El Niño, characterized by warmer-than-normal water temperatures in parts of the equatorial Pacific, made its return in June 2026. Observations of sea surface height from the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite that month indicated that the 2026 event was continuing to strengthen.
Physicists from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) have examined a fundamental property of quantum mechanics in collaboration with the German Aerospace Center (DLR). In an article published in the journal Physical Review Letters, they show that this theory does not necessarily need to be formulated with imaginary numbers—real numbers can, in fact, also be used.
You come home after a stressful day and reach out to your cat for a bit of comfort. It hisses. Maybe takes a swipe. Or simply flicks its tail and saunters off without so much as a meow. A dog, by contrast, greets you as though they've just won the lottery.
A remarkable quality of bioengineering is that scientists can take biological processes honed by millions of years of evolution and use them to efficiently create drugs, chemicals and other products to improve our lives. Now Tufts researchers have found new ways to expand the potential for using bacterial spores as catalysts for chemical reactions, biofuel production or breaking down pollutants.
Microorganisms from our planet could survive on celestial bodies where water is present, such as Mars. That is the conclusion of Ph.D. candidate Tommaso Zaccaria after experiments with simulated space conditions. Our immune system reacts less effectively to pathogens that have undergone such a simulated space journey. According to his supervisors, his dissertation provides extraterrestrial insights that are also useful on Earth.
Materials engineers have developed the ability to manipulate structure and matter at the nanoscale for solid-state alloys called intermetallics, making it possible to alter their properties for improved performance.
The implementation of reflective white roofs and new urban parks can significantly reduce temperatures in cities and decrease population vulnerability to heat waves, although these measures are not sufficient to counteract the projected increase of more than 6°C (11°F) by 2100, according to a recent study led by the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB), Spain.
A team at the University of Basel, Switzerland, has developed a versatile nanorobot with propulsion and payload modules. The two reusable modules autonomously self-assemble and could be used in medicine or industry.
Researchers from the MRC Protein Phosphorylation and Ubiquitylation Unit at the University of Dundee, together with collaborators from ETH Zürich, the Malopolska Center of Biotechnology and the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, report a new link between protein quality control and DNA damage responses. The work centers on MINDY3, a deubiquitinase enzyme, and reveals that it carries a distinctive EF-hand region that acts as a novel ubiquitin-binding domain.
Using the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) and the Manchester Echelle Spectrograph (MES), astronomers from Turkey and Mexico have investigated a planetary nebula discovered two centuries ago, known as NGC 6563. Results of the observations, published June 15 in a special issue of Galaxies journal, yield important insights into the morphology and kinematics of this nebula.
