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The carbon-hydrogen bonds in alkanes--particularly those at the ends of the molecules, where each carbon has three hydrogen atoms bound to it--are very hard to "crack" if you want to replace the hydrogen atoms with other atoms. Methane (CH(4)) and ethane (CH(3)CH(3)) are made up, exclusively, of such tightly bound hydrogen atoms. In the journal Angewandte Chemie, a team of researchers has now described how they break these bonds while forming new carbon-nitrogen bonds (amidation).

The impact of high breathing efforts on the lungs of patients suffering with acute respiratory failure due to COVID-19 has been investigated by researchers at the University of Warwick, who assessed the likelihood of resulting lung injury.

Researchers at the RIKEN, Japan have discovered that acetate, a major metabolite produced by some intestinal bacteria, is involved in regulating other intestinal bacteria. Experiments specifically showed that acetate could trigger an immune response against potentially harmful bacteria. These discoveries will lead to the development of new ways to regulate the balance of intestinal bacteria.

A team of researchers, led by Yale-NUS College Associate Professor of Science (Computer Science) Robby Tan, who is also from the National University of Singapore's Faculty of Engineering, has developed novel approaches using computer vision and deep learning to resolve the problem of low-level vision in videos caused by rain and night-time conditions, as well as improve the accuracy of 3D human pose estimation in videos.

Researchers at IRB Barcelona unveil a pathway that determines the fate of cells in response to stress conditions and identify an important mechanism that recovers cell balance. The results have been published in the journal PNAS.

The final stage of cataclysmic explosions of dying massive stars, called supernovae, could pack an up to six times bigger punch on the surrounding interstellar gas with the help of cosmic rays, according to a new study led by researchers at the University of Oxford. The work will be presented by PhD student Francisco Rodríguez Montero today (19 July) at the virtual National Astronomy Meeting (NAM 2021).

This summer, if you see a butterfly with wings that are blue on top with orange spots underneath, you may have crossed paths with a male European Common Blue (or Polyommatus icarus), a newly introduced species in Canada. Could it be a fluke? Probably not, according to a group of researchers from the University of Ottawa who have taken a close look at this captivating blue creature. They are in fact the first to study its ecology.

Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) power all of modern-day electronic devices. However, with the shift from gasoline-powered vehicles to electric counterparts, there is a demand for higher battery capacity. In their quest for higher battery capacity, scientists from Japan devised a low-cost computational technique for extensively screening for atomic substitutions in LIBs to improve their discharge capacity, opening doors to the development of novel alloying materials to boost battery life and new energy storage systems.

The economic and environmental pros and cons of melting Arctic ice creating shorter shipping routes through the polar region are weighed up in ground-breaking research from UCL experts in energy and transport.They conclude that policy makers must properly assess the environmental trade-offs and costs in addition to the commercial benefits and opportunities in Arctic shipping. The authors also want to see more incentives to drive technological developments that will accelerate the uptake of green fuels and technologies.

Creating new procedures that improve mass drone traffic is the purpose of LABYRINTH, a European research project coordinated by the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) with the participation of 13 international organisations within the R&D&I, transport, emergency, and auxiliary services fields. Researchers hope to use these drone swarm applications to improve civil road, train, sea, and air transport, making it safer, more efficient, and more sustainable.

Interactions of two voltage-gated calcium channels and a pump enable separate control of exocytosis and endocytosis at chemical synapses

Proteins are essential for body growth and muscle building. However, protein metabolism varies depending on the body's internal biological clock. Therefore, it is important to know how distribution of protein intake over the day affects muscles. Researchers from Japan have now found that consumption of proteins at breakfast increases muscle size and function in mice and humans, shedding light on the concept of 'Chrononutrition' that deals with the timing of diets to ensure organ health.

Research led by the University of Southampton into the uptake of the COVID-19 vaccine in Ghana, West Africa has concluded that vaccine hesitancy has seen a small, but significant increase over the last three months. This research is in collaboration with youth-led not-for-profit organisation PACKS Africa.

An investigation from UK academics suggests that safeguards put in place in New Zealand to protect drug policy from Big Pharma's influence offer important lessons for the UK when striking new trade deals.

A coronavirus related to the virus that causes Covid-19 in humans has been found in UK horseshoe bats. However, there is no evidence that this novel virus has been transmitted to humans, or that it could in future, unless it mutates.

Germany is not meeting its legal obligations to protect refugee women and girls from discrimination, according to a "shadow report" by Göttingen University, the association Pro Asyl and several refugee councils. Based on current research and a survey of 65 women's counselling centres, psychosocial counselling centres and institutions working with refugees, the study finds that Germany does not adequately protect refugee women and girls and does not meet the requirements of the Istanbul Convention.

Researchers from TMDU and Osaka University have found that a protein called FCHSD1 is involved in the development of emphysema, which is destruction of the tiny air sacs in the lungs, and is a component of chronic pulmonary respiratory disease that causes illness and death worldwide. Mice deficient in FCHSD1 showed less lung damage, inflammation, and cell death. The team were able to uncover the mechanism by which FCHSD1 acts to promote emphysema, which could lead to the development of new treatments.

African swine fever (ASF), first detected in Germany in domestic pigs on 15 July 2021, does not pose a health hazard to humans. "The ASF pathogen cannot be transferred to humans", explains Professor Dr. Dr. Andreas Hensel, President of the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR). "No risk to health is posed by direct contact with diseased animals or from eating food made from infected domestic pigs or wild boar."

Researchers realized the high-contrast readout and coherent manipulation of a single silicon carbide divacancy color center electron spin at room temperature for the first time in the world, laying the foundation for building room-temperature solid-state quantum storage and scalable solid-state quantum networks.

Researchers from the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI and the Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), working in an international team, have developed a new method for complex X-ray studies that will aid in better understanding so-called correlated metals. These materials could prove useful for practical applications in areas such as superconductivity, data processing, and quantum computers. Today the researchers present their work in the journal Physical Review X.