Having to work harder and act like ‘robots’, with little scope for personal initiative, are the chief reasons for declining job satisfaction in Britain, according to new research sponsored by the ESRC.
Feelings of insecurity, too high expectations and people being ‘over-educated’ and unable to find work to match their qualifications, are largely dismissed as factors, in the study led by Professor Francis Green of the University of Kent. His team found no evidence to back suggestio
A research group led by Academy Professor Mikko Sams is developing a brain-computer interface, a device that transforms electrical or magnetic brain signals into commands a computer can understand. Equipment of this kind is necessary. For instance, it enables physically disabled persons to use a computer keyboard. The Brain-Computer Interface, or BCI, allows both physically disabled and healthy persons to direct a computer by merely thinking of certain commands. The On-line Adaptive Brain-Computer
Research by a University of Nottingham expert has shed new light on a genetic mystery that has its origins millions of years ago.
A study by Dr Angus Davison has helped to uncover new facts about the most common organic compound found on earth — a substance called cellulose. Cellulose is found in large amounts in all crops and plant life, making it one of the foundations of modern farming, human diet and the global economy.There is just one problem with it: most animals are unable to
High and volatile UK gas prices reached new levels over the last few days and have left some chemical companies no choice but to shut down operations. The Chemical Industries Association (CIA) now calls upon the DTI and OFGEM to take immediate, urgent action to resolve the situation before sites are closed down and companies make the decision not to manufacture in the UK.
The gas system operator, Transco, stated at a meeting today that there is ample gas to meet demand. Judith Ha
Neil Kinnock, Chair of the British Council today said that low-carbon cities were an imperative that must be achieved by the mid twenty-first century. He called for stronger links and combined action across the world to facilitate the exchange of information, ideas and tested solutions. Cities should learn rapidly from one another’s successes and mistakes through networks dedicated to the exchange of information tackling climate change.
Lord Kinnock was speaking at the launch of
High risk and chronically ill patients in Europe may soon find themselves able to lead independent and fully mobile lives thanks to the work of a project that has developed a Body Area Network of wireless sensors to remotely monitor vital signs.
Since this IST-funded project MobiHealth ended in February 2004, the project partners have gone on to further develop the mobile healthcare system and expect to have a commercial product on the market by early next year, potentially marking a
EUREKA project E! 2797 FACTORY MSETC (Mobile Self-Erecting Tower Crane) has successfully combined the technologies of mobile and self-erecting cranes to create a single crane that can do the work of five. The new crane features an anti-sway device which makes it safer as well as more efficient.
The Belgian lead partner, Arcomet NV, has developed self-erecting tower cranes for the building industry for many years. “These cranes were mounted and remained in a fixed position on
Near the coasts of Peru and Chile, the Humboldt Current ecosystem is the world’s most productive fishing zone. This cold-current zone, with frequent coastal upwellings (2), occupies less than 1 % of the world’s ocean surface and provides 15 to 20 % of global maritime catches.
Unlike other large regions of upwelling, this ecosystem proves to be more exposed to variations in climate. Its geographical location brings it under the direct influence of disturbances generated by the El
In most countries of Sub-Saharan Africa, few reliable data are available relating to employment, unemployment and the conditions in which occupations are practised. This is in spite of the fact that societies base their economies on work and that reduction of poverty remains the main objective of economic policies. The existing information in any case results from different concepts and methods of analysis peculiar to each national statistics institute, which prevents comparison at the scale
The Sahelo-Sudanian band of Africa is an endemic area for meningococcal meningitis (MCM). The disease, an infection of the meninges by the bacteria Neisseria meningitidis, is highly contagious and affects 25 000 to 200 000 people per year, particularly children.
Outbreaks occur every year between February and May. Their geographical distribution is contained within what is called the Meningitis Belt circumscribed between 10° and 15° of latitude North. Several factors contribute
The first experimental evidence that birds can be deceived by camouflage in the same way that humans are deceived, is published today in Nature [3 March 2005].
The idea that bold contrasting colours help to break-up the body’s outline was rapidly adopted by many armies as long ago as the First World War. And in biology this idea of ‘disruptive colouration’ has long been used to explain how insects such as moths conceal themselves from predators, shaping the evolution of protectiv
Researchers in Denmark have discovered a way to detect early signs of testicular cancer before it has started to spread. Their findings are the first step towards developing a simple screening test for men at risk of the disease.
Writing in Europe’s leading reproductive medical journal Human Reproduction[1] today (Thursday 3 March), doctors from the Rigshospitalet in Copenhagen report the first diagnosis of pre-invasive testicular carcinoma in situ (CIS) in a semen sample from a
Resembling neatly stacked rows of driftwood abandoned by receding tides, particles left by a confined, evaporating droplet can create beautiful and complex patterns. The natural, pattern-forming process could find use in fields such as nanotechnology and optoelectronics.
“A lot of work in nanotechnology has been directed toward the bottom-up imposition of patterns onto materials,” said Steve Granick, a professor of materials science, chemistry and physics at the University of Ill
Using a technique employed by astronomers to determine stellar surface temperatures, chemists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have measured the temperature inside a single, acoustically driven collapsing bubble. Their results seem out of this world.
“When bubbles in a liquid get compressed, the insides get hot – very hot,” said Ken Suslick, the Marvin T. Schmidt Professor of Chemistry at Illinois and a researcher at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science a
Nitrogen oxide and nitrogen dioxide gases in the upper stratosphere climbed to their highest levels in at least two decades in spring 2004, scientists report. The increases led to ozone reductions of up to 60 percent, roughly 40 kilometers [25 miles] above Earth’s high northern latitudes, according to Cora Randall of University of Colorado at Boulder and 10 colleagues in Canada, Norway, Sweden, and the United States. Two natural processes were responsible, they say.
“This declin
An international team of astronomers using the world’s largest X-ray and optical telescopes have spotted the most distant massive object ever detected, a cluster of galaxies 9 billion light years distant from Earth.
The cluster of galaxies is so far away that the light detected by the team is much older than the Earth itself. The galaxy cluster, if it is even still there, would be at least 11 billion years old now. “By capturing this ancient, 9-billion-year-old light, we
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