How the humble slime mold helped physicists map the cosmic web
Despite similarities, "We don't think the universe was created by a giant slime mold." Enlarge / A reconstruction of the cosmic web— a vast network of filamentary structures of matter spanning the universe—modeled on the growth patterns of.....»»
How coral and sediments helped to reconstruct 2.6 million years of climate history
Today's climate change is man-made. The consensus in the climate science community is unequivocal, but in order to determine just how exceptional current climate change is, we have had to contextualize the present on a much longer time scale. To do t.....»»
Murine study suggests cosmic radiation in outer space may affect long-term cognition
During missions into outer space, galactic cosmic radiation (GCR) will penetrate current spacecraft shielding and thus pose a significant risk to human health......»»
Restoring nature, "adaptation" helped limit Storm Boris impact
The restoration of a creek in Vienna reduced the impact of flooding caused by Storm Boris, authorities say, one of many projects experts believe helped central Europe endure the deluge better than in previous years......»»
Graphene at 20: Still no sign of the promised space elevator, but the material is quietly changing the world
Twenty years ago this October, two physicists at the University of Manchester, Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, published a groundbreaking paper on the "electric field effect in atomically thin carbon films." Their work described the extraordinar.....»»
New results from the CMS experiment put W boson mass mystery to rest
After an unexpected measurement by the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) experiment in 2022, physicists on the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment (CMS) at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) announced today a new mass measurement of the W boson, one of n.....»»
A new genetic analysis of animals in the Wuhan market in 2019 may help find COVID-19"s origin
Scientists searching for the origins of COVID-19 have zeroed in on a short list of animals that possibly helped spread it to people, an effort they hope could allow them to trace the outbreak back to its source......»»
How a doubling of sentence lengths helped pack England"s prisons to the rafters
Around 1,750 prisoners in England and Wales were recently released early, the first part of the government's plan to solve the prison overcrowding crisis......»»
New material with wavy layers of atoms exhibits unusual superconducting properties
MIT physicists and colleagues have created a new material with unusual superconducting and metallic properties, thanks to wavy layers of atoms only billionths of a meter thick that repeat themselves over and over to create a macroscopic sample that c.....»»
Independent origins of frog glue and its role in predator evasion
Skin-secreted adhesives, or glues, are highly effective defense adaptations that have evolved recurrently in a small number of amphibians. From an ecological standpoint, this rapidly solidifying material—essentially, a sticky slime—encumbers the.....»»
New cosmic distance catalog could unlock the mysteries of universe formation
A new catalog providing information on millions of distant galaxies, which determines their distances with unprecedented precision over a field of view and depth never before explored, has been published today......»»
Tracking plasma progression in a picosecond: Physicists develop ultra-fast laser method to study high-density plasmas
In a few picoseconds (trillionths of a second), a small, thin piece of copper momentarily becomes dense plasma, specifically a state called warm dense matter, warm being a relative term—the metal is nearly 200,000 degrees Fahrenheit. With the short.....»»
Physicists reveal evolution of shell structure using machine learning
A research team has used a machine learning approach to investigate the evolution of shell structure for nuclei far from the stability valley. The study, published in Physics Letters B and conducted by researchers from the Institute of Modern Physics.....»»
Science Crossword: Cosmic Goals
Play this crossword inspired by the October 2024 issue of Scientific American.....»»
Black hole pairs may unveil new particles
In a paper published in Physical Review Letters this week, physicists from Amsterdam and Copenhagen argue that close observations of merging black hole pairs may unveil information about potential new particles. The research combines several new disc.....»»
Physicists discover “hidden turbulence” throughout van Gogh’s Starry Night
Scientists measured scaling of the brush strokes to arrive at their conclusions. Enlarge / Many have seen a reflection of Vincent van Gogh's inner turmoil in the swirling vortices of The Starry Night. (credit: Public doman).....»»
Mice made transparent with a dye used in Doritos
Matching refractive indexes lets some wavelengths pass cleanly through the skin. Enlarge / Zihao Ou, who helped develop this solution, holds a tube of it. One key challenge in medical imaging is to look past skin and ot.....»»
Dating apps haven’t helped us find better partners, suggests research
You’d think that dating apps would help people find better partners, given that they allow daters to expand their dating pool beyond the people they meet organically, but new research suggests that isn’t the case. The research even suggests th.....»»
How Olmec elite helped legitimize their political power through art
In an article recently published in Latin American Antiquity, Dr. Jill Mollenhauer argues that the Gulf Lowland Olmec, one of Mesoamerica's earliest major civilizations, sometimes incorporated aesthetic and ritual practices associated with their rock.....»»
AI Has Helped Shein Become Fast Fashion’s Biggest Polluter
The company nearly doubled its emissions in 2023, making it the worst actor in a notoriously unsustainable industry......»»
Early dark energy could resolve cosmology"s two biggest puzzles
A new study by MIT physicists proposes that a mysterious force known as early dark energy could solve two of the biggest puzzles in cosmology and fill in some major gaps in our understanding of how the early universe evolved......»»