A multi-institutional research team has developed a method for embedding networks of biocompatible nanoscale wires within engineered tissues. These networks - which mark the first time that electronics and tissue have been truly merged in 3D - allow direct tissue sensing and potentially stimulation, a potential boon for development of engineered tissues that incorporate capabilities for monitoring and stimulation, and of devices for screening new drugs. [ + ]

Synbiosis has announced that its ProtoCOL 3 automated colony counter is being successfully used at one of Europe’s largest children’s health research facilities, the UCL (University College London) Institute of Child Health (ICH), to rapidly assess the effectiveness of novel vaccines. [ + ]

Dr Benjamin Kile and Dr Emma Josefsson have helped solve a 100 year old mystery surrounding the short life of blood platelets and the role of a known cancer gene in blood cell formation. [ + ]

Life Technologies Corporation has announced that the New York Genome Center (NYGC) has purchased four Ion Proton Sequencers for its new Innovation Center. The sequencers will be used to accelerate research on the genetic mechanisms of cancer. [ + ]

Luminex Corporation has announced that Public Health Wales has used Luminex’s CE marked xTAG Gastrointestinal Pathogen Panel (GPP) for outbreak investigation activities during Olympic and Paralympic training and events taking place in Wales. Results of a substantial diagnostic validation of the GPP test conducted by The Public Health Wales Microbiology laboratory team at the University Hospital of Wales, Cardiff, are anticipated to be published in a peer reviewed journal. [ + ]

Every year a variety of bioscience societies combine to hold a joint megaconference - ComBio. [ + ]

Crypsis, the act of disguising oneself as one’s background or another unimportant object, is used in the insect world largely for survival - usually in order to avoid being eaten. PhD student James O’Hanlon of Macquarie University is researching how crypsis and mimicry are used as a signalling strategy, one by which an individual attracts the attention of other animals. [ + ]

Rams testicles gave athletes in ancient Greece a testosterone boost, 1896 Paris-to-Bordeaux cyclists combined heroin and cocaine in a speedball, sprinters at the Berlin Olympics experimented with nitroglycerine in an effort to dilate their coronary arteries … athletes have been experimenting with performance-enhancing drugs and techniques for a long time. [ + ]

With the growing need for microbiological clean environments, room disinfection is becoming ever more critical. [ + ]

Analytical instruments capable of measuring chemical and physical adsorption and desorption isotherms and those capable of analysing temperature-programmed reactions can be powerful tools in the study of catalysis. [ + ]

A specially modified Falcon remote-operated vehicle has been supplied by ATSA Defence Services to the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre (ACE CRC) for research into sea ice algae. The vehicle will be jointly operated by researchers from ACE CRC and the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD). [ + ]

Two live attenuated vaccines in poultry have recombined to produce a new virulent herpesvirus, although the probability of a similar event in human viruses is vanishingly remote, say scientists. [ + ]

It’s not just world-class athletes who will be representing Australia at the Games of the XXX Olympiad in London. A team of world-class scientists from the National Measurement Institute will be part of the competition to outwit any drug cheats at the Games. [ + ]

Do you remember the Australian mockumentary The Games that satirised the bureaucracy behind the Sydney Olympics? One episode revolved around the 100-metre athletics track, which it turned out was only 94 metres long. Even a decade later, the YouTube clip ‘The Games : The 100 Metres track’ is very funny. However, such things should not happen at the London Olympics as the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is providing distance calibration. [ + ]

Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT in Pfinztal have developed a method for safer production of nitroglycerine: a microreactor process, tailored to this specific reaction. [ + ]