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News | Archive (2 July 2009)
Scientists find new actions of neurochemicals
— 18:00 GMT | BiologyAlthough the tiny roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans has only 302 neurones in its entire nervous system, studies of this simple animal have significantly advanced our understanding of human brain function because it shares many genes and neurochemical signalling molecules with humans. Now MIT researchers have found novel C. elegans neurochemical receptors, the discovery of which could lead to new therapeutic targets for psychiatric disorders if similar receptors are found in humans…
New form of El Nino could mean more hurricanes make landfall
— 18:00 GMT | EnvironmentEl Nino years typically result in fewer hurricanes forming in the Atlantic Ocean. But a new study, published in the 3 July issue of Science, suggests that the form of El Nino may be changing potentially causing not only a greater number of hurricanes than in average years, but also a greater chance of hurricanes making landfall, according to climatologists at the Georgia Institute of Technology…
Pacific Northwest forests could store more carbon, help address greenhouse issues
— 16:12 GMT | EnvironmentThe forests of the Pacific Northwest hold significant potential to increase carbon storage and help mitigate greenhouse gas emissions in coming years, a recent study concludes, if they are managed primarily for that purpose through timber harvest reductions and increased rotation ages…
Overweight kids experience more loneliness, anxiety
— 16:12 GMT | HealthAs childhood obesity rates continue to increase, experts agree that more information is needed about the implications of being overweight as a step toward reversing current trends. Now, a new University of Missouri study has found that overweight children, especially girls, show signs of the negative consequences of being overweight as early as kindergarten…
Natural compound stops retinopathy
— 16:07 GMT | HealthResearchers at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Centre have found a way to use a natural compound to stop one of the leading causes of blindness in the United States. The research appears online this month in the journal Diabetes, a publication of the American Diabetes Association…
Ferns took to the trees and thrived
— 16:01 GMT | BiologyAs flowering plants like giant trees quickly rose to dominate plant communities during the Cretaceous period, the ferns that had preceded them hardly saw it as a disappointment…
Sexist jokes favour the mental mechanisms that justify violence against women
— 15:56 GMT | HealthSexist jokes (and all the variants of this kind of humour) favour the mental mechanisms which urge to violence and battering against women in individuals with macho attitudes. Those are the conclusions of a study carried out at the University of Granada, that will be released today in the framework of the world most renowned international symposium about humour and its scientific applications ('International Summer School and Symposium on Humour and Laughter: Theory, Research and Applications') that will be held in Granada…
What prompts young people to take positive action to promote sustainable development?
— 15:52 GMT | EnvironmentA major change in education is the shift towards sustainable development. The United Nations has declared 2005-2014 as the decade for integrating sustainable development into all aspects of education and learning. Ellen Almers, at the School of Education and Communication, Joenkoeping, Sweden, based her thesis on her investigation into what prompts young people to take positive action to promote sustainable development…
Synote: Web-based annotation tool wins international award
— 15:47 GMT | TechnologySynote, an innovative Web-based annotation tool developed at the University of Southampton, which does for multimedia resources what indexes do for textbooks, has just won an international award. According to Dr Mike Wald at the University's School of Electronics and Computer Science (ECS), who led the team which developed Synote, the tool won the EUNIS Dorup E-Learning Award 2009 because of its innovation and the opportunities it offers to students…
In the eye of the storm: Why some people stayed behind
— 15:03 GMT | HealthHurricane Katrina was the largest natural disaster in U.S. history, claiming the lives of more than 1,800 victims and causing well over $100 billion in damage along the Gulf Coast. The 2005 storm breached every levee in New Orleans, flooding almost the entire city as well as the neighbouring parishes. Yet a surprising number of people stayed behind and rode out the storm…
Richest planetary system discovered
Pulverised planet dust might lie around double stars