Lifeboat Foundation

The accumulation of mutations in DNA is often mentioned as an explanation for the aging process, but it remains just one hypothesis among many. A team from the University of Geneva (UNIGE), in collaboration with the Inselspital, University Hospital of Bern and the University of Bern (UNIBE), has identified a mechanism that explains why certain organs, such as the liver, age more rapidly than others.

The mechanism reveals that damages to non-coding DNA, which are often hidden, accumulate more in slowly proliferating tissues, such as those of the liver or kidneys. Unlike in organs that regenerate frequently, these damages remain undetected for a long time and prevent cell division. These results, published in the journal Cell, open new avenues for understanding cellular aging and potentially slowing it down.

Our organs and tissues do not all age at the same rate. Aging, marked by an increase in senescent cells —cells that are unable to divide and have lost their functions—affects the liver or kidneys more rapidly than the skin or intestine.

Materials are crucial to modern technology, especially those used in extreme environments like nuclear energy systems and military applications. These materials need to withstand intense pressure, temperature and corrosion. Understanding their lattice-level behavior under such conditions is essential for developing next-generation materials that are more resilient, cheaper, lighter and sustainable.

A new type of OLED (organic light emitting diode) could replace bulky night vision goggles with lightweight glasses, making them cheaper and more practical for prolonged use, according to University of Michigan researchers.

In a paper published in Physical Review Letters this week, physicists from Amsterdam and Copenhagen argue that close observations of merging black hole pairs may unveil information about potential new particles. The research combines several new discoveries made by UvA scientists over the past six years.

Understanding how light travels through various materials is essential for many fields, from medical imaging to manufacturing. However, due to their structure, materials often show directional differences in how they scatter light, known as anisotropy. This complexity has traditionally made it difficult to accurately measure and model their optical properties. Recently, researchers have developed a new technique that could transform how we study these materials.

A breakthrough in quantum technology research could help realize a new generation of precise quantum sensors that can operate at room temperature.

TU Wien (Vienna) has succeeded in generating laser-synchronized ion pulses with a duration of well under 500 picoseconds, which can be used to observe chemical processes on material surfaces. The work has been published in Physical Review Research.

In 2023, the ATLAS collaboration, which provided its first W boson mass measurement in 2017, released an improved measurement based on a reanalysis of proton–proton collision data from the first run of the LHC. This improved result, 80,366.5 MeV with an uncertainty of 15.9 MeV, lined up with all previous measurements except the CDF measurement, which remains the most precise to date, with a precision of 0.01%.

The CMS experiment has now contributed to this global endeavor with its first W boson mass measurement. The keenly anticipated result, 80,360.2 with an uncertainty of 9.9 MeV, has a precision comparable to that of the CDF measurement and is in line with all previous measurements except the CDF result.

“The wait for the CMS result is now over. After carefully analyzing data collected in 2016 and going through all the cross checks, the CMS W mass result is ready,” says outgoing CMS spokesperson Patricia McBride. “This analysis is the first attempt to measure the W mass in the harsh collision environment of the second running period of the LHC. And all the hard work from the team has resulted in an extremely precise W mass measurement and the most precise measurement at the LHC.”

“What got you into astrophysics?” It’s a question I’m often asked at outreach events, and I answer by pointing to my early passion for exploring the biggest questions about our universe. Well, along with seeing Star Wars at an impressionable age.