#BIOBROOM#Breeding flies to fight broomrape parasite weeds Can flies be bred as gardeners weeding undesirable pests from the crop?
That is what a European union (EU) research project has achieved offering hope for farmers battling the broomrape one of nature's parasites.
Over the course of a two-year EU-funded research project, called Biobroom, Slovakian doctor Peter Tóth uncovered the intricate relationship between the broomrape and the broomrape fly, Phytomyza orobanchia,
He believes his work could lead to an efficient, herbicide-free control of parasitic weeds in all vulnerable crops.
Tóth is assistant professor at the Slovak University of Agriculture in the city of Nitra where he teaches in agricultural entomology,
weed control and integrated pest management. His project, backed by#166,563 of funding from the EU's Marie Curie Actions fellowship programme,
ran from October 2008 to October 2010 at Wageningen University, in The netherlands. Tóth is now working on two patents for applications from the research.
One will use the reinforced chemical compound bait to trap and redistribute the flies, while the other is for an early warning system that detects
Tóth says he expects the applications will be picked up by farmers across Europe suffering from broomrapes.
sucking out their water, minerals and carbohydrates. The broomrape or Orobanche does not use chlorophyll, the green pigment critical for photosynthesis in most plants,
and depends entirely on other plants for nutrients. Once a host is infested its growth slows
Farmers struggle to control the broomrape, whose scaly flower shoots produce millions of dust-size seeds that are dispersed easily, and long-lived.
Broomrape has plagued European agriculture for years, although climate change has made it more aggressive recently, Tóth says."
"In Slovakia, in particular, many field plots are infested, "he points out.""These plants are almost uncontrollable,
and it is a real problem in tomatoes, tobacco and hemp crops. In some areas they have stopped growing tobacco and tomatoes."
and each one is using slightly different plant's language to communicate with surrounding environment emitting more than 200 different volatile organic compounds,
it could offer an environmentally-friendly protection against a crop menace. Project details Participants: The netherlands (Coordinator), Slovakia FP7 Proj.
#Eurobioref#How a radical redesign is strengthening economic viability in the bioeconomy Fotolia 2012the word bioeconomy has existed only since the late 1990s.
just as much emphasison the'economy'side of the concept as the'bio'part significant progress is needed still.
With 23 million of funding allocatedunder the EU's 7th Framework Programmeeurobioref brings together four different FP7RESEARCH themes:
Food Agriculture and Fisheriesbiotechnology; Nanosciences nanotechnologiesmaterials and new productiontechnologies; Energy; and Environment (includingclimate change. Established in 2010 and due to continue until2014 the project is focused on developing ahighly integrated multipurpose refinery.
Incontrast with previous designs this one wouldbe capable of handling multiple feedstock'sprocessing them in multiple ways (chemicalbiochemical thermochemical) and producingmultiple products from aviation fuels tochemicals polymers and other materials.
The project is also aiming to produce a designwhich is modular and flexible allowing it to beinstalled in various locations around Europeas
either large-or small-scale units as localconditions require. The highly diversified nature of the newbiorefinery design is vividly demonstratedby the range of project participants.
The 28partners are drawn from research institutionsand commercial enterprises across the entirebiomass value chain. They include biomass producers advancedbiomass pre-treatment specialists catalyticand enzymatic reactions developers and finalchemical and biochemical producers and endusers.
In addition to the production of a broaderrange of higher value-added products it isexpected that the greatly enhanced efficiencyof the new design will yield significant benefits.
These will include a 30%improvement in costefficiencya 30%reduction in energy use andzero waste production.
The work of Eurobioref is still far fromcomplete but the potential prize is clear. Theproject will provide an efficient bridge betweenthe agriculture and chemical industries byintegrating the entire biomass chain in asingle concept adaptable for use in a rangeof locations.
It is an advance which will domuch to help provide a viable basis for thebio-economy as a whole.
It will also put Europe at the forefront of whatis sure to be one of the most dynamic andimportant areas of economic and scientificactivity of the future u
#PHARMA-PLANTA#Harnessing plant biotechnology to revolutionise pharmaceutical production The hope is that the drug will prove effective in preventing HIV infection.
But the real significance of the regulatory green light, given by the UK's licensing body,
the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory agency (MHRA), went further than that. It confirmed, for the first time, that molecules known as monoclonal antibodies the key component of the drug,
As well as bringing hope to the fight against HIV/AIDS the decision opened the way for trials of other plant-derived medicines to treat a range of diseases.
It was, potentially, an important step towards the transformation of modern drug manufacturing, offering the developing world access to key drugs
With#12 million of funding provided under the EU's 6th Framework Programme of research and development,
The approval from the MHRA was described by the project's scientific co-ordinator, Professor Julian Ma of St george's, University of London,
"The conventional production systems referred to by Professor Ma use sophisticated stainless steel fermentation vats containing bacteria or mammalian cells.
The process of deriving antibodies from these cells is high-tech-and highly expensive. By contrast, the antibodies produced by PHARMA-PLANTA were derived from tobacco plants grown in greenhouses in Germany,
harvested after 45 days and shredded. According to Professor Rainer Fischer, Director of the institute where the GM tobacco was grown, this much simpler,
more low-tech option is between 10 and 100 times cheaper. Just as importantly, the simplicity of the process means it could easily be transferred to developing countries
"Discovered by one of the four private commercial partners in the project, Austrian biotech company Polymun,
the new antibody successfully completed its Phase 1 trial, ascertaining its safety, at the end of 2011. It is now set to move into the next phase of testing,
to establish its medical effectiveness. Meanwhile, other diseases for which it is envisaged that GM plants could provide new drugs include cancer, rheumatoid arthritis and others which,
in the words of Professor Ma, are currently"horribly expensive"to treat. As Professor Fischer explains,
the success of PHARMA-PLANTA"is a springboard for European plant biotechnology and will enable many important medical products to be realised".
"Project details Participants The netherlands, Germany (Coordinator), France, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Sweden, United kingdom, Austria, Greece, Switzerland, South africa FP6 Proj.
N°503565 Total costs:##17 600 000 EU contribution:##12 000 000 Duration: from: Feb. 2004 to:
#A robot in mind It a new kind of robot, designed for some of the most delicate operations a surgeon can perform.
Giancarlo Ferrigno is Professor at Politecnico di Milano. He said: his is a robotic system for assisting a surgeon during neurosurgery operations.
It has been designed for the insertion of instruments like biopsy probes or electrodes for deep brain stimulation through small holes in the head of the patient.
It a new kind of robot, designed for some of the most delicate operations a surgeon can perform.
It accurate to just a few hundred microns, and is far steadier than a surgeon hand.
And that a big help: o maintain a specific orientation and avoid areas that could be just a few milimetres away from the one that you want to go through,
Neurosurgeon Francesco Cardinale is a specialist in epilepsy surgery. He helped the robot engineers at Politecnico di Milano understand what doctors really need.
That includes defining the parameters of the software that plans each operation. One of the system innovative features is the feedback from the robot to the surgeon via the hand-held controller.
He said: he surgeon can control the movements of the active robot using an instrument like that,
and at the same time receive feedback of the sensations that he would have operating directly on the brain.
The robot feedback is amplified to help the surgeon feel his way around the brain. So what kind of operation could be perfomed with this type of robot?
rug-resistant epilepsy, Parkinsons and other motor skill problems like for example dystonia, chronic pain and all types of brain cancer, said Cardinale.
The robot, developed within the EU Robocast project, is a year away from surgical trials.
In the meantime, the engineers are making it even smarter. Giancarlo Ferrigno said there still more work to do:
he next step is to work on robots that have their own activity, for example to compensate for the movement of the patient head during an operation,
as in surgical interventions on patients who remain awake. s
#HELIOS makes silicon breakthrough Experts from the Electronics and Information technology Laboratory of The french Atomic energy commission (CEA-Leti) and III-V lab, a joint lab of Alcatel-lucent Bell labs France,
in cooperation with Thales Research and Technology in the United kingdom, say the tuneable laser source integrated on silicon is a groundbreaking achievement in efforts to secure fully integrated transceivers.
Researchers at Ghent University and the Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre (IMEC) in Belgium, and the University of Surrey in the United kingdom, who designed the modulator,
supported the research. The group from CEA-Leti and III-V lab also demonstrated single wavelength tuneable lasers
with a 21 ma threshold at 20o Celsius, a 45 nm tuning range and a side mode suppression ratio larger than 40 db over the tuning range.
The researchers say silicon photonics is a powerful technology. Silicon photonics have the potential to bring the large-scale manufacturing of CMOS to photonic devices that are not cheap
'We are proud to jointly present with III-V lab the results of the integrated silicon photonics transmitter and the tuneable laser.
a modulator and passive waveguides on silicon paves the way of further developments on integrated transceivers that can address several application needs in metropolitan and access networks, servers, data centres,
high-performance computers as well as optical interconnects at rack-level and board-level. We are pleased to bring our contribution to these state-of-the-art results
And it not just the occasional flower buyer who needs guidance on watering as even experienced farmers can misjudge how much to sprinkle on their crops,
But now research is offering an intelligent irrigation system to monitor how much water is being held in the soil, automatically spraying when needed.
Available as a smartphone app, it a breakthrough that could save harvests, as well as trillions of litres of water wasted in world farming every year.
Global agriculture wastes 60%,or 1 500 trillion litres, of the 2, 500 trillion litres of water it uses each year, according to the WWF.
Even in Europe, farmers still suffer during droughts, and the Mediterranean region, with its limited, fragile and unevenly distributed water resources is especially vulnerable:
the 2003 heat wave cost about#11 billion in lost crops. The waste is mainly down to inefficient irrigation systems.
But better managed, it could mean more water resources for other basics like drinking, hygiene and cooking.
The new research harnesses technological advances in wireless networking, environmental sensors and soil water movement models.
Aided by a grant of#1. 14 million from the European commission, the Waterbee Demonstration Action project which gathered ten European partners over two years-brings the innovations together to help farmers irrigate where
and when they need. e wanted to build something that is easy for farmers to use
while being flexible and robust enough to survive in farm environments, says John Olaherty, the technical director of Ireland Limerick-based National Microelectronics Applications Centre (MAC),
which is spearheading Waterbee. e tried to learn what the growers really needed. They are interested not in the technical specifications.
which is developed why we a smartphone app. Thanks to sensors planted across the field, the Waterbee system can continuously monitor water movement in the root zone.
It uses a Zigbee-standard, low cost, low power consumption wireless sensor network, sending the data to an intelligent web service software application for analysis. Once the numbers are crunched-taking due account for weather and other local parameters-it automatically activates the selected irrigation nodes in the areas
required Prototypes of the system have already been tested in the UK, Malta, Finland, Sweden, Spain,
Italy and Estonia, using crops like lettuce, courgettes, and berries. In The british trials, on Maris Piper potatoes, Waterbee used 56%less water than the local irrigation system in use.
The complete kit is expected to cost around#3, 500, and can be adapted for almost all terrains. t cheap,
so we can imagine it being used by farmers, growers, hotels, golf clubs, and even domestic homeowners, says Olaherty. t the same time,
As it user friendly and doesn cost the earth, this could really change the way we farm
#Playing for health Consider the following health problems, related by three different people:""Every day I said to myself:'
And now I have serious difficulties moving the steering wheel while driving. It all started with pain along the neck and moving down to my shoulders.
Three very different medical conditions, all hard to treat. Could the virtual exploration of an island be part of the solution for these three patients?
So this is the story of how research has managed to develop a serious videogame, for a serious purpose."
"Under study in Barcelona is the complex disease, Binge Eating Disorder, which leads to a total loss of control when eating.
Patients are testing a videogame specially developed to help them to recognise their emotions and to regain self-control.
Fernando Fernández-Aranda is a researcher in Eating Disorders at Bellvitge University Hospital. He said:"
"The videogame is proving useful as a complimentary tool for some patients to control certain aspects of their personality, like impulsivity or tolerance to frustration."
"For instance, the videogame can teach my patient to raise her tolerance to frustration, to lose impulsivity
which are not-to states of mind like sadness or anxiety"."In The netherlands, physical ailments are also benefiting form this novel approach.
The same videogame helps them to relax their muscles, raise their exercise performance and maintain discipline in their training.
Human Movement scientist, Stephanie Jansen-Kosterink demonstrated on a patient, explaining:""These electrodes are going to measure his muscle tension,
so he can try to reduce that muscle tension. With the system we can see exactly where the patient is in space,
So there are all kinds of data that we can get out of the game and use in our research,
"The videogame has been developed under a European Research project called Playmancer. Game developers, psychologists and therapists worked together on tailoring the right scenarios for both pain rehabilitation and mental health treatments.
Elias Kalapanidas, the Coordinator for the Playmancer project, said:""This game goes beyond virtual reality. Virtual reality reproduces the surrounding environment,
but it offers no rewards system. Our aim was to motivate patients to know their body and mind better.
Videogames are entertaining and motivating, so we thought they can provide effective complimentary therapies in different diseases.
This videogame is like a bonding factor between patients and their therapists and doctors.""The search for videogame treatments to some psychological disorders proved to be specially challenging."
"At first I found it bizarre that my addiction to gambling could be treated with a videogame.
But after some sessions I understood the point. The videogame helps me to know my state of mind at any given moment.
For instance, it can help me to realise I'm becoming too nervous. So I can work on my own emotions to try to calm myself down".
"Indeed, the videogame identifies boredom, excitement or anxiety in patients-and their cognitive responses-with the help of emotion recognition technologies and biosensors.
Avoiding undesirable secondary effects, like eventual addiction to playing, was a main priority.""Technical developers first proposed a number of ideas.
We know from scientific literature that these online videogames are highly addictive to certain vulnerable users.
So we asked developers to just provide a simple videogame that a patient can play alone
Patients are supposed always to play the videogame under medical supervision. And this scientists say, is a huge difference compared to existing commercial videogames that already recognise users'movements."
"When you play a commercial game, there are, for instance, moves that you can fake. Because you are just using a console.
But here you can't fake the walking, you have to really walk. There is another difference:
"explains Stephanie Jansen-Kosterink So how long will it be before you can get a videogame prescription for certain mental disorders or physical rehabilitation?
The research proves therapeutical videogames can be useful for certain patients. Now scientists say it is up to policymakers to play the game.
"There is no problem with acceptability by patients and therapists. There is also no problem with existing technology.
"In the meantime researchers are already searching for new therapeutical applications of this-and other-serious games m
The Consortium has developed the core e-Infrastructure (neugrid) required to develop disease markers on extra large brain imaging datasets.
Core grid-based applications have been integrated of acknowledged utility for early diagnosis and disease marker development.
US and Canadian funding agencies have been aligned to the EC in view of coordinated calls aiming to build a global imaging laboratory based on Grid/Cloud computing. Proactive actions of US funding agencies have been elicited to raise appropriate funds
The neugrid Consortium has built the core of the infrastructure (computational nodes, connectivity, middleware, and a set of core applications for image processing).
The DECIDE consortium has implemented onto neugrid a popular tool for the detection of a diagnostic marker for Alzheimer's disease based on PET imaging (gridspm.
The outgrid Consortium has promoted the interchange of technical information of neugrid with LONI and CBRAIN partners, developed a common strategic agenda,
N4u will develop the user-facing services of neugrid and a managing structure that will make it sustainable and profitable.
Early diagnosis and disease markers to test drugs quickly and efficiently are critical success factors.
Extra large brain imaging datasets are lately available that will allow to develop disease markers. The community of imaging scientists working on Alzheimer's disease need new powerful environments to perform experiments on such datasets.
Who is involved? Four academic partners leaders in imaging neuroscience and based in Brescia (IT), Amsterdam (NL), Stockholm (SW),
and Genève (CH), representing the community working in the fields of Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative diseases,
inflammatory diseases including multiple sclerosis, and psychiatric diseases including bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Four technical partners based in Archamps (FR), Paris (FR), Bristol (UK),
and Sophia-Antipolis (FR), leaders in the field of biomedical image processing and grid computing for biomedical applications.
A partner with expertise in dissemination, based in Milano (IT. Two international partners based in Los angeles (USA)
The neugrid Grid-based e-infrastructure aims building a research environment where a large clinical and image dataset that is being collected Europe-wide can be exploited by a large neuroscience community through the application of sophisticated brain analysis algorithms.
The neugrid e-infrastructure is so far the first and only European effort aiming to offer a distributed working environment to computational neuroscientists. neugrid has been developed for the front runner community of neuroscientists working in the field of Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative diseases (i e.
NS-NDD but designed generically so as to accommodate new services for other biomedical communities in the short term. neugrid provides integrated and reusable services ranging from simple access to distributed images and clinical data, to advanced imaging pipelines execution and monitoring
, to quality control interfaces for experiment outputs and data cleanup, as well as collaboration facilities enabling scientists to exchange
and team up in their daily research work. How much money has invested the EU in this? The EU contribution amounts to#9 240 million overall r
#Promising technologies to reduce power plant emissions Carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology has the potential to help the European union (EU) significantly cut its greenhouse gas emissions.
However, efficient and reliable pre-combustion capture technologies that can reduce carbon dioxide (CO2 EMISSIONS from fossil fuel power plants at low cost are still missing.
The research team behind the EU-funded project DECARBIT developed new pre-combustion technologies that could lead to significant CO2 reductions from fossil-fuelled power plants by 2020
and reduce the carbon capture costs. Post-combustion CO2 capture technology typically uses chemicals that extract CO2 from the exhaust gases in power plant (flue gases.
hese post-combustion processes are very energy intensive, mainly due to the energy required for regenerating the chemicals used in the capture operation,
explains project coordinator Marie Bysveen, Executive vice-president of SINTEF Energy Research in Norway. ew pre-combustion technologies,
on the other hand, remove the carbon from fuel before combustion and produce hydrogen, which is much more energy efficient,
she adds. The DECARBIT team focused on four promising pre-combustion technologies and carried out related pilot experiments,
with the aim of demonstrating feasibility and providing accurate figures on their CO2 capture cost analysis.
The most promising DECARBIT processes were the Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA Membrane Gas Desorption (MGD), Low temperature separation (LT) and the High temperature membrane air separation (ITM.
helping achieve the EU 2020 target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30%.%The new solutions developed by the DECARBIT team could also see the use of CCS technologies in other energy-intensive industries.
The knowledge gained from the project could encourage further industrial uptake of CCS and achieve a significant reduction of the capture cost of CO2.
and real-time biological analysis. The use of these tools is as easy as getting dressed,
with the required electronics and software being integrated eventually into clothes and clothing accessories. Researchers involved in the Biotex project in Dublin are searching for an appropriate method to analyse perspiration.
Their newest prototype has built-in biochemical sensors, which measure such properties as the saltiness, acidity and temperature of a person's sweat, giving insight into the subject's state of health.
The data is sent then wirelessly to a computer. The prototype is a piece of fabric with a fluidic channel
along which a ph sensor, conductivity sensor, sodium sensor and temperature sensors are set. The design provides much more reliable data than in the past,
as it enables a continuous flow of fresh sweat through the sensors. This is very important since the chemical composition of sweat changes with time.
This wearable technology will be of great benefit to the sports industry. The biochemical engineers are now looking at integrating their prototype into A t-shirt together with other sensors,
providing a complete physiological overview of a person while they train or exercise. Products like smart shoes or T-shirts with sensors could provide a complementary function to traditional testing methods such as blood testing.
The technology could therefore be used against sports doping, or for physiotherapists and trainers to observe the physical state of their athletes.
The technology could also be applied to medicine, for example, to continuously monitor diabetics or cystic fibrosis sufferers.
But difficult problems still exist in integrating soft textiles with hard electronics and even with chemicals.
The Wear It At work project in Bremen, Germany, is developing job-specific gadgets that they call wearable computing.
and is also very adaptive to specific working conditions. Tests are under way with several emergency service crews in Europe.
The possibilities include wireless communication between fire fighters sending images when visibility is extremely low and identifying toxic fumes in the air.
Another area of application is medical surgery. A doctor could transfer data to and from a computer just by wearing an electronic bracelet and belt.
The PCB (printed circuit board) consists of a Bluetooth module, a small power supply unit, interfaces connected to sensor modules and an RFID (radio frequency identification) reader.
Information is collected from the RFID reader and the sensors and sent via Bluetooth to a computer.
One prototype is controlled a wristband by hand gestures. It reacts to upwards and sideways movements recognising the speed of movement.
The wristband has now been developed to react to micro gestures, after the larger, less subtle movements during earlier testing made patients feel uncomfortable.
The doctor, or any user of this technology, can receive the necessary information to support a primary task without further delays or interruptions.
There is great potential for a computer system where the conventional keyboard or mouse is rendered obsolete. The technology already exists.
It is now a matter of fine-tuning for general use at work and eventually at home
#European initiative spearheads medical advances Through the accomplishments of the Healthy Aims project treatments are emerging for the previously untreatable.
Teams of doctors and engineers across Europe are supplying new technologies to improve current medical methods.
A 70 year old patient of the Southampton Hospital in the UK, Anthony Batchelor, has already been subjected to triple bypass surgery,
after he was victim to several heart attacks. He will now receive a defibrillator implant, which should regulate his heart rate.
Pre-surgery measurements are a very important part of the whole treatment; physiological responses like blood pressure or respiratory rate are analysed in comparison to the physical activities of the patient.
Until now the only available method was to ask the patient, but the arrival of a new device allows accurate data to be collected objectively.
The Activity Monitor, developed in Codicote, north of London, is being used for sufferers of cardiovascular diseases, diabetes or obesity.
The device, worn on the waist, can take measurements 24 hours a day, detailing the type, intensity and duration of the patient's activities.
Measurements are made with a three-axis accelerometer which senses external forces very accurately, and then analysed using specially developed algorithms.
The Healthy Aims project, involving 25 partners from 10 countries, is delivering many devices such as the Activity Monitor.
An important theme of the project is the reproduction of electrodes and strain gauge technology at the nano scale, allowing for micro scale medical systems that can exist on or within the human body without causing further complications.
Another device is helping a stroke victim, Marci Lelliott of Poole in the UK, return movement to her left hand.
Marci received an implant in her forearm with electrodes attached to muscle and nerve bundles.
One operational function is to extend the wrist; the other is to open the fingers.
The device has then different modes to control the wrist for different purposes. The implant is connected wirelessly with a removable box,
which is worn on the forearm. It controls and supplies power to the implant. The system, named STIMUGRIP, uses accelerometers in a similar fashion to the Activity Monitor.
When particular arm movements from the patient are detected by the accelerometers, the implant sends electrical pulses to stimulate the desired wrist and finger movements.
In Mechelen, Belgium, further research is being done on cochlear technologies. A new generation of implant will greatly improve the quality of life from many deaf people
allowing them to converse in louder conditions. The implant has enabled its recipient, Maurice Vertongen, to listen to music for the first time in 20 years.
This is achieved by sending electrical impulses to stimulate the cochlea, the part of the inner ear responsible for hearing.
The system itself includes an external component (an ear hook similar to traditional hearing aids) and an implant
which are connected wirelessly. The external component consists of the microphones, sound processor and batteries, while the implant has the electronics that send the stimulation pulses.
The Healthy Aims project hopes to develop the implant technology extensively enough so that the accompanying external part becomes obsolete.
To meet this aim researchers are working on a battery that can be implanted safely in a human.
The electrodes will also be designed for optimal use with the human nervous system. With the financial backing of a collective Europe scientific community, things are being achieved,
what were until recently not thought possible. The technical advances from the Healthy Aims project allows one to envision a future without deafness,
or where patients can win back the use of once paralysed parts of the body y
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