Good news for lovers of fish and chips. Japanese scientists have come up with the perfect recipe to make a crispy batter which is also lower in fat, reports Joanna Harries in Chemistry & Industry.

Dr Thanatuksorn and his team at Tokyo University of Technology studied how the structure of the batter molecules changes during the frying process. By altering the water content and frying time they were able to suggest the perfect conditions to create batter with the best lasting crispiness, as well as helping to reduce the fat content.

During the deep-frying process a rigid microstructure of pores is formed in the batter, and this microstructure is responsible for the textural properties of the food, as well as determining how much oil is absorbed during the frying.

The Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) is a collaboration of over 315 institutional investors with assets under management of more than $41 trillion. They have released their 5th annual global report, providing the largest and most comprehensive database of strategies from the world's largest corporations regarding the impact of climate change on shareholder value.

On behalf of the collaboration of 315 investors, including Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs, CalPERS and AIG, CDP has sent a questionnaire to the world's largest publicly-owned companies each year since 2002. This elicits detailed information on the risks and opportunities posed to the companies by climate change.

Every response has been graded and ranked based on climate disclosure and governance practices.

Researchers have found that lack of sleep can more than double the risk of death from cardiovascular disease. They also found that too much sleep can also more than double the risk of death.

One way or another, you are going to die. Strangely, your sleep habits may speed up that process.

The study detailed how sleep patterns affected the mortality of 10,308 civil servants in the “Whitehall II study”. Amongst other things the data they used provided information on the mortality rates and sleep patterns on the same group of civil servants at two points in their life (1985-8 and those still alive in 1992-3).

Six months of acupuncture treatment appears to be more effective than conventional therapy in treating low back pain, according to a study in the Sept. 24 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, although the study suggests that both sham acupuncture and traditional Chinese verum acupuncture appear to be effective in treating low back pain.

“Low back pain is a common, impairing and disabling condition, often long-term, with an estimated lifetime prevalence of 70 percent to 85 percent,” the authors write as background information in the article.

Modern conservation techniques have brought us the resurgence of American bald eagles, sustainable forest harvests and the rescue of prized lobster fisheries. So how can modern conservation strategies also have wrought such failures, from the catastrophic loss of Guatemalan forests to the economy-crippling Klamath River salmon kill in 2006?

Indiana University political scientist Elinor Ostrom and colleagues argue that while many basic conservation strategies are sound, their use is often flawed.

For more than 100 years, scientists have tried to figure out the cell size problem: How does a cell know when it is big enough to divide? In research conducted in budding yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), scientists at Rockefeller University have now identified the cellular event that marks the moment when a cell knows it is big enough to commit to cell division and spawn genetic replicas of itself.

The findings provide a precise and quantitative framework for studying the possible mechanisms that allow cells to monitor and sense their size.

During the first phase of the cell cycle, known as G1, budding yeast grows and begins to form a bud; in the final stage, the cell splits into two — one bigger than the other.