Canadian researchers spent nearly 300 hours observing and carrying out interviews with staff, patients and families in an intensive care unit and a palliative care unit for people with terminal illnesses. They concluded that "combined with scientific skill and compassion, humor offers a humanizing dimension in healthcare that is too valuable to be overlooked."
Chemists report that carbon dioxide removed from smokestack emissions in order to slow global warming could become a valuable raw material for the production of DVDs, beverage bottles and other products made from polycarbonate plastics.
New research suggests that many children diagnosed with severe language disorders in the 1980s and 1990s would today be diagnosed as having autism. The research supports the theory that the rise in the number of cases of autism may be related to changes in how it is diagnosed.
Engineers are creating a wireless device designed to be injected into tumors to tell doctors the precise dose of radiation received and locate the exact position of tumors during treatment.
The Human Genome Project revealed that only a small fraction of the 3 billion "letter" DNA code actually instructs cells to manufacture proteins, the workhorses of most life processes. This has raised the question of what the remaining part of the human genome does. How much of the rest performs other biological functions, and how much is merely residue of prior genetic events?
In one of the first clinical trials involving men 60-85 years of age, researchers' preliminary results indicate that testosterone treatment for five months has a positive effect on the bone markers of older men. This is the first known study to report on the impact of bone metabolism based on dosing schedules.
The relationship between a thin liquid film or drop of liquid and the shape of the surface that it wets is explained with a new simplified mathematical formula. Understanding the precise interaction between liquids and surfaces is important for a number of areas, including the chemical industry and new nanotechnologies.
If you've always suspected there are unknown things living in the dark and dusty corners of your home and office, scientists are now one step closer to cataloguing exactly what might be lurking in your indoor environment. Buildings have their own pattern of bacteria in indoor dust, which includes species normally found in the human gut, according to new research. Bacteria in indoor dust are diverse, thanks to the people around us.
Imaging the olfactory bulb of awake rats reveals that odor discrimination occurs about 100 milliseconds after sensory input reaches the brain, sharply limiting the role that spike rate and temporal integration can play in coding odor identity.
"Mother cells" which produce the neurons affected by Parkinson's disease have been identified by scientists. The new discovery could pave the way for future treatments for the disease, including the possibility of growing new neurons, and the cells which support them, in the lab. Scientists hope these could then be transplanted into patients to counteract the damage caused by Parkinson's.
Judicial review sought of decision to allow university researchers to create human-animal embryos Source: guardian.co.uk Science | 9 Apr 2008 | 10:47 am
Archaeologists say they have broken through to a layer which could help to explain why Stonehenge was built. Source: BBC News | Science/Nature | UK Edition | 9 Apr 2008 | 10:42 am
US doctors have carried out what is believed to be the world's first simultaneous six-way kidney transplant. Source: BBC News | Science/Nature | UK Edition | 9 Apr 2008 | 10:12 am
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (Reuters) - Revenues from worldwide government and private spending on space projects rose to $251 billion last year, up 11 percent from 2006 despite slowing growth in many countries, an analysis released on Tuesday said.
Scientists find link between rapid growth as a baby and the long-term rise in a person's metabolism Source: guardian.co.uk Science | 8 Apr 2008 | 11:08 pm
BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan (Reuters) - A Russian Soyuz rocket carrying South Korea's first astronaut blasted off into space on Tuesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
DETROIT (Reuters) - When Tom Weatherbee swapped his minivan for a Toyota Prius hybrid two years ago, he was mostly hoping to save money at the gas pump.
A targeted cull of badgers is to go ahead in Wales as part of plans to combat the spread of TB in cattle. Source: BBC News | Science/Nature | UK Edition | 8 Apr 2008 | 3:16 pm
TOKYO (Reuters) - Robots could fill the jobs of 3.5 million people in graying Japan by 2025, a thinktank says, helping to avert worker shortages as the country's population shrinks.
The creator of DNA fingerprinting
heads the shortlist for the prestigious Millennium Technology Prize. Source: BBC News | Science/Nature | UK Edition | 8 Apr 2008 | 2:03 pm
Intel reveal details of a patent for protecting future generations of computers from the growing threat of cosmic rays. Source: BBC News | Science/Nature | UK Edition | 8 Apr 2008 | 11:43 am
South Korea's first astronaut, Yi So-yeon, blasts off for a sojourn on the International Space Station. Source: BBC News | Science/Nature | UK Edition | 8 Apr 2008 | 11:22 am
CANBERRA (Reuters) - The first images of a German merchant raider sunk in a fierce battle with an Australian warship more than 66 years ago were released on Tuesday by international deep-ocean wreck hunters.
