Posts

May 09, 2013

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9:33 PM | DARPA To Scientists: Find A Better Way To Study Chemical Weapons

Biological agent entering a cell DARPA The agency wants researchers to invent a technology that can determine, in just 30 days, how a new chemical or biological attack works. The U.S. Defense Advanced Projects Research Agency has set a new challenge for scientists: Invent a method that can figure out, on a molecular level, how new chemical and biological weapons work-and that can do so within 30 days of a victim being exposed. DARPA is calling the five-year program Rapid Threat Assessment. A […]

May 08, 2013

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12:40 AM | Monitoring volcanic activity at Mount Cleveland

Laura Nielsen for Frontier Scientists On Saturday May 4th the Alaska Volcano Observatory detected a series of low-level explosions at Cleveland volcano. Three discrete explosions occurred at 5:00 am, 9:17 am, and 11:44 am Saturday, while subsequent less powerful rumbles on Sunday denoted an ongoing low-level eruption. The sequence of eruptions emitted ash, gas, and steam into local airspace. Cleveland is a 5,676 foot tall conical stratovolcano, a restless volcano prone to rumbles, small […]

May 06, 2013

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5:30 PM | New Device Detects Asbestos In Real-Time, With Lasers And Magnets

Light scattering with a laser Paul Kaye, University of Hertfordshire, UKWe can all breathe a little easier. Asbestos is an insidious killer, with a nasty habit of being most deadly when it is least visible. Fortunately, a new device can detect asbestos on site, without a lab test. Popular in construction because of its fire-retardant properties, asbestos is mostly harmless if left alone. However, friction or other damage can make asbestos-containing products release asbestos fibers into the […]

March 15, 2013

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2:49 PM | The five-sigma spell

In the days of the discovery of the Higgs boson, the international media were flooded by scientific concepts like the "5 σ" (five sigma) significance. People were informed that physicists at CERN were eagerly waiting for having a detection at five sigma. Translated in poor words, it meant that scientists were waiting for having accumulated sufficient data. Indeed, it is known that each measurement is affected by errors. There are basically two types of error: statistical and systematic. The […]

February 21, 2013

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5:00 PM | What The Russian Meteor Explosion Sounded Like

Infrasound Array This was one of the infrasound arrays in Greenland that detected the Chelyabinsk meteorite on Friday. CTBTO, via wikimedia commons Last week was a busy one for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization, a detection agency set up to identify nations when they test nuclear weapons banned by treaty. On Tuesday, the organization's seismographs detected a rumble in North Korea that could only have been an atomic test. Then on Friday, CTBTO infrasound sensors picked up an […]

February 19, 2013

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7:26 AM | Cliff Gets a Whiff for C. diff

Before the development of modern diagnostic equipment, doctors had to rely on their senses to make a diagnosis; diabetes is marked by fruity breath; the breath of patients with cystic fibrosis smells acidic and typhoid smells like baked bread (Stitt 1995). The … Continue reading →

February 18, 2013

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5:01 PM | Researchers Create Decoy Beetles to Manage The Invasive Emerald Ash Borer

The emerald ash borer (Agrilus planipennis) is a beetle native to Asia which was first identified near Detroit, Michigan and Ontario in 2002. It is now a serious invasive pest of North American ash trees in the genus Fraxinus. Emerald ash borer populations are spreading rapidly in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states of the USA, [...]

Drew P. Pulsifer, ,Akhlesh Lakhtakia,Jayant Kumar, Thomas C. Baker, & Ra´ul J. Mart´ın-Palma (2012). Toward Pest Control Via Mass Production of Realistic Decoys of Insects, Proceedings of SPIE, 8339 DOI: 10.1117/12.915924

Lelito, J., Fraser, I., Mastro, V., Tumlinson, J., Böröczky, K. & Baker, T. (2007). Visually Mediated ‘Paratrooper Copulations’ in the Mating Behavior of Agrilus planipennis (Coleoptera: Buprestidae), a Highly Destructive Invasive Pest of North American Ash Trees, Journal of Insect Behavior, 20 (6) 537-552. DOI: 10.1007/s10905-007-9097-9

Lelito, J., Fraser, I., Mastro, V., Tumlinson, J. & Baker, T. (2008). Novel visual-cue-based sticky traps for monitoring of emerald ash borers, (Col., Buprestidae) , Journal of Applied Entomology, 132 (8) 668-674. DOI: 10.1111/j.1439-0418.2008.01308.x

Citation

March 20, 2012

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4:07 AM | The Singularity Is Here In Chess

Chess machines can already beat all humans Kenneth Regan, the same as our Ken, is besides many things, an international chess master. He combines his strong understanding of theory, of computing, and of chess. This combination is almost unique in the world and has led him to work on many interesting questions concerning chess. Today [...]

June 30, 2011

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2:56 PM | National Lung Cancer Screening results and their potential impact

“Current and former heavy smokers can now be screened more effectively for lung cancer. Results from the National Lung Screening Trial (NLST) revealed that detecting small lung cancers with computed tomography (CT) reduces lung cancer specific mortality by 20 percent.” … Continue reading →

March 31, 2011

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11:56 AM | Carbon-Nanotube Cancer Detector Can Catch Even a Single Marauding, Malignant Cell

What’s the News: Scientists have developed a new carbon nanotube device (pictured above) that’s capable of detecting single cancer cells. Once implemented in hospitals, this microfluidic device could let doctors more efficiently detect the spread of cancer, especially in developing countries that don’t have the money for more sophisticated diagnostic equipment. Any improvement in detecting cancer’s spread is important, says MIT associate professor of aeronautics and [...]