Month: October 2010

  • Vietnam and Japan partner for rare earth mining and nuclear plant

    Vietnam has chosen to partner with Japan in mining rare earth minerals and building a nuclear power plant in the Southeast Asian country, Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan said on Sunday, as Tokyo seeks to reduce its dependence on China. Japan, the world’s third-biggest nuclear power generator, is also eyeing fast-growing markets to develop nuclear…

  • Florida Will Build Nation’s First High-Speed Rail Corridor

    As the Obama Administration pushes for high-speed rail networks across the country, Germany’s Siemens has secured a place for its Valero ICE trains in the Sunshine State. Earlier this month, Siemens presented its vision of U.S. high-speed rail to the people of Florida with the “Future of Florida High-Speed Rail Tour,” a traveling exhibit featuring…

  • Innovation: Portable Breast Scanners

    A new portable scanner for detecting early signs of breast cancer has been developed at the University of Manchester by Professor Zhipeng Wu. The device works by radio frequency technology that can show the presence of tumors on a computer screen. The amazing thing is that it can show the image within seconds on the…

  • Water Wars: Oregon Vs. Nestle

    Bottled water is a huge industry, and a profitable one. Last year it netted $10 billion in the US, but there are signs that the industry is slowing. Restaurants have turned away from pricey bottled water, and consumers have returned to tap water to save money. Nestlé is a huge player in the sector: its…

  • Antarctica Melting News

    The change in the ice mass covering Antarctica is a critical factor in global climate events. Scientists at the GFZ German Research Center for Geosciences have now found that the year by year mass variations in the western Antarctic are mainly attributable to fluctuations in precipitation, which are controlled significantly by the climate phenomenon El…

  • Sierra Leone ends flag of convenience for fishing vessels

    Sierra Leone is closing its international shipping registry to foreign-owned fishing vessels in a move intended to reduce illegal catches in its seas and around the world, the fisheries minister said on Thursday. Officials said the West African country — notorious as a so-called “flag of convenience” with minimum enforcement of maritime regulations — was…

  • Mind Over Fat

    Scientists have revealed that an anti-obesity drug changes the way the brain responds to appetizing, high-calorie foods in obese individuals. This insight may aid the development of new anti-obesity drugs which reduce the activity in the regions of the brain stimulated by the sight of tasty foods. This is not unexpected since the brain is…

  • Indonesia disaster toll hits 377 as volcano erupts again

    Indonesia’s Mount Merapi erupted on Thursday for the second time in a week, blasting vast plumes of ash into the sky, as the death toll from the initial eruption and a tsunami that hit remote western islands reached 377.

  • Picture: new monkey discovered in Myanmar

    Hunters’ reports have led scientists to discover a new species of monkey in the northern forests of Myanmar. Discovered by biologists from the Myanmar Biodiversity and Nature Conservation Association with support from primatologists with Fauna & Flora International (FFI) and the People Resources and Biodiversity Foundation, the strange looking primate is a member of the…

  • Vast Amber Deposit from India: New Trove of Fossils Suggests Global Distribution of Tropical Forest Ecosystems in the Eocene

    A vast new amber deposit in India has yielded 100 fossil spiders, bees, and flies that date to the Early Eocene, or 52-50 million years ago. These arthropods are not unique — as would be expected on an island (which India was at that time) — but have close evolutionary relationships with fossils from the…