Technology

Largest Meteorite Hunt in History Yields Treasure for UA

Thanks to the generosity of three professional meteorite hunters, the UA Lunar and Planetary Laboratory will own three samples of a rare kind of meteorite leftover from the earliest beginnings of the solar system.

To the untrained eye, the black, smooth-edged lump that is sitting under a glass cover looks similar to a piece of charcoal. But to scientists Dante Lauretta and Ed Beshore from the University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, it is one of the most intriguing stones they have ever seen.

“This meteorite is the oldest rock you’ll ever find on Earth. In fact, it formed 50 to 60 million years before the Earth even existed,” said Lauretta, who is a professor of planetary science and principal investigator of NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, which will send a spacecraft to return a sample from an asteroid in 2023. (more…)

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How Public Should Public Records Be? Increased Availability Sparks Privacy Concerns

Online technology has vastly increased citizens’ access to public records such as political campaign contributions and real estate transactions. But that explosion of information availability also sparks privacy concerns and may dampen some people’s willingness to engage in public activities, according to recent research.

Six researchers, including two from the University of Washington, co-authored the paper “Attitudes Toward Online Availability of U.S. Public Records.” It was presented at the Proceedings of the 12th Annual International Digital Government Research Conference in College Park, Md. An expanded version of the article will appear in a forthcoming issue of Information Polity. (more…)

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Feeding Tubes May Worsen Pressure Ulcer Risk

In the Archives of Internal Medicine, researchers report that despite the conventional wisdom that feeding tubes help dementia patients resist pressure ulcers, feeding tubes actually are associated with an increased risk of ulcers developing. The tubes also don’t promote healing.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — A new study led by Brown University researchers reports that percutaneous endoscopic gastric (PEG) feeding tubes, long assumed to help bedridden dementia patients stave off or overcome pressure ulcers, may instead make the horrible sores more likely to develop or not improve. (more…)

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UMD Finding May Hold Key to Gaia Theory of Earth as Living Organism

Discovery ultimately could lead to better climate understanding and prediction

COLLEGE PARK, Md. Is Earth really a sort of giant living organism as the Gaia hypothesis predicts? A new discovery made at the University of Maryland may provide a key to answering this question. This key of sulfur could allow scientists to unlock heretofore hidden interactions between ocean organisms, atmosphere, and land — interactions that might provide evidence supporting this famous theory. (more…)

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Biosensor Illuminates Compounds to Aid Fight Against TB

EAST LANSING, Mich. — For his work on developing new treatments for tuberculosis, a Michigan State University researcher has been named a Grand Challenges Explorations winner, an initiative funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Robert Abramovitch of MSU’s Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics is using a synthetic biosensor that glows green in response to conditions that mimic human tuberculosis infection. He will screen for compounds that target chronic TB infection and may help shorten therapy or treat multidrug-resistant TB, which does not respond well to existing antibiotics. (more…)

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Energy in Action

For two molecules on blind date, new method predicts potential for attraction or repulsion

Krzysztof Szalewicz, professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Delaware, and Rafal Podeszwa of the University of Silesia Institute of Chemistry in Poland have developed and validated a more accurate method for predicting the interaction energy of large molecules, such as biomolecules used to develop new drugs.

The research is reported as a communication in the April 27 issue of the Journal of Chemical Physics, which is the most highly cited journal in atomic, molecular and chemical physics according to Thomson Reuters. The journal is published by the American Institute of Physics. Despite appearing at the end of April, the paper was on the list of the 20 most-read articles in JCP for that month. (more…)

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