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Categories: Ecology: General, Engineering: Robotics Research

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The previously hidden and diverse underwater acoustic world in British ponds has been uncovered by a team of researchers.

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Roboticists have developed a jellyfish-inspired underwater robot with which they hope one day to collect waste from the bottom of the ocean. The almost noise-free prototype can trap objects underneath its body without physical contact, thereby enabling safe interactions in delicate environments such as coral reefs. Jellyfish-Bot could become an important tool for environmental remediation.

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Researchers have designed a tabletop-sized vaccine printer that could be scaled up to produce hundreds of vaccine doses in a day and deployed anywhere vaccines are needed. The vaccine doses are contained within microneedle patches that can be stored long-term at room temperature and applied to the skin, avoiding the need for injections.

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A new smart material is activated by both heat and electricity, making it the first ever to respond to two different stimuli.

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The genomes of two hornet species, the European hornet and the Asian hornet (or yellow-legged hornet) have been sequenced.

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Mechanically responsive molecular crystals are extremely useful in soft robotics, which requires a versatile actuation technology. Crystals driven by the photothermal effect are particularly promising for achieving high-speed actuation. However, the response (bending) observed in these crystals is usually small. Now, scientists address this issue by inducing large resonated natural vibrations in anisole crystals with UV light illumination at the natural vibration frequency of the crystal.

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An interdisciplinary group of researchers is proposing a new way to think of some interactions between species, classifying a variety of plants, animals and fungi as 'nature's chefs.' Specifically, nature's chefs are organisms that provide food -- or the illusion of food -- to other organisms. The concept offers a new perspective on species interactions, which can inform how people think about food across the tree of life as well as disparate research disciplines.

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A new global survey of 1000 forest areas shows how climate change since the peak of the last ice age has had a major impact on the diversity and distribution of tree species we see today. The results can help us predict how ecosystems will react to future changes, thus having an impact on conservation management around the globe.

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Researchers have designed a system that makes an off-the-shelf quadruped robot nimble enough to walk a narrow balance beam -- a feat that is likely the first of its kind.

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The high seas have been colonized by a surprising number of coastal marine invertebrate species, which can now survive and reproduce in the open ocean, contributing strongly to the floating community composition. Researchers found coastal species, representing diverse taxonomic groups and life history traits, in the eastern North Pacific Subtropical Gyre on over 70 percent of the plastic debris they examined. Further, the debris carried more coastal species than open ocean species.

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The new smart sensor uses embedded information to detect motion in a single video frame.

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We typically think of robots as metal objects, filled with motors and circuits. But the field of molecular robotics is starting to change that. Like the formation of complex living organisms, molecular robots derive their form and functionality from assembled molecules stored in a single unit, i.e., a body. Yet manufacturing this body at the microscopic level is an engineering nightmare. Now, a team has created a simple workaround.

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Killer whales (also known as orcas) are intelligent predators. While it's known that killer whales in the Pacific Northwest exploit widely different food types, even within the same region, we know much less about the feeding habits of those found throughout the North Atlantic. Thanks to a new technique, it is now possible to quantify the proportion of different prey that killer whales in the North Atlantic are eating by studying the fatty acid patterns in their blubber. As climate change leads to a northward redistribution of killer whales, the results have implications not only for the health and survival of these killer whales, but also in terms of potential impacts on sensitive species within Arctic ecosystems.

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Researchers have created environmentally-friendly, high-efficiency photovoltaic cells that harness ambient light to power internet of Things (IoT) devices.

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Wildfires. Many see them as purely destructive forces, disasters that blaze through a landscape, charring everything in their paths. But a new study reminds us that wildfires are also generative forces, spurring biodiversity in their wakes.

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A new study, which used 44 years of data, shows that as the globe has warmed, altering the timing and amount of snow cover, snowshoe hares' winter transformation may be out of sync with the color of the background environment; this may actually put them at a greater disadvantage.

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To make human-robot interactions safer and more fruitful, robots should be capable of sensing their environment. In a recent study, researchers developed a novel robotic link with tactile and proximity sensing capabilities. Additionally, they created a simulation and learning framework that can be employed to train the robotic link to sense its environment. Their findings will pave the way to a future where humans and robots can operate harmoniously in close proximity.

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Whether wriggling your toes or lifting groceries, muscles in your body smoothly expand and contract. Some polymers can do the same thing -- acting like artificial muscles -- but only when stimulated by dangerously high voltages. Now, researchers report a series of thin, elastic films that respond to substantially lower electrical charges. The materials represent a step toward artificial muscles that could someday operate safely in medical devices.

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Soil stores more carbon than plants and the atmosphere combined, and soil microbes are largely responsible for putting it there. However, the increasing frequency and severity of drought, such as those that have been impacting California, could disrupt this delicate ecosystem. Microbial ecologists warn that soil health and future greenhouse gas levels could be impacted if soil microbes adapt to drought faster than plants do.

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Can humans endure long-term living in deep space? The answer is a lukewarm maybe, according to a new theory describing the complexity of maintaining gravity and oxygen, obtaining water, developing agriculture and handling waste far from Earth.