Heavens

Los Angeles, CA (September 14, 2012) – An expert assessment of China's nuclear weapons strategy highlights the risk of escalation to nuclear war from a conflict beginning with conventional weapons, due to the unusual structure of the nation's military. The new study, previously only available in Chinese, appears in the latest edition of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, published by SAGE. The authors believe that this is the first comprehensive non-governmental study on how China's nuclear-war plan was developed.

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Using ultrasound waves, MIT engineers have found a way to enhance the permeability of skin to drugs, making transdermal drug delivery more efficient. This technology could pave the way for noninvasive drug delivery or needle-free vaccinations, according to the researchers.

Since the early 1900s, scientists have been wondering how birds and mammals could have developed almost identical conduction systems independently of each other when their common ancestor was a cold-blooded reptile with a sponge-like inner heart that has virtually no conduction bundles.

The studies show that it is simply the spongy inner tissue in the foetal heart that gets stretched out to become a fine network of conductive tissue in adult birds and mammals. And this knowledge can be put to use in the future.

Severe UK winters, like the 'big freeze' of 2009/10, can now be better forecast months in advance using the Met Office's latest model, new research suggests.

A new study, published today, Friday 14 September, in IOP Publishing's journal Environmental Research Letters, compares the latest seasonal forecast system to the one previously used and shows that it can better warn the UK of extreme winter weather conditions.

Tropical Storm Nadine is struggling against wind shear and some dry air. Infrared satellite imagery from NASA showed that Nadine's most powerful thunderstorms were being pushed east of the center.

NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Tropical Storm Nadine early on Sept. 13 and saw several factors that indicated the storm was still struggling to achieve hurricane status.

Tropical Storm Sanba exploded in intensity between Sept. 12 and 13, becoming a major Category 4 Typhoon on the Saffir-Simpson Scale. NASA's Aqua satellite captured infrared data that showed a large area of powerful thunderstorms around the center of circulation, dropping heavy rain over the western North Pacific Ocean.

OAKLAND, Calif. − Protection against whooping cough (also called pertussis) waned during the five years after the fifth dose of the combined diphtheria, tetanus, acellular pertussis (DTaP) vaccine, according to researchers from the Kaiser Permanente Vaccine Study Center. The fifth dose of DTaP is routinely given to 4- to 6-year-old children prior to starting kindergarten.

The study appears in the current online issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Tropical Depression 14 strengthened into Tropical Storm Nadine while NASA's Hurricane Severe Storm Sentinel Mission, or HS3 mission, was in full-swing and NASA's Global Hawk aircraft captured the event. While the Global Hawk was gathering data over the storm, NASA satellites were also analyzing Nadine from space.

NASA's Global Hawk landed back at Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va., after spending a full day gathering data from the 14th Atlantic Tropical Depression that strengthened into Tropical Storm Nadine during the morning hours of Sept. 12.

One of NASA's infrared "eyes" is an instrument that flies aboard the Aqua satellite, and it provided data that helped forecasters determine that low pressure "System 90E" strengthened into the eastern Pacific Ocean's eleventh tropical depression.

A paper recently published in the Journal of Animal Science helps researchers further understand how microbials and probiotics affect poultry health.

With homeland security on high alert, screening systems to search for concealed weapons are crucial pieces of equipment. But these systems are often prohibitively expensive, putting them out of reach for public spaces such as train and bus stations, stadiums, or malls, where they could be beneficial.

EVANSTON, Ill. --- When mercury is dumped into rivers and lakes, the toxic heavy metal can end up in the fish we eat and the water we drink. To help protect consumers from the diseases and conditions associated with mercury, researchers at Northwestern University in collaboration with colleagues at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland, have developed a nanoparticle system that is sensitive enough to detect even the smallest levels of heavy metals in our water and fish.

The research was published September 9 in the journal Nature Materials.

The study, led by Lara McKenzie, PhD, principal investigator in the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's, was the basis for the spray bottle prototype.

The distribution system piping in U.S. public water systems that rely on non-disinfected well water or "ground water" may be a largely unrecognized cause of up to 1.1 million annual cases of acute gastrointestinal illness (AGI), involving nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, scientists are reporting. Their study in ACS' journal Environmental Science & Technology concludes that such illnesses may become more of a problem as much of the nation's drinking water supply system continues to age and deteriorate.