Few things appear as delicate as a spiders web, each gossamer strand one-tenth the width of a human hair. Yet pound for pound, the sturdiest spider silks are stronger than steel and stretchier than nylon. With such remarkable properties, its no wonder that researchers have made numerous attempts to synthesize spider silk for industrial and medical applications. (Efforts to farm the arachnids have failed as a result of their territorial nature.) Indeed, in the words of one scientist, this
Playing virtual reality computer games could provide the answer to combating motion sickness.
Scientists are looking at how feelings of nausea can be induced in people who are put into a virtual reality environment. By putting them back into that environment on a frequent basis the researchers are hoping to find out if they become accustomed to the conditions and overcome the symptoms of motion sickness.
The research is being carried out by scientists at Loughborough Univers
Scientists believe that they have found a chemical responsible for increasing cardiovascular risk, it was revealed. And crucially they have identified how it is made and destroyed in the body raising the possibilty that new drugs to reduce the risk of heart disease are around the corner. A team of scientists based at the new British Heart Foundation (BHF) Laboratories at UCL first identified ADMA as a naturally occurring substance that blocks the production of a gas made by the body – Nitric Oxide. N
Middle aged men should be heartened to know that frequent sex is not likely to increase their risk of stroke. It may actually reduce the risk of sudden death, suggests research in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.
The Caerphilly study, which takes its name from a former mining town in South Wales, involves tracking the development of heart disease in almost 3000 men. All were aged between 45 and 59 when recruited to the study between 1979 and 1983.
Just under 1000 m
Researchers finally measure the subtle quantum effects of fourth fundamental force.
Far from falling smoothly, objects moving under gravity do so in lurching, quantum leaps, a French experiment has revealed 1 . The finding confirms that gravity, like the Universe’s three other fundamental forces, can have a quantum effect.
Particles, such as electrons confined to their orbital shells around the nucleus of an atom, are restricted by the rules of quantum mechan
A new type of Earth ecosystem could be found on other planets.
Scientists have found a community of microbes unlike anything else on Earth. Conditions in this ecosystem could mimic those on Earth when life began, and might exist elsewhere in today’s Solar System.
Home to the microbes is a hot spring 200 metres beneath the US state of Idaho. Their lives owe nothing to the Sun. They generate energy by combining hydrogen from rocks with carbon dioxide, releasing methane as a by