Australia
Australia and New
Zealand’s science research partnership
News
29 July 2010: For the first time, scientists have shown that
selective breeding of domestic dogs is not only dramatically changing
the way animals look but is also driving major changes in the canine
brain.
Read
more
22 July 2010: Australian
researchers have begun clinical trials of a new vaccine to protect
newborn infants against rotavirus, a life-threatening diarrhoeal
disease that kills half a million children worldwide each year.
Read more
22 July 2010: Researchers have collected venom from octopuses in
Antarctica for the first time, significantly advancing our
understanding of the properties of venom as a potential resource for
drug-development.
Read more
19 July 2010: The discovery of
a remarkable 15-million-year-old Australian fossil limestone cave
packed with even older animal bones has revealed almost the entire life
cycle of a large prehistoric marsupials.
Read more
7 July 2010: Vaccination against the virus that causes cervical
cancer has had an additional benefit – a marked decline in cases of
genital warts, a new study has found.
Read
more
6 July 2010: Professional
women in their 30s are opting out of
full-time work at an alarmingly high rate. Only 38 per cent of
Generation X, tertiary qualified women participating in a long-running
University of Melbourne study work full-time, compared to 90 per cent
of Generation X, tertiary qualified men
Read more
28 June 2010: The most
efficient quantum memory for light is created using a technique that
stops and controls light from a laser which manipulates electrons in a
cooled crystal. This will allow the delicate quantum nature of the
light to be stored, manipulated and recalled.
Read more
24 June 2010: Eminent
Australian scientist Professor Frank Fenner, who helped to wipe out
smallpox, predicts humans will probably be extinct within 100 years,
because of overpopulation, environmental destruction and climate change
. Read more
23 June 2010: The brightly
coloured cichlid fish turns the colour vision theory inside out as a
new study reveals the fish are camouflaged to other cichilds.
Read more
4 June 2010: Autism finding could lead to simple urine test for
the condition.
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more
3 June 2010: The same mutated gene that makes humans more
susceptible to the potentially fatal West Nile virus is also
responsible for the virus affecting horses.
Read more
2 June 2010: Scientists have discovered a mechanism in the spine
which works to counteract the brain waves which produce tremor, meaning
they are a step closer to treating these shakes and transforming lives.
Read
more
1 June 2010: Drinking tea may decrease the risk of ovarian
cancer.
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more
31 March 2010: Some lizards escape predators by
"dropping" their
tail, but the experience appears to leave its mark. After losing their
tail, lizards end up with damaging changes to their DNA.
Read
more
30 March 2010: Novel discoveries about the human
ability to predict what other people are about to say could have
significant applications for educators, speech therapists,
entrepreneurs, and many others interested in communication and
comprehension.
Read
more
30 March 2010: Open call for the Eurostars programme for
innovative small and medium-sized enterprises.
Read
more
11
March
2010: Discovery
of
'Fat'
Taste
Could
Hold
the
Key
to
Reducing
Obesity - A newly discovered ability for
people to
taste fat could hold the key to reducing obesity, Deakin University
health
researchers believe. Read
more
11 March
2010: Spider and snake enzymes could
deliver healthy food - Danisco
(Australia)
is
starting
a
new
four-year
research
project
to
investigate potential uses of enzymes
produced by
spiders, snakes and carnivorous plants as processing aids for food and
other
industrial uses. Read
more
5 March 2010: Extinct
Australian frog reappears 30 years after last sighting.
The
yellow-spotted bell frog (Litoria castanea), last observed in 1970s,
has long
been thought to be extinct in the wild. Scientists believed it was
probably a
victim of the deadly
chytrid fungus that has devastated amphibian populations
around the
world. Read
more
19 February 2010: Research
at the University of Queensland have uncovered how antidepressants
actually work. Read
more
29 January 2010: Immune cell
levels predict skin cancer risk in kidney transplant patients. Read more
6 January 2010: Superfast
quantum computing is closer following recent breakthroughs by an
international team led by University of New South Wales researchers. Read more
21 December 2009: Australia
plans to introduce an Internet filtering system to block obscene and
crime-linked Web sites. Read more
9 December 2009: Australian
galaxy survey to lead to 'new physics'. Read more
7
December 2009: Monash
University-led international research team has developed an innovative
way to boost the output of the next generation of solar cells. Read more
30 November 2009: Scientists
from Monash University have modified a human embryonic stem cell line
to glow red when the stem cells become red blood cells. Read
more
25 November 2009: Australian
Senior Clinical Research Fellowships, round two applications open. Read
more
16 November 2009: Australian
agency moves to calm climate row. Read
more
13 November 2009: Postdoctoral
Fellowship
supports
excellence
in
full-time
research
in
one
of the
child and adolescent health area research. Read more
9 November 2009: Australian
agency denies gagging researchers. Read
more
29 October 2009: Australians
need simpler salt labelling scheme, study at Deakin University,
Victoria, Au. Read
more
27 October 2009: Enzyme
treatment of Brassica proteins may give meat-like flavourings, suggests
a new Chinese-Australian study. Read
more
21 October 2009: University of Adelaide
researchers collect genetic information from bison preserved in
permafrost to help improve modern agricultural livestock and breeding
programs. Read more
7 October 2009: A Study from
Monash University
says antioxidants could make us more, not less, prone to diabetes.
Read more
5 October 2009: ABRS National Taxonomy Research Grant Program.
Read
more
16 September 2009:
U.S. and Australian conservation geneticists say they have discovered a
new tool to aid in the tracking of migratory and endangered sea
turtles.
Read
more
14 September
2009: Continued high dietary intakes of salt may make people
resistant to blood pressure-lowering drug, according to a study in
Brisbane, Australia. Read
more
8 September 2009:
According to research from the University of New South Wales it
may be possible to predict the types of microbes that thrive in
specific marine environments by sampling the genomes of just a few
dominant species. Read
more
3 September 2009:
The
Australian National Contact Point (NCP) and coordinator of BILAT for
Australia, the Forum for European-Australian Science and Technology
Cooperation (FEAST), is currently conducting an evaluation of
Australian involvement in the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7)
covering both successful and unsuccessful proposals. Read more
1 September 2009:
Chillies
could replace aspirin, or be combined with aspirin as a medication for
the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease. Read
more
18 August 2009: Hate cockroaches? Best pour
yourself a stiff
drink. The widely loathed insects can hold their breath to save water,
a new
study has found – and the trick could help them to thrive in the face
of climate
change. Read
more
30 June 2009: Australian scientists have developed a "trojan
horse" therapy to combat cancer by using a bacterially derived nano
cell to penetrate and disarm the cancer cell before a second nano cell
kills it with chemotherapy drugs.
Read
more
29 June 2009: Researchers from the Royal Adelaide Hospital
and University of Adelaide believe our oldest mammalian relative may
help us to better understand ovarian cancer -- Platypus.
Read
more
26 June 2009: Data collected over a 20-year period from
1985-2004 shows that coastal and river dwellers in particular are 41%
more likely to be diagnosed with melanoma.
Read more
25 June 2009: Australia has one of the worst rates of
old-age poverty in the developed world, with more than 1/4 seniors
living in financial hardship.
Read
more
25 June 2009: Neuroscientists have, for the first time, been
able to demonstrate that moderate exercise significantly increases the
number of neural stem cells in the ageing brain.
Read more
24 June 2009: Looking for the carbon signature in the
near
infra-red wavelength that is detectable by some telescopes. This
process is complicated because detection can only be done through gaps
between the lines of intense airglow in the night sky.
Read
more
23 June 2009: Researchers in Australia found that drinking
fat-free milk in the morning helped increase satiety, a feeling of
fullness, and led to decreased calorie intake at the next meal.
Read more
23 June 2009: A fossil study of the extinct giant kangaroo
has added weight to the theory that humans were responsible for the
demise of "megafauna" 46,000 years ago.
Read more
22 June 2009: Australian molecular scientists have made a
breakthrough in the battle against malaria, identifying a weakness in
the virulent mosquito-borne parasite that could lead to the development
of more potent and targeted drugs.
Read
more
22 June 2009: An Australian stroke victim paralysed for more
than 20 years has walked again, thanks to anti-wrinkle drug botox.
Read moe
19 June 2009: Australia and New Zealand announced a
non-lethal whale research expedition to the Antarctic, a direct
challenge to Japan's research program that kills up to 1,000 whales a
year.
Read
more
17 June 2009: Ancient Australian forests are key to
fighting
climate change. They contain the world's most dense carbon store,
eclipsing tropical rainforests as efficient greenhouse gas absorbers.
Read
more
15 June 2009: A breakthrough is made on the locations of
genes that appear to be linked to susceptibility to multiple sclerosis.
Read
more
12 June 2009: Australia's climate: Drought and flooding in
annual rings of tropical trees.
Read more
11 June 2009: Internet-based therapy programs are as
effective as face-to-face therapies in combating depression.
Read more
10 June 2009: A study of oyster genetics is helping
scientists better understand the mysterious QX-disease, which has been
responsible in the past for killing Sydney rock oysters in the Georges
and Hawkesbury Rivers.
Read more
8 June 2009: The University of Queensland has found paying
to preserve carbon stored in forests could protect endangered wildlife
such as Indonesia's orangutans.
Read
more
5 June 2009: A way is developed to deliver drugs which can
specifically shut down cancer-causing genes in tumour cells while
sparing normal healthy tissues.
Read more
4 June 2009: Sleep apnea changes brain bioenergetics. The
changes in brain biochemistry of those suffering from “obstructive
sleep apnoea" is similar to people who have had a severe stroke.
Read
more
4 June 2009: Google on 3 June 2009 expanded "Google Flu
Trends," its online tool for tracking influenza outbreaks, to Australia
and New Zealand.
Read
more
3 June 2009: Australian men risk being lonely and isolated
in retirement, according to a survey.
Read more
2 June 2009: After 111 years, a tiny legless lizard, once
thought to be extinct, has been rediscovered in the Northern Territory.
Read
more
29 May 2009: Scientists have used stem cells grown onto
contact lenses to improve the sight of people with cornea damage.
Read more
28 May 2009: Doctors may soon be prescribing their patients
a script to adopt a cat or dog, given a recent study found an estimated
$3.86 billion was saved on health spending in Australia, due to the
benefits of pet ownership.
Read more
27 May 2009: A Monash-led research team has discovered an
entirely new mechanism that promotes blood clot formation - a major
breakthrough that will impact on treatment and prevention of heart
disease and stroke.
Read
more
26 May 2009: An Australian team reveals a world-first
discovery in Floppy Baby Syndrome -- a congenital myopathy disorder
that causes babies to be born without the ability to properly use their
muscles.
Read more
25 May 2009: FSANZ says the majority of Australian adults
are not exceeding its recommended maximum daily salt intake, following
media reports that claim some Australians could be consuming 40g of
salt a day – almost seven times the recommended max.
Read
more
25 May 2009: Australian and US scientists have successfully
tested hypersonic aircraft technology which could revolutionise
international flight.
Read more
25 May 2009: The Tasmanian devil, a snarling fox-sized
marsupial, was listed in Australia as an endangered species on 22 May
2009 because of a contagious cancer that has wiped out most of the wild
population.
Read
more
22 May 2009: A dentist has found a way to make decayed tooth
enamel re-grow, thus eliminating the necessity of fillings.
Read
more
22 May 2009: Scientists in Sydney and Boston believe they
may have identified a gene that controls abnormal production of sugar
in the liver, a very troublesome problem for people with diabetes.
Read more
22 May 2009: A team of Australian researchers used
nanotechnology to boost the storage potential nearly 10,000-fold
compared to standard DVDs.
Read more
20 May 2009: The increase in nutrients coming out of the
river systems is putting pressure on mangrove forests and making them
far more susceptible to environmental variability and climate change.
Read more
18 May 2009: Australian and Korean researchers have now
developed a novel, highly porous, sponge-like material whose mechanical
properties closely resemble those of biological soft tissues.
Read more
18 May 2009: One in four middle-aged men who snore are at
risk of suffering brain damage while they sleep, a new study has found.
Research has found snoring associated with sleep apnoea may seriously
impair brain function.
Read
more
18 May 2009: The energy requirements of kangaroos and sheep
has concluded roos have far less impact on the environment than once
thought.
Read more
14 May 2009: One of the major sources of drinking water for
south-east Queensland is now under the watchful eye of Australia's
largest integrated intelligent wireless sensor network.
Read more
8 May 2009: The lesson from Australia's Great Barrier
Reef
is that we have to protect its biodiversity - because biodiversity in
turn protects us.
Read
more
6 May 2009: Humans, not climate, driving increased dengue
risk in Australia.
Read
more
1 May 2009: A genetic test on patients before they have
surgery can help guide post-surgery treatment. Genetic differences can
explain why some patients undergoing heart surgery later experience
shock and kidney complications.
Read more
1 May 2009: Researchers develop better treatment for
social fears. About one in 20 Australians suffer from an extreme form
of shyness known as social phobia.
Read more
30 April 2009: Australian scientists
are a major step
closer
to developing a vaccine which could stop people at risk of Type 1
diabetes from developing the debilitating condition.
Read
more
28 April 2009: Polyfluoroalkyl Chemicals ((PFCs) in Pooled
Blood Serum from Infants, Children, and Adults in Australia. Limited
data exist on human exposure to PFCs in the Southern Hemisphere.
Read more
28 April 2009: Needle-free Nanopatch Could Transform
Vaccines. Such patches, being developed by Australian scientists,
will pierce the skin and deliver fewer toxins..
Read more
24 April 2009: The high speed of stars and apparent presence
of ‘dark matter’ in the satellite galaxies that orbit our Milky Way
Galaxy presents a direct challenge to Newton’s theory of gravitation.
Read
more
24 April 2009: A product created by scientists at The
University of Queensland could make Chlamydia testing more accessible,
particularly to those living in remote areas.
Read more
22 April 2009: Marine scientists say they are astonished at
the spectacular recovery of certain coral reefs in Australia's Great
Barrier Reef Marine Park from a devastating coral bleaching event in
2006.
Read more
21 April 2009: A research collaboration between Australia
and Israel has identified a genetic variation that influences the
severity of symptoms in Rett syndrome.
Read more
21 April 2009: An international team, including researchers
from The University of Queensland (UQ), cracks mammalian gene control
code.
Read more
17 April 2009: Australia launched what it described as a
major initiative to develop clean coal technology on 16 April 2009,
saying
it could play a major role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Read
more
17 April 2009: Scientists are celebrating the first
successful deployment and retrieval of a remotely controlled, deep
ocean-going robotic submarine destined to play a central role in
measuring changes in two of Australia's most influential ocean
currents.
Read more
14 April 2009: Results of pizza tossing could help
researchers in designing optimal standing wave ultrasonic motors
(SWUMs), which operate on similar principles as pizza tossing.
Read more
8 April 2009: The $A15 billion national broadband network
will be constructed by a joint public-private company. The project has
been described as the biggest infrastructure since the Snowy Mountains
Hydro-Electricity Scheme.
Read
more
8 April 2009: Major breakthrough in transplantation
immunity. Australian scientists have made a discovery that may one day
remove the need for a lifetime of toxic immunosuppressive drugs after
organ transplants.
Read
more
6 April 2009: A world-first breakthrough to treat high blood
pressure has been successfully trialled in Melbourne.
Read more
3 April 2009: Researchers have developed the first
diagnostic test for the deadly Devil Facial Tumour Disease, a
breakthrough they hope will help save the Tasmanian devil from
extinction.
Read
more
2 April 2009: As sea levels rise in the wake of climate
change and semi-arid regions turn to desert, people living in those
parts of the world are likely to be displaced. Decision scientist have
devised a mathematical algorithm to address the problem of population
relocation.
Read
more
1 April 2009: Scientists have made a major breakthrough in
better understanding how Hendra spreads from infected horses to other
horses and humans.
Read
more
31 March 2009: Ecologists have discovered that cane toads
are far more susceptible to being killed and eaten by meat ants than
native frogs. Their research reveals a chink in the cane toad's armour
that could help control the spread of this alien invasive species in
tropical Australia.
Read
more
25 March 2009: 2 new greenhouse gases are accumulating in
the atmosphere: Nitrogen trifluoride (NF3) and sulfuryl fluoride
(SO2F2).
Read more
19 March 2009: Canberra parents lack allergy awareness.
Nearly 4 per cent of kindergarten children have a peanut allergy.
Read more
6 March 2009: Australian scientists have made a breakthrough
in stem cell research which raises the prospect of regrowing damaged
sections of a person's liver, pancreas or even their brain.
Read
more
6 March 2009: Ocean's journey towards the center of
the Earth. Geoscientist and researchers have discovered the existence
of an ocean floor destroyed 50 to 20 million years ago, proving that
New Caledonia and New Zealand are geographically connected.
Read more
5 March 2009: University of Adelaide research has
discovered
that there are many more species of Australian lizards than previously
thought.
Read more
3 March 2009: A vaccine to protect humans from a bird flu
pandemic is within reach after a new discovery by researchers at the
University of Melbourne, Australia.
Read more
2 March 2009: Teams of scientists from Australia and the
United States have used yeast and mammalian cells to discover a
connection between genetic and environmental causes of Parkinson's
disease.
Read more
24 February 2009: Aerosols may have a greater impact on
patterns of Australian rainfall and future climate change than
previously thought.
Read
more
16 February 2009: Climate models predicted Australian
bushfires.
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more
13 February 2009: VICTORIA'S bushfires have released a
massive amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere - almost equal to
Australia's industrial emission for an entire year.
Read
more
11 February 2009: Australian bushfires rage. Heatwaves and
fires will become more frequent in a warming world.
Read
more
11 February 2009: A plant for all seasons? Scientists at the
University of Technology, Sydney, Australia, are investigating whether
vanadium dioxide nanoparticles can be used as smart pigments in paint
coatings.
Read
more
10 February 2009: Scientists at Melbourne's Burnet Institute
have developed a potential new treatment for patients with prostate
cancer.
Read more
5 February 2009: A team of researchers at Monash University
has released a new analysis of precipitation records from the long-term
cloud seeding operation in Tasmania that shows a promising increase in
rainfall during periods of seeding.
Read
more
5 February 2009: Deep-sea researchers uncover several new
species and thousands of fossilized coral samples.
Read more
4 February 2009: A team of Monash University researchers
has
made a major breakthrough in the international fight against malaria,
which claims the life of a child across the world every 30 seconds.
Read more
3 February 2009: World's oldest crystals get protection.
Australian geoheritage reserve will save ancient zircons from abuse.
Read
more
3 February 2009: De-multiplexing to the max: 640
Gbits/second (Gbps, or billion bits per second).
Read more
30 January 2009: Australian heatwave sign of climate change.
Read
more
28 January 2009: Ecologists have developed a new model to
predict the impact of climate change on the dengue fever-carrying
mosquito Aedes aegypti in Australia - information that could help limit
its spread.
Read
more
27 January 2009: Climate-change research to examine human
health.
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more
26 January 2009: EU-funded researchers have analysed the
genetic sequence of bacteria found in the stomachs of native people in
the Pacific in order to shed new light on how and when humans colonised
this vast, diverse region. Their findings, published in the journal
Science, confirm previous studies from the fields of archaeology,
linguistics and human genetics.
Read
more
23 January 2009: Pacific people spread from Taiwan. New
research into language evolution suggests most Pacific populations
originated in Taiwan around 5,200 years ago.
Read more
22 January 2009: Giant koalas. New fossil study sheds light
on extinction, 50,000 years ago, of Australia’s ‘megafauna’ species.
Read
more
21 January 2009: New climate maps of the Earth’s surface
during the height of the last Ice Age support predictions that northern
Australia will become wetter and southern Australia drier due to
climate change.
Read
more
20 January 2009: Scientists had uncovered new marine animals
in their search of previously unexplored Australian waters, along with
a bizarre carnivorous sea squirt and ocean-dwelling spiders.
Read more
15 January 2009: Adelaide researchers have made a world
breakthrough in treating premature babies at risk of developmental
disorders.
Read
more
15 January 2009: Toxic chemical contamination was the
likely cause of fatal fish mutations in northern Australia in which
thousands of bass larvae spawned with two heads.
Read more
13 January 2009: Removing an invasive species from
sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island, a World Heritage Site, has caused
environmental devastation that will cost more than A$24 million to
remedy. Ecologists warn that conservation agencies worldwide must learn
important lessons from what happened on Macquarie Island.
Read more
13 January 2009: Tomorrow, beach-goers will get a glimpse of
what our coastlines may look like in 50 years, when New South Wales and
South East Queensland experience the highest daytime ‘king tides’
forecast for 2009.
Read
more
13 January 2009: University of Queensland research is paving
the way for better management of our precious natural environment.
Read more
5 January 2009: A new family tree of proteas (commonly known
as sugarbushes) reveals that new species of these plants are appearing
three times faster in biodiversity hotspots in Australia and South
Africa than in the rest of the world.
Read
more
5 January 2009: WESTERN Australia is set to go ahead with
trials of genetically modified canola resistant to the pesticide
Roundup.
Read
more
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