A research team led by Ryo Shimano of the University of Tokyo has successfully visualized two distinct mechanisms through which up and down spins, inherent properties of electrons, switch in an antiferromagnet, a material in which spin alignments cancel each other out. One of the visualized mechanisms provides a working principle for developing ultrafast, non-volatile magnetic memory and logic devices, which could be much faster than today’s technologies. The findings are published in the journal Nature Materials. Paper slips with holes, small metal rods, vacuum tubes, and transistors: these are technologies that have ...

Growing energy demand means the U.S. will almost certainly have to expand its electricity grid in coming years. What’s the best way to do this? A new study by MIT researchers examines legislation introduced in Congress and identifies relative tradeoffs involving reliability, cost, and emissions, depending on the proposed approach.  The researchers evaluated two policy approaches to expanding the U.S. electricity grid: One would concentrate on regions with more renewable energy sources, and the other would create more interconnections across the country. For instance, some of the best untapped wind-power resources in the U.S. lie ...

A recently published article in the journal BioScience has revealed a surprising opportunity for conserving threatened species: sports teams and their branding. The research, led by Dr. Ugo Arbieu of Université Paris-Saclay in France, analyzed 727 sporting organizations across 50 countries and 10 team sports. The authors found that "threatened species and species with a declining population trend are more represented than other species, with differences across regions." Arbieu and colleagues explain that "given the ongoing global biodiversity crisis and the importance of sport in modern societies, representations ...

Media Contact: John Dudley (814) 490-3290 (cell) jjdudley@usf.edu TAMPA, Fla. (Dec. 2, 2025) – A new study led by researchers at the University of South Florida’s College of Marine Science has found that certain populations of the seaweed sargassum have experienced a significant decline over the past decade, even as increased abundance of sargassum in the tropical Atlantic has caused large mats of the seaweed to inundate beaches across the Caribbean and Gulf regions. The abundance of sargassum in the Atlantic’s ...

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is invaluable in the medical world. But despite all the good it does, there is room for improvement. One way to enhance the sensitivity of MRI is called dynamic nuclear polarization (DNP), where target molecules for imaging are modified so they form clearer images when scanned with an MRI machine. But this technique requires some special crystalline materials mixed with polarizing agents which are difficult to create. For the first time, researchers including those from the University of Tokyo demonstrate the use of molecules called fullerenes as polarizing agents. Their new method can make DNP targets sufficient to yield far greater clarity when ...

Addressing Current Limitations in Spatial Omics Existing tools for spatial proteomics often have constraints. Many are not equipped to predict multiple localizations for individual proteins or to quantify across different cellular compartments. In addition, their use frequently requires programming knowledge and lacks accessible interfaces, which can limit broader application. Spatial lipidomics has remained challenging due to the absence of reliable markers for lipid localization. Introducing a Tool for Integrated Spatial Proteomics and Lipidomics C-COMPASS was developed to address these methodological gaps. The software uses neural networks to predict multiple subcellular ...

Lions, tigers, wolves, leopards, and bears are some the world’s favourite sport symbols, but while they thrive on jerseys, many of these species are at risk of extinction in the wild. A new international study, co-authored by Flinders University researchers, reveals that nearly 25% of professional sports teams worldwide use a wild animal in its name, logo, or fan identity, presenting a powerful and largely untapped opportunity to support biodiversity conservation. The research, published in BioScience, examined 727 teams across 50 countries and 10 major sports, identifying at least 161 different wild animals featured in professional ...

Fever, aching limbs and a runny nose – as winter returns, so too does the flu. The disease is triggered by influenza viruses, which enter our body through droplets and then infect cells.  Researchers from Switzerland and Japan have now investigated this virus in minute detail. Using a microscopy technique that they developed themselves, the scientists can zoom in on the surface of human cells in a Petri dish. For the first time, this has allowed them to observe live and in high resolution how influenza viruses enter a living cell.  Led by Yohei Yamauchi, Professor of Molecular Medicine at ETH Zurich, the researchers ...

Destroyed habitats, poaching, and prey depletion have dramatically reduced tiger habitats around the world. Today, tigers occupy just 5 to 10% of their historical habitats. But on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, an important population of critically endangered Sumatran tigers may persevere, a new Frontiers in Conservation Science study showed. Using infrared cameras, researchers working on the island, have set out to estimate sex-specific population densities and tigers’ movements during three surveys. “We documented a robust tiger population, apparently among the healthiest on the island,” said Dr Joe Figel, ...

EMBARGOED Until Thursday, December 4, 2025 12:00 am ET According to the Department of Health and Human Services, the United States is expected to face a significant shortage of OB-GYNs in the next five years. It’s vital for women to have access to highly trained health care providers for all stages of their lives, from the first menstrual cycle to menopause and beyond. Certified nurse-midwives offer this kind of care, but most Americans don’t realize it. A new survey by The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center reveals 93% of people think midwives only deliver babies and are surprised to ...

A remarkable resistance to venom has been discovered in a frog that feasts on hornets despite their deadly stingers. This frog could potentially serve as a model organism for studies on mechanisms underlying venom tolerance. While just the sight of a hornet’s stinger is enough to fill many of us with dread, some animals, such as some birds, spiders and frogs, are known to prey on adult hornets. The venom injected by their stingers can cause sharp, intense pain as well as local tissue damage and systemic effects such as destruction of red blood cells and cardiac dysfunction, which may even be fatal. But whether the animals that hunt hornets are able to ...

When damage to the liver caused by alcohol or viral infections persists, liver fibrosis progresses and replaces tissue with collagen fibers. This is especially a risk in chronic hepatitis C patients, where liver fibrosis can continue post-viral treatment. If this condition advances, it leads to cirrhosis, a state of liver function decline. Further, liver fibrosis is considered the greatest risk factor for liver cancer, thus making the development of early diagnostic methods crucial. To detect the presence of liver fibrosis, a research group led by Associate Professor Misako Sato-Matsubara at Osaka Metropolitan University’s Graduate ...

Underwater octopuses change their body color and texture in the blink of an eye to blend perfectly into their surroundings when evading predators or capturing prey. They transform their bodies to match the colors of nearby corals or seaweed, turning blue or red, and move by softly curling their arms or snatching prey. This behavior has long been regarded as the epitome of a 'perfectly transformed robot created by nature'. Such 'soft robot' technology, modeled after biological capabilities, is rapidly evolving thanks to recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced materials science. ...

Strong social relationships, particularly high-quality marriages, may help protect against obesity by influencing a complex communication system between the brain and gut, according to new research by UCLA Health.  The study, published in the journal Gut Microbes, is the first to demonstrate how social bonds influence weight and eating behaviors through an integrated pathway involving brain function, metabolism and the hormone oxytocin, sometimes referred to as “the love hormone.”   The findings ...

In high-speed optical communications, traditional orbital angular momentum (OAM) multiplexing systems face fundamental limitations, including exponentially increasing spatial-domain complexity, aggravated modal crosstalk, and strong dependence on continuous-wave lasers. These challenges hinder scalability and robustness in complex environments.   To address this, a research team led by Professor Fu Feng and Professor Xiaocong Yuan from Zhejiang Lab has developed a novel OAM-based spatiotemporal multiplexing (OAM-STM) architecture. This approach couples pulsed OAM beams with a diffractive deep neural ...

A collaborated research team from the Institute of Solid State Physics, the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has discovered a high-energy-density barocaloric effect in the plastic superionic conductor Ag₂Te₁₋ₓSₓ.  "This material shows a volumetric barocaloric performance far beyond that of most known inorganic materials," said the Prof. TONG Peng, who led the team, "Its high energy density makes it well-suited for smaller and lighter cooling devices." The findings were published online in Advanced Functional Materials. Modern refrigeration mainly relies on vapor-compression systems, ...

The study of large-time behavior of solutions to partial differential equations is a fundamental pursuit in mathematical analysis, with profound implications for physics and engineering. It addresses a core question: regardless of the initial data, will the solutions eventually settle into a simple, predictable pattern? Answering this question is crucial for verifying the long-term validity of mathematical models and predicting final, stable states. Asymptotic states—such as shock waves, rarefaction waves, and contact waves—are universal patterns that serve ...

Astronomers using the Subaru Telescope in Hawaiʻi have discovered a massive planet and a brown dwarf orbiting distant stars. The discoveries are the first results from OASIS (Observing Accelerators with SCExAO Imaging Survey), which combines space-based measurements with the Subaru Telescope’s advanced imaging to find hidden worlds. These discoveries in turn enable NASA’s upcoming Roman Space Telescope to test critical technologies for imaging Earth-like planets. Only about 1% of stars host massive planets and brown ...

As 2D materials race toward flexible electronics, precisely tailoring their strain fields without cracking crystals remains a grand challenge. Now, a Purdue team led by Prof. Gary J. Cheng and Prof. Wenzhuo Wu demonstrates the first laser-shock imprinting (LSI) on chiral-chain tellurene, revealing orientation-dependent deformation that retains single-crystal integrity while generating dense dislocation networks—offering a universal route for nanoscale strain engineering of anisotropic 2D systems. Why LSI on Tellurene Matters Ultrafast & High-Resolution: 5-ns, 0.4 GW cm-2 pulse delivers smooth 3-D nanoshaping with sub-micron feature control. Orientation-Sensitive ...

Researchers from Tongji University and Shanghai Jiao Tong University have developed a socially aware prediction-to-control pipeline that lets autonomous vehicles safely navigate dense crowds by anticipating multiple ways pedestrians might move. Instead of betting on a single forecast, their system combines a Social GAN trajectory predictor with a real-time Model Predictive Control (MPC) planner, treating each predicted path as a moving obstacle. In dynamic crowd simulations, the integrated Social GAN+MPC controller achieved zero safety violations and maintained ...

High-nickel batteries, which are high-energy lithium-ion batteries primarily used in electric vehicles, offer high energy density but suffer from rapid performance degradation. A research team from KAIST has, for the first time globally, identified the fundamental cause of the rapid deterioration (degradation) of high-nickel batteries and proposed a new approach to solve it. KAIST announced on December 3rd  that a research team led by Professor Nam-Soon Choi of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, ...

New ECU tool can help concussion patients manage fear and improve recovery    Researchers from Edith Cowan University (ECU) have developed a new tool to evaluate fear avoidance behaviour following a concussion.  The tool, aptly named the Fear Avoidance after Concussion Tool (FACT), consists of a questionnaire that can be completed within five minutes, under the supervision of a health care provider.   ECU Masters by Research student Mr Liam Sherwood noted that if fear avoidant behaviour could be recognised early, ...

The risk of sudden cardiac death is higher both for people with type 1 and type 2 diabetes, according to a large study published in the European Heart Journal [1] today (Thursday). The increase in risk is especially noticeable among younger adults.   Sudden cardiac death is when someone dies suddenly and unexpectedly due to a problem with their heart. It is generally rare in young and seemingly healthy individuals.   The research also shows that people with diabetes have a shorter life expectancy on average, and that a proportion of this reduction is due to sudden cardiac death.   The research was led by Dr Tobias Skjelbred from Copenhagen University ...

Breast density notification is being rolled out across Australia, but evidence suggests that women do not feel more informed by it  Between 25 and 40 percent of women have denser breast tissue which can make it harder for cancers to be detected through a mammogram    New research by experts at the University of Sydney shows that breast density notification is leaving some women confused and anxious about their breast health.  The notification program is designed to advise women that their breast density ...

K’gari is the world’s largest sand island and known for its world-famous lakes, but research from the University of Adelaide has discovered its largest lakes could be vulnerable to drying. The researchers looked back at ancient sediment profiles on K’gari, which is located off Queensland’s south-eastern coast, and found evidence of a strong drying event around 7500 years ago, a period known as the middle Holocene. “Our research shows that about 7500 years ago, at a time of higher rainfall and long after the end of the last Ice Age, some of K’gari’s deepest lakes dried out,” says lead researcher Associate Professor John ...