SciFi Sydney offers science fiction fans the chance to meet recreations of some of their favourite film characters while raising money for charity. Visitors will have the chance to get their pictures taken with the likes of Darth Vader, R2D2, a Dalek and K9. All models and outfits have been created by the Sydney Robot Workshop and Novus Ordo Star Wars Costuming groups. People can also get behind the wheel of a Star Wars Droid or climb inside a Dalek and drive it around the hall. The event takes place on April 9th 2011 at the Dougherty Community Centre in Chatswood, ...

Some of Australia's most talented and creative musicians will play at the 2011 Melbourne Jazz Fringe Festival (MJFF) next month. The line-up consists of 80 performers who will take the stage at venues across the city over ten days and nights. Melbourne's Recital Centre Salon hosts the event's opening night concert on April 29th, featuring a recital of Place by the Andrea Keller Quartet with Strings. The 60-minute piece was commissioned by the Four Winds Festival and is inspired by the area surrounding Bermagui in New South Wales. Tickets are priced at AU$30 and ...

VERNON – Texas Agrilife Research fire and brush control studies in the Rolling Plains on a working ranch-scale showed the benefits and limitations of managed fires for reducing mesquite encroachment while sustaining livestock production. The head fire is set in a paddock as a part of a managed fire during the Waggoner Ranch study. (Texas AgriLife Research photo by Dr. Richard Teague) Dr. Richard Teague, AgriLife Research rangeland ecology and management scientist, along with colleagues Dr. Jim Ansley, brush ecologist, and Dr. Bill Pinchak, animal nutritionist, spent ...

Recent findings on the differences in heart disease among women and men and among blacks and whites show that characteristics such as gender and ethnicity matter when it comes to health research. The Health of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender People: Building a Foundation for Understanding, a new report from the Institute of Medicine, recommends steps to ensure that clinical researchers identify and address the needs of LGBT populations. The report was written in response to a request from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for guidance on researching ...

A new study on hunger entitled "Map the Meal Gap" is the first study to identify the county-level distribution of over 50 million food-insecure Americans. "Until now, we could only compare the data by state," said Craig Gundersen, University of Illinois associate professor of agricultural and consumer economics and executive director of the National Soybean Research Laboratory who led the data analysis on the project. "Having this data by county has the potential to redefine the way service providers and policy makers address areas of need." Gundersen explained that ...

From the opening gala to the closing ceremony, the action will be over-the-top and elaborate, with audiences guaranteed a unique night out. One of the anticipated highlights of the occasion takes place on April 28th, when Twisted Cabaret hits the stage and showcases the darker side of the art form. The Legends of the Stage Tribute & International Golden Gala also looks set to be a memorable evening, as top stars pay homage to the heritage of burlesque. "With a packed schedule of high-profile events, celebrity following and a loyal and rapidly expanding fan base, ...

As fiber optic technology continues to advance, it faces challenges from both its physical properties and its use of infrastructure. One emerging high-speed solution being developed at Stevens Institute of Technology uses lasers to transmit data through readily available open space, with the potential of expanding past the limitation of fibers into a system known as optical free space communications. Dr. Rainer Martini has overcome a number of free space challenges to develop a high-speed communications technology that is not limited by a physical conductor. With an optical ...

A study of thousands of people with bipolar disorder suggests that genetic risk factors may influence the decision to attempt suicide. Johns Hopkins scientists, reporting in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, have identified a small region on chromosome 2 that is associated with increased risk for attempted suicide. This small region contains four genes, including the ACP1 gene, and the researchers found more than normal levels of the ACP1 protein in the brains of people who had committed suicide. This protein is thought to influence the same biological pathway as lithium, ...

The National Society of Cosmetic Physicians announces the addition of Dr Paul Fondacaro to the faculty of the Society. Dr Fondacaro will be offering both CME (Continuing Medical Education) accredited, and non-CME accredited, workshops in Laser Liposuction at his Franklin Lakes, NJ; and Brick, NJ facilities. www.drparkave.com Dr Fondacaro joins a Society faculty of over 25 physicians, offering CME accredited workshops across the US and Canada. The National Society of Cosmetic Physicians has a membership of over 1,800; and is the largest organization offering CME ...

A new study on the use of prostate-specific antigen (PSA)-based prostate cancer screening in the United States found that many elderly men may be undergoing unnecessary prostate cancer screenings. Using data from surveys conducted in 2000 and 2005, researchers report that nearly half of men in their seventies underwent PSA screening in the past year – almost double the screening rate of men in their early fifties, who are more likely to benefit from early prostate cancer diagnosis and treatment. Further, men aged 85 and older were screened just as often as men in their ...

State laws and policies governing the storage and use of surplus blood samples taken from newborns as part of the routine health screening process range from explicit to non-existent, leaving many parents ill-informed about how their babies' left over blood might be used, according to a team led by a member of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics, in collaboration with researchers from the University of Utah. A report on their analysis of the subject is published March 28 in the journal Pediatrics. The study is believed to be one of the first to provide in-depth ...

PHILADELPHIA – By combining sophisticated mathematical techniques more commonly used by spies instead of scientists with the power and versatility of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a Penn neurologist has developed a new approach for studying the inner workings of the brain. A hidden pattern is encoded in the seemingly random order of things presented to a human subject, which the brain reveals when observed with fMRI. The research is published in the journal NeuroImage. Geoffrey K. Aguirre, MD, Assistant Professor of Neurology at the University of Pennsylvania ...

Cattle ranchers in southwestern Alberta have suspected it for a long time and now, GPS tracking equipment confirms it: wolf packs in the area are making cow meat a substantial part of their diets. University of Alberta researchers tracked wolves to bone yards, where ranchers dispose of dead cattle, and to sites of fresh cow kills. The study was done over two grazing seasons in 2008 and 2009. The vast study area in southwestern Alberta includes private ranchland and wooded public lands bordering the Rocky Mountains. Researchers found that during the summer months when ...

Warmer air is only part of the story when it comes to Greenland's rapidly melting ice sheet. New research by scientists at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) highlights the role ocean circulation plays in transporting heat to glaciers. Greenland's ice sheet has lost mass at an accelerated rate over the last decade, dumping more ice and fresh water into the ocean. Between 2001 and 2005, Helheim Glacier, a large glacier on Greenland's southeast coast, retreated 5 miles (8 kilometers) and its flow speed nearly doubled. A research team led by WHOI physical oceanographer ...

Personal trainer, author and motivational speaker wants women to benefit in the same way that her polycystic ovarian syndrome was transformed Katie Humphrey knows firsthand about just how miserable PCOS can make a woman's life. She struggled for years with deeply distressing side-effects of polycystic ovarian syndrome like the lack of a menstrual cycle, weight gain, acne and constant fatigue. Finally, she was diagnosed with insulin resistance-linked PCOS and urged, like many women with this disorder, to take birth control pills and anti-diabetes medication to improve ...

Russia's boreal forest – the largest continuous expanse of forest in the world, found in the country's cold northern regions – is undergoing an accelerating large-scale shift in vegetation types as a result of globally and regionally warming climate. That in turn is creating an even warmer climate in the region, according to a new study published in the journal Global Change Biology and highlighted in the April issue of Nature Climate Change. The Great Russian forest, which includes much of Siberia, is the size of the contiguous United States. It has experienced significant ...

New Delhi, India – The Indian Government today released new tiger population numbers for the first time since 2007, indicating that numbers have increased in the country that has half of the world's remaining wild tigers. The government estimated current tiger numbers in India at 1,706, up from 1,411 during the last count in 2007. However, the 1,706 figure includes an additional tiger reserve in the count, the Sundarbans, that contained 70 tigers. This area was not counted in 2007. Therefore, when comparing the previous survey with the current one, the official estimate ...

Greengrade, a collaborative online LEED management software tool that allows project teams to communicate, track, and manage LEED project information, today announced a new feature allowing users to access LEED information directly from LEEDuser. LEEDuser helps certify building projects through the key commercial and institutional LEED rating systems, with tipsheets, checklists, sample documentation and forms, forums, and more. "LEEDuser is all about saving time and money on LEED projects by providing the insights and help design and construction professionals need, ...

Calculations by researchers at the University of California, San Francisco and the University of California, Berkeley estimate that the cancer risk associated with one type of airport security scanners is low based on the amount of radiation these devices emit, as long as they are operated and function correctly. "The doses are low – extremely low," said Rebecca Smith-Bindman, MD, a professor of radiology at UCSF, who made the calculations with Pratik Mehta, an undergraduate at UC-Berkeley. "The amount of radiation in these scans is so low that you don't have to be concerned ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Engineers at Ohio State University have invented a new kind of nano-particle that shines in different colors to tag molecules in biomedical tests. These tiny plastic nano-particles are stuffed with even tinier bits of electronics called quantum dots. Like little traffic lights, the particles glow brightly in red, yellow, or green, so researchers can easily track molecules under a microscope. This is the first time anyone has created fluorescent nano-particles that can change colors continuously. Jessica Winter, assistant professor of chemical and ...

Bixby Land Company, a leading commercial real estate operator and investment manager based in Orange County, Calif., has purchased four Class A industrial properties totaling approximately 850,000 square feet. The acquisitions increase Bixby Land Company's wholly-owned portfolio to more than 5 million square feet and point to Bixby's increasing investment activity as California property markets show signs of improvement. "Our investment in these high-quality properties is a reflection of our confidence in the recovery of commercial real estate, in particular the industrial ...

Conception is a blessed event, be it a child's, or a new book. That is novelist Josie Brown's contention. She should know. The idea for her fourth novel, The Baby Planner [Simon & Schuster/Gallery Books]--about a childless woman who channels her nurturing instincts toward her pregnant clients--was born in the reception area of her mammogram center. "I picked up the only reading material available: a local parenting magazine," explains Brown, who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. "My own children are older, so it wasn't necessarily something I felt might interest ...

Between 75 and 80 per cent of all volcanic activity on Earth takes place at deep-sea, mid-ocean ridges. Most of these volcanoes produce effusive lava flows rather than explosive eruptions, both because the levels of magmatic gas (which fuel the explosions and are made up of a variety of components, including, most importantly CO2) tend to be low, and because the volcanoes are under a lot of pressure from the surrounding water. Over about the last 10 years however, geologists have nevertheless speculated, based on the presence of volcanic ash in certain sites, that explosive ...

Last week, the Michigan Catastrophic Claims Associations (MCCA) announced it would be instituting a slight fee increase that will be passed on to policyholders in the state. Car insurance providers currently are required to pay the MCCA $143.09 per insured vehicle, which gets incorporated into the premiums of even the cheapest auto insurance companies in the state. That amount will be raised 1.3 percent starting in July. The fee revenue goes into an MCCA-administered fund that exists as a result of the unorthodox structure of Michigan's no-fault system. Unlike the ...

By taking a closer look at animal bones scattered across the wilderness landscape, a researcher at the University of Chicago has found a powerful tool for showing how species' populations have changed over decades or even a century. "The skeletons of long-dead animals lying on landscapes provide critical insight into our understanding of ecosystem history, especially how populations have changed," said the study's author, University of Chicago alumnus Joshua H. Miller, S.M.'05, PhD'09, a postdoctoral research fellow in biological sciences at Wright State University in ...