Tech
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- From airplane wings to overhead powerlines to the giant blades of wind turbines, a buildup of ice can cause problems ranging from impaired performance all the way to catastrophic failure. But preventing that buildup usually requires energy-intensive heating systems or chemical sprays that are environmentally harmful. Now, MIT researchers have developed a completely passive, solar-powered way of combating ice buildup.
August 31, 2018 - Sitting for too many hours per day, or sitting for long periods without a break, is now known to increase a wide range of health risks, even if one engages in recommended amounts of physical activity.
Asthma patients, with a specific genetic profile, exhibit more intense symptoms following exposure to traffic pollution, according to researchers at the National Institutes of Health and collaborators. The study appeared online in Scientific Reports.
The tropical cyclone known as Jebi has intensified into a super typhoon and NASA's Terra satellite found it was undergoing eyewall replacement. Terra found powerful storms around the 15 nautical-mile wide eye in this Category 5 storm.
Hurricane Miriam continues to track north through the Central Pacific Ocean and NASA's Aqua satellite analyzed the storm infrared imagery.
NASA's Aqua satellite provided valuable infrared temperature data on Category 4 Hurricane Norman that showed its strongest storms were southeast of center.
People who have had a stroke are around twice as likely to develop dementia, according to the largest study of its kind ever conducted.
The University of Exeter Medical School led the study which analysed data on stroke and dementia risk from 3.2 million people across the world. The link between stroke and dementia persisted even after taking into account other dementia risk factors such as blood pressure, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Their findings give the strongest evidence to date that having a stroke significantly increases the risk of dementia.
The conditions for life surviving on planets entirely covered in water are more fluid than previously thought, opening up the possibility that water worlds could be habitable, according to a new paper from the University of Chicago and Pennsylvania State University.
Wheat, maize and rice yields (particularly in northern climates) are projected to fall as insects in temperate regions thrive in a warmer climate, new research shows.
The study, which was published today in the journal Science, models increases in insect populations and their metabolic rates in a warmer world. It projects a 50 to 100 percent increase in pest-induced crop losses in European wheat and 30 to 40 percent increases in North American maize even if countries meet their existing commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Scientists have discovered that some childhood bone cancers start growing years before they are currently diagnosed. Researchers at the Wellcome Sanger Institute and Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), Canada discovered large-scale genetic rearrangements in Ewing Sarcomas and other children's cancers, and showed these can take years to form in bone or soft tissue. This study will help unravel the causes of childhood cancers and raises the possibility of finding ways to diagnose and treat these cancers earlier in the future.
When NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Hurricane Norman on Aug. 30 infrared data showed very cold storm tops around a 20 nautical-mile-wide eye.
NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Norman on Aug. 30 at 5:29 a.m. EDT (0929 UTC). The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder or AIRS instrument analyzed the storm in infrared light which provides temperature information. Temperature is important when trying to understand how strong storms can be. The higher the cloud tops, the colder and the stronger they are.
The breakneck pace of biomedical discovery is outstripping clinicians' ability to incorporate this new knowledge into practice.
Charles Friedman, Ph.D. and his colleagues recently wrote an article in the Journal of General Internal Medicine about a possible way to approach this problem, one that will accelerate the movement of newly-generated evidence about the management of health and disease into practice that improves the health of patients.
In the weeks and months following a major earthquake, the surrounding area is often wracked by powerful aftershocks that can leave an already damaged community reeling and significantly hamper recovery efforts.
While scientists have developed empirical laws, like Bäth's Law and Ohmori's Law, to describe the likely size and timing of those aftershocks, methods for forecasting their location have been harder to grasp.
Bumblebees acquire a taste for pesticide-laced food as they become more exposed to it, a behaviour showing possible symptoms of addiction.
This study of bumblebee behaviour indicates that the risk of pesticide-contaminated food entering bee colonies may be higher than previously thought, which can have impacts on colony reproductive success.
For decades, scientists struggled to explain how scarce resources can sustain the multitude of species that exists on Earth. Early theoretical attempts to understand biodiversity led to a nonsensical situation: theory predicted that the number of species had to be equal to the number of resource types available in the environment, a conclusion that clearly fails the test of reality. The contrast between the theoretical prediction and the experimental observation is so glaring that it has been called paradoxical.