Scientific Discoveries

Explore the latest scientific discoveries, science news, breakthroughs and developments from around the world.

Latest Scientific Discoveries

All News →
New 'computational microscope' simulates DNA packaging at more than ten times previous scale
Science News

New 'computational microscope' simulates DNA packaging at more than ten times previous scale

The DNA in our cells wraps around proteins called histones to form nucleosomes, which organize into chromatin. This organization helps pack genetic material into the nucleus and influences how easily genes can be read and DNA damage repaired. Understanding how chromatin changes requires studying molecular movements and interactions that are difficult to capture experimentally.

📅 2026-10-08 22:10:01    •    Phys.org
Chemists uncover the true active surface of nickel catalysts
Science News

Chemists uncover the true active surface of nickel catalysts

Nickel is a promising, cost-effective and robust catalyst for alkaline water electrolysis—a key technology for the climate-neutral production of hydrogen. However, the actual structure of the active surface of such nickel electrodes under reaction conditions had not yet been conclusively determined. A research team at Ulm University has now refuted a decades-old assumption: The catalytically active surface does not consist of nickel oxyhydroxide (NiOOH), as was previously widely assumed, but is nickel dioxide (NiO₂). The findings have been published in the journal Nature Catalysis.

📅 2026-10-08 22:00:07    •    Phys.org
Bavaria's ancestral languages: Resisting linguistic genocide
Science News

Bavaria's ancestral languages: Resisting linguistic genocide

My ancestral languages, Boarisch (Bavarian) and Schwäbisch (Swabian), are routinely described as German dialects. That might sound like a technical linguistic distinction. For me, a Boarisch-Schwob scholar and community member, it raises a practical question: What happens to a people when their ancestral language, which carries their identity and "Weltanschauung" (worldview), is excluded from protection under a European language treaty because the modern state and dominant culture reduce it to a dialect?

📅 2026-10-08 22:00:01    •    Phys.org
Big dogs age faster at an epigenetic level, new study finds
Science News

Big dogs age faster at an epigenetic level, new study finds

Great Danes and mastiffs rarely live more than a decade, while Chihuahuas can live twice as long. Exactly why big dogs die younger than small ones do has been unclear — but new findings may help to solve that mystery.The research, published Thursday (Oct. 8) in the journal Science, looked at a chemical code written on top of dogs' DNA. This code, called the methylome, consists of chemical tags called methyl groups, which bind to DNA's building blocks. Proteins constantly access DNA, loading up the information written in its code and taking that data away to be turned into new proteins for the cell. But these methyl groups can act as tiny roadblocks that stop that process in its tracks. These...

📅 2026-10-08 21:59:11    •    Live Science
Lensless imaging method enables long-term monitoring of living cells without staining
Science News

Lensless imaging method enables long-term monitoring of living cells without staining

In a study led by Tampere University, researchers have developed a new lensless imaging method that produces precise quantitative data on living cells from a single image. The compact system can be placed inside a standard cell-culture incubator, allowing living cells to be monitored continuously for hours or even days without staining or other labels. The research is published in the journal Applied Physics Letters.

📅 2026-10-08 21:50:01    •    Phys.org
Atlantic weather pattern shaped southern Greenland's rain and snow for millennia, sediments reveal
Science News

Atlantic weather pattern shaped southern Greenland's rain and snow for millennia, sediments reveal

In high-latitude coastal areas, Arctic amplification means that temperatures are rising faster than the global average. This combination of rising temperatures and changing precipitation patterns driven by the North Atlantic Oscillation has major impacts on regions with a "cryosphere"—areas that host ice sheets and glaciers, such as southern Greenland.

📅 2026-10-08 21:40:21    •    Phys.org
Do we all see anger the same way?
Science News

Do we all see anger the same way?

Happiness, sadness, disgust, surprise, fear, contempt and anger. These are the basic emotions traditionally associated with facial expressions described as universal. As important social signals, facial expressions help us rapidly interpret the emotions and intentions of others. Among these emotions, anger holds a particularly relevant role because it often signals interpersonal threat or conflict.

📅 2026-10-08 21:40:02    •    Phys.org
Real-time oxygen measurements expose hidden losses in solar water splitting
Science News

Real-time oxygen measurements expose hidden losses in solar water splitting

A new technique developed at Imperial College London measures oxygen production in real time, revealing hidden losses in solar water splitting. The researchers found that electrical current did not always correspond to oxygen generation in hematite, one of the most widely studied materials in the field, revealing a previously unknown limitation in the reaction.

📅 2026-10-08 21:30:01    •    Phys.org
Nitrogen fixation 'off switch' discovery could one day help crops make their own fertilizer
Science News

Nitrogen fixation 'off switch' discovery could one day help crops make their own fertilizer

Nitrogen is essential for life. It's needed to build proteins, DNA and many other components of cells. Although nitrogen gas makes up almost 80% of Earth's atmosphere, most organisms cannot use it directly. Certain microbes solve this problem through a process called nitrogen fixation, which converts nitrogen gas into ammonia. This process is carried out by an enzyme called nitrogenase.

📅 2026-10-08 21:20:21    •    Phys.org
How enzyme activity can accelerate molecular movement inside cells
Science News

How enzyme activity can accelerate molecular movement inside cells

A cell sitting in fluid looks like one of the most passive things in biology. Nutrients drift toward it on the aimless currents of molecular motion, and now and then one bumps into the right spot on the cell's surface and gets pulled inside. This impression of the cell as a lottery run by chance, with the molecules wandering and the cell waiting, is a misconception.

📅 2026-10-08 21:20:02    •    Phys.org
'Freakish' discovery of 9 million-year-old capybara tooth supports idea that Atacama wasn't always a desert
Science News

'Freakish' discovery of 9 million-year-old capybara tooth supports idea that Atacama wasn't always a desert

An illustration of ancient capybaras enjoying coastal wetlands, which may have looked somewhat like the Atacama Desert around 9 million years ago. (Image credit: Mauricio Alvarez)Researchers have discovered a roughly 9 million year old tooth belonging to a large, water-loving relative of modern day capybaras in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. The fossilized molar adds to previous evidence suggesting that it's unlikely the Atacama, one of the driest places on Earth, was continuously dry for the last 40 million years.The Atacama Desert, possibly the oldest desert on Earth, takes up the northern third of Chile. It's bounded by the Chilean Coast Range to the west, which blocks rain from th...

📅 2026-10-08 21:19:31    •    Live Science
Health-promoting imprisonment is being deprioritized, researcher claims
Science News

Health-promoting imprisonment is being deprioritized, researcher claims

For several decades, Norwegian prison research has focused on the pains of imprisonment, isolation and the harm that prison does. But what is needed for a prison to actually promote health, personal growth and hope? Research shows that what is needed is something quite different from the developments currently underway in Norway.

📅 2026-10-08 21:00:13    •    Phys.org