Max Planck Institute

If you were studying the diet of ancient humans, it certainly wouldn't help if you got their preserved feces confused with those of their dogs. A new analytical system known as coproID is designed to keep that from happening.

A study is offering the most comprehensive demonstration into how volatile organic compounds can spread throughout indoor environments from cigarette smokers’ clothing and bodies, however, the health risks from this kind of exposure are still unclear.

Different materials can play different roles when it comes to trapping and dissipating heat. But could one material have it both ways? A new breakthrough suggests that it could, made by scientists who believe heat needn’t just be a one way street.

Some bacteria use tiny syringes to inject toxins into their host’s cells. Now, researchers from the Max Planck Institute have found a way to use this to our advantage, by swapping out these toxins for other chemicals, like drugs.

Astronomers from the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics and at the University Observatory Munich have found the largest black hole using direct mass measurements so far. It has a mass 40 billion times that of the Sun.

Gamma-ray bursts are already the most energetic events we know of in the universe. Now, astronomers have detected the most powerful one ever. The competition isn’t even close, either – it's almost a thousand times more powerful than your average GRB.

Researchers have extend the lifespan of fruit flies by 48 percent using a triple drug combination made up of drugs already used in people.

Although it outnumbers regular matter by a ratio of five to one, dark matter is frustratingly elusive, and efforts to hunt down different types of candidate particles have revealed no direct trace. Now, researchers from Max Planck have proposed a new hypothetical particle that might be behind dark matter – the superheavy gravitino – and outlined just how we might find them.

Though it seems empty, the intergalactic medium (IGM) actually contains more matter than galaxies do. Now, astronomers have used simulations to reveal new details about the structure of this matter, showing that “intergalactic pancakes” spanning millions of light-years collapse into a cosmic fog.

A team of engineers in Germany has created a tiny jellyfish-inspired robot, which can not only swim, but transport objects, mix fluids and even bury itself. It's hoped the five millimeter tetherless "jellyfishbot" could help us understand the survivability of baby jellyfish in changing environments.

It is now possible to take a talking-head style video, and add, delete or edit the speaker's words as simply as you'd edit text in a word processor. A new deepfake algorithm can process the audio and video into a new file in which the speaker says more or less whatever you want them to.

What if you could stay healthier without changing your diet? In mouse tests researchers have now found a way to alter the fat metabolism in the liver, reducing the chances of diabetes without changing a high-fat diet.