With nanotechnology yielding a burgeoning menagerie of microscopic pumps, motors, and other machines for potential use in medicine and industry, here is one good question: How will humans turn those devices on and off?
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Scientists are reporting a key advance toward developing the first effective drug treatment for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), a genetic disease that involves motor neuron loss and occurs in 1 out of every 6,000 births. SMA is the leading cause of hereditary infant death in the United States.
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Researchers are using nanotechnology to search for new cancer-fighting drugs through a process that could be up to 10,000 times faster than current methods.
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Scientists have discovered that a bone infection is caused by a newly described species of bacteria that is related to the tuberculosis pathogen. The discovery may help improve the diagnosis and treatment of similar infections, according to an article in the International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology.
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Scientists have developed a novel tetranitrate ester, which is solid at room temperature, is a highly powerful explosive, and can be melt-cast into the desired shape.
The more alcohol an individual drinks, the smaller his or her total brain volume. Brain volume decreases with age at an estimated rate of 1.9 percent per decade, accompanied by an increase in white matter lesions, according to background information in the article.
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Plant scientists have discovered another piece of the genetic puzzle that controls how plants respond to high temperatures. That may allow plant breeders to create new varieties of crops that flourish in warmer, drier climates.
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Scientists report the discovery of common versions of two single-letter variations in the human genome (SNPs) that confer risk of basal cell carcinoma (BCC), the most common cancer among people of European ancestry. Unlike the four sets of SNPs previously found by deCODE to confer risk of BCC and cutaneous melanoma, those reported today are [...]
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Tropical wetlands are able to absorb and hold onto about 80 percent more carbon than can wetlands in temperate zones, according to a new study. The scientists extracted soil cores from wetlands in Costa Rica and in Ohio and analyzed the contents of the sediment from the past 40 years. Based on their analysis, they [...]
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Visual impairment appears to be more common in people with diabetes than in those without the disease, according to a new report.
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