In certain materials, when we apply an electric field (it could be that of light) that vibrates at a certain frequency, it can create a direct current, a steady flow of electrical charge. This current is special because its strength depends on the square of the electric field’s strength. This phenomenon is called “shift current.” […]
Odi et amo. I hate and I love. Maybe you’re wondering why I do that. I do not know. But I feel it happening, and I suffer. So Catullus, famous ancient Roman poet, described the painful and puzzling feeling of love’s contradiction. And if you have ever experienced heartbreak, it’s very likely that you understand […]
The deployment of robot teams could allow humans to complete various real-world tasks faster and more efficiently. For instance, multiple co-operating robots could help to quickly find and rescue survivors of natural disasters or monitor pollution across large geographical areas. Researchers at Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) have developed a new swarm architecture inspired by […]
Immigrating birds adapt quickly through social learning Great tits demonstrate social learning by adopting new behaviors from resident birds when they immigrate to a new environment. Researchers used puzzle boxes to show that 80% of immigrant birds quickly adopted the resident birds’ methods for obtaining food, underscoring the importance of social learning in animal behaviour […]
Numerous proteins in the cell withstand mechanical loads while performing their function. This is especially significant for cell-surface proteins located in the extracellular matrix, which are essential for the communication between cells in the extracellular milieu. Reacting to mechanical force through conformational changes is crucial for these cell-surface proteins, translating a physical signal into an […]
Authors: Albert HiuKa Fok, Postdoctoral Fellow in Neuroscience, McGill University and Sabrina Chierzi, Research Associate, Neuroscience, McGill University Astrocytes — named for their star-like shape — are a type of brain cell as abundant as neurons in the central nervous system, but little is known about their role in brain health and disease. Many neurological […]
Scientists believe individuals of the most recently discovered hominin group (the Denisovans) that interbred with modern day humans passed on some of their genes via multiple, distinct interbreeding events that helped shape early human history. In 2010, the first draft of the Neanderthal genome was published, and comparisons with modern human genomes revealed that Neanderthal […]
When you think about DNA, the first thing that probably comes to mind is the double helix model published by Watson and Crick. However, in the 90s scientists identified a particular conformation in DNA molecules in vitro (in a tube): single chain knot-like loops that they called i-motifs. These structures form because, instead of the […]
Fast radio bursts linked to massive galaxies Scientists have discovered that fast radio bursts, or FRBs, are more likely to originate in massive, metal-rich galaxies, suggesting that these cosmic phenomena may be linked to the formation of magnetars through stellar mergers. The study in Nature used the Deep Synoptic Array-110 to analyze the origins of […]