401 articles from THURSDAY 12.11.2020

The COVID-19 pandemic: How US universities responded

A new George Mason University study found that the majority of university announcements occurred on the same day as the World Health Organization's pandemic declaration. Timing of announcements on moving courses online, discouraging campus housing, canceling travel, closing campus, and remote working was studied.

This tableware made from sugarcane and bamboo breaks down in 60 days

Scientists have designed a set of 'green' tableware made from sugarcane and bamboo that doesn't sacrifice on convenience or functionality and could serve as a potential alternative to plastic cups and other disposable plastic containers, which can take as long as 450 years or require high temperatures to degrade. This non-toxic, eco-friendly material only takes 60 days to break down. This plastic...

Time for a new state of matter in high-temperature superconductors

Scientists from Universität Hamburg have pointed out how to create a time crystal in an intriguing class of materials, the high-temperature superconductors. They propose to drive these superconducting materials into a time crystalline state by inducing Higgs excitations via light. The work is reported in the journal Physical Review Research.

UCLA researchers create armored emulsions as tiny test tubes for parallel reactions

UCLA bioengineers and mathematicians have invented the first-ever 'armored' emulsions. The armor comes in the form of tiny soft U-shaped cups, about a half-millimeter in length. With a hydrophobic (water-repelling) exterior and hydrophilic (water-attracting) interior, each U-shaped particle captures a fluid droplet resulting in an emulsion that stays intact following mixing. The research was...

UNC Charlotte study finds success in Charlotte-Mecklenburg's efforts to end homelessness

A new comprehensive study from UNC Charlotte's Urban Institute, College of Health and Human Services and School of Social Work shows an effective approach to ending chronic homelessness that helps those in need and benefits communities. The Housing First Charlotte-Mecklenburg initiative, an innovative multi-sector collaboration that's been working to end chronic homelessness in Charlotte for five...

Unexplained brightness from colossal explosion

Astronomers may have potentially spotted a magnetar born from a neutron star merger for the very first time. The merger resulted in the brightest kilonova ever seen. The light first came as a violent explosion of gamma rays billons of light-years away that unleashed more energy in a blink of an eye than the Sun will produce over its entire 10-billion-year lifetime.

Vaping may increase respiratory disease risk by more than 40%: BU study

A growing body of evidence points to the health risks of using e-cigarettes (or "vaping"). But because e-cigarettes are marketed as a less harmful alternative to traditional cigarettes, it has been difficult to tell whether the association between vaping and disease is just a matter of smokers switching to vaping when they start experiencing health issues.

Seven dead as Typhoon Vamco triggers Philippine capital's worst floods in years

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday ordered government agencies to hasten relief efforts after a powerful typhoon killed at least seven people and unleashed some of the worst flooding in years in the capital Manila. Duterte cut short his attendance of a virtual meeting of Southeast Asian leaders to inspect the damage from Typhoon Vamco, moments after a speech during which he urged...

Seven dead as Typhoon Vamco triggers Philippine capital's worst floods in years

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday ordered government agencies to hasten relief efforts after a powerful typhoon killed at least seven people and unleashed some of the worst flooding in years in the capital Manila. Duterte cut short his attendance of a virtual meeting of Southeast Asian leaders to inspect the damage from Typhoon Vamco, moments after a speech during which he urged...

Sensor for smart textiles survives washing machine, cars and hammers

If the smart textiles of the future are going to survive all that we throw at them, their components are going to need to be resilient. Now, researchers have developed an ultra-sensitive, seriously resilient strain sensor that can be embedded in textiles and soft robotic systems. It could be used in everything from virtual reality simulations and sportswear to clinical diagnostics for...