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Army hosts yacht training camp for school children

September 19, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Nainital, Sep 18 (ANI): With an aim to revive yacht sailing in the country, a 15-day camp is being organised in Nainital district of Uttarakhand where in school children are being trained in yacht sailing.

Over 40 school students from the various parts of Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh are taking part in the camp, which is being conducted under the aegis of Indian Army’s Central Command.

The Lucknow based Central Command is conducting such adventure camps for school children from over a decade.

The participants are receiving guidance in the yacht sailing by a team of 11 Army instructors.

“This yacht sailing is a great sport because these days it’s becoming extinct. Most of the people do not want to take part and people of Nainital are also not taking so much interest in yacht sailing. But I feel it’s a very adventurous sport and a great sport,” said Karel Caprini, a participant.

Many of the participants also feel that the training would open up new job opportunities for them.

“We have come here to revive this sport and as far as I can say it’s a very good sport and there is a lot of job opportunity in it. If we do well and learn the technique, we can make our career in the sports,” said Deep, another participant.

According to the Chief instructor of the camp, Mahip Singh the main motive behind the camp is to popularise the dying sport among youth.

“Basic purpose is that sailing is an international sport and the facilities available in Uttaranchal especially, which comes under the central command. We have got our sailors, who have participated in international levels and we got the expertise. So to give the young building up generation a chance to gain knowledge and finally if they have the interest, so excel in the sport. That’s why we have organised the camp,” said Singh.

Despite being considered as a sport at the international level, yacht sailing in India is still at its nascent stage. (ANI)

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Navy inducts stealth destroyer INS Kochi

September 19, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Kochi, Sep 18 (ANI): The Indian Navy today inducted a stealth destroyer of Kolkata class, INS Kochi, to boost its maritime capabilities and safeguard India’s interests.

Madhulika Verma wife of Chief of the Naval Staff, Admiral Nirmal Verma, named the second of the three Project 15-A stealth destroyers on September 18.

Mazagon Docks Ltd in Mumbai built the 6500-ton ship, named INS Kochi.

The ship has advanced stealth features, which make it less vulnerable to detection by enemy radar and will be fitted with state-of-the-art weapon systems which include the supersonic BrahMos surface-to-surface missile, the LRSAM Long Range Surface-to-Air Missiles and the MFStar multi-function radar system providing accurate data on surface and air targets.

In addition, four AK-630 rapid-fire guns and a medium range gun will boost the ship’s close-range defence capability.

The ships will also be fitted with indigenously developed twin-tube torpedo launchers and anti-submarine rocket launchers.

The NPOL developed Humsa-NG hull-mounted sonar, and two multi-role helicopters adding punch to the ship’s anti-submarine capability. The maximum speed of the ship is above 30 Knots.

The destroyer will be launched using the pontoon-assisted launch technique, to be employed for the first time in the history of indigenous warship building.

This technique helps in overcoming slipway/ draft constraints and permits launching of heavier vessels. (ANI)

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Navy to induct stealth destroyer INS Kochi on Sep.18

September 17, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

New Delhi, Sep 16 (ANI): The Indian Navy will induct a stealth destroyer of Delhi class on September 18 to boost its maritime capabilities and safeguard India’s interests.

Madhulika Verma wife of Chief of the Naval Staff, Admiral Nirmal Verma, will launch the second of the three Project 15-A stealth destroyers on September 18.

The 6500-ton ship, to be named INS Kochi, is being built by Mazagon Docks Ltd in Mumbai. The Directorate of Naval Design has designed the destroyer indigenously. The existing Delhi Class destroyers are INS Delhi, INS Mysore and INS Mumbai.

In addition, four AK-630 rapid-fire guns and a medium range gun will boost the ship’s close-range defence capability.

The ships will also be fitted with indigenously developed twin-tube torpedo launchers and anti-submarine rocket launchers.

The NPOL developed Humsa-NG hull-mounted sonar, and two multi-role helicopters adding punch to the ship’s anti-submarine capability. The maximum speed of the ship is above 30 Knots.

The destroyer will be launched using the pontoon-assisted launch technique, to be employed for the first time in the history of indigenous warship building.

This technique helps in overcoming slipway/ draft constraints and permits launching of heavier vessels. (ANI)

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‘Two for one’ breast boosting technique not as viable as it seems

September 17, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, Sep 16 (ANI): A technology that was claimed as the ultimate solution to give a boost to women’s breasts by using fat removed from thighs is not viable as it seems, say experts.

Mel Graham, chairman of the Harley Medical Group, recently claimed that the “two for one” procedure could extract excess fat from where it was not wanted – the belly, hips or thighs – and relocate it to the bust.

However, rival cosmetic surgeons criticised the “hype” surrounding the new operation, insisting that it was “premature”.

“(This) is setting consumers up for disappointment and there are many reasons for vigilance,” the Independent quoted Dai Davies, of Plastic Surgery Partners in Harley Street, as saying.

He said that doctors have long been experimenting with innumerable aids to give women larger busts, including using body fat as a procedure.

The technique of removing fat by liposuction, and then injecting it into the chest has been tried for almost 20 years but with limited success, said Davies.

“Where you are injecting small amounts of fat into the face, which has a good blood supply, there is good evidence that it works. Most plastic surgeons would agree there is a place for it. But this involves injecting a large blob of fat into the breast area. Fat consists of living cells and living cells must have a blood supply, otherwise they die,” he explained.

In a Japanese study last year, 230 women underwent fat transfer, and it was found that, on average, half the fat injected was lost and all the women needed a second procedure after a year.

There are also fears that dying fat cells could cause micro-calcification in the breast leading to difficulties in breast screening and an increase in biopsies – an invasive procedure to remove tissue to check for cancer.

“I don’t think we should be a testing ground for all these techniques. You are feeding on a susceptible group of people. There should be controls but, sadly, the Government has decided it won’t implement regulation,” said Davies.

Professor David Sharpe, a plastic surgeon in Yorkshire and the founding chairman of the breast special interest group of BAAPS, said: “This sounds like another example of creative marketing. Breast implants are a well-tried and tested method. At the moment, I would stick with that.”

Mel Braham, chairman of the Harley Medical Group, said results of a US trial to be presented next month would demonstrate the success of the operation.

“The results will be assessed by our medical board and, if approved, the operation will be introduced next year. I don’t take risks with patients. I am confident this is a safe procedure,” he said. (ANI)

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Declining CO2 levels helped in Antarctic formation 34 million years ago

September 14, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, September 14 (ANI): In a major research study, the link between declining carbon dioxide (CO2) levels in the earth’s atmosphere and the formation of the Antarctic ice caps some 34 million years ago has been confirmed for the first time.

The research was carried out by a team of scientists from Cardiff, Bristol and Texas A and M universities, in a small East African village, where they extracted microfossils in samples of rocks which show the level of CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere at the time of the formation of the ice-cap.

Geologists have long speculated that the formation of the Antarctic ice-cap was caused by a gradually diminishing natural greenhouse effect.

The study’s findings confirm that atmospheric CO2 declined during the Eocene – Oligocene climate transition and that the Antarctic ice sheet began to form when CO2 in the atmosphere reached a tipping point of around 760 parts per million (by volume).

According to Professor Paul Pearson from Cardiff University’s School of Earth and Ocean Sciences, who led the mission to the remote East Africa village of Stakishari, “About 34 million years ago, the Earth experienced a mysterious cooling trend. Glaciers and small ice sheets developed in Antarctica, sea levels fell and temperate forests began to displace tropical-type vegetation in many areas.”

“The period, known to geologists as the Eocene – Oligocene transition, culminated in the rapid development of a continental-scale ice sheet on Antarctica, which has been there ever since,” he said.

“We therefore set out to establish whether there was a substantial decline in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels as the Antarctic ice sheet began to grow,” he added.

The team mapped large expanses of bush and wilderness and pieced together the underlying local rock formations using occasional outcrops of rocks and stream beds.

Eventually, they discovered sediments of the right age near a traditional African village called Stakishari.

By assembling a drilling rig and extracting hundreds of meters of samples from under the ground, they were able to obtain exactly the piece of Earth’s history they had been searching for.

According to co-author Dr Gavin Foster from the University of Bristol Earth Sciences Department, “By using the rather unique set of samples from Tanzania and a new analytical technique that I developed, we have, for the first time, been able to reconstruct the concentration of CO2 across the Eocene-Oligocene boundary – the time period about 34 million years ago when ice sheets first started to grow on Eastern Antarctica.” (ANI)

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Newly developed thin films show promise for solar applications

September 10, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, September 9 (ANI): Researchers at Ben-Gurion University (BGU) of the Negev in Israel have developed thin films that exhibit carrier multiplication (CM), which shows promise future solar applications.

The films were synthesized at BGU by Professor Yuval Golan and PhD student Anna Osherov of the Department of Materials Engineering and the Ilse Katz Institute for Nanoscale Science and Technology.

One of the important factors limiting solar-cell efficiency is that incident photons generate only one electron-hole pair, irrespective of the photon energy.

Any excess photon energy is lost as heat.

Carrier Multiplication (CM) has been thought to be enhanced significantly in nanocrystalline materials such as quantum dots, owing to their discrete energy levels and enhanced Coulomb interactions.

The BGU team demonstrated that contrary to this expectation, for a given photon energy, carrier multiplication occurs more efficiently in bulk PbS and PbSe films than in nanocrystalline films of the same materials.

“Films developed at BGU show CM, in which each incoming photon (tiny quantity of sunlight) creates more than one electron-hole pair,” Golan explained.

“This can potentially be used for making more efficient solar cells. The new physics behind this work are that while CM has been mostly demonstrated in nanocrystalline materials (“quantum dots”), we now show that CM can be obtained also in single crystal (‘bulk’) films of lead sulfide and lead selenide,” he said.

Notably, the films were prepared using chemical solution deposition, an attractive, inexpensive deposition technique for which the Golan group at BGU has received considerable recognition. (ANI)

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Laser cooling may be used to create “exotic” states of matter

September 10, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, September 9 (ANI): In a new study, scientists have determined that the technique of laser cooling could be used to create “exotic” states of matter.

According to a report in National Geographic News, in a new technique, Martin Weitz and Ulrich Vogl of the University of Bonn in Germany used a laser to bring the temperature of dense rubidium gas far below the normal point at which the gas becomes a solid.

Previous research had been able to use lasers to quickly “supercool” only very diluted gases.

But, “here’s a case where you shine a laser on something and it actually cools down, and not just a handful of atoms, but a macroscopic object,” said Trey Porto, a physicist with the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s laser-cooling group.

The process could be used to create fascinating new states of matter, according to the study authors.

“For example, if you can very quickly cool water much lower than zero Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit), where it would normally turn to ice, exotic crystalline and glassy states of matter would be predicted,” Weitz said.

The new technique could also be used in cooling mechanisms to boost the efficiency of some stargazing equipment, he added.

“If you could cool thermal cameras that look at the stars, they may have less noise and be more sensitive,” he said.

Since a laser’s color is linked to its intensity, the new technique is based on using a red laser in which the frequency has been adjusted so that the beam affects the atoms only when they collide with each other.

Weitz and Vogl shone this laser beam into gaseous rubidium atoms in a high-pressure “atmosphere” of argon.

In the experiment, the rubidium gas fell from 662 degrees Fahrenheit (350 degrees Celsius) to almost 536 degrees Fahrenheit (280 degrees Celsius) within mere seconds.

Much more research needs to be done before the laser-cooling process can be used in real-world applications, study co-author Weitz cautioned.

But, NIST’s Porto said the work already represents a major departure from traditional cooling of diluted gases, which are currently used for studying quantum effects or preparing gas samples for atomic clocks.

“I think the really amazing thing is that you can even get cooling in this regime, because it’s a really dense gas and a very different mechanism,” Porto said.

“Traditional cooling powers are so tiny. To cool a physical object by a measurable degree with a laser is amazing,” he added. (ANI)

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Novel biosensor can detect typhoid bacteria instantly

September 10, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Sept 9 (ANI): Scientists from Rovira i Virgili University (URV) in Tarragona have come up with a novel biosensor that can instantly detect Salmonella typhi, the bacteria that causes typhoid fever.

The technique uses carbon nanotubes and synthetic DNA fragments that activate an electric signal when they link up with the pathogen.

“We have developed a new biosensor that can detect extremely low concentrations of bacteria immediately, easily and reliably”, F. Xavier Rius, lead author of the study and a professor in the Chemometrics, Qualimetrics and Nanosensors research group in the Analytical Chemistry and Organic Chemistry Department of the URV, told SINC.

The new biosensor functions using a method, which involves carbon nanotubes with inbuilt aptamers providing electrochemical readings.

According to the researchers, the aptamers are small fragments of artificial DNA or RNA designed to attach themselves specifically to a particular molecule, cell or micro organism, in this case Salmonella.

If the bacteria are not present, the aptamers remain on the walls of the carbon nanotubes.

However, if they detect bacteria, they become activated and stick to it, and the carbon nanotubes generate an electric signal that is picked up by a simple potentiometer connected to the biosensor.

“The presence of the bacteria sparks a change in the interaction between the aptamers and the nanotubes, which takes place in a few seconds and creates an increase in the voltage of the electrode”, said Ruis, who led the research along with researcher Jordi Riu.

“This technique means small quantities of micro organisms can be detected simply and practically in real time, just the same as measuring the pH of water”, Ruis added.

The study appears in the scientific journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition. (ANI)

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Punjab authorities launch drive to uproot “Congress Grass”

September 6, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Nag Khurd (Amritsar), Sep.5 (ANI): Farmers in Punjab are confronted with an unusual problem these days. A weed described as “Congress Grass” has covered all soil-bunds in the fields here and the administration is taking up measures to educate farmers about how to obviate it.

The “Congress Grass” is said to be a major biological pollutant of the environment. It is described as one of the seven most destructive weeds of the world.

Locally known as ‘Gajar Buti’, the Congress Grass has become an ecological nuisance especially on sides of link roads and other waste lands. It causes Asthma, Allergy and skin diseases to humans and also the animals.

It becomes a host for dangerous insects. Nowadays the vast growth of this weed can also be seen on roadsides and other wastelands.

Observing its harmful effects on the fields, the agriculture department has decided to pull out the “Congress grass” from its roots.

It is a mechanical technique in which fodder cutter machines attached to tractors are to be used to clear the area covered up by Congress Grass.

The novel technique of mechanical removal of this weed from the sides of link roads and wastelands in Amritsar district was started on Thursday.

Authorities are spreading public awareness among farmers through demonstrations about the new technique with the help of fodder cutting machine by eradicating Congress Grass.

With the help of the machines, the farmers are able to get rid of this menace of “Congress Grass” more effectively and rapidly.

The idea to use fodder cutting machine for this purpose has been conceived by Deputy Commissioner, Amritsar, Kahn Singh Pannu.

On Thursday, Pannu demonstrated to farmers by driving a tractor in Nag Khurd village in Majitha area about how to pull out the “Congress Grass”.

Talking to ANI Pannu said, this is first time in Punjab that they are cutting the hazardous weed “Congress Grass” with fodder cutter machines and it is giving god results.

According to Pannu, Congress Grass is not only harmful to the crop but also causes severe skin problems like rashes and itching and some time cause respiratory diseases.

“Through demonstration, we are creating awareness and educating the farmers to get rid of this unwanted weed by applying new methods,” Pannu said.

With the help of department of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Rural Development, about 20 Fodder Cutter Machines in the district will be employed for the removal of the Congress Grass from the berms and the waste lands in the district.

The farmers, who own these machines, will operate them to remove the weed and they will be paid for their services by the Panchayats (village councils).

“Since these day we have ample time so we would pull out the Congress Grass by applying the new method,” said Satnam Singh, a farmer, while adding that it is more convenient as there has been always a shortage of labour in Punjab.

“Apart from the damage to crop through reduced yields, Congress Grass is weakening the strength of the land,” said Inder Preet Singh, another farmer.

Appreciating the efforts being made by administrative authorities, Singh said he feels that agriculture department should organize more camps so that the more farmers could benefit by eradicating the Congress Grass from their field. By Ravinder Singh Robin(ANI)

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New ultrasensitive electronic sensor to speed up DNA testing (corrected)

September 1, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Sept 1 (ANI): Singapore scientists have developed a new ultrasensitive electronic sensor that would speed up DNA testing for disease diagnosis and biological research.

The novel electronic sensor array would be rapid, accurate and cost-efficient.

According to lead researcher Dr Zhiqiang Gao, from Singapore’s Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (IBN), the Nanogap Sensor Array has shown “excellent” sensitivity at detecting trace amounts of DNA.

“By saving time and lowering expenses, our newly developed Nanogap Sensor Array offers a scalable and viable alternative for DNA testing,” said Gao.

The biosensor translates the presence of DNA into an electrical signal for computer analysis.

The distinctively designed sensor chip has the ability to detect DNA more efficiently by “sandwiching” the DNA strands between the two different surfaces.

“The novel vertical nanostructure design and two different surfaces of the sensor allow ultrasensitive detection of DNA,” said Gao.

“This sensitivity is best-in-class among electrical DNA biosensors. The design of the sensor also took into consideration the feasibility of mass production in a cost-effective way for expanded usage,” the expert added.

Presently, human DNA is detected through the use of polymerase chain reaction (PCR), which while effective, is also expensive, cumbersome and time-consuming for widespread use.

Although effective, tests involving PCR may not be optimal for situations such as a pandemic outbreak.

The biosensor captures DNA strands more effectively. This is possible because the two surfaces of the sensor are coated with a chemically treated “capture probe” solution through an electrochemical technique specially developed by IBN.

This allows DNA strands to “stick” more easily to the sensor, resulting in a faster and more accurate analysis.

“This new biosensor holds significant promise to speed up on-going efforts in the detection and diagnosis of debilitating diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular problems and infectious viruses,” said Dr Jackie Y. Ying, Executive Director of IBN, one of the research institutes of Singapore’s Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR).

“We aim to make healthcare accessible to the masses with early disease diagnosis as the critical driving force behind the research we undertake here at IBN,” she added.

The study appears in Journal of the American Chemical Society. (ANI)

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New, improved zebrafish cloning method may further human health research

September 1, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, August 31 (ANI): In what may eventually prove very useful in human health research, scientists at Michigan State University have come up with a more efficient method to clone zebra fish.

What makes this work an important achievement is the fact that zebra fish, which have served as an excellent model for understanding normal development and birth defects for more than 20 years, are quickly becoming the animal of choice for many researchers.

“After the mouse, it is the most commonly used vertebrate in genetic studies. It is used in cancer research and cardiovascular research because they have many of the same genes we have,” Nature magazine quoted Jose Cibelli, an MSU professor of Animal Science, as saying.

While previous methods of cloning zebra fish have had very low success rates, the MSU researchers say that their novel method can increase the number of cloned fish that can be obtained from an adult fin cell or an embryonic tail clip increased by 2 percent to 13 percent, respectively.

What makes zebra fish so useful in research is their eggs are transparent and the fish’s development is easy to follow.

Improving on the techniques of zebra fish cloning also is important because currently only the mouse remains the best model for gene targeting.

“So far the mouse is the only one from which you can delete genes in a reliable fashion. What researchers do is mutate a gene, abolish its function completely, and then study the consequences,” Cibelli said.

A research article describing the novel technique has been published in the journal Nature Methods. (ANI)

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Anna Friel follows Madge’s fitness technique for Breakfast At Tiffany’s

September 1, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, Aug 31 (ANI): Actress Anna Friel is apparently using the same technique as Queen of Pop Madonna, to get that perfect shape for her new role in a stage version of Breakfast At Tiffany’s.

The former Brookside star has installed a hi-tech Power Plate fitness machine outside her trailer, similar to the one that ‘Material Girl’ hitmaker uses when on a tour.

“I hate workouts and having a trainer so I had this outside my trailer,” the Daily Express quoted Friel as saying.

She added: “You stand on it and if you hold a squat it makes every muscle vibrate 40 times per second. You only have to do 10 minutes a day.”

Mentioning the funny side of her workouts, the beauty said: “People would walk past and say, ‘Oh, Anna’s at it, she’s vibrating again,’ “

Friel has recently been working on the film ‘Land Of The Lost’ too.(ANI)

Filed Under: Entertainment News Tagged With: Actress, ANI, anna, Anna Friel, Aug, beauty, breakfast, breakfast at tiffany, brookside, daily, daily express, day, Express, film, film land, fitness, Fitness Machine, funny side, Girl, hitmaker, land, land of the lost, London, machine, Madge, Madonna, material, material girl, mentioning, muscle, Perfect Shape, plate, pop, power, Power Plate, queen, Queen of Pop, role, Second, shape, side, stage, stage version, star, technique, Tiffany, tour, trailer, trainer, version, vibrate, workouts

New stem cell op may prevent thousands from having hip replacements

September 1, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, August 31 (ANI): British surgeons at the Spire Hospital in Southampton are using a novel technique that uses stem cells to repair damaged bones.

Media reports on this procedure suggest that it may prevent thousands of people from needing to have an artificial hip fitted.

Mark Venables, 39, is one patient on whom doctors at the Spire Hospital conducted one of their first operations.

He suffers from a condition where bone in his hip died, weakening his joint and causing pain on movement.

The surgeons at the hospital used his own stem cells to rejuvenate the affected bone.

“I just want to get back to an active life,” Sky News quoted Venables as saying before the operation.

For the operation, the surgeons first purified stem cells from bone marrow that they had extracted from Venables’ pelvis.

The doctors then mixed them with cleaned, ground-up bone from another patient, who had had their own hip replaced.

After removing the dead tissue from the ball of his hip, the doctors filled the cavity with the mixture of stem cells and donated bone.

Surgeon Doug Dunlop said that the bone would have collapsed without the stem cell treatment, and that Venables would have then needed an artificial hip joint.

“If this new procedure works, he won’t need a hip replacement. It will fix his hip for life,” said Dunlop.

To date, six patients have been operated using the new procedure, and only one surgery has failed.

Professor Richard Oreffo, of Southampton University, is now hoping to improve the technique further by replacing the donated bone with an artificial material containing chemicals that help the stem cells grow.(ANI)

Filed Under: Health News Tagged With: active life, ANI, August, ball, bone, Bone marrow, bones, cavity, cell, chemicals, condition, date, Dead Tissue, doctors, Doug Dunlop, hip, hip replacement, hip replacements, hospital, life, London, Mark Venables, Marrow, material, media, mixture, movement, New, NEWS, novel, Novel Technique, operation, pain, patient, Pelvis, procedure, professor richard, Professor Richard Oreffo, replacement, sky, sky news, southampton, southampton university, SPIRE, stem, Stem cell, stem cells, surgeon, surgery, technique, tissue, treatment, University, Venables

Slow-moving faults may help protect some cities against destructive quakes

August 29, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, August 29 (ANI): A new research by scientists from the University of Arizona (UA) in Tucson has determined that some slow-moving faults may help protect some regions of Italy and other parts of the world against destructive earthquakes.

Until now, geologists thought when the crack between two pieces of the Earth’s crust was at a very gentle slope, there was no movement along that particular fault line.

“This study is the first to show that low-angle normal faults are definitely active,” said Sigrun Hreinsdottir, UA geosciences research associate.

According to Richard A. Bennett, a UA assistant professor of geosciences, “We can show that the Alto Tiberina fault beneath Perugia is steadily slipping as we speak – fortunately, for Perugia, without producing large earthquakes.”

Perugia is the capital city of Italy’s Umbria region.

Creeping slowly is unusual. Most faults stick, causing strain to build up, and then become unstuck with a big jerk. Big jerks are big earthquakes.

For decades, researchers have known about the Alto Tiberina and similar faults and debated whether such features in the Earth’s crust were faults at all, because they didn’t seem to produce earthquakes.

Hreinsdottir and Bennett have now shown that the gently sloping fault beneath Perugia is moving steadily at the rate of approximately one-tenth of an inch (2.4 mm) a year.

Perugia has not experienced a damaging earthquake in about 2,000 years, according to Hreinsdottir.

“Because the fault is actively slipping, it might not be collecting strain. To have an earthquake, you have to have strain,” she said.

Other towns in the region that lie near steeply sloping faults, including L’Aquila and Assisi, have experienced large earthquakes within the last 20 years.

The UA team became interested in the Alto Tiberina fault because previous research suggested the fault might be moving.

To check on the fault, the UA team measured rock movements in and around Perugia using a technique called geodesy.

The geodesy network can tell where one antenna and its rock are relative to another antenna. Taking repeated measurements over time shows whether the rocks moved relative to one another.

The UA team analyzed data from 19 GPS stations within approximately a 30-mile (50 km) radius around Perugia.

“Having such closely spaced stations and several years of data were key for detecting the fault’s tiny motions,” said Hreinsdottir.

“This study is one more piece in the puzzle to understand seismic hazards in the region and can apply to other regions of the world that have low-angle normal faults,” she added. (ANI)

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Novel method to make safer human stem cells uses just one gene

August 29, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, Aug 29 (ANI): Inching closer to curing diseases like Parkinson’s using cells generated from a patient’s own body, researchers have successfully reprogrammed human nerve cells back to an embryo-like state by using just a single gene.

It is known that embryonic stem cells are pluripotent – they can develop into any of the body’s cell types.

But such cells are not available in large numbers, as they can only be harvested from a donated egg or embryo, and, for ethical reasons, most countries have laws restricting their use.

In 2006, Shinya Yamanaka and his colleagues at Kyoto University in Japan successfully made mouse cells pluripotent by reprogramming skin cells into a state like embryo cells.

They did so by using retroviruses to insert four genes – known as “factors” – into the cells’ DNA.

They repeated the trick a year later with human cells.

However, using genes and retroviruses in this way increases the risk of the cell becoming cancerous, not just because tinkering with DNA has that effect, but also because two of the four factors are known to cause cancer.

In a bid to make these promising cells in a safe way, Hans Scholer’s team at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine in Münster, Germany, has been working to achieve pluripotency using fewer factors.

Last year, they did this with the two factors that do not cause cancer, and now they have simplified the recipe further, doing it with just one.

“Remarkably, it turns out that three of these four essential factors are already expressed in human neural stem cells – although not in skin cells – so we only needed to add one factor, OCT4,” New Scientist quoted Boris Greber, a member of the team, as saying.

He said that the cells from neural tissue are much easier to reprogram than skin cells, and are less prone to mutations.

It is much harder to get a sample of neural stem cells than skin cells, as it can be done via extracting the cells from the dental pulp of teeth, said Greber.

Inserting even one gene into the chromosome of a cell still permanently modifies its DNA, which is why the new method will remain a lab tool instead of being allowed in the clinic.

However, the researchers are hoping that it will help them improve methods for producing embryonic stem cells.

“Ideally, we will be able to find a chemical that does the same job of expressing the factor without the need for a gene,” said Greber.

Earlier this year, researchers in California managed just that when they reprogrammed mouse fibroblasts using a cocktail of proteins.

That technique did not involve inserting genes, and, thus, shouldn’t raise the cancer risk. But that was far less efficient.

“Without stable intervention using viruses, the frequency of reprogramming goes down and you have to wait a long time. We don’t have the perfect method yet,” said Greber.

The study has been published in the journal Nature. (ANI)

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McGrath’s advice to Johnson: Keep it simple

August 27, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Sydney, Aug.27 (ANI): Former Australian fast bowler Glenn McGrath has told left-arm quick Mitchell Johnson not to overdo or over think things and keep things simple if he wants to reach his considerable potential as a Test match bowler.

McGrath, who has high hopes for Johnson and the other two members of Australia’s Ashes pace attack – Ben Hilfenhaus and Peter Siddle, feels Johnson’s potential, will be reached only through a clear head uncluttered by countless theories about his bowling technique.

Though finishing with a solid return of 20 wickets at 32 in the Ashes series, Johnson was not the rampant force he was in South Africa and earlier at home.

“All his problems were sorted out when Michael Clarke said to him ‘just bowl fast’,” McGrath said.

“I can understand that. He needs to keep it simple. That is the key. He just has to clear his head and not complicate things. Less things can go wrong when you keep it simple. I just used to switch a voice off in my head, pick out a song to sing at the top of my mark and trust myself that my body knew how to bowl. It didn’t always work. But if you win the battle with yourself you are 75 per cent towards being successful,” the Courier Mail quoted McGrath, as saying.

“That’s all Mitch needs to do. Just relax. Even when he isn’t bowling well he still takes wickets. It is just a confidence thing. He needs to just run in and bowl,” he added.

McGrath also felt that Brett Lee can again return as a Test match force for Australia but the Johnson-Siddle-Hilfenhaus union has the potential to be a long-term one for Australia.

“Those three guys will grow as time goes on. They were the leading wicket-takers in the Ashes from both teams. You can’t really sledge them too much because I think they have done pretty well,” he said.

McGrath said Lee bowled well in an early tour game before being injured and cannot be dismissed from Test match calculations this summer when Australia play the West Indies and Pakistan in three-Test series.(ANI)

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Gene breakthrough could banish inherited diseases

August 27, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, Aug 26 (ANI): Researchers at Oregon Health and Science University’s Oregon National Primate Research Center (ONPRC) have developed a new technique that could banish a host of crippling inherited diseases forever.

The landmark research raises the prospect of wiping out diseases passed on from mothers to their children through mutated DNA in cell mitochondria.

“We believe this discovery in nonhuman primates can rapidly be translated into human therapies aimed at preventing inherited disorders passed from mothers to their children through the mitochondrial DNA, such as certain forms of cancer, diabetes, infertility, myopathies and neurodegenerative diseases,” said Shoukhrat Mitalipov, from Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU).

Mitochondria are structures that are found in all cells that provide energy for cell growth and metabolism, which is why they are often called the cell’s “power plant.”

The structures produce energy to power each individual cell. Mitochondria also carry their own genetic material.

When an egg cell is fertilized by a sperm cell during reproduction, the embryo almost exclusively inherits the maternal mitochondria present in the egg. This means that any disease-causing genetic mutations that a mother carries in her mitochondrial DNA can be passed on to her offspring.

OHSU researchers’ method transfers the mother’s chromosomes to a donated egg that has had its chromosomes removed, but which has healthy mitochondria, thereby preventing the disease from being passed on to one’s offspring.

During the research, scientists collected groups of unfertilized eggs from two female rhesus macaque monkeys (monkeys A and B). They then removed the chromosomes, which contain the genes found in the cell nucleus, from the eggs of monkey B, and then transplanted the nuclear genes from the eggs of monkey A into the eggs of monkey B.

Then the eggs from monkey B, which now contained their own mitochondria but monkey A’s nuclear genes, were fertilized. The fertilized eggs developed into embryos that were implanted in surrogate monkeys.

The initial implantation of two embryos resulted in the birth of healthy twin monkeys. These monkeys are the world’s first animals derived by spindle transfer.

Follow-up testing showed that there was little to no trace of cross-animal mitochondrial transfer using this procedure. This shows that the researchers were successful in isolating nuclear genetic material from mitochondrial genetic material during the transfer process.

“In theory, this research has demonstrated that it is possible to use this therapy in mothers carrying mitochondrial DNA diseases so that we can prevent those diseases from being passed on to their offspring,” Mitalipov said.

“We believe that with the proper governmental approvals, our work can rapidly be translated into clinical trials for humans, and, eventually, approved therapies,” Mitalipov added.

The research has been published in the Aug. 26 advance online edition of the journal Nature. (ANI)

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Foul odour from industrial chicken rendering facilities may soon be history

August 27, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Aug 27 (ANI): A research team led by Indian-origin scientist from North Carolina State University has devised a new technique that can help eliminate foul odour and air pollutants from industrial chicken rendering facilities.

Rendering facilities take animal byproducts (e.g., skin, bones, feathers) and process them into useful products such as fertilizer. However, the rendering process produces extremely foul odours.

Currently, the industry uses chemical “scrubbers” to remove odor-causing agents, but this technique is not very effective.

Furthermore, some of the odour-causing compounds are aldehydes, which can combine with other atmospheric compounds to form ozone – triggering asthma attacks and causing other adverse respiratory health effects.

According to Praveen Kolar, assistant professor of biological and agricultural engineering, the inexpensive treatment process uses ozone and specially-designed catalysts to break down the odour-causing compounds.

The new technique with an effective filtration system takes advantage of catalytic oxidation to remove these odour-causing pollutants.

This process takes place at room temperature, so there are no energy costs, and results in only two byproducts: carbon dioxide and pure water.

The researchers developed the catalysts by coating structures made of activated carbon with a nanoscale film made of cobalt or nickel oxides.

“We used activated carbon because its porous structure gives it an extremely large surface area meaning that there is more area that can be exposed to the odorous agents,” said Kolar.

The cobalt and nickel oxide nanofilms make excellent catalysts, Kolar explains, “because they increase the rate of the chemical reaction between the odour-causing compounds and the ozone, making the process more efficient. They are also metals that are both readily available and relatively inexpensive.” (ANI)

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New technique to help Parkinson’s patients speak louder

August 26, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Aug 26 (ANI): Scientists from Purdue University’s Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences have come up with a novel technique that would help Parkinson’s patients speak louder.

“People with Parkinson’s disease commonly have voice and speech problems,” said Jessica Huber, an associate professor in Purdue’s Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences.

“At some point in their disease they will have some form of voice or speech disorder that generally occurs a little later in the disease,” she added.

The most common therapy, the Lee Silverman voice treatment program, trains patients to speak louder in one-hour sessions four days a week for a month.

“Some Parkinson’s patients do great with this approach, but others do not. They forget to keep speaking louder the minute they have left the therapy room,” said Huber.

Lee Silverman tends to work less for people with later stages of disease or those who have some cognitive decline.

Huber used a new approach: The patients were asked to speak louder while a recording of background “multitalker babble noise” was played. The noise is essentially the sound of a restaurant full of patrons, but without the clattering silverware and clinking glasses.

“They had an easier time getting louder when I had the noise in the room,” she said.

“Ordinarily, when I asked them to be twice as loud they would say they couldn’t. They couldn’t speak 10 decibels louder, but when I turned on the babble noise, they spoke over 10 decibels louder,” she added.

In the device built by engineering resources manager Jim Jones and senior research engineer Kirk Foster, both in the Weldon School, the voice-activated device automatically plays the background babble when the person begins to speak.

A sensor placed on the neck detects that the person has begun to speak and tells the device to play the babble through an earpiece worn by the patient.

“I got the idea that if we train them with a natural cue in their everyday environment, we will probably get better results. We ask them to wear the system for about four hours a day as they go about their daily routine,” she added.(ANI)

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Collingwood says he knows he has to improve to keep his place

August 26, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, Aug.26 (ANI): England middle order batsman Paul Collingwood has said that he knows he has to improve as a batsman to keep his place in the England side.

Collingwood, who takes over as England’s captain this week for a one-dayer against Ireland in Belfast on Thursday and two Twenty20 internationals against Australia next week, was quoted by The Independent as saying: “I know I am going to have to tinker a bit with technique and become a better player to be able to stay in the side.”

“But I am willing to do that. I am still at an age when I am enjoying my cricket. He [Trott] came in and had a dream debut and I understand the position I am in. I am going to have to work my absolute nuts off to keep my place. I know I can do it and I still feel I am fit enough and mentally strong enough to do that,” he added.

After his match-saving innings of 75 in Cardiff, Collingwood’s final four innings were worth just 42 runs.

The Australians shut off Collingwood’s leg-side options, and now he is in the familiar position of fighting for his place in the side at the age of 33.

“I’ve had a great year playing Test cricket,” he said. “Look at my stats, they have been good. I would have loved to have played a lot better in last few Tests but the innings in Cardiff went a long way to winning these Ashes,” he says in his favour.

Perhaps it was the knowledge this could be his last crack at the Australians which made Collingwood appear the most nervous England player on Sunday, when he dropped several catches, including one at slip he would normally take with his cap pulled over his eyes.

“People sometimes think we are robots and don’t have emotions and nerves don’t get to us but believe me the closer you get to winning the Ashes the more nervous you become,” he said. (ANI)

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Gene breakthrough could banish inherited diseases

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New technique to help Parkinson’s patients speak louder

Collingwood says he knows he has to improve to keep his place

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