Biological Science: Research Guide

Rocky planets may have gotten their start far earlier than anyone expected, almost as soon as the first stars gave the universe the ingredients to build them. New computer simulations suggest that planetesimals, the solid precursors of planets like Earth, could have formed only about 100 million years after the Big Bang. At that point, [...]

Direct imaging has revealed strong evidence that Betelgeuse is orbited by a companion two to three times as massive as the Sun. For generations, Betelgeuse has appeared to the naked eye as a single reddish point in the constellation Orion. Now astronomers have obtained their strongest evidence yet that the famous star has company. Using [...]

Something in the young universe is shining like a star that should not be possible. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has detected a compact red object so luminous that ordinary nuclear fusion cannot plausibly explain it. Although the source has a star-like appearance and may be surrounded by gas on the scale of the solar [...]

MIT and University of Ferrara researchers created a mathematical blueprint for designing distinguishable non-Gaussian quantum states. Researchers worldwide are working to develop quantum systems for sensing, communications, computing, and control that could outperform today’s technologies. A major challenge is creating quantum states that are stable, measurable, and easy to distinguish, since these states are the [...]

A layer once dismissed as mere support has transformed a tiny photonic chip into a powerful generator of new light frequencies. A laser usually produces one narrow color of light. A device small enough to sit on a fingertip can turn that single input into hundreds of precisely spaced frequencies, creating a tool for measuring [...]

The microscopic magnetic flips behind digital memory could soon use thousands of times less energy, offering a new way to shrink AI’s rapidly growing power footprint. Artificial intelligence is creating and processing data on an enormous scale. Searches, recommendations, generated images, scientific simulations, and large language models all depend on information that must be repeatedly [...]

Researchers have identified shared biological changes across different genetic forms of autism, despite the disorder’s extensive genetic diversity. Hundreds of genes have been associated with autism, but scientists still do not fully understand the molecular and cellular processes that drive the condition. A new study published in Nature, led by Gaia Novarino at the Institute [...]

Ancient microbes appear to have used molybdenum as far back as 3.7 billion years ago, despite the metal being scarce in Earth’s early oceans. Scientists funded by NASA have found that organisms living on Earth more than 3 billion years ago were already using molybdenum, even though the metal was extremely rare in the environment [...]

A decades-old experiment in Victoria’s mountain ash forests is challenging assumptions about the trade-offs between timber production and conservation. Should a forest remain untouched, or should some trees be harvested to sustain nearby communities and economies? Australians have debated these competing approaches for decades, often treating conservation and timber production as mutually exclusive choices. Research [...]

A ghostly ribbon of stars winding around a faint galaxy 115 million light-years away is giving astronomers a rare new way to trace one of the universe’s most elusive ingredients: dark matter. The thin structure surrounds UGC 9050-Dw1, an ultra-diffuse galaxy about 115 million light-years from Earth. Researchers say it is the first known globular [...]

More than 20 robotic landings and a new fleet of commercial spacecraft are helping NASA turn its permanent Moon Base plans into reality. NASA is moving forward with plans for a durable Moon Base near the lunar South Pole, where future missions could support scientific research, technology development, and eventually sustained human activity. A major [...]

The human family tree may be due for a major rewrite. Researchers argue that Australopithecus and Paranthropus should be folded into the genus Homo because new fossils have blurred many of the traits once used to separate them. The proposed shake-up could provide a simpler, more accurate picture of our surprisingly complicated evolutionary past.

Scientists have identified exceptionally rare soft tissue preserved in a 450-million-year-old crinoid fossil, more than 200 million years older than the first dinosaurs. Its delicate tube feet offer a remarkable new window into how some of Earth’s earliest reef animals lived, fed, and evolved.

What if your next meal could help your gut defend itself? Your gut bacteria may be doing more than digesting dinner. They may also be making compounds that help repair the intestine when it is under attack. Researchers at the University of Louisville have uncovered how urolithin A (UroA), a compound produced when certain gut [...]

The liver appears to run metabolism on a surprisingly precise timetable, releasing signaling proteins at specific points in the day. Every day, the liver sends signals that help coordinate metabolism throughout the body, but those signals do not appear at random. Researchers at UT Health San Antonio, the academic health center of The University of [...]

Epigenetic fingerprints may help explain how environmental exposures contribute to colorectal cancer in people under 50. Why is colorectal cancer becoming more common in people under 50 when their tumors often lack obvious genetic differences from those diagnosed later in life? A new study suggests part of the answer may be written not in the [...]

Electronic fluctuations can act as a resonant bridge between normally separate crystal vibrations, offering a new route to study and control ferroaxial quantum states. Symmetry is a basic rule of the natural world. It explains why some objects appear the same after they are rotated, reflected, or changed in other ways. In materials, symmetry helps [...]

A small frog living in a flooded corner of the Amazon has turned out to be something scientists had never formally recognized before. Some species hide in remote places. Others hide in plain sight. In the western Brazilian Amazon, scientists have identified a new frog species, Adenomera varcena, living in forests that are seasonally submerged [...]

A newly identified Congo monkey represents an ancient evolutionary lineage that may already be endangered. A partly hidden monkey appeared in a photograph taken deep in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in 2008. Researchers saw the animal again a decade later, this time clearly enough to begin investigating whether it represented something science had [...]

A hidden genetic threat may trigger atrial fibrillation decades early, raising the risk of stroke before symptoms appear. Atrial fibrillation (AFib) occurs when chaotic electrical signals cause the heart’s upper chambers to beat irregularly and out of sync with the lower chambers. Blood can then collect inside the heart, creating clots that may travel to [...]