Sciencebase Science

microRNAs

Tue, 29 Sep 2009 03:20:14 +0100

Until 2001, few people had heard the term micro ribonucleic acids, but these little chunks of nucleic acid, just 21 to 23 bases long, have been conserved throughout evolution. They don’t…

Organic Compost Chemistry

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 14:17:33 +0100

Organic Compost Chemistry:

Okay…so I was kind of joking about doing a regular weekly gardening column, but having spent rather longer weeding and feeding this week than I intended to, I need to get…

Topsy Tweets

Sat, 26 Sep 2009 02:45:08 +0100

Topsy Tweets:

If you’re a fan of social media, social bookmarking, and all the other tech tools we seem to rely on these days, then you will probably also have a penchant for analytics tools. …

Treating the Obesity Epidemic

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 04:46:31 +0100

Treating the Obesity Epidemic:

Drugmaker Vivus saw its experimental weight-loss medication, Qnexa, pass two Phase III clinical trials C&EN reported on September 10, and the company’s share price skyrocket.

The…

Having Faith in Web Analytics

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:00:26 +0100

Having Faith in Web Analytics:

Do you put your faith in your web analytics tool? Which stats program do you trust to give you an accurate reflection of traffic to your website?

Maybe you have AWstats or Webalizer…

Dental Lead, Lung Cancer and Monopoles

Mon, 21 Sep 2009 15:36:25 +0100

Dental Lead, Lung Cancer and Monopoles:

This week’s ezines on SpectroscopyNOW are now live, featuring a breath test for lung cancer, magnetic monopoles, a way to boost fuel cells, and reducing toxic waste from dental…

Chemical-free Gardening

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:20:37 +0100

Chemical-free Gardening:

It may come as a shock to anyone thinking of taking up gardening as a hobby or as a way to beat back the credit crunch by doing a little grow-your-own that gardening is based…

Put Facebook on a Blog Diet

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:20:04 +0100

Put Facebook on a Blog Diet:

For a while now, I’ve been letting Facebook gorge itself on the Sciencebase blog. It grabs the full-fat feed and gulps it down in one go. Well, that was never a very satisfying…

Twitter Alter Egos

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 14:19:59 +0100

Twitter Alter Egos:

On the day my @sciencebase account on Twitter reached 5000 followers (2009-07-31), I’d sent out 5138 tweets, goodness knows how many direct messages, dozens of #followfridays,…

File Sharing for Scientists

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 20:20:11 +0100

File Sharing for Scientists:

In the olden days, scientists…

Organic, Nano, Pharma

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 14:32:37 +0100

Organic, Nano, Pharma:

Challenging natural products succumb to radical synthetic prowess, the Alchemist hears this week, while US researchers find a way to construct macroscopic crystals from tiny DNA…

Fun Science Games

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 13:10:05 +0100

Fun Science Games:

It’s Friday, our kids have been back at school a week now, so with the ever-present prospect of a wet weekend ahead of us, how to distract them from Youtube and Facebook with some…

Catching the Chat on Your Blog

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 22:50:13 +0100

Catching the Chat on Your Blog:

I had the hare-brained idea that because my Sciencebase.com science blog is getting fewer and fewer comments these days, that it might be worth my disabling that option altogether…

Babies, Smokestacks, and Kudzu Vine

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 01:30:22 +0100

Babies, Smokestacks, and Kudzu Vine:

Tears and smiles bond secure mothers to baby – The sight of her baby’s smile or even its tears cause the reward centres in a mother’s brain to light up, according to an…

Twitter Boosts Your Memory…

Wed, 09 Sep 2009 16:56:17 +0100

Twitter Boosts Your Memory…:

…Not!

Tracy Alloway is a psychologist at Sterling University, Scotland, interested in how working memory impacts life, apparently told the British Science Festival that using…

50 Million Chemicals and Counting

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 13:55:45 +0100

50 Million Chemicals and Counting:

Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) will announce the 50 millionth registered chemical substance in its Registry, tomorrow (8th September).

According to the email I received from a CAS…

Pre-eclampsia, NIR, Nano-dots

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 08:40:11 +0100

Pre-eclampsia, NIR, Nano-dots:

Pregnant pause for thought – The analytical cousin of magnetic resonance imaging, NMR spectroscopy, has revealed that a chemical compound found in unpasteurised food can be present…

Scraper Security

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 07:42:48 +0100

Scraper Security:

Bloggers pretty much have to accept that scraper sites will steal their blog’s content without permission for their own ends. It happens all the time and if they don’t just ignore it, then it can…

Verify Your Email Subscription

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 07:42:47 +0100

Verify Your Email Subscription:

A lot of wouldbe subscribers to the Sciencetext email feed are missing out on the latest and greatest headlines from the blog because they have not yet confirmed their email addres.

…

Biofuels vs Fossil Fuels

Wed, 02 Sep 2009 20:46:57 +0100

Biofuels vs Fossil Fuels:

Biofuels are not much better than fossil fuels in terms of the impact on atmospheric pollution levels and effects on climate change, according to Mark Jacobson professor of civil and…