Tech
Lead levels in London's atmosphere have dropped drastically since lead additives in petrol were phased out, and currently meet UK air quality targets. However despite this drop, airborne particles in London are still highly lead-enriched compared to natural background levels, according to new Imperial research published today in PNAS.
Holding onto everyday items as keepsakes when a loved one dies was as commonplace in prehistory as it is today, a new study suggests.
The study from the University of York suggests mundane items like spoons and grinding stones were kept by Iron Age people as an emotional reminder and a 'continuing bond' with the deceased - a practice which is replicated in societies across the globe today.
The research focused on "problematic stuff": everyday items used or owned by a deceased person that relatives might not want to reuse but which they are unable to simply throw away.
In a new publication from Opto-Electronic Advances; DOI https://doi.org/10.29026/oea.2021.200006, Researchers led by Professor Junsuk Rho from Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), South Korea consider switchable diurnal radiative cooling by doped VO2.
Johan Gaume, an EPFL expert in avalanches and geomechanics, has turned his attention to ice. His goal is to better understand the correlation between the size of an iceberg and the amplitude of the tsunami that results from its calving. Gaume, along with a team of scientists from other research institutes, has just unveiled a new method for modeling these events. Their work appears in Communications Earth & Environment, a new journal from Nature Research.
HOUSTON - (June 21, 2021) - Rice University engineers have created microscopic seeds for growing remarkably uniform 2D perovskite crystals that are both stable and highly efficient at harvesting electricity from sunlight.
Halide perovskites are organic materials made from abundant, inexpensive ingredients, and Rice's seeded growth method addresses both performance and production issues that have held back halide perovskite photovoltaic technology.
HOUSTON - (June 21, 2021) - Diamond may be just a phase carbon goes through when exposed to a flash of heat, but that makes it far easier to obtain.
The Rice University lab of chemist James Tour is now able to "evolve" carbon through phases that include valuable nanodiamond by tightly controlling the flash Joule heating process they developed 18 months ago.
Best of all, they can stop the process at will to get product they want.
The word "tsunami" brings immediately to mind the havoc that can be wrought by these uniquely powerful waves. The tsunamis we hear about most often are caused by undersea earthquakes, and the waves they generate can travel at speeds of up to 250 miles per hour and reach tens of meters high when they make landfall and break. They can cause massive flooding and rapid widespread devastation in coastal areas, as happened in Southeast Asia in 2004 and in Japan in 2011.
Following fertilization, early plant embryos arise through a rapid initial diversification of their component cell types. As a result, this series of coordinated cell divisions rapidly sculpts the embryo's body plan. The developmental phenomenon in question is orchestrated by a transcriptional activation of the plant genome. However, the underlying cellular differentiation programs have long remained obscured as the plant embryos were hard to isolate.
A commonly studied perovskite can superfluoresce at temperatures that are practical to achieve and at timescales long enough to make it potentially useful in quantum computing applications. The finding from North Carolina State University researchers also indicates that superfluorescence may be a common characteristic for this entire class of materials.
Superfluorescence is an example of quantum phase transition - when individual atoms within a material all move through the same phases in tandem, becoming a synchronized unit.
While the LGBTQ+ community has seen significant advancements in legal rights, political representation and social acceptance over recent years, mental and physical health disparities still exist for queer Americans - and are even worse among younger generations, says a new study from Michigan State University.
BEER-SHEVA, Israel, June 21, 2021 - A team of scientists at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) have invented an artificial nose that is capable of continuous bacterial monitoring, which has never been previously achieved and could be useful in multiple medical, environmental and food applications.
The study was published in Nano-Micro Letters.
A study conducted in the Una Biological Reserve in the state of Bahia, Brazil, shows that in a habitat with high hunting pressure the risk of predation has such a significant impact on the behavior of the Yellow-breasted capuchin monkey Sapajus xanthosternos that it even avoids areas offering an abundant supply of plant biomass and invertebrates, its main sources of food.
If you've ever been in a city's central core in the middle of summer, you know the heat can be brutal--and much hotter than in the surrounding region.
PULLMAN, Wash. - A tiny bee imposter, the syrphid fly, may be a big help to some gardens and farms, new research from Washington State University shows.
For decades, governments and health authorities have tried to steer people away from "vice" products such as tobacco, soda and alcohol through counter-marketing measures -- things like tax increases, usage restrictions and ad campaigns.
But which ones are the most effective? And what do they mean for big brands such as Marlboro, Coca-Cola, McDonald's and Budweiser?
According to a new study from the UBC Sauder School of Business, they can all help people quit -- but how much they help, and who pays the price, varies significantly.