In Professor Richard Foulds’ freshman design class, students perform angioplasty on pasta, amniocentesis on jelly donuts and surgery on hot dogs.
Foulds, along with other professors at New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), is pioneering a new way to educate engineers. Professors who use the method, called studio learning, demonstrate the fundamentals of engineering not by lecture and recitation but by active, hands-on, experiment-based learning. “Our students love studi
Mount Sinai researchers identify a new mechanism that contributes to the development of some breast and ovarian cancers
Researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine have discovered a new mechanism of activation of a pathway known to be implicated in many cancers. Additionally, the researchers found that when this mechanism is blocked cells may become more sensitive to radiation and chemotherapeutic agents, thus making them easier to destroy. The research was published in the Novem
If you happen to be looking left or right when your car is rear-ended, you could be lucky enough to avoid the headache of whiplash. A new study at the University of Alberta shows that whiplash injuries in low-speed accidents are much less likely if the victim’s head happens to be turned to either side instead of facing front when the vehicle is struck.
The research involving neck muscles is giving a solid scientific definition to whiplash that may help identify and establish
Diet found especially beneficial for female offspring
It has been estimated that up to 32 million Americans have adopted the low-carb style of eating, in part because of its quick and dramatic results. Converts often maintain components of low-carb eating long after they’ve officially finished dieting.
Not surprisingly, a growing number of pregnant women now explore ways to continue low-carb routines through gestation, in fact there are several chat rooms devoted
New study isolates gene mutation responsive to cocaine
Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and New York University have discovered a gene mutation in fruit flies that alters sensitivity to crack cocaine and also regulates their internal body clock. The findings, reported in the December issue of Public Library of Science (PLoS) Biology, may have implications for understanding innate differences in sensitivity to cocaine in humans, potentially prov
Researchers at the University of Edinburgh are seeking people with Parkinson’s Disease (PD) to help them better understand how mood– particularly depression– affects their symptoms. The study will investigate the way depression impacts on the thinking processes of those with PD, and look at how this mood disorder can be treated.
Research psychologist Anthoula Lioni said: ” Depression is very common in people with PD and we believe that their problems with elaborate thinking processes
Sending your favorite suit to the dry cleaners could one day become an infrequent practice. Researchers at Clemson University are developing a highly water-repellant coating made of silver nanoparticles that they say can be used to produce suits and other clothing items that offer superior resistance to dirt as well as water and require much less cleaning than conventional fabrics.
The patented coating — a polymer film (polyglycidyl methacrylate) mixed with silver nanoparticles —
A team of Dartmouth researchers has developed a new computational tool to help authenticate works of art, specifically paintings, prints and drawings.
Using high resolution digital images of drawings by Bruegel and some of his imitators, as well as a painting by Perugino, the computer scientists captured data about pen or pencil stroke patterns and other elements that represent an artist’s style or aesthetic signature. This signature was then used to discover consistencies a
Women with hereditary breast cancer treated with breast conserving therapy appear to have no increased risk for recurrence in the treated breast, according to results from a prospective study published in the January 1, 2005 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society. However, the risk of breast cancer in the opposite breast is significantly increased.
Breast conserving therapy (BCT), consisting of lumpectomy and radiation, has been demonstrated to b
Parents are more likely to get a good night’s sleep if they take their babies out in the early afternoon, according to a study in December’s Journal of Sleep Research.
Yvonne Harrison, from the School of Psychology at Liverpool John Moores University, found that babies who sleep well at night are exposed to twice as much light between 12 noon and 4pm than poor sleepers. 56 healthy, full-term babies were monitored for three consecutive days at six, nine and twelve weeks’ old. P
In airports on both sides of the Atlantic, BioWise is taking off as a leader in the provision of multi-biometric and multi-modal identification and authentication middleware for safer air travel.
Working with SITA and UNISYS, the BioWise system is in use in the US’ large-scale registered traveller’s pilot programme for internal flights. “In return for registering,” explains André Oeyen, Managing Director of BioWise, “they will be considered as trusted travellers and will be gr
BIG foreign companies that established UK business plants over a 14-year period exaggerated their job creation claims, a new study suggests.
Companies deliberately overstated job claims to attract business support and advice, conclude researchers from the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne Business School. The team say ambitious job creation targets can be advantageous to inward investment agencies, like regional development agencies (RDAs), and warn that such claims should be
Discovery shows stem cell-derived ‘insulation’ cells growing and functioning in a living system
For the first time, researchers have used human embryonic stem cells to create new insulating tissue for nerve fibers in a live animal model – a finding that has potentially important implications for treatment of spinal cord injury and multiple sclerosis.
Researchers at the UC Irvine Reeve-Irvine Research Center used human embryonic stem cells to create cells called oligodendr
Scientists have discovered that the air in the atmosphere around us is heavier (more dense) than they had previously thought. Knowing this will enable scientists to measure the mass of objects more accurately than ever before.
Writing in the Institute of Physics journal Metrologia, a team from the Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS) and the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) in France, report a new determination of the content of argon in a
The bacterium that causes ulcers and contributes to stomach cancers uses a clever interaction between two genes to randomly tighten and loosen its grip on the stomach, according to a study by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Umeå University in Sweden.
Helicobacter pylori often binds tightly to cells of the stomach lining to feed, but the newly identified interaction ensures that a small reservoir of bacteria are always more loosely connected.
A recently published dissertation from the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden shows that testosterone has both a physiological and a psychological impact on women’s sexuality.
In her dissertation, gynecologist Angelique Flöter Rådestad has studied the effects of combined testosterone and estrogen on sexuality, well-being, and the consistency of bones and the body in women who have had their uterus and ovaries removed.
Several previous studies have shown that hormones like e
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