Phys.org news

Phys.org / New 'Mars GPS' lets Perseverance pinpoint its location within 25 centimeters

Imagine you're all alone, driving along in a rocky, unforgiving desert with no roads, no map, no GPS, and no more than one phone call a day for someone to inform you exactly where you are. That's what NASA's Perseverance ...

17 hours ago in Astronomy & Space
Phys.org / Rising simultaneous wildfire risk compromises international firefighting efforts

The most high-risk conditions for fires are increasingly happening across countries at the same time, making resulting wildfires even more challenging to tackle, new research reveals.

16 hours ago in Earth
Phys.org / Archaeologists identify elders in Iron Age Israel through household artifacts

A new study from Bar-Ilan University is shedding light on a long-overlooked social group in archaeology: the elderly. While research on women and children has flourished in recent decades, older adults have remained largely ...

18 hours ago in Other Sciences
Phys.org / Chiral myosin steers actin into stable rotating rings without a template, study finds

Living cells are highly organized, yet they are not assembled using rigid blueprints or by following a predetermined plan. Instead, order emerges on its own from countless interactions between molecules that are constantly ...

15 hours ago in Biology
Phys.org / Why negativity can motivate founders: Study links doubts to greater persistence

A new study finds entrepreneurs become more committed to their business ventures when they are told they will fail, increasing their efforts to make those businesses successful. "Most entrepreneurs—people who start their ...

16 hours ago in Other Sciences
Phys.org / Microscopic mirrors for future quantum networks: A new way to make high-performance optical resonators

Researchers in the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences have devised a new way to make some of the smallest, smoothest mirrors ever created for controlling ...

18 hours ago in Physics
Phys.org / A clearer future: Researchers unveil transparent, plastic-free wood

Researchers at the University of Osaka have developed a highly transparent material made entirely from natural wood without adding plastic and uncovered why some wood becomes clearer than others. Their study reveals that ...

18 hours ago in Chemistry
Phys.org / Solving a longstanding mystery about complex life's origin—oxygen-tolerant Asgard archaea may explain eukaryotes' rise

The most widely accepted scientific explanation for the arrival of all complex life on Earth has had an unsolved mystery at its heart. According to the theory, all plants, animals and fungi, known collectively as eukaryotes, ...

19 hours ago in Biology
Phys.org / Eclipse research finds turbulent times in the sun's corona

Researchers at the University of Hawaiʻi have uncovered new clues about how energy moves through the sun's outer atmosphere, using one of nature's rarest events as their window: total solar eclipses. Drawing on more than ...

19 hours ago in Astronomy & Space
Phys.org / Antibiotic resistance is rising: A membrane protease could be E. coli's weak spot

A University of Alberta research team has identified a new drug target to treat harmful E. coli bacteria—which cause nearly 250,000 deaths a year from urinary tract infections (UTI) and are becoming increasingly resistant ...

18 hours ago in Biology
Phys.org / An 'electrical' circadian clock balances growth between shoots and roots

Plants don't just respond to light and water, they also run on an internal daily timekeeper known as the circadian clock. Researchers have now discovered that the plant circadian clock can regulate electrochemical signals ...

19 hours ago in Biology
Phys.org / The making of doting dads may involve a specific gene

Male caregiving is rare. Of the nearly 6,000 mammalian species, fewer than 5% of fathers stick around to raise their own young. Most are even instinctively hostile. Even among the mammals that pitch in with caregiving duties, ...

19 hours ago in Biology