Map of Cyprus showing the approximate position of fossil sites where dwarf elephants and hippos have been retrieved. Credit: Map created by CJA Bradshaw, Flinders University. Scientists have unraveled a mystery about the disappearance of dwarf hippos and elephants that once roamed the picturesque landscape on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus before paleolithic humans arrived. … Read more
Atlantic Yellow-nosed Albatross (Thalassarche chlororhynchos) feeding on the surface of the ocean on fishery bycatch. Credit: Carla du Toit Researchers have discovered that seabirds, including penguins and albatrosses, have highly-sensitive regions in their beaks that could be used to help them find food. This is the first time this ability has been identified in seabirds. … Read more
As urban centers in mountainous regions grow, more people end up living on steep slopes that can have higher risk of sneaky, slow-moving landslides, a new Earth’s Future study documents. Increased flooding in valley floors can also drive people to steeper, unsafe slopes. Credit: Jyoti Singh/unsplash As urban centers in mountainous regions grow, more people … Read more
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Feedback plays a crucial role in learning, helping individuals to understand and improve their performance, yet globally large and diverse student populations often mean that providing timely and personalized observations can be a challenge. Recent advances in generative artificial intelligence offer a solution to these challenges, but most existing studies primarily … Read more
Raju Lampande, postdoctoral researcher in Giebink’s lab, positions an OLED that leverages positive feedback to amplify the conversion of near infrared light into visible light in front of a microscope imaging system. Credit: Marcin Szczepanski, Michigan Engineering A new type of OLED (organic light emitting diode) could replace bulky night vision goggles with lightweight glasses, … Read more
YcaO-catalyzed enzymatic reactions and spy BGC. Credit: Nature Chemical Biology (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41589-024-01736-9 Thanks to a serendipitous discovery and a lot of painstaking work, scientists can now build biohybrid molecules that combine the homing powers of DNA with the broad functional repertoire of proteins—without having to synthesize them one by one, researchers report in a … Read more
Sketch of the pulsed ion source, not to scale. A UV laser pulse enters the UEBIS and is focused onto a LaB6 cathode to trigger ultrafast electron emission. Credit: Physical Review Research. (2024) https://journals.aps.org/prresearch/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.6.L032066 TU Wien (Vienna) has succeeded in generating laser-synchronized ion pulses with a duration of well under 500 picoseconds, which can be … Read more
Map of how much heavy oxygen there is in local groundwater. Credit: Bowen Lab More than 80,000 American service members remain missing from previous wars, most from World War II. When remains are found, decomposition often makes identification difficult—but not impossible. Even without a name, fingerprints or facial features, our history leaves indelible marks on … Read more
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain In the middle of the fast-flowing Chilkoot River, an Alaska state employee sits on a small perch over a narrow, fence-like structure and stares down into the rush of water. Eagles look on from the trees overhead as the river thunders around boulders nearby. The worker’s back is turned to a … Read more
Credit: Kindel Media from Pexels The deadly H5N1 avian influenza virus, which has killed millions of birds worldwide since 2021—and in rare cases can be transmitted to humans—may be spread through the food-stealing behavior of some seabirds. A study published in the journal Conservation Letters highlights food theft—also known as “kleptoparasitism,” where some seabird species … Read more
