Curiosity rover set for third drilling on Mars: NASA

WASHINGTON: US space agency NASA said Tuesday its Curiosity rover will carry out its third drilling on Mars in the coming days.

Curiosity used several tools to examine a Martian sandstone slab dubbed "Windjana" over the weekend, including a wire-bristle brush known as the Dust Removal Tool to clear away dust from a 6- centimeter-across patch on the rock, Xinhua quoted NASA as saying.

"In the brushed spot, we can see that the rock is fine-grained, its true colour is much grayer than the surface dust, and some portions of the rock are harder than others, creating the interesting bumpy textures," Curiosity science team member Melissa Rice of the California Institute of Technology said in a NASA statement.

"All of these traits reinforce our interest in drilling here in order to understand the chemistry of the fluids that bound these grains together to form the rock," Rice said.

Before Curiosity drills deeply enough for collection of rock- powder sample, there will be a preparatory "mini-drill" operation on the target, as a further check for readiness, NASA said.

Curiosity's drill collects powered sample material from the interior of a target rock for analysis.

The only two rocks previously drilled by Curiosity are even finer-grained mudstone in Yellowknife Bay, about 4 kilometres northeast of the rover's current location at a waypoint called " The Kimberley."

Those two targets, examined in 2013, provided evidence of an ancient lakebed environment from billions of years ago with conditions favourable for microbial life.

22.10 | 0 komentar | Read More

WHO declares antibiotic resistance "a major global threat"

LONDON: The most comprehensive picture of antibiotic resistance, with data from 114 countries has revealed that resistance to the last-resort treatment for life-threatening infections caused by common intestinal bacteria Klebsiella pneumonia — carbapenem antibiotics — has spread to all regions of the world.

K pneumoniae is a major cause of hospital-acquired infections such as pneumonia, bloodstream infections, infections in new borns and intensive-care unit patients.

In some countries, because of resistance, carbapenem antibiotics would not work in more than half of people treated for K pneumoniae infections.

Resistance to antibiotics was on Wednesday declared a "major global threat" to public health by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The report brought out by the WHO has also revealed high levels of E coli resistance to third generation cephalosporins and fluoroquinolones — two important and commonly used types of antibacterial medicine in Southeast Asia region, which is home to a quarter of the world's population.

In more bad news, in some parts of the region, more than one quarter of Staphylococcus aureus infections are reported to be methicillin-resistant (MRSA), meaning that treatment with standard antibiotics does not work.

The report, "Antimicrobial resistance: global report on surveillance" published on Wednesday, has revealed that resistance is occurring across many different infectious agents specially in seven different bacteria responsible for common, serious diseases such as bloodstream infections (sepsis), diarrhoea, pneumonia, urinary tract infections and gonorrhoea.

The results are cause for high concern, documenting resistance to antibiotics, especially "last resort" antibiotics, in all regions of the world.

Resistance to one of the most widely used antibacterial medicines for the treatment of urinary tract infections caused by E coli — fluoroquinolones — is very widespread.

In the 1980s, when these drugs were first introduced, resistance was virtually zero. Today, there are countries in many parts of the world where this treatment is now ineffective in more than half of patients.

Treatment failure to the last resort of treatment for gonorrhoea — third generation cephalosporins — has been confirmed in Austria, Australia, Canada, France, Japan, Norway, Slovenia, South Africa, Sweden and the United Kingdom. More than 1 million people are infected with gonorrhoea around the world every day.

Antibiotic resistance causes people to be sick for longer and increases the risk of death. For example, people with MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) are estimated to be 64% more likely to die than people with a non-resistant form of the infection. Resistance also increases the cost of health care with lengthier stays in hospital and more intensive care required.

"Without urgent, coordinated action, the world is headed for a post-antibiotic era, in which common infections and minor injuries which have been treatable for decades can once again kill," says Dr Keiji Fukuda, WHO's assistant director general for health security.

"Effective antibiotics have been one of the pillars allowing us to live longer, live healthier, and benefit from modern medicine. Unless we take significant actions to improve efforts to prevent infections and also change how we produce, prescribe and use antibiotics, the world will lose more and more of these global public health goods and the implications will be devastating."

Antibiotic resistance — when bacteria change so antibiotics no longer work in people who need them to treat infections — is now a major threat to public health.

The report reveals high levels of resistance to third generation cephalosporins in K pneumoniae throughout the WHO European Region. In some settings, as many as 60% of Staphylococcus aureus infections are reported to be methicillin-resistant (MRSA), meaning that treatment with standard antibiotics does not work.

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World’s biggest organ scanning project starts in UK

LONDON: In what is the world's biggest scanning project, 100,000 Britons are now undergoing detailed imaging of their brain, heart and vital organs to help researchers study a wide range of common, chronic and life-threatening conditions like diabetes, cancer and heart disease.

Scientists say that the UK Bio-bank imaging study is one of the most ambitious and exciting health research opportunities in recent years.

It will provide an unprecedented level of information to help scientists and doctors working on a wide range of illnesses, including dementia, heart disease, cancer, arthritis, depression and eye and lung disorders over very many years.

DNA has been collected from all the volunteers who will be compared and cross-referenced with the scans.
Prof Sir Rory Collins Chief Exec, UK Biobank said, "The aim is to try to improve the diagnosis and treatment of a huge range of diseases. We are trying to understand why one person gets a disease and another does not." The Bio bank said, "The project will collect pictures of participants' brains, hearts and bones.

Many thousands of UK Bio bank participants will be invited to take part over the coming year. We are grateful to all participants who have given up so much of their time to help medical research so far. Their contribution is already helping innovative research studies."

"We hope many will join this scanning project and provide more information for research which will benefit future generations," said Professor Collins.

The project will include Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans of the brain, heart and body to determine the structure of internal organs and the distribution of body fat. Ultrasound - scan of the carotid (neck) arteries will be carried out to study the build-up of fat in the vessels. Dual-Energy X-ray Absorptiometry (DXA) scan using low-energy X-rays will then measure bone density and risk of osteoporosis and arthritis.

Scientists have already begun to analyze the DNA of all 500,000 participants.

These will be identifying 850,000 biomarkers, many of which are associated with diseases.

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WHO declares antibiotic resistance "a major global threat"

LONDON: The most comprehensive picture of antibiotic resistance, with data from 114 countries has revealed that resistance to the last-resort treatment for life-threatening infections caused by common intestinal bacteria Klebsiella pneumonia — carbapenem antibiotics — has spread to all regions of the world.

K pneumoniae is a major cause of hospital-acquired infections such as pneumonia, bloodstream infections, infections in new borns and intensive-care unit patients.

In some countries, because of resistance, carbapenem antibiotics would not work in more than half of people treated for K pneumoniae infections.

Resistance to antibiotics was on Wednesday declared a "major global threat" to public health by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The report brought out by the WHO has also revealed high levels of E coli resistance to third generation cephalosporins and fluoroquinolones — two important and commonly used types of antibacterial medicine in Southeast Asia region, which is home to a quarter of the world's population.

In more bad news, in some parts of the region, more than one quarter of Staphylococcus aureus infections are reported to be methicillin-resistant (MRSA), meaning that treatment with standard antibiotics does not work.

The report, "Antimicrobial resistance: global report on surveillance" published on Wednesday, has revealed that resistance is occurring across many different infectious agents specially in seven different bacteria responsible for common, serious diseases such as bloodstream infections (sepsis), diarrhoea, pneumonia, urinary tract infections and gonorrhoea.

The results are cause for high concern, documenting resistance to antibiotics, especially "last resort" antibiotics, in all regions of the world.

Resistance to one of the most widely used antibacterial medicines for the treatment of urinary tract infections caused by E coli — fluoroquinolones — is very widespread.

In the 1980s, when these drugs were first introduced, resistance was virtually zero. Today, there are countries in many parts of the world where this treatment is now ineffective in more than half of patients.

Treatment failure to the last resort of treatment for gonorrhoea — third generation cephalosporins — has been confirmed in Austria, Australia, Canada, France, Japan, Norway, Slovenia, South Africa, Sweden and the United Kingdom. More than 1 million people are infected with gonorrhoea around the world every day.

Antibiotic resistance causes people to be sick for longer and increases the risk of death. For example, people with MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) are estimated to be 64% more likely to die than people with a non-resistant form of the infection. Resistance also increases the cost of health care with lengthier stays in hospital and more intensive care required.

"Without urgent, coordinated action, the world is headed for a post-antibiotic era, in which common infections and minor injuries which have been treatable for decades can once again kill," says Dr Keiji Fukuda, WHO's assistant director general for health security.

"Effective antibiotics have been one of the pillars allowing us to live longer, live healthier, and benefit from modern medicine. Unless we take significant actions to improve efforts to prevent infections and also change how we produce, prescribe and use antibiotics, the world will lose more and more of these global public health goods and the implications will be devastating."

Antibiotic resistance — when bacteria change so antibiotics no longer work in people who need them to treat infections — is now a major threat to public health.

The report reveals high levels of resistance to third generation cephalosporins in K pneumoniae throughout the WHO European Region. In some settings, as many as 60% of Staphylococcus aureus infections are reported to be methicillin-resistant (MRSA), meaning that treatment with standard antibiotics does not work.

22.10 | 0 komentar | Read More

Now, nano 'fingerprints' to secure credit cards

SEOUL: Scientists have developed invisible nano 'fingerprints' that could be embedded into money, gadgets and credit cards, making it impossible to counterfeit the objects. Unique patterns made from tiny, randomly scattered silver nanowires have been created in an attempt to authenticate goods and tackle the growing problem of counterfeiting.

The nanoscale 'fingerprints' are made by randomly placing 20 to 30 individual nanowires, each with an average length of 10 to 50 micro metre, onto a thin plastic film, and could be used to tag a variety of goods from electronics and drugs to credit cards and bank notes.

According to the researchers, the 'fingerprints' are almost impossible to replicate because of the natural randomness of their creation and the difficulty associated with manipulating such small material. "It is nearly impossible to replicate the fingerprints due to the difficulty in trying to manipulate the tiny nanowires into a desired pattern," lead author of the research professor Hyotcherl Ihee, from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology and the Institute for Basic Science, said.

"The cost of generating such an identical counterfeit pattern would generally be much higher than the value of the typical product being protected," said Ihee.

Researchers estimate that the 'fingerprints' could be produced at a cost of less than $1 per single pattern, which was demonstrated in their study by synthesizing a solution containing individual silver nanowires, coating the nanowires with silica, doping them with specific fluorescent dyes and then randomly dropping them onto a transferable film made from flexible polyethylene terephthalate (PET).

The fluorescent dyes allowed the patterns, which are invisible to the naked eye, to be visually identified and authenticated under an optical microscope and could add another layer of complexity to the 'fingerprints' if a number of different coloured dyes are used.

The researchers said that the nanowire patterns could be tagged with a unique ID, or bar code, which could enable a quick search in a database and ease the process of authentication or counterfeit identification.

"Once a pattern is tagged and stored on a database using a unique ID, a certain substrate, whether a bank note or a credit card, could be authenticated almost immediately by observing the fluorescence images and comparing it with stored images," said "These authentication processes can be automated by using an algorithm that recognizes the positions and colours of the nanowires and digitizes the information in a database," Ihee said.
"Such digitised information could significantly reduce the size of the stored data and reduce the time required for the authentication process," said Ihee.

The research was published in the journal Nanotechnology.

22.10 | 0 komentar | Read More

Curiosity rover set for third drilling on Mars: NASA

WASHINGTON: US space agency NASA said Tuesday its Curiosity rover will carry out its third drilling on Mars in the coming days.

Curiosity used several tools to examine a Martian sandstone slab dubbed "Windjana" over the weekend, including a wire-bristle brush known as the Dust Removal Tool to clear away dust from a 6- centimeter-across patch on the rock, Xinhua quoted NASA as saying.

"In the brushed spot, we can see that the rock is fine-grained, its true colour is much grayer than the surface dust, and some portions of the rock are harder than others, creating the interesting bumpy textures," Curiosity science team member Melissa Rice of the California Institute of Technology said in a NASA statement.

"All of these traits reinforce our interest in drilling here in order to understand the chemistry of the fluids that bound these grains together to form the rock," Rice said.

Before Curiosity drills deeply enough for collection of rock- powder sample, there will be a preparatory "mini-drill" operation on the target, as a further check for readiness, NASA said.

Curiosity's drill collects powered sample material from the interior of a target rock for analysis.

The only two rocks previously drilled by Curiosity are even finer-grained mudstone in Yellowknife Bay, about 4 kilometres northeast of the rover's current location at a waypoint called " The Kimberley."

Those two targets, examined in 2013, provided evidence of an ancient lakebed environment from billions of years ago with conditions favourable for microbial life.

22.10 | 0 komentar | Read More

Now, nano 'fingerprints' to secure credit cards

SEOUL: Scientists have developed invisible nano 'fingerprints' that could be embedded into money, gadgets and credit cards, making it impossible to counterfeit the objects. Unique patterns made from tiny, randomly scattered silver nanowires have been created in an attempt to authenticate goods and tackle the growing problem of counterfeiting.

The nanoscale 'fingerprints' are made by randomly placing 20 to 30 individual nanowires, each with an average length of 10 to 50 micro metre, onto a thin plastic film, and could be used to tag a variety of goods from electronics and drugs to credit cards and bank notes.

According to the researchers, the 'fingerprints' are almost impossible to replicate because of the natural randomness of their creation and the difficulty associated with manipulating such small material. "It is nearly impossible to replicate the fingerprints due to the difficulty in trying to manipulate the tiny nanowires into a desired pattern," lead author of the research professor Hyotcherl Ihee, from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology and the Institute for Basic Science, said.

"The cost of generating such an identical counterfeit pattern would generally be much higher than the value of the typical product being protected," said Ihee.

Researchers estimate that the 'fingerprints' could be produced at a cost of less than $1 per single pattern, which was demonstrated in their study by synthesizing a solution containing individual silver nanowires, coating the nanowires with silica, doping them with specific fluorescent dyes and then randomly dropping them onto a transferable film made from flexible polyethylene terephthalate (PET).

The fluorescent dyes allowed the patterns, which are invisible to the naked eye, to be visually identified and authenticated under an optical microscope and could add another layer of complexity to the 'fingerprints' if a number of different coloured dyes are used.

The researchers said that the nanowire patterns could be tagged with a unique ID, or bar code, which could enable a quick search in a database and ease the process of authentication or counterfeit identification.

"Once a pattern is tagged and stored on a database using a unique ID, a certain substrate, whether a bank note or a credit card, could be authenticated almost immediately by observing the fluorescence images and comparing it with stored images," said "These authentication processes can be automated by using an algorithm that recognizes the positions and colours of the nanowires and digitizes the information in a database," Ihee said.
"Such digitised information could significantly reduce the size of the stored data and reduce the time required for the authentication process," said Ihee.

The research was published in the journal Nanotechnology.

22.11 | 0 komentar | Read More

Curiosity rover set for third drilling on Mars: NASA

WASHINGTON: US space agency NASA said Tuesday its Curiosity rover will carry out its third drilling on Mars in the coming days.

Curiosity used several tools to examine a Martian sandstone slab dubbed "Windjana" over the weekend, including a wire-bristle brush known as the Dust Removal Tool to clear away dust from a 6- centimeter-across patch on the rock, Xinhua quoted NASA as saying.

"In the brushed spot, we can see that the rock is fine-grained, its true colour is much grayer than the surface dust, and some portions of the rock are harder than others, creating the interesting bumpy textures," Curiosity science team member Melissa Rice of the California Institute of Technology said in a NASA statement.

"All of these traits reinforce our interest in drilling here in order to understand the chemistry of the fluids that bound these grains together to form the rock," Rice said.

Before Curiosity drills deeply enough for collection of rock- powder sample, there will be a preparatory "mini-drill" operation on the target, as a further check for readiness, NASA said.

Curiosity's drill collects powered sample material from the interior of a target rock for analysis.

The only two rocks previously drilled by Curiosity are even finer-grained mudstone in Yellowknife Bay, about 4 kilometres northeast of the rover's current location at a waypoint called " The Kimberley."

Those two targets, examined in 2013, provided evidence of an ancient lakebed environment from billions of years ago with conditions favourable for microbial life.

22.11 | 0 komentar | Read More

WHO declares antibiotic resistance "a major global threat"

LONDON: The most comprehensive picture of antibiotic resistance, with data from 114 countries has revealed that resistance to the treatment of last resort for life-threatening infections caused by common intestinal bacteria Klebsiella pneumonia - carbapenem antibiotics - has spread to all regions of the world.

K pneumoniae is a major cause of hospital-acquired infections such as pneumonia, bloodstream infections, infections in new borns and intensive-care unit patients.

In some countries, because of resistance, carbapenem antibiotics would not work in more than half of people treated for K pneumoniae infections.

Resistance to antibiotics was on Wednesday declared a "major global threat" to public health by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The report brought out by the WHO has also revealed high levels of E coli resistance to third generation cephalosporins and fluoroquinolones — two important and commonly used types of antibacterial medicine in Southeast Asia region, which is home to a quarter of the world's population.

In more bad news, in some parts of the region, more than one quarter of Staphylococcus aureus infections are reported to be methicillin-resistant (MRSA), meaning that treatment with standard antibiotics does not work.

The report, "Antimicrobial resistance: global report on surveillance" published on Wednesday, has revealed that resistance is occurring across many different infectious agents specially in seven different bacteria responsible for common, serious diseases such as bloodstream infections (sepsis), diarrhoea, pneumonia, urinary tract infections and gonorrhoea.

The results are cause for high concern, documenting resistance to antibiotics, especially "last resort" antibiotics, in all regions of the world.

Resistance to one of the most widely used antibacterial medicines for the treatment of urinary tract infections caused by E coli - fluoroquinolones - is very widespread.

In the 1980s, when these drugs were first introduced, resistance was virtually zero. Today, there are countries in many parts of the world where this treatment is now ineffective in more than half of patients.

Treatment failure to the last resort of treatment for gonorrhoea-third generation cephalosporins-has been confirmed in Austria, Australia, Canada, France, Japan, Norway, Slovenia, South Africa, Sweden and the United Kingdom. More than 1 million people are infected with gonorrhoea around the world every day.

Antibiotic resistance causes people to be sick for longer and increases the risk of death. For example, people with MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) are estimated to be 64% more likely to die than people with a non-resistant form of the infection. Resistance also increases the cost of health care with lengthier stays in hospital and more intensive care required.

"Without urgent, coordinated action, the world is headed for a post-antibiotic era, in which common infections and minor injuries which have been treatable for decades can once again kill," says Dr Keiji Fukuda, WHO's Assistant Director-General for Health Security.

"Effective antibiotics have been one of the pillars allowing us to live longer, live healthier, and benefit from modern medicine. Unless we take significant actions to improve efforts to prevent infections and also change how we produce, prescribe and use antibiotics, the world will lose more and more of these global public health goods and the implications will be devastating."

Antibiotic resistance — when bacteria change so antibiotics no longer work in people who need them to treat infections — is now a major threat to public health.

The report reveals high levels of resistance to third generation cephalosporins in K pneumoniae throughout the WHO European Region. In some settings, as many as 60% of Staphylococcus aureus infections are reported to be methicillin-resistant (MRSA), meaning that treatment with standard antibiotics does not work.

22.11 | 0 komentar | Read More

Now, nano 'fingerprints' to secure credit cards

SEOUL: Scientists have developed invisible nano 'fingerprints' that could be embedded into money, gadgets and credit cards, making it impossible to counterfeit the objects. Unique patterns made from tiny, randomly scattered silver nanowires have been created in an attempt to authenticate goods and tackle the growing problem of counterfeiting.

The nanoscale 'fingerprints' are made by randomly placing 20 to 30 individual nanowires, each with an average length of 10 to 50 micro metre, onto a thin plastic film, and could be used to tag a variety of goods from electronics and drugs to credit cards and bank notes.

According to the researchers, the 'fingerprints' are almost impossible to replicate because of the natural randomness of their creation and the difficulty associated with manipulating such small material. "It is nearly impossible to replicate the fingerprints due to the difficulty in trying to manipulate the tiny nanowires into a desired pattern," lead author of the research professor Hyotcherl Ihee, from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology and the Institute for Basic Science, said.

"The cost of generating such an identical counterfeit pattern would generally be much higher than the value of the typical product being protected," said Ihee.

Researchers estimate that the 'fingerprints' could be produced at a cost of less than $1 per single pattern, which was demonstrated in their study by synthesizing a solution containing individual silver nanowires, coating the nanowires with silica, doping them with specific fluorescent dyes and then randomly dropping them onto a transferable film made from flexible polyethylene terephthalate (PET).

The fluorescent dyes allowed the patterns, which are invisible to the naked eye, to be visually identified and authenticated under an optical microscope and could add another layer of complexity to the 'fingerprints' if a number of different coloured dyes are used.

The researchers said that the nanowire patterns could be tagged with a unique ID, or bar code, which could enable a quick search in a database and ease the process of authentication or counterfeit identification.

"Once a pattern is tagged and stored on a database using a unique ID, a certain substrate, whether a bank note or a credit card, could be authenticated almost immediately by observing the fluorescence images and comparing it with stored images," said "These authentication processes can be automated by using an algorithm that recognizes the positions and colours of the nanowires and digitizes the information in a database," Ihee said.
"Such digitised information could significantly reduce the size of the stored data and reduce the time required for the authentication process," said Ihee.

The research was published in the journal Nanotechnology.

22.10 | 0 komentar | Read More