Burning eyes, burning lungs, skin rashes and other symptoms of illness have been found in a study of residents living near land fertilized with Class B biosolids, a byproduct of the human waste treatment process.
This study is the first linking adverse health effects in humans to the land application of Class B biosolids to be published in a medical journal. It was co-authored by David Lewis, a UGA research microbiologist also affiliated with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)&#
Why would an uneven coating of gold on a silica surface excite any interest, much less earn cover-story honors in a respected scientific journal?
This uneven coating – nanoparticles of gold in a layer that changes from very dense to very sparse across a surface of selected molecules – will allow improvements in a wide range of processes and devices. And it’s the decreasing concentration of the coating and overlaying particles, the designed-in gradient, that has chemical engineers and ph
Parchment points to authenticity of Vinland Map
For the first time, scientists have ascribed a date – 1434 A.D., plus or minus 11 years – to the parchment of the controversial Vinland Map, possibly the first map of the North American continent. Collaborators from the Smithsonian Center for Materials Research and Education (SCMRE), Suitland, Md., the University of Arizona, Tucson, and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, N.Y., used carbon-dating techn
By the time you`ve had your new computer for six months, much faster processors will already be on the market. But there is a limit to how fast conventional computers can become. This is because computers process information in a step-by-step fashion, carrying out each part of the process in turn. To make things work really fast, we need to build `quantum computers` instead. Computers today handle information in binary form, representing everything as zeros or ones. In order to process that
For the first time in the controversial saga of the famous Vinland Map, scientists say they have shown with certainty that the supposed relic is actually a 20th-century forgery. The findings are reported in the July 31 print issue of Analytical Chemistry, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society.
The Vinland Map — a drawing that suggests Norse explorers charted North America long before Columbus — has given scientists and historians
UK researchers announced a first this week when they reported their discovery of how lobsters change colour from the blue-purple of their ocean-floor camouflage to the distinctive orange-red when cooked.
Writing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, scientists from Imperial College London, University of Manchester, Daresbury Laboratory and Royal Holloway, University of London describe how they have solved the structure of a key part of the lobster shell protein, Beta
Prion Research Center to open this week
Scientists around the world are striving to learn as much as possible about the phenomenon that causes mad cow disease so that they will be prepared if and when an epidemic breaks out, according to Dr. Albert Taraboulos of the Institute of Microbiology of the Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical School. He explained that the exact incubation period of the disease is unknown and so scientists are working hard to ensure that they are not caught unpr
The next step in understanding what the human genome is telling us, especially
Despite some cosmetic differences, we all have the same genetic makeup that evolved from primitive man. Unfortunately, the genes that were in place before the advent of the earliest civilizations were not designed to carry individuals through today’s typical age span, now approximately eight decades of wear and tear. Additionally, the multiple genetic mutations that could survive in ancient times more than
The culprit in bacterial streptococcus pharyngitis, or strep throat, can be vicious. Ask a parent who suspects their child has caught the virus, or the family of 29 Texans, including nine children, who died in 1997 after the bacteria manifested itself into a flesh eating disease. This virulent disorder used to cause physicians to order patients to immediately start taking antibiotics – even when a bacterial origin had not been established.
But taking antibiotics when not needed reduces the
Toxicology experts have long known that individuals can exhibit a wide range of physiological responses when exposed to identical doses of opiate- or morphine-based drugs. This drug class includes illicit drugs such as heroin, as well as regulated drugs like methadone and oxycontin, which have legitimate uses in addiction treatment and pain management. Unfortunately, an individual’s response to these drugs can be gauged only after the drug has been administered, leaving care givers to make an educate
Positve self-perceptions of aging may influence longevity more than other health factors
Even if we are not aware of them, negative thoughts about aging that we pick up from society may be cutting years off our lives, according to Becca Levy, Ph.D., the lead researcher of a study conducted at Yale University’s Department of Epidemiology and Public Health. The study found that older people with more positive self-perceptions of aging, measured up to 23 years earlier, lived 7.5 years l
Roman A. Amosov and a team of Russian scientists from the Central Institute for Geological Exploration of Non-ferrous and Noble Metals, Institute of Paleontology, Russian Academy of Sciences, and from the Institute of Microbiology, Russian Academy of Sciences, led by, have managed to simulate in the laboratory the process of precipitation of gold which in the natural geothermal wells is promoted by blue-green algae (cyanobacteriae).
For the purposes of the experiment Vladimir Orleans
A report in the open access journal BMC Psychiatry presents a new hypothesis that may explain the causes of the psychiatric disease, schizophrenia. The hypothesis hinges on glia, a special type of cell, which is important for the maintenance of the connections between brain cells. By re-examining previously published research the authors suggest that schizophrenia may be caused by a combination of defective genes, which result in deficiencies of a variety of growth factors in glia, and infection by v
University of Pennsylvania Museum archaeologists have discovered a 3700-year-old “magical” birth brick inside the palatial residence of a Middle Kingdom mayor’s house just outside Abydos, in southern Egypt. The colorfully decorated mud birth brick–the first ever found–is one of a pair that would have been used to support a woman’s feet while squatting during actual childbirth. The birth brick, which measures 14 by 7 inches, was discovered during summer 2001 excavations directed b
New field studies produce environment-friendly results An Arizona State University researcher is making good use of some of the 14 million Firestone tires that were recalled two years ago. The tires were used on Ford Explorers and recalled after reports of tread separation. How to dispose of all those used tires without causing serious environmental hazards once had state officials scratching their heads, but Civil and Environmental Engineering Professor Han Zhu believes has the answe
A University of Michigan physicist and a research scientist are questioning the belief that bigger and heavier vehicles are automatically safer than other cars and trucks. U-M physicist Marc Ross and Tom Wenzel, a research scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), recently released a report which shows that vehicle quality is actually a better predictor of safety – both for the driver and for other drivers – than weight. The two will discuss their results at a briefi
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