'Fire streaks' ever more real in the collisions of atomic nuclei and protons

Collisions of lead nuclei take place under extreme physical conditions. Their course can be described using a model which assumes that the transforming, extremely hot matter—the quark-gluon plasma—flows in the form of hundreds of streaks. Until now, the "fire streaks" seemed to b … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Wild red deer contribute to the preservation of open landscapes

Similar to farm animals such as cattle or sheep, wild red deer grazing in open landscapes can also contribute to the conservation of protected habitats. This was demonstrated by a research team from the University of Göttingen and the Institute for Wildlife Biology of Göttingen a … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Study questions current regulations on light pollution and calls for paradigm shift

An international study involving researchers from the University of Granada (UGR), Spain, and the University of Krakow (Poland) has found that Spain's current regulations on light pollution are inadequate, as they fail to take into account all the necessary factors—including the … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Odyssey's three views of Martian moon Phobos

For the first time, NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter has caught the Martian moon Phobos during a full moon phase. Each color in this new image represents a temperature range detected by Odyssey's infrared camera, which has been studying the Martian moon since September of 2017. Lookin … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Rare-Earth metals in the atmosphere of a glowing-hot exoplanet

KELT-9 b is the hottest exoplanet known to date. In the summer of 2018, a joint team of astronomers from the universities of Bern and Geneva found signatures of gaseous iron and titanium in its atmosphere. Now these researchers have also been able to detect traces of vaporized so … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

New water cycle on Mars discovered

Approximately every two Earth years, when it is summer on the southern hemisphere of Mars, a window opens: Only in this season can water vapor efficiently rise from the lower into the upper Martian atmosphere. There, winds carry the rare gas to the north pole. While part of the w … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Copper oxide photocathodes: Laser experiment reveals location of efficiency loss

Solar cells and photocathodes made of copper oxide could theoretically attain high efficiencies for solar energy conversion. In practice, however, large losses occur. Now, a team at the HZB has been able to use a sophisticated femtosecond laser experiment to determine where these … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Genomics uncovers the mystery of the magic drumstick tree—Moringa oleifera

The moringa (drumstick) tree has medicinal value and is a rich source of nutrients and minerals. Traditionally, its parts are known to confer multiple benefits, including anti-diabetic (leaves), cardio-protective (roots), anti-fertility (roots), anti-inflammatory (roots), anti-mi … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Scientists discover a new class of single-atom nanozymes

Nanozymes—catalytic nanomaterials with enzyme-like characteristics—offer the advantage of low cost, high stability, tunable catalytic activity and ease of mass production. For these reasons, they have been widely applied in biosensing, therapeutics and environmental protection. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Minister promises clean Delhi air in three years

A top Indian minister has made an ambitious promise that the government will clean New Delhi's toxic air in the next three years. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Ha Long heli: Vietnam launches chopper rides in famous bay

Most visitors to Vietnam's famed Ha Long Bay opt for cruise views of the UNESCO heritage site but from Friday tourists can hop on a helicopter to see the area's famous karst rock formations from the skies. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Rare Asian black bear spotted in Korean DMZ

A rare Asiatic black bear has been photographed in the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas, Seoul's environmental ministry said. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Crowdfunding brings life-saving water to Myanmar's deer

A herd of endangered deer wait under the shade of one of the sparse trees in this parched central Myanmar landscape, watching as rangers dispatch drinking water—a life-saving resource funded by wellwishers across the country. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Why does Facebook fail to fix itself? It's partly humans

The question comes up over and over, with extremist material, hate speech, election meddling and privacy invasions. Why can't Facebook just fix it? | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Python patrols stalk Florida swamps to staunch marauding serpents

Along with the venomous lionfish, the Burmese python is perhaps the least welcome invasive species in Florida: lacking any natural predators, it has happily chomped its way through the state's wildlife. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Japanese man jailed for smuggling insects from Ecuador

A Japanese man was sentenced to two years in prison in Ecuador for attempting to smuggle a massive haul of creepy crawlies out of the country, officials said Thursday. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

News Corp shows third quarter profit

Rupert Murdoch's mass media and publishing company News Corp posted a third quarter net profit of $23 million Thursday, boosted by its HarperCollins book division. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Mexico's prized beaches threatened by smelly algae invasion

Tourists looking for sun and sand in Mexican resorts like Cancun, Playa del Carmen and Tulum have been disgusted by foul-smelling mounds of sargassum—a seaweed-like algae—piling up on beaches and turning turquoise waters brown, and experts are warning that it may be the new norma … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Student 'geek squads' maintain school devices, help teachers

Buffalo kindergarten teacher Maria Spurlock was still struggling after trying for more than a week to get a reading app working on all of her classroom iPads. When she learned her building had a new team of technical experts, she put in a request for help. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Lunar tunnel engineers excited by boring Moon colonies

As space agencies prepare to return humans to the Moon, top engineers are racing to design a tunnel boring machine capable of digging underground colonies for the first lunar inhabitants. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Study explores the use of robots and artificial intelligence to understand the deep-sea

Artificial intelligence (AI) could help scientists shed new light on the variety of species living on the ocean floor, according to new research led by the University of Plymouth. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Climate change responsible for severe infectious disease in UK frogs

Climate change has already increased the spread and severity of a fatal disease caused by Ranavirus that infects common frogs (Rana temporaria) in the UK, according to research led by ZSL's Institute of Zoology, UCL and Queen Mary University of London published today in Global Ch … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

New method developed to detect and trace homemade bombs

Researchers at King's College London, in collaboration with Northumbria University, have developed a new way of detecting homemade explosives which will help forensic scientists trace where it came from. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Officials seek to open major spillway on Mississippi River

Army Corps of Engineers officials in Louisiana aim to open a historic flood control structure above New Orleans on Tuesday for an unprecedented second time in one year. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Amazon's Bezos says he'll send a spaceship to the moon

Jeff Bezos, who heads both Amazon and space company Blue Origin, unveiled on Thursday a lunar lander that he said would be used to transport equipment, and possibly human beings, to the south pole of the Moon by 2024. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Video games a hobby for majority of Americans, study says

Video games are enormously popular in the United States, with 164 million people—or 65 percent of adults—playing regularly, according to a study released on Thursday. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Uber's rocky road to global powerhouse

Uber, set to make its stock market debut in one of the largest technology share offerings, has become a disruptive force in local transportation and generated its share of controversies. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Gravitational waves leave a detectable mark, physicists say

Gravitational waves, first detected in 2016, offer a new window on the universe, with the potential to tell us about everything from the time following the Big Bang to more recent events in galaxy centers. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Assessing battery performance: Compared to what?

Scientists must often ask themselves, compared to what? How do the results we generate in the laboratory compare with those obtained by others? How do our theoretical calculations compare with experimental data? | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

NASA-NOAA satellite catches formation of Tropical Cyclone Lili

NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite passed over the Southern Indian Ocean and captured a visible image of newly formed Tropical Cyclone Lili, located north of the coast of Australia's Northern Territory. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Studying DNA breaks to protect future space travelers

Earth's atmosphere shields life on the ground from cosmic radiation that can damage DNA. Astronauts in space have no such protection, and that puts them at risk. An investigation on the International Space Station examines DNA damage and repair in space in order to help protect t … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Mathematical framework explores how the brain keeps a beat

A new mathematical model demonstrates how neurons in the brain could work together to learn and keep a musical beat. The framework, developed by Amitabha Bose of New Jersey Institute of Technology and Aine Byrne and John Rinzel of New York University, is described in PLOS Computa … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

50 US coal power plants shut under Trump

Fifty coal-fired power plants have shut in the United States since President Donald Trump came to office two years ago, an environmental organization said Thursday. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Apple's 'most ambitious' retail store set for US capital

Half store, half museum, Apple's new location in the US capital within a historic landmark is being described as the "most ambitious" project for its retail operations. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Uber to price IPO at $45, valuing company at $82 bn: source

Uber was preparing a share offering that values the global ridesharing giant at up to $82 billion, a source familiar with the deal said Thursday. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

How sea level rise affects birds in coastal forests

When saltwater inundates coastal forests as sea levels rise, it kills salt-sensitive trees, leaving "ghost forests" of bare snags behind. A new study from North Carolina State University explores how changes in vegetation affect coastal bird species. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Egg yolk precursor protein regulates mosquitoes' attraction to humans

Feeding mosquitoes sugar makes them less attracted to humans, a response that is regulated by the protein vitellogenin, according to a study publishing May 9 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Jessica Dittmer, Paolo Gabrieli and colleagues at the Università degli Studi di … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Plants and the art of microbial maintenance

It's been known for centuries that plants produce a diverse array of medically-valuable chemicals in their roots. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Exploiting parasitic yeast to kill yeast pathogens

Insights into the genes and proteins involved in the predatory behavior of a parasitic yeast species could lead to new strategies for controlling yeast pathogens, according to a study published May 9 in the open-access journal PLOS Pathogens by Jürgen Wendland of the Carlsberg Re … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Color vision found in fish that live in near darkness

An international team of researchers discovered a previously unknown visual system that may allow color vision in deep, dark waters where animals were presumed to be colorblind. The research appears on the cover of the May 10, 2019, issue of the journal Science. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Methane-consuming bacteria could be the future of fuel

Known for their ability to remove methane from the environment and convert it into a usable fuel, methanotrophic bacteria have long fascinated researchers. But how, exactly, these bacteria naturally perform such a complex reaction has been a mystery. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Gravitational forces in protoplanetary disks may push super-Earths close to their stars

The galaxy is littered with planetary systems vastly different from ours. In the solar system, the planet closest to the Sun—Mercury, with an orbit of 88 days—is also the smallest. But NASA's Kepler spacecraft has discovered thousands of systems full of very large planets—called … | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

An electric tongue can handle more spicy foods than you can

Thousands of new spicy products hit supermarket shelves every year. Some people crave the heat, some fear the burn. But if you enjoy it, spicy food wears out taste buds quickly. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Do most Americans believe in human-caused climate change?

What percentage of Americans believe in human-caused climate change? | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

DNA nanostructures designed for drug delivery remain a technical challenge

Many studies indicating that DNA nanostructures can enter cells more readily than simple DNA strands are flawed, according to researchers at McGill University. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Video: What's the chemistry behind the home pregnancy test?

There are many ways to find out if you're pregnant. One is to wait and see. For those of us who are a little less patient, there's the take-home chemistry kit known as a pregnancy test. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Free video streaming offers some gems—if you can find them

Free video services let you watch thousands of movies and TV shows online, but many of the offerings consist of reality TV, long-forgotten "classics" and movies that never made it to theaters. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago

Co-Founder Chris Hughes: Time to break up Facebook

Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes says it's time to break up the social media behemoth. | Continue reading


@phys.org | 5 years ago