Researchers have developed a new candidate vaccine to protect against chikungunya virus, a mosquito-borne pathogen that produces an intensely painful and often chronic arthritic disease that has stricken millions of people in India, Southeast Asia and Africa.
Earth
A thriving undersea wildlife park tucked away near the southern tip of Mexico's Baja peninsula has proven to be the world's most robust marine reserve in the world, according to a new study led by researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego.
Despite the rapid retreat of Arctic sea ice in recent years, the ice may temporarily stabilize or somewhat expand at times over the next few decades, new research indicates.
Results of a study by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) appear this week in the journal Geophysical Research Letters (GRL), published by the American Geophysical Union.
Two completely different quantum systems were successfully joined at Vienna University of Technology (TU Vienna). This should pave the way to feasible quantum-computer microchips.
The recycling of the Earth's crust in volcanoes happens much faster than scientists have previously assumed. Rock of the oceanic crust, which sinks deep into the earth due to the movement of tectonic plates, reemerges through volcanic eruptions after around 500 million years. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Mainz obtained this result using volcanic rock samples. Previously, geologists thought this process would take about two billion years.
A team of researchers from the University of Valladolid (Spain) has analysed 40 brands of beer, discovering that dark beer has more free iron than pale and non-alcoholic beers. Iron is essential to the human diet, but also helps oxidise the organic compounds that give these beverages stability and flavour.
According to the analysis carried out by the University of Valladolid (UVa) on 40 types of beers from all 5 continents, dark beers have an average free iron content of 121 ppb (parts per billion) compared to 92 ppb in pale beers and 63 ppb in non-alcoholic beers.
Thousands of tons of toxic mercury are released into the environment every year and much of this collects in sediment where it is converted into toxic methyl mercury, and enters the food chain ending up in the fish we eat.
New research, published in BioMed Central’s open access journal BMC Biotechnology, showcases genetically engineered bacteria which are not only able to withstand high levels of mercury but are also able to mop up mercury from their surroundings.
Research involving scientists from The University of Nottingham is pioneering a new method of studying and making molecules.
The work, reported in Nature Materials, could pave the way for the production of nanomaterials for use in a new generation of computers and data storage devices that are faster, smaller and more powerful.
The Nottingham research group, led by Dr Andrei Khlobystov in the University's School of Chemistry, specialise in the chemistry of nanomaterials and has been studying carbon nanotubes as containers for molecules and atoms.
An undergraduate student has overcome a major hurdle in the development of invisibility cloaks by adding an optical device into their design that not only remains invisible itself, but also has the ability to slow down light.
The optical device, known as an 'invisible sphere', would slow down all of the light that approaches a potential cloak, meaning that the light rays would not need to be accelerated around the cloaked objects at great speeds ― a requirement that has limited invisibility cloaks to work only in a specified region of the visible spectrum.
Athens, Ga. – Increased seawater temperatures are known to be a leading cause of the decline of coral reefs all over the world. Now, researchers at the University of Georgia have found that extreme low temperatures affect certain corals in much the same way that high temperatures do, with potentially catastrophic consequences for coral ecosystems. Their findings appear in the early online edition of the journal Global Change Biology.
GREENBELT, Md. -- A NASA scientist and her colleagues were able to observe for the first time the power of an earthquake and tsunami to break off large icebergs a hemisphere away.
LOS ALAMOS, New Mexico, August 8, 2011—A Los Alamos National Laboratory research team has harnessed neutrons to view for the first time the critical role that an elusive molecule plays in certain biological reactions. The effort could aid in treatment of peptic ulcers or acid reflux disease, or allow for more efficient conversion of woody waste into transportation fuels.
CORVALLIS, Ore. – Researchers from a team funded by the National Science Foundation have examined some of last spring's massive tornado damage and conclude in a new report that more intensive engineering design and more rigorous, localized construction and inspection standards are needed to reduce property damage and loss of life.
Nearly half of all women scientists and one-quarter of male scientists at the nation's top research universities said their career has kept them from having as many children as they had wanted, according to a new study by Rice University and Southern Methodist University (SMU).
The study, "Scientists Want More Children," was authored by sociologists Elaine Howard Ecklund of Rice and Anne Lincoln of SMU and appears in the current issue of the journal PLoS ONE.
University of Guam ecologist Thomas Marler recently mobilized efforts to characterize the vegetation that has recovered following the eruption of Mount Pinatubo, Philippines. "My interest was sparked by the paradox that this volcano's cataclysmic 1991 eruption was so powerful it changed global climate, yet after a full 15 years the biology of the recovering ecosystem had not been studied," said Marler.