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Medieval Manuscripts to Get Technological Makeover

The world’s largest collection of Anglo-Saxon (Old English) poetry may soon be available on a smart device App, as part of a project initiated by the University of Exeter.

The App is in its prototype stage of development but in time will introduce school age pupils to the world of medieval manuscripts and the history of the book.

The initial stage will be based around Exeter Cathedral’s famous Exeter Book (10^th century) which features the Exeter Riddles, a collection of 96 literary mysteries. The University of Exeter’s Modern Languages department is working in collaboration with Antenna International to create the App which will reveal the secrets of medieval literature to a new audience. The research into the prototype model was initially funded by Research & Enterprise in Arts & Creative Technology (REACT) and Higher Education Innovation Funding (HEIF). (more…)

Training Your Robot the PaR-PaR Way

Berkeley Lab and JBEI Researchers Develop a Biology-Friendly Robot Programming Language

Teaching a robot a new trick is a challenge. You can’t reward it with treats and it doesn’t respond to approval or disappointment in your voice. For researchers in the biological sciences, however, the future training of robots has been made much easier thanks to a new program called “PaR-PaR.”

Nathan Hillson, a biochemist at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI), led the development of PaR-PaR, which stands for Programming a Robot. PaR-PaR is a simple high-level, biology-friendly, robot-programming language that allows researchers to make better use of liquid-handling robots and thereby make possible experiments that otherwise might not have been considered. (more…)

“Nike+ Kinect Training” Provides World Class Athletic Training – at Home

Microsoft and Nike team up to make Nike’s elite athletic training – never before available to the public – available to everyone in the comfort of their living room with the power of Kinect for Xbox 360.

REDMOND, Wash. – Oct. 30, 2012 – Want to get athlete fit? With “Nike+ Kinect Training,” you can just do it in your living room. (more…)

Transforming America by Redirecting Wasted Health Care Dollars

Eliminating excessive spending could mean windfall for U.S., study suggests

The respected national Institute of Medicine estimates that $750 billion is lost each year to wasteful or excessive health care spending. This sum includes excess administrative costs, inflated prices, unnecessary services and fraud — dollars that add no value to health and well-being.

If those wasteful costs could be corralled without sacrificing health care quality, how might that money be better spent? (more…)

Common Food Preservative May Slow, Even Stop Tumor Growth

ANN ARBOR — Nisin, a common food preservative, may slow or stop squamous cell head and neck cancers, a University of Michigan study found.

What makes this particularly good news is that the Food and Drug Administration and the World Health Organization approved nisin as safe for human consumption decades ago, says Yvonne Kapila, the study’s principal investigator and professor at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry. (more…)

UMD Study: Fiscal Cliff Could Trigger Deep Recession, Fear of Cliff Has Cut GDP Already

COLLEGE PARK, Md. – The so-called “fiscal cliff” has already begun dampening the U.S. economy – even before it officially kicks in – and by year’s end will have cut 2012 GDP an estimated six-tenths of one percent, says a new study conducted by researchers at the University of Maryland’s Interindustry Forecasting Project (Inforum).

The study, called Fiscal Shock: America’s Economic Crisis, is one of the first to look beyond the first year effects of the combined federal spending cuts and tax increases. It projects an escalating impact into 2014 and beyond, as “multiplier” effects of fiscal contraction kick in. (more…)

State-of-the-Art Beams from Table-Top Accelerators

Berkeley Lab’s lead in laser plasma acceleration research continues with new benchmarks for electron beam quality

Part One: Focusing in on beam focus

The rapidly evolving technology of laser plasma accelerators (LPAs) – called “table-top accelerators” because their length can be measured in centimeters instead of kilometers – promises a new breed of machines, far less expensive and with far less impact on the land and the environment than today’s conventional accelerators. (more…)

A New Vision of Democratic Individualism in ‘Awakening to Race’

Jack Turner, UW assistant professor of political science, is the author of “Awakening to Race: Individualism and Social Consciousness in America,” published this month by University of Chicago Press. He answered a few questions about his book for UW Today.

What’s the central concept behind “Awakening to Race”?

The book addresses the challenge of racial justice by asking, “What does it mean to be a self-aware human being? What does it mean to be awake to reality?”

In part, it means confronting the worst aspects of ourselves and our lives. Being awake to reality in the United States means confronting the ways America’s history of slavery, Jim Crow and white supremacy still shapes the present — the opportunities we have or we lack, the confidence we have in ourselves or fail to have in others, the ways our chances for success are still color coded. (more…)