Month: August 2023

Enlarge / Pixel Pass bundled a phone and a bunch of Google services. (credit: Google)

Google's "Pixel Pass" payment plan has perished. The company is shutting down the all-in-one subscription service that let customers pay a monthly fee for a new Pixel Phone and a bunch of Google subscription services like YouTube Premium. When the service launched in October 2021, Google said that every two years on the Pixel Pass would make you eligible for a brand new phone. But the service only lasted 22 months, so no one will be eligible for that phone upgrade.

Pixel Pass was introduced alongside the Pixel 6 launch. For $45 per month, you would get a new Pixel 6, YouTube and YouTube Music Premium, 200GB of Google One storage, "Preferred Care" coverage for your phone, and a "Google Play Pass," a Netflix-style all-you-can-eat subscription for Play Store apps and games. Google said you could "save up to $294 over two years" compared to buying everything individually. A more expensive $55-per-month plan got you a Pixel 6 Pro instead, and there were even plans that included Google Fi Wireless cellular service.

Google explained its latest product shutdown on a support page. "Beginning August 29, 2023, Pixel Pass is no longer offered for new Pixel purchases or renewal," the company said.

Enlarge (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Scientists have been working on models of planet formation since before we knew exoplanets existed. Originally guided by the properties of the planets in our Solar System, these models turned out to be remarkably good at also accounting for exoplanets without an equivalent in our Solar System, like super Earths and hot Neptunes. Add in the ability of planets to move around thanks to gravitational interactions, and the properties of exoplanets could usually be accounted for.

Today, a large international team of researchers is announcing the discovery of something our models can't explain. It's roughly Neptune's size but four times more massive. Its density—well above that of iron—is compatible with either the entire planet being almost entirely solid or it having an ocean deep enough to drown entire planets. While the people who discovered it offer a couple of theories for its formation, neither is especially likely.

A freakish outlier

The study of the new planet started as many now do: It was identified as an object of interest by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TOI, for TESS Object of Interest). TOI-1853 is a star somewhat smaller than our Sun, with about 0.8 times its mass. And there were clear indications of a planet orbiting the star, called TOI-1853 b. The planet orbits quite close to its host star, completing a full orbit in 1.24 days.

Enlarge (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Scientists have been working on models of planet formation since before we knew exoplanets existed. Originally guided by the properties of the planets in our Solar System, these models turned out to be remarkably good at also accounting for exoplanets without an equivalent in our Solar System, like super Earths and hot Neptunes. Add in the ability of planets to move around thanks to gravitational interactions, and the properties of exoplanets could usually be accounted for.

Today, a large international team of researchers is announcing the discovery of something our models can't explain. It's roughly Neptune's size but four times more massive. Its density—well above that of iron—is compatible with either the entire planet being almost entirely solid or it having an ocean deep enough to drown entire planets. While the people who discovered it offer a couple of theories for its formation, neither is especially likely.

A freakish outlier

The study of the new planet started as many now do: It was identified as an object of interest by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TOI, for TESS Object of Interest). TOI-1853 is a star somewhat smaller than our Sun, with about 0.8 times its mass. And there were clear indications of a planet orbiting the star, called TOI-1853 b. The planet orbits quite close to its host star, completing a full orbit in 1.24 days.

Enlarge / One half of a Falcon 9 payload fairing deploys its parafoil. (credit: Elon Musk/Instagram)

Amid much fanfare, SpaceX started landing its Falcon 9 rockets in 2015, and it began reusing them less than two years later. The first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket, with nine engines and the bulk of the mass, accounts for about half of the cost of manufacturing a rocket, so this represents a considerable savings in time and money for SpaceX.

However, as with most other boosters, there are two other main components of the Falcon 9 rocket. There is the second stage, which boosts a payload into orbit, and, for most missions, a payload fairing that protects the satellite during its transit through the atmosphere. SpaceX briefly studied recovering the second stage of the Falcon 9 but concluded it was not feasible without major modifications that would have greatly reduced the rocket's payload capacity.

But what about the payload fairing? These are built in two pieces through a laborious process of laying down composite materials, not dissimilar to papier-mâché. The manufacture of fairings is time-consuming, and it costs about $6 million to produce both halves.

Enlarge / One half of a Falcon 9 payload fairing deploys its parafoil. (credit: Elon Musk/Instagram)

Amid much fanfare, SpaceX started landing its Falcon 9 rockets in 2015, and it began reusing them less than two years later. The first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket, with nine engines and the bulk of the mass, accounts for about half of the cost of manufacturing a rocket, so this represents a considerable savings in time and money for SpaceX.

However, as with most other boosters, there are two other main components of the Falcon 9 rocket. There is the second stage, which boosts a payload into orbit, and, for most missions, a payload fairing that protects the satellite during its transit through the atmosphere. SpaceX briefly studied recovering the second stage of the Falcon 9 but concluded it was not feasible without major modifications that would have greatly reduced the rocket's payload capacity.

But what about the payload fairing? These are built in two pieces through a laborious process of laying down composite materials, not dissimilar to papier-mâché. The manufacture of fairings is time-consuming, and it costs about $6 million to produce both halves.