PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

December 2012 Story Tips

2012-12-07
(Press-News.org) DISASTER RESPONSE – Limiting access . . .

Ensuring that only people who have legitimate business are allowed to enter areas hit by floods, hurricanes or other disasters is a big challenge, but Credentialing 2.0 offers a software solution. "Obviously, first responders, utility crews, tree cutters, disaster relief workers and members of the media have reasons to be on the scene, but there's no efficient way to control access," said Oak Ridge National Laboratory's David Resseguie, who leads the Credentialing 2.0 development team. The ORNL system helps officials to control access through the use of virtual credentials that do not require new or additional equipment, networks, materials or infrastructure. [Contact: Ron Walli, (865) 576-0226; wallira@ornl.gov]

ENERGY – New MAXLAB facility complete . . .

Residential and commercial buildings of tomorrow could use less energy because of research that will be performed at the new $16 million Maximum Building Energy Efficiency Research Laboratory at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The 18,000-square-foot facility features a high bay area for building and studying large-scale wall assemblies and a low bay area that houses a heating, ventilation and air conditioning lab. Together, the bays will be used to advance the energy efficiency and durability of building envelopes, equipment and appliances. Both bays are flexible in operation and able to support many types of experiments that will be performed by ORNL researchers and industry partners. [Contact: Ron Walli, (865) 576-0226; wallira@ornl.gov]

MEDICAL — Results in seconds . . .

Detecting parasites in biological or medical samples has never been faster than when using a dime-sized microchip developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Purdue University. For years, chips have been able to produce test results that are typically gathered from full-scale laboratories, but now they can produce them in three to four seconds. Using a technique called rapid electrokinetic patterning that relies on light and electromagnetic fields, researchers can detect low concentrations of parasites instantly because they group together in a stimulated region of the chip. This increases the chip's performance and efficiency, allowing the device to conduct biological and applied medical and bio-detection studies at unprecedented rates. A paper describing this work has been published in the Journal Lab on a Chip at http://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlepdf/2012/lc/c2lc40662d. [Written by Jennifer Brouner, (865) 241-9515; brounerjm@ornl.gov; contact: Ron Walli, (865) 576-0226; wallira@ornl.gov]

SUPERCOMPUTING – Research time on Titan …

Oak Ridge National Laboratory is home to Titan, a supercomputer ranked No. 1 in speed and No. 3 in energy efficiency in the most recent global Top500 list. Titan's true importance, however, is accelerating scientific discoveries and engineering innovations, largely through the Innovative and Novel Computational Impact on Theory and Experiment program. For 2013, INCITE awarded 1.84 billion core hours on Titan to dozens of researchers in industry, academia, and government using simulations to solve grand challenges. ORNL researchers awarded time on Titan include Tom Evans (nuclear fuel behavior), Markus Eisenbach (magnetic properties of nanoscale materials), Tony Mezzacappa (core-collapse supernovas), Jeremy Smith (multicomponent biomass systems), and Paul Kent (energy materials). The average award on Titan was 58 million core hours. [Contact: Dawn Levy, (865) 576-6448; levyd@ornl.gov]

IMAGING – Marker-less motion correction . . .

Medical scans of children and people with Parkinson's or Alzheimer's disease could have greater clarity because of a technology developed by researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The add-on device features motion correction without physical markers to track movements that are unavoidable with some patients, said ORNL's Jim Goddard, founder of start-up Innovative Vision Solutions, which hopes to bring the instrument to market in about one year. Hospitals and research facilities that use Positron Emission Tomography and Magnetic Resonance Imaging should find this device especially useful, according to Goddard and co-developer Shaun Gleason, who are working with Johns Hopkins University, Vanderbilt University, the University of Tennessee and the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. [Contact: Ron Walli, (865) 576-0226; wallira@ornl.gov]

### END


ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Combining two genome analysis approaches supports immune system contribution to autism

2012-12-07
Researchers using novel approaches and methodologies of identifying genes that contribute to the development of autism have found evidence that disturbances in several immune-system-related pathways contribute to development of autism spectrum disorders. The report published December 4 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE powerfully supports a role for the immune function in autism by integrating analysis of autism-associated DNA sequence variations with that of markers identified in studies of families affected by autism. "Others have talked about immune function contributions ...

Tiny structure gives big boost to solar power

Tiny structure gives big boost to solar power
2012-12-07
Princeton researchers have found a simple and economic way to nearly triple the efficiency of organic solar cells, the cheap and flexible plastic devices that many scientists believe could be the future of solar power. The researchers, led by electrical engineer Stephen Chou, were able to increase the efficiency 175 percent by using a nanostructured "sandwich" of metal and plastic that collects and traps light. Chou said the technology also should increase the efficiency of conventional inorganic solar collectors, such as standard silicon solar panels, although he cautioned ...

Valuable tool for predicting pain genes in people

2012-12-07
Scientists in Australia and Austria have described a "network map" of genes involved in pain perception, with remarkable similarity from fruit flies to people. The work should help identify new analgesic drugs. Dr Greg Neely from the Garvan institute of Medical Research in Sydney and Professor Josef Penninger from the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna had previously screened the 14,000 genes in the fly genome and identified 580 genes identified with heat perception. In the current study, using a database from the US National Centre for Biotechnology Information, ...

Severe acute kidney injuries rise rapidly nationwide

Severe acute kidney injuries rise rapidly nationwide
2012-12-07
Severe acute kidney injuries are becoming more common in the United States, rising 10 percent per year and doubling over the last decade, according to a retrospective study at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). The study, to be published online this week in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, analyzed information from a national database that monitors all causes of hospitalizations and used this data to estimate the total number of acute kidney injuries in the United States that were severe enough to require a patient to be placed on dialysis. ...

Fasting may benefit patients with epilepsy, Johns Hopkins Children's Center study suggests

2012-12-07
Children with persistent and drug-resistant seizures treated with the high-fat, low-carbohydrate ketogenic diet may get an added therapeutic benefit from periodic fasting, according to a small Johns Hopkins Children's Center study. The results, published online Dec. 3 in the journal Epilepsy Research, suggest the ketogenic diet and fasting can work in tandem to reduce seizures but appear do so through different mechanisms -- a finding that challenges the longstanding assumption that the two share a common mechanism. "Our findings suggest that fasting does not merely ...

Paradox of aging: The older we get, the better we feel?

2012-12-07
Presently, there are about 40 million Americans over the age of 65, with the fastest-growing segment of the population over 80 years old. Traditionally, aging has been viewed as a period of progressive decline in physical, cognitive and psychosocial functioning, and aging is viewed by many as the "number one public health problem" facing Americans today. But this negative view of aging contrasts with results of a comprehensive study of 1,006 older adults in San Diego by researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Stanford University. ...

New IDSA guidelines aim to reduce death, disability, and cost of prosthetic joint infections

2012-12-07
[EMBARGOED FOR DEC. 7, 2012, ARLINGTON, Va.] – Of the one million people each year who get hips and knees replaced, as many as 20,000 will get an infection in the new joint, a number that is expected to skyrocket in the next 20 years. Multispecialty physician teams need to work together to reduce disability, death and costs associated with the ever-growing number of these prosthetic joint infections, note the first guidelines on the topic being released by the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA). "There are very few things that improve quality of life as much ...

Antibiotic-eating bug unearthed in soil

2012-12-07
It's well known how bacteria exposed to antibiotics for long periods will find ways to resist the drugs—by quickly pumping them out of their cells, for instance, or modifying the compounds so they're no longer toxic. Now new research has uncovered another possible mechanism of antibiotic "resistance" in soil. In a paper published on Dec. 6 in the Journal of Environmental Quality, a group of Canadian and French scientists report on a soil bacterium that breaks down the common veterinary antibiotic, sulfamethazine, and uses it for growth. Certain soil bacteria are already ...

Nicaragua Participates in the 2012 Outsource to LAC

2012-12-07
Nicaragua is currently participating in the Latin American and the Caribbean (LAC) Offshoring and Outsourcing Summit, held in Medellin Colombia from December 4th to the 6th, whose objective is to promote the development of the outsourcing and offshoring industry in the region and establish key contacts between international companies interested in seeking new outsourcing destinations. The Nicaraguan delegation participating in the summit includes representatives from PRONicaragua, the official investment and export promotion agency of the Government of Nicaragua, and ...

EcigaretteReviewed.com Stands up to Misinformation Surrounding Electronic Cigarettes

EcigaretteReviewed.com Stands up to Misinformation Surrounding Electronic Cigarettes
2012-12-07
The trusted electronic cigarette review website EcigaretteReviewed.com has hit back against false and misleading claims surrounding electronic cigarettes. News reports from around the world have spurred on the uncertainty surrounding the new nicotine-vaporizing devices, but a glut of scientific research has shown that there is very little to worry about with regards to their safety. It's been claimed that the presence of nitrosamines and diethylene glycol in e-cigarettes renders them a potential health hazard, but the website rallies against these claims, ultimately placing ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Thirty-year mystery of dissonance in the “ringing” of black holes explained

Less intensive works best for agricultural soil

Arctic rivers project receives “national champion” designation from frontiers foundation

Computational biology paves the way for new ALS tests

Study offers new hope for babies born with opioid withdrawal syndrome

UT, Volkswagen Group of America celebrate research partnership

New Medicare program could dramatically improve affordability for cancer drugs – if patients enroll

Are ‘zombie’ skin cells harmful or helpful? The answer may be in their shapes

University of Cincinnati Cancer Center presents research at AACR 2025

Head and neck, breast, lung and survivorship studies headline Dana-Farber research at AACR Annual Meeting 2025

AACR: Researchers share promising results from MD Anderson clinical trials

New research explains why our waistlines expand in middle age

Advancements in muon detection: Taishan Antineutrino Observatory's innovative top veto tracker

Chips off the old block

Microvascular decompression combined with nerve combing for atypical trigeminal neuralgia

Cutting the complexity from digital carpentry

Lung immune cell type “quietly” controls inflammation in COVID-19

Fiscal impact of expanded Medicare coverage for GLP-1 receptor agonists to treat obesity

State and sociodemographic trends in US cigarette smoking with future projections

Young adults drive historic decline in smoking

NFCR congratulates Dr. Robert C. Bast, Jr. on receiving the AACR-Daniel D. Von Hoff Award for Outstanding Contributions to Education and Training in Cancer Research

Chimpanzee stem cells offer new insights into early embryonic development

This injected protein-like polymer helps tissues heal after a heart attack

FlexTech inaugural issue launches, pioneering interdisciplinary innovation in flexible technology

In Down syndrome mice, 40Hz light and sound improve cognition, neurogenesis, connectivity

Methyl eugenol: potential to inhibit oxidative stress, address related diseases, and its toxicological effects

A vascularized multilayer chip reveals shear stress-induced angiogenesis in diverse fluid conditions

AI helps unravel a cause of Alzheimer's disease and identify a therapeutic candidate

Coalition of Autism Scientists critiques US Department of Health and Human Services Autism Research Initiative

Structure dictates effectiveness, safety in nanomedicine

[Press-News.org] December 2012 Story Tips