Search Results for: Research

BY MONICA DOBIE and KEITH NUTHALL
SENSOR PROJECTS

RESEARCHERS from Canada’s University of Toronto have designed a screening tool that lights up when dangerous pathogens and diseases are detected in liquid samples, including water and bodily fluids. A study in Bioorganic & Medicinal Chemistry Letters explains the probe crushes cells to release DNA, then untangles a strand of DNA, (there are usually two combined), of a particular pathogen.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
DESIGNATED-driver initiatives do not reduce the number of drunk drivers on the roads, according to a new US study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. The research found that as popular as the projects may be, very few designated drivers actually abstain from alcohol and in fact, it is the least drunk person in a group, as opposed to a sober one, that usually drives.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) and Russia have agreed to intensify their work together in the nuclear sector, with the industry receiving significant attention in a new detailed cooperation agreement. It said joint nuclear projects would have “particular emphasis on nuclear safety and security”, including information exchanges.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
BETTER efforts need to be made to ensure a “culture of safety” exists in nuclear power plants worldwide, a meeting of the parties to the United Nations Convention on Nuclear Safety has concluded. Debating the current problems the idea at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) headquarters in Vienna, the meeting noted “in some instances…safety culture in nuclear power plants should be strengthened as deficiencies were reported in areas of decision-making, even management and internal communications”.…

KEITH NUTHALL
ANDRIS Piebalgs, the European Union (EU) Commissioner for energy, has announced that energy conservation would be his top overall policy priority for his five-year term, rather than developing new energy sources. The Commission would this year launch a major ‘European Energy Efficiency Initiative’, he said, which should set the EU “an ambitious but realistic and achievable target” to save, by 2010, the equivalent of 70 million tonnes of oil per annum, saving the EU Euro 15 billion annually.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE ECOLOGICAL havoc that could be wreaked by careless undersea mineral extraction at the fringes of Europe’s continental shelf will be assessed by a Euro 15 million international study. The European Commission is funding the HERMES project, which involves 36 research institutes and nine small companies from 15 countries, led by Britain’s Southampton Oceanography Centre.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
RESEARCHERS from Britain, Australia, New Zealand and the US are to map the sheep genome to secure improvements in meat and wool production. Britain’s Genesis Faraday group will work with American project leader Utah State University; New Zealand’s AgResearch; and Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation; Livestock Australia; and Australian Wool Innovation.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has announced it is funding with Euro 7 million a BASF-led research project studying the safe use of nanoparticles. This Nanosafe2 project will examine the behaviour of tiny nanotechnology particles in all goods, but especially on potential harm caused by inhaling nanoparticles incorporated in sprays and aerosols.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
SCIENTISTS from the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) in the United States have developed a industrially-usable manufacturing technique that takes the itch out of wool, makes it whiter and makes it shrink-proof. Its “biopolishing” process involves pre-treating wool with a stable, activated peroxide, which is followed by a treatment with either serine or cysteine protease cellular enzymes.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE BIGGEST obstacle faced by Europe promoting its economic growth is its failure to draw more women, young people and workers aged above 50 into its workforce, an official at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said. Its deputy research director David Robinson, speaking at the Brussels Economic Forum, said national governments rather than EU institutions should encourage the employment of these groups.…