Researchers at North Carolina State University are working to demonstrate that trees can be used to degrade or capture fuels that leak into soil and ground water. Through a process called phytoremediation – literally a "green" technology – plants and trees remove pollutants from the environment or render them harmless.
Tech
A study published online today [Thursday] estimates nearly 45,000 annual deaths are associated with lack of health insurance. That figure is about two and a half times higher than an estimate from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in 2002.
The new study, "Health Insurance and Mortality in U.S. Adults," appears in today's [Thursday's] online edition of the American Journal of Public Health.
MADISON — Imagine a car that runs on hydrogen from solar power and produces water instead of carbon emissions. While vehicles like this won't be on the market anytime soon, University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers are making incremental but important strides in the fuel cell technology that could make clean cars a reality.
LEWISTON, Idaho – Temperature differences and slow-moving water at the confluence of the Clearwater and Snake rivers in Idaho might delay the migration of threatened juvenile salmon and allow them to grow larger before reaching the Pacific Ocean.
Researchers are one step closer to creating a micro-aircraft that flies with the maneuverability and energy efficiency of an insect after decoding the aerodynamic secrets of insect flight.
Scientists in Pennsylvania report that boosting production of crops used to make biofuels could make a difficult task to shrink a vast, oxygen-depleted "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico more difficult. The zone, which reached the size of Massachusetts in 2008, forms in summer and threatens marine life and jobs in the region. Their study is scheduled for the Oct. 1 issue of ACS' semi-monthly journal Environmental Science & Technology.
WASHINGTON -- A report released today by the National Research Council calls on the United States to launch a new multiagency, multiyear, and multidisciplinary initiative to capitalize on the extraordinary advances recently made in biology and to accelerate new breakthroughs that could solve some of society's most pressing problems -- particularly in the areas of food, environment, energy, and health.
Scientists from the Universities of Exeter and Plymouth are today calling for urgent research to understand the impact of renewable energy developments on marine life. The study, now published in the Journal of Applied Ecology, highlights potential environmental benefits and threats resulting from marine renewable energy, such as off-shore wind farms and wave and tidal energy conversion devices.
German researchers from the Institutes for General Practice in Frankfurt, Main, and Jena have achieved positive results from a sustainable intervention in the primary care practice Annals of Internal Medicine. The international relevance of the trial is also highlighted in the editorial.
Researchers funded by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) at the University of Michigan invented a new type of magnetron that may be used to defeat enemy electronics. A magnetron is the type of vacuum tube used as the frequency source in microwave ovens, radar systems, and other high-power microwave circuits.
Chemical engineers at Oregon State University have invented a new technology to deposit "nanostructure films" on various surfaces, which may first find use as coatings for eyeglasses that cost less and work better. Ultimately, the technique may provide a way to make solar cells more efficiently produce energy.
If you are in the business of developing high-speed electronic components, it pays not to lose sight of the electrons. To keep track of them you will need to use dedicated optical elements, such as those now on offer from UltraFast Innovations GmbH. The new company, which has just been founded by researchers at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) in Munich and the Max Planck Society (MPG), manufactures specialized mirrors and other optical elements for use with pulsed laser light and x-rays. These components allow to generate and manipulate ultrashort light pulses.
College football fans cheer when marching bands spell out the home team's name in gigantic letters on the field at halftime. Now scientists in Utah are reporting the ultimate in one-upmanship: Development of a new technology for writing the school name in letters so small that 500 would fit across the diameter of a human hair (or hundreds of thousands would fit inside the diameter of a human hair). A report on the study, which helps overcome a long-standing challenge in nanotechnology, is scheduled for the October issue of ACS' Nano Letters, a monthly journal.
Sept. 16, 2009 – WASHINGTON, D.C., A diverse collaboration of healthcare leaders today released the AF Stat™ Call to Action for Atrial Fibrillation to serve as a roadmap for reducing the burden of atrial fibrillation (AFib) in the United States. The document outlines critical issues surrounding the management of AFib, and recommends priority actions in the areas of policy, management, education and quality.
Compared with white patients, black patients who have an in-hospital cardiac arrest are significantly less likely to survive to hospital discharge, having lower rates of successful resuscitation and postresuscitation survival, although much of this survival difference was associated with the hospital in which black patients received care, according to a study in the September 16 issue of JAMA.