Tuesday 03 November 2026 · No. 12
Top Story Astronomy
Hubble and Webb looked at the same sky together and found small, faint objects that hold clues to how planets formed.
Think of two friends describing one room, one by its colours and the other by its warmth. That is how this survey worked. Hubble and Webb stared at one patch of sky together, Hubble reading visible light and Webb reading infrared, and they spotted 27 objects no one had catalogued before. These lie beyond Neptune and are called trans-Neptunian objects, or TNOs.
Maths gives a feel for the scale. The smallest is about 3 miles (5 km) across, roughly five times below what the best ground telescopes can detect. Most TNOs are more than 100 million times fainter than the naked eye can see.
History explains two families. Cold TNOs never left home, orbiting where they formed on near-circular paths. Hot TNOs were born between Uranus and Neptune, then scattered outward when the giant planets migrated early on.
One object is so faint that detecting it would be like spotting a small swarm of fireflies on the Moon from Earth.
Colour is the clue. Small TNOs look much like large ones, so their surfaces seem to have changed little since the solar system formed, like a sealed time capsule. TNOs never grew into full planets, so they keep clues about how planets formed.
Two doctoral students led the work. Marielle Eduardo of the University of Victoria led the size study and Anastasia Morgan of Northern Arizona University led the colour study, and both papers appear in The Astronomical Journal.
Far beyond Neptune, there are small icy objects. Scientists call them trans-Neptunian objects, or TNOs. They are very hard to see.
NASA's Hubble and Webb telescopes looked at the same patch of sky together. Hubble collected visible light. Webb collected infrared light. Using both gave a better picture.
They found 27 new TNOs. The smallest is about 3 miles across. TNOs are leftover building blocks that never became planets. That is why they hold clues about how planets formed.
World Ukraine
Kyiv and Moscow disagree about what the Oleshky pause was used for, while the US eyes talks in Abu Dhabi.
A truce is a pause, and what a pause allows is often disputed. In Oleshky, in Russian-held Kherson region of Ukraine, a six-day ceasefire took effect on 27 October and officially ended on 1 November at 10:59 PM. It was meant for humanitarian aid and the evacuation of civilians.
Now both sides are arguing about what the pause was used for. Ukraine's General Staff said Russian forces used it to rotate personnel and bring in ammunition, and that Ukraine honoured the terms. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Moscow had no detailed information and that moving troops during a ceasefire could be normal.
Meanwhile, diplomacy is being planned. President Zelensky said technical-level talks among Ukraine, Russia and the United States, with the US mediating, could be held from 6 to 10 November 2026. Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates is the main venue under consideration, with Switzerland also mentioned. Neither the date nor the venue is final.
Leaders are watching the same calendar. Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said Putin would take a call from Zelensky if Ukraine initiated it. For now, neither a call nor a final date for the technical talks has been announced.
The pause also shows how fragile local deals are. It lasted six days, from 27 October to 1 November, and each side now tells a different story about what it allowed. Whether the proposed talks can build on it depends on the venue and the date, both still undecided.
In a town called Oleshky, in Ukraine, there was a ceasefire for six days. It was meant to let aid in and people leave.
The truce ended on 1 November. Now Ukraine says Russia used the pause to move soldiers and bring in ammunition. A Russian spokesperson said moving troops during a ceasefire could be normal.
President Zelensky said Ukraine, Russia and the United States could hold talks from 6 to 10 November. Abu Dhabi is the main place being considered. Nothing is final yet.
India Cyclone
A severe cyclonic storm was forecast to cross between Nellore and Narsapur overnight on 2 to 3 November.
Geography decides where a storm does its harm, so start with the map. A severe cyclonic storm called Murasu was expected to cross the southern coast of Andhra Pradesh between Nellore and Narsapur, near Ongole, between 11:30 PM on 2 November and 4 AM on 3 November.
A cyclone's strength is measured in wind. Murasu was expected to bring winds of 100 to 110 kmph, gusting to 120 kmph. That is fast enough to damage trees, power lines and weak buildings, which is why coastal states prepare before a storm arrives.
Preparation was already visible in the south. Schools in Chennai, in neighbouring Tamil Nadu, were closed on 2 November. In the north, Delhi-NCR was reported to be spared, a reminder that a cyclone's effects are tied to the coast it approaches.
The storm is a test of how well forecasts turn into action. Reports gave a window of about four and a half hours for the crossing, and the fixed times let districts decide when to move people, close schools and switch off power safely.
Elsewhere in India, the Finance Ministry reported on 1 November that gross GST collections rose nearly 23% from a year earlier to over Rs 2.31 lakh crore in October. GST is a tax on goods and services, and growth was driven by domestic economic activity and higher tax revenue from imports. Finance Minister Sitharaman said the economy shows no fragility and urged confidence.
In New Delhi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Bharat Renewable Energy Summit & Expo 2026 at Bharat Mandapam. It runs from 2 to 5 November under the theme Invest. Innovate. Inspire., and is held alongside the 9th ISA Assembly and the 4th International Conference on Green Hydrogen. Country partners include Australia, Denmark, the EU, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the UK.
Sport brought good news too. On 1 November Ishan Kishan set an Indian record for most T20I runs in a calendar year, with 1,220 runs in 37 innings in 2026, passing Suryakumar Yadav's 1,164 from 2022. PV Sindhu won the Hylo Open women's singles in Saarbrucken, beating Denmark's Line Kjaersfeldt 21-12, 21-14.
A strong storm called Cyclone Murasu was due on the coast of Andhra Pradesh. It would cross between Nellore and Narsapur. That is near Ongole.
Winds of 100 to 110 kmph were expected. Gusts could reach 120 kmph.
Schools in Chennai were closed on 2 November so children would stay safe. The storm was expected to cross the coast between 11:30 PM on 2 November and 4 AM on 3 November.
United States Markets
The Nasdaq sits almost 8% below its record high from three weeks ago.
FRIDAY'S FALL Percent fall on Friday
Money markets have mood swings, and Friday was a gloomy one. Wall Street shares fell sharply: the S&P 500 dropped 1.8%, the Dow 1.1% and the Nasdaq 2.9%. The Nasdaq, which is full of technology companies, ended almost 8% below its record high from three weeks earlier.
Why technology? Weak quarterly results from Intel, which fell almost 30%, and from Amazon set off the slide. Alphabet had its biggest one-day percentage fall on record, and a measure of chip shares fell 7.2%. Together these reports made investors ask a hard question: will huge spending on artificial intelligence pay off?
Over October as a whole, more than US$2.6 trillion was wiped from the market value of big technology companies, and the Nasdaq fell about 6% for the month. Market value is the price of all of a company's shares added together, so it can fall without anyone selling a product.
There are two sides to the picture. JP Morgan says more than 80% of S&P 500 companies that have reported beat earnings estimates, but investors remain worried about how AI spending will pay off. Gold, often seen as a safe place to park money, also fell, by 3.5% on Friday, to a one-year low.
More tests are coming. Apple, AMD, Qualcomm and Palantir report results next week, and US elections take place on Tuesday.
The shares fall comes on the eve of midterm elections, held in the middle of a president's term. On Tuesday 3 November Americans vote, and the results decide who controls Congress for the last two years of Donald Trump's term. Rising gas prices from the Iran war have been a major issue, and the administration pledged $15 billion to farmers to offset diesel and fertilizer costs.
On Friday, share prices in the United States dropped. The Nasdaq fell 2.9%. The S&P 500 fell 1.8% and the Dow fell 1.1%.
Weak results from big technology companies like Intel and Amazon started the slide. Investors are worried about whether huge spending on artificial intelligence will pay off.
The Nasdaq is now almost 8% below its record high from three weeks ago.
Science & Tech Space
Each ESCAPADE probe gets a 9-minute engine burn at closest approach, on 7 and 9 November.
Space travel has a trick that sounds like a physics class dare: use a planet to speed up a spaceship. NASA's twin ESCAPADE spacecraft will each fly past Earth in November, combining Earth's gravity with an engine burn to head toward Mars. They will do it back to back.
The timing is precise. Spacecraft 1's closest approach is around 5 a.m. EST on Saturday 7 November, and spacecraft 2's is around 6 a.m. EST on Monday 9 November. At that point each is 600 to 1,100 miles above Earth and about the size of a standard refrigerator.
The burn does the real work. Each engine burn lasts about 9 minutes at closest approach and raises speed by more than 1,000 mph, from about 6.3 to 6.7 miles per second. NASA calls the manoeuvre a powered flyby, because gravity and the engine work together.
Why not fly straight to Mars? ESCAPADE launched in November 2025, when Earth and Mars were on opposite sides of the Sun. The spacecraft looped around the Earth-Sun L2 point and returned to Earth to use its gravity once the planets realigned. The burns happen over southern Australia.
After a roughly 10-month cruise, they arrive at Mars on 7 and 9 September 2027. ESCAPADE will be the first multi-spacecraft mission to fly in formation around Mars, studying how the solar wind drives atmospheric loss, which is how the planet's air is stripped away.
There is bonus science too. During the loop, the spacecraft explored a distant part of Earth's magnetotail that no spacecraft had directly studied before, and NASA plans to share the findings later.
Technology news from India offers another kind of speed. Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on 1 November, during an inspection at BEML in Bengaluru, that India's first indigenous bullet train design is ready. Manufacturing is progressing, and the first prototype is scheduled to roll out early, with BEML's Bengaluru facilities handling the models and systems of the trainset.
NASA has two spacecraft called ESCAPADE. They are heading to Mars. Each is about the size of a refrigerator.
This month each one will fly past Earth. Earth's gravity helps, and a 9-minute engine burn adds more speed. The first flyby is on 7 November and the second on 9 November.
They will reach Mars in September 2027, after a trip of about 10 months. They will study how the wind from the Sun strips away air from Mars.
Economy Oil
Brent hit a six-month high before sliding as Iran and Qatar spoke for a third day.
Oil is a number families feel without ever seeing. Brent crude, a widely used world price for oil, rose almost 14% in October and the US benchmark WTI rose 15%. Brent ended the month at its highest level in six months, even though before the war it was near $70 a barrel.
Then prices swung back. On Monday, Iranian and Qatari officials held a third straight day of talks aimed at a deal to end the war, and oil slid. The Associated Press reported that Brent fell about 7.5% to roughly $104.98 a barrel. Another report put it at about $111 on Monday afternoon in Australia, after it had reached $117.64 earlier in the day.
The reasons for the swings are in the geography. Attacks on oil tankers moving through the Strait of Hormuz are raising global energy and shipping costs, and any hint of a deal lowers the fear that adds to the price.
The talks themselves are the main hope. Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Sunday that they were ongoing and progressing, and that Tehran is prepared for both defence and diplomacy. No deal has been reported yet, and Qatar is acting as the mediator between the sides.
Producers are not stepping in. OPEC+ kept its December production targets steady on Sunday and is not expected to make further policy changes until next year.
What next? Analyst Tim Waterer said rhetoric around Iran could rise and push Brent toward $120 after the US midterm elections. For households that is the practical question, because rising oil prices tend to feed into the cost of fuel and of moving goods.
Central banks are also acting. Markets widely expected the Reserve Bank of Australia to raise rates on Tuesday by 0.25 percentage points, taking its cash rate to 4.85%, and the Bank of England was tipped to raise to 4.0% on Thursday. Higher rates make loans cost more but are meant to slow rising prices. The US 10-year bond yield stood at 4.93%.
Gold, often a refuge when investors are nervous, fell 3.5% on Friday to a one-year low, a reminder that money moves in many directions at once. Rising gas prices from the war have also been a major issue in the US midterm elections.
Oil is the fuel that moves cars, ships and planes. In October, one major price, Brent, rose almost 14%.
On Monday, Iran and Qatar held talks to try to end the war. Oil prices fell. One report said Brent dropped about 7.5% to roughly $104.98 a barrel.
Attacks on tankers near the Strait of Hormuz make fuel and shipping cost more. That can raise prices in shops far away.
Did you know?
Explainer
Hubble collected visible light and Webb collected infrared light, so using both at once gives a more complete picture than either could alone. This is a bit like reading a map with both a road layer and a terrain layer.
For trans-Neptunian objects the combination matters, because the objects are very faint. The team ran what they call the deepest survey of TNOs to date and found 27 previously unknown ones.
Discuss
Why might scientists use two telescopes that see different kinds of light instead of one?
A truce is meant to help civilians, yet each side says the other used it for its own purposes. How could outsiders check what happened?
Why do falling technology shares matter to people who do not own any?
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