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How would a starfish wear trousers? Science has an answer
Starfishes are weirdly shaped animals. Scientists have long puzzled over how a starfish body equates to the more typical animal arrangement of a head on one end and trunk or tail on the other. Humans wear trousers on the bottom of their trunks, so you could extrapolate out from that to suggest solutions to the…
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What causes fainting? Scientists finally have an answer
Whether as a result of heat, hunger, standing for too long, or merely at the sight of blood or needles, 40% of people faint at least once in their lifetime. But exactly what causes these brief losses of consciousness — which researchers call ‘syncope’ — has remained a mystery for cardiologists and neuroscientists for a…
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Strange blobs in Earth’s mantle are relics of a massive collision
The protoplanet Theia, which was roughly the size of Mars, slammed into proto-Earth 4.5 billion years ago (artist’s impression).Credit: Hernán Cañellas For decades, scientists have been baffled by two large, mysterious blobs in Earth’s mantle. These rock formations are thousands of kilometres long and slightly denser than their surroundings, hinting that they are made of…
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Out-of-plane cations homogenise perovskite composition for solar cells
Abstract Perovskite solar cells (PSCs) composing the formula of FA1-xCsxPbI3 provide an attractive ption for integrating high efficiency, durable stability and compatibility with upscale fabrication. Despite the Cs cation incorporation potentially enabling a perfect perovskite lattice1,2, the compositional inhomogeneity caused by A-site cation segregation is likely detrimental to the photovoltaic performance of solar cells3,4. Here,…
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Personal motivations polarize people’s memories of the COVID-19 pandemic
RESEARCH BRIEFINGS 01 November 2023 How accurately a person recalls the COVID-19 pandemic is affected by motivational factors, including how they feel about their vaccination status. The recollections of vaccinated and unvaccinated people are skewed in opposite directions, leading to different retrospective narratives about the pandemic. This distorted recall influences how individuals evaluate past political…
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Protect the ‘right to science’ for people and the planet
When I travelled to Iraq earlier this year, I witnessed what some might call a dystopian future. In blistering 50 °C heat in Basra, it was clear that climate change is our here and now. As United Nations secretary-general António Guterres said in July, the era of ‘global boiling’ has well and truly commenced. We are…
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Daily briefing: Watch the mesmerizing flow of warning signals across a plant’s leaves
Hello Nature readers, would you like to get this Briefing in your inbox free every day? Sign up here. Jurassic lampreys (artist’s impression) used their toothed suckers to consume the flesh of their prey, a strategy that allowed them to grow larger than creatures that came before. (Heming Zhang) Lampreys had flesh-eating ancestors Two superbly…
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Using smartphones to optimise and scale-up the assessment of model-based planning
Abstract Model-based planning is thought to protect against over-reliance on habits. It is reduced in individuals high in compulsivity, but effect sizes are small and may depend on subtle features of the tasks used to assess it. We developed a diamond-shooting smartphone game that measures model-based planning in an at-home setting, and varied the game’s…
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Sequence optimized diagnostic assay for Ebola virus detection
Abstract Rapid pathogen identification is a critical first step in patient isolation, treatment, and controlling an outbreak. Real-time PCR is a highly sensitive and specific approach commonly used for infectious disease diagnostics. However, mismatches in the primer or probe sequence and the target organism can cause decreased sensitivity, assay failure, and false negative results. Limited…
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Carbon-to-nitrogen single-atom transmutation of azaarenes
Abstract When searching for the ideal molecule to fill a particular functional role (for example, a medicine), the difference between success and failure can often come down to a single atom1. Replacing an aromatic carbon atom with a nitrogen atom would be enabling in the discovery of potential medicines2, but only indirect means exist to make…