MILTON KEYNES, England, May 28 /PRNewswire/ --

- ABS Capital Partners Attracted to Leader in Mobile Field Force Solutions

O4 Corporation, global provider of mobile sales force automation solutions for retail execution, today announced it had completed a $15 million Series A financing transaction led by ABS Capital Partners, a leading later-stage growth company investor.

The deal marks another milestone in O4's surge to prominence in this rapidly expanding software market segment. It also underscores the value investors see in successful software companies that deliver on-demand solutions in high-growth sectors.

LONDON, May 28 /PRNewswire/ -- Telnic Limited (http://www.telnic.org), the registry operator for the new communications-focused .tel top level domain (TLD) which has sold over 200,000 domains in six weeks since launch, today announced that .tel Superbook for the iPhone and iPod Touch is now available to download for free on the Apple App Store.

STOCKHOLM, May 28 /PRNewswire/ --

- A Powerful CRM and Workflow Solution From the Leading Swedish Provider of Software for the Online Advertising Industry Ensures the Best Possible Sales Results for Partners and Customers of OMS

HERAKLION, Greece and BRUSSELS, May 28 /PRNewswire/ -- The European Network and Information Security Agency [ENISA] launches two reports with three recommendations on emerging new technologies and their potential to improve the resilience of communication networks. Technologies have been developed with properties that improve both the resilience and security of the Internet. Experience is missing in the area of commercial operation of these features, as well as operational best practices and recommendations in applied network resilience.

AMSTERDAM, May 28 /PRNewswire/ -- Amsterdam Molecular Therapeutics (Euronext: AMT), a leader in the field of human gene therapy, announced today that the European Medicines Agency has granted Orphan Drug Designation to AMT's gene therapy product AMT-021 for the treatment of acute intermittent porphyria (AIP).

VIB (the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology) researchers linked to K.U.Leuven and Harvard University say they have shown that stretches of DNA previously believed to be useless 'junk' DNA play a vital role in the evolution of our genome. Their findings were that unstable pieces of junk DNA help tuning gene activity and enable organisms to quickly adapt to changes in their environments.

Junk DNA in two paragraphs

"Most people do not realize that all our genes only comprise about 3% of the total human genome. The rest is basically one large black box,"  says Kevin Verstrepen, heading the research team. "Why do we have this DNA, what is it doing?"

Oxidative stress has been linked to aging, cancer and other diseases in humans. Paradoxically, researchers have suggested that small exposure to oxidative conditions may actually offer protection from acute doses. Now, scientists at the University of California, San Diego, have discovered the gene responsible for this effect. Their study, published in PLoS Genetics on May 29, explains the underlying mechanism of the process that prevents cellular damage by reactive oxygen species (ROS).

Scientists at the University of Leeds say they have uncovered a previously unknown giant volcanic eruption.   And it's no ordinary eruption, they say - it led to global mass extinction 260 million years ago. 

The eruption in the Emeishan province of south-west China unleashed around half a million cubic kilometres of lava, covering an area 5 times the size of Wales, and wiping out marine life around the world.

Even if we don't always notice, our brain is constantly distracted with 'noise' - unimportant messages that are filtered out.   

When we pay attention, our neurons begin firing in harmony and a study in the May 29 issue of Science lays out what researchers say is the likely brain center that serves as the conductor of our neural chorus.  MIT neuroscientists say that neurons in the prefrontal cortex, the brain's planning center, fire in unison and send signals to the visual cortex to do the same, generating high-frequency waves that oscillate between these distant brain regions like a vibrating spring. These waves, also known as gamma oscillations, have long been associated with cognitive states like attention, learning, and consciousness.

Biomedical engineers at Boston University have taught bacteria how to count.  The researchers have wired a new sequence of genes that allow the microbes to count discrete events, opening the door for a host of potential applications, which could include drug delivery and sensing environmental hazards. 

The young but burgeoning field of synthetic biology addresses biological research questions with an engineering approach. Researchers design and build networks of genes, splicing them into bacterial genomes to run specific tasks or manufacture desired molecules – a process akin to installing biological computer software. Though the field is rapidly advancing, the gene-based tools available to synthetic biologists remain limited.