Tech
There are an estimated 90 fatalities a year in the UK caused by drivers pulling out into the path of an oncoming motorcycle. New research by psychologists at the University of Nottingham suggests this sort of crash may often be the result of a short-term memory failure rather than the driver not seeing an approaching motorcycle.
BOSTON (September 23, 2019) --At a time when the rapid growth in electronic cigarette "vaping" among young people threatens to reverse decades of progress in reducing tobacco use, a large study published today in JAMA Pediatrics finds that medical professionals are largely failing to use existing tools to help young people quit smoking.
Berkeley -- From habitat loss to climate change, amphibians around the world face immense threats to their survival. One emerging and sinister threat is the chytrid fungus, a mysterious pathogen that kills amphibians by disrupting the delicate moisture balance maintained by their skin, and that is decimating frog populations around the world.
Scientists at UCL have developed a method to reactivate 'tumour suppressor' genes, which are switched off by cancer cells - a finding which could lead to new targeted biotherapies for cancer.
In the study, published in Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, researchers at UCL Cancer Institute and the Cancer Research UK UCL Centre aimed to identify ways to block the function of a regulatory protein called PRC2 (Polycomb repressive complex 2).
Of the various different functions that proteins perform in a cell, a crucial one is the recognition and transmission of certain "signals," collectively referred to as signal transduction. Receptors (proteins) on the cell surface recognize certain molecules and then initiate a chain of biochemical events inside the cell. These biochemical events are responsible for cellular activities such as multiplication, survival, etc. Needless to say, any perturbation of this "biochemical signaling" can be extremely detrimental to the cell, even leading to cancer in some cases.
A scientist has discovered a way of using one of the world's most abundant natural resources as a replacement for manmade chemicals in soaps and thousands of other household products.
An innovative research project, published this month and led by the University of Portsmouth, has demonstrated that bails of rice straw could create a 'biosurfacant', providing an alternative non-toxic ingredient in the production of a vast variety of products that normally include synthetic materials which are often petroleum based.
KFU's In-Situ Combustion Lab has been in charge of the project since 2016. Senior Research Associate Irek Mukhamatdinov is the project head. The team also includes Lab Head Alexey Vakhin and Junior Research Associate Firdavs Aliev. A number of publications, including a master thesis ("Study of the rheological and wetting properties of polymer solutions based on polyacrylamides" by Anabel Sosa Acosta), have appeared since then.
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- An international team of scientists has figured out how to capture heat and turn it into electricity.
The discovery, published last week in the journal Science Advances, could create more efficient energy generation from heat in things like car exhaust, interplanetary space probes and industrial processes.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] -- A new study finds that kids who specialize in a chosen sport tend to engage in higher levels of vigorous exercise than their peers and may be more likely to sustain injuries, such as stress fractures, tendinitis and ACL tears.
Diversity - at least among cancer cells - is not a good thing. Weizmann Institute of Science research shows that in melanoma, tumors with cells that have differentiated into more diverse subtypes are less likely to be affected by the immune system, thus reducing the chance that immunotherapy will be effective. The findings of this research, which were published today in Cell, may provide better tools for designing personalized protocols for cancer patients, as well as pointing toward new avenues of research into anti-cancer vaccines.
PITTSBURGH (Sept. 23, 2019) -- From soda bottles to polyester clothing, ethylene is part of many products we use every day. In part to meet demand, the Shell Oil Company is building an ethane cracker plant in Beaver County, Pa., specifically to produce ethylene molecules from the abundant ethane found in natural gas. However, the chemical reaction used to convert ethane into valuable ethylene is incomplete, so such plants produce an impure mixture of ethylene and ethane.
Cambridge engineers have developed a new augmented reality (AR) head-mounted display (HMD) that delivers a realistic 3D viewing experience, without the commonly associated side effects of nausea or eyestrain.
The device has an enlarged eye-box that is scalable and an increased field of view of 36º that is designed for a comfortable viewing experience. It displays images on the retina using pixel beam scanning which ensures the image stays in focus regardless of the distance that the user is fixating on. Details are reported in the journal Research.
Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have discovered that the spreading of seizures through the brain can be suppressed depending on the amount of pressure within the brain, an important discovery that may revolutionize the treatment of drug-resistant epilepsy.
BUFFALO, N.Y. -- New research on two-dimensional tungsten disulfide (WS2) could open the door to advances in quantum computing.
In a paper published Sept. 13 in Nature Communications, scientists report that they can manipulate the electronic properties of this super-thin material in ways that could be useful for encoding quantum data.
The study deals with WS2's energy valleys, which University at Buffalo physicist Hao Zeng, co-lead author of the paper, describes as "the local energy extrema of the electronic structure in a crystalline solid."
In a group of animals, who deals with new information coming from the environment? Researchers have discovered that the answer lies not in who, but in where: information can be processed, not only by individual animals, but also in the invisible connections between them. In a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, an international team of scientists provides evidence of information processing occurring in the physical structure of animal groups.