Chemistry
We summarize the week's science breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Tech
Plastic fantastic seals in speeding projectiles
Layered nanomaterial shows how bulletproof polymers wrap around penetrating particles.
- Chemistry
Human blood types have deep evolutionary roots
The ABO system may date back 20 million years or more, a genetic analysis suggests.
- Chemistry
Depths hold clues to dearth of xenon in air
The gas doesn’t dissolve well in minerals deep inside Earth, a discovery that may explain why it’s also scarce in the atmosphere.
- Life
Research in cell communication system wins 2012 chemistry Nobel
G protein-coupled receptors relay messages from other cells and the environment into the cell's interior.
- Chemistry
Solar blobs collide with a bounce
Superhot ejections from the sun surprise physicists by gaining energy of motion in collision.
- Chemistry
Chemical bond shields extreme microbes from poison
Molecular structure explains how ‘arsenic life’ bacteria instead survive by fishing out phosphate from their surroundings.
- Chemistry
Japanese lab lays claim to element 113
With the latest observation of a superheavy atom, a chemical catfight looms over who will get to name it.
- Tech
Degradable devices vanish after use
Technique combines silicon, magnesium and silk for medical implants, transistors and digital cameras that can melt away.
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- Chemistry
Water boils sans bubbles
Insulating steam keeps a superhot object from splattering the soup.
- Chemistry
Too-young caterpillars like scent of sex
Larvae respond to mate-attracting pheromones, raising evolutionary questions about what a very grown-up chemical signal could mean to them.
- Chemistry
Big jobs go to loyal proteins
Cells offload much of their nonessential work on enzymes that juggle a number of tasks.
