Athens, Ga. – New research just published in the journal Science by a team of chemists at the University of Georgia and colleagues in Germany shows for the first time that a mechanism called tunneling control may drive chemical reactions in directions unexpected from traditional theories. The finding has the potential to change how scientists understand and devise reactions in everything from materials science to biochemistry. The discovery was a complete surprise and came following the first successful isolation of a long-elusive molecule called methylhydroxycarbene ...

The scandals involving Bernie Madoff, Tom Petters and others have inspired action from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) -- an independent regulatory body of securities firms in the United States. As a reaction to the high-profile scandals, FINRA proposed a rule in May 2010 that would increase the amount of oversight in the securities industry. The proposed rule, which FINRA recently submitted to the Securities and Exchange Committee (SEC), would extend oversight to so-called "back-office" personnel, or operations professionals. Traditionally, ...

The research focused on the role of stomata, microscopic pores in the surface of leaves that allow carbon dioxide gas to be taken up for use in photosynthesis, while at the same time allowing water to escape. Instead of being fixed pores in the leaf, rather like a sieve, the stomata of modern plants are more like valves that open and close on demand. They do this in response to environmental and chemical signals, such as light and carbon dioxide, therefore balancing the photosynthetic and water requirements of the plant. Therefore, a key evolutionary question is: when ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---Banning federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research would have "disastrous consequences" on the study of a promising and increasingly popular new stem cell type that is not derived from human embryos, according to a University of Michigan researcher and his colleagues. Human induced pluripotent stem cells, known as iPS cells, are reprogrammed adult cells that display many of the most scientifically valuable properties of embryonic stem cells while enabling researchers to bypass embryos altogether. Scientists hope to harness the power of both ...

High chairs and baby seats can are a great help to busy parents, providing a safe way for them to feed their children. The chairs keep children at table-level, allowing them to eat and interact while safely restrained in their seats. However, highchairs, like many baby products, are frequently recalled due to defects and general safety hazards. Parents should regularly check the recall status of their frequently used baby products in order to better ensure their children's safety. Those who own the "metoo" clip on chair by phil&teds, may be troubled ...

PHILADELPHIA -- Two University of Pennsylvania engineers have proposed the possibility of two-dimensional metamaterials. These one-atom- thick metamaterials could be achieved by controlling the conductivity of sheets of graphene, which is a single layer of carbon atoms. Professor Nader Engheta and graduate student Ashkan Vakil, both of the Department of Electrical and Systems Engineering in Penn's School of Engineering and Applied Science, published their theoretical research in the journal Science. The study of metamaterials is an interdisciplinary field of science ...

(Edmonton) Detailed analysis of the most pristine meteorite ever recovered shows that the composition of the organic compounds it carried changed during the early years of the solar system. Those changed organics were preserved through billions of years in outer space before the meteorite crashed to Earth. The research team, led by University of Alberta geologist Chris Herd, analyzed samples of a meteorite that landed on Tagish Lake in northern British Columbia in 2000. Variations in the geology of the meteorite samples were visible to the naked eye and indicated the asteroid, ...

High-quality early education has a strong, positive impact well into adulthood, according to research led by Arthur Reynolds, co-director of the Human Capital Research Collaborative and professor of child development, and Judy Temple, a professor in the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. The study is the longest follow-up ever of an established large-scale early childhood program. In "School-based Early Childhood Education and Age 28 Well-Being: Effects by Timing, Dosage, and Subgroups," published today in the journal Science, Reynolds and ...

Texting while driving is a dangerous habit--just as dangerous as drunk driving--and often has similar consequences. Fortunately, some state laws have finally caught up with the dangers of cell phone use while driving, with eight states banning all use of cell phones while driving, and 30 states banning texting while driving. The State of New York bans handheld cell phone use while driving, including texting. The Department of Motor Vehicles imposes a $100 fine for using a cell phone while driving, as well as a two-point penalty on the offender's driver's license. It ...

Many amateur athletes have long suspected what research scientists for the Department of Preventative and Rehabilitative Sports Medicine of the Technische Universitaet Muenchen at Klinikum rechts der Isar have now made official: Documented proof, gathered during the world's largest study of marathons, "Be-MaGIC" (beer, marathons, genetics, inflammation and the cardiovascular system), that the consumption of non-alcoholic weissbier, or wheat beer, has a positive effect on athletes' health. Under the direction of Dr. Johannes Scherr, physicians examined 277 test subjects ...

Scientists at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) in Germany have built what is currently the strongest source of ultracold neutrons. Ultracold neutrons (UCNs) were first generated here five years ago. They are much slower than thermal neutrons and are characterized by the fact that they can be stored in special containers. This property makes them important tools for experiments to investigate why matter dominates over antimatter in our universe and how the lightest elements were created directly after the Big Bang. "We have commissioned a new UCN source and improved ...

The U. S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) finally released the SaferProducts.gov database mandated by Congress, as part of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. Consumers can submit and read reports of harm or risks of harm, and to search for information on products they own or may be considering buying. The CPSC plans to use reports from consumers to help identify product hazards more quickly. "CPSC stayed on time and on budget in building this new database," said Chairman Inez Tenenbaum. "Through SaferProducts.gov, consumers will ...

This release is available in German. Because Kapton® film is over 100 times thinner and 200 times lighter than glass typically used for PV, there are inherent advantages in transitioning to flexible, film-based vs. rigid glass CdTe systems. High-speed and low-cost roll-to-roll deposition technologies can be applied for high-throughput manufacturing of flexible solar cells on polymer film as substrates. The new polyimide film potentially enables significantly thinner and lighter-weight flexible modules that are easier to handle and less expensive to install, making them ...

Researchers funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)-led Integrated Biorefining Research and Technology (IBTI) Club have identified an enzyme in bacteria which could be used to make biofuel production more efficient. The research is published in the 14 June Issue of the American Chemical Society journal Biochemistry. This research, carried out by teams at the Universities of Warwick and British Columbia, could make sustainable sources of biofuels, such as woody plants and the inedible parts of crops, more economically viable. The ...

Can dogs read our minds? How do they learn to beg for food or behave badly primarily when we're not looking? According to Monique Udell and her team, from the University of Florida in the US, the way that dogs come to respond to the level of people's attentiveness tells us something about the ways dogs think and learn about human behavior. Their research1, published online in Springer's journal Learning & Behavior, suggests it is down to a combination of specific cues, context and previous experience. Recent work has identified a remarkable range of human-like social ...

A team from the University of Sheffield's School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR) has developed a new index to measure hospital mortality rates that has been accepted for use by the Department of Health. Led by Professor Michael Campbell, the team, including Drs Richard Jacques and James Fotheringham, were commissioned in January 2011 by the Department of Health to develop and test a new index to look at deaths following a hospital admission. In the past this has mainly been done by a company called Dr Foster, which produced the Hospital Standardised Mortality ...

A research breakthrough has proven that it is possible to reprogram mature cells from human skin directly into brain cells, without passing through the stem cell stage. The unexpectedly simple technique involves activating three genes in the skin cells; genes which are already known to be active in the formation of brain cells at the foetal stage. The new technique avoids many of the ethical dilemmas that stem cell research has faced. For the first time, a research group at Lund University in Sweden has succeeded in creating specific types of nerve cells from human ...

During the financial turmoil of the past several years, no issue has troubled American families more than the possibility of losing their homes. Many have turned to debt relief attorneys for advice about how to stop foreclosure by pursuing a loan modification, short sale or other strategy. One important related issue -- wrongful foreclosures -- received little attention until late last year. Suddenly, cases from around the country began to reveal that employees of lenders and loan servicers were signing legal documents that attested to personal knowledge of a mortgage ...

Bonn 8 June Evidence from benchmark sites across the tropics is proving that an integrated, multifunctional approach that allows for land-use sharing in agriculture, forests and other functions can achieve good results in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and raising food production levels. It provides more realistic solutions than the popular view on sparing land for forests through agricultural intensification. Agricultural intensification, also known as the Borlaug hypothesis, means increasing yields per unit area of land regardless of the emissions caused, expecting ...

Cancers of the gut, stomach and pancreas could be detected much sooner with a simple urine test, research suggests. Researchers at the University of Edinburgh have identified key proteins in the urine of patients with advanced cancers. The findings could help the detection of these cancers in people who have not yet started to show symptoms of the disease. This would enable patients to be diagnosed much earlier, leading to improved survival rates. Only around 10 per cent of patients with these cancers – known as cancers of the upper gastrointestinal tract – are ...

Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a new technique for using multi-core chips more efficiently, significantly enhancing a computer's ability to build computer models of biological systems. The technique improved the efficiency of algorithms used to build models of biological systems more than seven-fold, creating more realistic models that can account for uncertainty and biological variation. This could impact research areas ranging from drug development to the engineering of biofuels. Computer models of biological systems have many uses, from ...

(Baltimore, MD) – In a study published today in the Clinical Neuropsychologist (e-publication ahead of print), researchers from the Kennedy Krieger Institute found differences in the brain development of preschool children with symptoms of Attention-deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Results showed the region of the brain important for cognitive and motor control was smaller in these children than in typically developing children. Novel for its use of neuroimaging in very young, preschool age children with early symptoms of ADHD, this study's examination of brain differences ...

The Kabbalah Centre, a Los-Angeles based, not-for-profit spiritual organization that studies Jewish mysticism, is under investigation for federal tax evasion by the Criminal Investigation Division (CID) of the Internal Revenue Service. The IRS' investigation comes on the heels of a couple lawsuits accusing the Kabbalah Centre of committing financial fraud. The Kabbalah Centre, well-known for its A-list celebrity adherents and supporters, including Madonna, has been led by the Berg family for the past 40 years. A story in the Los Angeles Times noted that, while applying ...

Whether it is a deterioration of civility in the culture of sports, or even a reflection of society at large, in recent years there have been a number of high-profile confrontations between players and fans, and fights between fans. These clashes have resulted in a rash of sports fan injuries. In 2004, Frank Francisco, then a member of the Texas Rangers baseball team, reacted to a disturbance in the Rangers bullpen between a player and a fan by throwing a folding chair into the stands. The chair struck the wife of the Oakland A's fan, breaking her nose. An investigation ...

BOSTON (June 9, 2011) − Mice born to mothers who are fed a diet supplemented with B vitamins are less likely to develop intestinal tumors, report scientists at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging (USDA HNRCA) at Tufts University. Previous research in humans and mice suggests that B vitamins, particularly folate, play a role in the prevention of colorectal cancer. Using a mouse model of naturally occurring colorectal cancer, the USDA HNRCA scientists examined whether a mothers' B vitamin intake impacts her offspring's cancer risk. Mothers ...