Phys.org news
Phys.org / City birds dazzle females with 'borrowed' human items
Bowerbirds in an Australian city use a range of human items—from glass and plastic to banknotes and even a pair of handcuffs—to impress females, shows new research in Royal Society Open Science. Male bowerbirds create an ...
Phys.org / For satellites as small as a briefcase, getting around in space just got a whole lot easier
MIT engineers are testing a new propulsion system that combines the power and speed of conventional chemical thrusters with the precision and fuel-efficiency of electrical thrusters. The system could enable the design of ...
Phys.org / A new origin story for multicellular life points to physics, not genes alone
How did life make the leap from single cells to coordinated, multicellular organisms? And how do genetically identical cells still perform a version of that feat every time an embryo begins to take shape?
Phys.org / Terahertz imaging maps spatial chirality in materials with 100-micrometer resolution
In nature, there exist structures that are mirror images of each other but cannot be perfectly superimposed. These are known as chiral objects, derived from the Greek word for "hand," since left and right hands share the ...
Phys.org / Small Magellanic Cloud is being pulled apart, reshaping how astronomers read its past
Using more than a decade of observations from the VISTA Survey of the Magellanic Clouds (VMC), researchers measured the motions of millions of stars across the Small Magellanic Cloud with unprecedented precision. The new ...
Phys.org / Under Notre Dame cathedral, a 'dig of the century' unearths 1,700 years of history
Wilting in the summer sun, a line of tourists waits to climb Notre Dame cathedral and meet its gargoyles.
Phys.org / Strain creates moiré 2D materials without twisting or stacking, opening more scalable route
Cornell researchers have developed a new way to create moiré patterns—atomic-scale structures that can give materials unusual quantum behaviors—without relying on the traditionally used difficult-to-control twisting and stacking ...
Phys.org / Amazon rainforest emits new stress-defense molecules during El Niño drought
The Amazon rainforest responded to the most severe drought ever recorded in the basin with an unexpected defense mechanism. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz, Germany, found that during and after ...
Phys.org / Bees can swim and use visual cues to survive water crashes
When a bee crashes into water, it may still be able to swim to safety. New research from Michigan State University confirms that honeybees can propel themselves across the water's surface, and their movement is purposeful ...
Phys.org / Laser beam builds cell-like protein networks without chemical modification
Networks of protein fibers play important roles in living cells. To understand the dynamical behavior of these networks, model networks are needed to perform in vitro studies. However, fabrication of protein networks similar ...
Phys.org / Meteor as heavy as an elephant causes widespread speculation across New England
When the double boom rang out in New England over the weekend, shaking homes and sending pets fleeing, questions started flooding social media.
Phys.org / Proteins can be selectively controlled with radio waves
In a significant advance in biological quantum sensing, a research team led by the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has discovered and tested a new mechanism of action in which proteins can be controlled with radio waves. ...
