Get touchy feely with plants
Forget talking to plants to help them grow, gently rubbing them with your fingers can make them less susceptible to disease, a paper in the open access journal BMC Plant Biology reveals.
View ArticleTrue colors: Female squid have two ways to switch color
The female common market squid –– AKA Doryteuthis opalescens –– may not be so common after all. Researchers at UC Santa Barbara have discovered that this glamorous cephalopod possesses a pair of...
View ArticleContainer's material properties affect the viscosity of water at the nanoscale
Water pours into a cup at about the same rate regardless of whether the water bottle is made of glass or plastic.
View ArticleResearchers discover how microbes survive in freezing conditions
Most microbial researchers grow their cells in petri-dishes to study how they respond to stress and damaging conditions. But, with the support of funding from NASA, researchers in LSU's Department of...
View ArticleResearchers explain the flagellar synchronisation of swimming algae
The beating of flagella is one of the basic principles of movement in the cellular cosmos. However, up to now, scientists were unsure as to how the movements of several of these small cellular...
View ArticleAn intersection of math and biology: Clams and snails inspire robotic diggers...
Engineering has always taken cues from biology. Natural organisms and systems have done well at evolving to perform tasks and achieve objectives within the limits set by nature and physics.
View ArticleHealing powers: Team detects mechanism in cell division relevant for closing...
How do cells spread to cover and close a wound? A team of researchers led by IST Austria professor Carl-Philipp Heisenberg, including first author Pedro Campinho, Ph.D. student in the Heisenberg group,...
View ArticleTiny oil droplets help measure mechanical forces produced by living cells...
(Phys.org) —As embryonic tissue develops, cells push and pull on each other, and they must do so correctly for the tissue to develop properly. Now scientists at Harvard University have devised the...
View ArticleEnergy harvesting takes wing in merger of engineering and biology
A bird flapping its wings or a fish's deep dive may be pictures of nature in action, but in their elegant simplicity Michael Shafer sees the complex challenges of merging technology with a biological...
View ArticleResearchers create 'ultrasonic hands' that can grip microparticles
(Phys.org) —A team of researchers from the Universities of Bath, Bristol and Dundee has discovered for the first time that ultrasonic waves can be used to grab several microparticles at a time,...
View ArticleHow sperm get into the zona
Before it can fertilize an egg, a sperm has to bind to and bore through an outer egg layer known as the zona pellucida. Despite decades of research, some of the biological mechanisms behind this...
View ArticleCarbon-fiber epoxy honeycombs mimic the material performance of balsa wood
In wind farms across North America and Europe, sleek turbines equipped with state-of-the-art technology convert wind energy into electric power. But tucked inside the blades of these feats of modern...
View ArticleQuantum mechanical calculations reveal the hidden states of enzyme active sites
Enzymes carry out fundamental biological processes such as photosynthesis, nitrogen fixation and respiration, with the help of clusters of metal atoms as "active" sites. But scientists lack basic...
View ArticleNew device could make large biological circuits practical
Researchers have made great progress in recent years in the design and creation of biological circuits—systems that, like electronic circuits, can take a number of different inputs and deliver a...
View ArticleCulprit identified in decline of endangered Missouri River pallid sturgeon
Pallid sturgeon come from a genetic line that has lived on this planet for tens of millions of years; yet it has been decades since anyone has documented any of the enormous fish successfully producing...
View Article3D reconstruction of a vital interaction
Researchers at IBS (CEA/CNRS/Joseph Fourier University) have succeeded for the first time in observing, on an atomic scale, the path taken and the successive changes in form undergone by a disordered...
View ArticleBorrowing from whales to engineer a new fluid sensor
How can a humpback whale and a device that works on the same principle as the clicker that starts your gas grill help an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) fly longer and with more stability?
View ArticleCatch-release-repeat: Study reveals novel technique for handling molecules
Like vast international trading companies, biological systems pick up freight items (in the form of small molecules), transport them from place to place and release them at their proper destination....
View ArticleThe mechanics of life
An interdisciplinary research team formed by Otger Campàs, assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), and colleague Jérome...
View ArticleReducing big data using ideas from quantum theory makes it easier to interpret
Analysing the large volumes of data gathered by modern businesses and public services is problematic. Traditionally, relationships between the different parts of a network have been represented as...
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