An international study involving researchers from the University of Göttingen investigated the evolution of flowering plants in extraordinary detail using advanced DNA sequencing technology. The researchers discovered that there was an evolutionary explosive development of flowering plants producing enormous diversity. Over 130 million years ago, this explosion in diversity gave rise to more than 80 per cent of the major lineages of flowering…

After more than three years of pandemic with around 20 million deaths, it is common knowledge that COVID-19 is an insidious disease. The causing virus, SARS-CoV-2, literally kept the world on tenterhooks for a long time. It mainly infects the lung cells and triggers a wide range of symptoms with an often uncertain course of the disease. Thanks to vaccination, the pandemic is largely over, but there are still unanswered questions, such as what the…

Filamentous cyanobacteria buckle at a certain length when they encounter an obstacle. This was discovered by the research group of Stefan Karpitschka, group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization and professor at the University of Konstanz. The results provide an important basis for the use of cyanobacteria in modern biotechnology. Cyanobacteria are one of the oldest and most important life forms in the world – for…

Land plants cover the surface of our planet and often tower over us. They form complex bodies with multiple organs that consist of a broad range of cell types. Developing this morphological complexity is underpinned by intricate networks of genes, whose coordinated action shapes plant bodies through various molecular mechanisms. All of these magnificent forms burst forth from a one-off evolutionary event: when plants conquered Earth’s surface,…

Preparations for this year's stratospheric flight of the balloon-borne solar observatory Sunrise III have reached an important milestone: today, just three weeks after the hardware arrived at Esrange Space Center near the Arctic Circle in Sweden, Sunrise III peered at the Sun for the first time in almost complete flight configuration. During the so-called “First Light”, the team led by the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS)…

Mathematicians usually describe a position in space using coordinates in a coordinate system. But how does our brain do this? It has been known for some time that the target of an arm movement in some brain regions is coded relative to our line of sight, in others relative to the current position of our hand, but in any case, always relative to our own body. But does that always apply? Neuroscientists at the German Primate Centre (DPZ) – Leibniz…

A new model developed by scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization (MPI-DS) extends the theory of elastic phase separation towards nanoscopic structures. Such patterns are frequent in biological systems and also used in nano-engineering to create structural color. With their new insights, the scientists can predict the length scale of nanoscopic patterns and thus control them during production. Well-defined…

During archaeological excavations in the Schöningen open-cast coal mine in 1994, the discovery of the oldest, remarkably well-preserved hunting weapons known to humanity caused an international sensation. Spears and a double-pointed throwing stick were found lying between animal bones about ten meters below the surface in deposits at a former lakeshore. In the years that followed, extensive excavations have gradually yielded numerous wooden…

The next stratospheric flight of the balloon-borne solar observatory Sunrise III is planned for early summer this year. Today's departure of the flight hardware from the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS) in Germany to the launch site beyond the Arctic Circle marks the beginning of the final and decisive phase of the mission. On site at the Swedish Space Agency's Esrange Space Center near the city of Kiruna, the Sunrise team…

The curvature of a surface determines the migration behavior of biological cells. They preferentially move along valleys or grooves while avoiding ridges. These findings with contribution from the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization (MPI-DS) and the Weizmann Institute of Science gave rise to a model predicting cellular behavior. Such universal principles now allow a better understanding of the migration of immune and cancer…