Evrim Yazgin

6 days ago | cosmosmagazine.com | Evrim Yazgin

A sponge-like device produced by engineers in Australia and China can capture water from thin air. The researchers say it could be used in arid regions of the world to collect water. A device, described in a paper published in the Journal of Cleaner Production, works in areas of low humidity where other technologies such as fog harvesting or radiative cooling struggle. The new design is effective in humidity levels of 30% to 90% and temperatures from 5°C to 55°C.

1 week ago | cosmosmagazine.com | Evrim Yazgin

Physicists have taken the first images of individual atoms interacting with each other, helping to prove theoretical correlations that had never been directly observed. The findings are published in the Physical Review Letters. Images of individual atoms have been taken before – but only ever in the context of a crystal-like structure or in strong fields where the atoms cannot move. The new images begin with a “cloud” of freely moving atoms.

1 week ago | cosmosmagazine.com | Evrim Yazgin

A study of the 28 most populous cities in the US shows that all are sinking. The most common cause is groundwater extraction. But the authors present possible solutions. The fastest-sinking city is Houston, with more than 40% of it descending more than 5mm a year, and 12% sinking twice as quickly. Some localised spots are going down as much as 5cm per year. Other fast-sinking zones include parts of Las Vegas, Washington DC, San Francisco and the area around New York’s LaGuardia Airport.

1 week ago | cosmosmagazine.com | Evrim Yazgin

New research reveals that Neanderthal stone tool makers had to be extremely precise about the angle at which they would strike to produce hand tools hundreds of thousands of years ago. The study, published in the journal Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, challenges the previously held belief that the angle of hammer strike was dependent on the stiffness of the flake and would have little effect on the shape of the stone tool.

1 week ago | cosmosmagazine.com | Evrim Yazgin

Tyrannosaurus rex dominated North America just before the mass extinction 66 million years ago which spelled the end of the “Age of Dinosaurs”. But its ancestors came from Asia according to new research. T. rex is iconic. It is sometimes referred to as the “king of the dinosaurs” due to its massive size. It was one of the largest land predators of all time, measuring up to 13m long and 9 tonnes.