Technology – Page 684 – Shamskm: A site to exchange knowledge and solutions

Few Pregnant Women Treated for Sexually Transmitted Infections

Many pregnant women with sexually transmitted infections aren’t getting the treatment they need when they visit emergency rooms, according to a new Michigan State University study that highlights a wholly preventable risk to unborn children and raises questions about current medical guidelines.

About half of the 735 women with gonorrhea or chlamydia who visited the ERs at three hospitals in Grand Rapids, Mich. from 2008 through 2010 did not get treatment there, despite the availability of effective and relatively inexpensive antibiotics. Of the 179 who were pregnant, only 20 percent received treatment in the ER. (more…)

NASA Satellites Find Freshwater Losses in Middle East

PASADENA, Calif. – A new study using data from a pair of gravity-measuring NASA satellites finds that large parts of the arid Middle East region lost freshwater reserves rapidly during the past decade.

Scientists at the University of California, Irvine; NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.; and the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., found during a seven-year period beginning in 2003 that parts of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran along the Tigris and Euphrates river basins lost 117 million acre feet (144 cubic kilometers) of total stored freshwater. That is almost the amount of water in the Dead Sea. The researchers attribute about 60 percent of the loss to pumping of groundwater from underground reservoirs. (more…)

Kofi Annan to students: ‘It’s your world now’

Former U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan predicted during a campus visit that the civil war in Syria will become even more tragic before the international community takes action to help resolve the conflict, but said he is optimistic about the political and economic prospects for Africa in the years ahead. (more…)

High Stakes: Businesses Make Big Data Bets

Big data has exploded into the mainstream, and very soon harnessing the power of information won’t just be a matter of profitability, but of survival. Microsoft has the tools to help businesses survive and thrive in the dawning age of big data.

REDMOND, Wash. – Feb. 13, 2013 – For the first time in history, it’s going to start raining information.

Hallelujah or headache? For businesses, it’s all about being ready to ride this perfect storm of big data – and their understanding of what’s at stake. (more…)

African Chickens

UD’s Schmidt studies heat stress, disease resistance in African chickens

Last fall, the University of Delaware’s Carl Schmidt took a trip to Uganda with a team of researchers from Iowa State University and North Carolina State University to get genetic samples from African chickens. The goal was to compare and contrast their genes to one another, and also to American broiler chickens, to gauge how the two species’ genetic makeup helps them cope with heat stress, as well as susceptibility and resistance to different diseases. (more…)

Zinc Helps against Infection by Tapping Brakes in Immune Response

COLUMBUS, Ohio – New research suggests that zinc helps control infections by gently tapping the brakes on the immune response in a way that prevents out-of-control inflammation that can be damaging and even deadly.

Scientists determined in human cell culture and animal studies that a protein lures zinc into key cells that are first-responders against infection. The zinc then interacts with a process that is vital to the fight against infection and by doing so helps balance the immune response. (more…)

Bisphenol A Affects Sex-Specific Reproductive Behaviors in a Monogamous Animal Species, Says MU Researcher

Animal Findings Suggest That Gender May Also Influence Chemical Exposure Risks for Humans

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Parents, teachers and psychologists know boys and girls behave differently. However, that difference isn’t taken into account by most methods used to assess the risk to children from chemical exposure, according to Cheryl Rosenfeld, associate professor of biomedical sciences in the University of Missouri’s Bond Life Sciences Center. A series of experiments by Rosenfeld studied the effects of prenatal exposure to bisphenol A (BPA) on later reproductive-associated behaviors using a socially and genetically monogamous rodent, the California mouse, which may better mirror most human societies than other rodents. (more…)

Caching In: How Some Organizations Are Using Big Data to Change the Way They Do Business

As big data access shifts to the masses, The Weather Company and other top global companies are showing the world how it’s done.

REDMOND, Wash. — Feb. 12, 2012 —Big data is changing the way organizations do business, make discoveries, and interact with each other. In fact, pundits are predicting that 2013 will be the year organizations across a range of industries begin implementing big data strategies, or face obsolescence. As David Selinger wrote in a recent article on Forbes online: “If executives don’t find a way to trap, tame, and train their data monsters, they’ll be extinct in two years—fossils who’ve missed the new world order.”

Microsoft believes that big data has the power to drive practical and theoretical insights that have eluded people to date. In the past, high costs and technology limitations have constrained access to data storage infrastructure and the tools needed to manage and analyze large quantities of data. This is finally starting to change. (more…)