Report using private health claims data shows prices are driving health spending growth
Mon, 21 May 2012 21:12:08 +0000

Rising prices for care were the chief driver of health care costs for privately insured Americans in 2010, according to the first report from the newly formed Health Care Cost Institute (HCCI). The per capita spending on inpatient and outpatient facilities, professional procedures, and prescriptions drugs rose 3.3 percent in 2010 for beneficiaries under age [...]

More informed citizens have a more positive perception of politicians
Mon, 21 May 2012 21:09:37 +0000

Consumption of political information is linked to more moderate and positive opinions about the sector, according to a study by the University of Navarra. The results show that scientists are the most trusted profession, and politicians are the least. "The more they read, listen and see political information, the less negative and more balanced the [...]

New silicon memory chip developed
Fri, 18 May 2012 23:56:12 +0000

The first purely silicon oxide-based ‘Resistive RAM’ memory chip that can operate in ambient conditions – opening up the possibility of new super-fast memory – has been developed by researchers at UCL. Resistive RAM (or ‘ReRAM’) memory chips are based on materials, most often oxides of metals, whose electrical resistance changes when a voltage is [...]

Computing experts unveil superefficient ‘inexact’ chip
Thu, 17 May 2012 20:27:18 +0000

Researchers have unveiled an "inexact" computer chip that challenges the industry’s dogmatic 50-year pursuit of accuracy. The design improves power and resource efficiency by allowing for occasional errors. Prototypes unveiled this week at the ACM International Conference on Computing Frontiers in Cagliari, Italy, are at least 15 times more efficient than today’s technology. The research, [...]

Religion is a potent force for cooperation and conflict, research shows
Thu, 17 May 2012 20:20:45 +0000

Across history and cultures, religion increases trust within groups but also may increase conflict with other groups, according to an article in a special issue of Science. "Moralizing gods, emerging over the last few millennia, have enabled large-scale cooperation and sociopolitical conquest even without war," says University of Michigan anthropologist Scott Atran, lead author of [...]

Legislation to ban burqa is liberal overkill, researchers claim
Mon, 14 May 2012 22:22:58 +0000

Banning and criminalising the Muslim face veil tests the very foundations of modern liberal society, warn researchers from Queen Mary, University of London and the University of Sussex. The paper ‘Reasons to Ban? The Anti-Burqa Movement in Western Europe’ examines the move to legislate against, and to criminalise face-veiling which has swept across the EU [...]

Buddhists and Hindus are on the rise nationally, Baylor University professor finds
Wed, 09 May 2012 22:24:18 +0000

Hindu and Buddhist groups have grown steadily in the United States since changes in immigration laws in 1965 and 1992, with particularly high concentrations in Texas, California, the New York Metropolitan Area, Illinois and Georgia, according to a Baylor University professor who helped compile the newly released 2010 U.S. Religion Census. "Both Buddhists and Hindus, [...]

Self-worth needs to go beyond appearance
Wed, 09 May 2012 22:22:32 +0000

Women with high family support and limited pressure to achieve the ‘thin and beautiful’ ideal have a more positive body image. That’s according to a new study looking at five factors that may help young women to be more positive about their bodies, in the context of a society where discontent with appearance is common [...]

New protocol enables wireless and secure biometric acquisition with web services
Sat, 05 May 2012 16:11:24 +0000

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed and published a new protocol for communicating with biometric sensors over wired and wireless networks – using some of the same technologies that underpin the web. The new protocol, called WS-Biometric Devices (WS-BD), allows desktops, laptops, tablets and smartphones to access sensors that [...]

Scientific evidence proves why healers see the ‘aura’ of people
Sat, 05 May 2012 16:09:37 +0000

Researchers in Spain have found that many of the individuals claiming to see the aura of people – traditionally called "healers" or "quacks" – actually present the neuropsychological phenomenon known as "synesthesia" (specifically, "emotional synesthesia"). This might be a scientific explanation of their alleged "virtue". In synesthetes, the brain regions responsible for the processing of [...]