Electric in Biological News

GOCE's electric ion propulsion engine switched on

GOCE's sophisticated electric ion propulsion system has been switched on and confirmed to be operating normally, marking another crucial milestone in the satellite's post-launch commissioning phase. The success of GOCE's ultra-sensitive gravity measurements depends on finely controlling the sat...

Novel electric signals in plants

Using ion-selective micro-electrodes electrical signals in plants moving from leaf to leaf could be measured. The speed of the signals spreading as voltage changes over cell membranes ranged from 5 to 10 cm per minute. The scientists discovered this new kind of electrical signal transmission syste...

Greenhouse gas auction revenues can help cut Md. electric use significantly, says study

COLLEGE PARK, Md. Maryland officials can reduce electricity use in the state significantly by investing revenues from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) cap-and-trade auctions in energy efficiency programs, says a new study from a University of Maryland-led research team. It adds that ...

Penn engineers create carbon nanopipettes that are smaller than cells and measure electric current

PHILADELPHIA - University of Pennsylvania engineers and physicians have developed a carbon nanopipette thousands of times thinner than a human hair that measures electric current and delivers fluids into cells. Researchers developed this tiny carbon-based tool to probe cells with minimal intrusio...

Electric fish conduct electric duets in aquatic courtship

Cornell researchers have discovered that in the battle of the sexes, African electric fish couples not only use specific electrical signals to court but also engage in a sort of dueling "electric duet." The study is the first to compare electrical and behavioral displays in breeding and nonbreed...

Convergent evolution of molecules in electric fish

Having a set of extra genes gave fish on separate continents the ability to evolve electric organs, report researchers from The University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Harold Zakon and colleagues, in a paper recently published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show that African and S...

UF scientists trace origin of shark's electric sense

Sharks are known for their almost uncanny ability to detect electrical signals while hunting and navigating. Now researchers have traced the origin of those electrosensory powers to the same type of embryonic cells that gives rise to many head and facial features in humans. The discovery, repo...

Mechanism for memory revealed in neurons of electric fish

Researchers from The University of Texas at Austin studying electric fish have gained new insight into how memory is stored at the level of neurons. Their finding, published in the Feb. 16 issue of Neuron, could help researchers better understand memory formation and neural disorders like epilep...

Stem cells' electric abilities might help their safe clinical use

Researchers from Johns Hopkins have discovered the presence of functional ion channels in human embryonic stem cells (ESCs). These ion channels act like electrical wires and permit ESCs, versatile cells that possess the unique ability to become all cell types of the body, to conduct and pass along ...

AGU journal highlights -- Aug. 6, 2009

...ate lightning Dust storms on Earth build up an electric field as dust particles collide, and then emit lightning as the electric field discharges. Some previous evidence suggested...ermal microwave radiation, which indicates a large electric discharge, from ordinary thermal radiation. The in...

'Green' energy from algae

... focused on extracting the valuable constituents of the algae biomass by an electric pulsed treatment. So far, Dr. Georg Mller, head of this institute's Pulsed ... for energy production", says Mller. "The plant cells are exposed to a high electric field for a very short term. This causes a perforation of the cell membrane...

Symposium to discuss geoengineering to fight climate change at the ESA Annual Meeting

...t of the atmosphere and stores it in underground reservoirs. Jackson says that this solution has the potential to store more than a century's worth of electric power emissions at a relatively low cost. He notes, however, that some potential risks of geologic sequestration include carbon leakage and the potent...

Opening a new window on daylight

... at the Asian Institute of Technology in Pathumtani, Thailand, explain that electric lighting is typically responsible for 25 to 40% of total electricity consum...uch as Bangkok, the potential for daylighting is high and could cut daytime electric lighting requirements significantly. The team suggests that for more than 9...

DOE-funded research projects win 46 R&D 100 Awards for 2009

...mion systems available today for the plugin hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) and electric vehicle markets, which will help facilitate meetin...es from a camera mounted on a pair of glasses into electric signals in the eye that the brain uses to create a...

Researchers design first model motor nerve system that's insulated and organized like the human body

...e, at the electrically charged nodes of Ranvier. Nerve malfunctions, called neuropathies, involve a breakdown in the way the brain sends and receives electric signals along nerve cells, leading to malfunctions at the nodes of Ranvier, along with demyelination". Hickman's team has now achieved the first succe...

Robo-bats with metal muscles may be next generation of remote control flyers

...he muscular system. "We're using an alloy that responds to the heat from an electric current. That heat actuates micro-scale wires the size of a human hair, mak...scles.' During the contraction, the powerful muscle wires also change their electric resistance, which can be easily measured, thus providing simultaneous actio...

Can a new implant coating technique create a new six million dollar man?

...nthetic hydroxyapatite. In place of plasma-spraying the coating onto the metal, the metal implant is placed into a bath of electrolyte solution and an electric current is applied. According to Prof. Eliaz, a good coating is crucial to the stable fixation of the implant in the surrounding bone. Since human ...

New biomarker method could increase the number of diagnostic tests for cancer

...mic technologies have been based on mass spectrometry, a decades-old technology that determines which proteins are in a specimen based on the mass and electric charge of fragments of each protein. The current biomarker discovery process typically identifies hundreds of candidate biomarkers in each study us...

Natural-born divers and the molecular traces of evolution

... Mirceta will be presenting these latest results at the Society of Experimental Biology Annual Meeting in Glasgow on Monday 29th June 2009. The net electric charge of any protein is directly related to the charge of its individual amino acids, and therefore it can be predicted if the amino acid sequence is...

Story tips from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, June 2009

...ped under an Oak Ridge National Laboratory-General electric partnership. GE will be the first major brand to h...9 Department of Energy "Energy Star" standards for electric water heaters. GE has announced that it will begin making the hybrid electric water heaters -- which are 50 percent more energy ...

Researchers create freestanding nanoparticle films without fillers

...anel television screens and computer displays. EDP is a wet method. Nanoparticles are placed in a solution along with a pair of electrodes. When an electric current is applied, it creates an electrical field in the liquid that attracts the nanoparticles, which coat the electrodes. Using colloids, mixtures ...

New study: Home energy savings are made in the shade

... Trees positioned to shade the west and south sides of a house may decrease summertime electric bills by 5 percent on average, according to a recent study* of California homes by researchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology...

Center to investigate plant cells for better biomass fuels

...The Lignocellulose Center is one of 46 EFRC centers formed nationwide by the DOE to address fundamental issues in fields ranging from solar energy and electric storage to materials sciences, biofuels and carbon capture and sequestration. The Center has planned collaboration with researchers at North Carolina ...

Heart attacks: The tipping point

...d be measured by electrical activity. Studying the electric coupling tiny electric signals between myocytes and fibroblast cells, he...anner, he compares that to a diseased heart, where electric coupling is scattered and irregular and the impuls...

Risk of vibration-induced vascular injuries linked to vibration frequency differences

...i-vibration gloves and tools. Higher frequency vibrations produced by an electric sander (greater than 100 Hz) are smoother than the slower vibrations of an electric hand drill (approximately 63 Hz) and therefore are less likely to cause use...

Cheap and efficient white light LEDs new design described in AIP's Journal of Applied Physics

...mall amounts of mercury vapor, an environmental toxin. LEDs on the other hand, are made from thin wafers of material flanked by electrodes. When an electric current is sent through the wafers, it liberates electrons from the atoms therein, leaving behind vacancies or "holes." When some of the wandering ele...

NIST-Cornell team builds world's first nanofluidic device with complex 3-D surfaces

...luidic device is accomplished using electrophoresis, the method of moving charged particles through a solution by forcing them forward with an applied electric field. In these novel experiments, the NIST-Cornell researchers tested their device with two different solutions: one containing 100-nanometer-diamete...

The secret to chimp strength

...s are these limits bypassedas in the anecdotal reports of people able to lift cars to free trapped crash victims. "Add to this the effect of severe electric shock, where people are often thrown violently by their own extreme muscle contraction, and it is clear that we do not contract all our muscle fibers ...

Crabs' memory of pain confirmed by Queen's academic

...ic has shown that crabs not only suffer pain but that they retain a memory of it. The study, which looked at the reactions of hermit crabs to small electric shocks, was carried out by Professor Bob Elwood and Mirjam Appel from the School of Biological Sciences at Queen's and has been published in the journ...

Covering the bases: Quantum effect may hold promise for low-cost DNA sequencing, sensor applications

...Bridging the divide Electron tunneling is a peculiar property of matter acting over tiny distances at the atomic or subatomic scale. In a classical electric circuit, a gate is either open or closed, permitting or blocking the flow of current. But, as Lindsay explains, "when you start to get two electrodes ...

The sunlight solution for better health

...ren to spend hours playing outside. The lure of video games and computers has changed all that. Adults also live and work in the perpetual twilight of electric lighting. Though we feel comfortable, there is evidence that our bodies have not really adjusted to a lifestyle that is less than a century old. In fa...

New method for detecting explosives

...ve sensors for years. Typical sensors use ion mobility spectrometers, which ionize tiny amounts of chemicals and measure how fast they move through an electric field. While these instruments are fast, sensitive, and reliable, they are also expensive and bulky, leading many researchers in the last few years to...

AGU journal highlights -- March 12, 2009

...terize perturbations that can affect orbiting satellites Magnetospheric electric and magnetic perturbations at ultralow frequencies (ULF, between 2 and 25 m...to study ULF pulsations in the magnetosphere, the authors identify specific electric and magnetic field disturbances that are shown through modeling and observa...

The genetics of fear: Study suggests specific genetic variations contribute to anxiety disorders

...ced working memory but also greater levels of anxiety. In this experiment, volunteers were shown a picture (A) and then immediately received a mild electric shock. They were also shown another picture (B) that was never associated with a shock. The participants learned during the experiment to fear picture...

Story tips from the Departments of Energy's Oak Ridge National Lab -- March 2009

...smuth ferrite possess an unexpected electron conductance. The nanometer-scale domain walls separate the regions of a material with different magnetic, electric and other properties. Scientists believe that they hold a key to making great strides in logic and memory functions of tomorrow's electronic devices. ...

Houseplants increase quality of life for retirement community residents

...lants. Second, caring for the plants encouraged active and energetic participation. The researchers reported that "the overall energy was positive and electric as everyone involved could not wait to see how their plants would fare", adding that study participants "got dirty hands, dirt on their clothes, and f...

Decisive action needed as warming predictions worsen, says expert

...ons are accelerating much faster than we thought," says Field. "Over the last decade developing countries such as China and India have increased their electric power generation by burning more coal. Economies in the developing world are becoming more, not less carbon-intensive. We are definitely in unexplored...

Reducing CO2 through technology and smart growth

... if the full vehicle fleet was converted to hybrid electric vehicles, such as the Toyota Prius or the soon-to-...rtually all cars on the roads by 2050 to be hybrid electric vehicles, assuming the costs of these vehicles bec... conventional engine technologies. Today's hybrid electric vehicles can achieve 40 miles to the gallon and hi...

$300,000 donation from BP includes solar vehicle for UH

...tives, the environment and renewable energy sources is a great example of social responsibility in action." The BP solar buggy is equipped with two electric motors with 30 horsepower, delivering more than 170 pounds of torque and making it one of the most powerful all-terrain vehicles available in its cate...

PSEG's Ralph Izzo to explore at NJIT the impacts of climate change, more

...pment, Izzo serves on the boards of the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce, the American Gas Association, the New Jersey Utilities Association, the Edison electric Institute and the Nuclear Energy Institute. In addition, he is a member of the Council on Competitiveness Energy Security; Innovation and Sustainabil...