A study published in Science Advances on April 1 reveals a new hypothesis that may explain why European cave bears went extinct during past climate change periods. The research was motivated by controversy in the scientific literature as to what the animal (Ursus spelaeus) ate and how that affected their demise.

Cells will ramp up gene expression in response to physical forces alone, a new study finds. Gene activation, the first step of protein production, starts less than one millisecond after a cell is stretched—hundreds of times faster than chemical signals can travel, the researchers report.

Scientists have long been able to measure and analyze the fossil skulls of our ancient ancestors to estimate brain volume and growth. The question of how these ancient brains compare to modern human brains and the brains of our closest primate cousin, the chimpanzee, continues to be a major target of investigation.

The Golden Age of Hollywood is known for its glitz, glamour and classic movies. Northwestern University researchers have peeled back the gilded sheen to reveal an industry tarnished by severe gender inequity.

A partial skeleton of Homo naledi represents a rare case of an immature individual, shedding light on the evolution of growth and development in human ancestry, according to a study published April 1, 2020 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Debra Bolter of Modesto Junior College in California and the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and colleagues.

That the COVID-19 situation has been accompanied by a relentless flood of information is evident from a quick examination of newspaper front pages, top stories on any news channel, or trending topics on Twitter.

A discovery by a team of researchers led by UMass Lowell nuclear physicists could change how atoms are understood by scientists and help explain extreme phenomena in outer space.

Who wants to be an astronaut? More than 12,000 people do, resulting in NASA's second-largest group of astronaut hopefuls.

At the BESSY II storage ring, a joint team of accelerator physicists, undulator experts and experimenters has shown how the helicity of circularly polarized synchrotron radiation can be switched faster—up to a million times faster than before. They used an elliptical double-undulator developed at HZB and operated the storage ring in the so-called two-orbit mode. This is a special mode of...

With colleges and universities around the world shuttered because of the COVID-19 pandemic, chemistry teachers are navigating the shift to online learning. There are several factors to consider in this effort, from technology to accessibility. Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society, asked chemistry teachers with online learning experience to...

Scientists have mapped the genome of the German shepherd, one of the world's most popular canine breeds, after using a blood sample from 'Nala,' a healthy five-year-old German shepherd living in Sydney.

As part of their project BioSCAN - devoted to the exploration of the unknown insect diversity in and around the city of Los Angeles—the scientists at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (USA) have already discovered numerous insects that are new to science, but they are still only guessing about the lifestyles of these species.

More than a third of the food produced ends up being wasted. This situation creates environmental, ethical and financial issues, that also affect food security. Negative effects from waste management, such as bad smells or the emission of greenhouse gases, make the bioeconomy one of the best options to reduce these problems.

Many aquatic animals like frogs and turtles spend a big part of their lives under water and have adapted to this condition in various ways, one being that they have excellent hearing under water.

Researchers at Linköping University, working with colleagues in Great Britain, China and the Czech Republic, have developed a perovskite light-emitting diode (LED) with both high efficiency and long operational stability. The result has been published in Nature Communications.

As requested by the Austrian Federal Government and the WHO, a significant increase in the capacity for coronavirus testing is essential to combat the new coronavirus. The University of Innsbruck is now responding to this by immediately developing and evaluating a new high-throughput method for the genetic analysis of patient samples at its Faculty of Biology.

Meat is no ordinary solid. Made up of complex networks of moisture-saturated proteins, it displays some intriguing physical properties when it is cooked. Several studies in the past have attempted to recreate this behaviour in computer simulations, but because this demands so much computing power, they have only achieved simplified, one-dimensional recreations of the process, which aren't...

Across the world, animals are kept in captivity for various reasons: in zoos for education and research, in research facilities for testing, on farms for meat and other products, and in people's homes as pets. Maintaining good animal welfare is not only important for ethical reasons; poor welfare can impact human wellbeing and the economy. But how do we assess how animals are feeling?

A research team led by scientists from Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology (TUAT), Japan, has successfully established 3-D cultured tissue that mimics liver fibrosis, a key characteristic of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). For making the 3-D culture, cells were collected from liver tissues of NASH model mice. Their findings open up an alternative avenue for developing drugs for...

Though factories have shut, planes have been grounded and cars left in the garage, the coronavirus pandemic is having very little impact on climate change, the World Meteorological Organization said Wednesday.

Dropping Mentos candies into a bottle of soda causes a foamy jet to erupt. Although science fair exhibitors can tell you that this geyser results from rapid degassing of the beverage induced by the candies, the precise means by which bubbles form hasn't been well characterized. Now, researchers reporting in ACS' Journal of Chemical Education used experiments in the lab and at various altitudes to...

The circadian clock controls a variety of biological phenomena that occur during the course of the day, such as sleeping and waking. Perturbation of the circadian clock has been associated with many diseases such as sleep disorders, metabolic syndrome, and cancer. The development of small-molecule compounds to regulate specific components of the circadian clock facilitates the elucidation of the...

Malaysian authorities seized about six tonnes of pangolin scales and smashed a smuggling syndicate, officials said Wednesday, as the country clamps down on rampant wildlife trafficking.

Maria dreams of being the next Greta Thunberg. Kelita is studying in the first-ever university program in the Amazon. Fabio is helping his family do its part to fight climate change through sustainable agriculture.