http://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Astrophysicists at the University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain) and the Byurakan Observatory (Armenia) have detected a star of low luminosity which within a matter of moments gave off a flare so strong that it became almost 15 times brighter. The star in question is the flare star WX UMa. http://phys.org/news290437956.html Space & Earth Fri, 14 Jun 2013 14:13:02 EST news290437956 A new set of long-term climate records based on cave stalagmites collected from tropical Borneo shows that the western tropical Pacific responded very differently than other regions of the globe to abrupt climate change events. The 100,000-year climate record adds to data on past climate events, and may help scientists assess models designed to predict how the Earth's climate will respond in the future. http://phys.org/news289737797.html Space & Earth Thu, 06 Jun 2013 14:00:06 EST news289737797 Tree cover in the tropics will likely change in surprising ways as climate change increases the frequency of extreme rainfall events, according to a study by scientists from Wageningen University published today in Nature Climate Change. http://phys.org/news289462020.html Space & Earth Mon, 03 Jun 2013 07:07:07 EST news289462020 (Phys.org) —Titanic forces in the Earth's crust explain why the abundance and richness of corals varies dramatically across the vast expanse of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, a world-first study from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (CoECRS) has found. http://phys.org/news288426841.html Biology Wed, 22 May 2013 07:50:05 EST news288426841 (Phys.org) —Mathematicians from Queen Mary, University of London will bring researchers one-step closer to understanding how the structure of the brain relates to its function in two recently published studies. http://phys.org/news286702431.html Physics Thu, 02 May 2013 08:34:03 EST news286702431 (Phys.org)—Comet explosions did not end the prehistoric human culture, known as Clovis, in North America 13,000 years ago, according to research published in the journal Geophysical Monograph Series. http://phys.org/news278759528.html Space & Earth Wed, 30 Jan 2013 09:14:05 EST news278759528 (Phys.org)—Researchers using computer simulations and modeling have come up with two possible explanations for the phenomenon known as true polar wandering. The team led by Jessica Creveling of Harvard University, suggest in their paper published in the journal Nature, that dramatic shifts in the Earth's surface over millions of years, and then a return to the previous state, can be explained by bulging at the equator and elasticity of the planets outer shell. http://phys.org/news271578233.html Space & Earth Thu, 08 Nov 2012 06:50:02 EST news271578233 A command doctrine used by the US military and NATO designed to warn personnel of Nuclear, Chemical and Biological (NBC) hazards could be overly conservative and degrade war fighting effectiveness or, under certain conditions, risk lives because it is susceptible to changes in wind direction and speed that happen in periods shorter than its two-hourly updates. http://phys.org/news269688679.html Space & Earth Wed, 17 Oct 2012 10:31:30 EST news269688679 Scientists have designed a simple system to study how electrons travel through energy barriers instead of over them. http://phys.org/news263039761.html Physics Wed, 01 Aug 2012 13:00:14 EST news263039761 Mathematicians at UC Davis have come up with a new way to crinkle up the fabric of space-time -- at least in theory. http://phys.org/news261922793.html Other Sciences Thu, 19 Jul 2012 13:21:27 EST news261922793 The ability to control the flow of electrons using engineered materials is fundamental to the information technology revolution, yet many properties of matter are still unclear. Now a University of Alberta researcher is closer to understanding some of the exotic electronic properties in matter using optical analogues. http://phys.org/news253601086.html Physics Sat, 14 Apr 2012 05:45:04 EST news253601086 Scientists have long speculated about why there is a large change in the strength of rocks that lie at the boundary between two layers immediately under Earth's crust: the lithosphere and underlying asthenosphere. Understanding this boundary is central to our knowledge of plate tectonics and thus the formation and evolution of our planet as we know it today. A new technique for observing this transition, particularly in the portion of Earth's mantle that lies beneath the Pacific Ocean basin, has led Carnegie and NASA Goddard scientist Nick Schmerr to new insight on the origins of the lithosphere and asthenosphere. His work is published March 23 in Science. http://phys.org/news251636246.html Space & Earth Thu, 22 Mar 2012 14:00:05 EST news251636246 A team of Spanish researchers have used different geological samples, extracted from the Enol lake in Asturias, to show that the Holocene, a period that started 11,600 years ago, did not have a climate as stable as was believed. http://phys.org/news247486307.html Space & Earth Fri, 03 Feb 2012 10:57:51 EST news247486307 Two decades after the United Nations established the Framework Convention on Climate Change in order to "prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system", the Arctic shows the first signs of a dangerous climate change. A team of researchers led by CSIC assures so in an article published in the latest issue of the Nature Climate Change magazine. http://phys.org/news247163080.html Space & Earth Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:25:31 EST news247163080 (PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers from the University of Birmingham and other UK universities describe the evolution and assembly of a stream ecosystem in South East Alaska in new de-glaciated terrain, from early insect and crustacean invaders to the arrival of migrating salmon from the ocean, in a paper published in the journal Ecology this month (October). http://phys.org/news238145447.html Space & Earth Tue, 18 Oct 2011 08:32:34 EST news238145447 (PhysOrg.com) -- What do abrupt changes in ocean circulation and Earth's climate, shifts in wildlife populations and ecosystems, the global finance market and its system-wide crashes, and asthma attacks and epileptic seizures have in common? http://phys.org/news171117206.html Biology Wed, 02 Sep 2009 13:34:19 EST news171117206 Some of these responses, including insect outbreaks, wildfire, and forest dieback, may adversely affect people as well as ecosystems and their plants and animals. http://phys.org/news151334006.html Space & Earth Fri, 16 Jan 2009 13:13:26 EST news151334006