News
Superbugs may meet their match in these nanoparticles
Source: Science News
Antibiotics may have a new teammate in the fight against drug-resistant infections.
Researchers have engineered nanoparticles to produce chemicals that render bacteria more vulnerable to antibiotics. These quantum dots, described online October 4 in Science Advances, could help combat pathogens that have developed resistance to antibiotics (SN: 10/15/16, p. 11).
“Various superbugs are evolving too rapidly to be counteracted by traditional drugs,” says Zhengtao Deng, a chemist at Nanjing University in China not involved in the...
Breast cancer cells spread in an already-armed mob
COLD SPRING HARBOR, N.Y. — When breast cancer spreads, it moves in gangs of ready-to-rumble tumor cells, a small genetic study suggests. Most of the mutations that drive recurrent tumors when they pop up elsewhere in the body were present in the original tumor, geneticist Elaine Mardis reported May 9 at the Biology of Genomes meeting.
DNA may offer rapid road to Zika vaccine!
Blog Post provided by Sciences News
Last August, scientists injected a potential vaccine for Zika virus into a human being — just 3½ months after they had decided exactly what molecular recipe to use.
In the world of vaccine development, 3½ months from design to injection is “warp speed,” says vaccine researcher Nelson Michael of the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Silver Spring, Md. Clinical trials can take years and epidemics can burn out before vaccines make it to doctors’ shelves. Even vaccine creation is typically sluggish.
But in this case, the vaccine is a...
The procrastinator's guide to viewing the solar eclipse
(Article from USATODAY.com)
This is not a drill. The eclipse is today. We repeat, the total solar eclipse is today!
Yes, the celestial event of the year/decade/century, depending who you ask, is finally here. Many (organized) people planned their eclipse day a year ago, or longer.
But if you're not one of them, don't worry — we've got you covered.
Here's what you need:
Real (not fake) eclipse glasses
This cannot be stressed...
Entrepreneurs are turning trash into food, drink, and clean energy
(Article from popsci.com)
When Tristram Stuart was growing up on a farm in England, he raised pigs as a hobby. He saw that much of the thrown-out food he was feeding them was actually fit for humans. One day, having found an appetizing loaf of sun-dried tomato bread in the pile of waste, he sat down and ate lunch with his pigs.
Stuart recognized early — he was about 15 — the folly of food waste, and vowed to do something about it. “I grew up with a strong relationship with the land,” he said....
