All News
Phys.org / How play and social connection may help some dogs understand words
Some dogs are seemingly more talented than others. So-called gifted word learners (GWL) are rare canines that can rapidly learn the names of toys, a skill that most dogs don't possess. To understand why this is so, researchers ...
Phys.org / Electron-phonon 'surfing' could help stabilize quantum hardware, nanowire tests suggest
That low-frequency fuzz that can bedevil cellphone calls has to do with how electrons move through and interact in materials at the smallest scale. The electronic flicker noise is often caused by interruptions in the flow ...
Phys.org / Into the neutrino fog: The ghosts haunting our search for dark matter
Ciaran O'Hare scribbles symbols using colored markers across his whiteboard like he's trying to solve a crime—or perhaps planning one. He bounces around the edges of the board, slowly filling it with sharp angles and curling ...
Phys.org / Ancient Alaskan site may help explain how the first people arrived in North America
New evidence has emerged that sheds light on the possible first people to populate the Americas. Dating of stone and ivory tools found at an archaeological site in Alaska suggests that these early pioneers traveled through ...
Phys.org / Study: Why Nobel Prize-level materials have yet to reach industry
Excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, polluted water, and increasingly strict environmental regulations are driving the search for materials that can efficiently trap pollutants at the molecular level. For more than two ...
Phys.org / Light-driven probe enables sensitive detection of epigenetic intermediates
Epigenetic modifications such as DNA methylation play a key role in regulating gene expression. Emerging evidence suggests that intermediates generated during DNA demethylation may have distinct biological roles. However, ...
Phys.org / Global warming is speeding breakdown of major greenhouse gas, research shows
Scientists at the University of California, Irvine have discovered that climate change is causing nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas and ozone-depleting substance, to break down in the atmosphere more quickly than previously ...
Phys.org / When continents try, and fail, to break apart
Great things can come from failure when it comes to geology. The Midcontinent rift formed about 1.1 billion years ago and runs smack in the middle of the United States at the Great Lakes. The rift failed to completely rupture, ...
Medical Xpress / DNA marker in malaria mosquitoes may be pivotal in tackling insecticide resistance
A new study has detected a DNA marker in a gene encoding a key enzyme known as cytochrome P450 that helps mosquitoes to break down and survive exposure to pyrethroids, the main insecticides used for treating bed nets. This ...
Phys.org / Invisible actors in groundwater mapped for first time, revealing role in freshwater reservoir
Groundwater is considered the largest reservoir of liquid freshwater on Earth and a habitat for complex microbial communities that drive essential biogeochemical cycles. Until now, the role of viruses that infect microorganisms ...
Phys.org / Olives have been essential to life in Italy for at least 6,000 years—far longer than we thought
How far back does the rich history of Italian olives and oil stretch? My new research, published in the American Journal of Archaeology, synthesizing and reevaluating existing archaeological evidence, suggests olive trees ...
Phys.org / A student made cosmic dust in her lab—what she found could help us understand how life started on Earth
A Sydney Ph.D. student has recreated a tiny piece of the universe inside a bottle in her laboratory, producing cosmic dust from scratch. The results shed new light on how the chemical building blocks of life may have formed ...
