Causal reasoning is ubiquitous – from physics to medicine, economics and social sciences, as well as in everyday life. Whenever we press the button, the bell rings, and we think that the pressing of the button causes the bell to ring. Normally, causal influence is assumed to only go one way – from cause to effect – and never back from the effect to the cause: the ringing of the bell does not cause the pressing of the button that…
A multi-institutional team became the first to generate accurate results from materials science simulations on a quantum computer that can be verified with neutron scattering experiments and other practical techniques. Researchers from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory; the University of Tennessee, Knoxville; Purdue University and D-Wave Systems harnessed the power of quantum annealing, a form of quantum computing, by embedding an existing model into a quantum computer. Characterizing materials has long been a hallmark of classical supercomputers,…
Graphene Flagship researchers report a new method to integrate graphene and 2D materials into semiconductor manufacturing lines, a milestone for the recently launched 2D-EPL project. Two-dimensional (2D) materials have a huge potential for providing devices with much smaller size and extended functionalities with respect to what can be achieved with today’s silicon technologies. But to exploit this potential we must be able to integrate 2D materials into semiconductor manufacturing lines – a notoriously difficult step. A team of Graphene Flagship…
Researchers from the University of Basel have developed a virtual reality app for smartphones to reduce fear of heights. Now, they have conducted a clinical trial to study its efficacy. Trial participants who spent a total of four hours training with the app at home showed an improvement in their ability to handle real height situations. Fear of heights is a widespread phenomenon. Approximately 5% of the general population experiences a debilitating level of discomfort in height situations. However, the…
A team at the University of Colorado Boulder has designed new kinds of liquid crystals that mirror the complex structures of some solid crystals–a major step forward in building flowing materials that can match the colorful diversity of forms seen in minerals and gems, from lazulite to topaz. The group’s findings, published today in the journal Nature, may one day lead to new types of smart windows and television or computer displays that can bend and control light like never…
Molecular blueprint for important receptor deciphered In order for a drug to be effective at the right places in the body, it helps if scientists can predict as accurately as possible how the molecules of that drug will interact with human cells. In a joint research project, scientists from Collaborative Research Centre 1423 at Leipzig University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shanghai have succeeded in elucidating such a structure, namely that of the neuropeptide Y receptor Y2 with…
MAX-phases are the new promising class of artificially created compounds that started to be extensively studied in the last two decades. They are a family of ternary layered compounds with the general formula Mn+1AXn (n = 1, 2, 3 …), where M is an early transition metal (Sc, Ti, V, Cr, et cetera; elements from the left side of the d-block of the periodic table from group III to group VII); A — an element from group IIIA or IVA…
Diurnal in vivo xylem sap glucose and sucrose monitoring using implantable organic electrochemical transistor sensors. Researchers at Linköping University, Sweden, have developed biosensors that make it possible to monitor sugar levels in real time deep in the plant tissues – something that has previously been impossible. The information from the sensors may help agriculture to adapt production as the world faces climate change. The results have been published in the scientific journal iScience. The primary source of nutrition for most…
The research team of NUST MISIS has presented an improved structure of perovskite solar cells. Scientists have modified perovskite-based solar cells using MXenes — thin two-dimensional titanium carbides with high electrical conductivity. The MXenes-based modified cells showed superior performance, with power conversion efficiency exceeding 19% (the reference demonstrated 17%) and improved stabilized power output with respect to reference devices. The results have been published in the Nano energy international scientific journal. Perovskite solar cells are promising alternative energy technology worldwide….
THz wave absorption signal with a unique two-step decay characteristic in the time domain was demonstrated, revealing fundamental aspects of the charge transport process in water. Photoionization of water involves the migration and solvation of electrons, with many transient and highly active intermediates. The process results in a large blue shift in the absorption spectrum, from the THz or gigahertz region to the visible range. While the behavior of low-density quasifree electrons excited by small pump power density has been…
Plasma processing modifies carbon black powder to catalyze valuable chemical. Rice University researchers have created a “defective” catalyst that simplifies the generation of hydrogen peroxide from oxygen. Rice scientists treated metal-free carbon black, the inexpensive, powdered product of petroleum production, with oxygen plasma. The process introduces defects and oxygen-containing groups into the structure of the carbon particles, exposing more surface area for interactions. When used as a catalyst, the defective particles known as CB-Plasma reduce oxygen to hydrogen peroxide with…
Filaments made of polymer-coated iron oxide nanoparticles are obtained by exposing the material to a magnetic field under controlled temperature; the applications are myriad and include transporting substances into cells or directing fluids. Researchers at the University of Campinas’s Chemistry Institute (IQ-UNICAMP) in the state of São Paulo, Brazil, have developed a template-free technique to fabricate cilia of different sizes that mimic biological functions and have multiple applications, from directing fluids in microchannels to loading material into a cell, for…
With climate change, uncertainties in food security, and pressure to preserve resources, agriculture is facing difficult tasks. To meet these challenges with cost-effective and intelligent electronic solutions, researchers at Fraunhofer IZM are working with partners to combine smart system integration with sensor technology, thus enabling the leap to Agriculture 4.0. In an earlier project they developed a laser that uses optical detection and AI evaluation to prevent infestation with harmful insects in warehouses and that is intended to replace the…
Researchers led by assistant professor Dr. Jörn Petersen of the Leibniz Institute DSMZ-German Collection of Microorganisms and Cell Cultures GmbH have for the first time investigated the relevance of antibiotic resistance in the group of marine Roseobacter bacteria. The scientists were able to demonstrate that a plasmid acquired by horizontal gene transfer confers a 50-fold increased tolerance to the broad-spectrum antibiotic chloramphenicol. The team published their findings in the renowned journal Environmental Microbiology (doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.15380). Roseobacter already part of the…
A new method has enabled the natural structure of particularly large and complex enzymes to be revealed. Scientists at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) and TU Berlin have published their findings in the journal “Cell Reports”. They investigated a multi-enzyme complex that plays an essential role in metabolism and have discovered that it functions differently than previously thought. This will help scientists better understand certain diseases. Enzymes are a cell’s biocatalysts. They accelerate chemical reactions in the body or ensure…
New snowboard from Chemnitz is lighter than comparable boards and can be manufactured far more ecologically – the Department of Textile Technologies uses the dry fiber placement process. The snowboard – every winter sports enthusiast knows it. The first boards for gliding over snow existed as early as 1900, but it was not until 1963 that American surfers brought the feeling of surfing to the snow and developed the original snowboard – the so-called snurfer. A few years later, the…
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