Medicine Nobel: how an algal protein became a switch for nerve cells
A light-sensitive protein lets researchers change selected nerve cells’ activity, helping reveal how brain signals contribute to memories, feelings and behavior.
Continue reading →The archive
science
Why Crew-13 reached the space station in under eight hours
Meeting an orbiting laboratory requires arranging both spacecraft’s positions and matching their motion, with preparations beginning days before launch.
Continue reading →Why a sea-temperature map can miss a marine heatwave
A Mediterranean and Black Sea study compares surface temperatures with heat through 40 metres, revealing what each view misses about marine habitats.
Continue reading →Molecular scissors exposed a hidden sugar in a gut archaeon’s wall
By cutting an elusive cell wall into measurable fragments, ArmA revealed both an unexpected molecular architecture and how methane-producing archaea separate daughter cells.
Continue reading →Removing sodium left boron unusually conductive—and able to deform
Researchers used sodium as a removable atomic scaffold, leaving an open boron framework that conducted electricity and permanently deformed under nanoscale compression.
Continue reading →How two satellites can weigh water they cannot see
Tiny changes in the distance between orbiting spacecraft reveal broad shifts in Earth’s stored water, but models are needed to infer which reservoirs changed.
Continue reading →To test the finest clock, scientists built it a twin
Two single-ion lutetium clocks agreed after 200 hours of comparison—but gravity, stability and systematic error explain why that is not the same as perfect time.
Continue reading →The heatwave season is stretching at both ends
A global study finds an earlier first heatwave and a later last one, but its longer “season” is a span between events, not continuous heat.
Continue reading →A forest can absorb more carbon without growing more wood that year
A new study finds that photosynthesis and wood growth often disagree from year to year, while its models show a longer-term relationship that changes how scientists interpret the mismatch.
Continue reading →Some rocks near Mars’s possible lakeshore may have begun as magma
Perseverance’s measurements suggest that some examined rock formed as molten material cooled, then recorded several later encounters with water.
Continue reading →Researchers infer that GJ 3090 b circles its star backwards
A reported three-dimensional spin–orbit angle of about 136° puts the planet on the retrograde side of 90°, while its formation history remains unresolved.
Continue reading →How scientists made pig and human brain maps comparable
Matching activity networks and white-matter geometry revealed large-scale correspondences—but each colorful map rests on measurements, modeling choices and important limits.
Continue reading →A nanoscale net gives cryo-EM proteins somewhere safer to land
Carbon nanotubes helped protein complexes avoid a damaging surface, adopt more viewing angles and assemble into detailed maps—but the new support creates problems of its own.
Continue reading →CRISPR cut this virus’s DNA. Two proteins helped repair it
The phage system called Healer reveals a distinct counter-CRISPR strategy: surviving DNA damage after the molecular scissors have done their work.
Continue reading →Scattered light reveals a chemical fingerprint of senescent cells
A mouse-tissue study connected molecular vibrations to gene activity and location, offering a label-free view of cellular senescence while revealing a formidable imaging bottleneck.
Continue reading →What researchers actually found inside 100 South Australian rainwater tanks
The tests found bacterial DNA and occasional elevated metals, but a genetic signal, a living organism and a demonstrated illness are not the same finding.
Continue reading →A tiny shift in iron’s X-rays reveals a stellar wind falling onto a pulsar
XRISM turned a displacement of only a few electronvolts into a measurement of otherwise invisible plasma racing toward a neutron star.
Continue reading →Red blood cells adapt to low oxygen by rearranging what they already have
Experiments reveal an oxygen-sensitive switch around the membrane protein Band 3 that redirects existing cellular machinery without making anything new.
Continue reading →Study finds adults’ chosen task information outperformed random selection
An experiment suggests that useful knowledge accumulates more effectively when adults choose what to pass on, rather than merely sending along information.
Continue reading →What Hurricane Hunters see as a tilted cyclone lines up
Aircraft radar reveals four characteristics associated with vertical alignment, an important step in intensification—but not a guarantee or a validated forecast checklist.
Continue reading →How an archaeon fixes nitrogen at about 92°C
A deep-sea microbe’s unusually heat-stable nitrogenase gives researchers a near-atomic view of the metal clusters that help break nitrogen’s stubborn triple bond.
Continue reading →VIPR reads DNA with a ‘match two, skip one’ code
A peer-reviewed structural study reveals an RNA-guided recognition system that deliberately leaves every third DNA letter unmatched.
Continue reading →A stiff film slows heat better than silicone
A layered material combines the rigidity of a solid with unusually poor heat conduction, challenging a familiar materials tradeoff without yet proving a practical coating.
Continue reading →To read a burned scroll, scientists made one to sacrifice
A modern papyrus with known writing showed how lead-sensitive X-rays and virtual unrolling might identify ancient texts worth scanning—without touching their brittle layers.
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