A research group from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology reports in Nature an unprecedented achievement in electron microscopy: the direct measurement of “dark points” within light waves. By doing so, the researchers were able to confirm a prediction from the 1970s that the speed of these points exceeds the speed of light.

The “dark points” measured by the group are essentially tiny “holes” in the wave structure. Known as vortices, the holes are a common phenomenon in nature: We encounter them in ocean waves, in air currents, and even in coffee when we stir it or pour it into the sink. As early as the 1970s, a surprising theoretical prediction was proposed: Vortices may move faster than the wave in which they are formed. As strange as it sounds—imagine a vortex in a river overtaking the flow of water in which it exists—the phenomenon is real. Until now, this was based on theory. The research team’s achievement has now confirmed it experimentally.

A newly engineered molecule acts like a “rechargeable” solar heat battery, storing sunlight and releasing it on demand.

In Your Way Out, actors move like NPCs, wear lycra masks and painted costumes, and the lighting has no shadows.

Watkins et al. show that RNase L dampens the expression of interferon-stimulated genes by accelerating mRNA decay, inhibiting nuclear mRNA export block, and repressing transcription.

New research from the University of St Andrews has revealed that human readiness for intergroup violence is not a single or unified mindset. Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the new study, spanning 58 countries and involving more than 100 researchers from various institutions around the world, demonstrates that violent extremist intentions are driven by two fundamentally different psychological motivations.

These are defensive extremism, which aims to protect a group from perceived threats, and offensive extremism, which seeks to establish group dominance and expand influence.

This preregistered study analyzed data from 18,128 participants globally. The findings indicate that defensive extremist intentions are consistently more prevalent, showing higher levels of endorsement than offensive intentions in 56 out of the 58 surveyed nations. This suggests a widespread tendency to find protective violence more morally acceptable than violence aimed at conquest.

Ancient rocks reveal that Earth’s magnetic field during the Ediacaran may not have been chaotic after all.

New polymer design fixes ion flow limits in safer batteries, boosting conductivity and improving performance.

Spotlight: Hiba Baaziz and Daniela Cimini (Virginia Tech) discuss recent work from Zych et al. (https://hubs.la/Q0485YJy0), showing that low RCC1 levels impair protein export in micronuclei, causing overgrowth and rupture. https://hubs.la/Q0485R1g0

Micronuclei (MN), a hallmark of chromosome instability, frequently rupture, leading to protumorigenic consequences. MN rupture requires nuclear lamina defects, yet their underlying causes remain unclear. Here, we demonstrate that MN lamina gaps are linked to excessive MN growth resulting from impaired protein export. This export defect arises from reduced levels of the transport protein RCC1 in MN. Overexpressing RCC1 increases protein export and protects MN from rupture. Differences in RCC1 levels linked to chromatin state also explain why high euchromatin content increases the stability of small MN. Additional RCC1 loss in euchromatic MN results in impaired protein import. For these MN, increasing RCC1, directly or through increasing histone methylation, accelerates rupture. Our findings define a new model of MN rupture, where defects in protein export drives continuous MN growth causing nuclear lamina gaps that predispose MN to membrane rupture and where chromatin-specific features can alter rupture of small MN by further impairing nuclear transport.

Zych et al. demonstrate that reduced RCC1 levels in micronuclei impair protein export, causing persistent micronuclear growth, nuclear lamina gap expansion

Plants make a surprising intermediate en route to quinine and cinchonidine