Gold demand remains resilient. Q3 2012 was above the five year quarterly average of 984.7t, according to the World Gold Council's Gold Demand Trends Report. In value terms gold demand was 14.0% lower year on year at $57.6bn and the average gold price of $1,652/oz was down 3% on the record average Q3 2011 price. The key findings from the report are as follows: - Global investment in ETFs over the quarter was up significantly by 56% on the previous year. - The Indian market is showing signs of recovery, up 9% to 223.1t from 204.8t in Q3 2011 following increases in ...

Everyone knows that Firelight Fusion means savings, but the company continues to add deal after deal to their offerings that makes the product and company irresistible to smokers looking to switch from smoking tobacco. On top of their low prices, they now offer free shipping and a free battery program when re-ordering cartridges. They also offer bundles of their electronic cigarette starter kit that are designed to make the smokers life as easy as possible. "We designed bundle kits to help keep startup cost low for smokers looking to switch to the electronic ...

Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered a new mode of action for enzymes immersed in cellular membranes. Their experiments suggest that instead of recognizing and clipping proteins based on sequences of amino acids, these proteases' location within membranes gives them the unique ability to recognize and cut proteins with unstable structures. In a report published online Nov. 13 in the new journal eLife, the Johns Hopkins scientists say their study results are the first to shed light on how these enzymes make use of their native environment to function. The particular ...

Insights from a genetic condition that causes brain cancer are helping scientists better understand the most common type of brain tumor in children. In new research, scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have identified a cell growth pathway that is unusually active in pediatric brain tumors known as gliomas. They previously identified the same growth pathway as a critical contributor to brain tumor formation and growth in neurofibromatosis-1 (NF1), an inherited cancer predisposition syndrome. "This suggests that the tools we've been developing ...

Come rain or shine (or even snow), some glaciers of the Himalayas will continue shrinking for many years to come. The forecast by Brigham Young University geology professor Summer Rupper comes after her research on Bhutan, a region in the bull's-eye of the monsoonal Himalayas. Published in Geophysical Research Letters, Rupper's most conservative findings indicate that even if climate remained steady, almost 10 percent of Bhutan's glaciers would vanish within the next few decades. What's more, the amount of melt water coming off these glaciers could drop by 30 percent. Rupper ...

Maternal vitamin C deficiency during pregnancy can have serious consequences for the foetal brain. And once brain damage has occurred, it cannot be reversed by vitamin C supplements after birth. This is shown through new research at the University of Copenhagen just published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE. Population studies show that between 10-20 per cent of all adults in the developed world suffer from vitamin C deficiency. Therefore, pregnant women should think twice about omitting the daily vitamin pill. "Even marginal vitamin C deficiency in the mother stunts ...

Children who learn how to swim at a young age are reaching many developmental milestones earlier than the norm. Researchers from the Griffith Institute for Educational Research surveyed parents of 7000 under-fives from Australia, New Zealand and the US over three years. A further 180 children aged 3, 4 and 5 years have been involved in intensive testing, making it the world's most comprehensive study into early-years swimming. Lead researcher Professor Robyn Jorgensen says the study shows young children who participate in early-years swimming achieve a wide range ...

For the first time, Bochum clinicians have been able to show on the basis of a large sample, that it is possible to examine children's heads in the MRI scanner without general anaesthesia or other medical sedation. In many cases it was sufficient to prepare the young patients for the examination in an age-appropriate manner in order to take away their fear of the tube. And the results speak for themselves: of the 2461 image sequences recorded with 326 patients, the participating radiologists classified 97 percent as "diagnostically relevant". At the same time, through his ...

The skin is the most versatile of our organs: It protects the body from environmental effects, contributes to the body's immune system and supports metabolic functions such as breathing. The skin is always in action. Lack of movement is anathema to it. If a patient does not move, the ever higher moisture levels, pressure and effects of gravity lead to circulatory disorders. This increases the amount of toxic tissue, resulting in ulcers which can lead to life-threatening complications. This affects two groups of patients in particular: the elderly and paraplegics. There ...

ESA's GOCE gravity satellite has already delivered the most accurate gravity map of Earth, but its orbit is now being lowered in order to obtain even better results. The Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE) has been orbiting Earth since March 2009, reaching its ambitious objective to map our planet's gravity with unrivalled precision. Although the planned mission has been completed, the fuel consumption was much lower than anticipated because of the low solar activity over the last two years. This has enabled ESA to extend GOCE's life, improving ...

Fear of visiting the dentist is a frequent problem in paediatric dentistry. A new study confirms the emotional transmission of dentist fear among family members and analyses the different roles that mothers and fathers might play. A new study conducted by scientists at the Rey Juan Carlos University of Madrid highlights the important role that parents play in the transmission of dentist fear in their family. Previous studies had already identified the association between the fear levels of parents and their children, but they never explored the different roles that ...

A fundamental cornerstone for spintronics that has been missing up until now has been constructed by a team of physicists at Linköping University in Sweden. It's the world's first spin amplifier that can be used at room temperature. Great hopes have been placed on spintronics as the next big paradigm shift in the field of electronics. Spintronics combines microelectronics, which is built on the charge of electrons, with the magnetism that originates in the electrons' spin. This lays the foundation for entirely new applications that fire the imagination. The word "spin" ...

Near surface water has shaped the landscape of Mars. Areas of the planet's northern and southern hemispheres have alternately thawed and frozen in recent geologic history and comprise striking similarities to the landscape of Svalbard. This suggests that water has played a more extensive role than previously envisioned, and that environments capable of sustaining life could exist, according to new research from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Mars is a changing planet, and in recent geological time repeated freeze and thaw cycles has played a greater role than expected ...

Researchers at the University of Copenhagen have found that a protein, known for causing cancer cells to spread around the body, is also one of the molecules that trigger repair processes in the brain. These findings are the subject of a paper, published this week in Nature Communications. They point the way to new avenues of research into degenerative brain diseases like Alzheimer's. How to repair brain injuries is a fundamental question facing brain researchers. Scientists have been familiar with the protein S100A4 for some time as a factor in metastasis, or how cancer ...

Dartmouth plant biologist C. Robertson (Rob) McClung is not your typical clock-watcher. His clocks are internal, biological, and operate in circadian rhythms—cycles based on a 24-hour period. Living organisms depend upon these clocks to keep pace with the Earth's daily rotation and the recurring changes it imposes on the environment. These clocks allow the plant or animal to anticipate the changes and adapt to them by modifying its biology, behavior, and biochemistry. "If you know that the sun is going to go down, and if you are a photosynthetic plant, you have to readjust ...

"You look at the material world and see objects and how you can use them. I look at the material world and see a fascinating hidden life which is within our control, if we can only understand how it works," says Jane Lipson, the Albert W. Smith Professor of Chemistry at Dartmouth. Lipson looks at things from the point of view of both a chemist and a physicist. "What I do lies between the two sciences, and there is some engineering thrown in there, too," she says. Lipson is a polymer chemist who, by definition, deals with long chain molecules composed of repeating structural ...

New Rochelle, NY, November 13, 2012—Following an infection, dysregulation of the immune system can result in a systemic inflammatory response and an often fatal condition called severe sepsis or septic shock. Sepsis is not uncommon, yet its cause and underlying immune dysfunction remain poorly understood. Regulatory T cells (Tregs), a component of the immune system, now appear to have an important role in suppressing the immune response in advance of sepsis, and understanding this role may lead to new therapeutic strategies for improving patient outcomes, as described in ...

BOSTON – Many of the body's processes follow a natural daily rhythm or so-called circadian clock. There are certain times of the day when a person is most alert, when blood pressure is highest, and when the heart is most efficient. Several rare gene mutations have been found that can adjust this clock in humans, responsible for entire families in which people wake up at 3 a.m. or 4 a.m. and cannot stay up much after 8 at night. Now new research has, for the first time, identified a common gene variant that affects virtually the entire population, and which is responsible ...

By tweaking the formula for growing oxide thin films, researchers at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory achieved virtual perfection at the interface of two insulator materials. This finding, published in the journal Advanced Materials, could have significant ramifications for creation of novel materials with applications in energy and information technologies, leading to more efficient solar cells, batteries, solid oxide fuel cells, faster transistors and more powerful capacitors. The research team, led by ORNL's Ho Nyung Lee, demonstrated that ...

An international team, including an expert from the University of Exeter, has found evidence that adolescents who spend long periods engaged in certain sedentary activities are more likely to have low bone mineral content in parts of the body where it can be an indicator of the risk of developing osteoporosis. In the research, published by PubMed on November 15, the team found that studying put girls at particular risk, while for boys leisure internet use posed the greatest threat. Scientists found that participating in at least three hours of certain sports could significantly ...

Groundwater provides drinking water for millions of Americans and is the primary source of water to irrigate cropland in many of the nations most productive agricultural settings. Although the benefits of groundwater development are many, groundwater pumping can reduce the flow of water in connected streams and rivers—a process called streamflow depletion by wells. The USGS has released a new report that summarizes the body of knowledge on streamflow depletion, highlights common misconceptions, and presents new concepts to help water managers and others understand the effects ...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 15, 2012 – Research conducted and supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has led to a new analysis of the pig genome, revealing new similarities between pigs and humans that could potentially advance biomedical research significantly. Additional findings from the study, reported today in the journal Nature, may also lead to better breeding strategies, improved pork production and improvements to human health. The research was conducted by a global team of scientists as part of the International Swine Genome Sequence Consortium (ISGSC). "This ...

Psychological scientists are exploring the mechanisms that underlie memory to understand why we remember certain things and why we forget others. Read about the latest research on memory published in the November 2012 issue of Psychological Science. Retrieval-Induced Forgetting Predicts Failure to Recall Negative Autobiographical Memories Failure to retrieve memories may not always be a bad thing - we might, for example, prefer to forget about certain instances of heartbreak or failure in favor of some of the more positive events from our lives. In this study, researchers ...

Fire the coach? Not so fast says a new study of elite college football teams. Professors from the University of Colorado and Loyola University Chicago studied what happened to the records of college football teams that replaced a head coach for performance reasons in the Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly Division 1-A) between 1997 and 2010. Over this period, an average of 10 percent of FBS teams fired their coach each year because of the team's poor performance on the field. The authors used statistical methods to compare groups of teams that were similar except for ...

New research from Georgia Aquarium and Georgia Institute of Technology provides evidence that a suite of techniques called "metabolomics" can be used to determine the health status of whale sharks (Rhincodon typus), the world's largest fish species. The study, led by Dr. Alistair Dove, Director of Research & Conservation at Georgia Aquarium and an adjunct professor at Georgia Tech, found that the major difference between healthy and unhealthy sharks was the concentration of homarine in their in serum—indicating that homarine is a useful biomarker of health status for the ...