Science News Digest 20th June 2011
In the science news this week, research to help prevent stillbirths, internet in a suitcase funded by the US, UK pours money into vaccination programme and finally… a new cap to cure insomnia
Warning issued to expectant mothers
New research from the University of Auckland has cautioned pregnant women that sleeping on their back or right hand side the night before giving birth makes them twice likely to have a still born child compared with those who slept on their left, according to the Guardian this week.
Statistics showed that 1.96 per 1,000 births were stillborn for those sleeping on their left compared to 3.93 per 1,000 births for any other position.
The researchers conducted an observational study by speaking to 155 women who had stillborn babies between 2006 & 2009.
As a control group, the researchers also questioned two randomly selected women who were at the same stage of pregnancy.
The study, published in the British Medical Journal was aiming to establish the effects of sleep disorders, such as sleep apnoea in pregnant women and their babies. Instead the research found that sleeping positions on the night before birth was the decisive factor.
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Internet in a suitcase to bypass oppressive regimes
The US government has backed the development of an ‘internet in a suitcase’ device to allow dissidents around the world to stay online after oppressive regimes have shut down public communication services.
The device would comprise of a Wi-Fi enabled box that can be smuggled over a border. So far this year, Egypt and Libya are among a number of Middle Eastern countries this year that have disconnected themselves from the internet in an effort to quash uprisings according to New Scientist this week.
US secretary of state Hilary Clinton said; "We see more and more people around the globe using the internet, mobile phones and other technologies to make their voices heard as they protest against injustice and seek to realise their aspirations,". "So we're focused on helping them do that, on helping them talk to each other, to their communities, to their governments and to the world."
Despite this move to increase global communications, it has been noted that this is contrary to the US’s domestic policy, where politicians are moving to give the US Department of Justice the power to block non-US websites to crack down on file-sharing.
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Britain Pledges over £800m extra to global vaccination programme
David Cameron has pledged an additional £814 million on top of the UK’s current contribution to the Global Alliance on Vaccines and Immunisation of £680 million between 2011-2015.
While vaccines are primarily aimed at protecting the individual, they can also result in the permanent eradication of diseases. Through vaccination we have already extinct smallpox in 1979 and rinderpest in 2011.
According to the Telegraph, 1.7 million children die from vaccine preventable diseases every year, so the taxpayers’ additional £814 million has been welcomed by the science community as a very worthy allocation of funds.
David Cameron said; “UK money will help vaccinate over 80 million children and save 1.4 million lives. That is one child vaccinated every two seconds for five years. It is one child's life saved every two minutes. That is what the money that the British taxpayer is putting in will give."
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And finally…
New cap to cure insomnia
A new invention could solve insomnia without the need for sleeping pills, according to the Telegraph this week.
Research presented at the meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies in Minneapolis has suggested that being fitted with a special cap containing cold water, slows brain activity and aids rest.
Leader of the study Dr Eric Notzinger of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine said “The most significant finding from this study is that we can have a beneficial impact on the sleep of insomnia patients via a safe, non-pharmaceutical mechanism that can be made widely available for home use by insomnia sufferers”
Their research outlines the metabolic process in the frontal cortex of the brain, which slows down while falling asleep in healthy brains, but increases in insomniacs.
In the study they used 12 patients with primary insomnia and 12 healthy control patients and fitted them all with soft plastic caps that contained tubes filled with water that circulated at different speeds to induce ‘cerebral hypothermia’.
The control patients took 16 minutes to fall asleep, while the insomniacs only took 13 minutes. Both groups slept for 89% of the time they were in bed.
Warning issued to expectant mothers
New research from the University of Auckland has cautioned pregnant women that sleeping on their back or right hand side the night before giving birth makes them twice likely to have a still born child compared with those who slept on their left, according to the Guardian this week.
Statistics showed that 1.96 per 1,000 births were stillborn for those sleeping on their left compared to 3.93 per 1,000 births for any other position.
The researchers conducted an observational study by speaking to 155 women who had stillborn babies between 2006 & 2009.
As a control group, the researchers also questioned two randomly selected women who were at the same stage of pregnancy.
The study, published in the British Medical Journal was aiming to establish the effects of sleep disorders, such as sleep apnoea in pregnant women and their babies. Instead the research found that sleeping positions on the night before birth was the decisive factor.
------------------------------------
Internet in a suitcase to bypass oppressive regimes
The US government has backed the development of an ‘internet in a suitcase’ device to allow dissidents around the world to stay online after oppressive regimes have shut down public communication services.
The device would comprise of a Wi-Fi enabled box that can be smuggled over a border. So far this year, Egypt and Libya are among a number of Middle Eastern countries this year that have disconnected themselves from the internet in an effort to quash uprisings according to New Scientist this week.
US secretary of state Hilary Clinton said; "We see more and more people around the globe using the internet, mobile phones and other technologies to make their voices heard as they protest against injustice and seek to realise their aspirations,". "So we're focused on helping them do that, on helping them talk to each other, to their communities, to their governments and to the world."
Despite this move to increase global communications, it has been noted that this is contrary to the US’s domestic policy, where politicians are moving to give the US Department of Justice the power to block non-US websites to crack down on file-sharing.
------------------------------------
Britain Pledges over £800m extra to global vaccination programme
David Cameron has pledged an additional £814 million on top of the UK’s current contribution to the Global Alliance on Vaccines and Immunisation of £680 million between 2011-2015.
While vaccines are primarily aimed at protecting the individual, they can also result in the permanent eradication of diseases. Through vaccination we have already extinct smallpox in 1979 and rinderpest in 2011.
According to the Telegraph, 1.7 million children die from vaccine preventable diseases every year, so the taxpayers’ additional £814 million has been welcomed by the science community as a very worthy allocation of funds.
David Cameron said; “UK money will help vaccinate over 80 million children and save 1.4 million lives. That is one child vaccinated every two seconds for five years. It is one child's life saved every two minutes. That is what the money that the British taxpayer is putting in will give."
-----------------------------------------
And finally…
New cap to cure insomnia
A new invention could solve insomnia without the need for sleeping pills, according to the Telegraph this week.
Research presented at the meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies in Minneapolis has suggested that being fitted with a special cap containing cold water, slows brain activity and aids rest.
Leader of the study Dr Eric Notzinger of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine said “The most significant finding from this study is that we can have a beneficial impact on the sleep of insomnia patients via a safe, non-pharmaceutical mechanism that can be made widely available for home use by insomnia sufferers”
Their research outlines the metabolic process in the frontal cortex of the brain, which slows down while falling asleep in healthy brains, but increases in insomniacs.
In the study they used 12 patients with primary insomnia and 12 healthy control patients and fitted them all with soft plastic caps that contained tubes filled with water that circulated at different speeds to induce ‘cerebral hypothermia’.
The control patients took 16 minutes to fall asleep, while the insomniacs only took 13 minutes. Both groups slept for 89% of the time they were in bed.
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