Technology

Sandia, Cray, AMD team for Opteron-based supercomputer

Intel-rival Advanced Micro Devices got a nice science win Monday when Sandia National Laboratory and Cray Inc. said they would build a supercomputer capable 40 trillion calculations per second using AMD’s forthcoming Opteron processor. Ten thousand of them, to be precise. Total cost: $90 million. Sandia says it will use the computing heavyweight for “modeling and simulation of complex problems that were only recently thought impractical, if not impossible.”

Screening technique may speed hunt for genes

The hunt to find a gene that causes a disease typically costs hundreds of thousands of dollars and requires years of research – and it still may fail to turn up the sought-after culprit, driving the research back to square one. The result is that while the genes involved in a few inherited diseases such as cystic fibrosis have been identified, many have not. Now, two scientists say they may have found a way to make the search more economical and speed it up. In an article to appear online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences next week, scientists from the University of Florida and Purdue University report merging two established genetic-screening techniques to create one that’s better. The new technique narrows the pool of “candidate” genes in a study from thousands of possibilities to fewer than 100 – perhaps as few as 20.

PC group-think reports first success

For the first time, a distributed computing experiment has produced significant results that have been published in a scientific journal. Writing in the online edition of Nature magazine, Stanford University scientists describe how they — with the help of 30,000 personal computers — successfully simulated part of the complex folding process that a typical protein molecule undergoes to achieve its unique, three-dimensional shape.

Fractals Help Researchers Design Antennas for New Wireless Devices

Antennas for the next generation of cellphones and other wireless communications devices may bear a striking resemblance to the Santa Monica Mountains or possibly the California coastline.
That’s because UCLA researchers are using fractals ? mathematical models of mountains, trees and coastlines ? to develop antennas for next-generation cellphones, cars and mobile communications devices. These antennas need to be miniature and be able to operate at multiple frequencies simultaneously.

New planet detection technique can spot even small worlds around distant stars

An extrasolar planet has been discovered using a new technique that will allow astronomers to detect planets no other current method can. Planets around other stars have been previously detected only by the effect they have on their parent star, limiting the observations to large, Jupiter-like planets and those in very tight orbits. The new method uses the patterns created in the dust surrounding a star to discern the presence of a planet that could be as small as Earth or in an orbit so wide that it would take hundreds of years to observe its effect on its star.

Gene therapy appears to help cancer pain

It’s one of those stories that simultaneously gives great hope but also a little dread. Researchers in Pennsylvania say they’ve successfully stimulated the production of a pain-blocking protein in mice by using a modified herpes virus to attach the appropriate genes onto the animals’ DNA. That’s potentially terrific news. If the same technique held true in humans, it could offer a new way to treat the devastating pain associated with some forms of cancer, such as bone cancer. Of course, a hell of a lot of mice were bred specifically develop the extremely painful bone tumors, just so the technique could be tested. It’s no doubt a necessary sacrifice, but one that shouldn’t be overlooked entirely. You don’t have to be a wacko member of PETA to spare a thought for the millions of mice and other lab animals that are sacrificed each year so humans can live healthier lives.

Neural stem cells used to hunt, kill brain cancer

Using neural stem cells to hunt down and kill cancer cells, researchers have successfully tested a new treatment for brain cancer. They now hope the technique will lead to an effective treatment for glioma, the most aggressive form of primary brain tumor in humans. As the Cedars-Sianai researchers note, the prognosis has historically been extremely poor for patients diagnosed with malignant gliomas. The tumors have poorly defined margins, and glioma cells often spread deep into healthy brain tissue making their surgical removal difficult. Often, pockets of tumor cells break off from the main tumor and migrate deep into non-tumorous areas of the brain. Therefore, even if the original tumor is completely removed or destroyed, the risk of recurrence is high as cells in these distant “satellites” multiply and eventually re-form a new brain tumor. Due to these characteristics, treating brain cancer has been extremely difficult.

Test could reduce need for biopsies in prostate disease

Men who test positive for elevated prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels sometimes freak out because they think it means they have cancer. To find out, a surgeon will often perform a biopsy. But researchers from the National Cancer Institute and the Food and Drug Administration report that a new test using a single drop of blood could help distinguish between prostate cancer and benign conditions. The trick is identifying patterns of proteins found in patients’ blood serum.

New technique cuts risks of gene therapy

Stanford researchers have developed a technique that could cut the risks associated with gene therapy. Traditionally, gene therapy involves sneaking a snippet of genes into a person’s DNA via a virus messenger. But the result is the new sequence gets randomly placed within the patient’s existing genes, sometimes triggering other illnesses, such as leukemia. The new technique eliminates the need for a virus delivery system and places the genes in precise locations.

Now for something really important … pork!

Treating pork and other livestock meat with plain old baking soda improves the taste, Wisconsin researchers have found. “For years consumers have noticed that pork quality is inconsistent. A major reason is that the meat from some pigs becomes pale, soft and watery after they are slaughtered, according to Robert Kauffman, an expert on pork quality and a UW-Madison emeritus professor.” Vegetarians in the audience should move on now, as this clearly meat-friendly story may make you a little uncomfortable.

Strange attraction: Shaping metal with magnets

Researchers in Ohio say they’ve come up with a way to shape metal using powerful magnetic fields, a process that could help cut down on the use of toxic lubricants otherwise needed to stamp products as diverse as auto parts and kitchenware. Said one of the researchers: “The process has to be reliable, and require as little human intervention as possible…. In automobile production especially, manufactures need to make parts in as few steps as they possibly can. I think we can do a lot of good things for industry with this technique.”

Bloodworm shows new use for copper

The lowly and somewhat gruesome bloodworm may have a few lessons to teach material scientists.The critter apparently is the first ever to be found to use a copper-containing mineral structure as part of its skeleton. The finding is remarkable first because the amount of copper detected in the jaw tip of the marine worm would normally be toxic to an organism. Second, the copper also occurs in non-mineral form in the bloodworm jaw where it may act as a sort of bridge, cross-linking long chains of fibrous proteins. And that has appealing commercial posibilities. “The marriage of protein with copper mineral as well as with bound copper ions is an intriguing concept per se but may also serve as a design prototype for new materials that need to be hard, lightweight, and durable.”