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Scientists Conjure Curves From Flatness
Researchers have found a set of rules for imbuing flat surfaces with curvature, enabling them to form a virtually unlimited range of three-dimensional structures.
Machine Intelligence Cracks Genetic Controls
Scientists have begun to decipher the most difficult-to-read parts of the genome — the parts that don’t code for proteins. The new work reveals how errors in these genetic instructions can lead to disease.
Prime Gap Grows After Decades-Long Lull
A year after tackling how close together prime number pairs can stay, mathematicians have now made the first major advance in 76 years in understanding how far apart primes can be.
A Common Logic to Seeing Cats and Cosmos
New research suggests physicists, computers and brains employ the same procedure to tease out important features from among other irrelevant bits of data.
New Twist Found in the Story of Life’s Start
All life on Earth is made of molecules that twist in the same direction. New research reveals that this may not always have been so.
Ancient Survivors Could Redefine Sex
Microscopic creatures called bdelloid rotifers have thrived without mating for millions of years. How they did it could reveal why sex is so essential for almost everyone else.
Multiverse Collisions May Dot the Sky
Early in cosmic history, our universe may have bumped into another — a primordial clash that could have left traces in the Big Bang’s afterglow.
In a Multiverse, What Are the Odds?
Testing the multiverse hypothesis requires measuring whether our universe is statistically typical among the infinite variety of universes. But infinity does a number on statistics.
Dwarf Galaxies Dim Hopes of Dark Matter
For five years physicists have been tantalized by possible evidence of dark matter in the Milky Way’s center. But new results from small satellite galaxies have complicated the story.