Month: January 2013
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Light-Activated Hydrogel, Stem Cells Recreate Knee Cartilage
Biomedical engineers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore designed a gel-like biomaterial that in a pilot study showed it could help heal damaged knee cartilage. The team led by Jennifer Elisseeff, director of the university’s Translational Tissue Engineering Center, published its findings in last week’s issue of the journal Science Translational Medicine (paid subscription required).…
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EC Opens Proof of Concept Funding Call
The European Commission opened a call for proposals to fund early-stage scientific research ideas with commercialization potential. Applications for the €10 million ($US 13.4 million) fund are due 24 April 2013. The Proof of Concept grants, as the program is called, are open to holders of current European Research Council science project funding. The scheme…
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Challenge Awarding $60,000 for Health Technology Ideas
A new challenge is awarding $60,000 for technology solutions, in particular modifications of current products, that promote healthier lifestyles or help manage chronic conditions. Health insurance provider United Healthcare is sponsoring the Breakthrough Health Tech Challenge, which has a deadline of 8 April 2013. United Healthcare, which announced the challenge at this week’s Consumer Electronics…
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Simulation Seeks Clues to Motivations for Vaccination
Researchers at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina used an online computer game to simulate an infectious disease epidemic and better understand the motivations behind getting or avoiding preventive actions. The work of Wake Forest economists Frederick Chen, Amanda Griffith, Allin Cottrell, and computer scientist Yue-Ling Wong appear this week in the online journal…
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Industrial Process Devised for Carbon Nanotube Fibers
Engineers and materials scientists from the U.S., Netherlands, and Israel developed an industrial-scale process for spinning carbon nanotubes into fibers for a range of commercial products. The team led by chemical engineering professor Matteo Pasquali at Rice University in Houston published its findings in this week’s issue of the journal Science (paid subscription required). Pasquali,…
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Weill Cornell, Tres Cantos Lab to Research TB Chemistry
Weill Cornell Medical College in New York will provide a microbiologist to work at Tres Cantos Open Lab, a facility of GlaxoSmithKline in Spain, to identify the ability of chemical compounds to penetrate the Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria. Financial aspects of the two-year project, funded by the Tres Cantos Open Lab Foundation, were not disclosed. The…
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Bioengineered Microbe to Convert, Recycle Biofuel Waste
Plant biologists at Texas A&M AgriLife Research in College Station are creating a bioengineered microbe to convert the waste from biofuel production into more biofuel. The project led by plant pathologist Joshua Yuan is funded by a $2.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy. Yuan and colleagues at AgriLife are developing a genetically…
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Signaling, Movement Properties Found in Synthetic Gels
Chemical engineers at University of Pittsburgh developed a computational model to track the ability of certain synthetic gels to sense a chemical signal and reconfigure themselves in response. The team led by Pittsburgh professor Anna Balazs describes its findings this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (paid subscription required). Balazs…
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Rare Earths, Materials Hub Set for Ames National Lab
The U.S. Department of Energy will establish a research center at Ames National Lab in Iowa to find solutions to domestic shortages of rare earth metals and other critical materials for energy security. The $120 million Critical Materials Institute, will bring together for five years researchers from academia, four national laboratories, and the private sector.…
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Carnegie Mellon, Anglo American Partner on Mining Robotics
Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and the mining company Anglo American PLC, based in London, agreed to develop robotic technologies for the mining industry. Financial terms of the five-year deal were not disclosed. The agreement calls for Carnegie Mellon’s National Robotics Engineering Center to design, build and deploy with Anglo American mining robots, robotic tools,…