Fruit flies adapt activity to 'white nights'

Evolution takes place constantly, everywhere in nature. Nevertheless, it is always exciting for biologists to observe evolution "in real time." One such opportunity for observation is currently being presented by the internal ...

New findings on the internal clock of the fruit fly

Most living organisms have an internal clock which, among other things, controls the sleep-wake rhythm. The internal rhythm lasts approximately one day (circadian), i.e. about 24 hours, and is regulated by means of various ...

Gravitational lenses measure universe expansion

It's one of the big cosmology debates: The universe is expanding, but how fast exactly? Two available measurements yield different results. Leiden physicist David Harvey adapted an independent third measurement method using ...

Solved: The mystery of the expansion of the universe

The Earth, solar system, the entire Milky Way and the few thousand galaxies closest to us move in a vast "bubble" that is 250 million light years in diameter, where the average density of matter is half as high as for the ...

The measurements of the expansion of the universe don't add up

Physicists use two types of measurements to calculate the expansion rate of the universe, but their results do not coincide, which may make it necessary to update the cosmological model. "It's like trying to thread a cosmic ...

Melatonin, biological clock keep singing fish on time

In the 1980s, people living on houseboats in the San Francisco Bay were puzzled by a droning hum of unknown origin that started abruptly in the late evening and stopped suddenly in the morning.

Variables of nature

Within physics there are certain physical quantities that play a central role. These are things such as the mass of an electron, or the speed of light, or the universal constant of gravity. We aren't sure why these constants ...

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