Culture

GAINESVILLE, Fla. --- Algae is a livid green giveaway of nutrient pollution in a lake. Scientists would love to reproduce that action in tiny particles that would turn different colors if exposed to biological weapons, food spoilage or signs of poor health in the blood.

Now, University of Florida engineering researchers have tapped the working parts of cells to clear a major hurdle to creating such "smart dust."The feat, which signifies a new approach to technology known as the "lab on a chip," is to be reported Sunday in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

Scientists have developed a mathematical model of the mating game to help explain why courtship is often protracted. The study, by researchers at UCL (University College London), University of Warwick and LSE (London School of Economics and Political Science), shows that extended courtship enables a male to signal his suitability to a female and enables the female to screen out the male if he is unsuitable as a mate.

Scientists from Ghent University and VIB (The Flemisch Institute for Biotechnology) have demonstrated how nematodes, also known as roundworms, manipulate the transport of the plant hormone auxin in order to force the plant to produce food for them. Their findings, published January 16 in the open-access journal PLoS Pathogens, could open up new possibilities for the development of nematode-resistant plants.

Countries seeking to make massive changes in the way their economies are run, for example by privatising formerly state-run sectors, must take into account the potential impact of such changes on people's health, experts warn today.

The warning comes after a study of former countries of the Soviet Union, including Russia, that underwent privatisation programmes in the 1990s, following the collapse of communism, revealed how the process coincided with large increases in male mortality in some countries. The findings are published in the Lancet Online First today.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 14, 2009 – Recent research presented today at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Small Changes Summit that addresses childhood obesity shows that calories in recipes have gradually increased over time. Speaking before the Summit, Dr. Brian Wansink, Executive Director of the USDA Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion said, "As an example, the calories in recipes in the iconic cookbook, The Joy of Cooking, have increased by 63% from its first publication in 1937 to its most recent edition in 2006.

A researcher from the University of Leicester has identified what looks to be the oldest archaeological evidence for chemical warfare--from Roman times.

At the meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America, University of Leicester archaeologist Simon James presented CSI-style arguments that about twenty Roman soldiers, found in a siege-mine at the city of Dura-Europos, Syria, met their deaths not as a result of sword or spear, but through asphyxiation.

While exploring the properties of polymer formation, a team of scientists at the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) has made a fundamental discovery* about these materials that could improve methods of creating the stable crystalline films that are widely used in electronics applications—and also offer insight into a range of other phenomena.