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Mar 26, 2024

Music and genomes: Beethoven’s genes put to the test

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, genetics, media & arts

To what extent are exceptional human achievements influenced by genetic factors? This question, dating back to the early days of human genetics, seems to be easier to address today as modern molecular methods make it possible to analyze DNA of individuals throughout history. But how reliable are the answers in this day and age?

Mar 26, 2024

Quantum Light Droplets Unveil New Realms of Macroscopic Complexity

Posted by in categories: particle physics, quantum physics

Scientists have advanced the field by stabilizing exciton-polaritons in semiconductor photonic gratings, achieving long-lived and optically configurable quantum fluids suitable for complex system simulations.

Researchers from CNR Nanotec in Lecce and the Faculty of Physics at the University of Warsaw used a new generation of semiconductor photonic gratings to optically tailor complexes of quantum droplets of light that became bound together into macroscopic coherent states. The research underpins a new method to simulate and explore interactions between artificial atoms in a highly reconfigurable manner, using optics. The results have been published in the prestigious journal Nature Physics.

Quantum Simulation Technologies

Mar 26, 2024

Time Travel for Tomorrow: Using Future Perspectives To Shape Today’s Tech

Posted by in categories: energy, sustainability, time travel

Researchers at Osaka University have discovered that considering sustainability issues through the lens of “imaginary future generations” provides valuable perspectives on technological advancements and trends in society.

The world stands on the brink of a crucial environmental threshold; the choices we make today about energy, resources, and the environment will have profound consequences for the future. Despite this, most sustainable thought tends to be limited to the viewpoint of current generations.

In a study published in Technological Forecasting and Social Change, researchers from Osaka University have revealed that adopting the perspective of “imaginary future generations” (IFGs) can yield fascinating insights into long-term social and technological trends.

Mar 26, 2024

The Dawn of Green Chemistry: Researchers Unveil Tenfold Increase in Reaction Efficiency

Posted by in categories: chemistry, energy, sustainability

Anyone who wants to produce medication, plastics or fertilizer using conventional methods needs heat for chemical reactions – but not so with photochemistry, where light provides the energy. The process to achieve the desired product also often takes fewer intermediate steps.

Researchers from the University of Basel are now going one step further and are demonstrating how the energy efficiency of photochemical reactions can be increased tenfold. More sustainable and cost-effective applications are now tantalizingly close.

Industrial chemical reactions usually occur in several stages across various interim products. Photochemistry enables shortcuts, meaning fewer intermediate steps are required. Photochemistry also allows you to work with less hazardous substances than in conventional chemistry, as light produces a reaction in substances which do not react well under heat. However, to this point there have not been many industrial applications for photochemistry, partly because supplying energy with light is often inefficient or creates unwanted by-products.

Mar 26, 2024

Primordial Fuel: Uncovering Hydrogen’s Role at the Origin of Life

Posted by in categories: biological, chemistry, habitats, sustainability

A recent study reveals how hydrogen gas, often touted as the energy source of tomorrow, provided energy in the past, at the origin of life 4 billion years ago. Hydrogen gas is clean fuel. It burns with oxygen in the air to provide energy with no CO2.

Hydrogen is a key to sustainable energy for the future. Though humans are just now coming to realize the benefits of hydrogen gas (H2 in chemical shorthand), microbes have known that H2 is a good fuel for as long as there has been life on Earth. Hydrogen is ancient energy.

The very first cells on Earth lived from H2 produced in hydrothermal vents, using the reaction of H2 with CO2 to make the molecules of life. Microbes that thrive from the reaction of H2 and CO2 can live in total darkness, inhabiting spooky, primordial habitats like deep-sea hydrothermal vents or hot rock formations deep within the Earth’s crust, environments where many scientists think that life itself arose.

Mar 26, 2024

Scientists Discover That “Transcendent” Thinking May Grow Teens’ Brains

Posted by in categories: education, neuroscience

Scientists at CANDLE have discovered that adolescents who grapple with the bigger meaning of social situations experience greater brain growth, which predicts stronger identity development and life satisfaction years later.

Scientists at the USC Rossier School of Education’s Center for Affective Neuroscience, Development, Learning and Education (CANDLE), have shown for the first time that a type of thinking, that has been described for over a century as a developmental milestone of adolescence, may grow teenagers’ brains over time.

This kind of thinking, which the study’s authors call “transcendent,” moves beyond reacting to the concrete specifics of social situations to also consider the broader ethical, systems-level, and personal implications at play. Engaging in this type of thinking involves analyzing situations for their deeper meaning, historical contexts, civic significance, and/or underlying ideas.

Mar 26, 2024

Unlocking Quantum Secrets With Spin-Squeezing Atomic Entanglement

Posted by in categories: particle physics, quantum physics

Researchers have developed methods to entangle large numbers of particles, improving the precision and speed of quantum measurements. These advancements could revolutionize quantum sensors and atomic clocks, with potential applications in fundamental physics research.

Opening new possibilities for quantum sensors, atomic clocks, and tests of fundamental physics, JILA researchers have developed new ways of “entangling” or interlinking the properties of large numbers of particles. In the process they have devised ways to measure large groups of atoms more accurately even in disruptive, noisy environments.

The new techniques are described in a pair of papers published in Nature.[1] JILA is a joint institute of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Colorado Boulder.

Mar 26, 2024

MIT’s Self-Powered Sensor Automatically Harvests Ambient Magnetic Energy

Posted by in categories: electronics, energy

A system designed at MIT could allow sensors to operate in remote settings, without batteries.

MIT researchers have developed a battery-free, self-powered sensor that can harvest energy from its environment.

Because it requires no battery that must be recharged or replaced, and because it requires no special wiring, such a sensor could be embedded in a hard-to-reach place, like inside the inner workings of a ship’s engine. There, it could automatically gather data on the machine’s power consumption and operations for long periods of time.

Mar 26, 2024

Characterizing the “Knee” of High-Energy Cosmic Rays

Posted by in categories: particle physics, space

Using observations made with an array of thousands of particle detectors, researchers have uncovered an important clue about cosmic rays that originate from outside of our Galaxy.

Mar 26, 2024

The Sagnac Effect

Posted by in category: futurism

The story of an experiment that might have kept Einstein awake at night—but that paved the way for the dawn of optical gyroscopes and that could enable future gravitational-wave detectors.

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