Understanding the daily variation in atmospheric pressure

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Understanding the daily variation

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Snapshot of the recession

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COLLEGE PARK, Maryland – "The unrelenting, month-by-month loss of American jobs throughout 2008 provides a revealing snapshot of our path into this recession," says University of Maryland economist Peter Morici, a professor in the Robert H. Smith School of Business. Morici predicted the recession early on – late last year when holiday sales proved disappointing.

Morici predicts the trend to continue with this Friday's release of November employment figures, forecasting the loss of nearly 300,000 more jobs.

India terrorism by the numbers

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COLLEGE PARK, MD. - A long history of terrorism in India precedes the recent coordinated attacks in Mumbai. The Global Terrorism Database (GTD), maintained at the University of Maryland by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) counts more than 4,100 terrorist attacks in India since 1970. Fatalities number in the thousands. This information is freely available online.

The GTD is the most comprehensive and detailed open-source terrorism database available. Funding comes from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Venus comes to life at wavelengths invisible to human eyes

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A pale yellow-green dot to the human eye, Earth's twin planet comes to life in the ultraviolet and the infrared. New images taken by instruments on board ESA's Venus Express provide insight into the turbulent atmosphere of our neighbouring planet.

Using Venus Express, it is possible to compare what the planet looks like in different wavelengths, giving scientists a powerful tool to study the physical conditions and dynamics of the planet's atmosphere.

Monetary aggregates play little role in the conduct of monetary policy

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Dogs chase efficiently, but cats skulk counterintuitively

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DURHAM, N.C. -- A Duke University study suggests that evolution can behave as differently as dogs and cats. While the dogs depend on an energy-efficient style of four-footed running over long distances to catch their prey, cats seem to have evolved a profoundly inefficient gait, tailor-made to creep up on a mouse or bird in slow motion.

Invasive garden ants as new pest insects in Europe

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Northern Europe has so far been free from invasive pest ants, but it seems just a matter of time until Lasius neglectus, a new ant that was discovered in 1990, will reach these latitudes and wreak havoc in parks and gardens of Northern Germany, Scandinavia and the British Isles.

Hypersensitivity reactions to the quadrivalent HPV vaccine are rare

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Hypersensitivity reactions to the quadrivalent HPV vaccine (4vHPV, Gardasil) are uncommon and most schoolgirls can tolerate subsequent doses, finds the first evaluation of the quadrivalent HPV vaccine published on bmj.com today.

Clues about controlling cholesterol rise from yeast studies

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Having discovered how a lowly, single-celled fungus regulates its version of cholesterol, Johns Hopkins researchers are gaining new insight about the target and action of cholesterol-lowering drugs taken daily by millions of people to stave off heart attacks and strokes. Their work appears in the December issue of Cell Metabolism.

In humans, statin drugs inhibit an enzyme, HMG-CoA reductase, to lower blood cholesterol. What's not as well understood are the multiple layers of control for the enzyme, especially the regulatory protein Insig.