Phys.org news
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 / How bacteria learned to target numerous cell types
Viruses attack nearly every living organism on Earth. To do so, they rely on highly specialized proteins that recognize and bind to receptors on the surface of target cells, a molecular arms race that drives constant evolution. ...
Phys.org / Resilience bonds could serve as an insurance solution to address climate change risks
Researchers with Lehigh University's Center for Catastrophe Modeling and Resilience, led by anthropologist David G. Casagrande, have identified two urgent challenges the United States faces in adapting to climate change: ...
Phys.org / New class of catalysts could dramatically change playing field in nickel catalysis
Researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have reported a breakthrough in nickel catalysis that harnesses a rare oxidation state of nickel that has proved challenging to control yet is highly valued for its ...
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 / 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 / Tiny new dinosaur Foskeia pelendonum fills in an evolutionary gap
An international team has described Foskeia pelendonum, a tiny Early Cretaceous ornithopod from Vegagete (Burgos, Spain), measuring barely half a meter long. Led by Paul-Emile Dieudonné (National University of Río Negro, ...
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 / Our ocean's 'natural antacids' may act faster than we thought
Earth's ocean absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, helping to temper the impact of climate change but increasing ocean acidity. However, calcium carbonate minerals found in the seabed act as a natural antacid: Higher ...
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 ...
Phys.org / Mapping how Arctic groundwater will respond to thawing permafrost
Dalhousie researchers have revealed how Arctic aquifers—permeable layers of the ground that store and transmit water to rivers, lakes and terrestrial ecosystems—behave today and how these vital resources will change with ...