Modern engine oil is a complex, highly engineered lubricating mixture, up to 20 percent of which may be special additives to enhance properties such as viscosity and stability and to reduce sludge formation and engine wear.

For years antiwear additives for high-performance oils have been phosphorous compounds, particularly zinc dialkyldithiophosphate (ZDDP), that work by forming a polyphosphate film on engine parts that reduces wear. Unfortunately phosphorus is a chemical poison for automobile catalytic converters, reducing their effectiveness and life span, so industry chemists have been searching for ways to replace or reduce the use of ZDDP. It’s not a simple problem because the additive has several useful functions in addition to wear resistance.

This DelFly Micro, made by Delft University of Technology, is a 'Micro Air Vehicle' (MAV), an exceptionally small remote-controlled aircraft with camera and image recognition software. The Micro, weighing just 3 grams and measuring 10 centimeters (wingtip to wingtip) has a minuscule battery weighing just 1 gram, can fly for approximately three minutes and has a maximum speed of 5 meters per second.

This kind of ultra-small, remote-controlled, camera-equipped aircraft is of great interest because they could eventually be used for observation flights in difficult-to-reach or dangerous areas.

The ten male soccer spectators who were struck by lightning in the Boston area on Sunday had taken refuge under a tree when a storm hit and were a great example of a rare phenomenon.

LARKSPUR, California, July 22 /PRNewswire/ --

Greenline Industries Inc., a leading global provider of best-in-class biodiesel production solutions, announced today that John Kinney is stepping down from his role as CEO. In the past year, Kinney helped secure US$20 million in funding from Leaf Clean Energy Company, a clean energy investment company ("Leaf"), allowing Greenline to execute its growth plans. The funding and partnership with Leaf is helping Greenline develop technologies that reduce the costs and increase the efficiency of its biodiesel production offerings.

NEW YORK, July 22 /PRNewswire/ --

Celebrating the "a-ha!" moment latent in every product designer and engineer, the Create the Future Design Contest sponsored by SolidWorks Corporation and Tech Briefs Media Group is accepting entries from inventors around the world.

HOLMDEL, New Jersey, July 22 /PRNewswire/ --

- New European customers signify worldwide requirements for quality management and regulatory compliance solutions

Sparta Systems, Inc. (Sparta), the maker of TrackWise(R), and the market leader in enterprise quality and compliance management software, today announced that it has furthered its market expansion in Europe with the addition of several new pharmaceutical and biotech companies to its extensive roster of more than 200 TrackWise customers. These organizations will deploy the company's market-leading TrackWise quality management software to support their globally dispersed operations in complying with government regulations, while streamlining overall process efficiency.

Nicholas Wade has an outstanding piece in today's Times Science section about the "hope" for Resverotrol and other sirtuin-activating compounds that may activate the lifespan extending pathway controlled by caloric restriction, although, like several stories on the subject lately, it left me wondering about a few things. Comment and answers appreciated, they are: 1. The reason for these stories--a Cell Metabolism article that appeared July 3 was actually quite negative about resverotrol's lifespan-extending effects. The Cell piece was about an experiment on normal, rather than high fat fed mice, raising the questions that resverotrol's previous success with high fat mice actually had more to do with energy partitioning than with the stress resistance touted by Sinclair and Guerente. Southern Illinois University School of Medicine

TROY, Michigan, July 22 /PRNewswire/ --

- Proven Italian software accelerates concept development process, empowering creative community to invent, explore and fully evaluate ideas quickly and cost-effectively

Leading industrial design/styling software company solidThinking (www.solidthinking.com) -- which has quietly grown its market share as the dominant tool of choice for Italian design firms and industrial designers for everything from jewelry and electronic devices to furniture and yachts -- is launching its latest version for Windows and Mac users worldwide.

To view the Multimedia News Release, go to: http://www.prnewswire.com/mnr/altair/34019/

BEIJING, July 22 /PRNewswire/ --

- Over 60,000 Haier Products Installed in Olympic Venues

Haier, the world's fourth largest white goods manufacturer and the official white goods sponsor of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, announced today that it has provided over 60,000 environmentally-friendly and energy-efficient products to the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG). Products such as refrigerators, air-conditioners, washing machines and water heaters will be used throughout the Olympic venues.

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080722/CNTU026 )

LONDON, July 22 /PRNewswire/ --

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