Usually, optical activity is understood as the ability some substances have to change the handedness of polarized light when it goes through them. Molecules that show optical activity have no plane of symmetry. So-called chiral matter broadly describes structures for which left- or right-handed mirror images are non-superimposable, or, equivalently, that lack improper rotation axes […]
Imagine an old-growth forest in the fading light of a summer evening. As the last of the sun’s rays disappear beneath the horizon, a tiny flash catches your eye. You turn around, hold your breath; it blinks again, hovering 2 feet above the leaf litter. Across the dusky glade, a fleeting response. Then another one […]
When polar seas freeze and ice forms, it is not only due to cold air chilling the surface of the water. Even more important is that warm water is prevented from rising to the surface from the depths of the ocean, due to the much lower salinity of the surface water. Sea ice forms in […]
Catalysis • Chemistry • DIPC Biochemistry • DIPC Photochemistry
When we consider the concepts metal and catalysis, we tend to assume quite matter-of-factly that the metal will be the catalyst. This assumption is based on the fact that metals can be found in reactions where they act as catalysts or co-catalysts in the form of coordination and organometallic compounds, nano-sized or bulk materials and […]
Bringing together concepts from electrical engineering and bioengineering tools, scientists have produced genetic “devices” designed to perform neuromorphic computations like artificial neural circuits in bacterial cells. The genetic material was inserted into bacterial cells in the form of a plasmid: a relatively short DNA molecule that remains separate from the bacteria’s “natural” genome. Plasmids also […]
Our brains “time-stamp” the order of incoming sounds, allowing us to correctly process the words that we hear, shows a new study by a team of psychology and linguistics researchers . “To understand speech, your brain needs to accurately interpret both the speech sounds’ identity and the order that they were uttered to correctly recognize […]
Cyclic polymers present a topology that differ significantly from their linear counterparts due to their circular structure and, therefore, the lack of chain ends. These simple characteristics are responsible for important unique properties (e.g. lower intrinsic and melt viscosity, lower hydrodynamic volumes, slower degradation profiles, increased blood circulation times and more selective bioaccumulation) thanks to […]
Astronomy • Biology • Evolution • Geosciences
Are we alone in the universe? This is a question that has intrigued humans for centuries and inspired countless studies and works of fiction. But are we getting closer to finding this out? Now that the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is in operation, we might have taken one giant leap in being able to […]
An unprecedented study of brain plasticity and visual perception found that people who, as children, had undergone surgery removing half of their brain correctly recognized differences between pairs of words or faces more than 80% of the time. Considering the volume of removed brain tissue, the surprising accuracy highlights the brain’s neuroplasticity– and its limitations […]
Spintronic devices are based on the inherent spin magnetic moment of the electron, the same way electronic ones are on just its charge, to store and process information. These devices should, in theory, operate faster and at lower temperatures than their current electronic-only counterparts because an electron’s spin can be flipped much quicker than its […]