SAN ANTONIO — January 26, 2026 — A new paper by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) staff details how using popular culture could effectively teach science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) concepts. The paper shares insights from SwRI staff who hosted “Physics of Anime” panels at anime and hobbyist conventions across the country, presenting complex scientific ideas in an engaging way to curious attendees.

Scientists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) have completed a spaceflight biology investigation aboard the International Space Station (ISS) that reveals how microgravity fundamentally alters microbial metabolism, limiting the efficiency of biological manufacturing processes critical to future long-duration space missions. The findings were recently published in the journal npj Microgravity.

 

 

Muons are particles used to study fundamental physics and to image large structures such as volcanoes, bridges and ancient buildings. But despite their apparent benefits to science – and even society more broadly – muons only have a half-life of around one microsecond. Now researchers at the University of Plymouth have suggested a means of overcoming that, using intense laser pulses to reduce the rate of decay and at least double the muon’s lifetime.

POSTECH Professor Junsuk Rho’s Team Develops the World’s First Multi-Frequency Elastic Wave Control Technology.

With the advances in smart materials and structures, integrated sensors and actuators, and AI technologies, the smart aircraft is becoming a new generation emergent and disruptive aeronautical technology. Based on the international symposium on Smart Aircraft 2019, Chinese Journal of Aeronautics (CJA) organized the first special topic on smart aircraft 1.0 published in 2021.

Powered descent is the make-or-break phase for pinpoint soft landing, yet fuel and mass uncertainties can derail optimized trajectories. A new study, published in the Chinese Journal of Aeronautics (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cja.2025.103914), proposes a worst-case robust convex-optimization approach plus receding-horizon closed-loop guidance to keep trajectories feasible and improve landing accuracy under adverse mass variations.