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Latest news from laboratory, environment, chemistry, life science and quality control

• The observation of molecular patterns of life
  Fluorescence light microscopy has the unique ability to observe cellular processes over a scale that bridges four orders of magnitude. Yet, its application to living cells is fundamentally limited ...
• New medication also promises protection against future SARS-CoV-2 variants
  Vaccines against the SARS-CoV-2 virus have been made possible by an unprecedented worldwide collaboration. But medications against Covid-19 have as yet seen only partial success. With the support o...
• Einstein wins again
  An international team of researchers from ten countries led by Michael Kramer from the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Bonn, Germany, has conducted a 16-year long experiment to challeng...
• Supposedly similar microplastic particles show different levels of toxicity
  More and more studies worldwide are looking into the effects of microplastics, especially with regard to the environment and health. They often use spherical polystyrene microparticles and have arr...
• Drug candidates against hospital germs
  The increasing spread of resistant germs means that formerly highly effective antibiotics are often not successful anymore in treating infectious diseases. To counteract this development, the team ...
• Cannabis oils: do they really contain what their packaging claims?
  Oils, shampoos and even chewing gum: the substance cannabidiol (CBD), an extract of the hemp plant, is currently very popular and can be found in many everyday products. However, it is not clear wh...
• New copper surface eliminates bacteria in just two minutes
  A new copper surface that kills bacteria more than 100 times faster and more effectively than standard copper could help combat the growing threat of antibiotic-resistant superbugs. The new copp...
• PCR: Activated by light
  DNA polymerases and other enzymes that modify DNA are essential tools in biotechnology and diagnostics. They are the key component for COVID-19 diagnostics by PCR. As useful as they are, DNA proces...
• Life Aaose on Hydrogen energy
  How did the first chemical reactions get started at the origin of life and what was their source of energy? Researchers at the Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) have reconstructed the meta...
• Evidence for a long-sought particle comprising four neutrons
  While all atomic nuclei except hydrogen are composed of protons and neutrons, physicists have been searching for a particle consisting of two, three or four neutrons for over half a century. Experi...
• Resolving the puzzles of graphene superconductivity
  Since superconductivity in three-layered graphene was discovered in September, the physics community has been left puzzled. Now, three months later, physicists from IST Austria together with collea...
• Circular economy: how synthetic rubber raw material can be degraded
  Enzymes are capable of degrading synthetic polyisoprene. The specific conditions for that have now been created and exploited by researchers at Martin Luther-University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) and t...
• New state of matter: crystalline and flowing at the same time
  More than 20 years ago, researchers predicted that with sufficiently high density certain particles of matter would form a new state of matter that features the properties of both crystalline solid...
• How mRNA therapeutics are delivered into cells
  Researchers have found where and how mRNA arrives in a cell to modify or deliver genetic information, a crucial process for the development of novel therapies. In recent years, ribonucleic acid ...
• Catalyst technology converts methane greenhouse gas into useful, valuable chemicals
  Methane, which produces more warming than other greenhouse gases and is the subject of newly announced U.S. emission restrictions, is hard to break down and keep out of the atmosphere. It's not tha...
• Visualising cell structures in three dimensions in mere minutes
  Viral pathogens like the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus change the interior structure of the cells they infect. These changes occur at the level of individual cell components - the organelles - and can pro...
• X-ray beam explores food color protein
  In food products, the natural blues tend to be moody. A fun food colorant with a scientific name - phycocyanin - provides a vivid blue pigment that food companies crave, but it can be unstable when...
• Understanding the texture of food with microscopy and mechanics
  Many delicacies are based on animal products. Artisan products - i.e. those with natural and identical ingredients - often have a different mouthfeel. This is among others also a big challenge in t...
• Corals remove microplastics from ocean waters
  Increasing numbers of tiny particles of plastic, known as microplastics, can be found in the world's oceans. Where these waste particles from car tires, diapers, decaying plastic bags and other eve...
• "Molecular sea of flags": nanostructures self-assemble and cover specific surfaces
  Researchers at the University of Bonn have developed a molecular structure that can cover graphite surfaces with a sea of tiny flagged "flagpoles". The properties of this coating are highly variabl...
• Ozone causes our skin to emit tiny airborne particles
  Air pollution is responsible for seven million of premature deaths around the world every year, according to the World Health Organization. That's roughly the same number of people who die from smo...
• Carbon material with unique structure discovered
  Researchers at the University of Bayreuth, together with partners in China and the USA, have for the first time produced a carbon material that does not have the strictly ordered structures of a cr...