Science News
Old Habit-Controlling Neurons May Also Help the Brain Learn New Tricks
Neuroscience News - 27 Aug 2021 00:51
The delicate balance between learning new behaviors and expressing old habits is controlled by two different populations of neurons in the dorsolateral striatum.
Scientists detected the radio 'colors' of an FRB for the first time
Live Science - 27 Aug 2021 14:52
Astronomers detected the radio 'colors' of a fast radio burst (FRB) for the first time, proving that the source was not a binary star system.
How domesticating the African baobab tree could secure its future
New Scientist - 27 Aug 2021 14:00
Farmers seldom plant the African baobab because it takes up to 23 years to fruit, but a team in Ghana has got the trees to flower in less than three years
6 mysterious structures hidden beneath the Greenland ice sheet
Live Science - 27 Aug 2021 13:00
The Greenland ice sheet, nearly 2 miles thick in places, hides a landscape of canyons, mountains, fjords and gem-like lakes.
Interstellar comets visit our solar system more frequently than thought
Live Science - 27 Aug 2021 13:00
Comets from other star systems, such as 2019 Borisov, visit the sun's neighborhood more frequently than scientists had thought, a new study suggests.
Restoring Chaperone Protein May Prevent Plaque Build-up in Alzheimer's
Neuroscience News - 27 Aug 2021 01:06
Restoring levels of the DAXX protein prevents misfolding of proteins that drive Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative diseases.
Inflammatory Proteins Help Better Diagnose Progression of Alzheimer's Disease
Neuroscience News - 27 Aug 2021 00:23
Testing for specific inflammatory proteins in cerebrospinal fluid can help doctors to diagnose the early onset of Alzheimer's disease and track the progression of the disease in patients.
Nanoscale systems for generating various forms of light
Phys.org - 27 Aug 2021 23:21
For decades, scholars have believed that the quantum statistical properties of bosons are preserved in plasmonic systems, and therefore will not create different form of light.
Researchers develop novel analog processor for high performance computing
Phys.org - 27 Aug 2021 23:13
Analog photonic solutions offer unique opportunities to address complex computational tasks with unprecedented performance in terms of energy dissipation and speeds, overcoming current limitations of modern computing arc...
Neurons in Visual Cortex of the Brain 'Drift' Over Time
Neuroscience News - 27 Aug 2021 22:21
Neurons in the visual cortex change their response to the same stimuli over time.
Maternal Voice Reduces Pain in Premature Babies
Neuroscience News - 27 Aug 2021 22:07
When a mother speaks to her newborn during a medical intervention, the baby's oxytocin levels increase and their expression of pain decreases.
Storm Ida could slam into Louisiana as a Category 3 hurricane
Live Science - 27 Aug 2021 19:27
The Governor of Louisiana has declared a state of emergency in advance of the storm.
A new type of infrared polaritons at the surface of bulk crystals
Phys.org - 27 Aug 2021 19:19
An international team has reported in Nature the first observation of ghost polaritons, which are a new form of surface waves carrying nanoscale light strongly coupled with material oscillations and featuring highly coll...
Simple safety measures reduce musical COVID-19 transmission
Science Daily - 27 Aug 2021 18:14
Researchers have found that while playing musical instruments can emit the same levels of potentially COVID-laden airborne particles as singing, simple safety measures, such as masking instruments, social distancing and ...
The physics behind a water bear's lumbering gait
Phys.org - 27 Aug 2021 18:09
Plump and ponderous, tardigrades earned the nickname "water bears" when scientists first observed the 0.02-inch-long animals' distinctive lumbering gaits in the 18th century. Their dumpy plod, however, raises the questio...
AI accurately identifies whether objects can be recycled from a glance
New Scientist - 27 Aug 2021 18:07
A neural network trained on a dataset of images can identify recyclable objects with more than 95 per cent accuracy using a standard webcam
Simulations of polymers? A quantum puzzle
Phys.org - 27 Aug 2021 17:57
Using computers to study polymers has always been a major challenge for scientific computation, especially for long and densely packed biomolecules, like DNA. New perspectives are now opening up through quantum computing...
The LIGO/Virgo Collaboration sets new constraints on cosmic strings
Phys.org - 27 Aug 2021 17:56
The LIGO/Virgo/KAGRA Collaboration, a large group of researchers at different institutes worldwide, has recently set the strongest constraints on cosmic strings to date, using the Advanced LIGO/Virgo full O3 dataset. Thi...
Novel physics gives rise to the highest coherence for microscopic lasers
Phys.org - 27 Aug 2021 17:53
Scientists from DTU have shown that a Fano laser, a new type of microscopic laser, has fundamental advantages compared to other types of lasers. The discovery can be important for many future applications, such as integr...
Earthquake swarm rocks the ground at Hawaii's Kilauea volcano
Live Science - 27 Aug 2021 17:36
A swarm of more than 140 earthquakes at Hawaii's Kilauea volcano caused the U.S. Geological Survey to raise the alert level for a potential eruption, but it seems to have been a false alarm.
Climate change linked to risk of viruses jumping species in the Arctic
New Scientist - 27 Aug 2021 17:00
Climate change may increase the risk of viruses infecting new hosts in the Arctic, suggests a study of genetic material from an Arctic lake
Cerebras Upgrades Trillion-Transistor Chip to Train 'Brain-Scale' AI
Singularity Hub - 27 Aug 2021 16:00
Much of the recent progress in AI has come from building ever-larger neural networks. A new chip powerful enough to handle "brain-scale" models could turbo-charge this approach. Chip startup Cerebras leaped into the lime...