Inkjet printer technology may be used to make toxin-detecting biosensors

October 5th, 2009 LONDON - A metal detecting enthusiast has uncovered a brooch and skull in an Oxfordshire field in England, which may belong to a 6th century Saxon princess. According to a report in the Herald Series, the early sixth century skeleton was found in West Hanney, near Wantage, by Chris Bayston from Yorkshire, who picked up a signal at a weekend metal detecting rally at the farm, which is not being named to protect the site.

September 25th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A team of engineers and artists working at the University of Washington's (UW's) Solheim Rapid Manufacturing Laboratory has developed a way to create glass objects using a conventional 3-D printer. The team's method, which it named the Vitraglyphic process, is a follow-up to the Solheim Lab's success last spring printing with ceramics.

August 26th, 2009 LONDON - Tired of hopping from store to store to make relevant purchases? Well, a new three-dimensional printer would soon allow shoppers to customise their purchases in store. The printer, displayed at Science Museum in London, can create objects including a pen, a light and an orange squeezer from pieces of metal and plastic.

July 30th, 2009 WASHINGTON - In an effort to extend the sensory range of 'electronic noses' (e-noses), scientists from CSIRO's Food Futures Flagship have developed a system that would help compare their performance against the much-superior nose of the common house fly. "Although e-noses already have many uses - such as detecting spoilage in the food industry and monitoring air quality - they are not as discriminating as biological noses," said CSIRO scientist, Dr Stephen Trowell.

July 30th, 2009 NEW DELHI - Despite the economic slowdown, printer sales in India grew one percent to 1.61 million units last fiscal as compared to the year before, an IT hardware manufacturers' lobby said Thursday. "The total printer sales between April 2008 and March 2009, with dot-matrix, ink-jet and laser-jet printers taken together, were 1.61 million, registering a growth of one percent over the previous year," the Manufacturers Association for Information Technology (MAIT) said in a statement.

July 15th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A team of scientists has successfully conducted the first remote detection of a harmful algal species and its toxin below the ocean's surface. The detection was made by scientists at NOAA's National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI).

June 30th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Patrol agents along the US border are using a sophisticated ground penetrating radar to spot illegal tunnels dug by criminals. While most tunnels are used to move drugs or people, they could also be used to move in weapons and explosives for a terrorist attack.

June 24th, 2009 Study: New radiation detectors not worth the costWASHINGTON — The government shouldn't buy more of the new radiation detection machines it's been developing to look for smuggled nuclear materials at ports, a report from the National Research Council says. The new machines are only marginally better at detecting hidden nuclear material than monitors already at U.S.

June 22nd, 2009 New detector not much better catching nuke matterWASHINGTON — Federal investigators say the government's next generation radiation detectors are only marginally better at detecting hidden nuclear material than monitors already at U.S. ports, but would cost more than twice as much.

June 18th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new evaluation of a "glow or no glow" technique may soon help the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) defend the nation against a spectrum of biological weapons that could be used in a terrorist attack. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have done the evaluation.

June 15th, 2009 LONDON - A team of astronomers has claimed to have seen hints of the first planet to be spotted outside the Milky Way galaxy, in the Andromeda galaxy. According to a report by BBC News, the team, which has made the finding, is made up of researchers from the National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN) in Italy and collaborators in Switzerland, Spain, and Russia.

April 20th, 2009 WASHINGTON - An international team of scientists has reported an innovative method for controlling light on the nanoscale by adopting tuning concepts from radio-frequency technology, which opens the door for antenna-based applications, including highly sensitive biosensors and extremely fast photodetectors. These applications could play an important role in future biomedical diagnostics and information processing.

April 13th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Scientists have developed a simple, accurate and highly sensitive test to detect and quantify ricin, a highly lethal toxin with potential use as a bioterrorism agent. Ricin, a protein extracted from castor beans, can be in the form of a powder, mist, pellet or solution.

March 17th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new type of botulinum toxin may smoothen moderate to severe forehead wrinkles, according to a new study. Injecting low doses of Clostridium botulinum toxin type A (Reloxin) is a method in vogue for treating lines on the face.

March 14th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Researchers have discovered a way to detect explosives based on the physical properties of their vapours and are readying the technology, which utilises micro-sensors, for field testing. 'Certain classes of explosives have unique thermal characteristics that help to identify explosive vapours in presence of other vapours,' said Thomas Thundat, Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL) and University of Tennessee researcher who conducted the study with colleagues at ORNL and the Technical University of Denmark.