Phys.org news
Phys.org / Life's earliest proteins may have folded into complex shapes with far fewer amino acids
How did the earliest life on Earth build complex biological machinery with so few tools? A new study explores how the simplest building blocks of proteins—once limited to just half of today's amino acids—could still form ...
Phys.org / AI model designs new antibiotic for staph infections after exploring 46 billion compounds
Researchers at McMaster University have developed a new generative artificial intelligence (AI) model capable of drastically speeding up drug discovery—and, in early tests, it has already designed a brand-new antibiotic. ...
Phys.org / These 'good' viruses hold up a booming industry—AI just found a faster way to track them
Researchers have developed a new methodology that uses artificial intelligence tools to identify and count target viruses more efficiently than previous techniques. The new approach can be used in applications such as pharmaceutical ...
Phys.org / AI automates quantum dot voltage tuning for scaling up quantum computing
Semiconductor spin qubits are a promising candidate for the building blocks of next-generation quantum computers due to their high potential for integration and compatibility with existing semiconductor technologies. Qubits—like ...
Phys.org / A huge tectonic boundary shook the ground where dinosaurs once stood
Scientists have discovered a Jurassic tectonic plate boundary that could help to predict what the planet might look like millions of years into the future. Dr. Jordan Phethean, Senior Lecturer in Earth Sciences at the University ...
Phys.org / Tiny songbird crosses Sahara by flying night after night
Every year a small songbird, no heavier than a letter, crosses the Sahara Desert, the Mediterranean and the Arabian Desert on its migration. New research from Lund University in Sweden now reveals how the tiny bird manages ...
Phys.org / Brazil unearths a bizarre beaked reptile with a trans-Atlantic prehistoric link
Paleontologists from the Federal University of Santa Maria (UFSM) have published a new study in the scientific journal Royal Society Open Science, in which they describe a new species based on a fossil skull approximately ...
Phys.org / Archaeological digs in Amazon provide clues about Indigenous inhabitants before colonization
Paving roads in the Amazon rainforest has long brought deforestation that threatens the people who live there. The same roadwork, however, has also allowed archaeologists to get glimpses of the region's past long before Europeans ...
Phys.org / What's that swirly pattern? It's a moiré, and it has potential power
Just as wave-like patterns can appear on a computer screen when pixels do not align, new research led by Flinders University is investigating atomic-scale "moiré patterns" in the promising field of ferroelectricity. The new ...
Phys.org / E. coli editing technique expands into a universal toolkit for rewriting bacterial DNA
The ability to precisely edit the genomes of bacteria has long been a goal of microbiologists. Such technology would enable scientists to make new inroads into studying disease, developing sustainable materials, and fighting ...
Phys.org / How earthquakes stop: Near-fault records uncover overlooked phase
While analyzing strong-motion data close to fault lines, a group of researchers at Kyoto University noticed something unexpected: a negative phase in the waveforms, a pattern that did not conform to the existing interpretations ...
Phys.org / Room to move: Neutron scattering shows how proteins behave in crowded environments
Proteins are essential molecules in living systems. They move, interact and organize themselves to carry out a wide range of functions, from helping cells communicate to forming structures inside the cell. In many cases, ...
