April 2011
Bunsen Burner
Robert Bunsen's 200th birthday
On the day of Robert Bunsen's 200th birthday, Martyn Poliakoff, research professor at the University of Nottingham, discuss with the help of his team, The Periodic Table of Videos, the most famous invention of Robert Bunsen.
English
Read time: 1 minSubmitted by Emanuela Clavarino on 27 April, 2011 - 15:53
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Copper kills bacteria: end of hospital-acquired infections?
di Marc Solioz
Prof. Hans Bärlocher left the hospital after a long working day. Outside the building, he took a deep breath of fresh Spring air; then, he smelled his right hand. Yes, it had the faint, but typical copper smell. This reassured him that he had not pick up any germs when going through the series of doors to leave the clinic. All the doors in his hospital had recently been refitted with door handles and push plates of antimicrobial copper. Also, many other items of stainless steel, like trays, bed rails, bathroom fixtures or toilet seats had been replaced by corresponding
Year of chemistry: some reflections
Chemical and physical sciences have profoundly modified the living conditions of mankind, in particular chemistry has played a central role. Its creative power has made available a range of new materials and processes for the transformation of matter. Somehow, however, these have often been perceived as unnatural and opposed to the natural ones. As a result the question of a control by society has become more and more actual. This requires that information be available to the public and to decision-makers for
Reflections on Fukushima: A time to mourn, to learn, and to
History of a "mutant" neutrino
The international collaboration of OPERA experiment located at the Gran Sasso national laboratories -National Institute of Nuclear Physics-, in a seminar held yesterday at the laboratory, announced the detection of a first candidate event for the observation of neutrino oscillations in "appearance".
The cost of pollution
di Luca Carra
On March 2, in Paris, the European Aphekom project, coordinated by the French Institute for public health surveillance (InVS), presented the results of a three-year study on air pollution and its impact on health, conducted by 60 researchers in 25 cities across Europe. Sorry for the sceptics, but the data are once again worrying, with the important new information that health impact is now associated with a monetary impact.
Astronomical Ichnology
Ichnology is the branch of paleontology that deals with the study of footprints left by animal organisms. Ichnology thus studies the width, length and shapes of footprints, stride (the distance between each one), the depth, possible asymmetries and more, in order to establish the size of the the animals, their characteristic forms and habits. The positioning of the footprints as well contains important information regarding the movement and pace. Just think of a horse's footprints and the difference between a trot and a gallop.