Phys.org news
Phys.org / Farewell black spruce? How climate change and pests are reshaping North America's forests
More than 80% of North American forests could face greater threats from pests and diseases by midcentury, a University of British Columbia-led study finds. If global emissions continue unchecked, rising temperatures and shifting ...
Phys.org / When panic freezes people: Virtual quake tests capture real-time fear and injury risk
Growing up, many of us were taught to drop, cover and hold on during an earthquake. The guidance is straightforward, but how people actually respond when the ground starts shaking can be far more complicated. Now, UC Berkeley ...
Phys.org / Predictive tools can confuse rare mutations with dangerous ones
When a patient's DNA is read, it is compared with a reference version of the human genome. This allows geneticists and rare disease experts to look at a list of places where the patient's DNA differs. Most variations will ...
Phys.org / Pigment found in beets linked to plants' adaptation to harsh environments
The pigments that give beets their red color may have helped a major group of flowering plants repeatedly adapt to dry environments, setting the stage for the evolution of traits that allowed plants to adapt to some of the ...
Phys.org / Probiotic and postbiotic treatments revive heat-stressed corals in field experiment
Climate change continues to threaten the world's coral reefs, which support at least a quarter of all marine life. Though probiotics have been shown to rehabilitate corals in aquarium experiments, demonstrating the efficacy ...
Phys.org / Wrinkled or smooth? Cell growth mechanics determine shape of plant organs
When inner and outer cell layers of sepals—the leaf-like plant organs that cover and protect the flower bud before it opens—all grow upward, the organs stay smooth and uniformly stiff, which is optimal for the plant, according ...
Phys.org / Rising species numbers on Europe's mountaintops may mask increasing losses of high-elevation plant specialists
Decades of warming have relaxed cold-temperature constraints on mountain plant distribution and increased species numbers on mountaintops. An international research team led by scientists from the University of Vienna, together ...
Phys.org / Tiny crustacean helps scientists understand genes regulating circatidal rhythms
Scientists at UMass Chan Medical School and the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole have shown that the four core clock genes responsible for maintaining circadian rhythms in animals—Per, Cry2, Bmal1 and Clk—also regulate ...
Phys.org / Metabolic networks provide clues about the earliest stages of enzyme evolution
The enzymes found in modern organisms are complex proteins, often with multiple folded substructures and specialized catalytic sites. Proteins are encoded by genes. Tracing the history of enzymes across all living organisms ...
Phys.org / Scientists observe Einstein's gravity in the quantum world
An international team including Nobel Prize-winning physicist Professor Sir Roger Penrose has observed a long-predicted effect of gravity on a falling quantum object for the first time. The result shows that a fundamental ...
Phys.org / Physicists test the weak equivalence principle in an orbiting space station
The weak equivalence principle (WEP) is central to Einstein's general relativity. It posits that gravity must accelerate everything equally, regardless of what it is made from. For the first time, a team led by Ming-Sheng ...
Phys.org / More than 120 molecular species found in giant cloud near Milky Way's center
Astronomers have discovered a second interstellar cloud near the center of the Milky Way that is extraordinarily rich in complex molecules, including several molecules associated with prebiotic chemistry. The newly studied ...
