VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland

New computer model takes a page from weather forecasting to predict regional peaks in influenza outbreaks Scientists have developed a system to predict the timing and severity of seasonal influenza outbreaks that could one day help health officials and the general public better prepare for them. The system adapts techniques used in modern weather prediction

Pancreatic cancer has one of the worst prognoses — with a five-year survival rate of 9 percent — in part because there are no telltale symptoms or non-invasive screening tools to catch a tumor before it spreads. Now, University of Washington researchers are developing an app that could allow people to easily screen for pancreatic cancer and other

Paying for a coffee or lunch by simply scanning your palm still sounds like science fiction to most of us. However, an engineering student at Lund University in Sweden has made it happen – making his the first known company in the world to install the vein scanning technique in stores and coffee shops. Fredrik

As the emerald ash borer ravages North American ash trees, threatening the trees’ very survival, a team of entomologists and engineers may have found a way to prevent the spread of the pests. Emerald ash borers (EABs), a type of beetle native to Asia, first appeared in the U.S. about 20 years ago. They are

A silicon-based quantum computing device could be closer than ever due to a new experimental device that demonstrates the potential to use light as a messenger to connect quantum bits of information — known as qubits — that are not immediately adjacent to each other. The feat is a step toward making quantum computing devices

The researchers’ goal is to eliminate 99 percent of the most toxic transuranic waste from nuclear fission reactors. University of Texas at Austin physicists have been awarded a U.S. patent for an invention that could someday be used to turn nuclear waste into fuel, thus removing the most dangerous forms of waste from the fuel cycle. The researchers

A new company lets you do a short internship at other jobs, no matter how old you are. If you’ve always thought you should be a chef but don’t know how to find out, now you have a way into a kitchen. Exploring a new career takes serious commitment: No one’s ever getting back the

This important scientific breakthrough, developed by the University of Granada, will aid the immediate use of artificially-grown skin for major burn patients, since the skin could be stored in tissue banks and made available when needed. One of the problems major burn victims have is that, using the current protocols for artificial skin, they need

The team calls its biological transistor the “transcriptor.” When Charles Babbage prototyped the first computing machine in the 19th century, he imagined using mechanical gears and latches to control information. ENIAC, the first modern computer developed in the 1940s, used vacuum tubes and electricity. Today, computers use transistors made from highly engineered semiconducting materials to

Scientists are reporting an advance toward overcoming a major barrier to tapping the potential of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and India’s Ayurvedic medicine in developing new and more effective modern drugs. Their report appears in ACS’ Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling. Andreas Bender and colleagues explain that TCM has made key contributions to modern medicine.