The Best Scientific Discoveries in 2020

The Best Scientific Discoveries in 2020
The Best Scientific Discoveries in 2020

Discoveries of 2020 are undoubtedly fascinating and mind-blowing, especially for individuals who rarely get interested in all recent innovations. While some of those events were of little importance for non-academic circumstances, others have ambitious consequences for all of us. If you only associate 2020 with a novel COVID-19 or deaths of celebrities, the academic world has much more to surprise you with.

We've compiled the greatest achievements worldwide in 2020 to represent this time through a scope of the highest and complex academic achievements of 2020. The top achievements of 2020 we've collected will represent rapid technological changes or the newest developments in biology, physics, and other disciplines. Without further ado, take a look at what competent scientists found out in the 2020s, a time full of uncertainties and ambitious projects for our future.

WHO Investigating COVID-19

The news dated April 2020 has proven to be horrific for our planet, undergoing abrupt changes caused by COVID-19. WHO, while gathering samples of tests from South Korea, found out that some patients who previously tested negative for COVID-19 were actually infected in 2020.

According to their reports of 2020, patients with a recovered medical history tested positive, an insight that made live science of COVID-19 even more complex than it was before. Scientists also found out that patients who successfully recovered from a viral coronavirus of 2020 could test positive. These uncertainties might not seem to be the greatest achievements, yet these insights shed light on the complexity of COVID-19 per se.

Google DeepMind in Practice

The start of 2020 marked a great achievement for oncology. The researchers utilized the technologies originated by Google DeepMind algorithm. By using its technological capabilities, medical experts invented a way to implement artificial intelligence in a way to surpass human experts in 2020.

In particular, this technological advancement made it possible to work closely with breast cancer detection in 2020. Despite a dazzling array of breakthroughs and discovery projects initiated by leading experts, a Google DeepMind algorithm has proven to be highly effective.

Although much more is needed to be accomplished to tackle all issues pertaining to oncology, Google's technologies make this research more approachable in 2020. In that sense, even skeptics believe that the announced use of a DeepMind algorithm in 2020 is a promising milestone.

Elon Musk

August 28 was the day when an iconic inventor Elon Musk had a marvelous presentation of one of his ambitious projects called Neuralink. It's a neurotechnology company aimed to develop progressive implantable brain-machine interfaces. A wide range of applications of these devices is far-reaching, making this presentation one of the most notorious futuristic events of 2020.

The primary intention of these implantable devices is to connect a human brain to an intuitive machine interface. This would essentially allow progressing with medical diagnostics and health monitoring as well as tracking activities concealed from regular machine devices. Neuralink is a system that has already shaken the Earth in 2020, whereas future updates would undoubtedly aid a greater cause. Even though certain ethical considerations are noticeable with the use of Neuralink devices, its presentation to a broader public was definitely an event worth mentioning.

History is the Future

Before 2020, dozens of speculations regarding the earliest-known mass extinction were taking place. The so-called Late Ordovician mass extinction, dated approximately 445 million years ago, was debated considerably. One of the key features discussed in 2020 was a reason for the mentioned mass extinction to happen.

The former most convincing evidence was related either to cooling or glaciation, the hypotheses supported considerably during the last years. With shared efforts of the Geological Survey of Canada and the University of Hull in England, geologists finally revealed the true reason for that event to happen in 2020.

According to their study, global warming, caused primarily by volcanic eruptions and anoxia, was the main reason for the earliest mass extinction to happen. Even though the results are also disputed by researchers, the evidence provided was sufficient. All of us should recognize that the planet we know in 2020 also struggles from the implications of global warming. Thus, realizing those issues of the past seems to be obligatory for our future.

NASA's Achievements

NASA, as an institution, produced dozens of insights in 2020 that allowed an overall state of monitoring to progress. From all published reports and achievements, the application of mathematical modeling was among the most interesting features. As NASA workers found out in 2020, the entire exoplanets with oceans may be common all across the Milky Way Galaxy.

This finding, backed up with solid evidence obtained from mathematical modeling invented in 2020, was among the most impressive achievements of the last few years. It was even stated that NASA staff couldn't imagine the presence of exoplanets half a year before they started applying the mentioned tools. This achievement might be of little importance to our life in 2020. Yet, future progress might reveal even more insights regarding the presence of other objects in our galaxy.

Emirates Mars Mission

Since, in 2020, it might be almost impossible to achieve much as a sole scientist, the entire countries of 2020 direct their efforts to space exploration. In 2020, the UAE successfully launched the Emirates Mars Mission. The scheduled date of arrival was estimated to be February 2021. With a renewed interest in Mars and space exploration, dozens of countries, such as the UAE, started and launched their projects in 2020.

With ambitious objectives of filling gaps in knowledge to fuel the future exploration of Mars and surrounding areas, this project is a real innovation of 2020. Despite the fact that much attention of 2020 was dispersed through other projects, those initiatives of the UAE are worth monitoring shortly.

Final Remarks

2020 was a wild era full of breakthroughs in various spheres of life. Even though most people would likely associate 2020 with the COVID-19, a range of achievements in technology should also be emphasized. Therefore, one can confidently say that 2020 was the time of rapid development in space exploration, medical diagnosis, and neurotechnologies. It is quite impressive to live in an era when thousands of individuals are discovering and inventing a dazzling array of mind-blowing tools. 2020 was of no exception.

Biography

This article was written by Adam Milner, a professional STEM tutor from PapersOwl. Before switching to full-time tutoring, Mr. Milner was a researcher. Other than that, Adam Milner co produced books and research articles dedicated to space exploration and medicine. Right now, he is tutoring ambitious students, mostly focusing on STEM disciplines.

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