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This tiny grain-of-rice sensor gives robots a new sense and changes what delicate tools can detect

Researchers have developed a sensor about the size of a grain of rice that can measure forces and twisting motions in all directions using light instead of traditional electronics. The new sensor could help robotic tools and medical devices “feel” what they are touching, especially at very small scales.

“Although modern imaging systems can show structures clearly, they do not provide information about physical interaction, such as force or torque, and existing force sensors are often too bulky or complex to fit into miniature tools,” said research team leader Jianlong Yang from Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China. “By allowing machines to measure contact force, pressure, shear and twisting, our technology could make it possible for robots to detect unsafe contact early and adjust their actions in real time, especially in small and sensitive environments.”

In Optica journal, the researchers describe their new sensor, which measures just 1.7 millimeters and uses a single optical signal to measure forces and torques in all directions at once. Proof-of-concept tests showed that the sensor can detect stiffness variations and locate hidden structures in models that mimic a tumor embedded in tissue.

JWST spots two early black holes growing far faster than their galaxies

Astronomers have discovered two early-universe galaxies where the central black holes appear to have grown far faster than their host galaxies. Observations with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) reveal that the black holes in these galaxies, seen just 800 million years after the Big Bang, are significantly more massive relative to their host galaxies, as opposed to what astronomers see in the nearby universe. The study is published on the arXiv preprint server.

Astronomers have long discovered quasars—extraordinarily luminous galaxies powered by accreting black holes weighing billions of solar masses—in the first billion years of the universe. For these to exist so early, the black holes must have started as large as heavy seeds and grown at their maximum rate possible for most of their lives. These early black holes appear oversized compared to the galaxies they live in.

On the other hand, when JWST began its operation in 2022, it made a huge splash in astronomy with the discovery of an astonishingly large number of mature galaxies and black holes in the first billion years of the universe. Among them were some “overmassive” black holes weighing billions of times the mass of our sun, but rarely as massive as those found in luminous quasars.

Resilient quantum sensor monitors Earth’s magnetic field from space for 10 months

From navigation to solar weather forecasting, many different areas of research require space-based sensors to measure Earth’s magnetic field as accurately as possible at any given moment. So far, however, existing sensors have consistently struggled with effects including drift, interference from the spacecraft itself, and the harsh conditions of orbit.

Through new research published in Physical Review Applied, Yarne Beerden and colleagues at Hasselt University in Belgium have developed a diamond-based quantum sensor which could offer a promising solution to these problems.

New alien-life test could help Mars and Europa missions read organic molecules

For decades, the search for life beyond Earth has revolved around a key question: What molecules should scientists be looking for on other planets or moons? A new study, published in Nature Astronomy, suggests that the more revealing clue may not be the molecules themselves, but the hidden order connecting them.

“We’re showing that life does not only produce molecules,” said Fabian Klenner, UC Riverside assistant professor of planetary sciences and co-author of the study. “Life also produces an organizational principle that we can see by applying statistics.”

The researchers found that amino acids are consistently more diverse and more evenly distributed in a material sample created by a living thing than those found in abiotic or nonliving things. In contrast, the pattern reverses for fatty acids: Abiotically produced fatty acids are distributed more evenly than those produced by biological processes.

More Star Wars-like worlds emerge as 27 planet candidates with two suns discovered

There’s so little we know about circumbinary planets—planets that orbit two stars instead of one—that they can feel like the stuff of fantasy. And for good reason: to date, we’ve only confirmed the existence of 18 circumbinary planets, compared to the more than 6000 planets we know about in single star systems.

Quantum dot emitter delivers near-identical telecom photons at 40 million per second

Quantum technologies, devices that perform specific functions leveraging quantum mechanical effects, could soon outperform their classical counterparts on some tasks. Quantum emitters, devices that release individual particles of light (i.e., photons), are central components of many of these technologies, including quantum communication systems and quantum computers.

To enable the reliable operation of quantum technologies, emitters should emit photons with high consistency and coherence. In other words, they should ensure that the quantum properties of emitted photons remain stable and predictable.

Researchers at University of Copenhagen’s Niels Bohr Institute, Ruhr-University Bochum, University of Basel and Sparrow Quantum ApS recently developed a new photon emitter based on quantum dots, tiny structures that can trap electrons in confined regions and enable the controlled emission of individual photons.

Hybrid AI architecture could turn neuromorphic systems into reliable discovery machines

The artificial intelligence (AI) machines that guide the world can be grouped into three main categories: inference machines, learning machines and discovery machines. Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis are tackling the rarest of these machines. A new study points to a better way to build discovery machines, thanks to recent research led by Shantanu Chakrabartty, the Clifford W. Murphy Professor and vice dean for research in the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis.

The work, now published in Nature Communications, builds off previous research on establishing a hybrid systems architecture, one that employs “neuromorphic” architecture modeled on human neurobiology functions combined with systems that leverage quantum mechanics to find optimal solutions to complex problems.

The research shows that these machines can consistently produce state-of-the-art solutions with high reliability and with competitive time-to-solution metrics, Chakrabartty said.

How a single star can reshape an entire galaxy

Astronomers who simulate galaxies do not always get the same result, even when they start from identical conditions. New research from Leiden University shows that this is not a flaw, but a consequence of how galaxies behave—and how they are modeled.

The findings offer, for the first time, a way to address a long-standing question: how chaotic is a galaxy like the Milky Way really? The computer simulations by Tetsuro Asano and Simon Portegies Zwart (Leiden Observatory) will soon be published in Astronomy & Astrophysics and are available now on the arXiv preprint server.

The researchers created hundreds of models of Milky Way-like galaxies: flat disks of stars, embedded in a large, invisible cloud of dark matter that holds the system together. In each experiment, they ran two almost identical simulations, differing by just one tiny detail—for instance, a small shift in the position of a single star. Over time, that slight difference grows into visible structural changes: the spiral arms develop differently and the central bar rotates in another way.

‘Elegant triangle’ experiment suggests quantum internet may be closer than we think

For more than 60 years, Bell’s theorem has been the gold standard for demonstrating that quantum mechanics defies the rules of classical physics. Now, an international team of researchers, including Constructor University Professor Dr. Nicolas Gisin, has extended this principle to new limits, using an “elegant triangle” to reveal new forms of quantum nonlocality that specifically emerge in multi-node quantum networks.

The study, published in Physical Review Letters, opens a new frontier in our understanding of how quantum correlations behave in realistic network settings, one that could help usher in the age of a quantum internet.

“This is not simply a more elaborate version of Bell’s theorem applied to networks, it’s something genuinely new that only emerges when multiple independent quantum sources interact through entangled measurements,” explained Dr. Gisin, who collaborated on the experiment with researchers from China, France and Austria.

Light reshapes metal-organic framework to harvest airborne water

Chemists at the University of Iowa have created a three-dimensional lattice that captures water from the air and stores it. In a new study appearing in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, researchers describe a millimeter-scale structure made of metal atoms connected by two types of organic molecules. When exposed to ultraviolet light, the material undergoes a chemical reaction that changes its shape, creating cavities throughout the lattice. Those cavities attract water molecules from the air and store them—like a multitude of tiny canteens.

The results, which would need to be tested at larger scales, show promise as a method to help provide drinking water to people and areas with limited access. Water stress or scarcity will affect nearly five billion people—half the world’s projected population—by 2050, according to the United Nations.

“We have found and validated a way to capture and to store water that would require only sunlight,” says Leonard MacGillivray, adjunct professor in the Department of Chemistry and former professor and department chair. “You can transport the crystal lattice and eventually release the water on demand. That’s why it’s such an advance.”

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