ScienceDaily: Top Technology News

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• Sleep deficiency and sleep medication use in astronauts
• White dwarfs crashing into neutron stars explain loneliest supernovae
• Stock prices of companies that use the same underwriter tend to move together
• Robot folds itself up and walks away: Demonstrates potential for sophisticated machines that build themselves
• Learning from origami to design new materials
• A Step closer to understanding the birth of the sun
• Water 'microhabitats' in oil show potential for extraterrestrial life, oil cleanup: Extremophilic ecosystems writ small
• The black hole at the birth of the Universe
• Astronomers find stream of gas, 2.6 million light years long
• Uranium Exposure, Skin Cancer: Study May Help Explain Link
• Synthesis of structurally pure carbon nanotubes using molecular seeds
• Bone tumor destroyed using incisionless surgery: First in North American child

Sleep deficiency and sleep medication use in astronauts Posted: 07 Aug 2014 06:58 PM PDT In an extensive study of sleep monitoring and sleeping pill use in astronauts, researchers found that astronauts suffer considerable sleep deficiency in the weeks leading up to and during space flight. The research also highlights widespread use of sleeping medication use among astronauts.

White dwarfs crashing into neutron stars explain loneliest supernovae Posted: 07 Aug 2014 06:58 PM PDT Astronomers and astrophysicists have found that some of the Universe's loneliest supernovae are likely created by the collisions of white dwarf stars into neutron stars.

Stock prices of companies that use the same underwriter tend to move together Posted: 07 Aug 2014 11:59 AM PDT The stock prices of companies that use the same lead underwriter during their equity offerings tend to move together, according to a new study by financial economics experts.

Robot folds itself up and walks away: Demonstrates potential for sophisticated machines that build themselves Posted: 07 Aug 2014 11:59 AM PDT A team of engineers used little more than paper and Shrinky dinks -- the classic children's toy that shrinks when heated -- to build a robot that assembles itself into a complex shape in four minutes flat, and crawls away without any human intervention. The advance demonstrates the potential to quickly and cheaply build sophisticated machines that interact with the environment, and to automate much of the design and assembly process.

Learning from origami to design new materials Posted: 07 Aug 2014 11:58 AM PDT A challenge increasingly important to physicists and materials scientists in recent years has been how to design controllable new materials that exhibit desired physical properties rather than relying on those properties to emerge naturally. Now physicists and polymer scientists are using origami-based folding methods for 'tuning' the fundamental physical properties of any type of thin sheet.

A Step closer to understanding the birth of the sun Posted: 07 Aug 2014 11:57 AM PDT Researchers are a step closer to understanding the birth of the sun. Scientists have investigated the solar system's prehistoric phase and the events that led to the birth of the sun.

Water 'microhabitats' in oil show potential for extraterrestrial life, oil cleanup: Extremophilic ecosystems writ small Posted: 07 Aug 2014 11:57 AM PDT An international team of researchers has found extremely small habitats that increase the potential for life on other planets while offering a way to clean up oil spills on our own. Looking at samples from the world's largest natural asphalt lake, they found active microbes in droplets as small as a microliter, which is about 1/50th of a drop of water.

The black hole at the birth of the Universe Posted: 07 Aug 2014 11:56 AM PDT The big bang poses a big question: if it was indeed the cataclysm that blasted our universe into existence 13.7 billion years ago, what sparked it? Three Perimeter Institute researchers have a new idea about what might have come before the big bang. It's a bit perplexing, but it is grounded in sound mathematics and is it testable?

Astronomers find stream of gas, 2.6 million light years long Posted: 07 Aug 2014 07:50 AM PDT Astronomers and students have found a bridge of atomic hydrogen gas 2.6 million light years long between galaxies 500 million light years away. The stream of atomic hydrogen gas is the largest known, a million light years longer than a gas tail found in the Virgo Cluster by another Arecibo project a few years ago.

Uranium Exposure, Skin Cancer: Study May Help Explain Link Posted: 07 Aug 2014 07:47 AM PDT The varying health risks from exposure to natural uranium are well established, but now researchers have identified a new target organ for uranium exposure: skin. "Our hypothesis is that if uranium is photoactivated by UV radiation it could be more harmful to skin than either exposure alone," the lead researcher said.

Synthesis of structurally pure carbon nanotubes using molecular seeds Posted: 07 Aug 2014 07:43 AM PDT For the first time, researchers have succeeded in "growing" single-wall carbon nanotubes (CNT) with a single predefined structure -- and hence with identical electronic properties. And here is how they pulled it off: the CNTs "assembled themselves", as it were, out of tailor-made organic precursor molecules on a platinum surface. In future, CNTs of this kind may be used in ultra-sensitive light detectors and ultra-small transistors.

Bone tumor destroyed using incisionless surgery: First in North American child Posted: 06 Aug 2014 11:21 AM PDT A Canadian child is the first in North America to have undergone a specialized procedure that uses ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to destroy a tumor in his leg without piercing the skin. Doctors used an MRI to guide high-intensity ultrasound waves to destroy a benign bone tumor called osteoid osteoma. The lesion had caused 16-year-old Jack Campanile excruciating pain for a year prior to the procedure. By the time he went to bed that night, the athletic teen experienced complete pain relief.

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