Aug 31, 2006
Mosts chemists get to see some wacky periodic tables during their careers – circular ones, spiral ones, ones that rearrange all the elements etc etc. Then there are the foody ones and then there are the giant periodic tables, the arty farty ones, the online version, the flash table.
And, then there’s the periodic table of sex.
I didn’t think it was real at first, but several sciencebase visitors have …
Aug 30, 2006
A posting about telemarketing on digg reminded me how a teacher friend used to mess with the heads of cold callers, asking them obviously dumb questions.
One of the less subtle was to ask the telemarketer from British Gas, which now also offer electricity as well as natural gas to UK customers, whether he’d be able to run his TV from the gas supply.
They caller would politely tell him no, but become increasingly frustrated …
The UK’s Food Standards Agency announced (August 21, 2006) that it has received an application from a food additive manufacturer to use glucosamine hydrochloride in a range of foods, including smoothies and sports drinks. The company, Cargill, makes glucosamine hydrochloride from the black mould Aspergillus niger.
But, why would they want to do this? Cargill wants to use its glucosamine as an ingredient in a range of pasteurised food products. These will include fruit …
Aug 29, 2006
Everyone with even a passing interest in science will have heard about the challenge to science published as a full-page ad in The Economist by Irish company Steorn. Steorn has developed a system it reckons challenges the First Law of Thermodynamics, one of the fundamental principles of science. Such a challenge offers the possibility of limitless clean energy and Steorn is keen to recruit twelve of the most sceptical scientists to …
When I first wrote about the doubts scientists were raising concerning sunscreens in Chem & Industry magazine some time in the early 1990s, it seemed that the findings would simply confuse consumers and cause a storm among manufacturers. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case, sun worshippers carried on frying themselves, slapping on only meagre amounts of purportedly protective cream, partly out of laziness and partly because it is just so expensive and manufacturers …
Aug 27, 2006
Well, the votes were counted and the decision made: Pluto was demoted to less than planetary status. The astronomy and science textbook publishers are rubbing their hands with glee as new editions will have to be printed and plucked from their shelves by eager homeschoolers and teachers keen to get their facts right.
Unfortunately, things are never so clear cut.
A fierce backlash has begun against the decision has begun, says the BBC. The lead scientist …
Aug 25, 2006
The very first European Chemistry Congress starts Sunday and runs till the end of the month. The event is being held in Budapest, Hungary, at Loránd Eötvös University, and promises to be an astounding affair showcasing chemical sciences in Europe and bringing together chemical and molecular scientists from industry, academia and government institutions across Europe and from around the world.
The conference has been organised by EuCheMS (European Association for Chemical and Molecular Sciences, …
Aug 24, 2006
In this week’s Alchemist news round up: oscillating carbon fibres could usurp silicon in the world of microscopic video, find out how a sugar molecule seen only on anthrax spores could help defeat the bacterium in the event of a bioterrorism attack. We also report on how the US government has asserted that levels of dioxins and related compounds have fallen in meat and poultry and we discover how to make see-through silver.
Finally, a new …
With a new school year almost upon us, there is a pressing need for parents everywhere to get advance warning of the kind of science conundrums (conundra?) they will face when their little darlings return with that first batch of science homework.
As ever, sciencebase is here to help with a bench covered in science fair projects, a labful of science experiments and all the science books for home study you can bear.
A …
Aug 23, 2006
Astronomers working under the proverbial umbrella of the International Astronomical Union (IAU), have come up with a new definition of “planets” and smaller “solar system bodies” such as comets and asteroids, this week, but the definition is not without controversy.
If the definition is approved by the astronomers who are pointing their telescopes at each other at the IAU General Assembly in Prague, this week, then our Solar System will have 12 …
A rather common search on the sciencebase site seems to ask how to generate a molecular formula. Well, the method I use is to go straight to ChemSketch and fire up ACD/Dictionary, type in the name of the compound I want to produce and paste it into the ChemSketch window. That gives you the everyday 2D structure. A quick click of the “3D Viewer” button does what it …
Aug 22, 2006
Google is expanding (again). You can now sign-up to use its online word processor, “Writely” without an invitation…
But, why would you want to do that? The tool allows you to create new documents from scratch, upload them from various file formats (including Word), or create them via e-mail batches. That all sounds well and good, but why not just use Word and avoid all that toing and froing with email batches? Well, what if you’re …
Science in the movies was the subject of a a feature I wrote for the now sunk HMSBeagle (on BioMedNet.com), but the world of cinema has moved on apace since then with dozens more feature films that are less science fiction than what my good buddy Carl Djerassi (well, I’ve met him twice!) refers to as science in fiction as well as more impressibley many that are purely science non-fiction.
Here’s just a list of …
A new open access site for chemists – Chemistry Central – launches today as part of the newly announced Open Access Central group of sites from the makers of BioMedCentral.
CC collates peer-reviewed research from a range of open-access journals and makes available the original research articles as soon as they are published.
Deputy Publisher and former chemist Bryan Vickery explains the motivation, “We have seen increasing interest from chemists in the open access publishing …
Aug 21, 2006
On Friday, August 18, Barr Laboratories asked the US Food and Drugs Administration to reconsider its application to make its Plan B contraceptive available over the counter. According to FierceBiotech’s John Carroll, “Given the FDA’s sudden willingness to work out a marketing plan for the contraceptive, Barr has a good shot at finally obtaining an approval that should have come through in 2004.” Carroll reckons that the FDA now has the opportunity to show …
Long-term treatment with statins help lower cholesterol and reduce heart attack and stroke incidence. But, it seems, GPs have not been prescribing enough as yet another benefit is now being touted in new research published today in the British Journal of Pharmacology. This latest study suggests this action only needs a few days of treatment, is independent of cholesterol lowering and helps the heart to recover following …
Aug 18, 2006
Once more, a news story from the Sciencebase global offices features in Sandra Tsing Loh’s science news podcast out of Caltech. Click the little speaker icon, top left of this post to hear her voice.
“…there’s a new way to stop corrosion: Put it to SLEEP.
The secret, say Dmitry Shchukin of the Max Planck Institute in Germany and colleagues? A gel-like material embedded with nanoparticles .. tiny bits, billionths …
The ivory trade was banned by CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) in 1989. However, illegal trade continues and as such researchers in India suggest that there is a continued need to characterize Asian elephant ivory and to be able to compare it with African ivory so that national and international laws can be implemented more effectively.
Previously, Erich Raubenheimer and colleagues in the …
Aug 17, 2006
There are lots of opportunities out there in the job market for chemists, so check out our newly updated chemistry jobs newsfeed powered by ScienceJobs.net. You will find the latest opportunities in all areas of the chemical sciences: Lectureships, research jobs, MBAs, tenure track positions, fellowships, university programs, lectureships, post-doctoral positions, research experience opportunities, research assistant jobs, and faculty positions from all the big players.
Technical tasks include Pfizer …
Brazilian researchers have developed a method to analyse the metal ion content of food products by combining X-ray spectroscopy (XRS) with a partial least-squares (PLS) data treatment. Their approach promises to be faster, more widely applicable to a range of food and agricultural products, and less expensive than other methods.
Food quality control is critical to consumer safety and satisfaction. Knowing levels of inorganic analytes, such as the toxic elements arsenic, cadmium, chromium, and lead, …
Aug 16, 2006
New research into weight loss and its effects on cellulite is making a big splash. Losing weight can reduce the appearance of cellulite for some women, according to research undertaken by plastic surgeon John Kitzmiller and colleagues. But, here’s the rub, weight loss could make the condition much worse for others.
About 85% of women (that’s 8.5 women in every ten ;-) are affected by cellulite, Kitzmiller claims, “Cellulite is …
NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope continues to surprise astronomers, this time by identifying the parent star of a distant planet through the observational technique of gravitational microlensing. By elucidating detailed information about the star associated with an exoplanet, astronomers should now be able to unearth the properties of the planet itself and so improve our understanding of planet formation and evolution.
Read the full story in the latest issue of …
No…not that kind of model!
“The formation and evolution of dislocation cell structures (patterning) is one of the most important aspects of the deformation process in ductile metals,” according to Lyle Levine and colleagues at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), and the University of Southern California. Metallurgists already know that this patterning process arises as clusters of dislocations interact with each …
Aug 15, 2006
This concise guide to the art of writing a scientific thesis demonstrates how you can wring the max. from your results with the min. of effort, at least that’s what the jacket claims.
The book is based on a proven concept that assumes no special writing talent and builds on the model of the previous publication in the series The Art of Scientific Writing. If you’ve got the results …
A key protein linked to neurodegenerative diseases, such as Huntington’s and Alzheimer’s diseases, has been characterised using NMR by US researchers.
John Cavanagh, Douglas Kojetin, David Kordys, and Richele Thompson of North Carolina State University teamed with colleagues Ronald Venters of Duke University and Rajiv Kumar of the Mayo Clinic and Foundation have obtained a structure for the protein, calbindin-D28K. This protein modulates calcium levels by sequestering calcium from areas that have too much or serves …
Aug 14, 2006
…but it’s not the deadly strain of avian influenza (high-pathogenicity avian influenza, HPAI H5N1) that has featured in endless media speculation over the last couple of years. At a time, when the Thai authorities have announced several new cases of bird flu in their country, scientists in the US have detected the low-pathogenicity (LPAI) bird flu in wild swans near the banks of Lake Erie.
Ron DeHaven, administrator of USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, …
As part of my personal contribution to global warming, I took a Ferrari for a test drive at the end of last week. I should hasten to add that this little jolly was a gift and that I have no intention of actually buying such a gas guzzler…at least until they do a fuel cell version, which should give me a few decades to start saving.
Aug 11, 2006
The ‘Naked Scientists’ – as featured on Sciencebase – perhaps don’t deserve the alarming image their name inspires. This radio show and podcast aims to strip science down to its bare essentials and promote it to the general public, says main man Dr Chris Smith, the main aim is to “help people enjoy science as much as we do and, at the same time, to have fun,” he says.
Naked Scientists is produced at the University …
Aug 10, 2006
In the latest issue of The Alchemist on ChemWeb.com I provide a round-up of the week’s chemistry news, of particular importance could be news that UK and Australian researchers may have found a new way to approach drug design for bird flu viruses that precludes drug resistance.
A new drug to fight bird flu that should be able to side-step the emergence of viral resistance is being developed by Andrew Watts of the University of Bath, …
Flavanols in cocoa could stave off cardiovascular disease, something that affects almost 78 million baby-boomers in the US alone, according to a paper in the August issue of the Journal of Hypertension.
Researchers at Harvard Medical School and the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston discovered that drinking a standardized flavanol-rich cocoa beverage improved several measures of blood vessel function, especially among older study participants. So, that relaxing chocolate drink at bed-time could be doing a …
Here’s a little conundrum for those who enjoy reality-cop-car-chase TV shows.
How do they record the driver’s grunts and groans of the driver and passengers and the sound of a car smashing into another car and/or brickwall…
…from the helicopter 500 feet up? Or, do they somehow infiltrate the criminals’ vehicle ahead of the crime being committed and fit microphones?
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