Bacteria go to extremes to handle hard times: They hunker down, building a fortress-like shell around their DNA and turning off all signs of life. And yet, when times improve, these dormant spores can rise from the seeming dead. But “you gotta be careful when you decide to come back to life,” says Peter Setlow, […]

Super strong artificial silk? That’s so metal. Giving revamped silkworm silk a metallic bath may make the strands both strong and stiff, scientists report October 6 in Matter. Some strands were up to 70 percent stronger than silk spun by spiders, the team found. The work is the latest in a decades-long quest to create […]