Phys.org news
Phys.org / Natural magnetic materials can control light in unprecedented ways
Imagine shining a flashlight into a material and watching the light bend backward—or in an entirely unexpected direction—as if defying the law of physics. This phenomenon, known as negative refraction, could transform ...
Phys.org / New database reveals how Americans use water
Water powers our lives. It feeds our crops, keeps factories running, generates electricity, and fills our taps. But until now, no one had a clear, national picture of how much water we're using—and for what.
Phys.org / Banning lead in gas worked: The proof is in our hair
Prior to the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970, Americans lived in communities awash with lead from industrial sources, paint, water supply pipes and, most significantly, tailpipe emissions. A dangerous ...
Phys.org / Reshaping gold leads to new electronic and optical properties
By changing the physical structure of gold at the nanoscale, researchers can drastically change how the material interacts with light—and, as a result, its electronic and optical properties. This is shown by a study from ...
Phys.org / AI streamlines deluge of data from particle collisions
Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory have developed a novel artificial intelligence (AI)-based method to dramatically tame the flood of data generated by particle detectors at ...
Phys.org / NASA fuels its moon rocket in a crucial test to decide when Artemis astronauts will launch
NASA fueled its new moon rocket in one final make-or-break test Monday, with hopes of sending astronauts on a lunar fly-around as soon as this coming weekend.
Phys.org / Air pollution causes social instability in ant colonies, triggering attacks on returning nest mates
A research team from the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology has shown in a new study that ants returning from habitats affected by air pollution are attacked when they re-enter the colony. The cause: air pollution, ...
Phys.org / AI mapping reveals over 20,000 malaria protein interactions across parasite life cycle
An international research team headed by scientists from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and the Center for Structural Systems Biology and Bernhard-Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine in Germany has revealed ...
Phys.org / A clearer look at critical materials, thanks to refrigerator magnets
With an advanced technology known as angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES), scientists are able to map out a material's electron energy-momentum relationship, which encodes the material's electrical, optical, ...
Phys.org / Bigger is not always better: Smaller leaves optimize light use in soybeans
In efforts to better understand how soybean plants capture and use light, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign investigated how leaf size and shape affect light distribution within the crop canopy. Using ...
Phys.org / Perseverance rover completes first AI-planned drive on Mars
NASA's Perseverance Mars rover has completed the first drives on another world that were planned by artificial intelligence. Executed on Dec. 8 and 10, and led by the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, ...
Phys.org / As Rubin's survey gets underway, simulations suggest it could find about six lunar-origin asteroids per year
Most near-Earth asteroids are thought to drift in from the main asteroid belt. But a small subset may have a much closer origin: the moon. One intriguing example is 469219 Kamoʻoalewa (2016 HO3), an Earth quasi-satellite ...