A project that helps students with low vision take notes wins the U.S. Imagine Cup’s preeminent software design category
REDMOND, Wash. – April 12, 2011 – When David Hayden’s team won the U.S. Imagine Cup’s prestigious category Monday, it was a victory for him as a student with low vision, and for all students with reduced vision across the world. (more…)
A new study finds that the general public thinks getting a suntan poses a greater public health risk than nanotechnology or other nanoparticle applications. The study, from North Carolina State University, compared survey respondents’ perceived risk of nanoparticles with 23 other public-health risks.
The study is the first to compare the public’s perception of the risks associated with nanoparticles to other environmental and health safety risks. Researchers found that nanoparticles are perceived as being a relatively low risk. (more…)
WASHINGTON — Geophysicists have made the first large-scale picture of the electrical conductivity of the gigantic underground plume of hot and partly molten rock that feeds the Yellowstone supervolcano. The image suggests that the plume beneath the volcanically active area—renowned today for geysers and hot springs—is even bigger than it appears in earlier images made with earthquake waves.
“It’s like comparing ultrasound and MRI in the human body; they are different imaging technologies,” says geophysics Professor Michael Zhdanov of the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. Zhdanov is principal author of the new study and an expert on measuring magnetic and electrical fields on Earth’s surface to find oil, gas, minerals and geologic structures underground. (more…)
Washington, D.C. — Although its name may make many people think of flowers, the element germanium is part of a frequently studied group of elements, called IVa, which could have applications for next-generation computer architecture as well as implications for fundamental condensed matter physics.
New research conducted by Xiao-Jia Chen, Viktor Struzhkin, and Ho-kwang (Dave) Mao from Geophysical Laboratory at Carnegie Institution for Science, along with collaborators from China, reveals details of the element’s transitions under pressure. Their results show extraordinary agreement with the predictions of modern condensed matter theory. (more…)
*Bloom could be suppressed by changes in ocean conditions in the Gulf of Maine*
Scientists from the NOAA-funded Gulf of Maine Toxicity (GOMTOX) project issued an outlook for a moderate regional bloom of a toxic alga that can cause ‘red tides’ in the spring and summer of this year, potentially threatening the New England shellfish industry. However, there are signs this year’s bloom could be suppressed by recent changes in ocean conditions in the Gulf of Maine.
An abundant seed population in bottom sediments has set the stage for a moderate bloom of the toxic alga Alexandrium fundyense. This organism swims in the water, and divides again and again to form a “bloom” or red tide, but it also produces dormant cells or cysts that fall to the ocean bottom at the end of these blooms where they remain until they germinate the next year to restart the process. (more…)
Men who sexually abuse children generally blame external factors to explain their actions and diminish their guilt. “Every reason they give is a cognitive distortion,” says Sarah Paquette, a student who investigated the issue as part of her master’s thesis at the Université de Montréal School of Criminology. (more…)
In the past few years, Dr. Baowen Feng, with 22 years of clinical experience in gynecology and obstetrics, has rarely had the chance to practice medicine. (more…)
Melting mountain glaciers are contributing to sea-level rise faster than at any time in the last 350 years, according to new research published in Nature Geoscience.
A research team from the University of Exeter, Aberystwyth University, and Stockholm University undertook a survey of the 270 largest outlet glaciers of the South and North Patagonian Icefields of South America. (more…)
