In recent years, urban waterlogging disasters have become more frequent due to rapid urbanization and climate change, severely threatening city infrastructure. Subway tunnels, with their semi-enclosed structure, face significant risks during floods, leading to difficult evacuations and substantial casualties. Statistics show that over 160 cities in China experience flood disasters annually, causing severe economic losses and fatalities. Due to these challenges, in-depth research on flood monitoring and early warning systems for subway tunnels is essential to enhance urban disaster prevention…
In order to make quantum computers usable, developing the control technology is crucial for scaled systems, yet it is still in its infancy. Project ARCTIC brings together 36 international partners from industry, academia and leading RTOs to establish a complete and comprehensive European supply chain and develop scalable, reliable, innovative control infrastructure for cryogenic quantum processors. The German Institutes Fraunhofer IPMS and Fraunhofer IAF contribute their extensive expertise in device characterization. The EU is funding the project with over €…
PME researchers were carrying out basic research on a magnetic topological insulator when they realized it had the potential to build optical storage devices. Researchers at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (PME) have made unexpected progress toward developing a new optical memory that can quickly and energy-efficiently store and access computational data. While studying a complex material composed of manganese, bismuth and tellurium (MnBi2Te4), the researchers realized that the material’s magnetic properties changed quickly and easily…
A low-cost approach regulates heat with common building materials that absorb or radiate heat. With temperatures rising globally, the need for more sustainable cooling options is also growing. Researchers at UCLA and their colleagues have now found an affordable and scalable process to cool buildings in the summer and heat them in the winter. Led by Aaswath Raman, an associate professor of materials science and engineering at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering, the research team recently published a study in Cell Reports…
ISTA researchers uncover how ‘mortal filaments’ self-assemble and maintain order. A previously unknown mechanism of active matter self-organization essential for bacterial cell division follows the motto ‘dying to align’: Misaligned filaments ‘die’ spontaneously to form a ring structure at the center of the dividing cell. The study, led by the Šarić group at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), was published in Nature Physics. The work could find applications in developing synthetic self-healing materials. How does matter, lifeless…
Sylt-based researchers release comprehensive study on the effects of climate change since the founding of the Wadden Sea Station 100 years ago. Climate change can produce a range of effects on flat sedimentary coasts. Researchers from the Wadden Sea Station on Sylt have just released a multidisciplinary overview of the far-reaching climate-based changes in the Wadden Sea, a listed World Heritage Site. The review paper in celebration of the station’s centennial was published in the journal Marine Biodiversity. It covers…
Heidelberg researchers successfully develop a new generation of biocompatible materials for additive manufacturing. Microalgae such as the diatom Odontella aurita and the green alga Tetraselmis striata are especially suitable as “biofactories” for the production of sustainable materials for 3D laser printing due to their high content in lipids and photoactive pigments. An international research team led by Prof. Dr Eva Blasco, a scientist at the Institute for Molecular Systems Engineering and Advanced Materials (IMSEAM) of Heidelberg University, has succeeded for…
– glial cells also produce harmful proteins. Memory loss, confusion, speech problems – Alzheimer’s disease is the most common cause of dementia, affecting about 35 million people worldwide, and the number is growing. The protein amyloid beta, which occurs naturally in the brain, plays a central role in the disease: It accumulates in patients in insoluble clumps that form plaques between neurons in the brain, damaging them. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute (MPI) for Multidisciplinary Sciences have now shown…
LMO4 Enhances T Cell Cancer-Fighting Abilities. Researchers at the Leibniz Institute for Immunotherapy (LIT), University Hospital Regensburg (UKR) and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) have engineered CD8+ T cells to artificially express the gene LMO4, thereby enhancing their effectiveness against tumors. T cell therapies, which use genetically engineered T cells of the human immune system as therapeutics, are revolutionizing medical oncology by effectively treating previously incurable blood cancers. However, their success against solid tumors has been limited….
Researchers from the RIKEN Center for Computational Science (Japan) and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology (Germany) have published new findings on how social norms evolve over time. They simulated how norms promote different social behavior, and how the norms themselves come and go. Because of the enormous number of possible norms, these simulations were run on RIKEN’s Fugaku, one of the fastest supercomputers worldwide. Models of indirect reciprocity describe how social norms promote cooperation. This literature stipulates that…
Light is an excellent carrier of information used not only for classical communication technologies but also increasingly for quantum applications such as quantum networking and computing. However, processing light signals is far more complex, compared to working with common electronic signals. An international team of researchers including Dr. Olga Kocharovskaya, a distinguished professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Texas A&M University, has demonstrated a novel way of storing and releasing X-ray pulses at the single photon level — a concept…
… could lead to more effective and efficient water purification systems. Novel approach significantly enhances the speed and efficiency of membrane production, offering promising solutions for water purification challenges. A team of NYU Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) researchers has developed a novel approach that utilizes microwave technology to more easily synthesize and fine-tune a new type of membrane which effectively purifies water from a wide range of contaminants. The membrane synthesis technique takes a few minutes, making it one of the…
Seismologists measure tremors up to 5000 km away. It was a monster wave that hit a fjord on Greenland’s east coast on 16 September 2023: In certain places, the traces of the flooding reached 200 metres high. Researchers led by Angela Carrillo Ponce from the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ) have now evaluated the seismic signals from earthquake measuring stations worldwide and discovered another unusual event: Triggered by the megatsunami, a standing wave sloshed back and forth in the…
… could reveal secrets of planet’s history. International team begin to unravel mantle’s role in life on Earth, volcanism and global cycles. Scientists have recovered the first long section of rocks that originated in the Earth’s mantle, the layer below the crust and the planet’s largest component. The rocks will help unravel the mantle’s role in the origins of life on Earth, the volcanic activity generated when it melts, and how it drives the global cycles of important elements such…
Solid-state electrolytes have been explored for decades for use in energy storage systems and in the pursuit of solid-state batteries. These materials are safer alternatives to the traditional liquid electrolyte—a solution that allows ions to move within the cell—used in batteries today. However, new concepts are needed to push the performance of current solid polymer electrolytes to be viable for next generation materials. Materials science and engineering researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have explored the role of helical…
Offering patients with concussion a type of brain scan known as diffusion tensor imaging MRI could help identify the one in three people who will experience persistent symptoms that can be life changing, say Cambridge researchers. Around one in 200 people in Europe every year will suffer concussion. In the UK, more than 1 million people attend Emergency Departments annually with a recent head injury. It is the most common form of brain injury worldwide. When a patient in the…
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