Science

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Revolutionizing clean energy by recycling not-quite-so-rare earths

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

Steel was the material of progress during the industrial revolution, while the twentieth century was the age of Mylar, Duraplex and other creatively named plastics. Nowadays, elements like neodymium and lanthanum constitute progress, sounding like they are straight out of sci-fi fictions. These and similar elements, collectively known as rare-earths, make up one of those lists awkwardly appended at the bottom of periodic tables. Thanks to high reactivity, resistance, as well as electric and...

Are we there yet- The long journey to Mars

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

How close are we to the giant leap to Mars? Recently the partial success of the European Space Agency's (ESA) ExoMars mission starkly reminded us of how tough of a destination the Red Planet actually is. Ironically, in the weeks leading up to the event, there was considerable attention on planning to bring people to Mars. One reason was President Barack Obama's uplifting op-ed on the CNN website, where he anticipated NASA taking astronauts to Mars and safely back home by the 2030s, and "one day...

Nanomachines win Nobel Prize

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

The 2016 Nobel Prize for Chemistry was awarded last month by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to a trio of European scientists.

Sir Fraser Stoddart, from Scotland, Dr. Jean-Pierre Sauvage, from France, and Dr. Bernard Feringa, from the Netherlands, will share the 8m Swedish kronor prize between them.

The Nobel was awarded for the generation of the world's smallest machines. The machines created by the laureates are one thousand times smaller than a single strand of hair.

In all living...

How interfering with your vision can shatter your recall of the way things look

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

How do we recall our stored knowledge of the physical properties of objects? Do we "see" things all over again when asked simple questions about the way common and familiar things look? Do brain centers that process visual images fire up all over again when we think about the physical properties of things or is it a more abstract process? "Yes" to the last two questions, according to Pierce Edmiston and Dr. Gary Lupyan of the Department of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin at...

Mars welcomes its latest orbiter ExoMars

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

On 19th October 2016 the European-Russian mission ExoMars arrived at its destination. It delivered the Trace Gas Orbiter, or TGO and an experimental lander, called Schiaparelli. Not everything went quite as planned, but it was a success, said European Space Agency (ESA) executives in a press briefing. The good news is that TGO entered its orbit perfectly. From there, it will sniff the Martian atmosphere searching, among other things, for traces of life on the planet. It will also serve as a...

Looking through 'Smart' Windows

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

Have you ever wanted a window that you could control how much light and heat it let in?

Thanks to scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, this might now be possible! The researchers have created a new flexible smart material that can be incorporated into windows, sunroofs and many other glass surfaces, which will have the ability to control both heat and light from the sun.

Dr. Delia Milliron, from the University of Texas, led the study, which has been recently...

Welcome to the neighborhood, Proxima b!

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

Scientists of the European Southern Observatory (ESO, headquartered right here in Munich!) discovered a planet orbiting Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to us. If the solar system were a condo, this planet---called Proxima Centauri b or Proxima b for short---would be an apartment in the building across the street! Whether anyone lives there, however, is a completely different story. Unable to see the planet directly, the team of scientists used an ingenious system to find it, carefully...

Turning a new leaf in the search for lower emissions

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

Carbon dioxide (or CO2) is probably the most notorious atmospheric public enemy. Being a potent greenhouse gas, it contributes heavily to global warming, ocean acidification and everything that comes with them. Understandably, then, scientists have tried a number of ways to reduce its amount, from burying it underground to (with surprising success) turning it into stone. However, the only sustainable solution to get CO2 levels under control is to produce less of it. In a study published in...

Bacteria Needed to Save Coral Reef

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

We increasingly hear about how important bacteria are for our bodies and our health, but scientists are now becoming aware of bacteria's importance for protecting and maintaining coral reefs and protecting them against global warming.

Our microbiome, or community of bacteria residing within us, is of fundamental importance to our health and day-to-day bodily functions. A recent study has shown that the coral microbiome could be just as important for coral daily health and long-term maintenance....

Welcome to Jupiter!

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

How did planets form? Where did they get the ingredients for life, like carbon and nitrogen, that we hold so dear on Earth? These are some of the big questions NASA's probe Juno will address as it peeks for the first time through Jupiter's thick clouds. It may sound surprising, but we know practically nothing about what goes on inside the biggest non-sun thing in the solar system. In the early morning of July 5 (European time), after almost five years of space travel, Juno successfully...

Stretching quantum cats could make for better computers

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

A team of physicists at Yale demonstrated that the inherent quantum weirdness can be harnessed to make quantum computers, and that cats would help do it---sort of. While classical computers (the kind you use to read this article) encode information in bits that can be either 0 or 1, quantum computers use quantum bits (or qubits) that can be both 0 and 1 at the same time, in a so-called "quantum superposition". In this, they resemble the famous Schrödinger's cat, both dead and alive until we...

"Happy little accident" opens new avenues for amazing future batteries

April 22, 2025 • 03:00 PM

Who wouldn't want a slim phone that stays charged for days and holds its capacity for years? Beyond consumer electronics, from electric cars to solar and wind power plants, many other technologies are being held back by bulky and short-lived batteries. Nanotechnology showed glimpses of a solution: nanowire batteries. However, a few major hurdles are still in the way. For one, these futuristic devices are very fragile and unreliable. But, thanks to a recent study by Mya Le Thai---a doctoral...

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Civilization: Wie wir heute leben

The exhibition 'Civilization' explores the multifaceted aspects of our incredibly complex coexistence, ranging from humanity's significant achievements to our collective failures. It examines cultures from all continents, highlighting how we produce and consume, work and play, travel and live, think...

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Fire Alarm Triggers Emergency Response on Mallorca Flight
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