After spending the better part of four months on the ground, Lockheed-Martin’s F-22 Raptor superjets have been cleared to fly again as of today. Originally grounded in May after reports of oxygen issues, the jets have been the focus of a months long study by the Air Force and aeronautics experts. Frequent readers may have noticed that this is a story we’ve been following for some time now.

The concern sprung from pilots returning from flights with hypoxia-like symptoms, a condition which occurs when the brain is deprived of oxygen. The condition, while temporary, is extremely dangerous as it can potentially affect decision making and reaction time — two things the pilot of an extremely fast and extremely expensive aircraft cannot afford to loose. Further studies found antifreeze in the blood of Raptor pilots, which only deepened the mystery of what was going on with the aircraft.

The European Space Agency (ESA) has announced that the Herschel Space Observatory has found the first significant evidence of molecular oxygen in the Orion Nebula. The amount of oxygen found is ten times larger than was expected based on previous observations of other molecular clouds, however is still well below theoretical expectations.

Oxygen is the third most abundant element in the Universe (after hydrogen and helium) and is a critical part of the chemistry of molecular clouds. It is also fundamental to life on Earth, which makes finding it in space the subject of intense research. The Herschel results suggest that under the right circumstances, heat from newly created stars can free oxygen frozen on grains of dust. This would increase the amount of molecular oxygen that is able to form in warm, dense gas clouds like the Orion Nebula.

Researchers at the University of Illinois have developed a new kind of artificial lung that can run on heart power and breathe normal air. That may not sound like much, but a quick look at current artificial lung technology goes to show you how complex the organ’s function really is.

Current artificial lungs don’t have efficient enough gas exchange to use normal air. Instead, they have to use pure oxygen to compensate, which means that they come part and parcel with heavy oxygen canisters. As if that weren’t bad enough, this inefficiency also means current artificial lungs have a lifespan on the order of days and, to boot, they require an outside power source.

The diving bell spider (Argyroneta aquatica) spends its life underwater. This arachnid needs air to breathe, and has devised an ingenious system by which is takes air from the surface and stores it underwater. The ability of these spiders to breathe underwater was first recognized over 250 years ago. But a new paper in the Journal of Experimental Biology describes in previously unknown detail the means by which Argyroneta aquatica accomplishes this feat.

Air from the surface of water is collected by the diving bell spider using the fine hairs on its abdomen. The air is trapped in a bubble, a bell-shaped web constructed by the spider underwater that it can then carry around with it. Though researchers have long known about the spider’s air balloon, until now it was a mystery how the spider could stay underwater for long periods of time without having to return to the surface to refill the tiny bubble with air.

Researchers Roger Seymour of the University of Adelaide in South Africa and Stefan Hetz of Humboldt University in Germany have discovered that the diving bell spider uses its web as a gill, so it can live underwater with only occasional visits to the surface.

The Cassini-Huygens spacecraft recently performed the closest flyby of Rhea, the second-largest moon of Saturn, ever, to discover what scientists have long suspected: Rhea, like a couple of Jupiter’s moons, has a little baby atmosphere. And while this atmosphere is mostly oxygen and carbon dioxide, there isn’t enough oxygen to be breathable by humans; and while the carbon dioxide could be cause by the existence of rudimentary life, there are a lot of other things that could cause it to appear.

NBC Universal’s Oxygen Media recently conducted a survey, asking 1,605 women versed and immersed in social media about their habits with Facebook, Twitter and other such services. And while you would expect there to be some level of addiction there, the results are actually quite staggering.

Of the over 1,600 women surveyed, 34 percent stated that they check Facebook literally first thing in the morning, before going to brush their teeth.