Amicus Plato, sed magis amica veritas (Plato is my friend, but Truth is still a better friend of mine), they say Aristotle whispered when he explained the arguments with which he demolished the theories of his teacher, whose school, the Academy, had been Aristotle’s home for twenty years. I remember this well known phrase almost […]
Gravity changes could help determine quake magnitudes faster Signals from Earth’s gravitational field could help seismologists determine the magnitude of large quakes more quickly. The quicker a temblor’s actual size can be determined, the sooner emergency personnel can know how many resources may be needed to respond. Nature Large cache of fossilized pterosaur eggs found […]
A quantum dot is a nanometric crystalline structure of semiconductor materials. In a quatum dot electrons are confined in a region of space, thus creating a well defined structure of energy levels that depends very much on the size and shape of the quantum dot. This structure resembles that of atoms, that is why sometimes […]
The immune system is a complex network that recognises foreign substances in the body. When it detects an alien substance (antigen), it creates antibodies to attack and destroy it. This system protects vertebrates against viruses, bacteria, fungi and other parasites, and is the reason for the “rejection” after organ transplants. When we have cancer, our […]
Right-sided blue whales roll left when feeding Blue whales, who normally exhibit a right-side bias, change to a left-side bias when feeding on small crustaceans. Researchers attached cameras, hydrophones and sensors to blue whales and noticed that they typically roll to the left during feeding, likely to allow their dominant right eye to more effectively […]
The ability to trap and control particles with the help of well-controlled electromagnetic fields has led to revolutionary advances in the fields of biology, condensed- matter physics, high-precision spectroscopy, and quantum information, enabling unprecedented control both in the study of isolated single particles as well as in few and many-body systems subject to controlled and […]
W orld Health Organization (WHO) established the recognition of obesity as a disease in 1948, but it was not until the last decade of the 20th century that people began to gain awareness of overweight-derived health problems. A decade ago and based on worldwide data indicating that 40 % of global adult population were overweight […]
Very often Economics is censured for using unrealistic assumptions, like that stating that people are selfish. According to some critics (e.g., the philosopher Mario Bunge, 2010 ), this fact is enough to show the invalidity of Economic models. After all, if we start with a falsehood, how can we hope to find useful theories? The […]
Living stromatolites discovered in remote wetlands of Tasmania Microbial mats of living stromatolites, which first appeared on Earth at least 3.5 billion years ago but are very rare now, have been found in a remote wetland area of Tasmania. Researchers were surprised to find the stromatolites thriving in a freshwater environment since most stromatolite communities […]
A dielectric is a nonconductor of electric charge in which an applied electric field causes a displacement of charge but not a flow of charge. Light propagation through a dielectric medium is determined by the spatial distribution of the material. Photons scatter at local variations of the refractive index. Therefore, how ordered the medium is […]