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Spacewalkers to Prepare for New Visitor

International Space Station crewmembers will start rolling out the welcome mat for the new Automated Transfer Vehicle with a spacewalk early Tuesday. The ATV is an unpiloted cargo carrier like the Russian Progress supply vehicles, but has a cargo capacity about 2-1/2 times that of a Progress. During the Aug. 3 spacewalk Expedition 9 Commander Gennady Padalka and NASA ISS Science Officer Mike Fincke will install antennas and laser reflectors to help the ATV dock to the rear of the Zvezda Service Module.

Blood pressure hormone may inhibit growth of lung cancer

A hormone that is important in the control of blood pressure may also inhibit the growth of lung cancer cells, say scientists at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center, writing in the new issue of the journal Carcinogenesis. Patricia E. Gallagher, Ph.D., and E. Ann Tallant, Ph.D., said the hormone, called angiotensin-(1-7), ”may represent a novel chemotherapeutic and chemopreventive treatment for lung cancer.”

A New Advance in Gallium Nitride Nanowires

A significant breakthrough in the development of the highly prized semiconductor gallium nitride as a building block for nanotechnology has been achieved by a team of scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California at Berkeley. For the first time ever, the researchers have been able control the direction in which a gallium nitride nanowire grows. Growth direction is critical to determining the wire’s electrical and thermal conductivity and other important properties.

Breastfeeding can save over 1 million lives yearly

If more infants worldwide are given only mother’s milk and no food or formula until the age of six months, at least 1.3 million lives could be saved this year, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said today. With more than 10 million children dying annually from mainly preventable causes like diarrhoea and pneumonia, the agency said if every baby were exclusively breastfed for the first half-year of life, an estimated 3,500 lives could be saved each day.

FDA Approves New Drug to Treat Alcoholism

The FDA today approved the drug Campral (acamprosate), for treating alcohol dependent individuals seeking to continue to remain alcohol-free after they have stopped drinking. Campral may not be effective in patients who are actively drinking at the start of treatment, or in patients who abuse other substances in addition to alcohol. Campral is the first new drug approved for alcohol abuse in a decade.

Say it inna so! Scots unhealthy and unhappy

A new report reveals that the citizens of Scotland enjoy little satisfaction in life and endure a variety of health problems. The report titled ”The Scots May Be Brave, But They Are Neither Healthy Nor Happy,” analyzed data from several sources, some encompassing 30 years of information, including Labour Force Surveys, Eurobarometer records, and the UK Office of National Statistics. ”We usually think that a strong economy leads to an increase in life satisfaction among the population… We found that’s not the case in Scotland.”

European observatory ‘catches a falling star’ on film

A popular saying states that when you see a meteor, you may make a wish. While astronomers cannot promise that it will be realised, a team of astronomers have indeed seen a dream come true! On May 12, 2002, they were lucky to record the spectrum of a bright meteor when it happened – by sheer chance and against all reasonable odds – to cross the narrow slit of the FORS1 instrument on the ESO Very Large Telescope.

Why kids drink soda pop

Flavored, carbonated drinks have been around for about two hundred years. And their popularity continues to grow–overtaking more nutritious beverages among some age groups, especially children and adolescents. Researchers from the University of Minnesota surveyed 560 children ages 8 to 13 years old on how often they drank soft drinks and the factors that influence soft drink consumption.

Prion finding offers insight into spontaneous protein diseases

UCSF scientists are reporting what they say is compelling evidence that the infectious agent known as prion is composed solely of protein. Their findings promise to create new tools for early diagnosis of prions causing bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or ”mad cow” disease, in cattle and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in people, they say. The researchers believe that their work may also help advance investigations of more common neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Titan’s Purple Haze Points to a Fuzzy Past

Encircled in purple stratospheric haze, Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, appears as a softly glowing sphere in this colorized image taken on July 3, 2004, one day after Cassini’s first flyby of that moon. Titan has a dense atmosphere composed primarily of nitrogen with a few percent methane. The atmosphere can undergo photochemical processes to form hazes.

Free electron laser reaches 10 kW

The Free-Electron Laser (FEL), supported by the Office of Naval Research and located at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, achieved 10 kilowatts of infrared laser light in late June, making it the most powerful tunable laser in the world. The recently upgraded laser’s new capabilities will enhance defense and manufacturing technologies, and support advanced studies of chemistry, physics, biology, and more.