Spiders build their webs using the silk they synthesize and secrete from their spinning glands, structures located in the back of the abdomen. The most primitive species have few glands and build their nets with fairly uniform silks. The most evolved spiders, on the other hand, have up to seven different spinning glands with which […]
Biology • Biomedicine • Computer science • Nanotechnology • Neuroscience • Physics
In 1873, the microscopist Ernst Abbe stipulated a physical limit for the maximum resolution of traditional optical microscopy: 0.2 micrometers, or 200 nanometers (the shortest wavelength for visible light, the extreme limit of violet). This meant that scientists could distinguish whole cells, as well as some parts of the cell called organelles. However, they would […]
On 8 October 2013, following the discovery at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider of a new particle that appeared to be the long-sought Higgs boson predicted by the theory, it was announced that Peter Higgs and François Englert had been awarded the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physics. But they were the survivors of the bunch of […]
In the last two decades, the easiness in the obtaining of genetic information from patient biological samples, together with the advanced knowledge on the physiological consequences of patient genetic alterations, has transformed the daily clinical practice in our hospitals. As a result, the current use of the precision medicine concept, as disseminated today in the […]
A region containing a maximum of potential that prevents a particle on one side of it from passing to the other side is called a potential barrier. The net in a tennis court is in a certain way a potential barrier, as the ball needs to have kinetic energy in excess of the height of […]
Departamento de Bioquímica y Biología molecular-A, Facultad de Biología, Universidad de Murcia, E-30100 Murcia, Spain * adrian.matencio@um.es Antimicrobial resistance is a problem in our society. Although several authors have focused on seeking new molecules with antimicrobial activity, resistance has increased. Several authors are looking for new antimicrobial substances or seeking to improve the use of […]
The article Weaponized Health Communication: Twitter Bots and Russian Trolls Amplify the Vaccine Debate , published in 2018 , affirms that, despite the great potential of social networks to disseminate objective information, they are often abused in order to disseminate content that may harm health. A direct consequence of the exposure of social network users […]
The concept of vector should be familiar: a quantity for which both magnitude and direction must be stated. This compares with a scalar quantity, where direction is not applicable, like temperature in a precise point. But, what if the magnitude varies with the direction? A vector would be a particular case, with only one direction […]
The term dyscalculia of the development was proposed for the first time in 1968 by Cohn to describe a learning problem centered in the mathematical operations and in the handling of the numbers. Affected people have serious and chronic difficulties when adding or subtracting and also in the management of the calendar and clock. Dyscalculia […]
The so-called van der Waals materials consist of two-dimensional layers bound by weak van der Waals forces. After the isolation of graphene, the field of two-dimensional van der Waals materials has experienced an explosive growth and new families of two-dimensional systems and block-layered bulk materials, such as tetradymite-like topological insulators – electronic materials that have […]