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. Over Christmas, vegetables, bananas and insulation foam washed up on beaches along England's southeast coast. They were from 16 containers spilled by the cargo ship Baltic Klipper in rough seas. In the new year, a further 24 containers fell from two vessels during Storm Goretti, with chips and onions among the goods appearing on the Sussex shoreline. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-onions-chips-england-south-coast.html Environment Sat, 24 Jan 2026 15:20:01 EST news688375208 Some of the world's best-known chocolate, from Mars to KitKat, is likely linked to deforestation in Liberia's rainforest despite many brands' claims of sustainability, according to research published by NGO Global Witness Tuesday. https://phys.org/news/2025-11-ngo-links-major-chocolate-brands.html Environment Tue, 25 Nov 2025 04:40:01 EST news683267810 Boeing and NASA have agreed to keep astronauts off the company's next Starliner flight and instead perform a trial run with cargo to prove its safety. https://phys.org/news/2025-11-boeing-capsule-wont-astronauts-space.html Space Exploration Mon, 24 Nov 2025 16:00:02 EST news683221869 There are tall, pointy metal tubes aplenty at Port Canaveral, but one is extra large. https://phys.org/news/2025-11-blue-1st-recovered-glenn-booster.html Space Exploration Wed, 19 Nov 2025 07:02:55 EST news682758171 For decades, scientists have known that motor proteins like kinesin-2 ferry vital cargo along microtubule "highways" inside cells. But how these molecular vehicles identify and bind to the right cargo remained a mystery. Now, a new study provides a key piece of this puzzle by revealing the atomic-level structure of the kinesin-2 tail and its interaction with cargo and adapter proteins. https://phys.org/news/2025-11-motor-protein-reveals-neurons-cargo.html Cell & Microbiology Thu, 06 Nov 2025 12:09:03 EST news681653341 The secretory pathway in eukaryotic cells is crucial for maintaining cellular function and physiological activities, as it ensures the accurate transport of proteins to specific subcellular locations or for secretion outside the cell. A research team led by Prof. Guo Yusong from the Division of Life Science at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) has been extensively investigating the molecular mechanisms by which cargo proteins are recognized and loaded into transport vesicles in the secretory pathway. https://phys.org/news/2025-10-vesicle-proteomics-uncover-cargo-proteins.html Cell & Microbiology Wed, 22 Oct 2025 16:43:03 EDT news680370181 At first glance, the tiny plastic pellets appear relatively harmless. No bigger than a lentil, these "nurdles" are destined to be melted down to make everything from car bumpers to salad bowls. https://phys.org/news/2025-10-eu-aim-plastic-pellets-nightmare.html Environment Tue, 21 Oct 2025 03:08:15 EDT news680234890 New research out of the University of California San Diego and the University of Haifa is reshaping what we know about ancient seaborne trade in the eastern Mediterranean. Published recently in Antiquity, a new paper documents the first-ever discovery of Iron Age ship cargoes within a former port city in Israel and provides rare, direct evidence of trade in a period previously understood largely through land-based finds. https://phys.org/news/2025-10-ancient-shipwrecks-rewrite-story-iron.html Archaeology Tue, 14 Oct 2025 14:10:06 EDT news679669801 Sierra Space had been looking to join SpaceX and Northrop Grumman as one of three commercial resupply partners for NASA aiming to fly its Dream Chaser spacecraft to the International Space Station. https://phys.org/news/2025-10-sierra-space-chaser-nasa-upended.html Space Exploration Wed, 01 Oct 2025 10:20:05 EDT news678532308 A newly launched supply ship has run into engine trouble that is preventing it from reaching the International Space Station. https://phys.org/news/2025-09-northrop-grumman-delay-delivery-international.html Space Exploration Wed, 17 Sep 2025 10:50:03 EDT news677324838 Measurements analyzed by an international research team led by ETH Zurich show that the global ocean absorbed significantly less CO₂ than anticipated during the unprecedented marine heat wave in 2023. https://phys.org/news/2025-09-ocean-carbon-ailing-absorption-marine.html Earth Sciences Tue, 02 Sep 2025 13:16:05 EDT news676037761 Mars has received considerable attention in the past few decades, thanks to the many robotic missions exploring it to learn more about its past. NASA and China plan to send astronauts/taikonauts there in the coming decades, and commercial space companies like SpaceX hope to send passengers there sooner. This presents several significant challenges, one of the greatest being the lengthy transit times involved. Using conventional propulsion and low-energy trajectories, it takes six to nine months for crewed spacecraft to reach Mars. https://phys.org/news/2025-06-missions-mars-starship-months.html Space Exploration Tue, 03 Jun 2025 16:13:05 EDT news668185982 Astrobee is a free-flying robotic system developed by NASA that is made up of three distinct cube-shaped robots. This system was originally designed to help astronauts who are working at the International Space Station (ISS) by automating some of their routine manual tasks. https://phys.org/news/2025-05-astrobee-soft-cargo-source-simulator.html Space Exploration Mon, 19 May 2025 08:00:01 EDT news666624973 An international team of researchers, led by scientists from Tel Aviv University, has discovered that the pathogen responsible for the mass deaths of sea urchins along the Red Sea coast is the same one responsible for mass mortality events among sea urchins off the coast of Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean. https://phys.org/news/2025-01-deadly-pathogen-decimated-sea-urchins.html Plants & Animals Wed, 29 Jan 2025 12:50:06 EST news657377402 A stricter speed limit isn't coming to the waters of the North Atlantic right whale calving grounds off the Georgia coast after all. https://phys.org/news/2025-01-limits-feds-meant-boats-whales.html Plants & Animals Thu, 16 Jan 2025 09:10:21 EST news656241014 Astronauts on the International Space Station generate their share of garbage, filling up cargo ships that then deorbit and burn up in the atmosphere. Now Sierra Space has won a contract to build a trash compactor for the space station. The device will compact space trash by 75% in volume and allow water and other gases to be extracted for reclamation. The resulting garbage blocks are easily stored and could even be used as radiation shielding on long missions. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-trash-compactor-space-station.html Space Exploration Mon, 11 Nov 2024 16:28:30 EST news650564907 NASA is asking U.S. industry to submit innovative architecture solutions that could help the agency land and move cargo on the lunar surface during future Artemis missions. Released in September, the agency's request for proposal also supports NASA's broader Moon to Mars Objectives. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-nasa-artemis-lunar-logistics-mobility.html Space Exploration Wed, 09 Oct 2024 12:40:35 EDT news647696431 Amid the scorching heat at the Albanian port of Durres, 102 containers set sail for Thailand in early July, sparking a high-seas drama that highlighted the perils of the global waste trade. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-sender-stranded-sea-toxic-dispute.html Environment Fri, 27 Sep 2024 04:30:01 EDT news646630099 In the world of nanotechnology, the development of dynamic systems that respond to molecular signals is becoming increasingly important. The DNA origami technique, whereby DNA is programmed so as to produce functional nanostructures, plays a key role in these endeavors. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-dna-origami-fluorescent-probes-precisely.html Bio & Medicine Wed, 18 Sep 2024 12:17:03 EDT news645880621 Australian transport emissions are still growing. As a result, transport is expected to be our biggest-emitting sector by 2030. So, cutting transport emissions is crucial to Australia's net-zero strategy. https://phys.org/news/2024-09-choices-significant-difference-climate.html Environment Mon, 02 Sep 2024 15:46:04 EDT news644510761 A Falcon 9 rocket with a Cygnus supply freighter blasted off on a mission to the International Space Station on August 4, just a few days after a two-week break due to launch problems. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-falcon-rocket-blasts-cygnus-freighter.html Space Exploration Mon, 05 Aug 2024 08:06:55 EDT news642064009 New York's Long Island Sound (LIS) is an important inlet and estuary in the North Atlantic Ocean, which is highly urbanized due to its proximity to the city. This daily activity of passenger transport, fishing and cargo ships has had significant consequences on the marine landscape here, resulting in environmental degradation that impacts the flora and fauna that call LIS home. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-york-island-acidifies-droughts.html Earth Sciences Tue, 30 Jul 2024 07:00:02 EDT news641541478 The strongest typhoon to hit Taiwan in eight years killed five people and flooded parts of the island's second-biggest city on Thursday, with rescuers searching for six sailors missing after their cargo ship sank in the storm. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-deadly-typhoon-taiwan-sailors-ship.html Environment Thu, 25 Jul 2024 10:30:01 EDT news641121819 Each cell in the body has its own unique delivery system that scientists are working on harnessing to move revolutionary biological drugs—molecules like proteins, RNA and combinations of the two—to specific diseased parts of the body. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-scientists-hijack-natural-delivery-proteins.html Biotechnology Wed, 24 Jul 2024 11:22:04 EDT news641038921 Melting sea ice in the fast-warming Arctic Ocean is not making it easier for sailors to navigate a legendary shortcut between Europe and Asia despite popular belief, scientists said Thursday. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-ice-smooth-fabled-arctic.html Environment Sat, 13 Jul 2024 13:00:01 EDT news639921284 NASA has released two white papers associated with the agency's Moon to Mars architecture efforts. The papers, one on lunar mobility drivers and needs, and one on lunar surface cargo, detail NASA's latest thinking on specific areas of its lunar exploration strategy. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-nasa-moon-mars-architecture-white.html Space Exploration Mon, 01 Jul 2024 14:54:02 EDT news639064441 Gray whales have been veering off their normal routes along the West Coast and swimming under the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco Bay in unprecedented numbers. https://phys.org/news/2024-06-wildlife-mystery-gray-whales-san.html Plants & Animals Tue, 25 Jun 2024 06:08:02 EDT news638514477 As part of NASA's efforts to expand commercial resupply in low Earth orbit, Sierra Space's uncrewed spaceplane arrived at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida ahead of its first flight to the International Space Station. https://phys.org/news/2024-05-nasa-sierra-space-chaser-spaceplane.html Space Exploration Mon, 20 May 2024 16:07:03 EDT news635440022 Endocytosis is a crucial cellular process that facilitates cells to take up cargos by enclosing them in membrane-bound vesicles, which are transported to different parts of the cell via the endosomal system and deliver cargos on the cytoskeleton and enable dynamic contact between various subtypes of endosomes or with other organelles, such as the lysosomes. https://phys.org/news/2024-03-hormonally-neu-kinase-hunk-unveils.html Cell & Microbiology Fri, 15 Mar 2024 11:09:02 EDT news629719741 Packing to go to space is a lot like getting ready for a plane ride with only a carry-on bag. You have to maximize the use of the space in your bag at the same time you want to make sure you have what you need. That's the challenge astronauts face in the upcoming Artemis moon missions. So, NASA held a competition to figure out the best and most innovative ways to store cargo for the missions. https://phys.org/news/2024-03-space.html Space Exploration Thu, 07 Mar 2024 13:25:04 EST news629040302