Corvallis, OR, USA. Carbon nanotubes can markedly increase the speed of biological sensors, a technology that could reduce the time needed for lab tests to minutes, speeding diagnosis and treatment while reducing the costs of production and operation.

The speed of prototype nano-biosensors have nearly tripled, suggesting applications not only in medicine but also in the development of new drugs, toxicology, environmental monitoring, and other fields.

Sheffield, United Kingdom. Just when the venerable electron microscope seemed to be nearing the practical limit for its usefulness, scientists have developed a new lensless method which could create the highest resolution images ever seen.

For over 70 years, transmission electron microscopy (TEM), which looks through an object to see atomic features within it, has been constrained by the relatively poor lenses which are used to form the image.

Washington, DC, USA. Pulling all-nighters in research labs and subsisting on little more than ramen noodles has long been a rite of passage for graduate students.

But some are now looking to unions for help setting limits on the austere lifestyle and extreme working conditions that pursuing an advanced degree often requires.

Tampa, FL, USA. Increasingly, institutions of higher learning are factoring in faculty member patents and commercialization activities when deciding on an offer of tenure and promotion. However, 75 percent of the institutions in a recent survey do not include these considerations in their criteria.

The survey results appear in Technology and Innovation, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Inventors®

Vancouver, BC, Canada. When addressing religious students, Brown University biologist (and practicing Catholic) Kenneth Miller deemphasizes conflict and helps them trace the development of a scientific theory, rather than to present it as some kind of finished doctrine that must be believed because it has evidentiary support.

Miller spoke of this at the Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) on 18 February 18 2012 in Vancouver, BC.