Tech

The traditional audience for books and scientific papers in which scientists report their findings has been the human reader. Now we can enhance publications by attaching to them many different kinds of digital objects (such as the sounds made by birds, maps that show where they occur, or images and videos) or by adding computer-readable sections and terms that allow computers to extract information for re-use. We refer to these enriched and marked-up documents as 'enhanced'.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. — A team of researchers from the University of California, Riverside's Bourns College of Engineering have solved a problem that previously presented a serious hurdle for the use of graphene in electronic devices.

Scanning electron microscopy image of graphene device used in the study. The scale bar is one micrometer. The UCR logo next to it is implemented with etched graphene.

ALMA opens another window to the universe in the 500 GHz frequency band. Astronomers successfully synthesized the distribution of atomic carbon around a planetary nebula NGC 6302 in test observations with the ALMA Band 8 receiver, developed by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ). This is the first 500 GHz band astronomical image captured by a radio interferometer with unprecedentedly high resolution.

Dr Laukkanen said: "Sudden cardiac death (SCD) accounts for approximately 50% of deaths from coronary heart disease. SCD typically occurs shortly after the onset of symptoms, leaving little time for effective medical interventions, and most cases occur outside hospital with few or no early warning signs. Finding ways to identify individuals at elevated risk of SCD would allow early interventions on risk factors to be implemented."

Despite the size and severity of the massive 2007 Anaktuvuk River fire on Alaska's North Slope, much of the arctic vegetation has recovered and the tundra is likely to return to its pre-fire condition according to University of Alaska Fairbanks scientist Syndonia "Donie" Bret-Harte and colleagues in a recent scientific paper.

Bacteria living in the Gulf of Mexico beaches were able to 'eat up' the contamination from the Deep Water Horizon oil spill by supplementing their diet with nitrogen, delegates at the Goldschmidt conference will be told today, Friday 30th August.

University of Alberta researchers have found that abundant materials in the Earth's crust can be used to make inexpensive and easily manufactured nanoparticle-based solar cells.

The U of A discovery, several years in the making, is an important step forward in making solar power more accessible to parts of the world that are off the traditional electricity grid or face high power costs, such as the Canadian North, said researcher Jillian Buriak, a chemistry professor and senior research officer of the National Institute for Nanotechnology, based on the U of A campus.

In the search for clean, green sustainable energy sources to meet human needs for generations to come, perhaps no technology matches the ultimate potential of artificial photosynthesis. Bionic leaves that could produce energy-dense fuels from nothing more than sunlight, water and atmosphere-warming carbon dioxide, with no byproducts other than oxygen, represent an ideal alternative to fossil fuels but also pose numerous scientific challenges. A major step toward meeting at least one of these challenges has been achieved by researchers with the U.S.

A recent study by UC Santa Barbara scientists analyzed whole-body fish samples taken from oil-and-gas production platforms and natural sites for heavy metal pollutants. The results showed all but four elements were relatively consistent at both types of location. The findings were published in the Bulletin of Marine Science.

For people struggling to live paycheck-to-paycheck, daily life can sometimes seem like a gauntlet of impossible-to-answer questions – Can I afford to put food on the table? Will I make rent this month? What will happen if I lose my job? What if my kids get sick, or my car breaks down?

For many, those questions become so persistent it's hard to concentrate on anything else. And that's exactly the problem, says Harvard economist Sendhil Mullainathan.

Young people who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual are twice as likely to have smoked than their heterosexual peers, according to new research published in BMJ Open. Lesbian and gay young people were also more likely to drink alcohol frequently and more hazardously.

The interdisciplinary research team comprised researchers from five UK Universities (UCL, University of Cambridge, London Metropolitan University, De Montfort University Leicester and Brunel University), a doctor working in General Practice and a consultant from Public Health England.

A significant portion of the petroleum consumed by the transport sector must be replaced in the long term by renewable energy. Therefore, it is of the utmost economic and ecological importance to optimise the production of biofuels from renewable raw materials. Researchers from VIB who are associated with KU Leuven have developed yeast strains that produce bio-ethanol from waste with an unprecedented efficiency. As a result, they are well placed to become important players on a global scale in this burgeoning industry.

Scientists at ETH Zurich and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in California have developed an innovative sensor for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS). Thanks to its unique surface properties at nanoscale, the method can be used to perform analyses that are more reliable, sensitive and cost-effective. In experiments with the new sensor, the researchers were able to detect a certain organic species (1,2bis(4-pyridyl)ethylene, or BPE) in a concentration of a few hundred femtomoles per litre. A 100 femtomolar solution contains around 60 million molecules per litre.

Ottawa (August 28, 2013) – A new expert panel report on research and development in Canadian industry has found that, despite Canada's historically poor performance in industrial R&D, four sectors of national strength exist.

The State of Industrial R&D in Canada, released today by the Council of Canadian Academies, provides a comprehensive and evidence-based analysis of Canada's R&D strengths in industry, how these strengths are distributed regionally, and also how they align with Canada's overall research and economic performance.

A new Energy Department study conducted by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) indicates that by 2025 wind and solar power electricity generation could become cost-competitive without federal subsidies, if new renewable energy development occurs in the most productive locations.