Good code, bad computations: A computer security gray area

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If you want to make sure your computer or server is not tricked into undertaking malicious or undesirable behavior, it's not enough to keep bad code out of the system.

Two graduate students from UC San Diego's computer science department—Erik Buchanan and Ryan Roemer—have just published work showing that the process of building bad programs from good code using "return-oriented programming" can be automated and that this vulnerability applies to RISC computer architectures and not just the x86 architecture (which includes the vast majority of personal computers).

News flash: Candidates' ads actually match deeds in Congress

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If you think candidates never keep their promises and will say anything to get elected, you're certainly not alone. And you're not right, either.

The perception is largely untrue, says Tracy Sulkin, a University of Illinois political scientist, who has conducted an extensive study, apparently the first of its kind, comparing the campaign ads and legislative records of recent congressional officeholders.

The fluid transducer: Electricity from gas and water

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Researchers at UH explore use of fat cells as heart attack therapy

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HOUSTON, Oct. 27, 2008 – For those of us trained to read nutrition labels, conventional wisdom tells us that fat isn't good for the heart. But a team of University of Houston researchers has set out to use fat cells to beef up heart muscles damaged by heart attack – and they're using an out-of-this-world device to do it.

Earthworm activity can alter forests' carbon-carrying capabilities

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WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Earthworms can change the chemical nature of the carbon in North American forest litter and soils, potentially affecting the amount of carbon stored in forests, according to Purdue University researchers.

The Purdue scientists, along with collaborators from the Smithsonian Institution and Johns Hopkins University, study the habits of earthworms originally brought to North America from Europe. They want to determine the earthworms' effect on forest chemistry by comparing carbon composition in forests that vary in earthworm activity.

New hormone data can predict menopause within a year

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ANN ARBOR, Mich.---For many women, including the growing number who choose later-in-life pregnancy, predicting their biological clock's relation to the timing of their menopause and infertility is critically important.

Now, investigators from the University of Michigan have provided new information about hormonal biomarkers that can address the beginning of the menopause transition.

Cut and run: MSU research predicts risk avoidance in the face of chronic economic loss

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EAST LANSING, Mich. --- Individual investors are liquidating their holdings at record levels as financial markets sink, often absorbing losses to avoid possibly worse pain later. Contradicting the counsel of many financial advisers, it also flies in the face of widely accepted behavioral theory and reinforces recent research by Michigan State University scientists.

Genetic evidence for avian influenza movement from Asia to North America via wild birds

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Wild migratory birds may be more important carriers of avian influenza viruses from continent to continent than previously thought, according to new scientific research that has important implications for highly pathogenic avian influenza virus surveillance in North America.

Better instructions reduce complications among patients using common blood thinner

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Large hormone dose may reduce risk of post-traumatic stress disorder

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NEW YORK, October 27, 2008 – A new study by Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) researchers found that a high dose of cortisone could help reduce the risk of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The article appears in Biological Psychiatry, Volume 64, Issue 8 (October 15, 2008), pages 708-717.

In an animal model of PTSD, high doses of a cortisol-related substance, corticosterone, prevented negative consequences of stress exposure, including increased startle response and behavioral freezing when exposed to reminders of the stress.