ANN ARBOR, Mich.---Ever since a forward-thinking trio of physicists identified the phenomenon known as self-organized criticality---a mechanism by which complexity arises in nature---scientists have been applying its concepts to everything from economics to avalanches.
Now, researchers at the University of Michigan and the University of Toledo have shown that clusters of ant nests on a coffee farm in Mexico also adhere to the model. Their work, which has implications for controlling coffee pests, appears in the Jan. 24 issue of the journal Nature.
BATON ROUGE According to a study published in Nature by researchers at LSU and Yale University, farming has significantly changed the hydrology and chemistry of the Mississippi River, injecting more carbon dioxide into the river and raising river discharge during the past 50 years.
A tiny, implantable device has pulled adult stem cells out of a living rat with a far greater purity than any present technique.
The test of the device designed by Michael R. King, associate professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Rochester, will be reported in the March 3 issue of the British Journal of Haematology.
DALLAS Jan. 23, 2008 A new computer-based text-searching tool developed by UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers automatically and quickly compares multiple documents in a database for similarities, providing a more efficient method to carry out literature searches, as well as offering scientific journal editors a new tool to thwart questionable publication practices.
Researchers have identified subtle genetic variations that predict the efficacy of two widely used antidepressant drugs. They found that certain variants in the gene for a protective transporter protein that pumps drugs and other substances out of the brain compromise the effectiveness of the antidepressants citalopram (trade name Celexa) and venlafaxine (Effexor).
This election season, we’re finding out that some choices are indeed tougher than others. Say you’re a die-hard Kucinich supporter or a Republican but now find yourself for practical reasons having to choose between Hillary and Obama. A new study from the February issue of the Journal of Consumer Research reveals that sometimes asking people to “reject” an option – rather than “choose” an option – makes it easier for consumers to decide among options that they don’t particularly like.
INSOMNIA AND SLEEP MEDICATIONS
New Rochelle, NY, January 23, 2008—RNA interference (RNAi) represents an innovative new strategy for using small RNA molecules to silence specific genes associated with disease processes, and a series of review articles describing the state-of-the-art and potential therapeutic applications of RNAi and microRNAs will begin with two review papers in the January 2008 issue (Volume 19, Number 1) of Human Gene Therapy, a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. The papers are available free online.
Researchers have found the brain region that controls the decision to halt your midnight exploration of the refrigerator and commence enjoyment of that leftover chicken leg. Whats more, they said, such mechanisms governing exploration are among those that malfunction in addiction and mental illness.
Emmanuel Procyk and colleagues published their findings in the January 24, 2008, issue of the journal Neuron, published by Cell Press.
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