In cooperation with a Swiss research team, geographers of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich have developed a novel measuring system relying on two different physical methods that promises to enhance forecasting of avalanches and spring floods. The method combines GPS and radar to measure snow properties also on the slopes. Accurate forecasting of avalanches, and the risk of flooding in Alpine catchment areas during the spring thaw, primarily requires time-resolved data on snow volumes and the levels of liquid water in the snow cover. A research group led ...

Researchers from North Carolina State University and China's Suzhou Institute of Nano-Science and Nano-Biotics have developed an inexpensive technique called "microcombing" to align carbon nanotubes (CNTs), which can be used to create large, pure CNT films that are stronger than any previous such films. The technique also improves the electrical conductivity that makes these films attractive for use in electronic and aerospace applications. "It's a simple process and can create a lightweight CNT film, or 'bucky paper,' that is a meter wide and twice as strong as previous ...

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative condition that strikes at the heart of what makes us human: the ability to think, to feel, to remember and to communicate with those around us. The tragedy is compounded by the fact that there is currently no cure, no treatment, and no diagnostic method capable of identifying Alzheimer's at its early stages. A ground-breaking study has now, for the first time anywhere, characterized early-stage changes that occur inside individual, Alzheimer's-affected cells in the intact brain. Remarkably, the study indicates that even ...

How many websites have you clicked on recently that haven't converted their format to mobile, frustrating your efforts to get the information you need in an effective and timely way? Now researchers from Northwestern University have unearthed some provocative facts on how consumers utilize their mobile devices to buy groceries. With the global market for smartphones predicted to reach two billion by 2016, their findings should convince retailers planning marketing strategies and advertising campaigns that they need to pay attention to mobile. In "On the Go: How Mobile ...

PITTSBURGH (May 5, 2015) ... For decades, robots have advanced the efficiency of human activity. Typically, however, robots are formed from bulky, stiff materials and require connections to external power sources; these features limit their dexterity and mobility. But what if a new material would allow for development of a "soft robot" that could reconfigure its own shape and move using its own internally generated power? By developing a new computational model, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh's Swanson School of Engineering have designed a synthetic polymer ...

Treating gum disease reduced symptoms of prostate inflammation, called prostatitis, report researchers from Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine and the Departments of Urology and Pathology at University Hospitals Case Medical Center. Previous studies have found a link between gum disease and prostatitis, a disease that inflames the gland that produces semen. Inflammation can make urination difficult. "This study shows that if we treat the gum disease, it can improve the symptoms of prostatitis and the quality of life for those who have the disease," ...

Although the use of cannabis as a medical drug is currently booming (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2012; 109: 495-501), we should not forget that leisure time consumption--for example, smoking weed--can cause acute and chronic harms. These include panic attacks, impaired coordination of movement, and nausea, as Eva Hoch and colleagues show in a topical review article in Deutsches Ärzteblatt International (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2015; 112: 271-8). The symptoms depend on a patient's age, the amount of the drug consumed, and the frequency of drug use. It also matters in which form the ...

(Winston-Salem, N.C. - May 5, 2015) - Researchers from Wake Forest University and the University of Utah are the first to successfully fabricate halide organic-inorganic hybrid perovskite field-effect transistors and measure their electrical characteristics at room temperature. "We designed the structure of these field-effect transistors that allowed us to achieve electrostatic gating of these materials and determine directly their electrical properties," said lead author, Oana Jurchescu, an assistant professor of physics at Wake Forest. "Then we fabricated these transistors ...

This news release is available in German. With the first detailed observations of a lava lake on a moon of Jupiter, the Large Binocular Telescope Observatory in Arizona places itself as the forerunner of the next generation of Extremely Large Telescopes. The applied high-resolution imaging methods were developed by an international research team including scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Bonn and the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg. Io, the innermost of the four moons of Jupiter discovered by Galileo in January ...

This news release is available in German. Overturning cars, flying missiles, and airplanes speeding across the screen -- on modern computers, 3D objects can be calculated in a flash. However, many surfaces still look unnatural. Whether it is skin, stone or wax -- on the computer screen, all materials look alike, as if the objects had all been cut out of the same kind of opaque material. This is about to change: TU Wien (Vienna), the University of Zaragoza and the video game company Activision-Blizzard have developed a new mathematical method which makes surfaces appear ...

Our view of what makes us happy has changed markedly since 1938. That is the conclusion of the psychologist Sandie McHugh from the Univeristy of Bolton who has recreated a famous study of happiness conducted in Bolton in 1938. She will present her study today, Tuesday 5 May 2015, to the Annual Conference of the British Psychological Society in Liverpool. In 1938 Mass Observation placed an advertisement in the the Bolton Evening News asking readers to answer the question 'What is happiness?'. A total of 226 people sent letters in reply, and they were asked to help compile ...

Ribosomes are vital to the function of all living cells. Using the genetic information from RNA, these large molecular complexes build proteins by linking amino acids together in a specific order. Scientists have known for more than half a century that these cellular machines are themselves made up of about 80 different proteins, called ribosomal proteins, along with several RNA molecules and that these components are added in a particular sequence to construct new ribosomes, but no one has known the mechanism that controls that process. Now researchers from Caltech and ...

AUSTIN, Texas -- Researchers in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin have developed a centimeter-accurate GPS-based positioning system that could revolutionize geolocation on virtual reality headsets, cellphones and other technologies, making global positioning and orientation far more precise than what is currently available on a mobile device. The researchers' new system could allow unmanned aerial vehicles to deliver packages to a specific spot on a consumer's back porch, enable collision avoidance technologies on cars and allow virtual ...

SAN DIEGO, Calif. (May 5, 2015)-- Acceptance of premarital sex is at an all-time high along with an acceptance of homosexuality, find researchers led by Jean M. Twenge from San Diego State University. The researchers -- also including Ryne Sherman from Florida Atlantic University and Brooke E. Wells from Hunter College -- analyzed data from the General Social Survey, a nationally representative survey of more than 33,000 U.S. adults taken between 1972 and 2012. They found substantial generational shifts in attitudes toward non-marital sex and number of sexual partners. ...

Using proteomics techniques to study injured optic nerves, researchers at Boston Children's Hospital have identified previously unrecognized proteins and pathways involved in nerve regeneration. Adding back one of these proteins--the oncogene c-myc--they achieved unprecedented optic nerve regeneration in mice when combined with two other known strategies. The findings were published online April 30 by the journal Neuron. Researchers have been trying for many decades to get injured nerves in the brain and spinal cord to regenerate. Various molecules have been targeted ...

"Imagine a tiny spotlight like those used in theatres but with a light ray measuring only a few nanometres, which shines light on a given spot but leaves everything else in the dark," explains Monica Mazzolini, SISSA research scientist, "That's how the optic fibres we used in our experiment work". Mazzolini, first author of a paper just published in PNAS, literally shut herself in a "darkroom" lit with infrared light only to stimulate rods, the light-sensitive cells of the retina (for night vision), with these extremely focused light beams in vitro. In their study, Mazzolini ...

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. (May 5, 2015) - While it may be a stereotype, it's also true that women seek medical care more frequently than men do. And a recent study shows that women with acute asthma who are treated in the emergency department (ED) are 60 percent more likely than men treated in the ED to need hospitalization. The study, published in the Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, the scientific publication of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI), looked at the sex differences in patient characteristics, and risk of hospitalizations ...

DALLAS, May 4, 2015 -- More bystanders performing CPR contributed to more cardiac arrest survivors returning to work in a Danish study published in the American Heart Association journal Circulation. In the largest study to date to examine return to work after cardiac arrest, researchers studied 4,354 patients in Denmark who were employed before they suffered out-of-hospital cardiac arrests between 2001 to 2011. Researchers found: More than 75 percent of survivors who had a cardiac arrest outside a hospital were capable of returning to work. Chances of returning ...

Many of us take a healthy immune system for granted. But for certain infants with rare, inherited mutations of certain genes, severe infection and death are stark consequences of their impaired immune responses. Now, researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center have identified an important role for calcium signaling in immune responses to chronic infection resulting from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium causing tuberculosis (TB). Specifically, they determined that the immune systems in genetically altered mice lacking the critically important calcium channel ...

Uninsured people don't have any more difficulty getting appointments with primary care doctors than those with insurance, but they get them at prices that are likely unaffordable to a typical uninsured person, according to new Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health-led research. And payment options are not very flexible, with only one in five people told they could be seen without paying the whole cost up front, suggests the new study published in the May issue of the journal Health Affairs. "There's a discouragement factor for uninsured people when it comes ...

A new screening method can detect twice as many women with ovarian cancer as conventional strategies, according to the latest results from the largest trial of its kind led by UCL. The method uses a statistical calculation to interpret changing levels in women's blood of a protein called CA125, which is linked to ovarian cancer. This gives a more accurate prediction of a woman's individual risk of developing cancer, compared to the conventional screening method which uses a fixed 'cut-off' point for CA125. The new method detected cancer in 86% of women with invasive epithelial ...

ATLANTA -- May 4, 2015 -- While black and white men under age 65 diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer received similar treatment, blacks had a 76% higher risk of death than whites, according to a new study. The study, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, found that the disparity was significantly reduced after accounting for differences in insurance and income. Male breast cancer is a rare disease, accounting for less than 1% of all cancers in men and approximately 2% of all breast cancers in the United States. Black men have a higher incidence of breast ...

Oxidative stress has been long known to fuel disease, but how exactly it damages various organs has been challenging to sort out. Now scientists from Johns Hopkins say research in mice reveals why oxidation comes to be so corrosive to heart muscle. A report on the results, published online May 4 in The Journal of Clinical Investigation, shows that oxidation inside the cardiac cells precipitates heart failure by disrupting the work of a heart-shielding protein called PKG, known to act as a natural "brake" against biological stressors like chronically elevated blood pressure, ...

Over the last ten years, public health campaigns in New York City around smoking, obesity, and HIV underwent a dramatic shift to use fear and disgust to spur behavior change, sometimes with the unintended consequence of stigmatizing affected populations. In a new article published in the May issue of the journal Health Affairs, scholars at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health explore the implications of this shift to fear-based campaigns in the present public health environment. Beginning in 2005, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. -- According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Alzheimer's disease (AD) may affect as many as 5.5 million Americans. Scientists currently are seeking treatments and therapies found in common foods that will help stave off the disease or prevent it completely. Now, University of Missouri researchers have determined that a compound found in green tea, and voluntary exercise, slows the progression of the disease in mice and may reverse its effects. Further study of the commonly found extract could lead to advancements in the treatment and prevention ...