Âé¶¹ÒùÔº - latest science and technology news stories / en-us Âé¶¹ÒùÔº internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Âé¶¹ÒùÔºics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Affordable sensor system detects algal bloom in real time Korea Institute of Civil Engineering and Building Technology has successfully developed a real-time, low-cost algal bloom monitoring system utilizing inexpensive optical sensors and a novel labeling logic. The system achieves higher accuracy than state-of-the-art AI models such as Gradient Boosting and Random Forest. The findings are published in the journal Environmental Monitoring and Assessment. /news/2025-05-sensor-algal-bloom-real.html Environment Thu, 29 May 2025 12:09:15 EDT news667739351 AI framework achieves 95.6% accuracy in predicting landslide-prone zones Landslides pose a significant threat to people and the environment worldwide. Researchers from the Leibniz Center for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF), together with international partners, have developed a new framework that significantly improves landslide prediction using machine learning methods. /news/2025-03-ai-framework-accuracy-landslide-prone.html Earth Sciences Mon, 31 Mar 2025 14:11:03 EDT news662649061 AI-powered analysis uncovers marine herbivores' impact on eelgrass disease spread Eelgrass, a type of flowering seagrass found in temperate zones around the world, provides habitat for many species, protects coastlines, improves water quality, sequesters carbon and supports fishing economies. The foundation of a highly productive marine food web, eelgrass's health is paramount but mysterious. /news/2025-02-ai-powered-analysis-uncovers-marine.html Plants & Animals Ecology Wed, 05 Feb 2025 12:18:05 EST news657980281 Vultures and AI as death detectors: A high-tech approach for wildlife research and conservation In order to use remote locations to record and assess the behavior of wildlife and environmental conditions, the GAIA Initiative developed an artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm that reliably and automatically classifies behaviors of white-backed vultures using animal tag data. /news/2024-11-vultures-ai-death-detectors-high.html Ecology Biotechnology Tue, 19 Nov 2024 15:58:16 EST news651254291 Scientists discover all-optical nuclear magnetic resonance analog with quantum fluids of light Researchers from Skoltech, the University of Warsaw, and the University of Iceland have demonstrated that by optical means it is possible to excite and stir an exciton-polariton condensate, which emits a linearly polarized light with a polarization axis following the stirring direction. /news/2024-11-scientists-optical-nuclear-magnetic-resonance.html Condensed Matter Optics & Photonics Tue, 05 Nov 2024 07:02:05 EST news650012521 Merging AI and human efforts to tackle complex mathematical problems By rapidly analyzing large amounts of data and making accurate predictions, artificial intelligence (AI) tools could help to answer many long-standing research questions. For instance, they could help to identify new materials to fabricate electronics or the patterns in brain activity associated with specific human behaviors. /news/2024-06-merging-ai-human-efforts-tackle.html Mathematics Mon, 24 Jun 2024 08:50:02 EDT news638437425 Biohybrid robot made from flour and oats could act as a biodegradable vector for reforestation Researchers at Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT-Italian Institute of Technology) in collaboration with the University of Freiburg have developed a biohybrid robot, which consists of a flour-based capsule created using 3D microfabrication techniques, and two natural appendages from oat fruit capable of moving in response to air humidity. /news/2024-05-biohybrid-robot-flour-oats-biodegradable.html Ecology Biotechnology Mon, 13 May 2024 12:53:28 EDT news634823606 New AI model designs proteins to deliver gene therapy Researchers at the University of Toronto have used an artificial intelligence framework to redesign a crucial protein involved in the delivery of gene therapy. /news/2024-01-ai-proteins-gene-therapy.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 29 Jan 2024 16:03:33 EST news625766607 Changing landscapes alter 'disease-scapes': Study A new study has highlighted how and when changes to the environment result in animal-borne disease thresholds being breeched, allowing for a better understanding and increased capacity to predict the risk of transmissions. /news/2023-03-landscapes-disease-scapes.html Environment Mon, 13 Mar 2023 12:31:03 EDT news597929461 New technique maps large-scale impacts of fire-induced permafrost thaw in Alaska About 40 percent of interior Alaska is underlain by ice-rich permafrost—permanently frozen grounds made up of soil, gravel and sand—bound together by ice. Certain conditions, such as climate warming, have intensified tundra wildfires which have profound implications for permafrost thaw. /news/2023-02-technique-large-scale-impacts-fire-induced-permafrost.html Earth Sciences Environment Tue, 14 Feb 2023 10:29:16 EST news595592950 Scientists use machine learning to fast-track drug formulation development Scientists at the University of Toronto have successfully tested the use of machine learning models to guide the design of long-acting injectable drug formulations. The potential for machine learning algorithms to accelerate drug formulation could reduce the time and cost associated with drug development, making promising new medicines available faster. /news/2023-01-scientists-machine-fast-track-drug.html Analytical Chemistry Tue, 10 Jan 2023 05:00:01 EST news592505159 Synthetic fibers discovered in Antarctic air, seawater, sediment and sea ice As nations meet in Uruguay to negotiate a new Global Plastics Treaty, marine and forensic scientists publish new results this week that reveal the discovery of synthetic plastic fibers in air, seawater, sediment and sea ice sampled in the Antarctic Weddell Sea. The field research was undertaken during an expedition to discover Sir Ernest Shackleton's ship, the Endurance. The results are published in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science. /news/2022-11-synthetic-fibers-antarctic-air-seawater.html Earth Sciences Environment Wed, 23 Nov 2022 16:14:03 EST news588442441 SARS-CoV-2 alters RNA in infected cells, study reveals For the first time, scientists at the Federal University of São Paulo (UNIFESP) in Brazil have shown that infection by SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, changes the functioning of host cell RNA. They arrived at this conclusion by analyzing 13 datasets obtained during four studies of viral, human and animal cell RNA. /news/2022-11-sars-cov-rna-infected-cells-reveals.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Wed, 09 Nov 2022 14:03:29 EST news587225005 Machine learning enables optimal design of anti-biofouling polymer brush films Polymer brush films consists of monomer chains grown in close proximity on a substrate. The monomers, which look like "bristles" at the nanoscale, form a highly functional and versatile coating, such that it can selectively adsorb or repel a variety of chemicals or biological molecules. For instance, polymer brush films have been used as a scaffold to grow biological cells and as protective anti-biofouling coatings that repel unwanted biological organisms. /news/2022-08-machine-enables-optimal-anti-biofouling-polymer.html Polymers Materials Science Wed, 03 Aug 2022 14:16:15 EDT news578754972 Study demonstrates the quantum speed up of supervised machine learning on a new classification task In recent years, several computer scientists and physicists have been exploring the potential of quantum-enhanced machine learning algorithms. As their name suggests, quantum machine learning approaches combine quantum algorithms with machine learning techniques. /news/2021-08-quantum-machine-classification-task.html General Âé¶¹ÒùÔºics Wed, 25 Aug 2021 13:25:22 EDT news549116705 Structure motif-centric learning framework for inorganic crystalline systems Âé¶¹ÒùÔºical principles can be incorporated in a machine learning architecture as a fundamental setup to develop artificial intelligence for inorganic materials. In a new report now on Science Advances, Huta R. Banjade, and a research team in physics, computer and information science and nanoscience in the U.S. and Belgium proposed structure motifs in inorganic crystals to serve as a central input to a machine learning framework. The team demonstrated how the presence of structure motifs and their connections in a large set of crystalline compounds could be converted into unique vector representations via an unsupervised learning algorithm. They accomplished this by creating a motif-centric leaning framework by combining motif information with atom-based graph neural networks to form an atom-motif dual graph network (AMDNet). The setup accurately predicted the electronic structure of metal oxides such as bandgaps. The work illustrates a method to design graph neural network learning architectures to investigate complex materials beyond atom physical properties. /news/2021-05-motif-centric-framework-inorganic-crystalline.html Materials Science Mon, 10 May 2021 09:40:01 EDT news539852478 Scientists use machine-learning approach to track disease-carrying mosquitoes You might not like mosquitoes, but they like you, says Utah State University biologist Norah Saarman. And where you lead, they will follow. /news/2021-02-scientists-machine-learning-approach-track-disease-carrying.html Ecology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 22 Feb 2021 15:00:03 EST news533222075 Pulse-driven robot: Motion via solitary waves Scientists have recently explored the unique properties of nonlinear waves to facilitate a wide range of applications including impact mitigation, asymmetric transmission, switching and focusing. In a new study now published on Science Advances, Bolei Deng and a team of research scientists at Harvard, CNRS and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering in the U.S. and France harnessed the propagation of nonlinear waves to make flexible structures crawl. They combined bioinspired experimental and theoretical methods to show how such pulse-driven locomotion could reach a maximum efficiency when the initiated pulses were solitons (solitary wave). The simple machine developed in the work could move across a wide range of surfaces and steer onward. The study expanded the variety of possible applications with nonlinear waves to offer a new platform for flexible machines. /news/2020-05-pulse-driven-robot-motion-solitary.html General Âé¶¹ÒùÔºics Fri, 08 May 2020 10:05:08 EDT news508151086 Researchers watch the dynamics of plasmonic skyrmions made from light on ultra-smooth gold platelets for the first time The destructive force of a tornado occurs due to the extremely high rotational speeds in its center, which is called a vortex. Surprisingly, similar effects are predicted for light that travels along an atomically smooth gold surface, which can exhibit angular momentum and vortices. Researchers at the Universities of Stuttgart and Duisburg-Essen and the University of Melbourne (Australia) have now succeeded for the first time in filming these vortex patterns, which are called skyrmions, on the nanometer scale. The journal Science reports this groundbreaking work in its issue of April 24, 2020. /news/2020-04-dynamics-plasmonic-skyrmions-ultra-smooth-gold.html Optics & Photonics Quantum Âé¶¹ÒùÔºics Fri, 24 Apr 2020 07:20:09 EDT news506931605 Computational origami: A universal method to wrap 3-D curved surfaces with nonstretchable materials The counterintuitive question on how to wrap a curved spherical surface using conventionally stiff and non-stretchable or brittle materials, forms the basis of this study. To answer the question, Yu-Ki Lee and a research team in the departments of materials engineering and computer science in the Republic of Korea and the U.S. extended a geometrical design method of computational origami to wrap spherical constructs in a new report now published in Science Advances. The approach provided a robust and reliable method to engineer conformal devices for arbitrary curved surfaces using a computationally designed nonpolyhedral developable net. The computer-aided design transformed two-dimensional (2-D) materials such as silicon (Si) wafers and steel sheets into conformal structures that could fully wrap 3-D structures without fracture or deformation. The computational wrapping method allowed them to develop a design platform to transform conventionally non-stretchable 2-D devices into conformal 3-D curved surfaces. /news/2020-04-origami-universal-method-d-surfaces.html Materials Science Wed, 15 Apr 2020 10:20:02 EDT news506163557 A deep learning-based model DeepSpCas9 to predict SpCas9 activity In a new report on Science Advances, Hui Kwon Kim and interdisciplinary researchers at the departments of Pharmacology, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Medical Sciences, Nanomedicine and Bioinformatics in the Republic of Korea, evaluated the activities of SpCas9; a bacterial RNA-guided Cas9 endonuclease variant (a bacterial enzyme that cuts DNA for genome editing) from Streptococcus pyogenes. They used a high-throughput approach with 12,832 target sequences based on a human cell library to build a deep learning model and predict the activity of SpCas9. /news/2019-11-deep-learning-based-deepspcas9-spcas9.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Fri, 22 Nov 2019 09:30:01 EST news493544298 Machine learning-assisted molecular design for high-performance organic photovoltaic materials To synthesize high-performance materials for organic photovoltaics (OPVs) that convert solar radiation into direct current, materials scientists must meaningfully establish the relationship between chemical structures and their photovoltaic properties. In a new study on Science Advances, Wenbo Sun and a team including researchers from the School of Energy and Power Engineering, School of Automation, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering and Green and Intelligent Technology, established a new database of more than 1,700 donor materials using existing literature reports. They used supervised learning with machine learning models to build structure-property relationships and fast screen OPV materials using a variety of inputs for different ML algorithms. /news/2019-11-machine-learning-assisted-molecular-high-performance-photovoltaic.html Materials Science Tue, 19 Nov 2019 09:40:01 EST news493369335 Machine learning tool can predict viral reservoirs in the animal kingdom Many deadly and newly emerging viruses like Ebola and Zika circulate in wild animal and insect communities long before spreading to humans and causing severe disease. However, finding these natural virus hosts – which could help prevent the spread to humans – currently poses an enormous challenge for scientists. /news/2018-11-machine-tool-viral-reservoirs-animal.html Plants & Animals Molecular & Computational biology Fri, 02 Nov 2018 06:58:02 EDT news460360675 Using bloodstains at crime scenes to determine age of a suspect or victim From the spatter analysis made famous in the TV show Dexter to the frequent DNA profiling of CSI and the real cases covered in the FBI Files, blood tests are ubiquitous in forensic science. Now, researchers report in ACS Central Science that a new blood test, which could be performed at a crime scene, could help determine the age of a suspect or victim within just an hour. /news/2018-06-bloodstains-crime-scenes-age-victim.html Analytical Chemistry Wed, 20 Jun 2018 09:06:29 EDT news448704380 How bacteria behave differently in humans compared to the lab Most of what we know today about deadly bacteria such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa was obtained from studies done in laboratory settings. Research reported May 14 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that this laboratory-based information may have important limits for predicting how these bugs behave once they've invaded humans. /news/2018-05-bacteria-differently-humans-lab.html Cell & Microbiology Tue, 22 May 2018 09:19:26 EDT news446199553 Neural networks explained In the past 10 years, the best-performing artificial-intelligence systems—such as the speech recognizers on smartphones or Google's latest automatic translator—have resulted from a technique called "deep learning." /news/2017-04-neural-networks.html Computer Sciences Mon, 17 Apr 2017 07:50:02 EDT news411633970 Computer taught to intuitively predict chemical properties of molecules Scientists from MIPT's Research Center for Molecular Mechanisms of Aging and Age-Related Diseases, together with Inria research center, Grenoble, France, have developed a software package called Knodle to determine an atom's hybridization, bond orders and functional groups' annotation in molecules. The program streamlines one of the stages of developing new drugs. A paper on the new development has been published in the Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling. /news/2016-10-taught-intuitively-chemical-properties-molecules.html Materials Science Fri, 14 Oct 2016 12:21:02 EDT news395666451 Computers learn to spot deadly bacteria Machine learning can predict strains of bacteria likely to cause food poisoning outbreaks, research has found. /news/2016-09-deadly-bacteria.html Cell & Microbiology Wed, 21 Sep 2016 09:03:39 EDT news393667381 Research advances security and trust in reconfigurable devices A research team at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) is studying a range of security challenges involving programmable logic devices – in particular, field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). /news/2015-04-advances-reconfigurable-devices.html Electronics & Semiconductors Wed, 29 Apr 2015 07:50:02 EDT news349509887 New method for non-invasive prostate cancer screening Cancer screening is a critical approach for preventing cancer deaths because cases caught early are often more treatable. But while there are already existing ways to screen for different types of cancer, there is a great need for even more safe, cheap and effective methods to save even more lives. /news/2014-09-method-non-invasive-prostate-cancer-screening.html General Âé¶¹ÒùÔºics Tue, 02 Sep 2014 11:00:03 EDT news328874084