Tech

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) (http://www.cdc.gov/) rank mortality related to chronic liver disease and cirrhosis as the 12th most common cause of death in adults in the U.S.

The UK's National Physical Laboratory (NPL) has developed a new portable radiation detector that can assess the safety of potentially contaminated areas far quicker than current methods. The prototype was inspired by the aftermath of the murder of Alexander Litvinenko in London 2006.

Litvinenko's death was due to radiation poisoning from polonium-210. It prompted wide-scale work to assess radiation levels at almost 50 premises in London that he had been prior to his death before opening them up again to the public, costing the Health Protection Agency £2 million.

Boulder, CO, USA - The meters-long, carnivorous "shrimp" from hell that once ruled the seas of Earth a half billion years ago may have been a real softy, it turns out. A new 3-D modeling of the mouth parts of the Anomalocaris, along with evidence that these parts were not hard like teeth, but flexible, shows that the famed predator could not have been munching on the hard shells of trilobites and other such creatures of the early seas.

Boulder, CO, USA - One common mitigation approach is to build a raised bed and fill it with freshly composted, low-lead soil from elsewhere, right? Maybe not, according to researchers studying the mysterious case of the lead contamination found within raised beds in community gardens in the Boston communities of Roxbury and Dorchester.

An overwhelming majority of Breast Cancer Surveillance Consortium (BCSC) facilities performing breast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the U.S. are up-to-par with American College of Radiology Imaging Network (ACRIN) and European Society of Breast Imaging (EUSOBI) technical standards and requirements, according to a study in the November issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology (www.jacr.org). The BCSC is a collaborative effort to improve breast cancer research.

Alexandria, VA — Racial and ethnic disparities among children with frequent ear infections (FEI) significantly influence access to affordable healthcare, according to new research published in the November 2010 issue of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery.

Ear infections are one of the most common health problems for children, with most kids experiencing at least one by their third birthday. Annual costs in the United States alone are in the billions of dollars.

SEATTLE--Primary-care clinicians know teen depression is common, but they've lacked a reliable screening test for it. Now researchers at the University of Washington (UW), Seattle Children's, and Group Health report the PHQ-9 (Patient Health Questionnaire - 9 item) is a good screening test for major depression in adolescents.

LAWRENCE, Kan. – A little self-awareness can help people struggling in the world of relationships, says Jeffrey Hall, assistant professor of communication studies at the University of Kansas.

Hall recently completed a study into styles of flirting among dating adults, surveying more than 5,100 people regarding their methods of communicating romantic interest.

Researchers have developed an efficient method for extracting and archiving CT radiation dose information that can enable providers to keep track of estimated radiation dose delivered to each patient at a given facility, help providers make more informed health care decisions and improve patient safety, according to a study in the November issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology (www.jacr.org).

An overwhelming majority of Breast Cancer Surveillance Consortium (BCSC) facilities performing breast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the U.S. are up-to-par with American College of Radiology Imaging Network (ACRIN) and European Society of Breast Imaging (EUSOBI) technical standards and requirements, according to a study in the November issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology (www.jacr.org). The BCSC is a collaborative effort to improve breast cancer research.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Researchers at Oregon State University have solved a quest in fundamental material science that has eluded scientists since the 1960s, and could form the basis of a new approach to electronics.

The discovery, just reported online in the professional journal Advanced Materials, outlines the creation for the first time of a high-performance "metal-insulator-metal" diode.

The decision to stop life-support for incapacitated and critically ill patients is, for surrogate decision makers, often fraught with moral and ethical uncertainty, and long-term emotional consequences. But as difficult as these decisions are, more than half of surrogate decision makers prefer to have full authority over the choice than to share or cede that power to physicians, according to a recent study out of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

Extra-virgin olive oil can protect the liver from oxidative stress. Researchers writing in BioMed Central's open access journal Nutrition and Metabolism exposed rats to a moderately toxic herbicide known to deplete antioxidants and cause oxidative stress, finding that those rats fed on a diet containing the olive oil were partially protected from the resulting liver damage.