Global glaciers and ice caps are shedding billions of tons of mass annually

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Earth's glaciers and ice caps outside of the regions of Greenland and Antarctica are shedding roughly 150 billion tons of ice annually, according to a new study led by the University of Colorado Boulder.

NIST provides octagonal window of opportunity for carbon capture

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Filtering carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, from factory smokestacks is a necessary, but expensive part of many manufacturing processes. However, a collaborative research team from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Delaware has gathered new insight into the performance of a material called a zeolite that may stop carbon dioxide in its tracks far more efficiently than current scrubbers do.*

Unusual 'collapsing' iron superconductor sets record for its class

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A team from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Maryland has found an iron-based superconductor that operates at the highest known temperature for a material in its class.* The discovery inches iron-based superconductors—valued for their ease of manufacturability and other properties—closer to being useful in many practical applications.

A bronze matryoshka doll: The metal in the metal in the metal

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A doll in a doll, and then one more, enveloping them from the outside – this is how Thomas Faessler explains his molecule. He packs one atom in a cage within an atom framework. With their large surfaces these structures can serve as highly efficient catalysts. Just like in the Russian wooden toy, a hull of twelve copper atoms encases a single tin atom. This hull is, in turn, enveloped by 20 further tin atoms.

Heavy lifting for cancer research

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Study indicates that induced labor may not lower risk of infection or respiratory problems in newborns

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DALLAS (Feb. 9, 2012) — In a study to be presented today at the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine's annual meeting, The Pregnancy Meeting ™, in Dallas, Texas, researchers will report findings that suggest that induction of labor in patients who suffer a rupture of membranes between the 34th and 37th week of gestation (before the onset of labor) does not reduce the risk of infection or respiratory problems in the newborn.

Utilizing risk-adjustment strategies to navigate an equitable road toward health-care reform

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Scientists make iron transparent

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At the high-brilliance synchrotron light source PETRA III, a team of DESY scientists headed by Dr. Ralf Röhlsberger has succeeded in making atomic nuclei transparent with the help of X-ray light. At the same time they have also discovered a new way to realize an optically controlled light switch that can be used to manipulate light with light, an important ingredient for efficient future quantum computers.

The research results are presented in the current edition of the scientific journal Nature (DOI: 10.1038/nature10741).

More focus on men needed in HIV prevention

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Edward Mills of the University of Ottawa, Canada and colleagues argue in this week's PLoS Medicine that the HIV/AIDS response in Africa needs a more balanced approach to gender, so that both men and women are involved in HIV treatment and prevention. Traditionally, targeted efforts at reducing the impact of the HIV epidemic have focused on women and children while men have received considerably less attention.

EARTH: Unearthing Antarctica's mysterious mountains

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Alexandria, VA – Buried more than a kilometer beneath the East Antarctica Ice sheet, the Gamburstev Subglacial Mountains have proven to be a geological puzzle for more than 5 decades. How did these mountains form? When did they form? And what makes this ancient mountain range one of the least-understood tectonic features on Earth?