Science

Science

[:es]‘The game has changed.’ AI triumphs at solving protein structures[:]

[:es]Artificial intelligence (AI) has solved one of biology’s grand challenges: predicting how proteins curl up from a linear chain of amino acids into 3D shapes that allow them to carry out life’s tasks. Today, leading structural biologists and organizers of a biennial protein-folding competition announced the achievement by researchers at DeepMind, a U.K.-based AI company.…
Science

[:es]Elephants can lose two bathtubs full of water in a single day when it gets hot[:]

[:es]When the weather is warm, elephants can lose up to 10% of all the water in their bodies in a single day, according to a new study. That’s the equivalent of nearly two bathtubs full, the highest volume of daily water loss ever recorded in a land animal.[:]
Science

[:es]To explain away dark matter, gravity would have to be really weird, cosmologists say[:]

[:es]Dark matter, the invisible stuff whose gravity is thought to hold galaxies together, may be the least satisfying concept in physics. But if you want to get rid of it, a new study finds, you’ll need to replace it with something even more bizarre: a force of gravity that, at some distances, pulls massive objects…
Science

[:es]Seas are rising faster than ever[:]

[:es]Ask climate scientists how fast the world’s oceans are creeping upward, and many will say 3.2 millimeters per year—a figure enshrined in the last Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, from 2014. But the number, based on satellite measurements taken since the early 1990s, is a long-term average. In fact, the global rate varied so…
Science

[:es]Microbes’ mystery DNA helps defeat viruses—and has genome-editing potential[:]

[:es]Seven years ago, an understanding of nature inspired a revolutionary new technology, when researchers turned a defense system used by bacteria to thwart viruses into the gene-editing tool now known as CRISPR. But for another emerging gene editor the understanding has lagged the applications. For several years, researchers have been adapting retrons—mysterious complexes of DNA,…
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[:es]Biogen’s Alzheimer’s drug candidate takes a beating from FDA advisers[:]

[:es]If the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) wants to approve the first new drug for Alzheimer’s disease in 17 years, it will have to do so against the overwhelming recommendation of the experts it turned to for advice on the matter. An independent advisory panel convened by the agency today to review data on…
Science

[:es]The Maya built the Western Hemisphere’s first water filtration system[:]

[:es]The Maya city of Tikal is famous for its soaring palaces and temples. But something far more humble kept Tikal functioning: its water filtration system, the earliest known of its kind. Researchers recently discovered a volcanic mineral that captures microbes and heavy metals in one of Tikal’s largest reservoirs. Because the material is not found…
Science

[:es]Europe is locking down a second time. But what is its long-term plan?[:]

[:es]Most countries are reacting without a long-term plan, simply trying to avoid the worst. Officials differ about the best way to bring the numbers down again, and how low a level they should strive for. And no one knows what comes next. Short of vaccines to save the day, countries may face an exhausting series…
Science

[:es]United Kingdom lights up its unusual fusion reactor[:]

[:es]The United Kingdom’s revamped fusion reactor, known as the Mega Amp Spherical Tokamak (MAST) Upgrade, powered up for the first time yesterday after a 7-year build. The £55 million device will be a testbed for technologies critical to all future fusion reactors, and may provide a stepping stone to a new design of energy-producing facility.[:]