Science and Enterprise

Month: May 2011

  • Initiative Aims to Improve Honey Bee Health

    An initiative led by several universities and supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture seeks to establish a nationwide network to monitor and maintain honey bee health. The program, called the Bee Informed Partnership, is funded by a $5 million grant from USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. Beekeeping is not only an industry…

  • Sanofi, Glenmark Sign Autoimmune Antibody License Deal

    The French pharmaceutical company Sanofi and Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Ltd. in Mumbai, India have signed an agreement for development and commercialization of GBR500, a monoclonal antibody to treat chronic autoimmune disorders. The deal is expected to close  next month following required regulatory steps. GBR500, developed by Glenmark, targets receptors that affect the adhesion of lymphocytes (white…

  • Engineers Develop Efficient Nanotech Solar Energy Film

    An engineering team from the universities of Missouri and Colorado, Idaho National Lab, and MicroContinuum Inc. in Cambridge, Massachusetts are developing a flexible solar sheet that captures more than 90 percent of available light, for manufacture in the next few years. Their lab findings have appeared in the Journal of Solar Energy Engineering. Current photovoltaic…

  • Regulatory Agency Funding Increases in Federal Budgets

    A new report from researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri and George Washington University in Washington, DC describe increases in funding and staff at federal regulatory agencies over the two most recent fiscal years. Fiscal Stalemate Reflected in Regulators Budget: An Analysis of the U.S. Budget for Fiscal Years 2011 and 2012, by…

  • Engineers Demo Collaborative Mapping Robot Vehicles

    A team from Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Pennsylvania and California Institute of Technology/Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) developed and demonstrated miniature vehicles that work by themselves to create a detailed floor plan of an office building. The researchers described their findings in a paper presented last month at the SPIE Defense, Security and Sensing…

  • U.K. University Offering Space Data for Smaller Companies

    The University of Leicester in the U.K. is making available Earth observation data from a European Union space program to small and medium-sized businesses in the East Midlands, where the university is located. The university’s Space Technology Exchange Partnership will develop practical uses of data generated from the EU’s Global Monitoring for Environment and Security…

  • Cause of Headphone, Hearing Aid Fatigue Diagnosed

    Engineers at Asius Technologies in Longmont, Colorado have found what they believe is the cause of listener fatigue brought on by on-ear headphones and hearing aids. Their findings, along with suggested fixes, were presented this past weekend at a meeting of the Audio Engineering Society in London, U.K. The problem concerns the discomfort and pain…

  • Travel day

    I will be on the road Friday 13 May.  Our posts will return on Monday 16 May. Enjoy your weekends. *     *     *

  • Study: Local Food Can Improve Oregon’s Health, Create Jobs

    A new study suggests that proposed legislation in Oregon that offers incentives to deliver fresh local food to schools would help improve the health of the state’s residents and create hundreds of new farm-industry jobs. The study was funded by a grant from the Health Impact Project, a collaboration of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation…

  • Software Helps Farmers Determine Pesticide Spray Dates

    The U.S. Department of Agriculture has developed software that helps farmers decide on the best days to spray pesticides on their fields. The software was developed by USDA’s Agricultural Research Service at its Fort Collins, Colorado research facility. The software, called PhenologyMMS (Modular Modeling System), was developed by agronomist Greg McMaster and plant science technician…