Phys.org news

Phys.org / The real Moana story: Why the Polynesians suddenly sailed east

Major drought forced people to migrate across the Pacific beyond Samoa and Tonga and toward the Americas, scientists have discovered. With the new live-action "Moana" film hitting cinemas, a team of geographers and climate ...

11 hours ago
Phys.org / Programmable light simulates quantum matter across 300 processes without bigger circuits

A team of researchers at the University of Ottawa and its Nexus for Quantum Technologies Institute, in collaboration with researchers from Federico II University in Italy, has developed a programmable quantum simulator that ...

9 hours ago
Phys.org / Medieval Islamic societies considered lovesickness a distinct mental illness, research shows

Lovesickness was taken seriously as a distinct mental illness by physicians in the medieval Islamic world, new research shows. Islamic scholars considered lovesickness, which they called ʿishq, to be different from melancholy—unlike ...

10 hours ago
Phys.org / Observing oscillations, flares and tornados on the sun

For six and a half days in July 2024, the balloon-borne solar observatory Sunrise III kept its gaze fixed on the sun. The stratospheric flight, which stretched from the northernmost tip of Sweden to Canada's Northwest Territories, ...

11 hours ago
Phys.org / Self-propelled microparticles scrub stubborn biofilms, improving wound care and instrument cleaning

Newly developed microparticles can infiltrate stubborn bacterial matrices and release tiny oxygen bubbles to clean surfaces and wounds more efficiently than hydrogen peroxide or other cleaning agents alone, researchers at ...

10 hours ago
Phys.org / Stress protection of Amazon trees, induced by climate warming, may alter atmosphere chemistry

The Amazon rainforest is one of the largest carbon reservoirs on Earth. It is also the world's largest source of biogenic volatile organic compounds (VOCs). These carbon-based gases are naturally released by vegetation. They ...

10 hours ago
Phys.org / Neutron imaging reveals how water limits CO₂ storage in recycled concrete

The construction sector faces two problems at once: it emits large amounts of CO₂ and produces vast quantities of concrete waste. But what if part of that waste could be used to trap carbon instead of ending up as rubble?

10 hours ago
Phys.org / Image: Curiosity rover sees Martian sulfur up close

This close-up view shows fragments of sulfur crystals, the first ever seen on the Red Planet.

12 hours ago
Phys.org / Fossils found decades ago reveal extinct 3.5 million-year-old giant salamander species

In the late 1990s in the Ajimu region of Japan's Oita Prefecture, researchers discovered three fossilized vertebrae belonging to the Cryptobranchidae family of giant salamanders. These were embedded in the Tsubusugawa Formation, ...

15 hours ago
Phys.org / New physics-based machine-learning method speeds search for 2D quantum materials

Researchers at The University of Manchester have developed a new computational approach to help identify two-dimensional materials that may host unusual quantum behavior. The work, published in Science Advances, focuses on ...

12 hours ago
Phys.org / Palm oil shows promise as greener processing aid for natural rubber composites

Natural rubber is widely used in tires, transport, construction, health care and industrial products because of its elasticity, resilience and durability. To improve performance, rubber manufacturers often add silica fillers ...

11 hours ago
Phys.org / New neutron method reveals inner architecture of drug delivery particles

Modern medicine increasingly relies on targeted drug delivery—a process during which tiny particles (nanoparticles) transport drugs to specific parts of the body. To ensure these treatments are safe and effective, scientists ...

11 hours ago