world war ii

Study: Combat vets 62 percent more likely to lose marriages

While politicians and generals determine what’s next for Iraqis, recent research raises questions about what’s next for the families of the American soldiers concluding combat operations in Iraq. Combat veterans’ first marriages are 62 percent more likely to end in separation or divorce than other men’s, according to a study led by a Brigham Young University professor. “While the war may be mostly over, its effects on the soldiers who fought it may be just beginning,” said Sven Wilson, an assistant professor of political science. “We found that combat experience is an important risk factor for divorce or separation.”

WWII discovery may counter bioterrorists

A compound developed by British scientists early in World War II as a treatment against chemical weapons has value against today’s threat of bioterrorism, according to Indiana University School of Medicine researchers at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne. Researchers studying British Anti-Lewisite provide an overview of its historical uses, development and clinical implications today of the heavy metal chelating agent, detailed in the March issue of the Annals of Emergency Medicine. BAL is a medical therapy to remove metal poisonings from the body.

Researchers claim advance in quantum cryptography

Researchers have demonstrated a new high-speed quantum cryptography method that uses the properties of light to encrypt information into a form of code that can only be cracked by violating the physical laws of nature. The method promises security even against information security’s greatest foe: the not-yet-invented but still-feared powerful quantum computer, which could break almost any conventional code. The researchers transmitted encrypted data at the rate of 250 megabits per second. Because it uses standard lasers, detectors and other existing optical technology to transmit large bundles of photons, the protocol is more than 1,000 times faster than its main competitor, a technique based on single photons that is difficult and expensive to implement, the researchers say.