Soil nutrients support plants, and the animals who consume plants return these nutrients to the soil, creating a nutrient cycle. In a new study published in Ecology, scientists from the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute (NZCBI) found that in prairie grasslands, the smallest herbivores—namely prairie dogs and grasshoppers—increase rates of nutrient cycling to a greater degree than larger herbivores such as bison and cattle.

SAN ANTONIO — September 10, 2025 — A new study led by Southwest Research Institute’s Dr. Michael Starkey has provided observational evidence from the SwRI-led Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) Mission of pickup ions (PUIs) and associated wave activity in the near-Earth solar wind environment. The MMS mission, launched by NASA in 2015, placed four spacecraft in orbit to observe Earth’s magnetosphere, a magnetic field around the planet that shields it from harmful solar and cosmic radiation.

By reducing blur and distortion, a new method could expand the practical use of single-pixel imaging for surveillance and other applications

Physicists have long believed that black holes explode at the end of their lives, and that such explosions happen—at most—only once every 100,000 years. But new research published in Physical Review Letters by physicists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has found a more than 90% probability that one of these black-hole explosions might be seen within the decade, and that, if we are prepared, our current fleet of space and earthbound telescopes could witness the event.

He has been researching perovskite solar cells for over a decade: Prof. Nam-Gyu Park from Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU) in Seoul, winner of the Alexander von Humboldt Research Award, will visit the University of Stuttgart several times for shorter periods from September 2025. Together with host Prof. Michael Saliba, Head of the Institute for Photovoltaics (IPV), the chemical engineer from South Korea wants to further advance the technology.

Rice scientists have developed a new drug delivery platform that could make it easier for patients to take their medications and may even boost drug efficacy.

Researchers have developed a technique to fold glass sheets into microscopic 3D photonic structures directly on a chip, a process they call photonic origami. The method could enable tiny, yet complex optical devices for data processing sensing and experimental physics.