Soft robots capable of self-driven information transmission show great potentials in future. Recently, scientists in China have developed an optically interactive soft robotic system that can transmit encoded instructions through holographic feedback, thereby guiding operators to perform tasks with high precision. This strategy establishes a new framework for the development of interactive soft robots that mimic biological systems by employing light as the central carrier of information.

A research team led by Prof. WANG Xianlong and Dr. WANG Pei from the Institute of Solid State Physics, Hefei Institutes of Physical Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, has successfully stabilized a B31-type MnSe_0.5Te_0.5 phase that exhibits superconductivity driven by pressure-induced Jahn–Teller distortions.

Scientists in China developed a hybrid frequency-dimension simulator on a thin-film lithium niobate chip. By combining intra- and inter-resonant frequency lattices, it realizes models such as the Hall ladder, Creutz ladder, and SSH model, enabling direct band-structure readout of the SSH model. Phenomena including spin-momentum locking, topological flat bands, and the Aharonov–Bohm cage are observed, while applications like piecewise-continuous optical frequency shifting are enabled via device cascading.

Soil moisture does more than help crops grow. It also shapes the invisible microbial reactions that determine whether nitrogen fertilizer is efficiently converted in soil or temporarily builds up as reactive nitrogen compounds. A new study published in Environmental and Biogeochemical Processes reveals how changing soil water levels can disrupt the balance between two key steps of nitrification, a central process in the soil nitrogen cycle.

According to study data, glaciers and snowfields thinned between 2014-2022 at a seven-fold increase compared to 1967-2014, with ice thinning driven by warming summer temperatures. In contrast, rock glaciers are near equilibrium and saw no change in the rate of ice melt from 1967-2022.

Lehigh University researchers have discovered that tiny drug-delivery robots, known as microswimmers, unexpectedly reverse their direction of motion when traveling through complex, non-Newtonian fluids like blood and mucus. Published in Applied Physics Letters, the study provides the first experimental proof of this "backward sliding" phenomenon. This foundational insight into fluid rheology could fundamentally change how biomedical engineers manipulate and control microscale robots for targeted drug delivery inside the human body, turning the surrounding bodily fluids from a navigation obstacle into a mechanism for steering control.

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) spoofing—the transmission of counterfeit signals that trick receivers into reporting false positions or times—poses a growing threat to aviation, maritime shipping, power grids and autonomous systems. 

Contrary to common assumptions, pigeons do not lock their eyes in place during flight. Instead, they make slow, subtle eye movements that may help them gather more information about their surroundings.

That is the key finding of a new study led by Dr. Anthony Lapsansky, who conducted the research as a postdoctoral fellow at UBC, and Dr. Doug Altshuler, professor in the department of zoology, who discuss what the findings reveal about animal vision and autonomous flight.