https://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. When biologists study cooperation in animals, they usually offer just a single task at a time. But what happens when animals can choose among several opportunities to work together? Biologists at Utrecht University discovered that this can make a remarkable difference. https://phys.org/news/2026-06-animal-behavior-distorted-view-cooperation.html Plants & Animals Fri, 26 Jun 2026 10:20:03 EDT news701684942 Inequality is not unique to human groups and societies. Individuals with relatively little power possess a variety of behavioral strategies to counterbalance or regulate power differences. In humans, these strategies include criticism, ridicule, disobedience, or even the expulsion or execution of powerful individuals. Similar inequality-reducing behaviors, which carry comparable social costs, are also found in animal societies. https://phys.org/news/2026-06-animals-behaviors-alphas.html Plants & Animals Tue, 09 Jun 2026 15:00:01 EDT news700229941 There's a conundrum that has perplexed biologists since Charles Darwin himself. Why do some exotic species take off as invasive pests while others don't? https://phys.org/news/2026-05-vast-botanical-darwin-puzzle-exotic.html Evolution Fri, 29 May 2026 13:40:04 EDT news699273241 For decades, historians have generally agreed that the progress of small villages as they evolved into cities came at the price of widening inequality. A small group of leaders, kings and priests, would inevitably seize control of the wealth and the gap between rich and poor would grow. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-year-city-defied-history-equal.html Archaeology Tue, 19 May 2026 14:10:01 EDT news698414541 Researchers have recently found a new way to summon useful structures in magnetic materials using light, heat, and electric fields. This new method, described in a new study published in Physical Review Letters, may lead to more energy-efficient and flexible technologies for data storage and optical devices. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-liquid-crystal-demand-skyrmions-room.html Condensed Matter Wed, 13 May 2026 12:40:02 EDT news697890165 In many primate species, males are much larger than their female counterparts, which is generally attributed to male competition for mates (sexual selection). But bigger bodies may not just be about alpha males defeating rivals. They could also come about because of competition between neighboring social groups, according to a new study published in the journal Biology Letters. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-rivalry-neighboring-groups-key-driver.html Plants & Animals Wed, 13 May 2026 10:30:01 EDT news697886163 A new study on ancient societies from around the world is rewriting what we thought we knew about democracy. A team of researchers analyzed archaeological and historical evidence from 31 ancient societies across Europe, Asia, and the Americas and found that shared, inclusive governance was far more common than was once believed. The findings are published in the journal Science Advances. https://phys.org/news/2026-03-democracy-deep-global-roots-greece.html Archaeology Wed, 18 Mar 2026 14:00:04 EDT news693053822 In recent years, Nepal has been heralded as a global leader in community-based forest conservation. By handing over nearly a third of its nationally owned forest to local villagers in the 1980s, the country reversed years of deforestation and effectively doubled its forest cover between 1992 and 2016. For many in rural Nepal, these forests are a lifeline, providing essential subsistence resources such as firewood for cooking and fodder for livestock. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-nepal-green-success-story-hidden.html Environment Mon, 26 Jan 2026 11:21:32 EST news688648861 That vibrant carpet of pink and yellow flowers blanketing Mediterranean cliffs might look beautiful in holiday photos on a social media feed. But scientists have discovered these same Instagram snapshots are revealing how one of the world's most destructive coastal plants is taking over new environments by extending its flowering season and threatening native biodiversity. https://phys.org/news/2025-10-instagram-photos-scientists-track-invasive.html Plants & Animals Wed, 15 Oct 2025 09:09:04 EDT news679738142 New fossil research shows how human impacts, particularly through the rise of agriculture and livestock, have disrupted natural mammal communities as profoundly as the Ice Age extinctions. https://phys.org/news/2025-09-humans-reshaped-animal-world-years.html Ecology Tue, 30 Sep 2025 09:20:03 EDT news678442717 A newly published study has found that males of some of our earliest known ancestors were significantly larger than females. The pronounced difference in body size present in both Australopithecus afarensis (the East African species that includes the famous fossil "Lucy") and A. africanus (a closely related southern African species) suggests the ancient hominins may have lived in social systems marked by intense competition among males, leading to the substantial size disparity among the sexes. https://phys.org/news/2025-07-early-human-ancestors-extreme-size.html Evolution Tue, 29 Jul 2025 13:36:39 EDT news673014991 Solar cells and computer chips need silicon layers that are as perfect as possible. Every imperfection in the crystalline structure increases the risk of reduced efficiency or defective switching processes. https://phys.org/news/2025-07-cosmic-chips-cooling-triggers-phase.html Condensed Matter Tue, 22 Jul 2025 07:30:05 EDT news672386224 Biologically speaking, female and male bonobos have a weird relationship. First, there's the sex. It's the females who decide when and with whom they mate. They easily parry unwanted sexual advances—and the males know better than to force the issue. https://phys.org/news/2025-04-wild-bonobos-reveals-females-team.html Plants & Animals Thu, 24 Apr 2025 11:00:01 EDT news664695602 A new study led by Amy Bogaard, Professor of European Archaeology, School of Archaeology, University of Oxford, reveals that high wealth inequality in human societies over the past 10,000 years was encouraged by land-hungry farming practices. Where land became scarce, wealth inequality often grew among households, but where land was abundant, wealth was more equally distributed. https://phys.org/news/2025-04-agricultural-wealth-inequality-years.html Archaeology Tue, 15 Apr 2025 10:50:01 EDT news663931973 If the archaeological record has been correctly interpreted, stone alignments in Tanzania's Olduvai Gorge are remnants of shelters built 1.7 million years ago by Homo habilis, an extinct species representing one of the earliest branches of humanity's family tree. https://phys.org/news/2025-04-archaeological-database-reveals-links-housing.html Archaeology Tue, 15 Apr 2025 08:10:01 EDT news663865283 An international team led by Rutgers University-New Brunswick researchers has merged two lab-synthesized materials into a synthetic quantum structure once thought impossible to exist and produced an exotic structure expected to provide insights that could lead to new materials at the core of quantum computing. https://phys.org/news/2025-04-scientists-merge-impossible-materials-artificial.html Nanophysics Tue, 01 Apr 2025 11:49:05 EDT news662726941 Scientists don't call it the "Great Dying" for nothing. About 252 million years ago, upward of 80% of all marine species vanished during the end-Permian mass extinction—the most extreme event of its kind in Earth's history. https://phys.org/news/2025-03-survivors-spanned-globe-earth-biggest.html Ecology Wed, 26 Mar 2025 14:33:05 EDT news662218381 Researchers from Würzburg have experimentally demonstrated a quantum tornado for the first time by refining an established method. In the quantum semimetal tantalum arsenide (TaAs), electrons in momentum space behave like a swirling vortex. This quantum phenomenon was first predicted eight years ago by a Dresden-based founding member of the Cluster of Excellence ct.qmat. https://phys.org/news/2025-03-quantum-tornadoes-momentum-space-experimental.html Condensed Matter Mon, 10 Mar 2025 11:24:11 EDT news660824646 A few things come to mind when we imagine the alpha male type. They're the ones calling the shots, who get all the girls. But there's a downside to being a strong and powerful alpha stud—at least if you're a baboon. https://phys.org/news/2025-01-ladies-price-alpha-male-baboons.html Plants & Animals Wed, 22 Jan 2025 17:09:04 EST news656788141 Physicists have long theorized the existence of a unique state of matter known as a quantum spin liquid. In this state, magnetic particles do not settle into an orderly pattern, even at absolute zero temperature. Instead, they remain in a constantly fluctuating, entangled state. https://phys.org/news/2024-12-physicists-uncover-strong-interactions-quantum.html Quantum Physics Thu, 12 Dec 2024 13:03:04 EST news653230981 As physicists continue their struggle to find and explain the origin of dark matter, the approximately 80% of the matter in the universe that we can't see and so far haven't been able to detect, researchers have now proposed a model where it is produced before the Big Bang. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-cosmological-dark-production-pre-big.html Astronomy Sat, 30 Nov 2024 11:00:01 EST news652096488 Researchers at the Complexity Science Hub and Santa Fe Institute have developed a model to calculate how quickly or slowly an organism should ideally learn in its surroundings. An organism's ideal learning rate depends on the pace of environmental change and its life cycle, they say. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-ideal-based-life.html Plants & Animals Thu, 31 Oct 2024 14:34:03 EDT news649604041 Orbital angular momentum monopoles have been the subject of great theoretical interest as they offer major practical advantages for the emerging field of orbitronics, a potential energy-efficient alternative to traditional electronics. Now, through a combination of robust theory and experiments at the Swiss Light Source SLS at Paul Scherrer Institute PSI, their existence has been demonstrated. The discovery is published in the journal Nature Physics. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-orbital-angular-momentum-monopoles-discovery.html General Physics Fri, 27 Sep 2024 05:00:01 EDT news646589010 If you'd rather be watching TV on your couch than dancing at the club, you might have something in common with aging griffon vultures. New research shows that young griffon vultures move frequently between sleeping sites in different locations and interact with many friends but get set in their ways as they age, roosting in the same spots with the same individuals. As moving between roosts becomes a grind, older vultures follow the same path, establishing movement routines that are not seen in young vultures. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-people-vultures-ways-friends-age.html Plants & Animals Thu, 29 Aug 2024 13:08:04 EDT news644155682 New research using a decommissioned section of the beam pipe from the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN has brought scientists closer than ever before to test whether magnetic monopoles exist. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-large-hadron-collider-pipe-elusive.html General Physics Fri, 16 Aug 2024 09:03:04 EDT news643017782 Despite its immense success in describing the fundamental building blocks of matter and their interactions, the Standard Model of particle physics is known to be incomplete. Experiments around the globe and in space are therefore searching for signs of new physics phenomena that would guide physicists towards a more comprehensive theory. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-atlas-probes-uncharted-territory-lhc.html General Physics Fri, 26 Jul 2024 09:08:34 EDT news641203708 An important part of physics research is examining why theoretical calculations and experimental results sometimes don't match. A recent experiment in Germany studied the helium-4 nucleus, also known as an alpha particle. Helium-4 consists of only two protons and two neutrons, making it relatively easy to describe using theoretical calculations. This makes it useful for precise tests of nuclear physics. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-alpha-particle-international-team-validates.html General Physics Thu, 25 Jul 2024 10:36:02 EDT news641122561 Blue and great tits recall what they have eaten in the past, where they found the food and when they found it, a new study shows. In the first experiment of its kind to involve wild animals, blue and great tits demonstrated 'episodic-like' memory to cope with changes in food availability when foraging. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-blue-great-tits-deploy-powerful.html Plants & Animals Wed, 03 Jul 2024 11:00:01 EDT news639213901 Magnetic monopoles are elementary particles with isolated magnetic charges in three dimensions. In other words, they behave as isolated north or south poles of a magnet. Magnetic monopoles have attracted continuous research interest since physicist Paul Dirac's first proposal in 1931. However, real magnetic monopoles have not yet been observed and their existence remains an open question. On the other hand, scientists have discovered quasi-particles that mathematically behave as magnetic monopoles in condensed matter systems, resulting in interesting phenomena. https://phys.org/news/2024-06-unveil-dynamical-nature-emergent-magnetic.html Condensed Matter Wed, 12 Jun 2024 11:42:03 EDT news637411321 Magpies that are aggressive towards other members of their group tend to be not so smart, according to researchers at The University of Western Australia. https://phys.org/news/2024-06-magpies-tend-intelligent.html Plants & Animals Wed, 05 Jun 2024 10:46:03 EDT news636803161