This month we look at three key things to consider when you are writing for business purposes. #1 Tone: Depending on your recipient, your tone is going to be either formal, friendly or familiar. The latter is unlikely to be used in a business scenario, unless you are simply emailing colleagues that you know extremely well. A formal tone is needed for any communications with people you have yet to meet, for reports, references for past employees, proposals or informative/scholarly articles. Emails and blogs can - in fact, should - be friendly in tone, engaging the ...

Discover many of the benefits the International Space Station yields humanity, thanks to the international collaborative effort of the station partners as they launch the International Space Station Benefits for Humanity website. When the International Space Station was first imagined, the idea was to create an unprecedented research platform to support microgravity investigations for the benefit of all humankind. That goal is now a reality, and researchers have not waited for completion to begin working on studies to build on our knowledge of science and technology ...

The Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC), a nationally recognized non-profit focusing on identity theft and related issues, has just launched a survey to discover the habits of consumers using public wireless Internet connections (public WiFi).  The ITRC is conducting this survey in order to better understand the best ways to help consumers protect themselves while online and on the go. "The ability to connect to the Internet is an integral part of many individuals daily life. This has led to the increased demand for public WiFi," says Nikki Junker, Social ...

TEMPE, Ariz. — Sustainability is a human decision — a responsibility that relies on good information and how we choose to use it — according to George Basile, a senior sustainability scientist at Arizona State University, who made that point in this month's cover story in Sustainability: The Journal of Record. Reframing sustainability as a human decision challenge, rather than "some version of people, planet and profit coming together," was one of the subjects discussed by Basile in the "On the Record" feature with journal editor Jamie Devereaux. "Sustainability is ...

Dinosaurs-like creatures may have injured themselves during leisurely deep-sea diving trips and not from resurfacing too quickly, as previously thought. A recent study identified bone deformities on the fossilized remains of Ichthyosarians, which were giant dolphin-like reptiles that first appeared about 245 million years ago. The lesions were similar to those human divers develop as a result of changes in body pressure, and suggest the reptiles suffered from a version of 'the bends'. A new analysis by University of Melbourne pathologist Associate Professor John ...

A national team of researchers led by investigators at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have developed a multidimensional set of brain measurements that, when taken together, can accurately assess a child's age with 92 percent accuracy. "We have uncovered a 'developmental clock' within the brain—a biological signature of maturation that captures age differences quite well regardless of other kinds of differences that exist across individuals," said first author Timothy T. Brown, PhD, a developmental cognitive neuroscientist in the Department ...

AUDIO: In this interview Jay Bradner explains how his paper in Cell reveals a viable target for a male contraceptive. Click here for more information. Researchers have finally found a compound that may offer the first effective and hormone-free birth control pill for men. The study in the August 17th Cell, a Cell Press publication, shows that the small molecule makes male mice reversibly infertile without putting a damper on their sex drive. When the animals stop taking this ...

HOUSTON - (Aug. 17, 3012) – A small molecule that can worm its way past the barrier that separates blood and sperm and snuggle into a crucial pocket needed in the process of making sperm may spell the future for male contraception. The molecule called JQ1 inhibited the amount and quality of sperm produced by mice in studies led by Dr. Martin M. Matzuk, director of the new Center for Drug Discovery and vice chair of pathology & immunology at Baylor College of Medicine, and Dr. James E. Bradner of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School in Boston, pointing ...

It isn't uncommon for people to pass for ages much older or younger than their years, but researchers have now found that this feature doesn't apply to our brains. The findings reported online on August 16 in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, show that sophisticated brain scans can be used to accurately predict age, give or take a year. It's a "carnival trick" that may have deeper implications for both brain science and medicine. "We have uncovered a 'developmental clock' of sorts within the brain—a biological signature of maturation that captures age differences ...

SEATTLE – Poxviruses, a group of DNA-containing viruses that includes smallpox, are responsible for a wide range of diseases in humans and animals. They are highly virulent and able to cross species barriers, yet how they do so has been largely a mystery because of their low mutation rates. While smallpox was considered officially eradicated by the World Health Organization in 1980, concerns about its use as a bioterrorism agent – and the finding that other poxviruses, such as monkeypox, can be transmitted from animals to humans – have spurred renewed interest in understanding ...

Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw once described England and America as two countries separated by a common language. Now research from the Johns Hopkins Children's Center suggests that common language may also be the divide standing between mothers of critically ill newborns and the clinicians who care for them. The study, published August 16 in the Journal of Perinatology, found that miscommunication was common, and that the most serious breakdown in communication occurred when mothers and clinicians discussed the severity of the baby's condition. Misunderstanding ...

SALT LAKE CITY – Scientists have discovered that poxviruses, which are responsible for smallpox and other diseases, can adapt to defeat different host antiviral defenses by quickly and temporarily producing multiple copies of a gene that helps the viruses to counter host immunity. This discovery provides new insight into the ability of large double-stranded DNA viruses to undergo rapid evolution despite their low mutation rates, according to a study published by University of Utah researchers in the Aug. 17, 2012, issue of Cell. Poxviruses are a group of DNA-containing ...

VIDEO: Dr. James Bradner talks about how he and other researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Baylor College of Medicine used a small molecule compound to generate reversible birth control in... Click here for more information. BOSTON—The development of a male contraceptive pill has long proven to be elusive, but findings from a new study may point scientists in the right direction to making oral birth control for men a reality. Researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer ...

In multiple sclerosis, the immune system attacks nerves in the brain and spinal cord, causing movement problems, muscle weakness and loss of vision. Immune cells called dendritic cells, which were previously thought to contribute to the onset and development of multiple sclerosis, actually protect against the disease in a mouse model, according to a study published by Cell Press in the August issue of the journal Immunity. These new insights change our fundamental understanding of the origins of multiple sclerosis and could lead to the development of more effective treatments ...

LA JOLLA, CA – August 16, 2012 – Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have made a breakthrough in understanding a class of cells that help wounds in skin and other epithelial tissues heal, uncovering a molecular mechanism that pushes the body into wound-repair mode. The findings, which appear in an advance, online version of the Immunity on August 16, 2012, focus on cells known as γδ (gamma delta) T cells. The new study demonstrates a skin-cell receptor hooks up with a receptor on γδ T-cells to stimulate wound healing. "This is a major activation ...

Coral Reefs, the Journal of the International Society for Reef Studies, has published online a study co-written by Dr. Gordon Hendler of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (NHM) about an invasive species of brittle star, Ophiothela mirabilis. The species was previously restricted to Pacific waters, but surprisingly, growing populations have established themselves at distant points in the Atlantic. Its presence near Brazilian and Caribbean ports indicates that O. mirabilis could have been spread by shipping. The marine animal is colorful and six-rayed. It ...

In the face of a changing climate many species must adapt or perish. Ecologists studying evolutionary responses to climate change forecast that cold-blooded tropical species are not as vulnerable to extinction as previously thought. The study, published in the British Ecological Society's Functional Ecology, considers how fast species can evolve and adapt to compensate for a rise in temperature. The research, carried out at the University of Zurich, was led by Dr Richard Walters, now at Reading University, alongside David Berger now at Uppsala University and Wolf Blanckenhorn, ...

Specialised group yoga classes could provide a cost-effective way of treating patients with chronic or recurrent low back pain, according to the UK's largest ever study of the benefits of yoga. Led by the University of York, and funded by Arthritis Research UK, the study provides an evaluation of a specially-developed 12-week group yoga intervention programme compared to conventional general practitioner (GP) care alone. The results published in Spine, show that the yoga intervention programme – 'Yoga for Healthy Lower Backs' - is likely to be cost effective for both ...

The growth of high topography on the Tibetan Plateau in Sichuan, China, began much earlier than previously thought, according to an international team of geologists who looked at mountain ranges along the eastern edge of the plateau. The Indian tectonic plate began its collision with Asia between 55 and 50 million years ago, but "significant topographic relief existed adjacent to the Sichuan Basin prior to the Indo-Asian collision," the researchers report online in Nature Geoscience. "Most researchers have thought that high topography in eastern Tibet developed during ...

Eribulin (trade name: Halaven®) was approved in March 2011 for women with locally advanced or metastasizing breast cancer in whom the disease has progressed despite prior drug therapy. In an early benefit assessment pursuant to the "Act on the Reform of the Market for Medicinal Products" (AMNOG), the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) examined whether eribulin offers an added benefit compared with the present standard therapy. According to the results of the assessment, the currently available evidence provides "hints" that eribulin ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Almost 41 percent of Ohioans have visited a lake, pond, river or creek in the state in the past year, and of those, nearly one-half usually spend their water-related recreational time at Lake Erie, according to preliminary findings in a new report. These figures and other findings in the report suggest that Ohio residents value their lakes and rivers, and particularly Lake Erie, as natural resources, but also help to clarify the risk that Ohioans face from contaminants in those same bodies of water, researchers say. Among the risks: Some blue-green ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – A Rhode Island Hospital researcher has found that the use of electronic prescription drug monitoring programs (PMPs) may have a significant impact on the demand for drug treatment programs and how prescribers detect and respond to abuse of painkillers. The study by Traci C. Green, Ph.D., MSc, research scientist in Rhode Island Hospital's department of general internal medicine, is published online in advance of print in the journal Pain Medicine. The study surveyed 1,385 providers in Rhode Island and Connecticut on their use of state PMPs, and found ...

Results of a phase III clinical trial of the drug Enzalutamide, published yesterday in the New England Journal of Medicine, show the drug extends life by an average five months in the most advanced stages of prostate cancer. "This is a major advance. Not only do we see more survival benefit than from traditional chemotherapy, but the side effects of Enzalutamide are much lower. It provides both more benefit and less harm – you get the quantification of more life, but also see quality of life improvements," says study co-author, Thomas Flaig, MD, medical director of the ...

Quantum computers promise to reach computation speeds far beyond that of today's computers. As they would use quantum effects, however, they would also be susceptible to external interferences. Information flow into and out of the system is a critical point. Researchers from KIT with partners from Grenoble and Strasbourg have now read out the quantum state of an atom directly by using electrodes. In the Nature journal, it is reported about the stable interface between classical and quantum world. (DOI: 10.1038/nature11341) "Normally, every contact with the outer world ...

Chapel Hill, NC – Leukemia and lymphoma patients who receive life-saving stem cell or bone marrow transplants often experience chronic side effects that significantly decrease quality of life, can last a lifetime, and ultimately affect their long-term survival. In chronic Graft vs. Host Disease (GVHD), the differences between the donor bone marrow cells and the recipient's body often cause these immune cells to recognize the recipient's body tissues as foreign and the newly transplanted cells attack the transplant recipient's body. Symptoms can range from dry eyes and ...