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New breakthrough in ‘spintronics’ could boost high speed data technology

Scientists have made a pivotal breakthrough in the important, emerging field of spintronics—which could lead to a new high speed energy efficient data technology.

An international team of researchers, including the University of Exeter, has made a revolutionary discovery that has the potential to provide high speed, low power-usage for some of the world’s most well-used .

While today’s information technology relies on electronics that consumes a huge amount of energy, the electrons within can also transfer a form of angular momentum called .

Physicists Observe Branched Flow of Light

Physicists from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology and the University of Central Florida have experimentally observed optical branched flow in liquid soap films.

Instead of producing completely random speckle patterns, the slowly varying disordered potential gives rise to focused filaments that divide to form a pattern resembling the branches of a tree.

Researchers Indicate COVID-19 Mutation Has Made Virus More Contagious

Researchers from Northwest University’s medical school in Chicago believe a mutation in the coronavirus has made it considerably more contagious.

Infection disease special Egon Ozer of the Feinberg School of Medicine has said that upon examining the genetic structure of coronavirus samples, it was evident there was a change in one of the amino acids that allowed a spike in protein on the surface of the virus.

In layman’s terms, this change has allowed the virus to penetrate nearby cells easier, and as a result the virus can replicate faster and be passed on easier.

Age-related heart disease linked to gut bacteria metabolite

New research from the University of Colorado Boulder has offered some of the clearest evidence to date showing how the gut microbiome produces a metabolite that, over time, contributes to age-related declines in cardiovascular health.

High blood levels of trimethylamine-N-Oxide (TMAO), a metabolic byproduct of digestion, have been strongly linked to negative cardiovascular health. When one eats red meat, eggs or other animal proteins, certain types of gut bacteria feed on chemicals in those foods and produce TMA, or trimethylamine, which is then turned into TMAO in the liver.

A number of studies have linked TMAO to heart disease, however, until now it hasn’t been clear exactly how this metabolite causes cardiovascular damage. A robust new study, published in the journal Hypertension, is offering one of the first thorough mechanistic investigations illustrating how TMAO damages the cardiovascular system.

Rare brain-eating amoeba infection confirmed in Florida, health officials say

A person in Florida has been infected with a rare and usually deadly brain-eating amoeba, according to health officials.

The Florida Department of Health announced Friday that one patient in Hillsborough County has been infected with Naegleria fowleri, a water-borne, microscopic single-celled amoeba that attacks the brain.

“Infections can happen when contaminated water enters the body through the nose,” the health department said.