Do babies says "mama" and "papa" because they recognize their parents or did those words become terms for parents because that's what babies first say?

The human brain may be hard-wired to recognize certain repetition patterns, according to a study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Using the latest optical brain imaging techniques, University of British Columbia post-doctoral fellow Judit Gervain and a team of researchers from Italy and Chile documented brain activities of 22 newborns (2-3 days old) when exposed to recordings of made-up words.

How do galaxies form? The most widely accepted answer to this fundamental question is the model of 'hierarchical formation', a step-wise process in which small galaxies merge to build larger ones. One can think of the galaxies forming in a similar way to how streams merge to form rivers, and how these rivers, in turn, merge to form an even larger river.

This theoretical model predicts that massive galaxies grow through many merging events in their lifetime. But when did their cosmological growth spurts finish? When did the most massive galaxies get most of their mass?

JERUSALEM and NEEDHAM, Massachusetts, August 26 /PRNewswire/ -- Oridion Systems Ltd. (SWX: ORIDN) today announced an OEM agreement with Spacelabs Healthcare, a leading global medical device and service company. With this agreement, Spacelabs now employs Oridion Microstream(R) capnography technology in its new, compact and ultra-lightweight patient monitoring system, élance.

Hydrogen will be one of the most important fuels of the future, if it can be obtained by efficiently splitting water. Today the electrolysis of water is a very energy intensive process, making it both expensive and unsustainable if the electricity necessary to generate it comes from the burning of fossil fuels anyway.

Photolysis, the splitting of water by light, is a highly promising alternative. A team of Australian and American researchers has now developed a catalyst that effectively catalyzes one of the necessary half reactions, the photooxidation of water. As it reports in the journal Angewandte Chemie, the core of the catalyst is a manganese-containing complex modeled after those found in photosynthetic organisms.

A new study from researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University sheds light on why smokers' intentions to quit “cold turkey” often fizzle out within days or even hours.

If a smoker isn't yearning for a cigarette when he makes the decision to kick the habit-and most aren't-he isn't able to foresee how he will feel when he's in need of a nicotine buzz.

Published in the September issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, the study, “Exploring the Cold-to-Hot Empathy Gap in Smokers,” bolsters the theory that smokers not in a state of craving a cigarette will underestimate and underpredict the intensity of their future urge to smoke.

LONDON, August 25 /PRNewswire/ --

Cascal N.V. (NYSE: HOO), a leading provider of water and wastewater services in seven countries, today announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, Aquas de Panama, SA, ("APSA") has filed for an "amparo" with the Supreme Court in Panama. An "amparo" is a constitutional action that seeks to protect the right to private property and due process.

SANDVIKA, Norway, August 25 /PRNewswire/ --

Renewable Energy Corporation ASA (REC) is pleased to announce Becancour, Quebec as the site of choice for the next phase of silicon materials expansions. The site will be developed in stages and could potentially hold four production units similar in size of the factory currently under completion in Moses Lake, Washington, USA.

REC has today decided to establish its next silicon materials manufacturing expansion in Becancour, Canada and has simultaneously signed agreements with Hydro Quebec, and Societe du Parc industriel et portuaire de Becancour. The agreements outline both the terms and conditions related to the development of a new production site and other commercial conditions.

NYON, Switzerland, August 25 /PRNewswire/ -- Mymetics Corporation (OTCBB:MYMX) announced today that its company information will be made available via Standard & Poor's Market Access Program, an information distribution service that enables subscribing publicly traded companies to have their company information disseminated to users of Standard & Poor's Advisor Insight. The company information to be made available through this program includes share price, volume, dividends, shares outstanding, company financial position, and earnings. Standard & Poor's Advisor Insight is an Internet-based research engine used by more than 100,000 investment advisors. A public version of the site is available at http://www.advisorinsight.com.

WELLESLEY HILLS, Massachusetts, August 25 /PRNewswire/ --

Joseph F. Finn, Jr., C.P.A. ("Finn"), Assignee of the assets of Spherics, Inc. ("Spherics") for the benefit of creditors, announced today that all pharmaceutical intellectual property will be sold at a sealed bid auction on October 10, 2008.

SRx-501 is an extended release formulation of Levodopa-Carbidopa that is the current gold standard treatment for Parkinson's disease, with global sales estimated at approximately US$250 million. Significant PK issues with the currently available product include erratic absorption, high inter-subject variability and a steep wearing-off rate under its three+ times daily dosing regimen.

Spherics has developed a multi-layer tablet allowing

VANCOUVER, Canada, August 25 /PRNewswire/ --

- COO Drew Cadenhead Spotlights Unconventional Oil Potential From the Company's 2,163,855 Acres in NZ's East Coast Basin

Unconventional oil and gas explorer Trans-Orient Petroleum Ltd. (OTCBB: TOPLF) is pleased to announce that Dow Jones MarketWatch interviewed company COO Drew Cadenhead on Thursday, August 21. The four-minute streaming video interview can be seen at: http://video.marketwatch.com/m/20731345/squeezing_oil_from_rocks.htm