Physics and Astronomy

The sequencing of the human genome was only the beginning of a much more complex task – deciphering the secrets of cellular chemistry and the mechanisms of disease. While the genome serves as a blueprint to understanding the body, proteins represent the materials that carry out these plans.

There are about 2 million distinct proteins in the human body. That’s a lot of proteins – and the future of personalized medicine depends on a better understanding of proteins, including their

Just as the printing press revolutionized the creation of reading matter, a “nano-printing” technique developed at MIT could enable the mass production of nano-devices currently built one at a time.

The most immediate candidate for this innovation is the DNA microarray, a nano-device used to diagnose and understand genetic illnesses such as Alzheimer’s, viral illnesses such as AIDS, and certain types of cancer. The ability to mass produce these complex devices would make D

The office that astronomer Lei Hao shares with her fellow research associates on the first floor of the Space Sciences Building at Cornell University is tidy and organized. But Hao has been thinking a lot lately about dust.

Actually, she’s recently found a great deal of it. And she’s thrilled.

The dust in question is between 0.88 billion and 2.4 billion light years away from Hao’s office, in galaxies scientists classify as active galactic nuclei (AGNs

Giant red blobs, picket fences, upward branching carrots, and tentacled octopi — these are just a few of the phrases used to describe sprites — spectacular, eerie flashes of colored light high above the tops of powerful thunderstorms that can travel up to 50 miles high in the atmosphere.

Most researchers have long supported the theory that sprites are linked to major lightning charges. Still, some scientists believe that conditions high in the atmosphere, like meteoritic dust

Sometimes seeing a shadow can be as good or better than seeing the real thing. A new measurement method* developed by researchers working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is a case in point. The method uses the shadow cast by a small glass probe to infer the dimensions of tiny, microscale holes or other micrometer-sized components. The technique may provide an improved quality control method for measuring the interior dimensions of fuel nozzles, fiber optic connecto

An international team of scientists has performed the most detailed ever study of the evolution of the Universe.

They have traced the evolution of the cosmos from the ’Big Bang’ 13.7 billion years ago to the present day — in a project similar in complexity to tracking the movement of every single person on Earth.

But instead of tracking people, the team — which includes University of Nottingham scientists — has modelled the paths of 10 billion particles of elusive