(Natural News) Thermochromic materials are “smart” materials that change their color depending on the temperature of their surroundings. Recently, a Singaporean research team presented a liquid that grew much darker as it got hotter. Their invention might prove useful in smart windows and other applications that respond to temperature changes. Unlike earlier examples that relied […]

(Natural News) Fingerprints have been used for many years to identify individuals based on the unique makeup of their fingerprints. But there are actually unique identifiers that exist in nature as well, and amazingly, there is a certain type of “fingerprint” that is so small, it can only be detected by specialized instruments. A new […]

(Natural News) Sleep is an important process that’s integral to life and good health. During sleep, your entire body heals and repairs damages incurred during the waking hours. While lack of sleep or poor-quality sleep is associated with an increased risk of pathological conditions, sufficient sleep is, of course, linked to better overall health. In […]

(Natural News) Why do healthy baseball players die when a ball slams into their chest while patients survive potentially lethal tachyarrhythmia attacks when they get a timely thump to the chest? Swiss researchers hoped to answer this puzzle with a recently-developed instrument that simulates how a blow to the chest affects the heart rate. When the […]

(Natural News) Patients with depression may experience improvements in their symptoms if they tried a new electricity-based stimulation therapy. Developed by North Carolina-based researchers, the transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) treatment applies gentle electrical stimulation to the scalp to adjust the recipient’s natural alpha brainwaves. In a recent study, researchers from the University of North Carolina at […]

(Natural News) The contamination of water, especially with fecal matter from animals or humans, is a serious problem. Pathogens from human or animal wastes can cause life-threatening diseases as well as economic losses. To address fecal pollution of water systems properly, it is important to know the origin of the waste. Human and animal wastes present different health […]

(Natural News) People could keep their jumper dresses or sweaters on even when the weather got warmer – if their clothing used a newly developed self-cooling textile. A combination of ordinary wool and metal conductor, the fabric retains heat during cold times and vents that stored heat when the weather starts warming up. The material detects the temperature of its surroundings and […]

(Natural News) Bacteria do not need animal or human carriers to spread. A Rutgers-led study suggests that microbes take advantage of natural air currents and use them as bridges to travel from one remote location to another. The genes that encode antibiotic resistance in bacteria appear in many seemingly unrelated bacterial species. Even microbes separated by thousands of […]

(Natural News) A new (and quiet) era of acoustics is opening up as engineers from Boston University have created a material that can silence noise without reducing airflow. In their study, which appeared in the journal Physical Review B, researchers led by Professor Xin Zhang and doctorate student Reza Ghaffarivardavagh of Boston University’s mechanical engineering department built what they called an […]

(Natural News) In a few years, you could be shopping for mobile phones that pack more juice and last twice as long with a single charge than your current phone. In their study, which was featured in Nature Materials, engineers at The Pennsylvania State University have developed a way to extend battery life and performance using a novel technology. […]