This brightly colored dragon was produced by 3D printing, using gold nanorods as photosensitizers.
Credit: American Chemical Society

People are exploring the use of 3D printing for wide-ranging applications, including manufacturing, medical devices, fashion and even food. But one of the most efficient forms of 3D printing suffers from a major drawback: It can only print objects that are gray or black in color. Now, researchers have tweaked the method so it can print in all of the colors of the rainbow. They report their results in the ACS journal Nano Letters.

Selective laser sintering (SLS) printers use a laser to heat specific regions of a powdered material, typically nylon or polyamide, so that the powder melts or sinters to form a solid mass...

Color image taken with the Hubble Space Telecope’s WFPC2 camera, showing the dumbbell-shaped cloud of gas and dust around the star. This nebula contains more than 10 times the mass of our Sun, which was ejected by Eta Carinae in the 19th century Great Eruption.
Credit: N. Smith (U. Arizona) and NASA.

Observations from the Gemini South and other telescopes in Chile played a critical role in understanding light echoes from a stellar eruption which occurred almost 200 years ago. Gemini spectroscopy shows that ejected material from the blast is the fastest ever seen from a star that remained intact. Imagine traveling to the Moon in just 20 seconds! That’s how fast material from a 170 year old stellar eruption sped away from the unstable, eruptive, and extremely massive star Eta Carinae.

Astro...

The reddish-blue mouse neurons in this image have reentered the cell cycle after exposure to amyloid beta oligomers, and thus are primed for death.
Credit: Image by Erin Kodis and George Bloom

About 50% of people who reach the age of 85 will develop Alzheimer’s disease. Most will die within about 5 years of exhibiting the hallmark symptoms of the disease – severe memory loss and a precipitous decline in cognitive function. But the molecular processes that lead to the disease will have begun years earlier.

Currently, there are no known ways to prevent the disease or to stop its progression once it has begun. But research at the University of Virginia offers new understanding of how the disease develops at the molecular level, long before extensive neuronal damage occurs and symptoms show up.

This is the vitamin pill-sized capsule, currently being commercialized by Atmo Biosciences.
Credit: RMIT University

New trials reveal swallowable sensor 3,000 times more accurate than current technology. New trials of a breakthrough swallowable sensor have revealed the device is 3,000 times more accurate than current technology used to diagnose many gut disorders. The findings show the revolutionary gas-sensing capsule developed by researchers at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, could surpass breath testing as the benchmark for diagnosing gut disorders, paving the way to solving previously undiagnosed conditions.

The vitamin pill-sized capsule, currently being commercialised by Atmo Biosciences, provides real time detection and measurement of hydrogen, carbon dioxides and oxygen in ...