West Africa Doctors Network News Portal

(Wiley-Blackwell) Japanese researchers at the Universities of Osaka and Kyoto have observed the action of a nanorotor on the molecular scale. As Akira Harada and his team report in the journal Angewandte Chemie, they were able to get "snapshots" of individual molecular rotors caught in motion.

(Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have discovered a new technique for growing single-crystal nanorods and controlling their shape using biomolecules. The research, published in the journal Advanced Materials, could enable the development of smaller, more powerful heat pumps and devices that harvest electricity from heat.

(University of California - San Diego) The world's top engineers, physicians and scientists are joining forces to conceptualize, develop and bring to reality the future tools and treatments of 21st century health care through UC San Diego's new Institute of Engineering in Medicine. Nanoparticle bombs to kill cancer, molecular-sized bridges to repair damaged hearts, and scarless surgery techniques are now on the frontier of medical innovations in California with the new institute leading the way.

(Purdue University) Researchers have overcome a major obstacle in reducing the cost of "solid state lighting," a technology that could cut electricity consumption by 10 percent if widely adopted.The technology, called light-emitting diodes, or LEDs, is about four times more efficient than conventional incandescent lights and more environmentally friendly than compact fluorescent bulbs. The LEDs also are expected to be far longer lasting than conventional lighting, lasting perhaps as long as 15 years before burning out.

(Duke University) Nature, in the simple form of a tree canopy, appears to provide keen insights into the best way to design complex systems to move substances from one place to another, an essential ingredient in the development of novel "smart" materials.

(DOE/Argonne National Laboratory) Researchers at the US Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory and their industrial partners have won two R&D 100 Awards for innovative fluid sealing and lithium-ion battery technologies.

(Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne) A novel super-resolution X-ray microscope developed by a team of researchers from the Paul Scherrer Institut (PSI) and EPFL in Switzerland combines the high penetration power of x-rays with high spatial resolution, making it possible for the first time to shed light on the detailed interior composition of semiconductor devices and cellular structures.

(Harvard University) The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has awarded a $1.2 million grant to an interdisciplinary team of Harvard University researchers to study surface enhanced Raman scattering for the first phase of a potential three-year effort. If all phases of the development program are completed, researchers could receive up a total of up to $2.9 million in funding.

(Ohio State University) What is there to see inside a magnet that's smaller than the head of a pin? Quite a lot, say physicists who've invented a new kind of MRI technique to do just that. The technique may eventually enable the development of extremely small computers, and even give doctors a new tool for studying the plaques in blood vessels that play a role in diseases such as heart disease.

(Purdue University) Purdue University is operating a virtual environment that enables scientists and engineers to interpret raw data collected with powerful instruments called dynamic atomic force microscopes, representing a research trend, with tools for other applications also being developed.

(North Carolina State University) Educating the public about nanotechnology and other complex but emerging technologies causes people to become more "worried and cautious" about the new technologies' prospective benefits, according to a recent study by researchers at North Carolina State University.

(Georgia Institute of Technology) Scientists at Georgia Tech have developed a potential new treatment against cancer that attaches magnetic nanoparticles to cancer cells, allowing them to be captured and carried out of the body. The treatment, which has been tested in the laboratory and will now be looked at in survival studies, is detailed online in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

(Health Physics Society) The following topics will be presented Wednesday, July 16, at the 2008 Annual Meeting of the Health Physics Society in Pittsburgh, Pa., at the David Lawrence Convention Center.

(Washington University in St. Louis) An interdisciplinary team of researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, led by Karen L. Wooley, Ph.D., James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor in Arts & Sciences, is a step closer to delivering cancer-killing drugs to pediatric brain tumors, similar to the tumor that Senator Ted Kennedy is suffering from. They developed polymeric nanoparticles that can entrap doxorubicin, a drug commonly used in chemotherapy, and slowly release the drug over an extended time.

(University of Florida) Cymbals don't clash of their own accord -- in our world, anyway.

(Georgia Institute of Technology Research News) A report published in the July 8 issue of the journal PNAS is the first to describe the principles behind the stability and electronic properties of tiny nanoclusters of metallic gold. The study found that the clusters are stable because they behave like "superatoms" and exhibit a "divide and protect" bonding structure -- a core of gold atoms and a protective layer of gold-thiolate complexes.

(Rutgers University) A newly developed nano-sized electronic device is an important step toward helping astronomers see invisible light dating from the creation of the universe. This invisible light makes up 98 percent of the light emitted since the "big bang," and may provide insights into the earliest stages of star and galaxy formation almost 14 billion years ago.

(Royal Society of Chemistry) Japanese scientists have made a micro-sized sewing machine to sew long threads of DNA into shape. The work published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Lab on a Chip demonstrates a unique way to manipulate delicate DNA chains without breaking them.

(Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB)) PTB, together with European partners, is doing research in the field of semiconductor analysis using synchrotron radiation. In this case, it is a matter of findings on the physical-chemical characteristics of semiconductor surfaces and nanolayers as well as the further development of reference-specimen-free analysis methods for detecting the surface contamination and layer characteristics.

(Health Physics Society) The HPS 2008 Midyear Topical Meeting of the Health Physics Society, which will take place July 14-17, 2008, in Pittsburgh, Pa., at the David Lawrence Convention Center. Approximately 900 attendees are expected, with nearly 260 presentations throughout the four days.