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Global health policy fails to address burden of disease on men

By Guest PostMay 20, 2013General, Healthaids, alcohol use, burden of disease, cerebrovascular disease, chris murray, davidson gwatkin, decline, economic situation, gender inequalities, gender norms, global health policy, global mortality rates, hiv, ischemic heart disease, kent buse, lancet, life expectancy, lower respiratory infections, men, policy makers, sarah hawkes, tobacco smoking, unaids, university of washington, unprotected sex, unsafe sex, women

Men experience a higher burden of disease and lower life expectancy than women, but policies focusing on the health needs of men are notably absent from the strategies of global health organisations, according to a Viewpoint article in this week’s Lancet.

The article reinterprets data from the ‘Global Burden of Disease: 2010’ study which shows that all of the top ten causes of premature death and disability, and the top ten behavioural risk factors driving rates of ill-health around the world, affect men more than they affect women. (more…)

Recent Antarctic climate, glacier changes at the ‘upper bound’ of normal

By Guest PostMay 15, 2013Environmentantarctic glaciers, antarctic peninsula, antarctic warming, Antarctica, climate change, dark layer, eric steig, glaciers, global warming, human caused warming, ice core, ice sheet divide, icy continent, isotope oxygen 18, oxygen 16, qinghua ding, rapid ice loss, sea-level rise, south america, temperature, tropical pacific ocean, university of washington, upper bound, volcanic ash, west antarctic

In the last few decades, glaciers at the edge of the icy continent of Antarctica have been thinning, and research has shown the rate of thinning has accelerated and contributed significantly to sea level rise.

New ice core research suggests that, while the changes are dramatic, they cannot be attributed with confidence to human-caused global warming, said Eric Steig, a University of Washington professor of Earth and space sciences. (more…)

New device could cut costs on household products, pharmaceuticals

By Guest PostMay 13, 2013Sciencealice dohnalkova, amy shen, cost, flow of liquid, flow procedure, fluid, household products, joshua cardiel, microfluidics, micron level, microscopic channels, nanoscale packages, neville dubash, pharmaceuticals, pump water, soap products, toxic, university of washington, web, ya zhao

Sometimes cost saving comes in nanoscale packages.

A new procedure that thickens and thins fluid at the micron level could save consumers and manufacturers money, particularly for soap products that depend on certain molecules to effectively deal with grease and dirt. Researchers at the University of Washington published their findings online April 9 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Read the back of most shampoos and dishwashing detergents and you’ll find the word “surfactant” in the list of active ingredients. Surfactant molecules are tiny, yet they are the reason dish soap can attack an oily spot and shampoo can rid the scalp of grease. (more…)

New book explores Harry Truman’s record on civil liberties

By Guest PostMay 8, 2013Politicsalger hiss, american freedoms, american government, american people, american political system, american politics, american principles, americans, anti communists, civil liberties, cold war, constitution, democrat controlled senate, fbi, george w. bush, global peace, harry truman, house, internal security subcommittee, issue, j edgar hoover, japanese americans, john s service, joseph mccarthy, justice department, key west, liberty and security, loyalty program, marshall plan, national security system, nato, new book, Obama, policy, president eisenhower, red scare, richard kirkendall, richard nixon, senator joe mccarthy, smith act case, unamerican activities committee, university of washington, uw today, violation, war in korea, world war

Richard Kirkendall is a University of Washington professor emeritus of history and editor of the new book “Civil Liberties and the Legacy of Harry S. Truman.” He answered a few questions about the book for UW Today.

Q: What’s the scope of the book?

A: The book surveys the civil liberties issue during the Truman presidency of 1945-1953, an especially important time in the history of this essential feature of the American political system.

The book begins with two chapters on Truman as a civil libertarian, one on his identification of himself, the other on his relations with Japanese-Americans, the victims during World War II of a major violation of American principles. (more…)

What Happened to Dinosaurs’ Predecessors After Earth’s Largest Extinction 252 Million Years Ago?

By Guest PostMay 4, 2013Scienceadam huttenlocker, africa, after the extinction, Antarctica, asilisaurus, australia, biogeographic patterns, brandon peecook, christian sidor, daril vilhena, dinosaurs in tanzania, dinosaurs predecessors, earliest dinosaur, earth, expeditions to antarctica, fossil hunting expeditions, fossil record, four legged animals, h richard lane, India, karoo, ken angielczyk, largest extinction, linda tsuji, mass extinction, museum fossils, national science foundation, nyasasaurus parringtoni, paleontologist, pig sized dicynodon, predecessors to dinosaurs, roger smith, sebastien steyer, snapshots, South Africa, south america, southern pangea, southwest russia, species distributions, sterling nesbitt, university of washington, unorthodox places, zambia, zambian basins

Fossil-hunting expeditions to Tanzania, Zambia and Antarctica provide new insights

Predecessors to dinosaurs missed the race to fill habitats emptied when nine out of 10 species disappeared during Earth’s largest mass extinction 252 million years ago.

Or did they?

That thinking was based on fossil records from sites in South Africa and southwest Russia.

It turns out, however, that scientists may have been looking in the wrong places. (more…)

Listening to the Big Bang – in high fidelity

By Guest PostApril 30, 2013Sciencebig bang, computer program, cosmic microwave, data, earthquake, high frequency structure, john cramer, mathematica, planck satellite mission, radiation, recordings, seismologists, septillion times, universe, university of washington

A decade ago, spurred by a question for a fifth-grade science project, University of Washington physicist John Cramer devised an audio recreation of the Big Bang that started our universe nearly 14 billion years ago.

Now, armed with more sophisticated data from a satellite mission observing the cosmic microwave background – a faint glow in the universe that acts as sort of a fossilized fingerprint of the Big Bang – Cramer has produced new recordings that fill in higher frequencies to create a fuller and richer sound. (The sound files run from 20 seconds to a little longer than 8 minutes.) (more…)

Rocket powered by nuclear fusion could send humans to Mars

By Guest PostApril 27, 2013Science3d computer simulation, aeronautics, anthony pancotti, astronautics, christopher pihl, david kirtley, expedition to mars, fusion reactions, fusion state, george votroubek, high voltage battery, humans to mars, hydrogen bomb, john slough, lithium metal rings, magnetic field, michael pfaff, microsecond, msnw, NASA, nuclear fusion, plasma, plasma dynamics laboratory, powered by, redmond, researcher, rocket, rocket fuel, space programs, university of washington, uw

Human travel to Mars has long been the unachievable dangling carrot for space programs. Now, astronauts could be a step closer to our nearest planetary neighbor through a unique manipulation of nuclear fusion, the same energy that powers the sun and stars.

University of Washington researchers and scientists at a Redmond-based space-propulsion company are building components of a fusion-powered rocket aimed to clear many of the hurdles that block deep space travel, including long times in transit, exorbitant costs and health risks. (more…)

Diversity programs give illusion of corporate fairness, study shows

By Guest PostApril 12, 2013Economybrenda major, cheryl kaiser, civil rights law, discrimination complaints, diversity programs, diversity statement, diversity training programs, jenessa shapiro, laura brady, rational assumptions, santa barbara, tessa dover, university of california, university of washington, work environments, workplace diversity programs

Diversity training programs lead people to believe that work environments are fair even when given evidence of hiring, promotion or salary inequities, according to new findings by psychologists at the University of Washington and other universities.

The study also revealed that participants, all of whom were white, were less likely to take discrimination complaints seriously against companies who had diversity programs. (more…)

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