A research team has investigated long-term X-ray variability in the neutron star NGC 7793 P13, an object thought to be driven by supercritical accretion, where an extraordinary amount of gas falls onto the object and emits intense X-rays. The team found a relation between the X-ray luminosity and the rotation velocity, which could provide clues to reveal the supercritical accretion mechanism.
Rocky planets like our Earth may be far more common than previously thought, according to new research published in the journal Science Advances. It suggests that when our solar system formed, a nearby supernova (the massive explosion of a star near the end of its life) bathed it in cosmic rays containing the radioactive ingredients to make rocky, dry worlds. This mechanism could be ubiquitous across the galaxy.
A team of researchers led by the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Paleontology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NIGPAS), in collaboration with colleagues from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, the University of Bristol, and Nanjing University, has identified the primary non-environmental factors controlling lithium-to-magnesium ratio (Li/Mg) fractionation. Their findings were recently published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters.
Tropical storms such as typhoons, hurricanes, and cyclones are Earth's most powerful weather systems. Born over warm oceans, they travel thousands of kilometers to land, traversing waters now polluted with plastics, from coastal runoff to the vast oceanic garbage patches.
Glacial earthquakes are a special type of earthquake generated in cold, icy regions. First discovered in the Northern Hemisphere more than 20 years ago, these quakes occur when huge chunks of ice fall from glaciers into the sea.
An international team of scientists have identified nine new species of butterflies using a combination of geographical, morphological and molecular analysis.
The cells of all animals—including humans—are characterized by their ability to adhere particularly well to surfaces in their environment. This mechanically stable adhesion enables the development of complex tissues and organs and is made possible by certain cell surface receptors called integrins. However, it is unclear how this form of cell adhesion developed over the course of evolution, as many single-celled organisms do not have integrin receptors.
Liquids and solutions are complex environments—think, for example, of sugar dissolving in water, where each sugar molecule becomes surrounded by a restless crowd of water molecules. Inside living cells, the picture is even more complex: tiny liquid droplets carry proteins or RNA and help organize the cell's chemistry.
For much of my career, I have been fascinated by the ways in which materials behave when we reduce their dimensions to the nanoscale. Over and over, I've learned that when we shrink a material down to just a few nanometers in thickness, the familiar textbook rules of physics begin to bend, stretch, or sometimes break entirely. Heat transport is one of the areas where this becomes especially intriguing, because heat is carried by phonons—quantized vibrations of the atomic lattice—and phonons are exquisitely sensitive to spatial confinement.
In a new study published in Nature Physics, researchers have achieved the first experimental observation of a fragile-to-strong transition in deeply supercooled water, resolving a scientific puzzle that has persisted for nearly three decades.
