https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Deep sea and sediments bring iron to Antarctic waters. The iron that fertilizes the waters around Antarctica mostly comes from the deep, upwelling waters and the sediments around the continent. https://phys.org/news/2024-03-deep-sea-sediments-iron-antarctic.html Earth Sciences Environment Wed, 06 Mar 2024 16:15:03 EST news628964102 Three physicists have taken a new look at the circumstances surrounding the mysterious Chinguetti meteorite and developed a means for confirming whether it exists or not. In their paper posted to the arXiv preprint server, Robert Warren, Stephen Warren and Ekaterini Protopapa suggest that there are only a few possible places the meteorite could be and thus a magnetometer-based survey over the region could solve the mystery. https://phys.org/news/2024-03-physicists-deny-chinguetti-meteorite.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 01 Mar 2024 11:30:01 EST news628512729 Recycling facilities collect glass and mercury from thrown-away fluorescent bulbs, but discarded lighting could also supply rare-earth metals for reuse. The 17 metals referred to as rare earths aren't all widely available and aren't easily extracted with existing recycling methods. https://phys.org/news/2024-02-bright-idea-recycling-rare-earth.html Materials Science Thu, 29 Feb 2024 15:06:03 EST news628441561 Iron is a micronutrient for plants. Biologists from the Institute of Botany at Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) describe in a study, which has now been published in the Journal of Cell Biology, that regulatory proteins for iron uptake behave particularly dynamically in the cell nucleus when the cells are exposed to blue light—an important signal for plant growth. They found that the initially homogeneously distributed proteins relocated together into "biomolecular condensates" in the cell nucleus shortly after this exposure. https://phys.org/news/2024-02-biomolecular-condensates-regulatory-hubs-iron.html Molecular & Computational biology Agriculture Fri, 23 Feb 2024 12:23:08 EST news627913386 Oxidative functionalization of hydrophobic compounds is an important research area from the perspective of effective utilization of natural resources and treatment and reuse of hazardous substances. However, a method that can facilitate such reactions has not been well established. https://phys.org/news/2024-02-mechanism-efficient-oxidation-hydrophobic-aromatic.html Analytical Chemistry Materials Science Mon, 19 Feb 2024 11:36:59 EST news627565013 Typically, researchers attempting to synthesize specifically targeted particles of materials have had to rely on intuition or trial-and-error methods. This approach can be inefficient, requiring significant time and resource investments. https://phys.org/news/2024-02-science-approaches-nanoparticle-synthesis.html Nanomaterials Mon, 12 Feb 2024 14:05:02 EST news626969101 Few gemstones are more difficult to find than diamonds. Geologists from ETH Zurich and the University of Melbourne have now established a link between their occurrence and the mineral olivine. This could make the search for diamonds easier in the future. https://phys.org/news/2024-02-olivine-diamonds-friends-precious-gemstones.html Earth Sciences Thu, 08 Feb 2024 09:28:03 EST news626606881 The production of aluminum generates around 180 million tons of toxic red mud every year. Scientists at the Max-Planck-Institut für Eisenforschung, a center for iron research, have now shown how green steel can be produced from aluminum production waste in a relatively simple way. In an electric arc furnace similar to those used in the steel industry for decades, they convert the iron oxide contained in the red mud into iron using hydrogen plasma. https://phys.org/news/2024-02-team-green-steel-toxic-red.html Analytical Chemistry Materials Science Mon, 05 Feb 2024 14:53:08 EST news626367183 The development of new antibiotics has stalled—new strategies are needed as the world enters the age of antibiotic resistance. To combat this challenge, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists have found that synthetic antibacterial minerals exhibit potent antibacterial activity against topical MRSA infections and increase the rate of wound closure. https://phys.org/news/2024-01-synthetic-antibacterial-minerals-combat-topical.html Cell & Microbiology Biotechnology Tue, 30 Jan 2024 11:05:17 EST news625835112 From a spin state perspective, metal complex catalysts are classified into two types: closed-shell catalysts (lacking unpaired electrons, typically based on noble metals like palladium) and open-shell catalysts (with unpaired electrons, often based on Earth-abundant metals such as iron). https://phys.org/news/2024-01-effect-catalyst-state-reaction.html Analytical Chemistry Materials Science Fri, 12 Jan 2024 09:18:11 EST news624273488 Plants and animals alike rely on iron for growth and regulation of microbiomes—collections of bacteria, fungi, and more that co-exist in places like the human gut or the soil around a plant's roots. Plants face a special challenge when acquiring iron, since the strategies plants use to increase iron availability alter the root microbiome and can inadvertently benefit harmful soil-dwelling bacteria. https://phys.org/news/2024-01-iron-immunity-resiliency-climate.html Molecular & Computational biology Agriculture Wed, 10 Jan 2024 11:00:01 EST news624100176 When our sun was a young star, 4.56 billion years ago, what is now our solar system was just a disk of rocky dust and gas. Over tens of millions of years, tiny dust pebbles coalesced, like a snowball rolling larger and larger, to become kilometer-sized "planetesimals"—the building blocks of Earth and the other inner planets. https://phys.org/news/2024-01-meteorite-analysis-earth-blocks.html Astronomy Planetary Sciences Tue, 09 Jan 2024 12:04:04 EST news624024242 Researchers from the John Innes Centre and the Max-Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology are calling for biofortification to play an integrated role in national and international food strategies to relieve the global problem of hidden hunger. https://phys.org/news/2024-01-hidden-hunger-biofortification-nutrition-home.html Ecology Agriculture Thu, 04 Jan 2024 12:57:39 EST news623595455 Just as snow crystals form in the upper atmosphere, then fall to lower, warmer elevations and melt, scientists believe a phenomenon called iron snow happens in the molten iron cores of some planetary bodies. Cooling near the core-mantle boundary creates crystals of iron, which melt as they fall deeper into the hot core. This movement may create magnetic fields in some smaller bodies like Mercury and Jupiter's moon Ganymede, but its dynamics are not well known. https://phys.org/news/2024-01-iron-ebb-magnetic-fields.html Planetary Sciences Wed, 03 Jan 2024 09:43:03 EST news623497381 Giant-impact driven redox processes in the atmosphere and magma ocean may have played crucial roles during the evolution of the Earth. However, the absence of rock records from the time or era makes it challenging to understand these processes. https://phys.org/news/2023-12-planetary-scientists-simulate-oxidation-iron.html Planetary Sciences Wed, 20 Dec 2023 07:25:55 EST news622279552 Researchers from the Bavarian Center for Battery Technology and the "SolTech" research network at the University of Bayreuth have presented a new production method for electrocatalysts: a fast, low-temperature synthesis of special ceramic materials (high-entropy oxides). https://phys.org/news/2023-12-fast-energy-saving-synthesis-method-electrocatalysts.html Nanomaterials Thu, 14 Dec 2023 14:26:02 EST news621786361 Copper (Cu) availability is critical for plant growth and development and for food yield and quality. It is essential for plants to maintain Cu homeostasis. To maintain Cu homeostasis in different tissues and organs, the uptake and transport of Cu must be precisely controlled. IRON MAN (IMA) is a family of small peptides that can bind both iron (Fe) and Cu ions. https://phys.org/news/2023-12-iron-ima-involved-copper-homeostasis.html Plants & Animals Molecular & Computational biology Wed, 06 Dec 2023 12:43:03 EST news621088982 Micrometeorites originating from icy celestial bodies in the outer solar system may be responsible for transporting nitrogen to the near-Earth region in the early days of our solar system. That discovery was published in Nature Astronomy by an international team of researchers, including University of Hawai'i at Mānoa scientists, led by Kyoto University. https://phys.org/news/2023-12-meteorites-source-nitrogen-early-earth.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 01 Dec 2023 07:29:03 EST news620638141 A team of scientists from Cornell University and the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory have revealed an unexpected function of a transport protein and its role in plant regulatory mechanisms. Their research, published in The Plant Cell earlier this year, could help reduce human mineral deficiencies by packing essential micronutrients into edible parts of plants. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-x-rays-reveal-unexpected-protein-function.html Plants & Animals Molecular & Computational biology Tue, 28 Nov 2023 09:54:05 EST news620387641 The Iron Age site of Casas del Turuñuelo was used repeatedly for ritualized animal sacrifice, according to a multidisciplinary study published November 22, 2023 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Mª Pilar Iborra Eres of the Institut Valencià de Conservació, Restauració i Investigació, Spain, Sebastián Celestino Pérez of Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain, and their colleagues. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-casas-del-turuuelo-site-animal.html Archaeology Wed, 22 Nov 2023 14:00:01 EST news619869578 Scientists have discovered that bacteria can create something like memories about when to form strategies that can cause dangerous infections in people, such as resistance to antibiotics and bacterial swarms when millions of bacteria come together on a single surface. The discovery—which has potential applications for preventing and combatting bacterial infections and addressing antibiotic-resistant bacteria—relates to a common chemical element bacterial cells can use to form and pass along these memories to their progeny over later generations. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-bacteria-memories-generations.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Tue, 21 Nov 2023 15:20:03 EST news619802401 Have you noticed many Australian landscapes, like the outback and our deserts, are brown and orange? This is especially easy to see when looking at a satellite image. Australia's red center is colored by an abundant mineral scorched into Australian soils and sediments. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-rust-riches-goethite-role-australia.html Earth Sciences Tue, 21 Nov 2023 14:02:04 EST news619797722 The core–mantle boundary (CMB) is the interface between the Earth's iron metal core and the thick rocky layer of mantle just above the core. It is a world of extremes—temperatures thousands of degrees Fahrenheit and pressures over a million times the pressure at the surface of the Earth. While it may seem far away from our environment on Earth's surface, plumes of material from the CMB can ascend upwards through the planet over tens of millions of years, influencing the chemistry, geologic structure, and plate tectonics of the surface world where we live. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-deep-earth-iron-oxide-extreme.html Earth Sciences Fri, 17 Nov 2023 13:49:53 EST news619451385 When it comes to chemical reactions, fluorine has a reputation as a 'magic bullet atom' for its ability to increase a drug's absorption and prolong its lifetime. However, traditional methods of adding it to compounds entail expensive materials and can be difficult to pull off. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-fluorine-catch-and-attach-boost-drug-efficiency.html Biochemistry Analytical Chemistry Mon, 13 Nov 2023 12:11:46 EST news619099903 Scientists know very little about conditions in the ocean when life first evolved, but new research published in Nature Geoscience has revealed how geological processes controlled which nutrients were available to fuel their development. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-recreation-ancient-seawater-reveals-nutrients.html Evolution Mon, 13 Nov 2023 11:37:00 EST news619097817 When pathogens like Salmonella invade the gut, a struggle for essential nutrients such as iron begins. Salmonella—and other bacteria—produce compounds to capture iron, and the host counters with its own proteins to sequester those compounds and starve the pathogen, a response called nutritional immunity. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-role-gut-bacteria-host-pathogen-competition.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 06 Nov 2023 11:08:03 EST news618491281 Snapping a picture on your next bushwalk could help predict and prevent devastating bushfires, thanks to a new innovative mobile phone app, NOBURN, powered by AI developed by University of Adelaide experts. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-ai-bushfires.html Earth Sciences Environment Thu, 02 Nov 2023 14:44:03 EDT news618155042 Researchers from Skoltech, MIPT, and Dukhov Research Institute of Automatics have proposed a method that cuts all the right corners to spare computational costs and enable the prediction of material structures at any temperatures. The team reports its findings for the structure of iron in the inner core and magnesium silicate in the Earth's lower mantle. https://phys.org/news/2023-11-method-roadblock-crystal-probes-earth.html Earth Sciences Thu, 02 Nov 2023 09:56:48 EDT news618137805 A genetic breakthrough has opened new opportunities for iron-fortified vegetables and cereal crops to help address the global health issue of anemia. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-power-peas-genetic-discovery-high-iron.html Molecular & Computational biology Agriculture Tue, 31 Oct 2023 10:33:04 EDT news617967182 Extraterrestrial mining and metal processing are key strategies for space exploration. In a new study in Scientific Reports, Rodolfo Marin Rivera, and a team of scientists in materials science, conducted catalytic dissolution of metals from meteorite proxies of metal-rich asteroids by using a deep eutectic solvent. These solvents are important for extraterrestrial mining since they can be designed to have relatively low vapor pressures and can comprise organic waste products from extraterrestrial settlements. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-asteroids-method-metals.html Astrobiology Planetary Sciences Tue, 31 Oct 2023 10:20:01 EDT news617966108