Through their basic research, physicians at the Heart Center of the University Hospital Bonn have discovered how the communication between individual cells can be influenced with the help of a specific protein. These findings are an important approach to improving the treatment of diseases such as arteriosclerosis (calcified blood vessels), which causes heart attacks. The study was published online in advance in the “Journal of Extracellular Vesicles”, the printed version will be published shortly. The human body consists of an…
Special metal oxides could one day replace semiconductor materials that are commonly used today in processors. Now, for the first time, an international team of researchers from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU), the University of Kaiserslautern and the University of Fribourg in Switzerland was able to observe how electronic charge excitation changes electron spin in metal oxides in an ultrafast and inphase manner. The study was published in the journal “Nature Communications”. In modern semiconductor electronics, the first key step…
For the first time ever, scientists have witnessed the interaction of a new phase of matter known as “time crystals”. The discovery, published in Nature Materials, may lead to applications in quantum information processing because time crystals automatically remain intact – coherent – in varying conditions. Protecting coherence is the main difficulty hindering the development of powerful quantum computers. Dr Samuli Autti, lead author from Lancaster University, said: “Controlling the interaction of two time crystals is a major achievement. Before…
A team of international physicists led by Lia Krusin-Elbaum of the City College of New York, has created a new topological magnetic superlattice material, that at a high temperature can conduct electrical current without dissipation and lost energy. The finding, detailed in a paper published in Nature Physics, could be the basis of research leading to an entire new quantum materials class that can potentially provide a platform for error-free quantum computing. The material in the form of crystals is…
Scientists at Osaka University demonstrate a simple method for inserting high-energy cubane molecules into an existing single-crystal supramolecular framework, work that may lead to next-generation energy storage and engineered catalysts Researchers at Osaka University have discovered a new method to easily add lanthanide cubanes into a previously synthesized metallo-supramolecular framework. By simply soaking a crystal in a cubane-containing solution, the molecules become intercalated via a single-crystal-to-single-crystal transformation. This research may help chemists design cost-effective methods of storing energy or develop…
Tropical Depression 10E weakened to a remnant low-pressure area in the Eastern Pacific Ocean. NASA’s Terra satellite observed the water vapor content in the storm. At 5 p.m. EDT on Sunday, Aug. 16, NOAA’s National Hurricane Center noted that the depression had been devoid of organized deep convection for the previous 24 hours at at that time and lacked any convection. NHC therefore classified 10E as a post-tropical as a non-convective remnant low-pressure area. Water vapor analysis of tropical cyclones tells…
One-of-a-kind video shows how bacterium annihilates the body’s immune cells. The tuberculosis bacterium has been around as long as mankind has. To fight the bacterium, we need to know how it attacks the body’s immune system. Researchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) have taken the next step toward that goal by filming the process. It’s thought that every fourth person harbors tuberculosis bacteria in their body, although only five to ten percent of the infected population…
Applied to skin as a piece of sticking plaster, the device developed by Brazilian researchers can be used to monitor human metabolism and administer drugs A wearable sensor printed on microbial nanocellulose, a natural polymer, has been created in Brazil by researchers at the University of São Paulo (USP) in São Carlos in collaboration with colleagues at São Paulo State University (UNESP) in Araraquara, the University of Araraquara (UNIARA), the University of Campinas (UNICAMP), and the Brazilian National Nanotechnology Laboratory…
When children are born with hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS), they require a series of major surgical procedures to survive. But even with a repaired heart, as many as one in four children die from complications before age 25. Now, a study published by a new faculty member at Cincinnati Children’s reports a potential therapeutic target that might promote heart cell regeneration even before birth. Details were published online Aug. 17, 2020, in Cell Stem Cell. ATLAS PROVIDES DEEP LOOK…
Bacteria show a wide range of capabilities in withstanding antibiotic treatment or attack by our immune system, which are great challenges in infection research. Scientists at the Würzburg-based Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI), a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), have developed a novel approach to reading the activity of hundreds of genes in an individual bacterium by sequencing its RNA. This groundbreaking work was just published in the journal Nature Microbiology. Using bacterial single-cell…
Environmental policy decisions are often based on so-called tipping points. A research team led by the biodiversity expert Helmut Hillebrand from the University of Oldenburg now reports in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution that such tipping points are hardly detectable in environmental data. The team concludes this from an extensive data analysis. Many policies tackling the consequences of global environmental change rely on the concept of tipping points: If an impact, such as biodiversity loss, becomes too large, an…
There’ s a loud bang, and then it starts: A battery module of an electric car is on fire in the Hagerbach test tunnel. A video of the test impressively shows the energy stored in such batteries: Meter-long flames hiss through the room and produce enormous amounts of thick, black soot. The visibility in the previously brightly lit tunnel section quickly approaches zero. After a few minutes, the battery module is completely burnt out. Ash and soot have spread throughout…
Although true “cyborgs” — part human, part robotic beings — are science fiction, researchers are taking steps toward integrating electronics with the body. Such devices could monitor for tumor development or stand in for damaged tissues. But connecting electronics directly to human tissues in the body is a huge challenge. Now, a team is reporting new coatings for components that could help them more easily fit into this environment. The researchers will present their results today at the American Chemical…
Spun by spiders and silkworms, silk has mystified human engineers who have yet to figure out how to artificially recreate this tough, fine fiber. But by combining silk, which is safe for use in the human body, with synthetic compounds, one research team is getting closer to developing new implantable composite materials with the best properties of both. Potential applications, which are still years away, could include structures that hold bone in place after surgery or replacements for the cartilage…
Corals growing on the reefs of the Bahamas produce an active agent that kills multi-resistant tuberculosis bacteria. Scientists at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have managed to produce the antibiotic biotechnologically in the laboratory – fast, cost-efficient and sustainably. Thomas Brück saw the sea whip Antillogorgia elisabethae for the first time 17 years ago while diving on a research trip to the Bahamas. He still remembers this encounter vividly, which took place 18 meters below the water’s surface: “Their…
Does urbanisation drive bumblebee evolution? A new study by Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) and the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig provides an initial indication of this. According to the study, bumblebees are larger in cities and, therefore, more productive than their rural counterparts. In “Evolutionary Applications”, the research team reports that differences in body size maybe caused by the increasingly fragmented habitats in cities. Over the last 200 years, the habitat of bumblebees and other insects…
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