Phys.org news

Migratory birds such as the pied flycatcher typically have wintering locations in Africa close to others from the same breeding population. That means that birds breeding in the Netherlands run into each other again in Africa, ...

Great apes may have been laughing with a similar rhythm to modern humans for at least 15 million years, a University of Warwick study reveals. The finding offers unexpected clues to how human speech evolved.

Pothole season, summer construction season or maybe bad weather. No matter the time of year, it's no surprise commuters who drive to work may start their day already feeling a bit on edge.

Marine sponges may play an important, previously underestimated role in reducing methylmercury contamination in marine food webs. In a new modeling study, researchers at Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon showed that sponges can significantly ...

For nearly 50 years, scientists have suspected that microscopic marine plankton play a role in cloud formation over the oceans. Now, an experiment led by the University of Helsinki suggests that it may be more important than ...

Plants convert light into energy efficiently through photosynthesis—an ability that scientists and engineers still struggle to match with electronic devices. Recently, researchers have looked beyond traditional semiconductor ...

Last fall, the 12 students in the Jackson School of Geosciences' GEO 347G "Climate System Modeling" class set out to understand something that hit close to home: What were the climatological factors that made the July 4, ...

A new electrochemical system simultaneously converts plant-derived materials and nitrate pollutants into valuable industrial chemicals. Developed by Tohoku University researchers, the system provides a more sustainable way ...

New research indicates that sea turtles seem to navigate across hundreds of miles of open ocean using Earth's magnetic field. Previous experimental studies suggested that sea turtles use geomagnetism to navigate, but this ...

In an international experiment, researchers observed Jahn–Teller polarons—quasiparticles that could play an important role in future ultrafast spintronic devices. These polarons emerged within the crystal lattice of cobalt ...

Chiral 2D metal halide perovskites (MHPs) are among the most promising materials for future technologies that exploit the spin of electrons in spin-based optoelectronics, or spintronics, but getting them to perform consistently ...

Forests and land play an important role in absorbing carbon dioxide emissions, but current models and forecasts don't incorporate a surprising ecological discovery: Despite more available carbon, climate change and warmer ...