Allowing females to mate with multiple males, rather than just one, could help make species more resistant to extinction, University of East Anglia research shows. A new study reveals that when females have multiple males to mate with, their offspring inherit significantly fewer harmful genetic mutations. This, in turn, makes the entire population healthier and less likely to die out.
Kinesin is a molecular motor responsible for hauling essential cargoes within cells by walking step by step along filamentous tracks known as microtubules. To move efficiently and avoid falling off, the motor's two feet must coordinate their stepping in a precise direction. Scientists have known that a connecting segment called the neck region is crucial for coordinating this motion. However, its exact three-dimensional structure and how it physically interacts with the microtubule track have remained a mystery because of the limitations of current imaging techniques.
The historic droughts of 2023 and 2024 in the Amazon reduced river flows and altered the region's rainfall composition. Daily monitoring in Manaus, the capital of the Brazilian state of Amazonas, revealed these changes through the use of isotopes, which act as a kind of water "fingerprint." This method demonstrated how El Niño and warming in the North Atlantic affected the origin of moisture and precipitation dynamics.
On a mostly flat plain an hour north of Stockholm lies a collection of large burial mounds dating from an ancient culture at least 2,500 years old. These people were not Vikings; they were northern Germanic Goths, pagan polytheists worshiping the precursors of Odin, Freyr and Thor.
Research underway in the lab of Rebecca Alexander, a professor in Wake Forest University's Department of Chemistry, is shedding light on an unusual human bacterium, Mycoplasma penetrans. Alexander's work to understand how and why this unique pathogen acts as it does could one day lead to new classes of drugs that better target illnesses associated with this particular pathogen, as well as others that act similarly.
Anna Sheinberg, Ph.D. candidate in chemistry, is working with fellow researchers in Trinity College's Chemistry Department and at the Nasher Museum of Art to uncover new information about some of the ancient dyed textiles in the Nasher's collection.
How much more income does a two-person household need than a person living alone? The answer is not simply twice as much. Two people need more food and other necessities, but they can also share expenses such as housing. This means that as a household grows, the income needed to maintain the same standard of living increases—but usually by less than the number of people in the household.
Unlike an animal cell, a plant cell can't crawl or migrate. It's locked inside a rigid wall, cemented to its neighbors for life. A cell born at the center of a young fruit will still be there when that fruit ripens.
More than 171 million students globally—or 1 in 10—from preprimary to upper secondary age had their schooling disrupted by climate hazards in 2025, according to a new analysis released by UNICEF today.
Parents often learn the hard way that to make it anywhere on time, they should calculate how much time they think they need to get ready—and double it.
Within tiny halos of light clinging to a vanishingly thin wisp of optical fiber, scientist Jongmin Lee guides atoms like marbles through a narrow pipe. Rock the fiber and the atoms shift side by side; they just don't fall off. But don't be deceived by the seemingly delicate nature of his experiment. Lee is exploring how to measure motion precisely in rough-and-tumble environments.
An entomologist at the University of Missouri has discovered two saucer bug species previously unknown to science, adding to our understanding of Earth's biodiversity.
Researchers from the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research & Technology's (SMART) Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) interdisciplinary research group, alongside collaborators from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Nanyang Technological University (NTU Singapore), and institutions in the United States, Poland and France, have discovered aminovaleramididine synthetase (AvaS), the first identified pyridoxal phosphate (PLP)-dependent enzyme responsible for producing a chemical modification linked to how bacteria respond to metabolic stress.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, we wore masks and kept 2 meters (6.6 feet) apart in an effort to reduce the spread of the tiny droplets we release into the air with every breath, conversation or cough. The main goal was to reduce the number of virus particles—known as virions—to which we were exposed. For each virus, a person must be exposed to a minimum infectious dose to develop disease, and in many cases, the larger the dose, the more severe the illness.
Researchers have demonstrated that a naturally occurring mineral can serve as a low-loss optical material for next-generation broadband all–van der Waals nanophotonic components.
Light in the mid-infrared (mid-IR) portion of the electromagnetic spectrum plays a key role in modern sensing. Because molecules interact with this kind of light in specific ways, researchers use technologies like mid-IR spectroscopy to identify biological materials, drugs and pollutants. Mid-IR light can also serve as a carrier of information in free-space optical communications, where data are transmitted through the air without using cables or fibers. Better control of mid-IR light could therefore lead to more sensitive detectors and faster communications.
If you want to drum up support for environmental action, putting climate change front and center may not always be the best strategy. A new study by Aya Takagi and Ryosuke Nakadai of Yokohama National University suggests that support for policies that emphasize biodiversity conservation, including conservation measures that also contribute to climate goals, may be less divided along cultural lines than measures explicitly associated with climate change.
Some 550 million years ago, Earth looked very different than it does today. The Southern Hemisphere was dominated by an enormous single continent known as Gondwana.
A University of the Basque Country-EHU research group has determined the causes of a 255 m (837 feet) crustal uplift of the Atlantic slope and a 167 m (548 feet) uplift of the Mediterranean slope, as well as the development of rivers in these areas.
England's approach to teaching young people about pornography may be doing more harm than good, according to new research from the University of Surrey. A new study argues that fear-based education is failing to reflect how teenagers actually encounter sexual media.