20 July 2006

Plasticisers go from breast milk to babies

Infants imbibing breast milk may also be sucking down a high dose of phthalates, the ubiquitous toxic plasticisers that are in many consumer products, from lipstick to vinyl flooring, according to Environmental Science and Technology.  

19 July 2006

Doctor, we seem to be missing several sponges...

Medics are turning to technology to ensure that surgical equipment isn't accidentally left behind in the bodies of patients. The latest idea: tagging gauze pads so that a detector wand waved over the patient triggers an alarm if they haven't all been removed, reports Nature. 

18 July 2006

Discovery burns engines and heads on home

Space Shuttle Discovery and its six-member crew landed yesterday at Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, at 9:14 a.m. EDT, bringing STS-121 to a close.  

17 July 2006

Cool drinks with a built-in air-con?

Thin-film technology that can create climate control systems by combining solar cells and heat pumps on surfaces ranging from walls to windows, and maybe even bottles of your favourite beverage, has been developed, reports NSF. 

14 July 2006

Olive oil the basis for environment-friendly gel nanomaterials

Organic gel nanomaterials that could be used to encapsulate pharmaceutical, food, and cosmetic products and to build 3-D biological scaffolds for tissue engineering have been created, reports NSF.  

13 July 2006

Stroke makes smokers forget their addiction

Damage to a small but very specific brain area can wipe out an addiction to smoking, according to Nature. 

12 July 2006

The sexual divide just got bigger

For those of you counting the differences between men and women, here are some more to take into account: according to Nature, 25 281 more distinctions in gene expression between male and female mice have been discovered. 

10 July 2006

Stem cell hope for AIDS patients

For the first time it has been demonstrated that human embryonic stem cells can be genetically manipulated and coaxed to develop into mature T-cells, raising hopes for a gene therapy to combat AIDS. 

07 July 2006

A pomegranate a day keeps the doctor away?

Drinking just under 300 ml of pomegranate juice a day nearly quadruples the length of time prostate cancer patients can maintain their condition without any increase in the biomarkers that indicate a worsening of the illness.  

06 July 2006

Magnetism shows a way to more accurate weather forecasting

Weather forecasting – particularly rain forecasts – have the potential to take a giant leap forward in accuracy thanks to new research that shows the onset of intense tropical rain shares the same underlying physics as magnetism.