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. By rapidly twisting a microscopically small tip back and forth, researchers at the University of Maryland (UMD) have unlocked a new way to detect subtle changes on the surface of a material flexing in response to infrared light. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-high-res-view-2d-materials.html Nanomaterials Fri, 07 Aug 2026 18:00:03 EDT news705327588 Supercontinuum light sources—often called "white lasers" because they emit a broad, continuous rainbow of colors—are essential tools for everything from advanced medical imaging to environmental gas detection. However, researchers have historically faced a frustrating trade-off: A broad spectrum comes at the expense of high fluctuations, which has effectively limited their use. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-elegant-modification-range-noise-white.html Optics & Photonics Thu, 06 Aug 2026 19:00:03 EDT news705252541 For the first time, scientists have observed a three-dimensional woven structure forming naturally inside a crystal, revealing a previously unknown way in which matter can organize itself. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-woven-naturally-crystal.html Condensed Matter Thu, 06 Aug 2026 17:50:01 EDT news705255901 When Pepper the social robot was given the chance to try its hand as a teaching assistant, it showed that it can be even better than a human teacher at motivating pupils and helping them learn. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-social-robots-teachers-workload-trial.html Education Thu, 06 Aug 2026 17:40:03 EDT news705255242 A KAIST research team led by professor Mooseok Jang from the Department of Bio and Brain Engineering has developed a single-shot phase imaging technique that reconstructs a phase object—a transparent object such as glass, plastic film or a living cell, which produces almost no visible contrast under an ordinary camera but induces a subtle shift in light called a phase change—from a single measurement, even when the object is fully enclosed between two dynamic scattering layers. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-shot-phase-imaging-technique-reconstruct.html Optics & Photonics Thu, 06 Aug 2026 17:20:03 EDT news705251821 Three years after a team of Caltech scientists showed that pairs of entangled photons could double the resolution of a light microscope, the same lab has figured out a way to double down on that improvement. They have now achieved a fourfold resolution boost compared to a classical microscope, using a new optical design that sends one of the entangled photons through the microscope's optics three times rather than just once. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-quantum-microscopy-quadruples-microscope-resolution.html Optics & Photonics Thu, 06 Aug 2026 17:20:01 EDT news705248785 Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, Europe's cartographers traded on their reputation for accuracy and detail at a time of huge societal change. But as demand grew for increasingly detailed maps of the world to support industrialization at home and colonization overseas, they didn't always get it right. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-adding-ai-tool-google-earth.html Earth Sciences Thu, 06 Aug 2026 16:40:05 EDT news705243747 In a meeting room at the C. V. Starr East Asian Library, a Chinese film poster flickers onto a large screen. Haiqing Lin, the library's head of technical services, is demonstrating an interface he built. With a few practiced clicks, he sends the image—one of 2,000 posters from the Paul Fonoroff collection—through an artificial intelligence model. Seconds later, a draft catalog description appears. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-ai-university-library-emerging-technology.html Education Thu, 06 Aug 2026 16:00:03 EDT news705239763 Fluorescent dyes have long been used in biological research to identify and visualize structures within living cells. Although effective, they have several drawbacks, including altering the cells under study, limiting the number of structures that can be examined at once and reducing measurement accuracy. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-ai-ramanomics-major-obstacle-cells.html Cell & Microbiology Thu, 06 Aug 2026 15:40:01 EDT news705240841 Many material properties depend on how electrons are arranged inside a material. Their distribution determines, for example, whether a material conducts electricity or displays magnetic behavior. Understanding how electrons organize themselves at the atomic scale is therefore one of the major challenges in materials science. Now, a team led by researchers at the Institute of Materials Science of Barcelona (ICMAB-CSIC) has developed a new technique that, for the first time, reveals how electrons are organized inside materials with an unprecedented level of detail. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-key-material-properties-atom.html Analytical Chemistry Thu, 06 Aug 2026 15:00:01 EDT news705237421 U.K. and U.S. scientists have uncovered an important piece of the puzzle in the signaling pathway that causes damaging scar tissue to build up in the body, raising hopes for future treatments. A team from the University of Manchester and University of Connecticut have revealed how a little-known protein helps keep one of the body's most powerful biological signals under tight control. Their findings, published in Nature Communications, could eventually help researchers develop new ways to tackle conditions linked to fibrosis, a process in which excessive scar tissue forms in organs and prevents them from working properly. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-protein-body-restrain-scar.html Cell & Microbiology Wed, 05 Aug 2026 17:00:05 EDT news705158941 In early 2025, special signals wended their way through a fiber-optic highway strung above the streets and sidewalks of the Maryland suburbs. The arrival of those signals at their destination marks a significant step toward a long-held dream of building a "quantum network." Researchers believe that this emerging technology could someday link quantum devices in ways that supercharge scientific research, enable ultrasecure communications and boost the power of future quantum computers. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-spooky-particles-transit-dc-suburbs.html Optics & Photonics Wed, 05 Aug 2026 16:30:01 EDT news705164821 In South Africa, it's been legal for several years for people to grow hemp (a type of Cannabis sativa with very low levels of the psychoactive compound THC) for personal use following changes to the law. There's also been a growing interest in its medicinal and industrial potential for clothing, insulation and paper production. Many see it as a "green gold" opportunity for small-scale farmers. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-hemp-thirsty-crop-cannabis-farming.html Agriculture Wed, 05 Aug 2026 12:20:05 EDT news705150062 Researchers from the U.S. National Science Foundation National Solar Observatory (NSF NSO), the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS) in Germany, and the High Altitude Observatory (HAO) in the U.S. have made a discovery in solar physics. New images of the sun's surface taken with the world's largest solar telescope, the NSF Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope, built and operated by the NSO in Hawaii, along with sophisticated computer simulations, reveal tiny plasma vortices that had never before been visible. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-tiny-vortices-sun-surface.html General Physics Wed, 05 Aug 2026 11:00:01 EDT news705066601 Using continuous imagery from NASA's PUNCH (Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere) mission, scientists predicted the near-Earth arrival of a solar eruption to within 30 minutes in an initial proof-of-concept test. The results, presented Tuesday at the Committee on Space Research Scientific Meeting and under review at the journal Space Weather, could revolutionize the way Earth-impacting storms are forecast. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-nasa-sharpens-solar-storm.html Astronomy Tue, 04 Aug 2026 17:10:03 EDT news705080161 The space around Earth is becoming increasingly crowded, with thousands of satellites and pieces of debris now sharing low Earth orbit. Even above this region—at altitudes of several hundred kilometers—the extremely thin upper atmosphere can slow satellites, making accurate information on atmospheric density essential for predicting satellite motion and preventing collisions. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-upper-atmosphere-starlink-satellite.html Astronomy Tue, 04 Aug 2026 15:10:02 EDT news705074281 Artificial light at night (ALAN) can cause plants to open their buds and sprout leaves earlier in the spring. ALAN can also cause trees to delay changing the color of their leaves in the fall. These changes can ripple through ecosystems, affecting pollinators, herbivores and insects that lay eggs on plants. ALAN also disorients many migrating birds and other animals. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-night-cities-ecological-effects.html Environment Tue, 04 Aug 2026 13:40:03 EDT news705056764 Two proposed computer chip designs could efficiently process data on future space telescopes while they search for Earth–like exoplanets, according to a University of Michigan Engineering study that will be presented at the IEEE Space Computing Conference in August. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-memory-centric-chips-future-space.html Space Exploration Tue, 04 Aug 2026 12:40:01 EDT news705056322 When designing microscopes, optical engineers have long faced a trade-off between speed, field of view and resolution. But improving one of these properties typically comes at the expense of another. Now, a UC Berkeley–led team of researchers has found a way to address this challenge, opening the door to new possibilities in the field of microscopy. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-focus-microscope-captures-billion-pixels.html Optics & Photonics Mon, 03 Aug 2026 18:40:01 EDT news704990341 Researchers at the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering have developed a new approach to nanoscale 3D printing that improves both speed and fidelity, overcoming a challenge that has limited the technology's broader use in manufacturing. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-pixel-patterns-harness-diffraction-faster.html Nanophysics Mon, 03 Aug 2026 16:20:02 EDT news704985845 The interaction between X-rays and matter can be actively controlled, according to an international research team led by the University of Hamburg and SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory that has succeeded in producing bright X-ray images with significantly less damage. In an article published in Nature Communications, the researchers report using ultrafast pulses that partially reverse the damage they generate. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-ultrafast-ray-partially-reverse-enabling.html Optics & Photonics Mon, 03 Aug 2026 14:00:05 EDT news704979602 University of Wollongong (UOW) scientists have uncovered, for the first time, exactly how two of the cell's "helper" proteins operate as a rescue crew for misfolded proteins, a discovery that sheds new light on the molecular breakdown that underpins neurodegenerative diseases. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-scientists-molecule-cell-helpers-problem.html Cell & Microbiology Mon, 03 Aug 2026 10:20:03 EDT news704970302 Scientists created an AI system that uses facial recognition and real-time touchscreen testing to automate cognitive studies of capuchin monkeys in the wild. The American Journal of Primatology published a proof-of-concept for the novel method—dubbed CapuchinAI—developed by researchers at Emory University and Georgia Institute of Technology. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-ai-era-cognitive-wild-primates.html Plants & Animals Sat, 01 Aug 2026 16:00:02 EDT news704556415 Information and communication technologies (ICTs) driven by artificial intelligence (AI) are generating data at an unprecedented rate. Every internet search, AI-generated image, recommendation, scientific simulation and large language model creates and processes enormous amounts of information that must be stored, transferred and analyzed. As AI continues to expand across every sector of society, global demand for data storage and computing is rising dramatically. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-optimized-magnetic-pulses-memory-energy.html Condensed Matter Fri, 31 Jul 2026 16:00:01 EDT news704720412 Two organisms inhabiting a common environment can sometimes mutually influence each other, either benefiting or, in some cases, damaging one another. This mutually beneficial or ambivalent biological relationship is known as symbiosis. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-lichen-life-million-years-fungal.html Evolution Fri, 31 Jul 2026 15:40:05 EDT news704709354 As artificial intelligence becomes part of how people work, learn and solve problems, a new University of Phoenix survey conducted by The Harris Poll finds that recent working learners see meaningful opportunities for AI to support accessibility. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-survey-highlights-ai-potential-advance.html Economics & Business Thu, 30 Jul 2026 20:40:03 EDT news704621471 An international team of researchers from École Polytechnique, Collège de France and Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) has achieved a world first: the experimental realization of an all-optical photonic time crystal (PTC), a material whose optical properties can be strongly and periodically modulated over ultrafast timescales. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-photonic-crystals-ultrafast-terahertz-range.html Optics & Photonics Thu, 30 Jul 2026 19:40:04 EDT news704645101 Every embryo of an organism that reproduces sexually faces an early and consequential decision: which of its cell lineages will make up the mortal body, and which will become the germline, the lineage that eventually makes eggs or sperm and carries genetic information to the next generation. Get this wrong, and an organism can live but cannot reproduce and, evolutionarily, ceases to exist. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-embryo-line-body-germline.html Cell & Microbiology Thu, 30 Jul 2026 18:20:05 EDT news704646001 When a virus enters a cell, its top priority is to replicate its genome rapidly, creating new viruses to infect elsewhere. The host has the opposite priority: to destroy the virus, ideally before it can do any harm. Biology has evolved diverse tactics for viral recognition and destruction, but they share a common theme—sensing that an invading viral genome is present in a cell. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-bacteria-virus-dna.html Cell & Microbiology Thu, 30 Jul 2026 18:20:02 EDT news704620612 What if glowing molecules could synchronize, much like fireflies flashing in unison? Researchers have discovered that molecules confined within tiny gold nanostructures can behave collectively, coordinating their interactions even under conditions where this was previously thought impossible. The finding challenges long standing assumptions about how optical coherence forms and opens new possibilities for highly sensitive sensors, molecular photonics, and future quantum technologies capable of operating at room temperature. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-scientists-molecules-cooperate-room-temperature.html Nanophysics Thu, 30 Jul 2026 18:10:02 EDT news704649001