The periodic table of videos

Tables charting the chemical elements have been around since the 19th century - but this modern version has a short video about each one.

Since launching this site, the videos have been watched more than 2.5 million times.

The chemical elements videos developed by The University of Nottingham and it can be viewed from http://www.periodicvideos.com

India sets up Rs.10 Bn nano-technology missionDate

India sets up Rs.10 Bn nano-technology mission
Date: Monday, September 08, 2008

New Delhi: India has set up a Rs.10 billion mission to help scientists do research in nano-technology and innovate new products in fields like healthcare, textiles and drug development, an official said Friday."We have set up a mission to boost nano-technology in the country. The fund will be utilised over a period of five years," Science Secretary T. Ramasami said Friday on the sidelines of an event on nano-technology at the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).Under the mission, the government would provide Rs.5 million as grant for the start-up of nano research projects."This would encourage research efforts and commercialisation of technologies. A suitable candidate can avail monetary support up to Rs.15 million," Ramasami told IANS.Ramasami said the mission is a brainchild of C.N.R. Rao, chairman, science advisory council to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.He said so far no one has availed the fund. "But we have short listed three to four scientists for financial support initially."According to FICCI, India has over 30 nano-technology start-ups and approximately 50 research institutes engaged in nano-technology research and development.Product development efforts in India are predominantly directed towards chip design and development, nano-medicine and nano-materials.

http://www.siliconindia.com/shownews/46234

e-books

Free e-books can be viewed from the blelow link. User can register to obtain username and password to get full text.

http://www.scribd.com/

PDF eBook search engine

July 31, 2008
PDF eBook search engine

The PDF Search Engine looks in multiple online eBook collections to find you your PDF options. Some PDFs are great, while others stink to holy heck. This is useful for people looking for eBooks to read on devices, in particular eBook readers like the Sony eBook Reader. Reading in PDF is a lot better than in straight HTML, which is how many free online eBooks are available unfortunately.
http://www.pdf-search-engine.com/

Electrostatic electrochemistry at insulators.

Electrostatic electrochemistry at insulators.

Abstract Text:
The identity of charges generated by contact electrification on dielectrics has remained unknown for centuries and the precise determination of the charge density is also a long-standing challenge. Here, electrostatic charges on Teflon (polytetrafluoroethylene) produced by rubbing with Lucite (polymethylmethacrylate) were directly identified as electrons rather than ions by electrochemical (redox) experiments with charged Teflon used as a single electrode in solution causing various chemical reactions: pH increases; hydrogen formation; metal deposition; Fe(CN)(6)(3-) reduction; and chemiluminescence in the system of Teflon(-)/Ru(bpy)(3)(2+)/S(2)O(8)(2-) (analogous to electrogenerated chemiluminescence). Moreover, copper deposition could be amplified by depositing Pd first in a predetermined pattern, followed by electroless deposition to produce Cu lines. This process could be potentially important for microelectronic and other applications because Teflon has desirable properties including a low dielectric constant and good thermal stability. Charge density was determined using Faraday's law and the significance of electron transfer processes on charged polymers and potentially other insulators have been demonstrated.

AUTHOR:allen j bard
For similar abstracts research abstracts see: abstracts research
PUBLICATION TYPE: Journal Article
Journal: Nature materials
VOLUME: 7
Page Numbers: 505-9

Developing control of the heart

Developing control of the heart

28 August 2008
Molecular biologists working at an American and several Japanese research institutions have unmasked an important regulator of embryonic development of the heart. The compound, an insulin-like growth-factor-binding protein (IGFBP), inhibits the standard Wnt signaling pathway that plays a key role in the initiation, growth and development of the heart. Abnormalities of formation of the heart — the first embryonic organ to form — are the most common congenital birth defects in humans.

The researchers recently reported in Nature1 that the compound IGFBP-4 could stimulate generation of cardiomyocytes, the cells from which heart muscle tissue is produced. Although IGFBPs are typically characterized by their ability to bind and modulate the action of insulin-like growth factors (IGFs), the researchers were able to show experimentally that in this case, the activity of IGFBP-4 involved no binding of IGFs. In fact, IGFBP-4 appears to inhibit Wnt signaling by interacting with a Wnt receptor and co-receptor to prevent them from binding Wnt. At different times of the process Wnt signaling can stimulate or repress development of the heart.

The researchers suggest that IGFBP-4 can regulate development via inhibiting Wnt signaling, and that IGFs can also play a modulation role through binding and sequestering IGFBP-4.
Reference

1. Zhu, W.,1,8 Shiojima, I.,1,8 Ito, Y.,2,8 Li, Z.,1 Ikeda, H.,1 Yoshida, M.,1 Naito, A.T.,1 Nishi, J.,1 Ueno, H.,3 Umezawa, A.,4 Minamino, T.,1 Nagai, T.,1 Kikuchi, A.,5 Asashima, M.2,6,7,9 & Komuro, I.1 IGFBP-4 is an inhibitor of canonical Wnt signaling required for cardiogenesis. Nature 454, 345–350 (2008). article

Authors and Affiliations
1Department of Cardiovascular Science and Medicine, Chiba University Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba 260-8670, Japan
2ICORP Organ Regeneration Project, Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST), Tokyo 153-8902, Japan
3Institute of Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California 94305, USA
4Department of Reproductive Biology, National Institute for Child Health and Development, Tokyo 157-8535, Japan
5Department of Biochemistry, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima 734-8551, Japan
6Department of Life Sciences (Biology), Graduate School of Arts and Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 153-8902, Japan
7National Institute of Advanced Industrial Sciences and Technology (AIST), Ibaraki 305-8562, Japan
8These authors contributed equally to this work.
9 Makoto Asashima is a member of A-IMBN.

Source: http://www.natureasia.com/A-IMBN/article.php?id=135

Energy Storage For Hybrid Vehicles

ScienceDaily (Aug. 18, 2008) — Hybrid technology combines the advantages of combustion engines and electric motors. Scientists are developing high-performance energy storage units, a prerequisite for effective hybrid motors.
Prototype of a lithium-polymer accumulator for use in hybrid vehicles. (Credit: Copyright Fraunhofer ISIT)

The vehicle is powered by petroleum on the freeway and by electricity in town, thus using considerably less energy. A hybrid propulsion system switches over to generator operation when the brakes go on, producing electric current that is temporarily stored in a battery. The electric motor uses this current when starting up. This yields tremendous savings, particularly in urban traffic.

But up to now, hybrid technology has always had a storage problem. Scientists from three Fraunhofer Institutes are developing new storage modules in a project called “Electromobility Fleet Test”.

The pilot project was launched by Volkswagen and Germany’s Federal Ministry for the Environment BMU together with seven other partners. The Fraunhofer Institutes for Silicon Technology ISIT in Itzehoe, Integrated Circuits IIS in Nuremberg, and Integrated Systems and Device Technology IISB in Erlangen will be pooling their expertise for the next three years. The researchers are developing an energy storage module based on lithium-polymer accumulator technology that is suitable for use in vehicles.

“This module has to be able to withstand the harsh environmental conditions it will encounter in a hybrid vehicle, and above all it must guarantee high operational reliability and a long service life,” states ISIT scientist Dr. Gerold Neumann, who coordinates the Fraunhofer activities. The researchers hope to reach this goal with new electrode materials that are kinder to the environment.

A specially developed battery management system makes the energy storage device more durable and reliable. The experts are also researching into new concepts that will enable large amounts of energy to be stored in a small space. To do this, they integrate mechanical and electrical components in a single module, devising systems for temperature control, performance data registration and high-voltage safety.

The tasks involved are distributed between the three Fraunhofer Institutes according to their skills: The ISIT experts, who have long experience in developing and manufacturing lithium accumulators, are manufacturing the cells. Their colleagues at IIS are responsible for battery management and monitoring. The scientists from IISB are contributing their know-how on power electronics components to configure the accumulator modules. The development and configuration of the new energy storage module is expected to be finished by mid-2010. Volkswagen AG – the industrial partner in this project – will then carry out field trials to test the modules’ suitability for everyday use in the vehicles.

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/ 080814091059.htm

A Better Way To Make Hydrogen From Biofuels

ScienceDaily (Aug. 21, 2008) — Researchers here have found a way to convert ethanol and other biofuels into hydrogen very efficiently.
A new catalyst makes hydrogen from ethanol with 90 percent yield, at a workable temperature, and using inexpensive ingredients.
Umit Ozkan, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at Ohio State University, said that the new catalyst is much less expensive than others being developed around the world, because it does not contain precious metals, such as platinum or rhodium.
"Rhodium is used most often for this kind of catalyst, and it costs around $9,000 an ounce," Ozkan said. "Our catalyst costs around $9 a kilogram."
She and her co-workers presented the research Wednesday, August 20 at the American Chemical Society meeting in Philadelphia.
The Ohio State catalyst could help make the use of hydrogen-powered cars more practical in the future, she said.
"There are many practical issues that need to be resolved before we can use hydrogen as fuel -- how to make it, how to transport it, how to create the infrastructure for people to fill their cars with it," Ozkan explained.
"Our research lends itself to what's called a 'distributed production' strategy. Instead of making hydrogen from biofuel at a centralized facility and transporting it to gas stations, we could use our catalyst inside reactors that are actually located at the gas stations. So we wouldn't have to transport or store the hydrogen -- we could store the biofuel, and make hydrogen on the spot."
The catalyst is inexpensive to make and to use compared to others under investigation worldwide. Those others are often made from precious metals, or only work at very high temperatures.
"Precious metals have high catalytic activity and -- in most cases -- high stability, but they're also very expensive. So our goal from the outset was to come up with a precious-metal-free catalyst, one that was based on metals that are readily available and inexpensive, but still highly active and stable. So that sets us apart from most of the other groups in the world."
The new dark gray powder is made from tiny granules of cerium oxide -- a common ingredient in ceramics -- and calcium, covered with even smaller particles of cobalt. It produces hydrogen with 90 percent efficiency at 660 degrees Fahrenheit (around 350 degrees Celsius) -- a low temperature by industrial standards.
"Whenever a process works at a lower temperature, that brings energy savings and cost savings," Ozkan said. “Also, if the catalyst is highly active and can achieve high hydrogen yields, we don’t need as much of it. That will bring down the size of the reactor, and its cost”.
The process starts with a liquid biofuel such as ethanol, which is heated and pumped into a reactor, where the catalyst spurs a series of chemical reactions that ultimately convert the liquid to a hydrogen-rich gas.
One of the biggest challenges the researchers faced was how to prevent "coking" -- the formation of carbon fragments on the surface of the catalyst. The combination of metals -- cerium oxide and calcium -- solved that problem, because it promoted the movement of oxygen ions inside the catalyst. When exposed to enough oxygen, the carbon, like the biofuel, is converted into a gas and gets oxidized; it becomes carbon dioxide.
At the end of the process, waste gases such as carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and methane are removed, and the hydrogen is purified. To make the process more energy-efficient, heat exchangers capture waste heat and put that energy back into the reactor. Methane recovered in the process can be used to supply part of the energy.
Though this work was based on converting ethanol, Ozkan's team is now studying how to use the same catalyst with other liquid biofuels. Her coauthors on this presentation included Ohio State doctoral students Hua Song and Lingzhi Zhang.
This research was funded by the Department of Energy.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/ 080820163111.htm

Millions displaced by India floods

Video News - Sep 02, 2008
Millions displaced by India floods
“The Indian authorities air drop relief material in the flood-hit eastern state of Bihar after the worst floods in 50 years.”

Scientific American
http://www.sciam.com/video.cfm?id=F774DE58587AE0F59FF569AFC4E09CE1

How Weight Loss Surgery Helps Diabetes

How Weight Loss Surgery Helps Diabetes
Study Explains Why Surgery Improves Blood Sugar Levels Even Before Patients Lose Weight
By Salynn BoylesWebMD Health News
Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD
Sept. 2, 2008 -- Obese diabetes patients who have gastric bypass weight loss surgery often show dramatic improvement in blood sugar control within days, long before significant weight loss occurs.
The reversal of type 2 diabetes tends to occur much more rapidly than with gastric banding, and a new study may help explain why.
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The findings could also advance the search for better diabetes treatments that target the small intestine and not the pancreas, researchers say.
"It is increasingly clear that the intestine is not just a conduit for food transit," gastric bypass surgeon Francesco Rubino, MD, tells WebMD. "We now know that it is also a very important organ for the regulation of glucose."
Intestine Produces Glucose
Several recent studies have suggested that weight loss surgery is a more effective treatment for type 2 diabetes in obese people than standard treatments for the disease.
Because weight loss alone cannot explain the rapid remission of disease in many gastric bypass patients, researchers have looked for other causes.
One theory has been that surgery alters the expression of hormones that help control appetite, blood sugar, and weight.
But studies designed to test this hypothesis have proven contradictory, diabetes researcher Gilles Mithieux tells WebMD.
In their newly published study, reported in the September issue of the journal Cell Metabolism, Mithieux and colleagues looked elsewhere for answers.
"We know from earlier work that the small intestine can produce glucose," he says. "We showed that with gastric bypass surgery you essentially double the capacity of the intestine to do this."
By studying mice treated with either gastric bypass or banding, researchers confirmed that the bypass operation was associated with increased production of glucose, or blood sugar, in the small intestine, while gastric banding was not.
Gastric bypass surgery essentially produces a "double intestine," Mithieux says. The portion of the small intestine that is closest to the stomach is bypassed so that it no longer received nutrients. The lower small intestine is then attached to the stomach where it becomes the main nutrient receiver.
By surgically repositioning the lower small intestine, which usually does not produce much glucose, it ramps up intestinal glucose production and improves insulin sensitivity, he says.
Treating Diabetes With Surgery
Rubino tells WebMD that the findings offer important insights into the role of the small intestine in blood sugar regulation.
"This doesn't tell the whole story, but it appears to be an important piece of the puzzle," he says.
The gastric bypass surgeon is a strong advocate of using the surgery as a first-line treatment for type 2 diabetes -- a position that remains controversial.
He directs the diabetes surgery center at the New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center.
"Surgery promises to be one of the most powerful resources we have to fight this disease," he says. "I don't think it will be the answer for everyone. But for patients with the right profile, the results can be remarkable."
Rubino believes that the surgery can help not just diabetic patients who are morbidly obese, but also people who are overweight but don't weigh enough under current guidelines to be considered for the gastric bypass procedure.
"We hope to study this to see if surgery is better than conventional treatment in patients who are moderately obese or just overweight," he says.