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FDA finds many possibly life-threatening medical equipment malfunctions result from software problems

The Baltimore Sun on Monday examined how FDA, with help from experts in the information technology and scientific fields, has found that medical equipment "might not malfunction because it was poorly designed or badly made ... but because the computer code running it includes a mistake."

2 Jul 2008

New research refutes myth of pure Scandinavian race

A team of forensic scientists at the University of Copenhagen has studied human remains found in two ancient Danish burial grounds dating back to the iron age, and discovered a man who appears to be of arabian origin.

10 Jun 2008

How safe is synthetic turf? tests provide answers

Synthetic turf test results released by the New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services (NJDHSS) on June 3rd confirmed lead chromate levels are well below that necessary to cause harm to children and athletes using the popular playing field surfaces.

5 Jun 2008

New, single-exposure imaging tool puts biomedical imaging in palm of hands

Researchers at Georgia Tech have developed a narrowband filter mosaic that will expand the uses and functionality of multispectral imaging-a technology that enables subsurface characterization.

20 May 2008

Egyptian actors address HIV/AIDS, recent imprisonment of men living with disease

Egyptian actors Amr Waked and Khaled Abul Naga are speaking out against HIV/AIDS-related stigma in the country after several people who are allegedly living with the disease have been jailed in recent months, AFP/Yahoo! News reports.

29 Apr 2008

A biosensing nanodevice to revolutionize health screenings

One day soon a biosensing nanodevice developed by Arizona State University researcher Wayne Frasch may eliminate long lines at airport security checkpoints and revolutionize health screenings for diseases like anthrax, cancer and antibiotic resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA).

26 Mar 2008

DNA detectives find genetic markers for lung cancers most likely to recur

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center have uncovered clearly recognizable genetic alterations in tumors and tissue removed from patients with early-stage lung cancers that look like good predictors of which of these cancers are more likely to recur.

13 Mar 2008

New smarter technology for identifying human remains

A researcher from the Physical Anthropological Laboratory of the University of Granada has developed the most complete database today to identify human remains and bodies in advanced states of decomposition using 3D computerised techniques for facial reconstruction.

13 Mar 2008

Portable DNA sensors

A researcher at the National University at San Diego has taken a mathematical approach to a biological problem - how to design a portable DNA detector.

11 Mar 2008

Stopping bird flu at the border

Several strains of the bird flu virus that raged across southern China were blocked from entering Thailand and Vietnam, UC Irvine researchers have discovered.

28 Feb 2008

You are what you eat and drink - and that is recorded in your hair

University of Utah scientists developed a new crime-fighting tool by showing that human hair reveals the general location where a person drank water, helping police track past movements of criminal suspects or unidentified murder victims.

27 Feb 2008

Guidelines for evaluation of psychological side-effects of brain injury

In her PhD, defended at the University of the Basque Country, Maria Luisa de Francisco Maiz provided a clinical-forensic evaluation of brain injuries and also a study on the variables that influence the length of "legal time periods".

21 Feb 2008

Fake antimalarial drugs analysis highlights threat to global health

A unique collaboration between scientists, public health workers and police has led to the arrest by the Chinese authorities of alleged traders of fake anti-malarial drugs in southern China and the seizure of a large quantity of drugs.

13 Feb 2008

Researchers can now determine when a human was born by radiocarbon dating of the human eye lens

Using the radiocarbon dating method and special proteins in the lens of the eye, researchers at the University of Copenhagen and Aarhus can now establish, with relatively high precision, when a person was born.

30 Jan 2008

Applied DNA Sciences files patents for optical DNA SigNature markers

Applied DNA Sciences, Inc. has announced that it has filed multiple patent applications to cover its latest developments in optical reporter markers.

23 Jan 2008

Real concerns over the ethics of a DNA database

The inventor of DNA fingerprinting, Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, of the University of Leicester, has voiced his concerns over the ethics of a DNA database.

10 Jan 2008

$Dads break or fracture the bones of their children far more often than moms$

Dads break or fracture the bones of their children far more often than moms

...and they tend to inflict their abusive rage on infants younger than five months old, according to a study in Child Abuse & Neglect.

5 Dec 2007

800-year-old mummies from Mongolia help advance DNA extraction

Dr. Heather Coyle and three forensic science graduate students at the University of New Haven have developed a new method for preparing certain skeletal remains for DNA extraction thanks to some 800-year-old mummies from Mongolia and the research the group is doing for the Smithsonian Institution.

22 Oct 2007

Alcohol is most common 'spiking' drug

Young women in Northern Ireland are leaving themselves vulnerable to rape or serious sexual assault because of their binge drinking, according to research carried out by staff and students within the Forensic and Legal Medicine team at the University of Ulster.

15 Oct 2007

Behavior of drug-dependent offenders

Researchers at the University of Leicester have worked with Northamptonshire Police's Scientific Support Unit to research whether or not drug-dependent offenders were more likely to be apprehended through forensic science techniques than those who were not.

10 Oct 2007