The feeding patterns of black holes offer insight into their size, researchers report. A new study revealed that the flickering in the brightness observed in actively feeding supermassive black holes is related to their mass.

Supermassive black holes are millions to billions of times more massive than the sun and usually reside at the center of massive galaxies...

The discovery that the anaesthetic ketamine can help people with severe depression has raised hopes of finding new treatment options for the disease. Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have now identified novel mechanistic insights how the drug exerts its antidepressant effect. The findings have been published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.

According to the World Health Organization, depression is a leading cause of disability worldwide and the disease affects more than 360 million people every year.

The risk of suffering is affected by both genetics and environmental factors. The most commonly prescribed antidepressants, such as SSRIs, affect nerve signalling via monoamines in the brain...

Physics researchers at the University of North Florida’s Atomic LEGO Lab discovered a new electronic phenomenon they call ” asymmetric ferroelectricity .” The research led by Dr. Maitri Warusawithana, UNF physics assistant professor, in collaboration with researchers at the University of Illinois and the Arizona State University, demonstrated this phenomenon for the first time in engineered two-dimensional crystals.

This discovery of asymmetric ferroelectricity in engineered crystals comes exactly 100 years following the discovery of ferroelectricity in certain naturally occurring crystals...

Researchers have developed a novel technique to investigate the dynamics of the early Solar System by analyzing magnetites in meteorites utilizing the wave nature of electrons.

Within meteorites, the magnetic fields associated with the particles that make up the object can act as a historical record. By analyzing such magnetic fields, scientists can deduce the probable events that affected the object and reconstruct a time-lapse of what events occurred on the meteorite and when.

“Primitive meteorites are time capsules of primordial materials formed at the beginning of our Solar System,” said Yuki Kimura, an associate professor at the Institute of Low Temperature Sci...