For hundreds of years, optical devices like microscopes and telescopes have relied on solid lenses that slide up and down to magnify and to focus. In pursuit of ever-smaller imaging systems, researchers are now working to create entirely unconventional ways of focusing light. [ + ]

Clinical Genomics recently acquired the US-based cancer screening company Enterix. [ + ]

Prima BioMed (ASX:PRR) is re-evaluating using PFS as a primary objective of an upcoming trial of its CVac cancer immunotherapy candidate, based on results to date of an earlier study. [ + ]

Researchers from the University of São Paulo have found that insects modify their mating behaviour in response to the changes in air pressure which precede a storm. By reducing mating during wind and rain, it is suggested that the insects are also reducing their risk of injury or death. [ + ]

Divesting business in China will allow Agenix to focus on its diagnostics projects. [ + ]

The planet is warming, but Dr Marilyn Ball’s research group has found that rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere makes cold-tolerant plants more susceptible to frost. [ + ]

Deep Lake, located 5 km from Davis Station in Antarctica, is 3500 years old, 36 m deep and so salty that it remains in liquid form down to a temperature of -20°C. Researchers have now uncovered the secrets of the lake's dominant inhabitants - extremophile microbes from the haloarchaea group. [ + ]

The sensitivity of next-generation sequencing can be fantastic and also problematic as the system can easily pick up contaminants and lead researchers into false conclusions. [ + ]

The first Parkinson's patient has been implanted with Living Cell Technologies' (ASX:LCT) NTCELL regenerative treatment during a phase I trial. [ + ]

Each year the American Chemical Society surveys its members to gain a snapshot of their employment and salaries. This year's survey has found that 2013 is looking much better for chemists and chemical engineers in the US as both employment and salaries are increasing. [ + ]

Allied Healthcare (ASX:AHZ) said paediatric heart defect patients treated using its CardioCel tissue patch have shown no sign of calcification at the site of repair after up to five years of monitoring. [ + ]

Natasha Harvey will head to ComBio this year with a few years’ worth of results and an exciting new story of a protein called Nedd4 and how it could hold a key to vascular networks and their problems. [ + ]

New Zealand biopharmaceutical company Innate Immunotherapeutics will migrate across the Tasman this month in a bid to get its Phase IIb trial financed and underway in Australia. [ + ]

Investigating why some people seem to resist severe illness has led scientists closer to developing a universal flu vaccine. [ + ]

Many transgenic crops synthesise their own pesticides, usually a toxic protein is synthesised in stems and leaves. Pests attempting to eat the crop are killed while those not attacking the crop are completely unaffected. A pretty nifty solution but now examples are emerging of pests developing resistance to the toxin as a dominant trait. [ + ]