Tech | Page 1244 | Science Codex

Ethanol blends carry hidden risk

HOUSTON – (Dec. 12, 2013) – Blending more ethanol into fuel to cut air pollution from vehicles carries a hidden risk that toxic or even explosive gases may find their way into buildings, according to researchers at Rice University.

Those problems would likely occur in buildings with cracked foundations that happen to be in the vicinity of fuel spills. Vapors that rise from contaminated groundwater can be sucked inside, according to Rice environmental engineer Pedro Alvarez. Once there, trapped pools of methane could ignite and toxic hydrocarbons could cause health woes, he said.

New screening strategy to prevent cardiovascular complications in sports

Istanbul, Turkey – 13 December 2013: Echocardiography with conventional M-mode and 2D modalities is a simple and cost effective way to increases the accuracy of pre-participation sports screening, according to research presented at EuroEcho-Imaging 2013 by Dr Alexander Kisko from Presov, Slovakia.

Can we turn unwanted carbon dioxide into electricity?

SAN FRANCISCO—Researchers are developing a new kind of geothermal power plant that will lock away unwanted carbon dioxide (CO2) underground—and use it as a tool to boost electric power generation by at least 10 times compared to existing geothermal energy approaches.

The technology to implement this design already exists in different industries, so the researchers are optimistic that their new approach could expand the use of geothermal energy in the U.S. far beyond the handful of states that can take advantage of it now.

Many older Americans rely on people, devices, other strategies to get by

ANN ARBOR— Only about a third of Americans ages 65 and older are fully able to take care of themselves and go about their daily lives completely independently, according to a new study published online in the American Journal of Public Health.

Understanding that there are different ways older adults adapt to disability is a big step in developing public health policies that maximize the quality-of-life for all older Americans, said the study's lead author, Vicki Freedman, a research professor at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research (ISR).

Low-power tunneling transistor for high-performance devices at low voltage

A new type of transistor that could make possible fast and low-power computing devices for energy-constrained applications such as smart sensor networks, implantable medical electronics and ultra-mobile computing is feasible, according to Penn State researchers. Called a near broken-gap tunnel field effect transistor (TFET), the new device uses the quantum mechanical tunneling of electrons through an ultrathin energy barrier to provide high current at low voltage.

Using air transportation data to predict pandemics

Computational work conducted at Northwestern University has led to a new mathematical theory for understanding the global spread of epidemics. The resulting insights could not only help identify an outbreak's origin but could also significantly improve the ability to forecast the global pathways through which a disease might spread.

Smashing science: Livermore scientists discover how explosives respond to shockwaves

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory researchers have combined ultrafast time-resolved experimental measurements with theory to reveal how an explosive responds to a high-impact shock.

The work involved advances in both ultrafast experimental shock wave methods and molecular dynamics (MD) simulation techniques, and the combination of experiment and simulation is a milestone in understanding chemical initiation and detonation.

Could 'methanol economy' help power post-fossil fuel era? New American Chemical Society video

Could a simple molecule known as methanol become a key energy source for the post-fossil fuel era? 1994 Nobel Prize in Chemistry winner George Olah, Ph.D., and Surya Prakash, Ph.D., think so. Their promising alternative fuel concept, known as the "methanol economy," is the focus of the latest episode of the American Chemical Society's (ACS') Bytesize Science series, available at http://www.youtube.com/BytesizeScience.

New study shows link between perfluorinated compounds and diabetes

Perfluorinated compounds are environmental toxins that are found in fire extinguishing foam and water-repellent textiles and, for example. In a new study, a research team led from Uppsala University has seen links between high levels of perfluorinated compounds in the blood and diabetes.

NUS researchers develop novel bio-inspired method to grow high-quality graphene for high-end electronic devices

Singapore, 12 December 2013 - A team of researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS), led by Professor Loh Kian Ping, who heads the Department of Chemistry at the NUS Faculty of Science, has successfully developed an innovative one-step method to grow and transfer high-quality graphene on silicon and other stiff substrates, opening up opportunities for graphene to be used in high-value applications that are currently not technologically feasible.

What the past tells us about modern sea-level rise

Researchers from the University of Southampton and the Australian National University report that sea-level rise since the industrial revolution has been fast by natural standards and – at current rates – may reach 80cm above the modern level by 2100 and 2.5 metres by 2200.

Brief laser-light treatment may significantly improve effectiveness of influenza vaccines

Pretreating the site of intradermal vaccination – vaccine delivered into the skin rather than to muscles beneath the skin – with a particular wavelength of laser light may substantially improve vaccine effectiveness without the adverse effects of chemical additives currently used to boost vaccine efficacy.

A new material for solar panels could make them cheaper, more efficient

ARGONNE, Ill. – A unique solar panel design made with a new ceramic material points the way to potentially providing sustainable power cheaper, more efficiently, and requiring less manufacturing time. It also reaches a four-decade-old goal of discovering a bulk photovoltaic material that can harness energy from visible and infrared light, not just ultraviolet light.

Researchers at Penn show optimal framework for heartbeats

After testing that their treated hearts were sufficiently softened or stiffened, they fluorescently labeled a small percentage of cells in the heart so they could quantify how hard the hearts were beating while looking at them under a microscope.

"When we treat the hearts with a chemical that breaks down the collagen," Majkut said, "we can directly see that the hearts aren't contracting as much because the labeled cells aren't getting as close to each other as they did before."

Hipster, surfer or biker? Computers may soon be able to tell the difference

Are you a hipster, surfer or biker? What is your urban tribe? Your computer may soon be able to tell. Computer scientists at the University of California, San Diego, are developing an algorithm that uses group pictures to determine to which of these groups, or urban tribes, you belong. So far, the algorithm is 48 percent accurate on average. That's better than chance--which gets answers right only nine percent of the time--but researchers would like the algorithm perform at least as well as humans would.