An international research team has discovered that a magnetic field can interact with the electrons in a superconductor in ways never before observed.

Andrea D. Bianchi, the lead researcher from the Université de Montréal, explains in the January 11 edition of Science magazine what he discovered in an exceptional compound of metals – a combination of cobalt, indium and a rare earth – that loses its resistance when cooled to just a couple of degrees above absolute zero.

“When subjected to intense magnetic fields, these materials produce a completely new type of magnetic tornado that grows stronger with increasing fields rather than weakening,” said Prof. Bianchi. “The beauty of this compound is how we can experiment without breaking it.”

New ways to make sure people are adequately informed about the risks and benefits of taking part in a clinical trial can be field-tested for effectiveness as vigorously as new medical treatments themselves, a study led by a Johns Hopkins bioethicist suggests.

Informed consent, a mainstay of ethical clinical trials, is the process by which potential research subjects are asked to decide whether to participate in research.

A new study by University of Colorado at Boulder researchers indicates older, multi-year sea ice in the Arctic is giving way to younger, thinner ice, making it more susceptible to record summer sea-ice lows like the one that occurred in 2007.

The team used satellite data going back to 1982 to reconstruct past Arctic sea ice conditions, concluding there has been a nearly complete loss of the oldest, thickest ice and that 58 percent of the remaining perennial ice is thin and only 2-to-3 years old, said the lead study author, Research Professor James Maslanik of CU-Boulder's Colorado Center for Astrodynamics Research.

The roundworm C. elegans, a staple of laboratory research, may be key in unlocking one of the central biological mysteries: why we sleep.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine report in this week’s advanced online edition of Nature that the round worm has a sleep-like state, joining most of the animal kingdom in displaying this physiology. This research has implications for explaining the evolution and purpose of sleep and sleep-like states in animals.

In addition, genetic work associated with the study provides new prospects for the use of C. elegans to identify sleep-regulatory genes and drug targets for sleep disorders.

LONDON, January 11 /PRNewswire/ -- eyeforpharma, the global source of information and education for the pharmaceutical industry, announced today that the 5th annual Patient Compliance & Communication conference, London, 11-12 June 2008 has secured its full speaker faculty including leading executives from Pfizer, Novartis, Wyeth, GSK, Bayer, AstraZeneca and Merck Serono.

The full detailed brochure is available to download now at http://www.eyeforpharma.com/pceu2008/brochure.shtml

LONDON, January 11 /PRNewswire/ --

The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) has today named the UK's top young women engineers in its Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards.

The Awards are the most prestigious of their type within the engineering profession and recognise success and talent among women engineers. This year the awards celebrate their 30th anniversary.

The main prize, the IET Young Woman Engineer of the Year, went to an electrical engineering programme co-ordinator with power company E.ON. Another winner began her career working on some of the world's most popular toys.

The winners are:

- Alice Delahunty, age 26 from Nottingham, won the 2007 IET Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards. Alice works for E.ON

PHILADELPHIA, January 11 /PRNewswire/ --

AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION (ALA) MIDWINTER MEETING -- Kirtas Technologies, the leader in quality, high-speed, nondestructive book digitization, today introduced three new systems to round out its product offering to the growing number of organizations and businesses digitizing their works and bringing information to a new generation of digital users.

The Kirtas APT BookScan 2400RA(TM) is a new, high-volume machine that provides remote access allowing users to capture raw images in one location and process them at another. It is equipped with a high-performance blade server, which enables the remote capability as well as providing increased storage capacity and a faster processing speed.

HOOFDDORP, The Netherlands, January 11 /PRNewswire/ --

- Kulik Continues Chairing Board of Chinese Joint Venture

The Board of Directors of CEVA Group plc. announced today that David G. Kulik, CEVA's Vice Chairman and former CEO, has advised the Company of his retirement, effective February 22nd, 2008. The Company also announced that they have entered into an agreement with Mr. Kulik wherein he will be a consultant to management as well as continue in his position as Chairman of the Board of ANJI-TNT, the joint venture between CEVA Logistics and Shanghai Automotive Industries Corporation - SAIC.

Cranberry juice, long dissed as a mere folk remedy for relieving urinary tract infections in women, is finally getting some respect.

Thanks to Prof. Itzhak Ofek, a researcher at Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine, the world now knows that science supports the folklore. Prof. Ofek's research on the tart berry over the past two decades shows that its juice indeed combats urinary tract infections.

And, he’s discovered, the refreshing red beverage has additional medicinal qualities as well. Prof. Ofek has found that cranberry juice exhibits anti-viral properties against the flu, can prevent cavities, and lessens the reoccurrence of gastric ulcers.

Methadone can be dangerous for some patients but is heroin a good idea for heroin addicts?

Maintenance treatment with heroin is appropriate for heroin misusers under certain circumstances, argue Jürgen Rehm from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto and Benedikt Fischer from the University of Victoria, British Columbia.

They point to trials in Switzerland, the Netherlands and Germany, which found heroin assisted maintenance treatment feasible and effective for those resistant to treatment.