A team of European scientists working with COROT have discovered an exoplanet orbiting a star slightly more massive than the Sun. After just 555 days in orbit, the mission has now observed more than 50 000 stars and is adding significantly to our knowledge of the fundamental workings of stars.

The latest discovery, COROT-exo-4b is an exoplanet of about the same size as Jupiter. It takes 9.2 days to orbit its star, the longest period for any transiting exoplanet ever found.

An aerosol mass spectrometer developed by chemists from Aerodyne Research Inc. and Boston College is giving scientists who study airborne particles the technology they need to examine the life cycles of atmospheric aerosols – such as soot – and their impact on issues ranging from climate change to public health.

BC Chemistry Professor Paul Davidovits and Aerodyne Principal Scientist Timothy B. Onasch say their novel spectrometer allows researchers to better understand what happens to these sub-microscopic particles that can absorb and scatter light and influence the lifetime of clouds.

Researchers at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center have disproved a long-standing clinical belief that the hepatitis C virus slows or stunts the immune system's ability to restore itself after HIV patients are treated with a combination of drugs known as the "cocktail."

Hepatitis C (HCV) infection is more serious in HIV-infected people, leading to rapid liver damage, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Intravenous drug use is a main method of contraction for both HIV and HCV and 50 to 90 percent of HIV-infected drug users are also infected with HCV.

An enormous research effort by Europe’s leading broadband players has helped accelerate dramatically the rollout of next-generation broadband services reaching speeds in the 10s of Mbit/s in many European countries. That is just the start.

The deployment of broadband services in the 10s of megabits per second (Mbit/s) is accelerating across the continent, thanks to the research efforts of Europe’s main broadband players. Even 100Mbit/s has become economically feasible and deployments have started.

Two years ago Europe’s leading telecoms, ISP companies, and its top technology vendors and research institutes finished their work on the first phase of the MUSE project. That effort led to a new set of standard specifications for broadband technology branded as the Global System for Broadband (GSB).

Officials from Florida Atlantic University (FAU) and FAU’s Center for Ocean Energy Technology (COET) in the College of Engineering and Computer Science accompanied Florida Governor Charlie Crist on a recent visit to several universities and organizations in the United Kingdom to continue discussions, exchange information and formalize agreements in areas of clean ocean energy, environmental issues and climate change.

Last year, Florida and the UK signed a partnership agreement on global climate change, physically tying one to the other by the Gulf Stream, that massive ocean current which is of critical importance to the present climate and quality of life affecting each partner.

In California it may be the summer of fires as smoke fills the air, but at Yale researchers pump smoke into the lungs of mice in order to help find an explanation behind reactions in smokers due viral infections.

Recent studies by researchers at Yale found that people who smoke have a worse reaction to viral infections not due to a weakened immune system, but because of an overreaction.

ALISO VIEJO, California and REDMOND, Washington, July 24 /PRNewswire/ --

- Leaders in data warehousing team to provide large-scale business intelligence solutions.

Microsoft Corp today announced that it intends to acquire DATAllegro Inc, a provider of breakthrough data warehouse appliances. The acquisition will extend the capabilities of Microsoft's mission-critical data platform, making it easier and more cost-effective for customers of all sizes to manage and glean insight from the ever-expanding amount of data generated by and for businesses, employees and consumers.

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If the drinker paradox states that in any pub there is a customer such that, if he or she drinks, everybody in the pub drinks and the diamond-water paradox states that water is more useful than diamonds, yet is a lot cheaper , then the French paradox that the French suffer a relatively low incidence of coronary heart disease despite a diet relatively rich in saturated fats, must certainly be true.

The French paradox became popular on an episode of 60 minutes in 1991 with the incorporation of research supporting, red wine as the reason for the decrease in heart disease. Shortly after the show aired wine sales went up 44 percent.

MAARSSEN, Netherlands, July 24 /PRNewswire/ --

The global pharma ingredients and services community's largest annual gathering, CPhI Worldwide, returns this year to Frankfurt on Tuesday 30 September - Thursday 2 October.

With the integrated ICSE contract services and P-MEC machinery and equipment events, the exhibitions will be conveniently located in the adjoining Messe Halls 3, 4, 5 and 6. Frankfurt has a long association with the events and 2008 marks the fifth time that the city hosts CPhI.

The industry has seen major growth since the event was last here in 2003. Five years ago there were 1,200 exhibitors: this year will see close to 1,800. The 2003 attendee total of just over 16,000 will likely be at least 50% up, at 24,000 or more for 2008.

BASEL, Switzerland, July 24 /PRNewswire/ -- The European Committee for Human Medicinal Products (CHMP) has confirmed that the presence of an impurity called ethyl methanesulfonate (EMS) in Roche's Viracept (nelfinavir mesylate) did not increase patients' risk of developing cancer.

The discovery of the EMS impurity in some batches of nelfinavir led to a global recall of this HIV medication in June 2007. Since then, the product has been made available again in the EU.

The conclusions announced today were based on tests with EMS, which have been validated by independent experts including toxicologists and HIV-treating clinicians. The results were also reviewed by patient advocates and non-governmental organisations.