Having in the last two episodes dealt with the first two of the three so-called mixed sciences, astronomy and optics, I shall now deal with statics[1]. Although receiving far less attention in antiquity that the other two, statics received much attention in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period and went on to become […]

I apparently no longer have Covid but I must admit I have felt healthier in my life. Starting today normal service will be resumed here at the Renaissance Mathematicus. I would like to briefly thank all of the readers here and on social media, who said kind things and wished me a rapid recovery from […]

Results from a study combining experiments and simulations could overturn the assumption that amorphous forms of the same compound have the same molecular arrangement. The team behind the work claims to have prepared three amorphous forms of the diuretic drug hydrochlorothiazide and determined that they have distinct properties and distinct types of disorder. ‘If polyamorphism […]

In 2013, nine years after Andre Geim and Kostya Novoselov first isolated graphene using a piece of sticky tape and three years after they won the Nobel prize in physics for their discovery, a €1 billion (£870 million), 10-year project was launched to help push graphene to the forefront of European scientific research. Funded by […]

For those who don’t follow me on social media, I’m not in Bad Kissingen receiving healing ministrations to my spine but have been back in my humble abode on the outskirts of Erlangen since Wednesday. Why, you might well ask. The answer is as simply as it is tragic. I went to Bad Kissingen to […]

The European Commission is ready to start talks on Switzerland’s association to Horizon Europe, research commissioner Iliana Ivanova has confirmed in a post on social media site X, formerly known as Twitter. Happy to confirm exploratory talks on Swiss 🇨🇭association to Horizon Europe 🇪🇺can start. We are ready! EU is open to cooperation in research […]

The slipperiness of a surface can be tuned by tweaking its molecular-scale roughness, researchers in Finland have shown. This helps to explain why water droplets can easily slide off hydrophilic surfaces if they are chemically homogeneous, and also opens up new possibilities for the design of low-friction surfaces – allowing the researchers to produce what […]

Italy has become the first country to ban the production, distribution and import of cultivated meat, which is cultured from animal-derived cells and requires no slaughter. The Italian parliament passed the new law after months of consideration. ‘In defence of health, of the Italian production system, of thousands of jobs, of our culture and tradition, […]

A 10-year mission to build an AI biologist has just launched. The team from US not-for-profit moonshot Future House wants to create an autonomous research assistant to accelerate the speed of scientific discovery and help tackle the key challenges facing humanity including antibiotic resistance, food security and climate change. ‘The fundamental bottleneck in biology today […]

Magnetic levitation is a technology best known in maglev trains, which allow a train to travel without friction by lifting it off its rails using electromagnetic induction. In 2021, however, Hamdi Ucar at Göksal Aeronautics in Turkey left physicists scratching their heads after he demonstrated a phenomenon that no known type of magnetic levitation – […]