Digging into the molecules of fossilized dinosaur eggshells
Dinosaurs roamed the Earth more than 65 million years ago, and paleontologists and amateur fossil hunters are still unearthing traces of them today. The minerals in fossilized eggs and shell fragments provide snapshots into these creatures' early liv.....»»
Exploring the self-organizing origins of life
Catalytic molecules can form metabolically active clusters by creating and following concentration gradients—this is the result of a new study by scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization (MPI-DS). Their model pred.....»»
Dinosaur track site in Lesotho: How a wrong turn led to an exciting find
I am a poor navigator. This is not an easy thing for a field geologist to admit. We need to be able to find our planned area of interest in good time and make our way back to our potentially hidden and distant vehicles at the end of the day. It's esp.....»»
New, simple and accessible method creates potency-increasing structure in drugs
Chemical structures called cyclopropanes can increase the potency and fine-tune the properties of many drugs, but traditional methods to create this structure only work with certain molecules and require highly reactive—potentially explosive—ingr.....»»
Bizarre-Looking Colossus Whale May Have Been Heaviest Animal Ever (Sorry, Blue Whales)
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” says a paleontologist not involved in the discovery of a 40-million-year-old fossilized whale.....»»
Bringing back extinct molecules to fight modern bacteria
A team of microbiologists and bioengineers at the University of Pennsylvania has tested the possibility of bringing back extinct molecules to fight modern bacteria. In their study, reported in Cell Host & Microbe, Jacqueline Maasch, Marcelo Torres, M.....»»
Ichnocoenoses reveal dynamic process of turbidity current–induced benthic-marine oxygenation
Trace fossils are fossilized structures produced on or within a substrate by the life processes of ancient organisms, including tracks, trails, burrows, borings, and other structures. Ichnocoenosis, a suite of trace fossils representing the work of a.....»»
Researchers demonstrate scaling of aligned carbon nanotube transistors to below sub-10 nm nodes
Carbon nanotubes, large cylindrical molecules composed of hybridized carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal structure, recently attracted significant attention among electronics engineers. Due to their geometric configuration and advantageous electroni.....»»
Scientists use a bath of swimming bacteria to assemble unconventional materials
A hot bath is a place to relax. For scientists, it is also where molecules or tiny building blocks meet to form materials. Researchers at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) take it to the next level and use the energy of swimming.....»»
High-resolution scattering imaging reveals vibrational-state-specific mechanisms in paradigmatic ion-molecule reaction
Charged atomic and molecular species are ubiquitous in environments such as planetary atmospheres, interstellar medium and plasma. The collisions between charged ions and neutral molecules play vital roles in determining the chemical evolution and en.....»»
New archosaur species shows that precursor of dinosaurs and pterosaurs was armored
Researchers have described a new species of armored reptile that lived near the time of the first appearance of dinosaurs. With bony plates on its backbone, this archosaur fossil reveals that armor was a boomerang trait in the story of dinosaur and p.....»»
Observation of a refractive index line shape in ultrafast XUV transient absorption spectroscopy
Ultrafast extreme ultraviolet (XUV) spectroscopy is a powerful technique for probing the dynamics of atoms and molecules with attosecond time resolution. However, conventional XUV absorption measurements only provide information about the imaginary p.....»»
AI-enabled portable e-nose sniffs out harmful molecules
Consider this—there is no cheap, at-home device that can tell you milk has gone bad faster than your nose. One whiff and you know that the milk has gone rancid. Humans have created technologies that allow us to see distant stars and single atoms bu.....»»
Researchers achieve water-assisted strong underwater adhesion
As the interfacial water layer hinders the formation of interfacial contacts and intermolecular interactions between the adhesive and the substrate, in almost all cases of underwater adhesion, water molecules typically act as a destroyer, resulting i.....»»
Phase-tailored assembly and encoding of dissipative soliton molecules
Streams of ultrashort light pulses delivered from mode-locked laser resonators stimulate potential applications in ultrafast science and information technology. Here the elementary pulse entity, termed dissipative solitons in contrast to the pure sol.....»»
Potent anti-cancer therapy created using "click chemistry"
A potent anti-cancer therapy has been created using Nobel prize-winning "click chemistry," where molecules click together like LEGO bricks, in a new study by UCL and Stanford University researchers......»»
Discovery of new ornithopod solves mystery of unidentified large dinosaur tracks
Researchers at the Fundación Conjunto Paleontológico de Teruel-Dinópolis/ Museo Aragonés de Paleontología, Spain, have released the description of a new upper Jurassic dinosaur based on fossil remains found in Spain......»»
Mammal bites dinosaur in "once-in-a-lifetime" fossil find
A badger-like mammal was sinking its teeth into the ribs of a dinosaur three times its size when they were buried in volcanic ash 125 million years ago, capturing the pair in a deadly embrace......»»
New sensor mimics cell membrane functions, may enable screening of hard-to-diagnose cancers
Drawing inspiration from natural sensory systems, an MIT-led team has designed a novel sensor that could detect the same molecules that naturally occurring cell receptors can identify......»»
A "toolbox of biocatalysts" improves control over free radicals
One of the central challenges for synthetic chemists is to impose control over free radicals. Highly reactive molecules with an unpaired electron, free radicals, may be familiar to you; these are the type of molecules we take antioxidant supplements.....»»
Fueled by new chemistry, algorithm mines fungi for useful molecules
A newly described type of chemistry in fungi is both surprisingly common and likely to involve highly reactive enzymes, two traits that make the genes involved useful signposts pointing to a potential treasure trove of biological compounds with medic.....»»