Phys.org news

Phys.org / Policing plagiarism of ideas in generative AI-assisted research writing

As more people—including researchers—use generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in their writing, it's becoming increasingly important to define what plagiarism looks like and how to police it.

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Dark lunar craters could host ultrastable lasers for moon navigation

They rank among the darkest and coldest places in the solar system: Hundreds of lunar craters, many of them at the moon's south pole, never receive direct sunlight and lie in permanent shadow. That's exactly why physicist ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Copper-based sensor explains key defense signaling in stressed plants

Researchers at the Institute of Transformative Bio-Molecules (WPI-ITbM), Nagoya University, together with collaborators from RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science (RIKEN CSRS) and The University of Osaka, have uncovered ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Climate adaptation may drive gentrification across African cities, continent-scale analysis shows

Green-blue adaptation (climate adaptation based on green and water spaces), which uses green and water spaces such as creating urban parks and restoring wetlands, is considered a representative climate adaptation strategy ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Microneedle patch vaccine could solving one of farming's most stubborn problems

Sticking needles into arms—or rather, haunches—is often the hardest part of distributing an effective agricultural vaccine. Now, University of Connecticut researchers show in the April 15 issue of Advanced Healthcare Materials ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Southern Ocean intermediate waters may hold key to Earth's carbon dioxide history

Researchers at National Taiwan University and partner institutions have uncovered new evidence that Antarctic Intermediate Water (AAIW)—a distinct layer sitting 500–1,500 meters below the ocean surface—played a pivotal role ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / How hidden viruses wake up inside seaweed and pass on to future generations

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Biology Tübingen have shown that giant viruses long thought to exist only as fleeting, free-living particles that can embed themselves permanently in the genome of a multicellular ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Chemical pathway unlocks next-generation infrared III–V nanocrystals

A research team led by Professor Sohee Jeong at Sungkyunkwan University has uncovered a key chemical pathway for the controlled synthesis of III–V semiconductor quantum dots, a class of next-generation infrared materials ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Indian and Tibetan wolves reveal ancient lineages with unexpected genomic diversity

Wolves in India, like the pack that raised Mowgli in "The Jungle Book," can often feel disconnected from both the research and storytelling of wolves. Rice University professor Lauren Hennelly is working to change that. Her ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / Machine learning reveals 5-angstrom sweet spot behind metallic glass stability

Using the second-nearest neighboring atoms to predict metallic glass stability can help researchers more accurately model the disordered solid with strong, elastic properties, according to a recent study led by University ...

May 18, 2026
Phys.org / People overestimate how confident AI systems are in their responses, experiments reveal

Artificial intelligence (AI) systems, particularly conversational agents such as ChatGPT or Gemini, are now used daily by a growing number of people worldwide. While many users trust the answers of AI agents to their queries, ...

May 17, 2026
Phys.org / Neutrino flavor flips could be key to triggering supernovae

Despite being so elusive, neutrinos are produced in abundance in some of the most violent events in the universe. One of their strangest properties is that they can spontaneously switch between three types, or "flavors": ...

May 17, 2026