Artemis II, NASA's first crewed mission to the moon in more than 50 years, represents a shift from short visits toward sustained exploration, where understanding lunar geology and resources becomes as important as the engineering that gets astronauts there. Artemis II is currently scheduled to launch Wednesday, April 1, at 6:24 p.m. EDT, with backup launch opportunities through early April if needed. [...]
Hidden features uncovered in X-ray signals are set to overturn a key scientific theory and fundamentally change how X-rays are interpreted across fields of physics, chemistry, biology and materials science, new research reveals. Researchers say the discovery can help scientists measure X-rays more precisely and reliably, and improve our understanding of common materials, from battery materials to biological proteins. [...]
In most bumblebee species, the queens spend their winters buried underground in a tiny cavity the size of a grape. For six to nine months, they enter a deep sleep-like state called diapause, waiting for spring. [...]
The way a key cellular motor works at an atomic level has been uncovered by simulations conducted by RIKEN biophysicists. This finding, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, provides important insights into how mechanical force is generated in cells. [...]
Emissions of two major pollutants have steadily decreased on Salt Lake City roads over the past two decades, while levels of carbon dioxide emissions, a related gas blamed for climate change, remained steady, according to a new study by University of Utah atmospheric scientists conducted in partnership with the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The research is published in the journal Atmospheric Environment. [...]
Superconductivity—the ability of a material to conduct electricity without any energy loss to heat—enables highly efficient, ultra-fast electronics essential for advanced technologies such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines, particle accelerators and, potentially, quantum computers. New research has now revealed that iron telluride (FeTe), a compound composed of the chemical elements iron and tellurium and long thought to be an ordinary magnetic metal, is in fact a superconductor. The researchers found that hidden excess iron atoms induce the material's magnetism, and removing these atoms allows electricity to flow with zero resistance. [...]
In a new book, University of Mississippi sociologist Amy McDowell says small talk can be used as a tool to block meaningful conversation in the evangelical church, leaving some people feeling isolated in their beliefs that conflict with Christian nationalism. [...]
AI language models, used to generate human-like text to power chatbots and create content, are also revolutionizing biology by treating complex biological data like a language. Language models are increasingly used, for example, to find patterns in DNA and proteins, to make predictions and speed research into biological complexity. A critical gap, however, is the lack of a method to estimate the reliability of these predictions. [...]
In animal societies as in human ones, some individuals regularly produce resources while others appropriate them. Contrary to what evolutionary theories had previously suggested, these social roles do not depend solely on innate individual predispositions. A study in mice conducted by scientists from CNRS² and Sorbonne Université shows that the distribution and stabilization of these roles within groups arise from a collective dynamic shaped by random early interactions and by learning. [...]
Earth's "gold kitchen" lies deep beneath the seafloor. Island arcs, whose volcanoes form above subduction zones where one oceanic plate sinks beneath another, are often particularly rich in gold. The reasons for this have long been debated. [...]
The direction in which the electromagnetic field of circularly polarized light rotates can be easily reversed by applying a voltage, RIKEN researchers have demonstrated. This could enable a new generation of optical devices based on circularly polarized light. The work is published in two papers in the journal Advanced Materials. [...]
As artificial intelligence and data-driven analytics rapidly transform online retail, a surprising dynamic is emerging: some e-commerce platforms deliberately allow third-party analytics tools to scrape or access marketplace data, even though doing so could weaken the platform's competitive advantage. [...]
Why do some species live for only weeks while others survive for centuries? Researchers at the Leibniz Institute on Aging—Fritz Lipmann Institute (FLI) in Jena have developed AEGIS, a freely available software tool that enables scientists to simulate evolution on a standard computer and investigate how lifespan and aging evolve under different ecological pressures and genetic constraints. [...]
More inclusive secondary schools see fewer students dropping out of education and becoming "not in education, employment or training" (NEET), according to new research from Leeds academics. Schools that are considered more inclusive because they use fewer suspensions, support lower-achieving pupils to make good progress, and have their own post-16 provision see fewer young people dropping out of education or training after Year 11, the data shows. The study is published in the journal Royal Society Open Science. [...]
Accents are usually thought of as a human trait, indicating where a person has grown up or the communities they belong—and new research shows the same dialects can also occur in Australia's largest carnivorous bat. [...]
Only 25% of newly-delineated priority areas identified for the protection of freshwater fishes in Colombia overlap with existing protected areas, according to a recent study published in Diversity and Distributions by the Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB). Strikingly, the required amount of area is similar to that of the existing protected areas. However, a more efficient spatial distribution would be important. This finding is in line with another study, published in Nature Communications, that found that protected areas in Europe are often insufficient to enhance the biodiversity and water quality of rivers because most protected areas were originally designated for terrestrial ecosystems. [...]
The Mediterranean Sea is undergoing rapid ecological transformations driven by climate change and human-mediated species introductions. Among the most striking processes is the increasing arrival and establishment of non-indigenous species entering through the Suez Canal, a phenomenon known as Lessepsian migration. [...]
Cholera-causing bacteria are locked in an evolutionary arms race with a viral nemesis, according to a new genomic study. Researchers have found that, in the Ganges Delta, cholera bacteria rapidly gain and lose special armor that protects against attacks from the virus, known as bacteriophage ICP1. The study, published today in Nature, highlights that maintaining these antiviral defenses leads to lower disease severity of cholera in humans and reduced ability to spread outside the country for this bacterial strain. [...]
Elon Musk's SpaceX has filed papers with US regulators that set the stage for what could be the largest-ever public stock offering, a source familiar with the matter told AFP on Wednesday. [...]
In 2024, NASA's Perseverance rover found surprising levels of Nickel in the Martian bedrock of an ancient river channel, called Neretva Vallis, which flowed into the Jezero crater. A new study, published in Nature Communications, has taken a closer look at the data collected from the region and researchers are seeing what could be remnants of ancient Martian life. [...]
In dryland ecosystems, increased environmental stress often triggers a change from a uniform vegetation cover to patchy vegetation patterns. Some theoretical studies suggest that this spatial self-organization of vegetation helps ecosystems delay and avoid desertification. Using a new theoretical framework, scientists from the Center for Advanced Systems Understanding (CASUS) at Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf demonstrate that this is not the case in general. They argue that such vegetation patterns can, by contrast, be a sign of reduced resilience. [...]
A new study from The University of New Mexico offers a nationwide look at how Americans discuss one of the most enduring forms of housing discrimination—redlining—using more than a decade of social media data. The study is published in the journal Computational Urban Science. [...]
A new synthetic molecule switches between emitting green and blue light after application of a solvent or mild heat. The color-changing phosphor can be leveraged for a two-layered information encoding platform, according to a study led by University of Michigan Engineering and published in Nature Communications. [...]
Researchers from the University of Maine, in partnership with the Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR), are analyzing more than 20 years of fishery survey data from the Gulf of Maine to examine how environmental change is reshaping marine ecosystems. The work aims to understand how changes impact the effectiveness of long-running DMR surveys that inform fishery management. It will also provide a model for evaluating and adapting survey methods to inform effective, science-based assessment and management of culturally and economically important marine resources like lobster, herring, and shrimp. [...]
HR and people managers should proceed with caution if they want to use AI to improve efficiency and human capital in the workplace, and should take steps to ensure creativity and critical thinking are preserved, new research from the University of Bath School of Management shows. [...]
Many insects have lived in close symbiosis with bacteria for millions of years, during which time the bacteria have provided them with vital nutrients, making the mutualistic relationship so close that neither partner can survive without the other. However, the mechanisms and reasons behind the occasional exchange of symbionts during evolution have remained unclear until now. [...]
Superb fairy-wrens are facing "imminent danger," and a well-studied population in Canberra could go extinct in the next 30 years if we don't urgently curb greenhouse gas emissions, according to an international team of scientists including researchers from The Australian National University (ANU), James Cook University (JCU) and Hainan University. Their comprehensive, decades-long study published in Nature Communications has tracked a population of fairy-wrens at the Australian National Botanic Gardens in Canberra since 1988. [...]
Experiments conducted in Brazil using laboratory rats have shown that graphene-based structures can act as a powerful ally in bone regeneration. These structures are made of sheets of the chemical element carbon that are just one atom thick. They can help heal fractures or bone loss. In the tests, the biocompatible matrix containing graphene facilitated nearly 90% repair of the damage sustained by the test subjects one month after the fracture was induced in the laboratory—a superior performance to that of other materials used in the research. [...]
Quantum computers of the future may be closer to reality thanks to new research from Caltech and Oratomic, a Caltech-linked start-up company. Theorists and experimentalists teamed up to develop a new approach for reducing the errors that riddle today's rudimentary quantum computers. Whereas these machines were previously thought to require millions of qubits to work properly (qubits being the quantum equivalent to 1's and 0's in classical computers), the new results indicate that a fully realized quantum computer could be built with as few as 10,000 to 20,000 qubits. The need for fewer qubits means that quantum computers could, in theory, be operational by the end of the decade. [...]
The history of science and technology is marked by major breakthroughs—the theory of evolution, the splitting of the atom, the development of antibiotics—and a research team including faculty at Binghamton University, State University of New York, has developed a method to help pinpoint discoveries that reshaped the course of science. [...]