Researchers at Princeton found that a material known as a topological insulator, made from the elements bismuth and bromine, exhibit specialized quantum behaviors normally seen only under extreme experimental conditions of high pressures and temperatures near absolute zero. Credit: Shafayat Hossain and M. Zahid Hasan of Princeton University A new discovery For the first time, physicists...
This artist’s impression shows an ultra-hot exoplanet, a planet beyond our Solar System, as it is about to transit in front of its host star. When the light from the star passes through the planet’s atmosphere, it is filtered by the chemical elements and molecules in the gaseous layer. With sensitive instruments, the signatures...
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain A group of investigators at Universität Heidelberg has constructed an early universe analog in their research laboratory utilizing cooled potassium atoms. In their paper publicized in the journal Nature, the group explains their simulator and exactly how it could be used. Silke Weinfurtner, with the College of Nottingham, has published a...
Stem cells are the blank slate on which all specialised cells in our bodies are built and they are the foundation for every organ and tissue in the body. Maturing and resisting it has long been a prominent point in traditional and modern literary works in human history. From the unfortunate Qin Shi Huang's exploration...
Credit: © fox17 / stock.adobe.com Researchers at the University of Chicago have found a means to produce a material that resembles plastic yet conducts electricity more like a metal. Like a metal? The research, released on Oct. 26 in Nature, shows how to produce a sort of material wherein the molecular fragments are shuffled and disordered but...
Polymyxin “last-resort” antibiotics kill bacteria by crystallizing their cell membranes. Credit: TED HOROWITZ/THE IMAGE BANK/GETTY IMAGES To eliminate drug-resistant bacteria, "last-resort" antibiotics borrow a method from Medusa's playbook: petrification. New high-resolution microscope pictures show that a class of antibiotics called polymyxins crystallizes bacteria's cell membranes. The honeycomb-shaped crystals that form transform the microorganisms' normally supple skins...
Credit: CC0 Public Domain During the 27th World Climate Conference (COP27) in Egypt, which is now going on for two weeks, climate finance is once again a leading subject. At the 21st World Climate Conference (COP21) held in Paris in 2015, all countries concurred for the very first time to limit climate change with their reduction...
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain A global group of investigators has tried to analyze the effect of both logging and afforestation on the worldwide water cycle. In their paper released in the journal Nature Geoscience, the team assesses rainfall records in addition to hydrologically heavy leaf place indices to calculate modifications in surface area water over...
Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) topographic map of the investigated area at Ultimi Scopuli. Dotted lines are MARSIS observations. The blue region indicates the geographic location of the main bright area. The observations in the light-gray shadowed area have not been used for data inversion, as they cross high and low basal reflectivity areas...
Utilizing old DNA, consisting of examples of human remains roughly 45,000 years, has shed light on a previously unknown facet of human development. Dr. Yassine Souilmi, Team Leader at the College of Adelaide's Australian Center for Old DNA, co-led the recent research study released in Nature Ecology and Development. "It was extensively thought the genes of...
