Response efforts to outbreaks of Ebola hemorrhagic fever in Africa can benefit from a standardized sampling strategy that focuses on the carcasses of gorillas, chimpanzees and other species known to succumb to the virus, according to a consortium of wildlife health experts.
Tech
Washington, D.C., May 16, 2012 – Last week the Institute of Medicine (IOM) issued its obesity-prevention report at the Weight of the Nation™ conference hosted by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). This report included a call to action for increased access to healthy foods (like fruits and vegetables) at retail outlets nationwide . Findings from a new Michigan State University (MSU) study released today, underscored the critical role that canned fruits and vegetables play in helping Americans increase these intakes, regardless of geography or income level.
Scientists from the University of Southampton have discovered a previously unrecognised volcanic process, similar to one that is used in chocolate manufacturing, which gives important new insights into the dynamics of volcanic eruptions.
In an article in the highly ranked interdisciplinary journal PNAS, Loïg Kergoat, a researcher at Linköping University, describes how transistors made of plastic can be controlled with great precision.
The Organic Electronics Research Group at Linköping University (LiU) in Sweden, led by Professor Magnus Berggren, attracted great attention a year ago when Lars Herlogsson showed in his doctoral thesis that it was possible to construct fully functional field-effect transistors out of plastic.
The mothers of Britain's 'mixed families' are ensuring their children learn about their heritage and culture, according to a collaborative development project between the University of Southampton and London South Bank University. Findings show even if a child's father hails from a minority background, it will still be the mother who is responsible for teaching them about the father's culture.
The Bristol scientists studied a giant specimen of the pliosaur Pliosaurus dating from the Upper Jurassic. Found in Westbury, Wiltshire, it has been kept since its discovery in the collections of the Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery.
The 8 metre long pliosaur was a terrifying creature with a large, crocodile-like head, a short neck, whale-like body and four powerful flippers to propel it through water in pursuit of prey.
Cambridge, MASS. -- In its early years, information theory — which grew out of a landmark 1948 paper by MIT alumnus and future professor Claude Shannon — was dominated by research on error-correcting codes: How do you encode information so as to guarantee its faithful transmission, even in the presence of the corrupting influences engineers call "noise"?
For the first time, researchers at the University of California, San Diego have peered inside a living mouse cell and mapped the processes that power the celebrated health benefits of omega-3 fatty acids. More profoundly, they say their findings suggest it may be possible to manipulate these processes to short-circuit inflammation before it begins, or at least help to resolve inflammation before it becomes detrimental.
The work is published in the May 14, 2012 online Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
A novel sensor enables them to do just that, and thereby comply with the new government regulations. The new metering device will be presented at the Sensor+Test 2012 trade fair in Nuremberg from 22 to 24 May.
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Researchers have taken a step toward overcoming a key obstacle in commercializing "hyperbolic metamaterials," structures that could bring optical advances including ultrapowerful microscopes, computers and solar cells.
The researchers have shown how to create the metamaterials without the traditional silver or gold previously required, said Alexandra Boltasseva, a Purdue University assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering.
New research from the University of Southampton has devised a new method to more accurately measure gas bubbles in pipelines.
Researchers from North Carolina State University have developed a new way to fine-tune wireless power transfer (WPT) receivers, making the systems more efficient and functional. WPT systems hold promise for charging electric vehicles, electronic devices and other technologies.
Researchers have shown that it is possible to transmit power wirelessly by using magnetic resonance. Even minor changes in how the transmitter or receiver is tuned, however, can result in faulty power transmission.
Sydney, Australia - Deep cracks in soil can remain open underground even after they have visibly sealed on the surface, a new study has found.
The results could have important implications for agricultural management around the timing and intensity of water and pesticide applications.
"These soils are very fertile and provide the most productive agricultural land in Australia," said lead author Dr Anna-Katrin Greve, a postdoctoral fellow with UNSW's Connected Waters Initiative.
Beyond the high-speed hard drive: Topological insulators open a path to room-temperature spintronics
Strange new materials experimentally identified just a few years ago are now driving research in condensed-matter physics around the world. First theorized and then discovered by researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and their colleagues in other institutions, these "strong 3-D topological insulators" – TIs for short – are seemingly mundane semiconductors with startling properties. For starters, picture a good insulator on the inside that's a good conductor on its surface – something like a copper-coated bowling ball.
In the search for technology by which economically competitive biofuels can be produced from cellulosic biomass, the combination of sugar-fermenting microbes and ionic liquid solvents looks to be a winner save for one major problem: the ionic liquids used to make cellulosic biomass more digestible for microbes can also be toxic to them. A solution to this conundrum, however, may be in the offing.