BERLIN, Germany, October 16 /PRNewswire/ -- Innovative companies from industry and production which have implemented outstanding projects for the increase of energy-efficiency can once again compete for the international "Energy Efficiency Award". The prize, endowed with award funds of a total of 30,000 Euros, is announced by the Deutsche Energie-Agentur GmbH (dena) - German Energy Agency - in the context of the Initiative EnergieEffizienz in collaboration with Deutsche Messe. The prize-winners will be honoured on the 21 April 2009 at the WORLD ENERGY DIALOGUE of the HANNOVER MESSE 2009.

Nothing drives biologists crazier than people who think the colloquial meaning of 'junk' means junk DNA is valueless. For about 15 years, scientists have known that certain junk DNA, repetitive DNA segments previously thought to have no function, could evolve into exons, which are the building blocks for protein-coding genes in higher organisms like animals and plants.

A new University of Iowa study has found evidence that a significant number of exons created from junk DNA seem to play a role in gene regulation. The findings increase our understanding of how humans differ from other animals, including non-human primates.

DONGYING, Shandong, China, October 16 /PRNewswire/ --

CNPV, a multi product solar company (ingots, wafers, solar cells & modules), with a strong presence in the Solar Photovoltaic space, is pleased to announce the appointment of Mr. B. Veerraju Chaudary as its new Chief Technology and Operating Officer (CTO & COO) with immediate effect. This appointment further advances the company's stated commitment to its future high growth and development.

LOS COLINAS, Texas, October 16 /PRNewswire/ --

- Handango Sponsoring Contest to Award the Best Paid and Free Android Apps Added to the Handango Catalog

Handango Inc., the leading retailer of smartphone apps globally, announced today it will be the first retailer to offer both paid and free apps for the first Android smartphone device anticipated to launch on October 22.

MAIDENHEAD, England, October 16 /PRNewswire/ -- The company that pioneered the mass merchandising of PC's for all the family back in mid 90's is reasserting its dominant position by supplying a new generation of netbooks.

Toys R Us, the giant entertainment retailer has teamed with Asus, one of the world's biggest PC manufacturers and the world's largest motherboard producer to offer a range of ultra light laptop PCs.

"Our Asus Eee PC range has become one of the hottest properties in the computing world and brings a whole new, highly mobile Internet experience for all the family," said Mike Coogan, Marketing Director at Toys R Us.

LONDON, October 16 /PRNewswire/ --

- Over 2500 New Video Podcast Feeds in French, German, Italian, and Spanish

Today Channels.com launched a series of enhancements that will provide dramatic improvements in the availability of Web video podcasts & video RSS feeds to non-English speaking Web users. The new Channels(TM) features include non-English language search and the addition of over 2500 new video podcast feeds in Spanish, Italian, German and French.

It's no news that women were historically excluded from the "boys club" of science but women scientists date as far back as Ancient Greece, and perhaps further. In more recent years, they have become essential to the scientific community.

Several of the women listed here are sisters or wives of scientific men. During their times, women were forced onto the backburner but, given equal rights and freedoms, might have overshadowed their masculine counterparts. Some even disguised themselves as men and most, if not all, faced tremendous adversity. They have been chosen for this list because their contributions to science cannot be ignored, nor forgotten. 

The last column here placed the financial crisis within a historical context. The financial meltdown is part of the disruptive transition from the Information Age to the Shift Age. We are moving through a period of turmoil when the old order is being replaced by a new order. The nation state economic model is being replaced by a new global model. We are at a time when the old ways no longer seem to work and yet the new realignments are not yet clear.



In the United States there have been three great waves that have arced over our society during the last 30 years. The incredible run up in residential real estate values since the late 1970s was the first arc. Except for a short period in the early 1980s and then again in the 1990s, the value of residential real estate seemed to go ever upward. This of course created a great sense of wealth for those that benefited. In the early part of this decade millions of households took advantage of historically low interest rates to take out billions of dollars of equity to use for purchases. This 30 year cycle obviously came to a crashing halt two years ago.

Lightning and gases from volcanic eruptions could have given rise to the first life on Earth, according to a new analysis of samples from a classic origin-of-life experiment by NASA and university researchers. The NASA-funded result is the subject of a paper in Science appearing October 16.

"Historically, you don't get many experiments that might be more famous than these; they re-defined our thoughts on the origin of life and showed unequivocally that the fundamental building blocks of life could be derived from natural processes," said lead author Adam Johnson, a graduate student with the NASA Astrobiology Institute team at Indiana University, Bloomington, Ind.

From 1953 to 1954, Professor Stanley Miller, then at the University of Chicago, performed a series of experiments with a system of closed flasks containing water and a gas of simple molecules. At the time, the molecules used in the experiment (hydrogen, methane, and ammonia) were thought to be common in Earth's ancient atmosphere.

Using brain imaging and chocolate milkshakes, scientists have found that women with weakened "reward circuitry" in their brains are at increased risk of weight gain over time and potential obesity. The risk increases even more for women who also have a gene associated with compromised dopamine signaling in the brain.

The results, drawn from two studies using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) at the University of Oregon's Lewis Center for Neuroimaging, appear in the Oct. 17 issue of the journal Science. The first-of-its-kind approach unveiled blunted activation in the brain's dorsal stratium when subjects were given milkshakes, which may reflect less-than-normal dopamine output.