An international team of researchers, led by postgraduate student Alexis Andrés, has found that the black hole at the centre of our galaxy, Sagittarius A*, not only flares irregularly from day to day but also in the long term. The team analysed 15 years’ worth of data to come to this conclusion. The research was initiated by Andres in 2019 when he was a summer student at the University of Amsterdam. In the years that followed, he continued his research, which…
Hereditary diseases as well as cancers and cardiovascular diseases may be associated with a phenomenon known as genomic imprinting, in which only the maternally or paternally inherited gene is active. An international research team involving scientists at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics (MPIMG) in Berlin and Harvard University in Cambridge (USA) has now investigated the mechanisms responsible for the deactivation of the genes. Our cells contain the entire genetic information from our…
USC Viterbi researchers create first nano-sized, molecular device potentially capable of sensing and altering the cell’s electric field, ushering in new possibilities for basic research. Bioelectricity, the current that flows between our cells, is fundamental to our ability to think and talk and walk. In addition, there is a growing body of evidence that recording and altering the bioelectric fields of cells and tissue plays a vital role in wound healing and even potentially fighting diseases like cancer and heart disease. Now, for the first…
Those who are interested in climate change and wish to understand how algae in the oceans bonds with carbohydrates need to take a look at sugar. Dr. Jan-Hendrik Hehemann is sure of that. The glycobiologist and his research group within the U Bremen Research Alliance have been investigating complex sugars – so-called polysaccharides – and have made groundbreaking findings. Jan-Hendrik Hehemann is a rather shy person who chooses his words carefully. Yet when he talks about his research group’s findings,…
Theory shows how manipulating quasiparticles could improve chemical processes. Dig this: Catalysis appears to function because of holes. They’re not the physical kind. These quasiparticles, also known as electron holes, can be viewed as effective positive particles in the absence of negative electrons. And according to Rice University researchers, their action and propagation on heterogeneous catalyst particles allows the chemical reactions to happen. The Rice lab of chemist Anatoly Kolomeisky and his colleague Professor Srabanti Chaudhury at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER)…
Tobacco hawkmoths (Manduca sexta) show an unusual preference for Datura plants that are already infested with leaf beetles when laying their eggs. The beetles and their larvae actually compete with tobacco hornworms, the larvae of Manduca, for food. Plants infested by beetles change their odor profile and increase the production of the substance alpha-copaene, making them, however, more attractive to tobacco hawkmoths. Despite food competition, tobacco hornworms seem to benefit from their mothers’ choice of such host plants because in…
Polarstern expedition explores the Earth’s history of Antarctica; the expedition launches the new Polarstern app. On 6 January, the research vessel Polarstern set off from Cape Town in South Africa for an expedition of around eight weeks to the Antarctic. Extensive preventive measures allow the Alfred Wegener Institute to tackle the important research on former instabilities of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet despite the Corona pandemic, which will be continued on two further planned expeditions in the coming years. Interested…
Chemistry professor Martin Oschatz of the University of Jena (Germany) has been awarded a coveted Starting Grant by the European Research Council to support his pioneering work, the ERC announced today. This grant, which provides up to 1.5 million euros over five years, is given annually to young researchers to help them pursue an innovative project idea. As part of the “CILCat” project, Prof. Oschatz wishes to use the funding to revolutionise the process of catalysis, which originated in Jena….
Researchers make new discoveries about “megaripple” grain composition. An interdisciplinary team including researchers from Leipzig University has analysed an extensive collection of sand samples from so-called megaripple fields around the world and gained new insights into the composition of these sand waves. These could help settle debates about the mechanistic origin of some recently discovered enigmatic extraterrestrial sand structures and improve our ability to infer information about past weather and climate events from sediment records. The results of their investigations…
For the first time, the Amazon basin could be identified as dominant source region for water precipitating in the Atacama Desert in northern Chile. From the rainforest, elevated water vapour travels more than 2000 km westwards, crosses the Andes, and turns southeast over the Pacific to form precipitation over the Atacama Desert. Dr Christoph Böhm from the University of Cologne’s Institute of Geophysics and Meteorology has identified moisture conveyor belts (MCBs) as the main mechanism for precipitation. They account for…
… with potential impact on conditions like PTSD. Fish that glow; a tailor-made microscope; a new way to catalog science. After six years, researchers produce the first snapshots of memory in a living animal. What physical changes occur in the brain when a memory is made? A team of researchers at the University of Southern California has, for the first time, answered this question by inducing a memory in a larval zebrafish and then mapping changes in their transparent heads…
… previously thought to be irreversible. A study published by researchers at the University of Illinois Chicago describes a new method for analyzing pyroptosis — the process of cell death that is usually caused by infections and results in excess inflammation in the body — and shows that process, long thought to be irreversible once initiated, can in fact be halted and controlled. The discovery, which is reported in Nature Communications, means that scientists have a new way to study…
Researchers at Université de Montréal have created a nanoantenna to monitor the motions of proteins. Reported this week in Nature Methods, the device is a new method to monitor the structural change of proteins over time – and may go a long way to helping scientists better understand natural and human-designed nanotechnologies. “The results are so exciting that we are currently working on setting up a start-up company to commercialize and make this nanoantenna available to most researchers and the…
Technology opens door to ubiquitous, more easily fabricated electronic screens. In a groundbreaking new study, researchers at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities used a customized printer to fully 3D print a flexible organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display. The discovery could result in low-cost OLED displays in the future that could be widely produced using 3D printers by anyone at home, instead of by technicians in expensive microfabrication facilities. The research is published in Science Advances, a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by…
Single equation proposed to predict strength of ecosystems, power grids, internet, and other systems. Whether a transformer catches fire in a power grid, a species disappears from an ecosystem, or water floods a city street, many systems can absorb a certain amount of disruption. But how badly does a single failure weaken the network? And how much damage can it take before it tips into collapse? Network scientist Jianxi Gao is building tools that can answer those questions, regardless of…
… dramatic, negative effects on sea anemone’s survival. Stationary marine organisms that don’t ply the ocean, but spend their lives rooted in one spot, have evolved impressive ways to capture prey. The sea anemone Nematostella, for instance, burrows into salt marsh sediments and stays there for life. But it has specialized ‘stinging cells’ that hurl toxins into passing prey, immobilizing the morsel so the anemone can snatch it with its tentacles. New research from the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL), however,…
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