A team of US researchers has unveiled a device that can conduct electricity along its fractionally charged edges without losing energy to heat. Described in Nature Physics, the work, led by Xiaodong Xu at the University of Washington, marks the first demonstration of a “dissipationless fractional Chern insulator,” a long-sought state of matter with promising implications for future quantum technologies.

From quantum Hall to fractional phases
The quantum Hall effect emerges when electrons are confined to a two-dimensional material, cooled to extremely loow temperatures, and exposed to strong magnetic fields...

Baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) is best known for its role in baking, brewing, and modern biotechnology. Yet this everyday microorganism may also offer insight into a far bigger question: how life might endure the extreme conditions found beyond Earth.

Researchers from the Department of Biochemistry (BC) at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), working with collaborators at the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL) in Ahmedabad, have discovered that yeast can survive environmental stresses similar to those on Mars...

New research suggests the liver plays a previously unrecognized role in bone health, but only in males. A McGill University-led study published in Matrix Biology found that a protein made in the liver helps regulate bone growth in male mice, but not in females. The findings may help explain why men with liver disease are more likely to experience bone loss.

The protein, known as plasma fibronectin, is naturally present in blood at higher levels in men than in women, declines when the liver is damaged and builds up in bone to modulate bone formation...

Using ideas borrowed from topological photonics, researchers in Singapore, France and the US have designed a compact antenna capable of handling information-rich terahertz (THz) signals. Reporting their results in Nature Photonics, the team, led by Ranjan Singh at the University of Notre Dame, say that with further refinements, the design could help underpin future sixth-generation (6G) wireless networks, allowing data to be shared at unprecedented speeds.

Why 6G needs terahertz antennas
In the not-too-distant future, 6G networks are expected to enable data rates of around one terabit per second—the same as transferring roughly half the storage of a mid-range smartphone in a single second...