news 2020

A publication by researchers led by physicist Prof. Cornelia Denz is among the world's 30 most groundbreaking papers of 2020, according to the journal Optics & Photonics News. In its special annual end-of-year issue, the journal selects the research highlights of the past year in the fields of optics and photonics.

Scientific articles in the field of physics are mostly very short and deal with a very restricted topic. A remarkable exception to this is an article published recently by physicists from the Universities of Münster and Düsseldorf. The article is 127 pages long, cites a total of 1075 sources and deals with a wide range of branches of physics - from biophysics to quantum mechanics.

How can cells adhere to surfaces and move on them? This is a question which was investigated by an international team of researchers headed by Prof. Michael Hippler from the University of Münster and Prof. Kaiyao Huang from the Institute of Hydrobiology (Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, China).

Students of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Stuttgart have developed and built the unmanned testing platform Aircraft for Research and Applied Science (ARAS). In the process, they designed the components for it to be able to withstand high loads. After the mechanical and electronic integration was finished, the "UAStudents Gruppe" (a compound made up of Unmanned Aerial System, another word for drone, and students) carried out extensive ground testing before the aircraft successfully took off for the first time in October.

In the first few months of the corona pandemic, street patrol officers responded to new demands with a "medium stress level" although the individual experience of strain varied greatly. For example, factors leading to a high stress level were little work experience in the police force or feeling unprepared.

Writing in PNAS, scientists from Cologne university present important new constraints showing that plate tectonics started relatively slow, although the early Earth's interior was much hotter than today. In an international collaboration earth scientists at the University of Cologne discovered that during Earth's early history mantle convection on, i.e. the internal mixing of our planet, was surprisingly slow and spatially restricted.

Although the individual risk of becoming infected with the coronavirus and falling ill with COVID-19 is currently estimated as being higher than was the case in summer, the willingness to be vaccinated is still not particularly great. In mid-2020, just under 55 percent of the respondents of a representative survey stated that they would probably, or very probably, be vaccinated.

Study shows link between cervical cancer and HIV infection A research team at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has quantified the effects of an infection with the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) on the development of cervical cancer. Their results show that the risk of developing cervical cancer is six times higher in women who are infected with HIV.

New HU study on the influence of "fake news" on the brain Neurocognitive studies by researchers at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (HU) show that headlines with emotional content influence our judgments about other people even when we consider the media source to be untrustworthy. Rumours, half-truths and misinformation can be consumed and shared non-stop online and have an enormous reach.

Researchers of Münster University reveal mechanobiological function of muscle-specific adhesion protein / Study published in "Nature Communications" The ability of cells to sense and respond to their mechanical environment is critical for many cellular processes but the molecular mechanisms underlying cellular mechanosensitivity are still unclear.

Scientists at Freie Universität Berlin develop a deep learning method to solve a fundamental problem in quantum chemistry No 255/2020 from Dec 18, 2020 A team of scientists at Freie Universität Berlin has developed an artificial intelligence (AI) method for calculating the ground state of the Schrödinger equation in quantum chemistry.

Researchers elucidate a unique molecular mechanism for efficient gene expression in pathogenic bacteria No 256/2020 from Dec 18, 2020 Three international research teams, including a consortium coordinated at Freie Universität Berlin, find that a motor protein, called HelD, acts like a "molecular bully" to pry the central enzyme of transcription, RNA polymerase, away from the DNA template, setting it free for the continued production of genetic messages.

Discovering a forgotten biosignal Conditions causing arrhythmia are among the most common cardiac conditions. A study headed by Prof. Georg Schmidt of the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has demonstrated for the first time that the nocturnal respiratory rate can help with an important prediction: It is an indicator of whether a defibrillator will help to extend the life of patients with arrhythmia.

International Team is awarded the Breakthrough of the Year 2020 prize by Physics World magazine Light For the development of a light-emitting silicon alloy, researchers from TU Eindhoven, Netherlands and the University of Jena, Germany together with partners from the University of Linz and TU Munich, are today (17 December) being awarded the " Breakthrough of the Year " prize by Physics World magazine.

Pseudospin in antiferromagnets: new perspectives for information technologies Elementary particles carry an intrinsic angular momentum known as their spin. For an electron, the spin can take only two particular values relative to a quantization axis, letting us denote them as spin-up and spin-down electrons.

Most comprehensive evaluation of the occurrence of vascular plants in Germany to date Life Germany's plant diversity is on the decline: in the last 60 years, decreases by an average of 15 percent have been observed across Germany in over 70 percent of the more than 2,000 species examined. These are the findings of the most comprehensive analysis of plant data from Germany ever conducted, recently published in "Global Change Biology".

A new study published today highlights the importance of overcoming gender inequality for climate change adaptation and explores future pathways of gender equality for sustainable development Vulnerability to the impacts of climate change differs on a wide range of factors including socio-economic status, education, ethnicity and gender.

The yield and quality of many crops benefit from pollination, but it isn-t just honey bees that do this work: bumble bees also have a role. However, placing honey bee or bumble bee colonies next to the field does not guarantee that they will visit the desired plants since there may be other plant species flowering at the same time that prove more attractive.

The research being carried out by Dr. Nina Engelhardt fills a gap in our understanding of tolerance as well as in (cognitive) literature, and her project has led to her being included in the Baden-Württemberg Foundation's Elite Program for postdocs. In public discourse, the word "tolerance" is often defined as respect, acceptance and recognition of other cultures.

An international team of researcher developed a traction force microscopy platform which allows for quantifying the pulls and pushes exerted via T-cell microvilli, in both tangential and normal directions, during T-cell activation Mechanical forces play a vital role for many biological mechanisms, such as the sensation of infected cells by T-cells.