An international team of astrophysicists has made a puzzling discovery while analyzing certain star clusters. The finding challenges Newton’s laws of gravity, the researchers write in their publication. Instead, the observations are consistent with the predictions of an alternative theory of gravity. However, this is controversial among experts. The results have now been published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. The University of Bonn played a major role in the study....

Newly discovered asteroid 2013 TV135 made a close approach to Earth on September 16, when it came within about 4.2 million miles (6.7 million kilometers). The asteroid is initially estimated to be about 1,300 feet (400 meters) in size and its orbit carries it as far out as about three quarters of the distance to Jupiter’s orbit and as close to the sun as Earth’s orbit. It was discovered on October 8, 2013, by astronomers working at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory in Ukraine....

Our sun is constantly changing. It goes through cycles of activity – swinging between times of relative calm and times when frequent explosions on its surface can fling light, particles and energy out into space. This activity cycle peaks approximately every 11 years. New research shows evidence of a shorter time cycle as well, with activity waxing and waning over the course of about 330 days. Understanding when to expect such bursts of solar activity is crucial to successfully forecast the sun’s eruptions, which can drive solar storms at Earth....

A barren landscape shaped by water The Holden Basin* is part of a series of channels and sinks called the Uzboi-Ladon-Morava (ULM) outflow system. This may have once drained up to 9% of the Martian surface. The ULM outflow system is a fascinating subject for Mars orbiters and rovers to investigate in further detail due to its complicated history. In the maps above and directly below, we see the Holden Basin and the full ULM outflow system in context....

Countries with international travel restrictions suffered fewer COVID-19 fatalities. Travel restrictions implemented early on in the pandemic have been crucial in slowing the spread of the coronavirus and keeping death rates low. A new study published by Ruud Koopmans, director at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center, shows that countries that had travel restrictions in place by February or early March suffered fewer COVID-19 fatalities by mid-year than countries that acted later....

Just as Australian researchers are finding colorful new bee species, some of them are already showing signs of exposure to environmental changes. Flinders University Ph.D. candidate James Dorey — whose macrophotography has captured some of Fiji’s newest bee species — says the naming of nine new species gives researchers an opportunity to highlight the risks. “Homalictus terminalis is named so to indicate that, like many Fijian bees, it is nearing its limit and is at risk of climate-related extinction,” he says....

The continued increase in COVID-19 infection around the world has led scientists from many different fields, including biomedicine, epidemiology, virology, fluid dynamics, aerosol physics, and public policy, to study the dynamics of airborne transmission. In Physics of Fluids, by AIP Publishing, researchers from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Mississippi used a model to understand airborne transmission that is designed to be accessible to a wide range of people, including nonscientists....

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has led many researchers to study airborne droplet transmission in different conditions and environments. The latest studies are starting to incorporate important aspects of fluid physics to deepen our understanding of viral transmission. In a new paper in Physics of Fluids, by AIP Publishing, researchers from A*STAR’s Institute of High Performance Computing conducted a numerical study on droplet dispersion using high fidelity air flow simulation. The scientists found a single 100-micrometer cough droplet under wind speed of 2 meters per second can travel up to 6....

Among older adults with obesity, combining aerobic exercise with moderate reductions in total daily calories led to greater improvements in vascular health compared to exercise alone.Reducing calorie intake by approximately 250 calories per day may lead to significant weight loss and improve vascular health in older adults with obesity. Cutting just 250 calories a day with moderate exercise reaped bigger rewards than exercise alone for older, obese adults. Among older adults with obesity, combining aerobic exercise with a moderate reduction in daily calories resulted in greater improvements in aortic stiffness (a measure of vascular health, which impacts cardiovascular disease), compared to exercise only or to exercise plus a more restrictive diet, according to new research published today in the American Heart Association’s flagship journal Circulation....

The researchers will present their results today at the American Chemical Society (ACS) Fall 2019 National Meeting & Exposition. ACS, the world’s largest scientific society, is holding the meeting in San Diego through Thursday, August 29, 2019. It features more than 9,500 presentations on a wide range of science topics. “Millions of tons of polyurethanes are produced every day, and they’re widely used in foams, plastics, sneakers, insulation, and other products,” says Ephraim Morado, a doctoral student who is presenting the work at the meeting....

A new method developed by MIT researchers uses standard 3-D printers to produce functioning devices with the electronics already embedded inside. The devices are made of fibers containing multiple interconnected materials, which can light up, sense their surroundings, store energy, or perform other actions. The new 3-D printing method is described in the journal Nature Communication, in a paper by MIT doctoral student Gabriel Loke, professors John Joannopoulos and Yoel Fink, and four others at MIT and elsewhere....

Eggs are an ancient symbol of new life, associated with pagan festivals celebrating spring. Decorating eggs for Easter is a tradition that dates back to the 13th century. One explanation suggests that eggs were formerly a forbidden food during Lent, so people would decorate them to mark the end of penance and fasting, and eat them on Easter as a celebration. The appetite for eggs is also apparent in modern-day architecture and design....

The healthcare market is failing to support new antibiotics used to treat some of the world’s most dangerous, drug-resistant “superbugs,” according to a new analysis by University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine infectious disease scientists. In a study published yesterday (October 7, 2019) in Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, a journal of the American Society for Microbiology, investigators used nationwide prescription data to determine that the current annual U.S. sales of new antibiotics to treat carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE), one of the world’s most insidious drug-resistant bacteria, is about $101 million annually — significantly short of the $1 billion believed to be necessary to assure the financial viability of a new antibiotic....

The researchers from Gothenburg detailed their findings in a study that was recently published in Nature Communications. It has to do with a protein that binds genetic material and, as the researchers have recently shown, is also in charge of characteristics that regulate tumor growth. The protein, known as HnRNPK, binds to messenger RNA (mRNA), which is encoded by the genes IER3 and IER3-AS1. These genes are highly active in several types of cancer....

USC study implicates flavored e-cigs in the teen vaping epidemic, with sweet and fruity e-cigs associated with heavier use. A University of Southern California (USC) study has found that teens who vape candy- or fruit-flavored e-cigarettes are more likely to stick with the habit and vape more heavily, implicating flavors in the teen vaping epidemic. The study, published online on October 28, 2019, in the journal Pediatrics, the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, could bolster calls for federal restrictions on flavored e-cigs....

Now, California Institute of Technology (Caltech) researchers have developed a database containing global data on how humans have impacted the planet. The Human Impacts Database is designed to be accessible to scientists, policymakers, and everyday citizens, and provides information ranging from global plastic production (400 billion kilograms per year), to the number of cattle on Earth (about 1.6 billion), to global annual mean sea level rise (approximately 3.4 millimeters per year)....

“All animals that have limbs with hands and feet and fingers and toes [that is, tetrapods] arose from animals that were fish with fins that lived in the water,” explained Stephanie E. Pierce, associate professor of organismic and evolutionary biology and curator of vertebrate paleontology at Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ). “One of the big puzzles is, how did that happen?” In collaboration with lead authors Borja Esteve-Altava and John Hutchinson at London’s Royal Veterinary College, Pierce and her colleagues present new research that may explain how....

In a study published this week in the journal Angewandte Chemie, the team reports that sodium-containing compounds found in common household ingredients are able to catalyze the growth of carbon nanotubes, or CNTs, at much lower temperatures than traditional catalysts require. The researchers say that sodium may make it possible for carbon nanotubes to be grown on a host of lower-temperature materials, such as polymers, which normally melt under the high temperatures needed for traditional CNT growth....

Concerns began when the U.S. government auctioned part of the C-band spectrum to wireless carriers in 2021 for US$81 billion. The carriers are using C-band spectrum to provide 5G service at full speed, 10 times the speed of 4G networks. The C-band spectrum is close to the frequencies used by key electronics that aircraft rely on to land safely. Here’s why that can be a problem. Keeping order on the spectrum Wireless signals are carried by radio waves....

How did the Earth and Moon form? There are several major theories, most involving a giant impact. They range from a scenario where the impacting object strikes the newly formed Earth with a glancing blow and then escapes, through to one where the collision is so energetic that both the impactor and the Earth are vaporized. Now researchers at the University of Leeds and the University of Chicago have analyzed the dynamics of fluids and electrically conducting fluids....