Scientists at JILA and collaborators have demonstrated an improved laser-based "molecular fingerprinting" technique that picks out traces of key hydrogen-containing and other molecules from a billion other particles in a gas in just 30 seconds or less—performance suitable for breathalyzers for diagnosing disease, measuring trace gases in the atmosphere, detecting security threats and other applications. JILA is jointly operated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and University of Colorado at Boulder (CU). Described in Optics Express,* the research ...

PHILADELPHIA — An article published in the Ffall 2010 issue of CR, the AACR's magazine for cancer survivors and their families and caregivers, details the immense challenges faced by those who suffer with cancer and lack the necessary resources for proper treatment and care — the homeless. CR magazine contributing writer Cynthia Ryan, Ph.D., who is an associate professor of English at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, took to the streets over the last year to offer a glimpse into the lives of homeless cancer patients struggling to obtain treatment while being ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Cyber attacks of various sorts have been around for decades. The most recent, and very dangerous, escalation in the past few years has been marked by countries launching attacks against other nations, such as Stuxnet, the nuclear plant-disrupting worm the Iranians have blamed on Israel and the U.S., while others are pointing the finger at Russia. University at Buffalo military ethicist Randall R. Dipert, PhD, one of the founders of the National Center for Ontological Research at UB, says we have good reason to worry, because cyber attacks are almost ...

Anxiety, or the reaction to a perceived danger, is a response that differs from one animal or human to another ― or so scientists thought. Now researchers at Tel Aviv University are challenging what we know about stress, and their study has implications for helping clinicians better treat victims of terrorism or natural disasters. Prof. David Eilam and his graduate student Rony Izhar of Tel Aviv University's Department of Zoology are spearheading a study designed to investigate the anxieties experienced by an entire social group. Using the natural predator-and-prey ...

Researchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the German national metrology institute have used NIST's miniature atom-based magnetic sensor to successfully track a human heartbeat, confirming the device's potential for biomedical applications. Described in Applied Physics Letters,* the study is the first to be performed under conditions resembling a clinical setting with the NIST mini-sensors, which until now have been operated mostly in physics laboratories. The new experiments were carried out at the Physikalisch Technische Bundesanstalt ...

TORONTO, ON – Evolutionary biologists at the University of Toronto (U of T) have found that environment plays a key role in determining whether a species opts for sexual over asexual reproduction. The study, led by post-doctoral student Lutz Becks and Professor Aneil Agrawal of the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, found that species that inhabit spatially heterogenous environments – habitats characterized by uneven concentrations of its own species among a rich variety of other animals and plants – had higher rates of sexual reproduction than those in more ...

A paper by researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) may breathe new life into the use of a powerful—but tricky—diagnostic technique for cell biology. The paper,* appearing this week in the Biophysical Journal, demonstrates that with improved hardware and better signal processing, a powerful form of molecular vibration spectroscopy can quickly deliver detailed molecular maps of the contents of cells without damaging them. Earlier studies have suggested that to be useful, the technique would need power levels too high for cells. The technique, ...

New insights into the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection process, which leads to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), may now be possible through a research method recently developed in part at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), where scientists have glimpsed an important protein molecule's behavior with unprecedented clarity. The HIV protein, known as Gag, plays several critical roles in the assembly of the human immunodeficiency virus in a host cell, but persistent difficulties with imaging Gag in a lab setting have stymied researchers' ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – A new law aimed at helping stimulate small business job growth through tax deductions could have major consequences for anyone with a retirement savings account at work, a University of Illinois expert on taxation and elder law notes. Law professor Richard L. Kaplan says an obscure provision in the recently enacted Small Business Jobs Act allows 401(k), 403(b) or 457 account holders to convert their retirement savings into a tax-advantaged Roth-version of the same account. The good news, according to Kaplan, is that by converting to a Roth variant, ...

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have demonstrated* for the first time the conversion of near-infrared 1,300 nm wavelength single photons emitted from a true quantum source, a semiconductor quantum dot, to a near-visible wavelength of 710 nm. The ability to change the color of single photons may aid in the development of hybrid quantum systems for applications in quantum communication, computation and metrology. Two important resources for quantum information processing are the transmission of data encoded in the quantum state of ...

Removing the toxic and odorous emissions of ammonia from the industrial production of fertilizer is a costly and energy-intensive process. Now, researchers in Bangladesh have turned to microbes and inexpensive wood charcoal to create a biofilter that can extract the noxious gas from vented gases and so reduce pollution levels from factories in the developing world. Writing in the International Journal of Environment and Pollution, Jahir Bin Alam, A. Hasan and A.H. Pathan of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology, ...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Physicians at Mayo Clinic's Florida campus are among the first in the nation to use a technique known as MRI-guided laser ablation to heat up and destroy kidney and liver tumors. So far, five patients have been successfully treated — meaning no visible tumors remained after the procedure. They join their colleagues at Mayo Clinic's site in Rochester, Minn., who were the first to use laser ablation on patients with recurrent prostate tumors. Although the treatment techniques are in the development stage, the physicians say the treatment is potentially ...

Personalized medicine — improving the fit between patient and treatment — has become a major focus of research in fields from cancer treatment to the psychopharmacology of mental disorders. Genetic studies have suggested that an individual's genetic makeup renders him either more or less sensitive to stressful social environments — but can an individual's unique genotype also determine the effectiveness of preventative or therapeutic behavioral interventions? The current issue of Perspectives on Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, ...

Athens, Ga. – A new long-term study published by researchers at the University of Georgia, the Menzies Research Institute in Hobart, Australia and the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute in Melbourne, Australia suggests that waist circumference, rather than the commonly used body mass index measure, is the best clinical measure to predict a child's risk for cardiovascular disease and diabetes later in life. The researchers, whose results appear in the early online edition of the International Journal of Obesity, found that children with high waist circumference values ...

Instruments designed by a UT Dallas professor to measure atmospheric components on the surface of Mars have uncovered important clues about the planet's atmosphere and climate history. The findings, published in a recent issue of the journal Science, reveal how carbon dioxide isotopes have reacted to volcanic activity, water and weathering – thus forming a more complete picture of the current Martian atmosphere. The NASA mission in which this work was accomplished was the Phoenix Lander, an unmanned spacecraft deployed to Mars in 2008. UT Dallas Physics Professor ...

CHAPEL HILL – Two years ago, a study by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill researchers found that an anti-vomiting drug called ondansetron helps reduce vomiting, the need for intravenous fluids and hospital admissions in children with acute gastroenteritis. Now a new economic analysis led by Canadian researchers, in collaboration with Michael J. Steiner, MD, assistant professor of pediatrics at UNC, concludes that routinely giving ondansetron to children with gastroenteritis-induced vomiting would prevent thousands of hospitalizations and save millions of dollars ...

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– A potent drug derived from an evergreen tree may soon save the lives of some patients with the deadliest form of breast cancer. According to the National Cancer Institute, breast cancer will claim approximately 40,000 lives in the U.S. this year. Scientists at UC Santa Barbara, in cooperation with scientists in the pharmaceutical industry, have discovered the mechanism by which this drug kills cancer cells. The team has isolated the drug's action in the test tube as well as in cancer cells. The results are reported in two studies published ...

DALLAS – Oct. 14, 2010 – Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have found that fluctuations in internal body temperature regulate the body's circadian rhythm, the 24-hour cycle that controls metabolism, sleep and other bodily functions. A light-sensitive portion of the brain called the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) remains the body's "master clock" that coordinates the daily cycle, but it does so indirectly, according to a study published by UT Southwestern researchers in the Oct. 15 issue of Science. The SCN responds to light entering the eye, and so is sensitive ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — In as many as 8 percent of pregnancies worldwide, women who seem fine for months develop preeclampsia, a serious complication causing symptoms including high blood pressure, severe swelling, and problems with placental development. The untreatable and unpredictable condition, with no known cause, often requires premature delivery, and can sometimes kill the mother and the fetus. In a new study, researchers led by a team at Brown University and Women & Infants Hospital describe two major advances: a well-defined animal model of preeclampsia ...

Human blood is famously fraught with fats; now researchers have a specific idea of just how numerous and diverse these lipids actually are. A national research team, led by scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, has created the first "lipidome" of human plasma, identifying and quantifying almost 600 distinct fat species circulating in human blood. "Everybody knows about blood lipids like cholesterol and triglycerides," said Edward A. Dennis, PhD, distinguished professor of pharmacology, chemistry and biochemistry at UC San Diego and ...

It could happen to students cramming for exams, people working long hours or just about anyone burning the candle at both ends: Something tells you to take a break. Watch some TV. Have a candy bar. Goof off, tune out for a bit and come back to the task at hand when you're feeling better. After all, you're physically exhausted. But a new study from Stanford psychologists suggests the urge to refresh (or just procrastinate) is – well – all in your head. In a paper published this week in Psychological Science, the researchers challenge a long-held theory that willpower ...

New research by University of British Columbia physicists indicates that high-temperature superconductivity in copper oxides is linked to what they term 'incoherent excitations'--a discovery that sheds light on the electronic response of these materials before they become superconducting. The study marks the first time researchers have been able to directly measure when electrons in a super conductor behave as independent well-defined particles, and when they evolve into ill-defined many-body entities. "We've never been able to directly quantify the nature of electron ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Buy something online, enter your credit card number and mailing address. Simple. Then you come to the box with the CAPTCHA, the Completely Automated Public Turing Test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart. Here, the website attempts to confirm that you're a human, not some robot about to commit a cybercrime. You dutifully copy down the warped, watery-looking letters. Incorrect. Another captcha appears. You try again. Also incorrect. A third captcha appears. You start rethinking your purchase. University at Buffalo computer scientist Venu Govindaraju, ...

Columbus, Ohio (Oct. 14, 2010) – An Ohio State University astronomer is working to unlock some of the mysteries surrounding the formation of vast galaxies and the evolution of massive black holes with his own large constellation of silicon wafers. Over the last year, two research teams led by Stelios Kazantzidis, a Long-Term Fellow at the Center for Cosmology and Astro-Particle Physics (CCAPP) at The Ohio State University, have used what would average out to nearly 1,000 computing hours each day on the parallel high performance computing systems of the Ohio Supercomputer ...

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– Physicists at UC Santa Barbara have succeeded in combining laser light with trapped electrons to detect and control the electrons' fragile quantum state without erasing it. This is an important step toward using quantum physics to expand computing power and to communicate over long distances without the possibility of eavesdropping. The work appears online today at Science Express. The research, led by David Awschalom, professor of physics, electrical and computer engineering, and director of UCSB's Center for Spintronics and Quantum Computation, ...