Jul 04, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Molecular machines control a sizeable number of fundamental processes in nature. Embedded in a cellular environment, these processes play a central role in the intracellular and intercellular transportation of molecules, as well as in muscle contraction in humans and animals. In order for the entire...
Key to platelet production advances understanding of RNA
Jul 04, 2022 (Nanowerk News) A new insight into RNA regulation has taken researchers a big step forward in understanding how the body creates platelets. Platelets are the smallest of all blood cells; they circulate in the bloodstream and bind together when they recognise damaged blood vessels, making them a...
Nasa considers sending swimming robots to habitable ocean worlds of the Solar System
Jul 04, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Nasa has recently announced US$600,000 in funding for a study into the feasibility of sending swarms of miniature swimming robots (known as independent micro-swimmers) to explore oceans beneath the icy shells of our Solar Systemâs many âocean worldsâ. But donât imagine metal humanoids swimming frog-like...
Nature in the wrong direction
Jul 04, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Physicists observed a strange new type of behaviour in a magnetic material when itâs heated up. The magnetic spins âfreezeâ into a static pattern when the temperature rises, a phenomenon that normally occurs when the temperature decreases. They publish their findings in Nature Physics ("Thermally...
Obstacle course for microscopic whirlwinds
Jul 04, 2022 (Nanowerk News) We know hurricanes mainly from worldwide weather phenomena, but they have started to occur more frequently also in Europe. However, when researchers use an optical Kerr microscope to zoom in on thin films of magnetic material, they see something related happening in the microcosm, given...
Magnet recycling pays off
Jul 04, 2022 (Nanowerk News) Magnets are valuable components. Although functional magnet recycling methods have been developed in recent years, they have not yet been applied in practice and magnets continue to be melted down into steel scrap. Researchers at the Fraunhofer Research Institution for Materials Recycling and Resource Strategies...
Spectacular success of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines just a glimpse of their full potential
Jul 04, 2022 (Nanowerk News) The “spectacular” success of mRNA (messenger ribonucleic acid) vaccine technology against SARS-CoV-2 provides “just a glimpse of their full potential”, according to the authors of a Perspective published by the Medical Journal of Australia ("mRNA vaccines: a transformative technology with applications beyond COVID-19"). Ms Isabella...