ScienceDaily Technology Headlines -- for Sunday, November 20, 2011

ScienceDaily Technology Headlines

for Sunday, November 20, 2011

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Light created from a vacuum: Casimir effect observed in superconducting circuit (November 19, 2011) -- Scientists have succeeded in creating light from vacuum – observing an effect first predicted over 40 years ago. In an innovative experiment, the scientists have managed to capture some of the photons that are constantly appearing and disappearing in the vacuum. ... > full story

New tool saves time, reduces risk of mistakes in diabetes care (November 19, 2011) -- In the fast-paced world of health care, doctors are often pressed for time during patient visits. Researchers have now developed a tool that allows doctors to view electronic information about patients' health conditions related to diabetes on a single computer screen. A new study shows that this tool, the diabetes dashboard, saves time, improves accuracy and enhances patient care. ... > full story

Corn gene boosts biofuels from switchgrass (November 19, 2011) -- Introducing a special corn gene into switchgrass was found to significantly boost the viability of the switchgrass biomass as a feedstock crop for advanced biofuels. The gene, a variant of the Corngrass1 gene, holds the switchgrass in a perpetual juvenile state, more than doubling its starch content and making it easier to convert its polysaccharides into fermentable sugars. ... > full story

Birth of famous black hole: Longstanding mysteries about object called Cygnus X-1 unraveled (November 18, 2011) -- A precise distance measurement by the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) allowed astronomers to accurately calculate the mass and spin of a famous black hole, thus providing a complete description of the object. ... > full story

World's most difficult chemical experiment: The struggle to discover the secret of super-heavy elements (November 18, 2011) -- In order to find the chemical properties of super-heavy elements, chemists must conduct one of the world's most demanding chemical experiments in a matter of seconds. ... > full story

Nanoparticles used as additives in diesel fuels can travel from lungs to liver (November 18, 2011) -- Recent studies have demonstrated that nanoparticles of cerium oxide -- common diesel fuel additives used to increase the fuel efficiency of automobile engines -- can travel from the lungs to the liver and that this process is associated with liver damage. ... > full story

New 'smart' material could help tap medical potential of tissue-penetrating light (November 18, 2011) -- Scientists are reporting development and successful initial testing of the first practical "smart" material that may supply the missing link in efforts to use in medicine a form of light that can penetrate four inches into the human body. The new polymer or plastic-like material has potential for use in diagnosing diseases and engineer new human tissues in the lab. ... > full story

Microfabrication breakthrough could set piezoelectric material applications in motion (November 18, 2011) -- Integrating a complex, single-crystal material with "giant" piezoelectric properties onto silicon, engineers and physicists can fabricate low-voltage, near-nanoscale electromechanical devices that could lead to improvements in high-resolution 3-D imaging, signal processing, communications, energy harvesting, sensing, and actuators for nanopositioning devices, among others. ... > full story

Chemists develop compounds capable of forming heath-resistant, economic and biocompatible gels (November 17, 2011) -- Eating a yogurt or a jelly, using a pharmaceutical or cosmetic cream or shampoo are just some of the numerous everyday actions in which we use gels developed through a process of gelation. Researchers have now developed a new family of compounds that enables to develop gels more resistant to high temperatures with a higher level of biocompatibility and able to work with a variety of organic solvents, and all this with an easy synthesis, scalable and low cost. This family of compounds has significant applications in industries such as pharmaceuticals and cosmetics or food industry, among others. ... > full story

French digitial kitchen is a recipe for success (November 17, 2011) -- An innovative kitchen that gives step-by-step cooking instructions in French could spark a revolution in language learning in the UK. ... > full story

Galaxies are the ultimate recyclers, NASA's Hubble confirms (November 17, 2011) -- New observations by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope are expanding astronomers' understanding of the ways in which galaxies continuously recycle immense volumes of hydrogen gas and heavy elements. This process allows galaxies to build successive generations of stars stretching over billions of years. ... > full story

Research cracks puzzle of enzyme critical to food supply (November 17, 2011) -- Researchers used the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory to identify a key atom inside the part of the nitrogenase enzyme where atmospheric nitrogen is converted into a form that living things can use. ... > full story