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Scientists have, for the first time, directly observed phonon wave dynamics within self-assembling nanomaterials unlocking the potential for customizable, reconfigurable metamaterials with applications ranging from shock absorbers to advanced computing.

On Monday 16 June the Faculty was delighted to welcome Justice of the Supreme Court, The Right Hon Lord Sales who delivered the LLM/MCL lecture to celebrate the end of the academic year. Lord Sales' gave an inspiring and interesting talk entitled 'Certainty and Flexibility in the Law: Insights from English Law' in which he argued that a central aim of any legal system is to maintain a healthy balance between certainty and flexibility. In his lecture, Lord Sales undertook a detailed examination of the essential tension between these two crucial legal principles, using the English legal framework as a prime illustration of how this balance is sought and achieved. Lord Sales concluded that statute law and common law represent two different strategies for achieving the vital balance between certainty and flexibility. While statute law relies on democratic authority to make clear rules and change them when needed, common law relies on a disciplined, principle-based, and culturally embedded judicial process to allow for gradual evolution. He suggested that this fundamental tension is not unique to the UK but is a core challenge faced by all legal systems. The talk has subsequently been published on the Supreme Court website . The lecture was followed by a lively question and answer session with the students covering a wide range of legal fields, and then a reception.

As electric vehicles grow more popular, their warning sounds may not be doing enough to protect pedestrians. A Swedish study shows that these signals are hard to locate, especially when multiple vehicles are involved, leaving people unable to tell where danger is coming from or how many cars are nearby.

The successful Cambridge grantees’ work covers a range of research areas, including the development of next-generation semiconductors, new methods to identify dyslexia in young children, how diseases spread between humans and animals, and the early changes that happen in cells before breast cancer develops, with the goal of finding ways to stop the disease before it starts.

The funding, worth €721 million in total, will go to 281 leading researchers across Europe. The Advanced Grant competition is one of the most prestigious and competitive funding schemes in the EU and associated countries, including the UK. It gives senior researchers the opportunity to pursue ambitious, curiosity-driven projects that could lead to major scientific breakthroughs. Advanced Grants may be awarded up to € 2.5 million for a period of five years. The grants are part of the EU’s Horizon Europe programme. The UK agreed a deal to associate to Horizon Europe in September 2023.

This competition attracted 2,534 proposals, which were reviewed by panels of internationally renowned researchers. Over 11% of proposals were selected for funding. Estimates show that the grants will create approximately 2,700 jobs in the teams of new grantees. The new grantees will be based at universities and research centres in 23 EU Member States and associated countries, notably in the UK (56 grants), Germany (35), Italy (25), the Netherlands (24), and France (23).

“Many congratulations to our Cambridge colleagues on these prestigious ERC funding awards,” said Professor Sir John Aston, Cambridge’s Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research. “This type of long-term funding is invaluable, allowing senior researchers the time and space to develop potential solutions for some of biggest challenges we face. We are so fortunate at Cambridge to have so many world-leading researchers across a range of disciplines, and I look forward to seeing the outcomes of their work.”

The Cambridge recipients of 2025 Advanced Grants are:

Professor Clare Bryant (Department of Veterinary Medicine) for investigating human and avian pattern recognition receptor activation of cell death pathways, and the impact on the host inflammatory response to zoonotic infections.

Professor Sir Richard Friend (Cavendish Laboratory/St John’s College) for bright high-spin molecular semiconductors.

Professor Usha Goswami (Department of Psychology/St John’s College) for a cross-language approach to the early identification of dyslexia and developmental language disorder using speech production measures with children.

Professor Regina Grafe (Faculty of History) for colonial credit and financial diversity in the Global South: Spanish America 1600-1820.

Professor Judy Hirst (MRC Mitochondrial Biology Unit/Corpus Christi College) for the energy-converting mechanism of a modular biomachine: Uniting structure and function to establish the engineering principles of respiratory complex I.

Professor Matthew Juniper (Department of Engineering/Trinity College) for adjoint-accelerated inference and optimisation methods.

Professor Walid Khaled (Department of Pharmacology/Magdalene College) for understanding precancerous changes in breast cancer for the development of therapeutic interceptions.

Professor Adrian Liston (Department of Pathology/St Catharine’s College) for dissecting the code for regulatory T cell entry into the tissues and differentiation into tissue-resident cells.

Professor Róisín Owens (Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology/Newnham College) for conformal organic devices for electronic brain-gut readout and characterisation.

Professor Emma Rawlins (Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience/Gurdon Institute) for reprogramming lung epithelial cell lineages for regeneration.

Dr Marta Zlatic (Department of Zoology/Trinity College) for discovering the circuit and molecular basis of inter-strain and inter-species differences in learning

“These ERC grants are our commitment to making Europe the world’s hub for excellent research,” said Ekaterina Zaharieva, European Commissioner for Startups, Research, and Innovation. “By supporting projects that have the potential to redefine whole fields, we are not just investing in science but in the future prosperity and resilience of our continent. In the next competition rounds, scientists moving to Europe will receive even greater support in setting up their labs and research teams here. This is part of our “Choose Europe for Science” initiative, designed to attract and retain the world’s top scientists.”

“Much of this pioneering research will contribute to solving some of the most pressing challenges we face - social, economic and environmental,” said Professor Maria Leptin, President of the European Research Council. “Yet again, many scientists - around 260 - with ground-breaking ideas were rated as excellent, but remained unfunded due to a lack of funds at the ERC. We hope that more funding will be available in the future to support even more creative researchers in pursuing their scientific curiosity.”

Eleven senior researchers at the University of Cambridge have been awarded Advanced Grants from the European Research Council – the highest number of grants awarded to any institution in this latest funding round.

Westend61 via Getty ImagesScientist pipetting samples into eppendorf tube

The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©University of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

The successful Cambridge grantees’ work covers a range of research areas, including the development of next-generation semiconductors, new methods to identify dyslexia in young children, how diseases spread between humans and animals, and the early changes that happen in cells before breast cancer develops, with the goal of finding ways to stop the disease before it starts.

The funding, worth €721 million in total, will go to 281 leading researchers across Europe. The Advanced Grant competition is one of the most prestigious and competitive funding schemes in the EU and associated countries, including the UK. It gives senior researchers the opportunity to pursue ambitious, curiosity-driven projects that could lead to major scientific breakthroughs. Advanced Grants may be awarded up to € 2.5 million for a period of five years. The grants are part of the EU’s Horizon Europe programme. The UK agreed a deal to associate to Horizon Europe in September 2023.

This competition attracted 2,534 proposals, which were reviewed by panels of internationally renowned researchers. Over 11% of proposals were selected for funding. Estimates show that the grants will create approximately 2,700 jobs in the teams of new grantees. The new grantees will be based at universities and research centres in 23 EU Member States and associated countries, notably in the UK (56 grants), Germany (35), Italy (25), the Netherlands (24), and France (23).

“Many congratulations to our Cambridge colleagues on these prestigious ERC funding awards,” said Professor Sir John Aston, Cambridge’s Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research. “This type of long-term funding is invaluable, allowing senior researchers the time and space to develop potential solutions for some of biggest challenges we face. We are so fortunate at Cambridge to have so many world-leading researchers across a range of disciplines, and I look forward to seeing the outcomes of their work.”

The Cambridge recipients of 2025 Advanced Grants are:

Professor Clare Bryant (Department of Veterinary Medicine) for investigating human and avian pattern recognition receptor activation of cell death pathways, and the impact on the host inflammatory response to zoonotic infections.

Professor Sir Richard Friend (Cavendish Laboratory/St John’s College) for bright high-spin molecular semiconductors.

Professor Usha Goswami (Department of Psychology/St John’s College) for a cross-language approach to the early identification of dyslexia and developmental language disorder using speech production measures with children.

Professor Regina Grafe (Faculty of History) for colonial credit and financial diversity in the Global South: Spanish America 1600-1820.

Professor Judy Hirst (MRC Mitochondrial Biology Unit/Corpus Christi College) for the energy-converting mechanism of a modular biomachine: Uniting structure and function to establish the engineering principles of respiratory complex I.

Professor Matthew Juniper (Department of Engineering/Trinity College) for adjoint-accelerated inference and optimisation methods.

Professor Walid Khaled (Department of Pharmacology/Magdalene College) for understanding precancerous changes in breast cancer for the development of therapeutic interceptions.

Professor Adrian Liston (Department of Pathology/St Catharine’s College) for dissecting the code for regulatory T cell entry into the tissues and differentiation into tissue-resident cells.

Professor Róisín Owens (Department of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology/Newnham College) for conformal organic devices for electronic brain-gut readout and characterisation.

Professor Emma Rawlins (Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience/Gurdon Institute) for reprogramming lung epithelial cell lineages for regeneration.

Dr Marta Zlatic (Department of Zoology/Trinity College) for discovering the circuit and molecular basis of inter-strain and inter-species differences in learning

“These ERC grants are our commitment to making Europe the world’s hub for excellent research,” said Ekaterina Zaharieva, European Commissioner for Startups, Research, and Innovation. “By supporting projects that have the potential to redefine whole fields, we are not just investing in science but in the future prosperity and resilience of our continent. In the next competition rounds, scientists moving to Europe will receive even greater support in setting up their labs and research teams here. This is part of our “Choose Europe for Science” initiative, designed to attract and retain the world’s top scientists.”

“Much of this pioneering research will contribute to solving some of the most pressing challenges we face - social, economic and environmental,” said Professor Maria Leptin, President of the European Research Council. “Yet again, many scientists - around 260 - with ground-breaking ideas were rated as excellent, but remained unfunded due to a lack of funds at the ERC. We hope that more funding will be available in the future to support even more creative researchers in pursuing their scientific curiosity.”

Eleven senior researchers at the University of Cambridge have been awarded Advanced Grants from the European Research Council – the highest number of grants awarded to any institution in this latest funding round.

Westend61 via Getty ImagesScientist pipetting samples into eppendorf tube

The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright ©University of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

Astronomers have identified a new kind of cosmic explosion extreme nuclear transients so powerful they outshine typical supernovae by orders of magnitude and stay bright for years. Triggered when massive stars are torn apart by supermassive black holes, these rare events emit energy that challenges previous theories of stellar death.

In a leap toward greener tech, researchers at the Paul Scherrer Institute have discovered a way to control magnetic textures using electric fields no bulky magnets needed. Their star material? A strange crystal called copper oxyselenide, where magnetic patterns like helices and cones swirl at low temperatures. By zapping it with different electric fields, they could bend, twist, and even flip these patterns a first in the world of magnetoelectrics. This opens the door to ultra-efficient data storage, sensors, and computing, all while saving tons of energy.

Smashing atomic nuclei together at mind-bending speeds recreates the fiery conditions of the early universe and scientists are finally getting a better handle on what happens next. A sweeping new study dives deep into how ultra-heavy particles behave after these high-energy collisions, revealing they don t just vanish after the initial impact but continue interacting like silent messengers from the dawn of time. This behavior, once overlooked, may hold the key to unraveling the universe s most mysterious beginnings.

Scientists have built detailed Milky Way simulations under strange new physical laws to probe dark matter, revealing how different versions of the universe might behave and helping us get closer to the real one.

Physicists at the University of Colorado Boulder have created a groundbreaking quantum device that can measure 3D acceleration using ultracold atoms, something once thought nearly impossible. By chilling rubidium atoms to near absolute zero and splitting them into quantum superpositions, the team has built a compact atom interferometer guided by AI to decode acceleration patterns. While the sensor still lags behind traditional GPS and accelerometers, it's poised to revolutionize navigation for vehicles like submarines or spacecraft potentially offering a timeless, atomic-based alternative to aging electronics.

Scientists at the University of Michigan have unlocked a long-standing mystery about quasicrystals exotic materials that straddle the line between the orderly structure of crystals and the chaos of glass. These rare solids, which once seemed to break the rules of physics, are now shown to be fundamentally stable through cutting-edge quantum simulations. The findings not only validate their existence but also open the door to designing next-generation materials using powerful new computational techniques.

Scientists have uncovered a previously unknown type of molecular motion inside DNA-based droplets: instead of spreading randomly, guest molecules advance in an organized wave. This surprising discovery opens the door to understanding how cells might organize internal processes without membranes. Using customizable DNA condensates as experimental models, the team showed how molecular waves emerge through precise DNA interactions. These insights could not only transform our grasp of cellular signaling but may even lay groundwork for treating neurodegenerative diseases by influencing how molecules behave inside aging cells.

California s solar energy boom is often hailed as a green success story but a new study reveals a murkier reality beneath the sunlit panels. Researchers uncover seven distinct forms of corruption threatening the integrity of the state s clean energy expansion, including favoritism, land grabs, and misleading environmental claims. Perhaps most eyebrow-raising are allegations of romantic entanglements between senior officials and solar lobbyists, blurring the lines between personal influence and public interest. The report paints a picture of a solar sector racing ahead while governance and ethical safeguards fall dangerously behind.

Oxford University Press has published Animals and the Constitution: Towards Sentience-Based Constitutionalism by Dr Rafael Fasel and Dr John Olusegun Adenitire (Queen Mary University of London), in the Oxford Constitutional Theory series. Constitutionalism—the idea that constitutions should limit and direct government...

Physicists have managed to simulate a strange quantum phenomenon where light appears to arise from empty space a concept that until now has only existed in theory. Using cutting-edge simulations, researchers modeled how powerful lasers interact with the so-called quantum vacuum, revealing how photons could bounce off each other and even generate new beams of light. These breakthroughs come just as new ultra-powerful laser facilities are preparing to test these mind-bending effects in reality, potentially opening a gateway to uncovering new physics and even dark matter particles.

Scientists at Binghamton University are bringing a sci-fi fantasy to life by developing tiny batteries that vanish after use inspired by Mission: Impossible. Led by Professor Seokheun Choi, the team is tackling one of the trickiest parts of biodegradable electronics: the power source. Instead of using toxic materials, they re exploring probiotics friendly bacteria often found in yogurt to generate electricity. With engineered paper-based batteries that dissolve in acidic environments, this breakthrough could revolutionize safe, disposable tech for medical and environmental use.

Harvard and PSI scientists have managed to freeze normally fleeting quantum states in time, creating a pathway to control them using pure electronic tricks and laser precision.

New research demonstrates that with collaboration between stakeholders, Australia can fully decarbonize its domestic and energy export economies by 2060 -- a feat requiring $6.2 trillion USD and around 110,000 square kilomters of land -- while avoiding harm to important areas for biodiversity outcomes, safeguarding agricultural activities, and respecting Indigenous land rights.

A new study found exposure to specific tiny particles in air pollution during pregnancy are associated with increased risk of various negative birth outcomes.

A new study details processes that keep pollutants aloft despite a drop in emissions.