Early EV switch cuts emissions by 44%, study finds

Replacing a functional fossil-fuel car with an electric vehicle is almost always better for the climate, even if the old car is new, according to a lifecycle emissions analysis. While manufacturing a new EV creates a carbon debt, it is paid back within three years through lower driving emissions. Over time, retiring a petrol or diesel car early and switching to an EV can cut total carbon emissions by roughly 44% across cars, SUVs and trucks, The Hindu reports.

Separately, using the Webb telescope, astronomers have found a supermassive black hole that existed just 660 million years after the Big Bang. The object is surrounded by a thick hydrogen gas envelope, indicating rapid growth. The team found that the gas scatters light in a way that makes such black holes appear heavier than they are, suggesting the masses of similar early black holes may have been overestimated by up to 100 times.

In another study on mice, scientists found that the brain can keep memories stable even when it changes. During hibernation, brain activity dropped sharply and more than half of the synapses in the hippocampus disappeared. However, when the mice woke up, their memories were intact. The brain relies on individual connections as well as clusters of synapses to store information, and these clusters were protected during hibernation.