Search Results for: Research

BY MONICA DOBIE

AMERICAN scientists from the USA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and its Horticultural Research Institute (HRI) are working together to develop new biodegradable bio-plastic pots for nursery production.

The team is developing environmentally sound pots to replace current non-biodegradable plastic models.…

STORIES BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Joint Research Centre (JRC) could be instructed to use some of its budget over 2007-13 to promote nuclear energy as an answer to cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Under amendments approved by the European Parliament’s industry, research and energy committee some of the Euro 750 million earmarked for JRC nuclear energy work would be spent on "campaigning to make politicians and the public understand nuclear energy".…

STORIES BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN research network Eureka has developed a computerised screening process that will help pharmaceutical companies assess thousands of plants for a potentially lucrative source of therapeutic compounds. At present, researchers trawl through plant samples looking for a useful species, but Eureka’s E!…

BY MONICA DOBIE

MUSHROOMS are as rich in antioxidants as more colourful vegetables according to a Penn State University, Pennsylvania, USA, study. Researchers ranked portabella and crimini mushrooms up with carrots, green beans, red peppers and broccoli as sources of dietary antioxidants.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

AN AMERICAN soya company has unveiled a new fake-meat manufacturing process that uses a blend of soya and meat protein to make faux beef and chicken. The Solae Company has launched SoleCina(TM), which it claims makes a "nutritious" product, with "virtually the same [appearance] taste and texture of traditional beef or chicken", including "beef strips, chunks, patties or steak", and "the consistency of cooked, whole muscle meat".…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A EUROPEAN Union (EU)-funded research project has been demonstrating wearable computer systems that it has been developing, at roadshows in Rome, Bremen – Germany, Athens, Madrid and Tel Aviv, Israel. The Germany-based project has developed glove-sensors acting as a mouse connected by radio via Bluetooth wireless systems to a computer, enabling users to operate simple programmes.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

European investment in renewable energy will exceed $60 billion by 2011, excluding large-scale hydroelectricity, predicts Emerging Energy Research (EER) a research and advisory company based in Spain and the United States. The firm says that the top 20 utilities have already set aside $13.3 billion for renewable energy ventures – "primarily onshore wind farms but also offshore wind, wave and tidal energy, solar, biomass and small-scale hydroelectric projects."…

BY DAVID HAWORTH

PROPOSALS for sweeping improvements to modernise the European Union’s (EU) universities were published in a strategy document approved by the European Commission yesterday (Wed 10 May).

It attacks "rigidities and hindrances" in the continent’s tertiary education and calls for "immediate, in-depth and coordinated change": from the regulation and management of systems, to the governance of universities.…

BY MONICA DOBIE

THE UNITED States’ Agricultural Research Service (ARS) has developed two new machines to improve cotton lint cleaning to help cotton ginners avoid losing good fibre during processing. Most cotton is currently processed with the same machine sequence, regardless of its specific needs, wasting good fibre.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission’s radiation section of its nuclear energy directorate has given Estonia a largely clean bill of health regarding radiological protection, but has called for some improvements. Checking the Estonian national monitoring network for environmental radioactivity, the Commission said it should compare its practices with those of other European Union member states to improve “the nature and frequency of sampling”.…