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58 articles from PhysOrg

Harnessing nature to promote planetary sustainability

As Earth's population grows, the demands of modern lifestyles place mounting strain on the global environment. Proposed solutions to preserve and promote planetary sustainability can sometimes prove more harmful than helpful. However, technologies that harness natural processes could be more successful.

Speeding up drug discovery with diffusion generative models

With the release of platforms like DALL-E 2 and Midjourney, diffusion generative models have achieved mainstream popularity, owing to their ability to generate a series of absurd, breathtaking, and often meme-worthy images from text prompts like "teddy bears working on new AI research on the moon in the 1980s."

Hope for salamanders? Study recalibrates climate change effects

For tiny salamanders squirming skin-to-soil, big-picture weather patterns may seem as far away as outer space. But for decades, scientists have mostly relied on free-air temperature data at large spatial scales to predict future salamander distributions under climate change. The outlook was dire for the mini ecosystem engineers, suggesting near elimination of habitat in crucial areas.

Academic institutions receive lower financial returns from biotechnology licenses than commercial firms

The financial terms of biotechnology licenses from academic institutions are significantly less favorable than those of comparable licenses between commercial firms according to a new study from Bentley University's Center for Integration of Science and Industry. The study, published in the journal PLOS ONE, shows that the royalties and payments to academic institutions are significantly lower...

What caused the record-low Antarctic sea ice in austral summer 2022?

Antarctic sea ice is an important component of the climate system, and may act as an early indicator of climate change. Under global warming, significant changes in Antarctic sea ice have been observed. Specifically, it experienced a slow increase during 1979–2014, but a rapid decline thereafter.

A new model predicts the flexibility of DNA movement at the molecular scale

In both physics and chemistry, the mesoscopic scale refers to the length scale on which the properties of a material or phenomenon can be studied, without entering into a discussion about the behavior of individual atoms. In a mesoscopic model, atomic scales are merged with the continuous scale, so they are quite difficult to develop.

Intervention with educational robotics for the development of early childhood lexical relationships

Technological evolution poses challenges in all sectors, which is why, in the case of the educational community, it is not surprising that more and more studies are interested in the integration of STEM disciplines (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) for the acquisition of skills in the classroom. Precisely, one of the most critical challenges in the education sector is the...

Making more sustainable decisions based on data

Ecosystems deliver many benefits to humans, such as providing water, fruits and vegetables, as well as recreation opportunities. An international research team conducted a pilot study in Eritrea in order to demonstrate that the mapping and assessment of ecosystems and their services (MAES) is key to inform sustainable policy and decision-making at national and sub-national levels.

Study: Visible light induces bacteria to produce superoxide for manganese oxidation

Manganese oxides are natural reactive minerals and widely spread in aquatic and terrestrial environments, affecting the fate of metals (such as As3+ and Cd2+) and organic pollutants (such as phenols and diclofenac) through adsorption and oxidation in sewage treatment. Usually, the manganese (III/IV) oxides in the environment are thought to be formed by the oxidation of dissolved Mn(II) through...