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    Taking Technology to the Next Level

    July 26, 2017, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    The new device is smaller than a thumbnail with a size of 0.1 x 4mm, and could be integrated into everyday electronic devices like smartphones. Credit: CUDOS

    The new device is smaller than a thumbnail with a size of 0.1 x 4mm, and could be integrated into everyday electronic devices like smartphones. Credit: CUDOS

    Researchers develop new platform making next-generation electronic devices more advanced. Integrated circuits, ie chips, are used in everyday electronic equipment like mobile phones and computers. It is a set of electronic circuits on one small flat piece of semiconductor material, normally silicon. But this material has some limitations when it comes to processing data. To overcome this, researchers are developing optical circuits made of chalcogenide glass. This is used for ultrafast telecommunication networks, transferring information at the speed of light.

    Integrating these glass optical circuits into silicon chips could lead to a...

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    Large, Distant Comets more Common than previously thought

    July 26, 2017, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    A new study suggests that distant "long-period" comets -- which take more than 200 years to orbit the sun -- are more common than previously thought. This illustration shows how the researchers used data from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) spacecraft to determine the nucleus sizes of several of these distant comets. They subtracted a model of how dust and gas behave in comets in order to obtain the core size. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

    A new study suggests that distant “long-period” comets — which take more than 200 years to orbit the sun — are more common than previously thought. This illustration shows how the researchers used data from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) spacecraft to determine the nucleus sizes of several of these distant comets. They subtracted a model of how dust and gas behave in comets in order to obtain the core size. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

    Comets that take more than 200 years to make one revolution around the sun are notoriously difficult to study. Because they spend most of their time far from our area of the solar system, many “long-period comets” will never approach the sun in a person’s lifetime...

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    Venus’s turbulent atmosphere

    July 26, 2017, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    1. The atmospheric superrotation at the upper clouds of Venus. While the superrotation is present in both day and night sides of Venus, it seems more uniform in the day (AKATSUKI-UVI image at 360 nm, right side), while in the night this seems to become more irregular and unpredictable (composite of Venus Express/VIRTIS images ar 3.8 μm, left). Credit: JAXA, ESA, J. Peralta (JAXA) and R. Hueso (UPV/EHU) 2. Examples of new types of cloud morphology discovered on the night side of Venus thanks to Venus Express (ESA) and the infrared telescope IRTF (NASA): stationary waves (Venus Express, up-left corner), "net" patterns (IRTF, up-right), mysterious filaments (Venus Express, down-left) and dynamical instabilities (Venus Express, down-right). CREDIT ESA, NASA, J. Peralta (JAXA) and R. Hueso (UPV/EHU)

    1. The atmospheric superrotation at the upper clouds of Venus. While the superrotation is present in both day and night sides of Venus, it seems more uniform in the day (AKATSUKI-UVI image at 360 nm, right side), while in the night this seems to become more irregular and unpredictable (composite of Venus Express/VIRTIS images ar 3.8 μm, left). Credit: JAXA, ESA, J. Peralta (JAXA) and R. Hueso (UPV/EHU)
    2. Examples of new types of cloud morphology discovered on the night side of Venus thanks to Venus Express (ESA) and the infrared telescope IRTF (NASA): stationary waves (Venus Express, up-left corner), “net” patterns (IRTF, up-right), mysterious filaments (Venus Express, down-left) and dynamical instabilities (Venus Express, down-right).
    CREDIT: ESA, NASA, J. Peralta (JAXA) and R...

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    Reversing Tissue Damage caused by Heart Attacks?

    July 25, 2017, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    ‘The adipokine leptin modulates adventitial pericyte functions by autocrine and paracrine signalling’ by Paolo Madeddu et al in Scientific Reports

    ‘The adipokine leptin modulates adventitial pericyte functions by autocrine and paracrine signalling’ by Paolo Madeddu et al in Scientific Reports

    A new discovery by University of Bristol scientists helps to explain how cells which surround blood vessels, pericytes, stimulate new blood vessels to grow with the hormone ‘leptin’ playing a key role. Leptin is produced by fat cells which helps to regulate energy balance in the body by inhibiting the appetite. This study, described in Scientific Reports, may have important implications for the treatment of heart attacks and also for cancer, the two main killers in the UK.

    The growth of new blood vessels, ‘angiogenesis’, is an important process occurring both in health and disease...

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