Phys.org news

A protein's function is determined by its structure, and structure—the way a protein folds—is determined by its sequence of amino acids, the building blocks of proteins.

Candida auris and Candida albicans are microscopic fungi that cause life-threatening human infections, killing almost a million people globally every year. The World Health Organization lists both species among the top four ...

A team of researchers led by the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Department of Chemistry has uncovered a faster way large carbon-based molecules may form in space, helping solve a long-standing mystery about how some of the ...

In dark skies at night, distant starlight twinkles and speaks to vast cosmic histories almost as old as time itself. New data from instruments such as NASA's James Webb Space Telescope are helping astrophysicists probe deep ...

Some molecules come in two "handed" forms. This property, called chirality, can influence not only how molecules interact with light but also which electron spins they allow to pass. Researchers at the University of Osaka ...

Researchers have captured in real time the "birth moment" when the performance of a next-generation memory material is determined. The key lies in controlling oxygen vacancies, microscopic defects created when oxygen atoms ...

Why do we remember certain moments while forgetting others? Every day, our minds are bombarded with thousands of pieces of information, yet our brains have a limited capacity to consolidate these experiences into lasting ...

Researchers have developed a vehicle-mounted spectroscopy system that can reliably detect methane in real time while driving. Using a moving vehicle to detect methane could make it easier to locate hidden methane emissions ...

With Hong Kong recently recording record-breaking high temperatures, extreme weather has once again raised public awareness of global warming and emission-reduction measures. A large-scale international study led by The Hong ...

Just a few minutes of freezing and thawing can have a decisive impact on how ferrihydrite, the most reactive iron mineral in cold soils, permafrost and glaciers, transforms, according to researchers at Umeå University. As ...

Why do humans rely on XY chromosomes to determine sex, while birds use ZW—and many reptiles use neither, letting temperature decide instead? Sex determination is remarkably diverse across the animal kingdom. In genotypic ...

How has offspring dependence on parents evolved over the course of evolution? Researchers at the University of Bayreuth, in collaboration with Kyoto University, Japan, have investigated one possible mechanism by studying ...