Tech
If you dive in the Mediterranean Sea, the cluster anemone is among the most fascinating and magnificent corals you could see. You can find it on rocks or sponges, in scarcely lit areas such as sea caves and gorges, where it clusters in dense agglomerations resembling yellow and orange carpets. In a study published in Scientific Reports, a research group of the University of Bologna found evidence that some corals commonly labelled as "cluster anemones" may belong to different species.
As part of the Journal of Plasma Physics' continuing focus on the scientific progress in fusion physics, the journal editors and Cambridge University Press are proud to present an important Special Issue of JPP, the Status of the SPARC Physics Basis.
This special issue's seven peer-reviewed articles provide a comprehensive summary of the physics basis for SPARC: a compact, high-field, DT burning tokamak, currently under design by a team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Commonwealth Fusion Systems.
The planting of woodlands in upland areas could play a significant role in preventing the flash flooding which has increasingly affected communities across the world in recent years.
A new study by the University of Plymouth (UK) has shown that within just 15 years of being planted, native broadleaf trees can have a marked impact on soil's response during extreme weather events.
It means the huge quantities of rainwater generated can be more readily absorbed, rather than it simply running over the surface and into rivers where it subsequently causes severe flooding.
Researchers at the University of Bath in the UK and biopharma company UCB have found a way to produce miniaturised antibodies, opening the way for a potential new class of treatments for diseases.
Until now, the smallest manmade antibodies (known as monoclonal antibodies, or mAbs) were derived from llamas, alpacas and sharks, but the breakthrough molecules isolated from the immune cells of cows are up to five times smaller. This is thanks to an unusual feature of a bovine antibody known as a knob domain.
A machine learning technique rapidly rediscovered rules governing catalysts that took humans years of difficult calculations to reveal--and even explained a deviation. The University of Michigan team that developed the technique believes other researchers will be able to use it to make faster progress in designing materials for a variety of purposes.
Researchers from Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University (SPbPU) in collaboration with colleagues from the Alferov University, Institute of Problems of Mechanical Engineering RAS and University of Technology of Troyes have registered the formation of silver nanoparticles in an ion-exchanged glass as a result of infrared laser irradiation.
A team of scientists from Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU) together with their colleagues from Austria, Turkey, Slovakia, Russia (MISIS, MSU), and the UK found a way to hydrogenate thin metallic glass layers at room temperature. This technology can considerably expand the range of cheap, energy-efficient, and high-performance materials and methods that can be used in the field of hydrogen energy. An article about the study was published in the Journal of Power Sources.
Complex brain circuits in rodents can organise themselves with genetics playing only a secondary role, according to a new computer modelling study published today in eLife.
The researchers from the TalTech molecular neurobiology laboratory headed by professor Tõnis Timmusk used the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster to develop a novel disease model for Pitt-Hopkins syndrome (PTHS). Their study was reported in the July issue of Disease Models and Mechanisms.
Scientists typically prefer to work with ordered systems. However, a diverse team of physicists and biophysicists from the University of Groningen found that individual light-harvesting nanotubes with disordered molecular structures still transport light energy in the same way. By combining spectroscopy, molecular dynamics simulations and theoretical physics, they discovered how disorder at the molecular level is effectively averaged out at the microscopic scale. The results were published on 28 September in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
Next-generation batteries using lithium-rich materials could be more sustainable and cost-effective, according to a team of researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory.
Usually, talk of carbon sequestration focuses on plants: forests storing carbon in the trunks of massive trees, algae blooming and sinking to the seabed, or perhaps peatlands locking carbon away for tens of thousands of years.
While it's true that plants take up large amounts of carbon from the atmosphere, the rocks themselves mediate a great deal of the carbon cycle over geological timescales. Processes like volcano eruptions, mountain building and erosion are responsible for moving carbon through Earth's atmosphere, surface and mantle.
Air pollution is currently the largest environmental risk factor for human health globally and can be linked to several million cases of premature deaths every year. A new study however shows that it is possible to achieve clean air worldwide with fundamental transformations of today's practices in many sectors, supported by strong political will.
ITHACA, N.Y. - Scientists, policymakers and the media should acknowledge inherent uncertainties in epidemiological models projecting the spread of COVID-19 and avoid "catastrophizing" worst-case scenarios, according to new research from Cornell University.
Threats about dire outcomes may mobilize more people to take public health precautions in the short term but invite criticism and backlash if uncertainties in the models' data and assumptions are not transparent and later prove flawed, researchers found.
University of Southampton scientists investigating ways of removing carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases from our atmosphere believe volcanic ash could play an important role.
A team from the University's School of Ocean and Earth Science has modelled the impact of spreading volcanic ash from a ship to an area of ocean floor to help amplify natural processes which lock away CO2 in the seabed. They found the technique has the potential to be cheaper, technologically simpler and less invasive than other techniques to remove harmful gases.