Virginia Tech researchers discover potentially harmful airborne nanoparticles produced through burning of coal

Environmental scientists led by the Virginia Tech College of Science have discovered that the burning of coal produces incredibly small particles of a highly unusual form of titanium oxide.

Annual Wind Power Report Confirms Technology Advancements, Improved Project Performance, and Low Wind Energy Prices

Wind energy pricing for land-based, utility-scale projects remains attractive to utility and commercial purchasers, according to an annual report released by the U.S. Department of Energy and prepared by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab). Prices offered by newly built wind projects in the United States are averaging around 2¢/kWh, driven lower by technology advancements and cost reductions.

New ultrafast method for determining antibiotic resistance

Researchers at Uppsala University have developed a new method for very rapidly determining whether infection-causing bacteria are resistant or susceptible to antibiotics. The findings have now been published in the US journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Distributed wind power keeps spinning, growing

Both businesses and homeowners are increasingly using distributed wind power thanks to innovative business models and other trends, according to a new report released today.

The mystery of the yellowing sugarcane

Since 2011, a mysterious illness known as Yellow Canopy Syndrome, or YCS, has afflicted Australian sugarcane. The condition causes the mid-canopy leaves of otherwise healthy plants to rapidly turn yellow to a degree that the plant's sugar yield can decrease by up to 30 percent.

In recent years, the syndrome has spread across the continent. Losses are estimated at around $40 million and growers fear it could ruin the industry in Australia.

"At the start of the project, there were many possibilities but little evidence to suggest the cause," says Kate Hertweck, an assistant professor of biology at The University of Texas at Tyler (UT Tyler) and a member of the team of researchers exploring the causes of the disease. "It could be a physiological reaction caused by water or nutrients in the soil. Or it could be a biological cause, like an insect, virus or fungus."

NASA Sees Typhoon Noru Over Southern Japan

Typhoon Noru was moving over Honshu, Japan when NASA's Aqua satellite passed overhead on August 7. Noru made landfall in the central prefecture of Wakayama early in the day.

Calcium in arteries influences heart attack risk

Patients without calcium buildup in the coronary arteries had significantly lower risk of future heart attack or stroke despite other high risk factors such as diabetes, high blood pressure, or bad cholesterol levels, new research from UT Southwestern cardiologists shows.

The Nitrogen Problem: Why Global Warming Is Making It Worse

It is a painful lesson of our time that the things we depend on to make our lives more comfortable can also kill us. Our addiction to fossils fuels is the obvious example, as we come to terms with the slow-motion catastrophe of climate change. But we are addicted to nitrogen, too, in the fertilizers that feed us, and it now appears that the combination of climate change and nitrogen pollution is multiplying the possibilities for wrecking the world around us.

New genes discovered regulating brain metastases in lung cancer patients

Research from McMaster University has identified new regulators of brain metastases in patients with lung cancer.

These regulators are the genes called SPOCK1 and TWIST2.

Blocking a key enzyme may reverse memory loss

In the brains of Alzheimer’s patients, many of the genes required to form new memories are shut down by a genetic blockade, contributing to the cognitive decline seen in those patients.

MIT researchers have now shown that they can reverse that memory loss in mice by interfering with the enzyme that forms the blockade. The enzyme, known as HDAC2, turns genes off by condensing them so tightly that they can’t be expressed.

For several years, scientists and pharmaceutical companies have been trying to develop drugs that block this enzyme, but most of these drugs also block other members of the HDAC family, which can lead to toxic side effects. The MIT team has now found a way to precisely target HDAC2, by blocking its interaction with a binding partner called Sp3.