Month: November 2022
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Adding a ‘decoy option’ may give extra boost to crowdfunding — ScienceDaily
Imagine walking into an ice cream shop and scanning your options. A sugar cone with one scoop is $3. A second scoop comes out to $4, but for just 50 cents more, you can get a large waffle cone with three scoops. Some people may not want that much ice cream. But for many, it’s…
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The Transistor at 75 – IEEE Spectrum
Seventy-five years is a long time. It’s so long that most of us don’t remember a time before the transistor, and long enough for many engineers to have devoted entire careers to its use and development. In honor of this most important of technological achievements, this issue’s package of articles explores the transistor’s historical journey…
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Forever chemicals, or PFAS, pose troubling health risks
For decades, chemicals that make life easier — your eggs slide out of the frying pan, stains don’t stick to your sofa, rain bounces off your jackets and boots — have been touted as game changers for our busy modern lives. “Better things for better living … through chemistry,” was the optimistic slogan coined by…
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Finally, an Accurate World Map That Doesn’t Lie
This article was originally published on Nov. 3, 2016. Our maps have been lying to us for centuries. The standard classroom maps we all learned geography from are based on the Mercator projection, a 16th century rendering that preserved lines used for navigation while hideously distorting the true sizes of continents and oceans further from…
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Physicians discuss COP27, need to keep focus on toll suffered by real people – Harvard Gazette
Climate change’s toll on human health is becoming more widely appreciated as impacts mount, including recent disasters such as floods in Pakistan and severe drought in the Horn of Africa, according to Harvard physicians who attended recent climate talks in Egypt. They noted an increased presence of health care experts at this year’s event, calls…
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Math approach may make drug discovery more effective, efficient — ScienceDaily
Researchers at The University of Texas at Dallas and Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. have devised a computer-based platform for drug discovery that could make the process more effective, more efficient and less costly. Dr. Baris Coskunuzer, professor of mathematical sciences at UT Dallas, and his colleagues developed an approach based on topological data analysis to screen…
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A Diamond “Blanket” Can Cool the Transistors Needed for 6G
High-power radio-frequency electronics are a hot commodity, both figuratively and literally. The transistors needed to amplify 5G and future 6G signals are struggling to handle the thermal load, causing a bottleneck in development. Engineers in the United States and England have teamed up to demonstrate a promising solution—swaddling individual transistors in a blanket of thermally…
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For female astronomers, the COVID-19 pandemic widened publishing’s gender gap
Women comprise about 20% of all astronomers worldwide, but their productivity, as measured by annual number of publications, has lagged behind that of their male colleagues. The COVID-19 pandemic set them back even more, a new study finds. Credit: Niel Freese, UC Berkeley Before the COVID-19 pandemic abruptly shut down labs and sent scientists home…
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Researchers develop treatment scheduling method to target heterogeneous tumors — ScienceDaily
Researchers at the University of Waterloo have identified a new method for scheduling radiation therapy that could be as much as 22 percent more effective at killing cancer cells than current standard radiation treatment regimens. While many mathematical studies have examined how to optimize the scheduling of radiation treatment for maximum effectiveness against cancer, most…
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Dry pet food may be more environmentally friendly than wet food
Pet owners may have a new reason to reach for the kibble. Dry cat and dog food tends to be better for the environment than wet food, veterinary nutritionist Vivian Pedrinelli of the University of São Paulo in Brazil and colleagues report. Their analysis of more than 900 pet diets shows that nearly 90 percent…