Researchers from the UK and Spain have identified an eco-friendly solid that could replace the inefficient and polluting gases used in most refrigerators and air conditioners. When put under pressure, plastic crystals of neopentylglycol yield huge cooling effects—enough that they are competitive with conventional coolants. In addition, the material is inexpensive, widely available and functions at close to room temperature. …
Now that they’ve identified the Higgs boson, scientists at the Large Hadron Collider have set their sights on an even more elusive target. All around us is dark matter and dark energy—the invisible stuff that binds the galaxy together, but which no one has been able to directly detect. “We know for sure there’s a dark world, and …
Artificial intelligence (AI), a branch of computer science that is transforming scientific inquiry and industry, could now speed the development of safe, clean and virtually limitless fusion energy for generating electricity. A major step in this direction is under way at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and Princeton University, …
The transition from hunting and gathering to farming and herding is considered a crucial turning point in the history of humanity. Scholars think the intensive food production that came along with the Neolithic Revolution, starting around 10,000 B.C., allowed cities to grow, led to technological innovation and, eventually, enabled life as we know it today. …
The complete skeletal remains of a new species of Mongolian dinosaur fill in a gap in the evolution of hadrosaurs, according to a study released April 17, 2019 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Khishigjav Tsogtbataaar of the Mongolian Academy of Science, David Evans of the Royal Ontario Museum, and colleagues. Dinosaurs of the family Hadrosauridae …
A new study into one of the world’s oldest types of fish, Coelacanth, provides fresh insights into the development of the skull and brain of vertebrates and the evolution of lobe-finned fishes and land animals, as published in Nature. Coelacanth (Latimeria chalumnae) is so rare it was thought to have gone extinct with dinosaurs over 65 …
For years, researchers have pursued a strange phenomenon: When you hit an ultra-thin magnet with a laser, it suddenly de-magnetizes. Imagine the magnet on your refrigerator falling off. Now, scientists at CU Boulder are digging into how magnets recover from that change, regaining their properties in a fraction of a second. According to a study …
Since its discovery in 2016, planetary scientists have been excited about TRAPPIST-1, a system where seven Earth-sized rocky planets orbit a cool star. Three of the planets are in the habitable zone, the region of space where liquid water can flow on the planets’ surfaces. But two new studies by scientists in the University of …
A stellar flare ten times more powerful than anything seen on our sun has burst from an ultracool star almost the same size as Jupiter. The star is the coolest and smallest to give off a rare white-light superflare, and by some definitions could be too small be considered a star. The discovery, funded by …
You can’t hide your lying eyes: scientists have revealed that women can judge whether a man is likely to be unfaithful just by looking at his face but men are less able to spot a cheating woman. Researchers at the University of Western Australia took a group of 1,500 people and showed them pictures of …
