The temperatures of North Atlantic Ocean water flowing north into the Arctic Ocean adjacent to Greenland — the warmest water in at least 2,000 years — are likely related to the amplification of global warming in the Arctic, says a new international study involving the University of Colorado at Boulder. (more…)
ANN ARBOR, Mich.— A majority of African American men said they do not go to the doctor because visits are stressful and physicians don’t give adequate information on how to make prescribed behavior or lifestyle changes, a new University of Michigan study shows. (more…)
*Researchers Recommend Public and Private Action*
COLLEGE PARK, Md. – Highly-caffeinated energy drinks – even those containing no alcohol – may pose a significant threat to individuals and public health, say researchers at the University of Maryland School of Public Health and Wake Forest University School of Medicine.
In a new online commentary in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), they recommend immediate consumer action, education by health providers, voluntary disclosures by manufacturers and new federal labeling requirements. (more…)
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Over the past two decades, Florida cattle ranchers have spent as much as $16 million a year doing battle with an invasive weed called tropical soda apple, known as TSA, that takes over pastures, elbowing out the forage grasses ranchers need for their cattle. (more…)
The operating system (OS) is the backbone of your computer. If the OS is compromised, attackers can take over your computer – or crash it. Now researchers at North Carolina State University have developed an efficient system that utilizes hardware and software to restore an OS if it is attacked.
At issue are security attacks in which an outside party successfully compromises one computer application (such as a Web browser) and then uses that application to gain access to the OS. For example, the compromised application could submit a “system call” to the OS, effectively asking the OS to perform a specific function. However, instead of a routine function, the attacker would use the system call to attempt to gain control of the OS. (more…)
NASA’s Stardust spacecraft has downlinked its first images of comet Tempel 1, the target of a flyby planned for Valentine’s Day, Feb. 14. The images were taken on Jan. 18 and 19 from a distance of 26.3 million kilometers (16.3 million miles), and 25.4 million kilometers (15.8 million miles) respectively. On Feb. 14, Stardust will fly within about 200 kilometers (124 miles) of the comet’s nucleus. (more…)
In the early years of the AIDS epidemic, being infected with the virus that causes the disease was considered a virtual death sentence. But with the development of antiretroviral therapy, many with HIV are now living much longer. In fact, it is estimated that by 2015, about half of all HIV-positive individuals will be older than 50. (more…)
To combat last year’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill, nearly 800,000 gallons of chemical dispersant were injected directly into the oil and gas flow coming out of the wellhead nearly one mile deep in the Gulf of Mexico. Now, as scientists begin to assess how well the strategy worked at breaking up oil droplets, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) chemist Elizabeth B. Kujawinski and her colleagues report that a major component of the dispersant itself was contained within an oil-gas-laden plume in the deep ocean and had still not degraded some three months after it was applied.
While the results suggest the dispersant did mingle with the oil and gas flowing from the mile-deep wellhead, they also raise questions about what impact the deep-water residue of oil and dispersant—which some say has its own toxic effects—might have had on environment and marine life in the Gulf. (more…)
