Phys.org news

The planar Hall effect is a tabletop diagnostic tool for special quantum properties useful in basic research and technological applications. Or so it was thought, because careful calculation by Kobe University researchers ...

Sunlight provides the energy necessary for photosynthesis and growth, but it also exposes plants to harmful ultraviolet-B (UV-B) radiation. Plants must therefore strike a delicate balance between growth and protection. By ...

Within the past decade, biologists have discovered that one strategy cells use to keep their contents organized is a phenomenon known as phase separation. Similar to the way oil forms droplets that float in a vinegar solution, ...

Proteins systematically lose their protective hydration shell when their environment becomes more acidic. Until recently, this was just a theory. State-of-the-art imaging techniques have helped researchers at Martin Luther ...

A celebrated scheme for human-wildlife coexistence is now at risk of failing due to lack of long-term government investment, new research has found.

Across much of the northern hemisphere, extreme weather events like heat waves and heavy precipitation have increased in frequency and severity over the last several decades. A new study from the Harvard John A. Paulson School ...

From household plastic packaging to the flexible frameworks that support wearable electronics, polymer materials form the invisible backbone of modern life. At a microscopic level, polymers consist of long, ribbon-like molecular ...

A team of researchers led by Luigi Naldini at the San Raffaele Telethon Institute for Gene Therapy (SR-Tiget) has developed a new strategy to significantly improve the precision and safety of CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing in human ...

Many diseases are driven by proteins interacting with each other inside cells. But blocking these interactions with drugs is difficult because typical "small-molecule" drugs often prove to be too small to grip the broad, ...

Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) have discovered a stellar bar in GN20, a massive galaxy seen just 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang. The new paper was submitted to the preprint server arXiv on May ...

Supermassive black holes are the largest known black holes in the universe, sitting at the center of most large galaxies. They are sometimes described as cosmic monsters because they feed on surrounding gas and dust when ...

Ancient Egyptians are often depicted wearing black eyeliner, known as kohl, which was stored in small containers. While kohl containers are typically found throughout Egypt and Sudan (Nubia), their presence beyond these areas ...