The technical assistance (TA) will support the Kingdom of Cambodia in building resilience within, and improving the competitiveness of the country's private sector by enhancing the capacity of state institutions to support adoption of digital technologies and to foster innovation and diversification in micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), where women entrepreneurs and workers are traditionally prevalent.

The project is closely aligned with (i) ADB's Strategy 2030's operational priorities on gender equality, environment, climate resilience and disaster risk management, rural development and food security, and institutional strengthening; (ii) Sustainable Development Goals on economic growth, social inclusion and environmental protection; and (iii) ADB's Water Sector Directional Guide that aims for poverty reduction, gender equality, climate resilience, food security, and capacity building.

The Government of Bangladesh (GOB) has recently launched the Bangladesh Climate and Development Partnership to drive climate actions at scale and with urgency. The BCDP is an example of country-led climate platform established to scale up implementation of climate actions and is being recognized as an important modality by the global community to deliver climate actions at scale.

It is proposed to modernize the 1,147 km strategic railway line between Turkmenabat, Mary, Ashgabat, and Turkmenbashi (TMAT), which is located at the crossroads of major eastwest and northsouth international trade routes and accounts for over 50% of freight movements in Turkmenistan.

The project integrates crop diversification with the adoption of climate-smart irrigated agricultural practices that require modernization of irrigation systems and on-farm water management to improve irrigation efficiency and crop water productivity. It includes the following three outputs: (i) irrigation management services strengthened, (ii) modern irrigation and drainage infrastructure developed, and (iii) efficient on-farm water management practices adopted.

The proposed SMEDP2-Phase 2 will consist of a $100 million concessional loan from ADB's ordinary capital resources and an attached technical assistance of $950,000 in aggregate from TASF-7 and Financial Sector Development Partnership Special Fund. It will finance the continuation and expansion of activities financed under the SMEDP2 project by increasing the number and size of commercially viable cottage, micro, small and medium enterprises (CMSMEs), as well as supporting employment in the CMSME sector.

Eight Australian sea lions were fitted with cameras and trackers to capture unprecedented insights into their behaviour and the marine habitats where they hunt

Cleaner wrasse use their reflection to build a mental image of their body size, which they use to compare themselves to rivals before picking a fight

Some lizards dive into streams to escape predators, and a specialised bubble-breathing technique enables them to stay submerged for up to 18 minutes

Campaigners are calling for stricter controls on rodenticides after finding that birds of prey in England are increasingly being exposed to high doses of rat poison

Remote sensing, including lidar, reveals that the Amazon was once home to millions of people. The emerging picture of how they lived challenges ideas of human cultural evolution

It may soon be possible to vaccinate ourselves against the diseases of old age, keeping our body and brain healthier for longer

To even out the intermittent power supply from wind and solar, we need to build vast energy storage facilities. It turns out the best solution might be cheap, simple ideas like heating bricks and lifting weights

Promising new vaccines are designed to be given to patients at risk of developing Alzheimer's disease. If they perform well in clinical trials, they have the potential to one day rid society of dementia

Clouds can trap heat or reflect it away from Earth, making their impact on global warming extraordinarily hard to predict. Now, new ways of studying them are lifting the fog

New research into the moments between wakefulness and sleep could bring hope for insomniacs and even make us more creative problem-solvers

Our metabolism's response to food is highly idiosyncratic and there are hints that tailoring our diet to these personal differences can deliver health benefits

To capture the clearest and most direct images of a “Wigner crystal”, a structure made entirely of electrons, researchers used a special kind of microscope and two pieces of graphene unusually free of imperfections

Physicists have coaxed a cloud of atoms into having a temperature beyond absolute zero and placed them in a geometric structure that could produce an unknown form of matter

The atoms within quasicrystals are arranged in repeating forms, but unlike ordinary crystals they have more complex symmetry. It turns out this makes them perfect for producing mazes

A weird quantum phenomenon called delocalisation has been measured for a 100-nanometre glass bead, helping reveal where the boundary lies between quantum and classical physics

A single ytterbium atom, cooled down to extreme temperatures and manipulated with laser beams, could reveal how gravity affects quantum objects

Billions of years ago, crushed quartz reacting with water could have created the conditions needed for the evolution of the photosynthetic microbes responsible for most of the oxygen now in Earth’s atmosphere

Semi-mythical "earthquake lights" may be accompanied by changes to Earth's magnetic field. Now researchers say these changes could be used to forecast major tremors

When most people are asked to name a river, they often reach for the Amazon or Nile, but these aren’t the only remarkable rivers out there. Here are 10 more from around the world – and solar system

This spectacular selection of images is taken from the winners of the Northern Lights Photographer of the Year competition, run by Capture the Atlas

These stunning photographs are all shortlisted for the Sony World Photography Awards 2024

For decades, planetary scientists have been trying to understand the origins of two colossal geological anomalies inside our planet. New insights suggest they could be leftovers from a cosmic collision

Quartz crystals produce electricity when they are deformed by mechanical stress, which may explain how enormous chunks of gold can form in inert rock

In some recent years, the Amazon biome released more carbon than it absorbed, and further degradation could make it a permanent shift

Our metabolism's response to food is highly idiosyncratic and there are hints that tailoring our diet to these personal differences can deliver health benefits

Radiocarbon dating and DNA analysis have revealed that a complete skeleton found in a 2nd-century cemetery is made up of bones from many people spanning thousands of years – but we don’t know who assembled it or why

The infinite monkey theorem states that illiterate primates could write great literature with enough time, but the amount of time needed is much longer than the lifespan of the universe

The British Heart Foundation’s Reflections of Research competition showcases beautiful images captured by researchers studying heart and circulatory disease

Reaching net-zero emissions is essential for halting climate change - but even after we achieve this goal, parts of the planet will continue to warm. Delaying net zero will worsen these effects

Campaigners are calling for stricter controls on rodenticides after finding that birds of prey in England are increasingly being exposed to high doses of rat poison

Samantha Harvey has won the UK's top fiction prize for a novel that takes place over 24 hours on the International Space Station

Archaeologists say a mysterious language inscribed on a 2000-year-old metal hand may be related to Basque, but linguists aren't convinced

A settlement in the east of England burned down in a fire 3000 years ago, falling into a muddy waterway that preserved everything inside the houses including tools, fabric, cooking pots and more

Around 3000 years ago, several empires and kingdoms in the Mediterranean collapsed, with a group of sea-faring warriors implicated as the culprit. But new evidence shows that many of our ideas about this turbulent time need completely rethinking