Brain-eating amoeba
Reading Time: < 1 minuteIt sounds like something out of a horror movie. Indeed, the brain-eating amoeba will get into the nose and starts to make its way up from the base of the brain all the way back to the brain stem area. So you can imagine this little amoeba starting to crawl, devouring some of the tissue as it goes […]
We can eat our fish and fight climate change too
Reading Time: 3 minutesBY PHILIP A LORING & RATANA CHUENPAGDEE KWAN PHAYAO, a large, crescent moon of a lake in Northern Thailand, is home to about 50 fish species, several hundred small-scale farmers and fishers, and the city of Phayao, where 18,000 people live. The lake has always been important to local people for fishing, but today, the lake’s fisheries are at the centre of the local […]
A step closer to fusion energy
Reading Time: 2 minutesHARNESSING nuclear fusion, which powers the sun and stars, to help meet earth’s energy needs, is a step closer after researchers showed that using two types of imaging can help them assess the safety and reliability of parts used in a fusion energy device. Scientists from Swansea University, Culham Centre for Fusion Energy, ITER in France, and the Max-Planck Institute of Plasma Physics in Germany […]
Mars moon got its grooves from rolling stones, study suggests
Reading Time: 2 minutesA NEW study bolsters the idea that strange grooves crisscrossing the surface of the Martian moon Phobos were made by rolling boulders blasted free from an ancient asteroid impact. The research, published in Planetary and Space Science, uses computer models to simulate the movement of debris from Stickney crater, a huge gash on one end of Phobos’ oblong body. The models show that boulders rolling across the […]
Weirdly shaped mouse sperm can be used to tell species apart
Reading Time: 3 minutesTHINK back to health class and picture a sperm. It’s got a smooth rounded head, with a long skinny tail at the end, right? As it turns out, the sperm from different species of animals have different shapes and, as a new study in the Journal of Mammalogy shows, those shapes can be used to tell apart closely related species. “In this paper, […]
Molecular insights into spider silk
Reading Time: 2 minutesTHEY are lightweight, almost invisible, highly extensible and strong, and of course biodegradable: the threads spiders use to build their webs. In fact, spider silk belongs to the toughest fibres in nature. Based on its low weight it even supersedes high-tech threads like Kevlar or Carbon. Its unique combination of strength and extensibility renders it in particular attractive for industry. Whether in […]
New approach helps mitigating the effect of climate change on sea turtles
Reading Time: 2 minutesNEW research has reported effective conservation strategies that can mitigate the impacts of climate warming on sea turtle nesting success. In the article published by Scientific Reports, a range of experiments were conducted between 2012 and 2017 in St Eustatius Marine Park in the Dutch Caribbean by Swansea University and Wageningen University & Research in association with St Eustatius National Parks, Groningen University and Deakin University in Australia. […]
Agricultural waste drives us closer to greener transport
Reading Time: 2 minutesA TEAM of researchers, led by the University of Ports-mouth, have developed a bio-composite material using date palm fibre biomass (bio-mass is a term that includes waste material from plants, food waste and sewage) that can be used in non-structural parts, such as car bumpers and door linings. The team also involved researchers from the University of Cambridge, INRA (Institut national de la recherche […]
A robust fuel cell that runs on methane at practical temperatures
Reading Time: 2 minutesFUEL CELLS have not been particularly known for their practicality and affordability, but that may have just changed. There’s a new cell that runs on cheap fuel at temperatures comparable to automobile engines and which slashes materials costs. Though the cell is in the lab, it has high potential to someday electrically power homes and perhaps cars, say the researchers at […]
Microplastics found in all sea turtle species
Reading Time: < 1 minuteTESTS on more than 100 sea turles – spanning three oceans and all seven species – have revealed microplastics in the guts of every single turtle. Researchers from the University of Exeter and Plymouth Marine Laboratory, working with the Greenpeace Research Laboratories, looked for synthetic particles (less than 5mm in length) including microplastics in 102 […]