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57 articles from PhysOrg

Study finds nearly 500 ancient ceremonial sites in southern Mexico

A team of international researchers led by the University of Arizona reported last year that they had uncovered the largest and oldest Maya monument—Aguada Fénix. That same team has now uncovered nearly 500 smaller ceremonial complexes that are similar in shape and features to Aguada Fénix. The find transforms previous understanding of Mesoamerican civilization origins and the relationship...

Study explores how climate change may affect rain in U.S. Corn Belt

Air humidity is more important than soil moisture in influencing whether it rains in the United States Corn Belt, an agricultural area in the Midwest, stretching from Indiana to Nebraska and responsible for more than 35% of the world's most important grain crop, according to a new study by Penn State researchers.

The human GID complex engages two independent modules for substrate recruitment

A new paper by the Peter group of the ETH Zurich's Institute of Biochemistry (IBC) finds that the human GID E3 ubiquitin ligase forms a tetrameric complex with two distinct substrate-recruitment modules, namely WDR26-RanBP9 and GID4-ARMC8a. Although the shorter ARMC8b isoform stably assembles into the hGID complex, it lacks the ability to recruit the GID4 substrate-receptor.

Biophysics analysis made easy with an online tool

EMBL Hamburg's García Alai Team has released eSPC, a freely available online platform for analyzing molecular biophysics data from a range of experimental techniques. The tool enables scientists around the world to easily analyze their data without the need to travel to the laboratory where the data was generated.

One plus one does not equal two: Research team investigates receptors that form pairs on the surface of cells

There are a number of G protein-coupled receptors in human cells. As an important component of the cell membrane, these proteins are responsible for detecting different stimuli in the surroundings of a cell within the body and transferring this information to the cell interior. They may act individually or in pairs, and this can have a crucial effect on their function. Together with colleagues...

Sloshing electrons in a charge density wave

In the latest edition of Physical Review B, UvA Ph.D. candidate Xuanbo Feng (QuSoft and IoP) and colleagues write about their recent experiments on a material that can go from a normal metal state to a more exotic state known as a "charge density wave state."

New study finds black spruce trees struggling to regenerate amid more frequent arctic fires

A new study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), finds that black spruce trees—a key species on the boreal landscape for millennia—are losing their resilience and capacity to regenerate in the face of warming temperatures and increasingly frequent Arctic wildfires. A continuation of this trend could result in a landscape-wide ecological shift that would...

New molecule targets, images and treats lung cancer tumors in mice

Lung cancer can be elusive to spot and difficult to treat because the markers for it are found in other tissues, too. Now, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign researchers have developed a finely tuned molecular agent that can target lung and other cancer cells for imaging and treatment.

Aquatic fungus has already wiped amphibians off the map and now threatens survival of terrestrial frogs

A water-borne fungus that has led to the extinction of several species of amphibians that spend all or part of their life cycle in water is also threatening terrestrial amphibians. In Brazil, researchers supported by FAPESP detected unprecedented mortality among a genus of tiny frogs known as pumpkin toadlets that live in the Atlantic Rainforest far from any aquatic environments. The animals were...

Seagrass restoration study shows rapid recovery of ecosystem functions

As the dominant seagrass species on the U.S. West Coast, eelgrass supports a wide range of ecosystem services and functions, making its preservation and restoration a top priority for the region. Eelgrass restoration has a spotty record of success, however, and studies of restoration sites have rarely assessed the full range of ecosystem functions.

Scientists reveal genetic secrets of stress-tolerant mangrove trees

Mangrove trees straddle the boundary between land and ocean, in harsh environments characterized by rapidly changing levels of salinity and low oxygen. For most plants, these conditions would mark a death sentence, but mangroves have evolved a remarkable resistance to the stresses of these hostile locations.

Ammonia synthesis by mechanocatalysis in a ball mill

A breakthrough in the fight against hunger, three Nobel Prizes, and 150 million tonnes of annual production—yet still a tricky topic for research: For over 100 years, the chemical industry has been using the Haber-Bosch process to convert atmospheric nitrogen and hydrogen into ammonia, an important component of mineral fertilizers and many other chemical products. Scientists at the...