PRESS RELEASE Date Released: Thursday, December 21, 2006 Source: European Southern Observatory ESO Releases 256 Million Pixel Image of Immense Stellar Factory A high-resolution image is available at http://www. Read more…
STATUS REPORT Date Released: Thursday, December 21, 2006 Source: Glenn Research Center NASA Notice of Intent to Grant Exclusive License - Makel Engineering, Inc. Read more…
Scientists have discovered what appears to be a new kind of cosmic explosion, the subject of four articles in this week's issue of Nature. They call the explosion a hybrid gamma-ray burst. (20 December 2006) Read more…
Gamma-ray detectors help scientists understand huge events deep in space. On Earth, they help security forces look out for radioactive materials that could be used by terrorists. (21 December 2006) Read more…
Researchers at Rush University Medical Center found that having complaints about memory problems is associated with changes in the brain related to Alzheimer's disease. They reported their findings in the November 2006 issue of Neurology. Read more…
Delft University of Technology PhD candidate Maaike Kroon has developed a sustainable and inexpensive production method for the chemical industry. This method combines reactions and separation processes, does not produce chemical waste and uses much less energy. Read more…
A report, published in health journal Sexual Health, has found nearly all women had had at least one Pap smear test in their lives with 26 percent reporting an abnormal result. Two thirds of these women were treated at clinics after abnormal tests with about one in five women reporting negative effects on their sex lives. Read more…
The oldest-known animal eggs and embryos, whose first pictures made the cover of Nature in 1998, were so small they looked like bugs -- which, it now appears, they may have been. This week, a study in the same prestigious journal presents evidence for reinterpreting the 600 million-year-old fossils from the Precambrian era as giant bacteria. Read more…
A link between obesity and the microbial communities living in our guts is suggested by new research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The findings indicate that our gut microbes are biomarkers, mediators and potential therapeutic targets in the war against the worldwide obesity epidemic. Read more…
A tiny, six-legged critter that suspends all biological activity when the going gets tough may hold answers to a better way to cryopreserve human eggs, researchers say. Tardigrades, also called water bears, can survive Himalayan heights or ocean depths as long as they have moisture. When they don't, they produce a sugar, trehalose, slowly dehydrate and essentially cease functioning until the rain comes, says Dr. Ali Eroglu, reproductive biologist and cryobiologist at the Medical College of Georgia. Read more…
Integrating new location-aware computer networks with old-fashioned human networks, researchers at the New Jersey Institute of Technology have developed an innovative solution to the problem of isolation that faces women in the academic science and engineering workforce. Read more…
Research reported in the Plant Cell reveals important aspects of plant metabolism associated with grain filling and kernel yield in maize. The scientific breakthrough of this research is its indication that two closely related isoforms of the cytosolic enzyme glutamine synthetase determine two major and distinct yield components in maize, kernel size and kernel number. The results point to a dominant role of nitrogen retranslocation rather than carbon allocation during grain filling. Read more…
The unusual ability of the organism Toxoplasma to infect and reproduce inside almost all warm-blooded animals has led scientists to wonder about the tricks it uses so successfully to subvert the behavior of cells. Now, a team of Stanford University School of Medicine researchers, led by John Boothroyd, PhD, has shown for the first time how Toxoplasma manages to be so effective: They documented how it injects a particular protein into the cell it infects and how that protein then travels to the cell's nucleus - where it blocks the cell's normal response to invasion. Read more…
New findings indicate that the aurora and other near-Earth space weather are driven by the rate at which the Earth's and sun's magnetic fields connect, or merge, and not by the solar wind's electric field as was previously assumed. Read more…
New laboratory research suggests that lithium and other drugs that inhibit a particular enzyme, GSK-3 beta, should be used with caution in treating Alzheimer's disease because too high a dose can impair, rather than enhance, neuronal function. Read more…
Scientists at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies who were studying how coral reefs are lost to weed were astonished when, after removing a cage from a particularly weedy bit of reef, the rare batfishes emerged out of the blue and cleaned up most of the weed. Read more…
The smell of an odor is not merely a result of chemical detection but is also influenced by what the smeller learns about the odor. Now, researchers have discovered how such "perceptual learning" about an odor influences processing of information from the purely olfactory chemical detection system. Read more…
The two-slice-touch rule increased the accuracy of diagnosing meniscal tears, according to a study conducted by the Department of Radiology at the University of Wisconsin Medical School and Hospital, in Madison, Wis. Read more…
New research from Children's Hospital Boston and the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary may help explain how glaucoma causes blindness, revealing the chain of events that ultimately damage the optic nerve, preventing visual information from getting to the brain. The study indicates possible targets for intervention, including one for which there are already approved drugs. Read more…
With the help of enormous computer simulations, astronomers have now shown that the first generation of stars --- which have never been observed by scientists --- should be distributed evenly throughout our galaxy, deepening the long-standing mystery about these missing stellar ancestors. The results are published in this week's issue of the Astrophysical Journal. Read more…
Mayo Clinic Cancer Center has begun three clinical studies looking at the use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) to prevent cancer -- colon, esophageal or lung. Read more…
Can planting a tree stop the sea level from rising, the ice caps from melting and hurricanes from intensifying? A new study says that it depends on where the trees are planted. It cautions that new forests in mid- to high-latitude locations could actually create a net warming. It also confirms the notion that planting more trees in tropical rainforests could help slow global warming worldwide. Read more…
An emulsion of olive oil, egg yolk and glycerine might be just the recipe to keep heart patients away from the operating room and cardiac bypass surgery. Read more…
Researchers at Virginia Tech, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia report that the chemistry of organic molecules control the rate of crystal growth. Nano-quantities of biomolecules in the tissues of organisms where biominerals develop can cause calcite crystals to grow faster. And speed of growth can be tuned by varying the charge and water-structuring ability of the biomolecules. The findings result in a speedometer that predicts the type of molecules that will speed up crystal growth. Read more…
Melanomas (skin cancers) are more likely to grow rapidly if they are thicker, symmetrical, elevated, have regular borders or have symptoms, according to a report in the December issue of Archives of Dermatology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. In addition, rapidly progressing melanoma is more likely to occur in elderly men and individuals with fewer moles and freckles, and its cells tend to divide more quickly and have fewer pigments than those of slower-growing cancers. Read more…
