Tech

"Not only that, but the structure we observed matches the known structure of lysozyme and shows no significant sign of radiation damage, despite the fact that the pulses completely destroy the sample. This is the first high-resolution demonstration of the 'diffraction-before-destruction' technique on biological samples, where we're able to measure a sample before the powerful pulses of the LCLS damage it," he added.

In 2004, a trio of researchers at Columbia University began an online experiment in social-media marketing, creating nine versions of a music-download site that presented the same group of unknown songs in different ways. The goal of the experiment was to gauge the effect of early peer recommendations on the songs' success; the researchers found that different songs became hits on the different sites and that the variation was unpredictable.

The University of Nottingham will be the base for the world's first Liquid Phase Photoelectron Spectroscopy (LiPPS) machine, a high performance tool that will increase the UK's competitiveness in a range of high-value industrial sectors including semiconductors, aerospace, pharmaceuticals and automotives.

Athens, Ga. – The assignment to write a court's majority opinion is one of the major tools for shaping judicial and, consequently, public policy. Researchers at the University of Georgia, along with the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, recently examined factors that might influence such an assignment. Based on data from all 50 states, the study reveals that judges' race, gender and other status-based characteristics influence the majority opinion assignment in many state supreme courts.

Language is so much more than a string of words. To understand what someone means, you need context.

Consider the phrase, "Man on first." It doesn't make much sense unless you're at a baseball game. Or imagine a sign outside a children's boutique that reads, "Baby sale - One week only!" You easily infer from the situation that the store isn't selling babies but advertising bargains on gear for them.

ALBANY, Calif.—A recent report analyzing a range of published studies on the impact of bark beetles on trees in the U.S. and Canada provides a more complete picture of the effect of this destructive insect on wildfires.

Researchers in the computer science department at the University of Calgary have developed a new font for numbers that represent their relative value. Unlike the usual numeric typefaces, the amount of ink—or dark pixels—used for each digit in FatFonts is proportional to its quantitative value.

Miguel Nacenta, formerly a post doc (now an assistant professor at University of St Andrews in Scotland), came up with the idea and worked with Sheelagh Carpendale, a computer science professor and Uta Hinrichs, a PhD student specializing in Computational Media Design.

EVANSTON, Ill. --- American parents may want to think again about how much they want to protect their children from everyday germs.

A new Northwestern University study done in lowland Ecuador remarkably finds no evidence of chronic low-grade inflammation -- associated with diseases of aging like cardiovascular disease, diabetes and dementia.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Tuberculosis, now largely controlled in the industrialized world, remains a stubbornly persistent killer in most of Africa, as well as parts of Asia and South America. The spread of multidrug-resistant strains of TB has slowed progress against the devastating disease, which is estimated to strike more than 10 million people annually. Now a modified soft-drink cooler, developed by researchers at MIT's D-Lab, could make a dent in the disease's impact.

Inexpensive, portable devices that can rapidly screen cells for leukemia or HIV may soon be possible thanks to a chip that can produce three-dimensional focusing of a stream of cells, according to researchers.

"HIV is diagnosed based on counting CD4 cells," said Tony Jun Huang, associate professor of engineering science and mechanics, Penn State. "Ninety percent of the diagnoses are done using flow cytometry."

The tuatara, an iconic New Zealand reptile, chews its food in a way unlike any other animal on the planet – challenging the widespread perception that complex chewing ability is closely linked to high metabolism.

Using a sophisticated computer model, scientists from UCL and the University of Hull demonstrate how the tuatara is able to slice its food like a "steak knife". The tuatara's complex chewing technique raises doubts about the supposed link between chewing and high metabolism in mammals.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — The smoke rising from a cookstove fills the air with the tantalizing aroma of dinner – and a cloud of pollutants and particles that threaten both health and the environment. How families in developing countries use their cookstoves has a big effect on emissions from those stoves, and laboratory emission tests don't accurately reflect real-world operations, according to a study by University of Illinois researchers.

Invisibility, once the subject of magic or legend, is slowly becoming reality. Over the past five years mathematicians and other scientists have been working on devices that enable invisibility cloaks – perhaps not yet concealing Harry Potter, but at least shielding small objects from detection by microwaves or sound waves.

The Organic Electronics research group at Linköping University previously developed ion transistors for transport of both positive and negative ions, as well as biomolecules. Tybrandt has now succeeded in combining both transistor types into complementary circuits, in a similar way to traditional silicon-based electronics.

An advantage of chemical circuits is that the charge carrier consists of chemical substances with various functions. This means that we now have new opportunities to control and regulate the signal paths of cells in the human body.