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March 4, 2009 – A large-scale study conducted at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health has identified the type and frequency of hazardous conditions found in the home healthcare (HHC) setting. An anonymous survey of over 700 home healthcare RNs employed in New York City provided the most complete assessment of homecare hazardous household conditions to date. The most common hazardous conditions found in households were environmental and physical hazards, including animal hair, cigarette smoke, excessive dust, and mold/dampness.

72.28 per cent of drug addict men admit to have consumed drugs to be able to have sexual relations and most of them (58%) choose cocaine to this purpose, the narcotic which increases the most sexual incapacitation. On the other hand, only 37.50% drug addict women consume drugs to this purpose, and when they do, they resort to cocaine (37%), speed ball (25%) and alcohol (25%).

The Human Fertilisation and Embryology (HFE) Act becomes law in April 2009¹. It promises groundbreaking legislation on assisted reproduction and embryo research², but was its development really a landmark in national scientific decision-making?

With contributions from leading figures in the worlds of science, policy, ethics and the media, the ESRC Genomics Forum³, based at the University of Edinburgh, is holding a conference examining how this new legal framework was determined, and who really makes the decisions related to science policy in Britain.

If someone ever calls you a "dirty rat," consider it a compliment. A new discovery published online in the FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org) shows that cellular mechanisms used by the blind mole rat to survive the very low oxygen environment of its subterranean niche are the same as those that tumors use to thrive deep in our tissues.

Researchers at the University of Leeds have made a significant step forward in understanding the causes of some forms of deafness.

The Leeds team has discovered that the myosin 7 motor protein - found in the tiny hairs of the inner ear that pick up sound - moves and works in a different way from many other myosins.

University of Adelaide research has discovered that there are many more species of Australian lizards than previously thought, raising new questions about conservation and management of Australia's native reptiles.

PhD student Paul Oliver, from the University's School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, has done a detailed genetic study of the Australian gecko genus Diplodactylus and found more than twice the recognised number of gecko species, from 13 species to 29. This study was done in colloboration with the South Australian Museum and Western Australian Museum.

Cellulosic biofuels offer similar, if not lower, costs and very large reductions in greenhouse gas emissions compared to petroleum-derived fuels. That's one of the key take-home messages from a series of expert papers on "The Role of Biomass in America's Energy Future (RBAEF)" in a special issue of Biofuels, Bioproducts and Biorefining.

Within five years innovative 'smart' sensing systems that will help the UK's 700,000 dementia sufferers live independently at home could be available commercially.

Once installed, the systems are designed to closely monitor people's movements and actions around the home. As well as providing voice-prompts (e.g. reminders to turn off a tap or cooker), they can also directly switch lights or appliances on and off in order to eliminate potential dangers.

'Information agents' have been developed that could prove invaluable in decision-making and directing the actions of the emergency services in the immediate aftermath of natural disasters or terrorist attacks.

Information agents are pieces of software that can acquire and process real-time data collected from sensor networks in order to support situational awareness and operational decision-making.

In quantum mechanics, a vanguard of physics where science often merges into philosophy, much of our understanding is based on conjecture and probabilities, but a group of researchers in Japan has moved one of the fundamental paradoxes in quantum mechanics into the lab for experimentation and observed some of the 'spooky action of quantum mechanics' directly.

Pretreatment MRI and PET/CT for cervical cancer may direct more women to optimal therapy choices and spare many women potential long-term morbidity and complications of trimodality therapy (surgery followed by chemoradiation), according to a study performed at the Institute for Technology Assessment in Boston, MA.

A new computer-aided method used with MDCT to detect and measure pneumothoraces in trauma patients helps physicians make quicker and more accurate decisions in busy emergency room settings, according to a study performed at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, MA.

Nearly one-fifth of trauma patients who undergo CT evaluation have incidental findings, according to a study performed by Columbus Radiology Corp. at Grant Medical Center in Columbus, OH.

Sonohysterography (SHG), a simple ultrasound technique commonly used to evaluate the uterine cavity, improves the diagnostic capability of transvaginal ultrasound in detecting adenomyosis (a common benign condition of the uterus that causes dysmenorrhea, abnormal vaginal bleeding and pelvic pain), according to a study performed at the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, PA.

Biologists analyzing DNA in search of the molecular underpinnings of life have consistently favored species with small genomes, which are cheaper to sequence and lack the repetitive "junk" that clutters bigger genomes. But a new study by Howard Hughes Medical Institute scientists suggests that when it comes to figuring out how genes are controlled, bigger genomes are much more useful.