Scientists have achieved an unprecedented level of control over defects in liquid crystals that can be engineered for applications in liquid matter photonics. They can lasso an intangible ring created out of liquid crystal defects - attaching a microsphere to a long thin fiber using optical tweezers. 

Liquid crystals are familiar to us from their application in LCD screens. What makes them so interesting is that they are rich in defects. Thanks to advances in manipulation tools such as optical tweezers, the authors were able to create an arbitrary number of defect pairs on a long thin fibre plunged into a nematic liquid crystal - an ordered fluid with long organic molecules all pointing in the same direction like sardines in a tin.

Crocus and daffodil blossoms mean spring has arrived on land and a similar "greening" event, a massive phytoplankton bloom, unfolds each spring in the Atlantic Ocean.

But, what happens to all that organic material produced in the surface ocean? 

This past weekend, 2 billion Christians celebrated Easter, when Jesus was a martyr for the sins of man. The weekend before that, environmentalists celebrated ignorance, poverty, and backwardness under the name Earth Hour, and they wondered why more people did not help them crash the grid to save the world.

There is one big reason.

Religion has no small amount of fear and blame and, if you are Catholic, some guilt. Environmentalism has those also yet they don't have 5 billion members the way religion does because they lack the one important thing: Religion offers salvation along with the guilt.

There are few geographical areas that have seen as much military action as the Gallipoli region, the site of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corp (ANZAC) landings in 1915. 

The conflicts in the region include some of the most renowned wars from Greek antiquity.

Patients with chronic kidney disease may be treated with a class of medications called Renin Angiotensin Aldosterone System inhibitors (RAASI's) but though they protect the heart and kidney, a significant percentage of patients develop a dangerous side effect; high potassium levels in the blood, a condition known as hyperkalemia. 

Elevated potassium puts patients at risk of death from cardiac arrhythmias. Lacking a drug to treat the problem, doctors either stop these beneficial drugs or may use kidney dialysis to quickly lower the potassium.

A short burst of intensive exercise before eating a high-fat meal is better for blood vessel function than the currently recommended moderate-intensity exercise, at least in young people.

Cardiovascular diseases including heart attacks and stroke are a leading cause of death and the process underlying these diseases start in youth. An impairment in the function of blood vessels is thought to be the earliest event in this process, and this is known to occur in the hours after consuming a high fat meal. 

With each new amyloid-targeting treatment for Alzheimer's disease that has been developed, there has been a corresponding concern about antibodies targeting amyloid-β peptide (Aβ) producing inflammation in the brain in some patients.

Gamma secretase inhibitors tend to produce adverse effects by interacting with Notch, an important pathway for cellular signaling. 

When Jonas the fat-tailed dwarf lemur died recently in captivity at the ripe age of 29 years, he was the oldest known of his species. But Jonas not only outlasted members of closely related lemur species held in captivity; he also lived much longer than science would predict based on his small size.

A new study has examined why beavers don't get tooth decay even though they don't brush their teeth or drink fluoridated water.

Thousands of years ago, Aristotle knew that some mushrooms glowed, so it is no surprise the great thinker wondered why.

Science may finally have an answer for his question. 

A new study posits that the light emitted from those fungi attracts the attention of insects, including beetles, flies, wasps, and ants. Those insect visitors are apparently good for the fungi because they spread the fungal spores around. The new study also shows that the mushrooms' bioluminescence is under the control of the circadian clock. In fact, it was that discovery that led the researchers to suspect that the mushrooms' light must serve some useful purpose.