Cultivating coca bushes, the source of cocaine, is speeding up destruction of rainforests in Colombia and threatening the region's "hotspots" of plant and animal diversity, scientists are reporting in a new study. The findings, which they say underscore the need for establishing larger protected areas to help preserve biodiversity, appear in ACS' journal Environmental Science & Technology. Liliana M. Dávalos and colleagues note that the pace of deforestation in Colombia has accelerated over the past 20 years, even as population growth has slowed and the economy has shifted ...

Scientists are reporting discovery of an environmentally friendly way to make a key industrial material — used in products ranging from paints to diapers — from a renewable raw material without touching the traditional pricey and increasingly scarce petroleum-based starting material. Their report on a new catalyst for making acrylic acid appears in ACS Catalysis, the newest in the American Chemical Society's suite of 39 peer-reviewed scientific journals. Weijie Ji, Chak-Tong Au, and colleagues note that acrylic acid is essential for making paints, adhesives, textiles, ...

With cholera on the rampage in Haiti and almost 40 other countries, scientists are reporting the development of a key advance that could provide a fast, simple test to detect the toxin that causes the disease. The report appears in ACS' journal Bioconjugate Chemistry. Cholera affects more than 200,000 people annually, mainly in developing countries, and causes about 5,000 deaths. Many involve infants, children, and the elderly. J. Manuel Perez and colleagues note that cholera is an intestinal infection from food or water contaminated with the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. ...

This release is available in Spanish. U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientist Pat Millner and safety manager David Prevar have worked with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and private consultants to design and conduct a pilot study for an alternative way to cap landfills. Millner is a microbiologist at the 6,615-acre Henry A. Wallace Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC) operated in Beltsville, Md., by the Agricultural Research Service (ARS), the chief intramural scientific research agency of USDA. Prevar oversees safety and health issues ...

Tumor cells have several routes that enable them to move from the primary tumor to distant tissues, a process called metastasis. It is metastasis of the primary tumor that kills most cancer patients. One of the least studied routes of metastasis is the lymphatic system. Many tumors produce factors that promote the formation of new lymphatic vessels (lymphangiogenesis). The newly formed lymphatic vessels enable tumor cells to travel from the primary tumor to the regional lymph nodes from whence they can spread throughout the body. Current treatment practice is to surgically ...

A combination of rising costs, shrinking supplies, and concerns about global climate change are spurring the development of alternatives to the burning of fossil fuels to meet our transportation energy needs. Scientific studies have shown the most promising of possible alternatives to be liquid fuels derived from cellulosic biomass. These advanced new biofuels have the potential to be clean-burning, carbon-neutral and renewable. Some could also be delivered through existing pipelines and used in today's engines, replacing gasoline on a gallon-for-gallon basis with no loss ...

No tipping point for Arctic Ocean ice, study says Using microearthquakes to evaluate potential carbon sequestration sites Observing flares from Jupiter's aurora Change in atmospheric patterns behind Arctic sea ice summer 2010 low Antarctic ice sheet melting would affect sea ice margin, marine food chain Simulating ocean carbon storage during the Last Glacial Maximum Anyone may read the scientific abstract for any already-published paper by clicking on the link provided at the end of each Highlight. You can also read the abstract by going to http://www.agu.org/pubs/search_options.shtml ...

Brightly-lit Cowboys Stadium during Sunday's Super Bowl XLV may symbolize one of the hottest new pieces of scientific intelligence about air pollution: Researchers have discovered — in a classic case of scientific serendipity — that the bright light from sports stadiums and urban street lights may boost daytime levels of ozone, a key air pollutant in many heavily populated areas. That's among the topics included in a broader article about the chemistry of air pollution in the current edition of Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), ACS' weekly newsmagazine. In the article, ...

A research study by the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), in collaboration with the State University of Campinas (Brazil), shows that young Spanish people were by 2001 taking six years longer than in 1981 to reach full employment, residential and family independence. Spain considers itself to be a "family-centred" country, in other words, families are expected to take up the slack with regard to areas not covered by social security. "The objective was to evaluate transformations in the trends of how young people gained their independence in Spain over the last ...

NEW YORK, CAMBRIDGE, Mass., AND BOSTON (Feb. 9, 2011) -- For the first time, researchers have laid bare the full genetic blueprint of multiple prostate tumors, uncovering alterations that have never before been detected and offering a deep view of the genetic missteps that underlie the disease. The study, made possible by key advances in whole genome sequencing and analysis, points to several new prostate cancer genes and a critical category of genomic changes as important drivers of prostate cancer growth. The work was led by researchers from Weill Cornell Medical College, ...

PORTLAND, Ore. – The dietary concerns of too much fructose is well documented. High-fructose corn syrup has become the sweetener most commonly added to processed foods. Many dietary experts believe this increase directly correlates to the nation's growing obesity epidemic. Now, new research at Oregon Health & Science University demonstrates that the brain – which serves as a master control for body weight – reacts differently to fructose compared with another common sweetener, glucose. The research is published in the online edition of the journal Diabetes, Obesity and ...

Stardust NExT must love comets. On Valentine's Day the spacecraft will get up close and personal with its second. It's been seven years since the original Stardust danced with Wild 2 out beyond the orbit of Mars, capturing a thimbleful of comet dust in its collector. It's been five years since the craft jettisoned its sample-return capsule and its precious cargo for a landing in the Utah desert. Next Monday the probe will make history again in a 125-mile embrace with comet Tempel 1. It will be the first time two different comets have been surveyed with the same set ...

Washington, D.C.—Chemical compounds called manganites have been studied for many years since the discovery of colossal magnetoresistance, a property that promises important applications in the fields of magnetic sensors, magnetic random access memories and spintronic devices. However, understanding—and ultimately controlling—this effect remains a challenge, because much about manganite physics is still not known. A research team lead by Maria Baldini from Stanford University and Carnegie Geophysical Laboratory scientists Viktor Struzhkin and Alexander Goncharov has made ...

A joint research project between the University of Alberta's Faculty of Education and the Department of Computing Science has found that, for high-school girls, the fun is in making video games, not just playing them. Computing science professor Duane Szafron and fellow U of A researchers Mike Carbonaro, Jonathan Schaeffer and Maria Cutumisu say that women in computing science are rare, but their study shows that if you want to get more females interested in computing science, you have to rewrite the program, so to speak. "There's been a huge push throughout North America ...

Research by the American Academy of Family Physicians demonstrates that vulvar cancer occurs most frequently in women age 65 to 75 years of age. Thirty percent of patients with vulvar cancer are age 70 or older, and the rate increases with age, reaching a peak of 20 per 100,000 women by 75 years of age. A team of researchers headed by Ashley Stuckey, MD, and Don Dizon, MD, of the Program in Women's Oncology at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island, recently presented research to the International Gynecologic Cancer Society at a meeting in the Czech Republic, which concluded ...

The United States has the highest adolescent pregnancy and birth rate among developed countries in the world. Many mistakenly believe that teens who become pregnant do not have aspirations of going to college or finding a good job. A study recently released by researchers at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island shows that pregnant teens have aspirations and dreams to go to college and get a good job. Whether or not the pregnancy was intended did not influence these aspirations. Maureen G. Phipps, MD, MPH, interim chief of obstetrics and gynecology at Women & Infants, ...

Being a mother is one of life's most difficult jobs. Getting through medical training and then juggling clinical practice, teaching, and research at the local university make the rigors of motherhood infinitely more challenging. A group of physician-mothers - led by Amy S. Gottlieb, MD, director of primary care curricula and consultation at the Women's Primary Care Center at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island, and Lynn E. Taylor, MD, an HIV/AIDS specialist at The Miriam Hospital – has found that there is strength, and sanity, in numbers. The support group MomDocFamily ...

ST. LOUIS -- A stockpiled vaccine designed to fight a strain of avian flu that circulated in 2004 can be combined with a vaccine that matches the current strain of bird flu to protect against a potential pandemic, researchers from Saint Louis University's Center for Vaccine Development have found. The findings suggest public health officials can get a jump on fighting a pandemic caused by avian flu virus because they won't have to wait for a vaccine that exactly matches the current strain of bird flu to be manufactured. They can begin immunizing against the bird flu by ...

COLLEGE PARK, Md. -- Under our feet and ubiquitous, lowly soil can be easily overlooked when it comes to addressing climate change and population growth. But in the January-February issue of the Soil Science Society of America Journal, a team of scientists say soil is an essential piece of the biosphere and more attention should be paid to protecting it. Strategies for doing so include refocusing and boosting research, and communicating its importance to the public. "The article is a call to better engage with each other and with those concerned about the coming stresses ...

Microsponges derived from seaweed may help diagnose heart disease, cancers, HIV and other diseases quickly and at far lower cost than current clinical methods. The microsponges are an essential component of Rice University's Programmable Bio-Nano-Chip (PBNC) and the focus of a new paper in the journal Small. The paper by John McDevitt, the Brown-Wiess Professor in Bioengineering and Chemistry, and his colleagues at Rice's BioScience Research Collaborative views the inner workings of PBNCs, which McDevitt envisions as a mainstream medical diagnostic tool. PBNCs to diagnose ...

Houston - In an international Phase III randomized study, everolimus, an inhibitor of the mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), has shown to dramatically improve progression-free survival for patients with advanced pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (pNET), according to researchers from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. The findings were published in the latest New England Journal of Medicine. James C. Yao, M.D., associate professor in MD Anderson's Department of Gastrointestinal Medical Oncology, first presented the at the 2010 European Society for Medical ...

New Rochelle, NY, February 9, 2011—Nicotine addiction usually begins during the critical teenage years, and pediatric healthcare professionals can play a prominent role in promoting a tobacco-free lifestyle among children and adolescents, as described in an article published online ahead of print in Pediatric Allergy, Immunology, & Pulmonology, a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. The article is available free online. Denormalization is a strategy for changing social norms and reinforcing a public perception of tobacco use as a health-compromising, ...

CHESTNUT HILL, MA (2/9/2011) – Coating a lattice of tiny wires called Nanonets with iron oxide – known more commonly as rust – creates an economical and efficient platform for the process of water splitting, an emerging clean fuel science that harvests hydrogen from water, Boston College researchers report in the online edition of the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Assistant Professor of Chemistry Dunwei Wang and his clean energy lab pioneered the development of Nanonets in 2008 and have since shown them to be a viable new platform for a number of energy applications ...

The payoff for investing in public parks and recreation sites may be healthier, more physically fit residents and a less strained healthcare system, according to Penn State researchers. Investments in parks and recreational services have a dramatic effect on health and fitness, say Geof Godbey, professor emeritus of leisure studies, and Andrew Mowen, associate professor of recreation and parks management. "There is a strong relationship between how much money is spent to provide such services and the amount of physical activity that people take part in," said Godbey. ...

Heart disease is a silent killer, but new microchip technology from Rice University is expected to advance the art of diagnosis. During National Heart Health Month, Rice Professor John McDevitt will discuss the potential of this technology to detect cardiac disease early at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Washington, D.C., Feb. 17-21. Cardiac disease is the focus of one of six ongoing major clinical trials of Rice's programmable bio-nano-chips (PBNCs). PBNCs combine microfluidics, nanotechnology, advanced optics ...