Science

If current education and labor market trends continue, New York will face a deficit of 350,000 workers with mid-level skills to fill current jobs. The need is particularly evident in the five-county Capital Region.

A cutting edge system is being developed to deploy more solar-based energy plants, enabling the delivery of cleaner power more efficiently, while keeping Europe at the leading edge of energy technologies.

Many genes are transcribed into messenger RNA (mRNA) molecules that provide instructions for protein synthesis. Other genes encode regulatory RNAs known as 'microRNAs', which can block protein translation by binding to specific sequences on target mRNAs. Now, researchers led by Prabha Sampath of the A*STAR Institute of Molecular Biology have identified a gene that uses an unusual 'see-saw' mechanism to regulate wound healing by switching between production of mRNA and microRNA.

A typical pair of running shoes generates 30 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions, equivalent to keeping a 100-watt light bulb on for one week, according to a new MIT-led lifecycle assessment. But what's surprising to researchers isn't the size of a shoe's carbon footprint, but where the majority of that footprint comes from.

About 55.5 million years ago, geologically rapid emission of a large volume of greenhouse gases at the Paleocene-Eocene boundary (PETM) led to global warming of about 5oC, severe ocean acidification, and widespread extinction of microscopic organisms living on the deep-sea floor (foraminifera).

Mapping all of the chemical, or epigenetic, changes to chromosomes that affect which genes are turned on or off—and thus determine the fate of genomically identical cells in the body—usually requires a large amount of starting cellular material. This technical limitation has impeded the analysis of gene regulation in many rare cell types and in small clinical biopsy samples. Now, a team of biologists led by A*STAR scientists has developed a protocol for characterizing these changes that requires up to 100 times fewer cells than previously needed. As a proof of principle, the researchers used the approach to chart which genes are activated or repressed in mouse reproductive cells that eventually give rise to eggs or sperm.

Ocean acidification is damaging some marine species while others thrive, say scientists. An international team studied the effect of ocean acidification on plankton in the North Sea over the past forty years, to see what impact future changes may have.

When studying any kind of population—people or cells—averaging is a useful, if flawed, form of measurement. According to the US Census Bureau, the average American household size in 2010 was 2.59. Of course, there are no homes with exactly 2.59 people. By inspecting each house individually, one would see some homes occupied by a single individual, and others by large families. These extremes get lost when values are averaged over a population.

Millions of years of evolution have molded our eyes into highly sensitive optical detectors, surpassing even many man-made devices. Now, Leonid Krivitsky and his co-workers at the A*STAR Data Storage Institute and the A*STAR Institute of Medical Biology, Singapore, have shown that the photoreceptor cells found in the retina are even sensitive to the statistical properties of light. This ability could be harnessed in 'bioquantum' interfaces, a novel class of optical devices that use biological systems to detect the quantum nature of light.

Social media has definitely changed the game for job-seekers and recruiters. Traditionally, HR recruiters placed an advertisement, sifted through the responses, and interviewed the shortlisted candidates before appointing the best interviewee with the best references. Those days are over.