SciTech Daily

February 28, 2012

Light-Switched Anesthetics Allow Researchers to turn Pain Nerves On and Off

A new study published in the journal Nature Methods, shows that a novel local anesthetic developed by a group of researchers at UC Berkeley, University of Münich, and the Université de Boardeaux, can be switched on and off using different wavelengths of light, allowing a much finer control of which nerves are blocked. Local anesthetics, [...]

February 28, 2012

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Flies Drink Alcohol to Medicate Against Wasp Infections

It’s been reported that the common fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, drinks alcohol to kill the wasps that have hatched inside of its body, which would otherwise eat it alive. Drosophila melanogaster gets the alcohol from eating yeasts that grow on rotting fruit that can contain up to 6% alcohol. The flies have even developed a [...]

February 28, 2012

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Marine Bacteria Use Bioluminescence to Lure Zooplankton and Fish

Many creatures in the sea glow in the depths of the deepest trenches of the oceans. Bioluminescence is even observed in some marine bacteria, which emit a steady light once they have attained a certain level of concentration of organic particles in ocean waters, which is known as quorum sensing. In a new article published [...]

February 28, 2012

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Optical Computer Memory Chips Could Ease Internet Traffic

All-optical routers managing Internet traffic would be much more energy efficient than what we have today, but their development has been hindered by the lack of optical memory devices. Researchers have developed this kind of device, which could pave the way to a faster and more energy-efficient Internet. Bits of data traveling through the Web [...]

February 28, 2012

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Researchers Present New Model for Planetary Accretion

Eagle Nebula made with data from the Kitt Peak telescope

Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have come up with a new explanation for planetary accretion. By using classical physics and the laws of thermodynamics and mechanics, the researchers present an accretion model that assumes a three-dimensional gas cloud that collapses and forms the Sun and planets instead of the prevailing model that assumes [...]

February 28, 2012

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Metal Sphere from Orbit Hits Brazilian Town

A small town in northeastern Brazil, in the state of Maranhão, was greeted by a 110-pound metal sphere that came crashing down. Locals from Riacho dos Poços reported that the crash sounded like a plane had fallen or an earthquake. It’s not yet clear what kind of debris this is, but it’s not the first [...]

February 28, 2012

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Evidence of Elusive Majorana Fermions Raises Possibilities for Quantum Computing

It’s been reported that researchers in the Leo Kouwenhoven group, based out of the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, might have beaten several competing teams in solid state and high energy physics to find the elusive Majorana fermions, a mysterious quantum-mechanical particle that might have some applications in quantum computing. At the end [...]

February 28, 2012

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New Approach to MEMS Design that Enables Engineers to Design 3-D Configurations

Researchers at MIT developed a MEMS device that enables 3-D sensing on a single chip by using a new design approach. Their new design method uses existing fabrication processes and the silicon device may be outfitted with sensors, placed atop and underneath the chip’s minuscule bridges, to detect three-dimensional phenomena such as acceleration. Microelectromechanical systems, [...]

February 28, 2012

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Rincon de la Vieja Erupts Again in Costa Rica

It has been almost 14 years since the volcano Rincón de la Vieja in Costa Rica entered an active eruptive phase and it looks like the volcano might be reawakening from its slumber. The volcano experienced two small eruptions in the early morning of February 22nd. Seismic records indicate that there were also other small [...]

February 27, 2012

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Researchers Focus on Development of Neural Control of Prosthetics for Amputees

neural interfaces aimed at improving amputees’ control over prosthetics

Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories are focusing on the development of biomaterials and peripheral nerves at the interface site between the nervous system and where an artificial device would intersect. ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico — Sandia National Laboratories researchers, using off-the-shelf equipment in a chemistry lab, have been working on ways to improve amputees’ control over [...]

February 27, 2012

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Cholera Kills off its Microbial Rivals by Jabbing Them with a Spring-Loaded Poison Dagger

Researchers at Harvard Medical School and the California Institute of Technology teamed up to image the T6SS system working in real-time to prove their hypothesis that cholera’s T6SS tactic mirrors the system that phage viruses use to inject their genetic material into bacteria for replication. Bacteria live in a state of perpetual warfare, with different [...]

February 27, 2012

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Researchers Develop New RNA Interference Method

cluster of microsponges made of long strands of folded RNA

Researchers have developed a new delivery vehicle in which RNA is packed into microspheres so dense that they withstand degradation until they reach their destinations. Their system of using an RNA synthesis method known as rolling circle transcription to produce extremely long strands of RNA made up of a repeating sequence of 21 nucleotides knocks [...]