Tech

COLUMBIA, Mo. - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that adults of all ages should engage in 150 or more minutes of moderate physical activity per week. Among adults 60 years of age or more, walking is the most common form of leisure-time physical activity because it is self-paced, low impact and does not require equipment. Researchers at the University of Missouri have determined that older adults who also are pet owners benefit from the bonds they form with their canine companions.

Behaviors that enable bullying--a significant public health problem for adolescents--were reduced among students who completed a new online anti-bullying program, according to a new study from Case Western Reserve University.

MADISON, Wis. -- One secret to creating the world's fastest silicon-based flexible transistors: a very, very tiny knife.

Working in collaboration with colleagues around the country, University of Wisconsin-Madison engineers have pioneered a unique method that could allow manufacturers to easily and cheaply fabricate high-performance transistors with wireless capabilities on huge rolls of flexible plastic.

Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a model that allows antenna designers to identify efficient configurations for antenna designs in minutes, rather than days. The model is designed to expedite development of next generation "multi-input, multi-ouput" (MIMO) antennas, which allow devices to get more use out of the available bandwidth.

WASHINGTON - A team of researchers from across the country, led by Alexander Spott, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA, have built the first quantum cascade laser on silicon. The advance may have applications that span from chemical bond spectroscopy and gas sensing, to astronomy and free-space communications.

Weaning cars and trucks off of gasoline and diesel made from fossil fuels is a difficult task. One promising solution involves biodiesel, which comes from natural oils and fats, but it is costly. Using a microwave and catalyst-coated beads, scientists have devised a new way to convert waste cooking oil into biodiesel that could make it more affordable. They report how they did it in ACS' journal Energy & Fuels.

Famous athletes and celebrities promoting charities made silicone wristbands cool more than a decade ago. Now, scientists have developed another use for the colorful, comfortable bands: figuring out what chemicals people are exposed to on a daily basis. The cover article in Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society, reports how these trendy accessories could already be helping people.

New research from North Carolina State University finds that player behavior in narrative role-playing games (RPGs) reflects specific character roles - even if the game tells players nothing about the character's role. The finding is relevant to both game designers and gaming researchers who study player behavior in RPGs.

TORONTO, April 19, 2016 - Researchers have developed a new tool that will improve how clinicians can identify women at high risk of developing pre-eclampsia, and who should take acetylsalicylic acid, also known as Aspirin, after 12 weeks of pregnancy.

Clinical practice guidelines recommend that women at high risk take low-dose (baby) ASA daily starting at 12 to 20 weeks of pregnancy.

There is no evidence to suggest that lasers pointed at airplane cockpits damage pilots' eyesight. But obviously if directed at critical moments, the dazzle from the beam and ensuing distraction could prove disastrous for crew and passengers, say leading eye specialists in an editorial published online in the British Journal of Ophthalmology.

In a bid to disentangle the hype, amid the rising number of cases of laser pointers directed at aircraft--more than 1500 over the past 12 months in the UK alone--the specialists set out in which circumstances eyesight can be damaged.

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Jeffrey Grossman thinks we've been looking at coal all wrong. Instead of just setting it afire, thus ignoring the molecular complexity of this highly varied material, he says, we should be harnessing the real value of that diversity and complex chemistry. Coal could become the basis for solar panels, batteries, or electronic devices, he and his research team say.

Americans used less energy overall in 2015 than the previous year, according to the most recent energy flow charts released by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

Each year, the Laboratory releases energy flow charts that illustrate the nation's consumption and use of energy. Overall, Americans used 0.8 quadrillion BTU, or quads, less in 2015 than in 2014. (A BTU or British Thermal Unit is a unit of measurement for energy; 3,400 BTU is equivalent to about 1 kilowatt-hour).

WASHINGTON, DC - April 19, 2016 - Cities have their own distinct microbial communities but these communities don't vary much between offices located in the same city, according to a new study. The work, published this week in mSystems, an open access journal from the American Society for Microbiology, offers insight into what drives the composition of microbes in built environments.

WASHINGTON, D.C., April 19, 2016 - Despite their hefty price tag, smartphones have an average consumer lifetime of about three years. The lithium ion batteries that power them, however, can last for about five years -- meaning that just about every discarded smartphone generates e-waste and squanders the battery's twilight years. To cut down on the environmental waste and provide storage for rural communities, researchers at Kyung Hee University in Seoul have proposed a model for recycling unspent lithium ion batteries into energy storage units for solar-powered LED lamps.

Polymer solar cells can be even cheaper and more reliable thanks to a breakthrough by scientists at Linköping University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). This work is about avoiding costly and unstable fullerenes.

Polymer solar cells have in recent years emerged as a low cost alternative to silicon solar cells. In order to obtain high efficiency, fullerenes are usually required in polymer solar cells to separate charge carriers. However, fullerenes are unstable under illumination, and form large crystals at high temperatures.