A team of researchers from Université Clermont Auvergne, working with a colleague from Universität Bayreuth, has found evidence that suggests the Earth’s composition changed over time during its early years via collisional erosion. In their paper published in the journal Science, the group describes their study of the amounts of samarium and neodymium in meteorites and what it showed them about the processes that led to the current makeup of the Earth. Zoë Malka Leinhardt, with the University of Bristol, has published a Perspective piece in the same journal issue outlining theories regarding the formation of the Earth and the work done by the team on this new effort.

Prior research has suggested that planets form from collisions of material in accretion ...

Hitherto, scientists have not fully understood why ticks are such dangerous disease vectors. A research team led by Johanna Strobl and Georg Stary from MedUni Vienna’s Department of Dermatology shows that tick saliva inhibits the skin’s defence function, thereby increasing the risk of diseases such as tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) or Lyme disease. The study was recently published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

The researchers carried out their investigations on skin samples from volunteers and also on models of human skin, mimicking the bite of the most common European tick (Ixodes ricinus)...

Soft robots can navigate hard-to-reach places like pipes or inside the human body. An interdisciplinary team of University of Minnesota Twin Cities scientists and engineers has developed a first-of-its-kind, plant-inspired extrusion process that enables synthetic material growth. The new approach will allow researchers to build better soft robots that can navigate hard-to-reach places, complicated terrain, and potentially areas within the human body.

The paper is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

“This is the first time t...

An international team of researchers has revealed new evidence for the ...