Science, engineering, and discovery — the research and breakthroughs that matter.

The human genome is about two meters (6.6 feet) long, yet it is folded inside a cell nucleus only about 10 micrometers in diameter. To fit into this tiny space, DNA is wrapped around histone proteins to form nucleosomes, which are further organized into chromatin. For decades, ch

Crime levels are falling for most offenses across the UK—but the public doesn't necessarily feel safer. It's a human trait to focus on frightening information in the news or on social media—but it could also mean that people are more fearful about crime than they need to be.

A signal that appears to show ions moving inside a battery may, in fact, be an illusion caused by an uneven surface. A KAIST research team has identified the origin of this type of artifact, which can lead researchers to misinterpret what is happening inside a battery, and has de

A common blue pigment could help turn carbon dioxide (CO₂) from an industrial waste product into a useful fuel. A joint research team led by Tohoku University's Advanced Institute for Materials Research (WPI-AIMR), in collaboration with Hokkaido University and startup AZUL Energy

University of California, Davis, researchers have stripped down LSD to the base features responsible for its hallucinogenic and therapeutic effects.

Scientists from Tokyo Metropolitan University have found a way to make plasma more effective for its wide-ranging uses, from antimicrobial applications to surface conditioning in the semiconductor industry. They mapped the production of atomic oxygen, a key ingredient of oxygen p

It's difficult to imagine a song like Queen's 1975 "Bohemian Rhapsody" topping the charts today. Almost six minutes long, it moves through several radically different musical sections and famously ignores the conventional structure of a pop song. It seems almost designed to break

Picture a senior English classroom.

The case against social media has become so well rehearsed that most people can easily merge it into ordinary conversation: It makes people lonely. It sorts them into camps. It hands them a room full of people who already agree with them and calls that a community.

When two black holes crash together and merge, the newly formed black hole rings like a bell, sending out gravitational waves with specific frequencies that fade over time. This brief, fading pattern of waves is called ringdown, and it may hold secrets about what is hiding around

War destroys laboratories and instruments. It also severs the human networks through which science reproduces itself. It disrupts mentorship, collaborations and informal ties that turn students into researchers.

Certain chemical substances, broadly called luminogens, have an inherent ability to emit light. Most fluorescent molecules emit light in solution but lose their emission in the solid state, where the molecules aggregate.

Residents of Kauai were warned to watch for tornadoes late Monday as Hurricane Lowell edged toward the westernmost Hawaiian Islands in the U.S. Pacific island chain, the National Weather Service said.

Meltwater rivers flowing from Svalbard glaciers are carrying ancient methane from rocks beneath the ice into the open air, new research published in Nature Communications shows.

The human genome is about two meters (6.6 feet) long, yet it is folded inside a cell nucleus only about 10 micrometers in diameter. To fit into this tiny space, DNA is wrapped around histone proteins to form nucleosomes, which are further organized into chromatin. For decades, ch

Wildfires ravaging the Indonesian part of Borneo are choking communities as far away as Malaysia with putrid haze, testing the resources and resolve of those who must endure it.

A squishy worm that starts its life as something of a floating head in the Pacific Ocean is changing what scientists know about metamorphosis at the cellular level.

As an embryo develops from a small cluster of stem cells, those once "blank slate" cells begin to take on more specialized roles like brain, liver or muscle cells and organize themselves into three-dimensional structures such as tissues and organs.

What if the key to making stronger, more sustainable plastics isn't changing their ingredients, but rearranging their molecules? Virginia Tech researchers have put that idea to the test, creating degradable polymers with a new molecular architecture that combines properties often

Most of the countryside around the Holnicote estate in Somerset has been dry and dusty for most of the summer. But one corner remains conspicuously green.

Nearly a century ago, a single colony of Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) helped launch the antibiotic age. In 1928, Alexander Fleming returned to his London lab to find that a stray mold had wiped out the Staphylococcus growing on one of his plates. The accident gave the world

We usually think of auroras as beautiful lights in the night sky. I see them as visible traces of a connection between the sun, Earth's magnetic field and the atmosphere. This led me to an origin-of-life question: Could the planetary structure that produces auroras also have orga

Crime levels are falling for most offenses across the UK—but the public doesn't necessarily feel safer. It's a human trait to focus on frightening information in the news or on social media—but it could also mean that people are more fearful about crime than they need to be.

When you think of conservation in Australia, chances are you'll think of a national park.