Search Results for: Research

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission wants to spend Euro 2.8 billion on Euratom nuclear research from 2007 to 2013, say its new detailed proposals for the next Seventh Framework Programme (7FP) on research. If the European Union Council of Ministers approves this budget – and there is a significant risk of a reduction – the money will be shared by the EU Joint Research Centre and other EU nuclear researchers.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
EXPOSURE to pesticides kills farmers so why are we still using them?

In Britain, farmers, most of them without knowing and unaware that their symptoms are linked to insecticide use, have poisoned their bodies by repeatedly being exposed to these dangerous chemicals.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UNITED Nations’ International Seabed Authority has postponed agreement of new regulations governing how mining companies would explore and exploit deep seawaters for hauls such as polymetallic sulphide nodules and cobalt-rich crusts. These mineral resources are rich in copper, iron, zinc, silver, gold and cobalt, with the sulphides being found around volcanic areas and the crusts on oceanic ridges.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE CREATION of a European centre for drug safety, coordinating safety checks staged by biomedical pharmaceutical manufacturers, has been proposed by a European Technology Platform on innovative medicines. The private-public group made the suggestion in a biomedicine strategic research agenda, which aims to improve predictivity of safety evaluation and efficacy assessments; knowledge management, and training.…

BY DEIRDRE MASON
EXCITING developments in malaria vaccine research may lead to a strengthened armoury against a disease that now infects about 400 million people worldwide and kills close to 2 million children a year. An international research project, led by Dr Adrian Batchelor from Maryland University, USA, has pinpointed a section of an important segment of “apical membrane antigen 1” or AMA-1 to those in the know, a protein produced by the malaria parasite during a critical stage of this complex, but deadly, organism’s development.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
HOW would you like the idea of a swarm of hundreds of tiny microscopic robots, each one smaller than an ant’s eye, charging through your body inspecting its defences against disease and injury and making repairs and improvements?…

BY ALAN OSBORN
BRITAIN is not normally thought of being subject to landslides and avalanches in the way that Alpine countries are, but the coming of climate change has made these natural disasters a real and potentially very expensive threat to us.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
THE USA’S Agricultural Research Service (ARS) has unveiled a natural super-carbohydrate ingredient, which can be used to make biscuits and cookies, promoting good health, whilst allowing consumers to indulge their sweet tooth. Its researcher George Inglett says Calorie-Trim (or C-Trim) is made from whole oats and barley, containing 20-50% soluble fibre beta-glucan, 5-10 times more than in standard oats, flour and oatmeal.…

KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN Union (EU) energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs has again demonstrated his commitment to energy conservation, highlighting it in an action plan to help Europe fend off potential economic damage caused by high oil prices.

In a five-point plan, the Latvian put reducing energy demand ahead of developing alternatives to oil and gas, garnering better information about oil markets and increasing oil and gas supplies.…

BY MARK ROWE
ON Boxing Day 2004, as the shockwaves from the tsunami rolled out across the Indian Ocean, one very important procedure quietly went according to plan. Detectors at the Indira Gandhi Kalpakkam power station on India’s east coast sensed the rising water levels and automatically shut the plant down.…