An international team of physicists working at the Antiproton Decelerator (AD) facility at CERN has announced the first controlled production of large numbers of antihydrogen atoms at low energies. After mixing cold clouds of trapped positrons and antiprotons – the antiparticles of the familiar electron and proton – under closely monitored conditions, the ATHENA collaboration has identified antihydrogen atoms, formed when positrons bind together with antiprotons. The results are published online toda
Scientists are developing a method that could prevent lung infections in people who smoke, according to a paper presented today (Wednesday 18 September) at the Society for General Microbiology autumn meeting at Loughborough University.
“We’ve used a human tissue model to show how we can prevent Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC) bacteria from invading cells in the lungs. These bacteria attach themselves to mucus and damaged tissue lining the lungs, and often cause infections in people with ex
Changes in the brain’s white matter may play a major role in the onset of Alzheimer’s disease, whose baffling origin has traditionally been blamed on the gray matter. The new findings could provide a fresh direction for Alzheimer’s research in this neglected part of the brain, offering the potential for early diagnosis and enhanced therapies.
The results are reported in the Sept. 17 print edition of Biochemistry, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Chemical Society, the w
Folic acid is not only a safeguard against spina bifida and other birth defects in babies – it can also prevent heart disease and strokes, two of Northern Ireland’s biggest killers, according to research from the University of Ulster.
Research at the University has shown and folic acid and three other related B-vitamins can prevent the accumulation of a high blood level of homocysteine, a risk factor in heart disease and strokes.
The risk of high homocysteine is similar to the risk
Project Synopsis:
The PEOPLE project involves the monitoring of ambient outdoor and indoor levels of air pollutants as well as measuring population exposure in European capitals. With the selection of benzene as a first pollutant to be measured, EC directive 2000/69/EC is also supported. Benzene is a carcinogenic pollutant to which exposure is associated with the risk of the development of leukaemia.
Brussels and Lisbon have been selected as the first cities for the PEOPLE
Contrary to popular belief, repetition does not always improve one’s memory for brand claims
Everybody remembers the pink bunny promoting batteries that keep going and going but is it Energizer or Duracell?
Contrary to popular belief in marketing, repetition in advertising does not always improve consumers’ memory for brand claims, says a U of T study. “Consumers often do not absorb the information from ads, so repeating the ads doesn’t necessarily lead to be
Accident Leads to Important Discovery
Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., have created large symmetrical crystals that rarely occur in nature. These crystals could be harder than conventional engineering materials. The accidental discovery was made during attempts to make superconducting nanostructures with a simple technique used to create carbon nanotubes.
Pulickel Ajayan and Ganapathiraman Ramanath, faculty members in materials science and eng
Study shows antioxidant takes no bite out of atherosclerosis in healthy people
LOS ANGELES, Sept. 17-Despite its early promise, taking vitamin E does not appear to slow the progression of atherosclerosis in healthy people, according to researchers from the USC Atherosclerosis Research Unit and colleagues.
Many believe that atherosclerosis, the thickening of artery walls that can lead to heart attack and stroke, results from oxidative damage to tissue in the artery wall cause
Researchers have discovered how to weld together single-walled carbon nanotubes, pure carbon cylinders with remarkable electronic properties. The discovery could pave the way for controlled fabrication of molecular circuits and nanotube networks.
Pulickel Ajayan, professor of materials science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., and his colleagues in Germany, Mexico, the U.K., and Belgium used irradiation and heat to form the welded junctions.
This is the first time
Driven by precise new satellite measurements and sophisticated new computer models, a team of NASA researchers is now routinely producing the first global maps of fine aerosols that distinguish plumes of human-produced particulate pollution from natural aerosols.
In the current issue of the journal Nature, atmospheric scientists Yoram Kaufman, at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., Didier Tanré and Olivier Boucher from CNRS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)
There is a sound neurological basis for the cliché that men are more aggressive than women, according to new findings by scientists at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
Using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, the Penn scientists illustrated for the first time that the relative size of the sections of the brain known to constrain aggression and monitor behavior is larger in women than in men.
The research, by Ruben C. Gur, PhD, and Raquel E. Gur, MD, PhD, and
A high-mileage, low-pollution car built by students at the University of California, Davis, will drive from Hockenheim, Germany to Paris, France between Sept. 22 and 25 as part of the Challenge Bibendum, a competition run by tire manufacturer Michelin to promote new technology in automobiles.
UC Davis is the only university represented among 70 participants including auto industry giants Ford, DaimlerChryser and Honda. Graduate students Eric Chattot, Thomas Dreumont and Charnjiv Bangar from the
A new method to make very small patterns of DNA molecules on surfaces has been developed by chemists at the University of California, Davis, and Wayne State University, Detroit. The technique could allow faster and more powerful devices for DNA sequencing, biological sensors and disease diagnosis.
The technique, called nanografting, can be used to make patterns of DNA that are up to a thousand times smaller than those in commercially available microarrays, said UC Davis chemist Gang-yu Liu
A computer simulation that shows how branches and bends in blood vessels disturb smooth-flowing blood and contribute to heart disease has been built by researchers at the University of California, Davis. Eventually, it could be possible to use such models to predict the risk of some types of heart disease.
Every minute at rest the heart pumps out about five liters, or more than a gallon, of blood. The swirls and eddies of that blood could help determine where fatty plaques build up, damagin
Frustrated by the limitations of present numerical models that simulate how Earth’s climate will be altered by factors such as pollution and landscape modification, Duke University engineers are creating a new model incorporating previously-missing regional and local processes.
“The model we are developing is much more refined,” said the project’s leader, Roni Avissar, chairman of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering.
British astronomers, together with Australian and American colleagues, have used the 3.9m Anglo-Australian Telescope [AAT] in New South Wales, Australia to discover a new planet outside our Solar System – the 100th to be detected. The discovery, which is part of a search for solar systems that resemble our own, will be announced today (Tuesday) at a conference on “The origin of life” in Graz, Austria. This takes the total number of planets found outside our solar system to 100, and scientists are now
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