Hamilton, ON (May 8, 2014) – New research from McMaster University suggests that a commonly performed test during certain types of heart surgery is not helpful and possibly harmful.
Tech
A key challenge in the biofuels landscape is to get more advanced biofuels—fuels other than corn ethanol and vegetable oil-based biodiesel—into the transportation pool. Utilization of advanced biofuels is stipulated by the Energy Independence and Security Act; however, current production levels lag behind proposed targets. Additionally, certain transportation sectors, such as aviation, are likely to continue to require liquid hydrocarbon fuels in the long term even as light duty transportation shifts to alternative power sources.
UPTON, NY—Scientists seeking to understand the intricacies of high-temperature superconductivity—the ability of certain materials to carry electrical current with no energy loss—have been particularly puzzled by a mysterious phase that emerges as charge carriers are added that appears to compete with superconductivity. It's also been a mystery why, within this "pseudogap" phase, the movement of superconducting electrons appears to be restricted to certain directions. So exploring the pseudogap and whether and how it affects the movement of electrons has been a pivotal challenge.
May 8, 2014 - If you are sending Mother's Day flowers to your mom this weekend, chances are you opted for guaranteed delivery: the promise that they will arrive by a certain time. Should the flowers not arrive in time, you will likely feel betrayed by the sender for breaking their promise. But if they arrive earlier, you likely will be no happier than if they arrive on time, according to new research. The new work suggests that we place such a high premium on keeping a promise that exceeding it confers little or no additional benefit.
Microscopes don't exactly lie, but their limitations affect the truths they can tell. For example, scanning electron microscopes (SEMs) simply can't see materials that don't conduct electricity very well, and their high energies can actually damage some types of samples.
In an effort to extract a little more truth from the world of nanomaterials and nanostructures, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have built the first low-energy focused ion beam (FIB) microscope that uses a lithium ion source.*
Researchers from Italy confirm that urinary ethyl glucuronide (uEtG) accurately detects alcohol consumption in liver transplant candidates and recipients.
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — A research team using tunable luminescent nanocrystals as tags to advance medical and security imaging have successfully applied them to high-speed scanning technology and detected multiple viruses within minutes.
The research, led by Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia and Purdue University, builds on the team's earlier success in developing a way to control the length of time light from a luminescent nanocrystal lingers, which introduced the dimension of time in addition to color and brightness in optical detection technology.
Reducing air pollution in New York City would result in substantial economic gains for children as a result of increasing their IQs. The study is the first to estimate the costs of IQ loss associated with exposure to air pollution, and is based on prior research on prenatal exposure to air pollutants among low-income children by Frederica Perera, PhD, lead author of the current study, and colleagues at the Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health at the Mailman School of Public Health.
Amsterdam, 8 May 2014. Despite fears over cost, the wide-scale screening of young people to detect risk of sudden cardiac death (SCD) is feasible and cost effective, according to a study presented at EuroPRevent 2014.(1) More than 12,000 people aged between 14 and 35 were screened at a cost of £35 (40 euro) each; rates of subsequent referral for further investigation were low and considered of "a relative low additional cost" to health services.
Human mortality and survival may have improved in the generations following the Black Death, according to results published May 7, 2014, in the open access journal PLOS ONE by Sharon DeWitte from University of South Carolina.
For years, scientists have had an itch they couldn't scratch. Even with the best microscopes and spectrometers, it's been difficult to study and identify molecules at the so-called mesoscale, a region of matter that ranges from 10 to 1000 nanometers in size. Now, with the help of broadband infrared light from the Advanced Light Source (ALS) synchrotron at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), researchers have developed a broadband imaging technique that looks inside this realm with unprecedented sensitivity and range.
When you get sick, your physician may take a sample of your blood, send it to the lab and wait for results. In the near future, however, doctors may be able to run those tests almost instantly on a piece of plastic about the size of credit card.
Leesburg, VA, May 5, 2014—Dose-tracking software provides effective and easy monitoring of radiation dose exposure in a busy academic practice, according to research conducted at Massachusetts General Hospital.
For commonly ordered abdominal CT exams, iterative reconstruction techniques enabled approximately 50 percent radiation dose reduction compared to the national averages reported in the Dose Index Registry*.
BUFFALO, N.Y. — Companies should use existing brand names and add new, sub-brand names to maximize revenue when introducing new products to market, according to a new study from the University at Buffalo School of Management.
Forthcoming in Management Science, the study notes a proliferation of new products in the consumer packaged-goods market each year. For example, U.S. manufacturers introduced more than 150,000 new products in 2010 alone. Of these, more than 90 percent were extensions of existing brand-name products.
Physicists are now designing novel materials with physical properties tailored to meet specific energy consumption needs. Before these so-called materials-by-design can be applied, it is essential to understand their characteristics, such as heat flow. Now, a team of Italian physicists has developed a predictive theoretical model for heat flux in these materials, using atom-scale calculations. The research, carried out by Claudio Melis and colleagues from the University of Cagliary, Italy, is published in EPJ B.