The Ebola virus, identified for the first time in 1976 in the Democratic Republic of Congo (ex-Zaire), has unleashed several lethal epidemics in Central Africa. For several years, many outbreaks have been occurring simultaneously in the Republic of Congo and Gabon, making the control of Ebola virus infection a major public health priority for these countries. In humans infection triggers haemorrhagic fever. In 80% of cases it leads to death in a few days. High mortality generated by this particularly
A waste product from rice has been used by Japanese scientists to produce surfacing materials that make for quieter, more resilient roads, reports Richard Butler in this issue of Chemistry & Industry Magazine.
Roads made using this method absorb noise better, drain faster and are less susceptible to extremes of temperature than traditional based road surfaces, according to Minebea, of Nagano, Japan. They may even be able to help traffic management.
The new traffic surfaces contain r
Six out of ten of all cases of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (cot death) in Europe are likely to be attributable to lying babies on their front or side, according to new research from the European Concerted Action on SIDS (ECAS) published in today’s ‘Lancet’.
The findings also reveal that all-night bed sharing should be discouraged for all mothers who smoke, since in 77% of cases studied where a baby had died while sharing a bed, the mother had been a smoker. On a more positive note, where th
A novel non-invasive system for cancer treatment is being developed with technology from the European space industry. The first target for this new treatment, which could be ready as early as 2006, is breast cancer.
Dutch entrepreneur Hugo Brunsveld van Hulten has come up with a solution to help physicians in their fight against breast cancer that combines two techniques: magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to locate and diagnose cancerous tissue and high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) to
Just as roads need to be repaved and highways repaired, the technological infrastructure that guides traffic also has to be kept up-to-date. But updating traffic management systems can be costly, as new applications and devices are often not designed to interoperate with older systems. Overcoming this problem is the IST project OMNI’s prototype platform that allows traffic authorities to integrate the new while retaining the old, thereby protecting past investments.
“There are high inve
A new tool developed under the IST CROSSGRID project aims to make running applications over the distributed computing environment of the Grid even easier. It currently is being used to help predict flooding across Europe.
Led by the Polish supercomputing institute Cyfronet, 21 partners in 11 countries across Europe are working to extend the Grid environment to a new category of practical applications. One of the key tools they have developed is the migration desktop, which is designed to sup
Previously unseen details of a mysterious, complex structure within the Carina Nebula (NGC 3372), also called the ’Keyhole Nebula’, are revealed by this image obtained with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The picture is a montage assembled from four different April 1999 telescope pointings with Hubble’s Wide Field Planetary Camera 2, which used six different colour filters.
The picture is dominated by a large, approximately circular feature, about 7 light-years acro
An all over tan is fashionable and large numbers of people, especially young women, achieve this by using sunbeds. Professor Antony Young, of King’s College London, has reviewed the evidence that links sunbed use to malignant melanoma; a skin cancer that is fatal if not detected and treated early. Malignant melanoma is a cancer of the skin’s cells that are responsible for tanning (melanocytes). Unlike most cancers, that tend to occur in late middle age, malignant melanoma can appear in younger people
Researchers and clinicians know that drinking alcohol can have both beneficial and harmful effects.
Yet little is known about the effects of long-term, chronic alcohol consumption on survival.
A new study has found that rats bred to prefer alcohol are healthier and live longer than rats bred to avoid alcohol, whether they drink alcohol or not
Study authors ponder the implications of this unexpected yet significant finding. Statistics clearly show that alcoh
Why is this year’s flu packing such a wallop? And why is it taking such a harsh toll on young children?
One reason is that the flu virus has changed, or mutated, slightly in the nine months since flu makers designed this year’s vaccine, and those changes may be rendering the vaccine less effective, according to flu expert John Treanor, M.D., director of the Vaccine Treatment and Evaluation Unit at the University of Rochester. Treanor provides an update on this year’s flu – and explai
Investigators at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Indiana University School of Medicine and other centers have identified a gene that appears to increase the risk of alcoholism.
The study, published in the January issue of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, is the first to demonstrate an association between this particular gene and alcohol dependence.
The gene is related to a receptor that allows for the movement of Gamma-amino butyri
Study shown fallen leaves play a role in the food web
Aquatic plants form the base of the food web. The energy they create supports aquatic life, from invertebrates to the largest sport fish. Now, a study shows that aquatic plants are receiving a little help from trees. In a paper in this week’s issue of the journal Nature, Michael Pace and Jonathan Cole of the Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York, along with colleagues from Wisconsin and Sweden, indicate that a
NASA’s QuikSCAT satellite is providing meteorologists with accurate data on surface winds over the global oceans, leading to improved 2- to 5- day forecasts and weather warnings. The increased accuracy, already being used in hurricane forecasts, is bringing economic savings and a reduction in weather-related loss of life, especially at sea, according to a recent NASA study.
Robert Atlas, a research scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., demonstrated the initial
Better designed oil filters and less frequent oil changes are two ways to reduce the health and environmental threats of used motor oil, according to a new study published in the Jan. 15 issue of Environmental Science & Technology, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.
The approximately one billion gallons of used oil generated in the United States each year comes primarily from lubricating oils — motor and transmission oils —
Frozen helium-4 behaves like a combination of solid and superfluid
Researchers at the Pennsylvania State University are announcing the possible discovery of an entirely new phase of matter: an ultra-cold, “supersolid” form of helium-4.
Writing in the 15 January 2004 issue of the journal Nature, Penn State physicist Moses H. W. Chan and his graduate student, Eun-Seong Kim, explain that their material is a solid in the sense that all its helium-4 atoms are frozen into a rigid
Most corn earworms cannot survive the cold of a Northeastern winter, but each summer this sweet corn pest arrives back in the cornfields of the northeastern United States more quickly than most people believe is possible. Now, a team of Penn State meteorologists thinks it knows how the small moths travel long distances so quickly, and perhaps can predict where and when they will appear next.
“For years, researchers have assumed that the moths travel in parcels of air,” says Matthew Welshans
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