Universal device will allow transdisciplinary collaboration globally. Spurred by the current climate crisis, there has been a heightened attention within the scientific community in recent years to how past climate variation contributed to historic human migration and other behaviors. Now, an international group of scientists — including archaeologists, historians, climate scientists, paleo-scientists, a volcanologist and others — are calling for a strengthened commitment to transdisciplinary collaboration to study past and present human-environmental interactions, which they say will advance our understanding…
Humboldt fellow Shailja Jain is investigating catalysts for green chemistry. She uses quantum technologies for observing molecules: Computational chemist Shailja Jain is visiting the Institute for Theoretical Chemistry at the University of Stuttgart for two years as a Humboldt postdoctoral fellow. In the team of Professor Johannes Kästner, she wants to advance the development of a new generation of catalysts for sustainable chemical processes. “I want to shed light on the structures, bonding, and reaction dynamics of metal-free small molecule…
Successful trial installation in Erlangen… The fully automated measurement of the biophysical properties of hundreds of cell samples in just a few days is the goal of the cooperative project “AutoRAPID,” involving scientists from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light (MPL) in Erlangen and the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Technology and Automation IPA in Mannheim. For the first time, the biophysicists and automation engineers have assembled their individual components in a setup in Erlangen. Researchers from the…
Dark excitons emerge exclusively at the top layer of bi-layered transition metal dichalcogenide heterostructures when the stacking order of the layers is changed. Transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) semiconductors are special materials that have long fascinated researchers with their unique properties. For one, they are flat, one-atom-thick two-dimensional (2D) materials similar to that of graphene. They are compounds that contain different combinations of the transition metal group (e.g., molybdenum, tungsten) and chalcogen elements (e.g., sulfur, selenium, tellurium). What’s even more fascinating…
Bayreuth animal ecologists study the effects on bumblebees for the first time. The decline of insects threatens many ecosystems worldwide. While the effects of pesticides are well researched, there has been a lack of knowledge about the effects of other anthropogenic pollutants. Animal ecologists at the University of Bayreuth have now studied the effects of diesel exhaust particles on bumblebees for the first time. In two new studies, they show that these fine dust particles can significantly damage the organism…
In a new interdisciplinary project between BTU Cottbus and TU Dresden, researchers are investigating the use of novel enzymes to remove micropollutants from municipal wastewater. Medicines are good for our bodies. However, depending on the type of drug, up to 90 percent of the active ingredient is excreted unchanged and thus ends up in wastewater. Improper disposal of pharmaceutical products in toilets and washbasins also leads to residues that can only be partially intercepted in wastewater treatment plants. The remaining…
An interdisciplinary research team from Bochum, Duisburg and Zurich has developed a new approach to construct modular optical sensors which are capable of detecting viruses and bacteria. For this purpose, the researchers used fluorescent carbon nanotubes with a novel type of DNA anchors that act as molecular handles. The anchor structures can be used to conjugate biological recognition units such as antibodies aptamers to the nanotubes. The recognition unit can subsequently interact with bacterial or viral molecules to the nanotubes….
Large collaboration at ISTA yields an unprecedented “live” view into the brain’s complexity. In a new paper published today in the journal Nature Methods, an interdisciplinary team of scientists at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) has come together to present a new way to observe the brain’s structure and dynamics – in a high resolution and without damaging the tissue. Brain tissue is one of the most intricate specimens that scientists have arguably ever dealt with. Packed…
A clinical trial under MHH leadership is testing a new therapy with immune cells against the JC virus. The aim is to cure the fatal disease PML. Human polyomavirus 2 – formerly called John Cunningham (JC) virus – infects about 70 to 90 percent of all people worldwide without most even noticing it. But once it enters the body, the genetic material of the pathogen remains dormant there. If the immune system is weakened or shut down by a serious…
An interdisciplinary team of clinicians and scientists has published a consensus paper recommending appropriate quantitative imaging techniques for coronary artery stenosis and atherosclerosis related treatment and procedural planning. Quantitative imaging has become increasingly important for the diagnosis of coronary artery disease (CAD) over the past five years. This is because new quantitative techniques can detect narrowed coronary arteries (coronary artery stenoses) and atherosclerosis, which play a major role in CHD patients. It is important to correctly diagnose and accurately assess…
An interdisciplinary team of researchers at the Otto-von-Guericke University in Magdeburg has gained new insights into how inflammatory mediators of pathogen defense can remotely drive cancer cells into death – an important contribution to improving cancer immunotherapies. Modern immunotherapies boost the body’s own defenses against cancer. They activate killer T cells of the immune system that can specifically recognize and destroy cancer cells. In many patients, however, cancer cells adapt and become invisible to killer T cells so that the…
Reactivating Damaged Motor Neurons Using Magnetic Fields. Motor neurons in healthy individuals send signals to the skeletal muscles. ALS, however, is currently an incurable, neurodegenerative disease in which motor neurons are severely damaged and can therefore no longer transmit these signals. An interdisciplinary team at HZDR has proven in cell experiments that magnetic fields can restore impaired motor neurons. This could serve as the groundwork for an entirely new therapeutic approach in curing neurodegenerative diseases, as currently reported in Cells,…
So far, it has not been possible to explain the causes of around half of all rare hereditary diseases. A Munich research team has developed an algorithm that predicts the effects of genetic mutations on RNA formation six times more precisely than previous models. As a result, the genetic causes of rare hereditary diseases and cancer can be identified more precisely. Variations of genetic sequence occur relatively frequently – on average, one in a thousand nucleotide of a person’s genome…
Stephanie Lacour’s specialty is the development of flexible electrodes that adapt to a moving body, providing more reliable connections with the nervous system. Her work is inherently interdisciplinary. So when a neurosurgeon asked Lacour and her team to come up with minimally invasive electrodes for inserting through a human skull, they came up with an elegant solution that takes full advantage of their expertise in compliant electrodes, and inspired by soft robotics actuation. The results are published in Science Robotics….
Interdisciplinary research team unlocks the mechanism for inhibiting inflammation of the joints. Immunoglobulin G antibodies (IgB) play an important role as drivers of inflammation in infectious diseases and autoimmune diseases. However, if the same immunoglobulin antibodies from the blood plasma of healthy donors are cleansed and injected into a patient’s bloodstream, they exhibit anti-inflammatory effects and have a positive effect on the immune system. The cause of this was unknown to a large extent up to now. An interdisciplinary team…
Increasing heat and drought are changing forests faster than expected. Researchers at the University of Würzburg want to keep a better eye on these dynamics. The Bavarian Research Institute for Digital Transformation (bidt) of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities is funding their project with 1.2 million euros. “Alarming data: Five percent of the forest area is gone.” This news made its way through the German media landscape in February 2022. The basis of the news was a satellite-based…
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