Phys.org news

Phys.org / Soil bacteria share amino acids, helping nearly half survive nutrient gaps

Bacteria, too, depend on good neighborly relations: A new study by the Osnabrück University, in collaboration with researchers from the University of Cambridge in England, shows that soil bacteria live in beneficial communities ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Climate scientists solve monsoon puzzle and warn of risks to fisheries

A new study has reconciled a long-standing paradox in the South Asian summer monsoon cycle. Climate scientists have discovered why geological records from land and sea have told opposite stories about monsoons throughout ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / How atmospheric dryness limits increases in typhoon rainfall

Under global warming, scientists have widely expected tropical cyclones (including typhoons and hurricanes) to bring more intense and frequent rainfall. The underlying physics seems intuitive: Rising temperatures allow the ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / What happens inside a wildfire? A Ph.D. student is finding out

What happens during a wildfire? The short answer is: much more than we know. As wildfires burn through trees, grasses and other vegetation, heat from the flames sets off thousands of chemical reactions at once. Molecules ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Scientists identify design rules for the best thermoelectric materials

Researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University have used a theoretical framework to derive design rules for creating new thermoelectric materials. The efficiency of converting thermal energy to electricity is often determined ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Glacier retreat could promote the spread of diseases among bees

A study conducted in the Swiss Alps by the University of Lausanne and the University of Milan shows that glacier retreat and changing vegetation could influence the spread of certain pathogens between honeybees and wild bees.

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Tiny ocean plankton hold clues to the future of Maine lobster

The future of Maine's lobster industry may depend on a creature the size of a sesame seed. Researchers at the University of Maine have discovered that planktonic baby lobsters, or larvae, preferentially feed on Calanus finmarchicus, ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Tiny root hairs, big impact: How bacteria help plants survive drought

What helps plants cope better with drought? With heat waves and periods of extreme drought becoming increasingly common worldwide, the need for drought-tolerant plants is increasingly urgent. With the help of bacteria, plants ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Ball milling enhances the antiviral activity of inexpensive inorganic materials

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, developing surfaces that can inactivate viruses upon contact has become an important goal in public health care. Ideally, such surfaces would work on their own without requiring chemical disinfectants, ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Mechanical memory helps explain how cells adapt their movement to changing environments

Cells in our bodies squeeze through dense tissue channels, thread past neighboring cells and navigate every nook and cranny within the extracellular matrix—the mesh-like network that surrounds and supports cells. How well ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Dry landscapes and newly fallowed fields may raise California Valley fever risk

Researchers at UC San Diego and UC Berkeley have found that certain landscapes surrounding California communities are associated with differing rates of Valley fever, a fungal respiratory infection caused by inhaling spores ...

Aug 24, 2026
Phys.org / Can satellites detect when forests lose resilience?

For years, scientists have been using a method called "temporal autocorrelation (TAC)" to measure forest resilience using satellite data. However, scientists have not used TAC uniformly, and its use as a resilience indicator ...

Aug 24, 2026