenty thousand kilometers per hour, managing to deviate its trajectory - all without sending Bruce Willis into space.

The seventh wonder of the year is particularly bizarre.It concerns an important neuroscientific experiment that aims to understand how cells communicate and how intelligence is formed and evolves.To do this, a team of scientists created a sort of brain on plate (“DishBrain”) using cells from human and mouse stem cells, subjecting them to different types of electrodes, simulating a microscopic version of a functioning brain.As for the electrical impulses, fundamental to its functioning, they came from a video game similar to Pong:the movement of the ball and the shots given by the player dictated the energy discharges necessary for the brain on the plate.

Finally, during 2022 we refined the capabilities to extract and reconstruct DNA from very ancient finds.After having managed to analyze the DNA of two mammoths that lived about two million years ago, this year we discovered and analyzed the genetic material of an entire ecosystem from two million years ago, confirming the conservation capabilities of DNA and, above all, the possibility of extracting it and studying it.A discovery that will also be useful to us humans of the 21st century, because it will teach us something more about the ways in which fauna and flora resist and evolve to adapt to the changes that surround them.We hope to do even better next year.