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Echoes of Electromagnetism Found in Number Theory
A new magnum opus posits the existence of a hidden mathematical link akin to the connection between electricity and magnetism. Read more at QuantaMag…
1 year, 9 months ago
Tiny Language Models Come of Age
To better understand how neural networks learn to simulate writing, researchers trained simpler versions on synthetic children’s stories. Read more a…
1 year, 10 months ago
Rogue Worlds Throw Planetary Ideas Out of Orbit
Scientists have recently discovered scores of free-floating worlds that defy classification. The new observations have forced them to rethink their t…
1 year, 10 months ago
What Makes Life Tick? Mitochondria May Keep Time for Cells
Every species develops at its own unique tempo, leaving scientists to wonder what governs their timing. A suite of new findings suggests that cells u…
1 year, 11 months ago
An Old Conjecture Falls, Making Spheres a Lot More Complicated
The telescope conjecture gave mathematicians a handle on ways to map one sphere to another. Now that it has been disproved, the universe of shapes ha…
1 year, 11 months ago
Even Synthetic Life Forms With a Tiny Genome Can Evolve
By watching “minimal” cells regain the fitness they lost, researchers are testing whether a genome can be too simple to evolve. Read more at QuantaMa…
2 years ago
Selfish, Virus-Like DNA Can Carry Genes Between Species
Genetic elements called Mavericks that have some viral features could be responsible for the large-scale smuggling of DNA between species. Read more …
2 years ago
Exoplanets Could Help Us Learn How Planets Make Magnetism
New observations of a faraway rocky world that might have its own magnetic field could help astronomers understand the seemingly haphazard magnetic f…
2 years, 1 month ago
To Move Fast, Quantum Maze Solvers Must Forget the Past
Quantum algorithms can find their way out of mazes exponentially faster than classical ones, at the cost of forgetting the paths they took. A new res…
2 years, 1 month ago
Underground Cells Make 'Dark Oxygen' Without Light
In some deep subterranean aquifers, cells have a chemical trick for making oxygen that could sustain whole underground ecosystems. Read more at Quant…
2 years, 2 months ago