One in three plants call islands home: Many at risk

From Tasmania to Madagascar to New Guinea, islands make up just over five per cent of Earth's land yet are home to 31 per cent of the world's plant species. A new study shows that of all plants classified as threatened worldwide, more than half are unique to islands, facing risks from habitat loss, climate warming and invasive species.

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Bacterial vaccine shows promise as cancer immunotherapy

Researchers have engineered bacteria as personalized cancer vaccines that activate the immune system to specifically seek out and destroy cancer cells.

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Are nearby planets sending radio signals to each other?

Researchers have developed a new method using the Allen Telescope Array to search for interplanetary radio communication in the TRAPPIST-1 star system.

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NASA, NOAA: Sun reaches maximum phase in 11-year solar cycle

Experts have announced that the Sun has reached its solar maximum period, which could continue for the next year. Scientists will not be able to determine the exact peak of this solar maximum period for many months because it's only identifiable after they've tracked a consistent decline in solar activity after that peak. However, scientists have identified that the last two years on the Sun have been part of this active phase of the solar cycle, due to the consistently high number of sunspots during this period.

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Major step toward fully 3D-printed active electronics

Researchers produced 3D-printed, semiconductor-free logic gates, which perform computations in active electronic devices. As they don't require semiconductor materials, they represent a step toward 3D printing an entire active electronic device.

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Liftoff! NASA's Europa Clipper sails toward ocean moon of Jupiter

NASA's Europa Clipper has embarked on its long voyage to Jupiter, where it will investigate Europa, a moon with an enormous subsurface ocean that may have conditions to support life. The largest spacecraft NASA ever built for a mission headed to another planet, Europa Clipper also is the first NASA mission dedicated to studying an ocean world beyond Earth.

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Evolution in real time

Snails on a tiny rocky islet evolved before scientists' eyes. The marine snails were reintroduced after a toxic algal bloom wiped them out from the skerry. While the researchers intentionally brought in a distinct population of the same snail species, these evolved to strikingly resemble the population lost over 30 years prior.

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Ordered defects may be key for solution-deposited semiconductors, enabling high-speed printable circuits and next-generation displays

A new solution deposition process for semiconductors yields high-performing transistors by introducing more defects, counterintuitively. Researchers used these devices to construct high- speed logic circuits and an operational high-resolution inorganic LED display.

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Bilingualism makes the brain more efficient, especially when learned at a young age

A new study from The Neuro (Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital) of McGill university, the University of Ottawa and the University of Zaragoza in Spain elaborates on bilingualism's role in cognition, showing increased efficiency of communication between brain regions.

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Asymmetric placebo effect in response to spicy food

The expectations humans have of a pleasurable sensation asymmetrically shape neuronal responses and subjective experiences to hot sauce, according to a new study.

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Viruses are teeming on your toothbrush, showerhead

Microbiologists found that showerheads and toothbrushes are teeming with an extremely diverse collection of viruses -- most of which have never been seen before.

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Another step towards decoding smell

We often only realize how important our sense of smell is when it is no longer there: food is not as tasty as it once was, or we no longer react to dangers such as the smell of smoke. Researchers have investigated the neuronal mechanisms of human odor perception for the first time. Individual nerve cells in the brain recognize odors and react specifically to the smell, the image and the written word of an object, for example a banana. The results of this study close a long-standing knowledge gap between animal and human odor research.

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Team engineers new enzyme to produce synthetic genetic material

A research team describes how they engineered an efficient new enzyme that can produce a synthetic genetic material called threose nucleic acid. The ability to synthesize artificial chains of TNA, which is inherently more stable than DNA, advances the discovery of potentially more powerful, precise therapeutic options to treat cancer and autoimmune, metabolic and infectious diseases.

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