An international team of scientists predict that our galaxy, the Milky Way, contains a disk of ‘dark matter’, in a paper published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Astronomers Dr. Justin Read, Professor George Lake and Oscar Agertz of the University of Zurich, and Dr. Victor Debattista of the University of Central Lancashire used the results of a supercomputer simulation to deduce the presence of this disk. They explain how it could allow physicists to directly detect and identify the nature of dark matter for the first time.

Unlike the familiar ‘normal’ matter that makes up stars, gas and dust, ‘dark’ matter is invisible but its presence can be inferred through its gravitational influence on its surroundings. Physicists believe that it makes up 22% of the mass of the Universe (compared with the 4% of normal matter and 74% comprising the mysterious ‘dark energy’). But, despite its pervasive influence, no one is sure what dark matter consists of.

Genetic studies involving the long term storage and study of human samples hold great promise for medical research—but they also pose new threats to individuals such as uninsurability, unemployability, and discrimination, say Matthias Wjst (Institute of Genetic Medicine, Bozen, Italy) and colleagues.

They argue that the traditional informed consent process—in which the researcher counsels potential study participants about the risks and benefits of taking part in a study—may no longer be appropriate when dealing with long-term studies using biological materials.

Johns Hopkins scientists report success in significantly suppressing levels of the "hunger hormone" ghrelin in pigs using a minimally invasive means of chemically vaporizing the main vessel carrying blood to the top section, or fundus, of the stomach. An estimated 90 percent of the body's ghrelin originates in the fundus, which can't make the hormone without a good blood supply.

"With gastric artery chemical embolization, called GACE, there's no major surgery," says Aravind Arepally, M.D., clinical director of the Center for Bioengineering Innovation and Design and associate professor of radiology and surgery at the John Hopkins University School of Medicine. "In our study in pigs, this procedure produced an effect similar to bariatric surgery by suppressing ghrelin levels and subsequently lowering appetite."

When it comes to aggression, boys are physical and girls are social, it is said, but a new analysis of almost 150 studies of aggression in children and adolescents has found that there's more overlap than stereotypes lead us to believe.

Physical aggression - hitting - is something boys are more likely to do while girls are more likely to spread rumors, gossip, and intentionally exclude others, called indirect, relational, or social aggression.

The analysis of 148 studies, which comprised almost 74,000 children and adolescents and were carried out largely in schools, looked at both direct aggression and indirect aggression and was conducted by Noel A. Card, assistant professor of family studies and human development at the University of Arizona, and researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Kansas.

Young girls from poor neighborhoods with conduct issues are more likely to initiate sex at a young age, according to a new study by researchers from the Université de Montréal, the University of New Brunswick and Tufts University, published in the journal Child Development. The study found that troubled girls living in poor neighborhoods were more likely to engage in sexual intercourse in early adolescence and also to be doing so with older boys.

These teen girls from poor neighborhoods with a history of conduct problems were more likely to associate with deviant peers and to be initiated into sex by males that were three years older or more. "Girls with a history of conduct problems were found to be more likely to have deviant and older male friends when they lived in a disadvantaged context," said lead author Véronique Dupéré, who completed the research at the Université de Montréal. "Deviant peers are thought to provide a pool of willing partners and cultivate a sense that early sexual activity is desirable."

Houses made of hemp, timber or straw could help combat climate change by reducing the carbon footprint of building construction, according to researchers at the University of Bath. The construction industry is a major contributor of environmental pollutants, with buildings and other build infrastructure contributing to around 19% of the UK’s eco-footprint, they say.

Researchers at the BRE Centre for Innovative Construction Materials are researching low carbon alternatives to building materials currently used by the construction industry. Although timber is used as a building material in many parts of the world, historically it is used less in the UK than in other countries.

Diversity is praised as good for business and for promoting creativity but when organizational theorist Viktorija Kalonaityte studied diversity work at a Swedish adult education school, the school wanted to make everyone as “Swedish” as possible.

That means protecting women from 'honor killings' and teaching in Swedish.

In Sweden, diversity is largely about integration policy and the public sector rather than just being corporate policy in places lke America. Viktorija Kalonaityte recently defended her doctoral dissertation at the School of Economics, Lund University in Sweden and her thesis addressed identity and diversity work at a municipal school for adults. The school she studied views itself as working actively with diversity in line with a municipal diversity plan but Kalonaityte says that the diversity plan often collides with people’s understandings of what things should be like at a Swedish workplace.

WASHINGTON, September 16 /PRNewswire/ --

At their September 8-10 meeting in Vienna, OPEC Ministers agreed to abide by their September 2007 production allocations (including new members Angola and Ecuador and excluding Indonesia and Iraq) totaling 28.8 million barrels per day (bpd) cutting production anywhere from 500,000 to 800,000 bpd.

The Abraham Energy Report (AbrahamEnergyReport.com) and its' Editor and Publisher, former U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, advises the newsletter's monthly subscribers that the production decline may not be as definitive as the OPEC meeting's communique implies.

BLUE BELL, Pennsylvania and TOKYO, September 16 /PRNewswire/ -- NEC and Unisys (NYSE: UIS) today announced that they have completed development of the first generation of a common platform for both companies' enterprise servers. NEC has begun manufacturing systems based on this common platform, and each company will market the systems as part of its own branded server line.

The common platform is the result of an alliance agreement the two companies signed in 2006. The alliance aims to provide industry-leading systems that leverage both companies' expertise in enterprise server products and enable them to reduce research and development costs.

OVERLAND PARK, Kansas, September 16 /PRNewswire/ --

- One of the world's largest architectural LED lighting grids shines on the Berlin Wall East Side Gallery

LightWild today announced the completion of an exterior architectural lighting project for the O2 World Arena in Berlin, Germany. The project, one of the world's largest architectural LED lighting grids, spans across the entire south glass facade of the new arena that opened Sept. 10, 2008.

To view the Multimedia News Release, go to: http://www.prnewswire.com/mnr/lightwild/34977/