FASEB highlights the negative impacts of inconsistent regulation of the research enterprisePublic release date: 11-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Lawrence Green lgreen@faseb.org 301-634-7335 Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology
Bethesda, MD - The Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) has submitted comments in response to the National Science Board's (NSB) Task Force on Administrative Burdens Request for Information (RFI) on reducing investigators administrative workload for federally funded research. The NSB will use the information collected from the RFI to develop recommendations to reduce administrative workload for researchers and institutions.
In its response (http://bit.ly/117IDix), FASEB identified three major themes of administrative burden and made six broad recommendations to alleviate these burdens. FASEB also provided recommendations pertaining to specific areas of administrative burden as outlined in the RFI, including conflict of interest reporting, research training requirements, effort reporting, select agents, and regulations pertaining to research involving human subjects and laboratory animal care and use.
In addition to its recommendations, FASEB provided the NSB with a summary of findings (http://bit.ly/ZHSUkD) from its online survey of individual investigators on administrative burdens associated with federally funded research. The survey was widely distributed among research and academic organizations and received over 1,300 responses.
###
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
FASEB highlights the negative impacts of inconsistent regulation of the research enterprisePublic release date: 11-Jun-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Lawrence Green lgreen@faseb.org 301-634-7335 Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology
Bethesda, MD - The Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) has submitted comments in response to the National Science Board's (NSB) Task Force on Administrative Burdens Request for Information (RFI) on reducing investigators administrative workload for federally funded research. The NSB will use the information collected from the RFI to develop recommendations to reduce administrative workload for researchers and institutions.
In its response (http://bit.ly/117IDix), FASEB identified three major themes of administrative burden and made six broad recommendations to alleviate these burdens. FASEB also provided recommendations pertaining to specific areas of administrative burden as outlined in the RFI, including conflict of interest reporting, research training requirements, effort reporting, select agents, and regulations pertaining to research involving human subjects and laboratory animal care and use.
In addition to its recommendations, FASEB provided the NSB with a summary of findings (http://bit.ly/ZHSUkD) from its online survey of individual investigators on administrative burdens associated with federally funded research. The survey was widely distributed among research and academic organizations and received over 1,300 responses.
###
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Apple Maps is getting a pretty little desktop client in the new OSX Mavericks. The desktop client includes the same (steadily improving) offering of 3D-flyover views, and provides you with information cards as you skirt around different locations. And once you find your destination on the desktop, you can shunt it right over to your iPhone at the press of a button.
It's not a lot of gab time and T-Mobile's data speeds still tend to lag behind other major carriers, but for $30 a month this T-Mobile prepaid plan is cheap.
4G speed isn't unlimited, but the cap is 5GB, which is pretty generous for a budget plan. The plan is for new activations only so you have to buy a $10 SIM card or a phone with a SIM to order it. Consumerist discovered, though, that existing T-Mobile customers whose contracts have ended can switch to the plan. Basically it seems like it's only off-limits for users currently on a T-Mobile prepaid plan.
Cellphone plans have gotten more competitive as the major carriers have come up against smaller groups offering cheap alternatives. If you don't spend hours talking on the phone or you can supplement with online talk options, this might be a way to save some money. [Consumerist]
Only days after the initial leaks and explanations by the US government about the National Security Agency's data surveillance program PRISM, Edward Snowden has revealed himself as the whistleblower. He's employed by defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton and also worked at the NSA as a "technical assistant" for the CIA. In speaking to The Guardian, he explained his reasons for disclosing the intelligence program: he wanted to "to inform the public as to that which is done in their name and that which is done against them," hoping that they'll use the information to debate the issue.
While the NSA's data-mining tool is reportedly known as Boundless Informant, Snowden has been keeping himself bound to a hotel in Hong Kong during this whole drama. Major internet companies have insisted that the government doesn't receive direct access to their servers and President Obama has stated that "nobody is listening to your phone calls, but the issue remains far from black and white. Snowden claims a "massive surveillance machine" is in the making under the radar -- at this point he's now waiting to see what happens next, assured he's made the the decision that feels right to him. Catch the full interview at the source link.
Update: In case there was any doubt that Snowden has ever been employed by Booz Allen Hamilton, the company just released the following statement:
Booz Allen can confirm that Edward Snowden, 29, has been an employee of our firm for less than 3 months, assigned to a team in Hawaii. News reports that this individual has claimed to have leaked classified information are shocking, and if accurate, this action represents a grave violation of the code of conduct and core values of our firm. We will work closely with our clients and authorities in their investigation of this matter.
Hubble reveals the Ring Nebula's true shapePublic release date: 23-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Lynn Chandler Lynn.chandler-1@nasa.gov 301-286-2806 NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
The Ring Nebula's distinctive shape makes it a popular illustration for astronomy books. But new observations by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope of the glowing gas shroud around an old, dying, sun-like star reveal a new twist.
"The nebula is not like a bagel, but rather, it's like a jelly doughnut, because it's filled with material in the middle," said C. Robert O'Dell of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. He leads a research team that used Hubble and several ground-based telescopes to obtain the best view yet of the iconic nebula. The images show a more complex structure than astronomers once thought and have allowed them to construct the most precise 3-D model of the nebula.
"With Hubble's detail, we see a completely different shape than what's been thought about historically for this classic nebula," O'Dell said. "The new Hubble observations show the nebula in much clearer detail, and we see things are not as simple as we previously thought."
The Ring Nebula is about 2,000 light-years from Earth and measures roughly 1 light-year across. Located in the constellation Lyra, the nebula is a popular target for amateur astronomers.
Previous observations by several telescopes had detected the gaseous material in the ring's central region. But the new view by Hubble's sharp-eyed Wide Field Camera 3 shows the nebula's structure in more detail. O'Dell's team suggests the ring wraps around a blue, football-shaped structure. Each end of the structure protrudes out of opposite sides of the ring.
The nebula is tilted toward Earth so that astronomers see the ring face-on. In the Hubble image, the blue structure is the glow of helium. Radiation from the white dwarf star, the white dot in the center of the ring, is exciting the helium to glow. The white dwarf is the stellar remnant of a sun-like star that has exhausted its hydrogen fuel and has shed its outer layers of gas to gravitationally collapse to a compact object.
O'Dell's team was surprised at the detailed Hubble views of the dark, irregular knots of dense gas embedded along the inner rim of the ring, which look like spokes in a bicycle wheel. These gaseous tentacles formed when expanding hot gas pushed into cool gas ejected previously by the doomed star. The knots are more resistant to erosion by the wave of ultraviolet light unleashed by the star. The Hubble images have allowed the team to match up the knots with the spikes of light around the bright, main ring, which are a shadow effect. Astronomers have found similar knots in other planetary nebulae.
All of this gas was expelled by the central star about 4,000 years ago. The original star was several times more massive than our sun. After billions of years converting hydrogen to helium in its core, the star began to run out of fuel. It then ballooned in size, becoming a red giant. During this phase, the star shed its outer gaseous layers into space and began to collapse as fusion reactions began to die out. A gusher of ultraviolet light from the dying star energized the gas, making it glow.
The outer rings were formed when faster-moving gas slammed into slower-moving material. The nebula is expanding at more than 43,000 miles an hour, but the center is moving faster than the expansion of the main ring. O'Dell's team measured the nebula's expansion by comparing the new Hubble observations with Hubble studies made in 1998.
The Ring Nebula will continue to expand for another 10,000 years, a short phase in the lifetime of the star. The nebula will become fainter and fainter until it merges with the interstellar medium.
Studying the Ring Nebula's fate will provide insight into the sun's demise in another 6 billion years. The sun is less massive than the Ring Nebula's progenitor star, so it will not have an opulent ending.
"When the sun becomes a white dwarf, it will heat more slowly after it ejects its outer gaseous layers," O'Dell said. "The material will be farther away once it becomes hot enough to illuminate the gas. This larger distance means the sun's nebula will be fainter because it is more extended."
In the analysis, the research team also obtained images from the Large Binocular Telescope at the Mount Graham International Observatory in Arizona and spectroscopic data from the San Pedro Martir Observatory in Baja California, Mexico.
###
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Hubble reveals the Ring Nebula's true shapePublic release date: 23-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Lynn Chandler Lynn.chandler-1@nasa.gov 301-286-2806 NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
The Ring Nebula's distinctive shape makes it a popular illustration for astronomy books. But new observations by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope of the glowing gas shroud around an old, dying, sun-like star reveal a new twist.
"The nebula is not like a bagel, but rather, it's like a jelly doughnut, because it's filled with material in the middle," said C. Robert O'Dell of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. He leads a research team that used Hubble and several ground-based telescopes to obtain the best view yet of the iconic nebula. The images show a more complex structure than astronomers once thought and have allowed them to construct the most precise 3-D model of the nebula.
"With Hubble's detail, we see a completely different shape than what's been thought about historically for this classic nebula," O'Dell said. "The new Hubble observations show the nebula in much clearer detail, and we see things are not as simple as we previously thought."
The Ring Nebula is about 2,000 light-years from Earth and measures roughly 1 light-year across. Located in the constellation Lyra, the nebula is a popular target for amateur astronomers.
Previous observations by several telescopes had detected the gaseous material in the ring's central region. But the new view by Hubble's sharp-eyed Wide Field Camera 3 shows the nebula's structure in more detail. O'Dell's team suggests the ring wraps around a blue, football-shaped structure. Each end of the structure protrudes out of opposite sides of the ring.
The nebula is tilted toward Earth so that astronomers see the ring face-on. In the Hubble image, the blue structure is the glow of helium. Radiation from the white dwarf star, the white dot in the center of the ring, is exciting the helium to glow. The white dwarf is the stellar remnant of a sun-like star that has exhausted its hydrogen fuel and has shed its outer layers of gas to gravitationally collapse to a compact object.
O'Dell's team was surprised at the detailed Hubble views of the dark, irregular knots of dense gas embedded along the inner rim of the ring, which look like spokes in a bicycle wheel. These gaseous tentacles formed when expanding hot gas pushed into cool gas ejected previously by the doomed star. The knots are more resistant to erosion by the wave of ultraviolet light unleashed by the star. The Hubble images have allowed the team to match up the knots with the spikes of light around the bright, main ring, which are a shadow effect. Astronomers have found similar knots in other planetary nebulae.
All of this gas was expelled by the central star about 4,000 years ago. The original star was several times more massive than our sun. After billions of years converting hydrogen to helium in its core, the star began to run out of fuel. It then ballooned in size, becoming a red giant. During this phase, the star shed its outer gaseous layers into space and began to collapse as fusion reactions began to die out. A gusher of ultraviolet light from the dying star energized the gas, making it glow.
The outer rings were formed when faster-moving gas slammed into slower-moving material. The nebula is expanding at more than 43,000 miles an hour, but the center is moving faster than the expansion of the main ring. O'Dell's team measured the nebula's expansion by comparing the new Hubble observations with Hubble studies made in 1998.
The Ring Nebula will continue to expand for another 10,000 years, a short phase in the lifetime of the star. The nebula will become fainter and fainter until it merges with the interstellar medium.
Studying the Ring Nebula's fate will provide insight into the sun's demise in another 6 billion years. The sun is less massive than the Ring Nebula's progenitor star, so it will not have an opulent ending.
"When the sun becomes a white dwarf, it will heat more slowly after it ejects its outer gaseous layers," O'Dell said. "The material will be farther away once it becomes hot enough to illuminate the gas. This larger distance means the sun's nebula will be fainter because it is more extended."
In the analysis, the research team also obtained images from the Large Binocular Telescope at the Mount Graham International Observatory in Arizona and spectroscopic data from the San Pedro Martir Observatory in Baja California, Mexico.
###
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
May 23, 2013 ? Researchers and physicians in the field could soon run on-the-spot tests for environmental toxins, medical diagnostics, food safety and more with their smartphones.
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign researchers have developed a cradle and app for the iPhone that uses the phone's built-in camera and processing power as a biosensor to detect toxins, proteins, bacteria, viruses and other molecules.
Having such sensitive biosensing capabilities in the field could enable on-the-spot tracking of groundwater contamination, combine the phone's GPS data with biosensing data to map the spread of pathogens, or provide immediate and inexpensive medical diagnostic tests in field clinics or contaminant checks in the food processing and distribution chain.
"We're interested in biodetection that needs to be performed outside of the laboratory," said team leader Brian Cunningham, a professor of electrical and computer engineering and of bioengineering at the U. of I. "Smartphones are making a big impact on our society -- the way we get our information, the way we communicate. And they have really powerful computing capability and imaging. A lot of medical conditions might be monitored very inexpensively and non-invasively using mobile platforms like phones. They can detect molecular things, like pathogens, disease biomarkers or DNA, things that are currently only done in big diagnostic labs with lots of expense and large volumes of blood."
The wedge-shaped cradle contains a series of optical components -- lenses and filters -- found in much larger and more expensive laboratory devices. The cradle holds the phone's camera in alignment with the optical components.
At the heart of the biosensor is a photonic crystal. A photonic crystal is like a mirror that only reflects one wavelength of light while the rest of the spectrum passes through. When anything biological attaches to the photonic crystal -- such as protein, cells, pathogens or DNA -- the reflected color will shift from a shorter wavelength to a longer wavelength.
For the handheld iPhone biosensor, a normal microscope slide is coated with the photonic material. The slide is primed to react to a specific target molecule. The photonic crystal slide is inserted into a slot on the cradle and the spectrum measured. Its reflecting wavelength shows up as a black gap in the spectrum. After exposure to the test sample, the spectrum is re-measured. The degree of shift in the reflected wavelength tells the app how much of the target molecule is in the sample.
The entire test takes only a few minutes; the app walks the user through the process step by step. Although the cradle holds only about $200 of optical components, it performs as accurately as a large $50,000 spectrophotometer in the laboratory. So now, the device is not only portable, but also affordable for fieldwork in developing nations.
In a paper published in the journal Lab on a Chip, the team demonstrated sensing of an immune system protein, but the slide could be primed for any type of biological molecule or cell type. The researchers are working to improve the manufacturing process for the iPhone cradle and are working on a cradle for Android phones as well. They hope to begin making the cradles available next year.
Cunningham's group is now collaborating with other groups across campus at the U. of I. to explore applications for the iPhone biosensor. The group recently received a grant from the National Science Foundation to expand the range of biological experiments that can be performed with the phone, in collaboration with Steven Lumetta, a professor of electrical and computer engineering and of computer science at the U. of I. They are also are also working with food science and human nutrition professor Juan Andrade to develop a fast biosensor test for iron deficiency and vitamin A deficiency in expectant mothers and children.
In addition, Cunningham's team is working on biosensing tests that could be performed in the field to detect toxins in harvested corn and soybeans, and to detect pathogens in food and water.
"It's our goal to expand the range of biological experiments that can be performed with a phone and its camera being used as a spectrometer," Cunningham said. "In our first paper, we showed the ability to use a photonic crystal biosensor, but in our NSF grant, we're creating a multi-mode biosensor. We'll use the phone and one cradle to perform four of the most widely used biosensing assays that are available."
Cunningham also is affiliated with the Institute for Genomic Biology, the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, and the Micro and Nanotechnology Laboratory, all at the U. of I.
See a video of the app in action at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kh7MUjIYuyw.
Shashi Seth, whose r?sum? includes management and executive roles at Yahoo, Aol, and Google, is joining the Tribune Company as the president of a new unit called Tribune Digital Ventures. Seth's role was first reported yesterday at AllThingsD, and the company is now confirming the news. It says Tribune Digital Ventures will operate as an independent unit based in Silicon Valley.
![[ Back to EurekAlert! ]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sk2iwLkgNKvjuKWxtMIRb_soidwPQ_ZVeRUWUCP9EyMG5rAoCt2knKJxCo979f523FQQKtpSBGP32uGucfumbtZpah2RzEQZa_hkUb7bM=s0-d){kind=small}
Public release date: 11-Jun-2013
Share ] 
Shashi Seth, whose