Peer Reviewed

Summaries of newsworthy papers include Converting human skin cells into neurons more efficiently; Evolution in the oceans; Telling the good from the bad in the gut and Efficient genome-scale genetic engineering in bacteria

Evidence that the most deadly species of malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum, is becoming resistant to the front line treatment for malaria on the border of Thailand and Myanmar is reported in The Lancet today. This increases concern that resistance could now spread to India and then Africa. Eliminating malaria might then prove impossible.

Latest news from Nature 04 April 2012

Nishioka and Ichikawa, researchers from Japan’s largest steel production company, describe recent developments in TMCP Technology in the latest issue of Science and Technology of Advanced Materials Vol. 13 (2012).

Panels always seem to damage during the installation of kitchen cabinets in Malaysian kitchens. The damages are in the form of split holes, loose holes and delamination. Hence Falah Abu and Mansur Ahmad of UiTM, Shah Alam, Malaysia studied the quality of particleboard panels in 28 Malaysian kitchens.

An elderly resources centre unveils high-technology home care...

The University of Tokyo (Tokyo, Japan) and the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) announced on 6th March 2012 that an international research team led by Professor Takao Someya has succeeded in manufacturing the world’s first flexible organic transistor on a polymeric film.

Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT) announced that they have developed a current-injection photonic-crystal laser with ultralow power consumption, which can be applicable to both off-chip and on-chip optical data transmission for microprocessors.

Latest news from Nature and the Nature journals 02 April 2012

Young talents from The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU)'s School of Design (SD) have shown their creativity and prowess in social innovations.

In the Osaka mayoral election held on November 27 last year, the former Governor of Osaka Toru Hashimoto won an overwhelming victory over incumbent Kunio Hiramatsu.

A voice is directed at those nearby and reaches them. That is probably what poems were in the first place. Or else words written on paper. And to reach people, they had to be transcribed again and again. And so printing machines came into being to replace the human hand. And so more time became necessary to get the words to the people.

Japan was stricken by a triple crisis of mega earthquakes, monster tsunami, and nuclear meltdown at Fukushima.

The Great East Japan Earthquake has dramatically altered the way the Japanese economy is seen. For example, the way that housing and real estate values are seen in Japan has changed since 3.11. Location value is what determines the values of homes and real estate.

Conserving electricity is an absolute necessity due to the power shortage associated with the Great East Japan Earthquake Disaster.

This earthquake and the tsunami claimed the lives of a large number of persons with disabilities.

About 30 years ago, I drove northward from Sotobo in Chiba along the coastline in Fukushima and Miyagi as far as accessible by road, passing through inland areas in Iwate to Miyako again, and went up north to the Shimokita Peninsula.

The accident at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant caused by the East Japan Great Earthquake Disaster has made it necessary to fundamentally revise the existing nuclear-centric energy policy.

It will be hot this summer. This is not a prediction that this summer will be as hot as last summer, but it does mean that the temperature will be higher in offices and homes to conserve energy.

Buildings have service lives. This seems obvious to Japanese, but might be seen as strange by Westerners.

Every stricken area I saw from the air on March 19 was covered with mud and had turned grey.

Although the people in the coastal areas there had the highest awareness of tsunamis in the nation, many of them could not run in time from the tsunami that far exceeded their expectations, reaching more than ten meters in height, claiming the lives of many victims, and leaving nothing but piles of rubble.

On May 1st—some 50 days after the Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster—we visited Kesennuma City in Miyagi Prefecture, which was severely affected by tsunamis, to conduct surveys and collect information on the earthquake disaster and the media.

A vast expanse of land has been reclaimed along the coastal areas in Japan’s large urban areas, Tokyo Bay, Ise Bay, and Osaka Bay.

For a century, Japanese electric power utilities (electric power companies) have been striving to build electric power systems that can stably supply consumers with high-quality electric power at low rates, which is a very difficult task.

The TEPCO Fukushima accident caused severe trouble for the public, beginning with the citizens of Fukushima prefecture, and we must ensure that an accident such as this never occurs again.

On March 11, 2011, on the campus of Waseda University in Shinjuku, Tokyo, those in laboratories and study rooms on some floors experienced such incredible shaking that they could not stay on their feet. We, on the staff of the Science Media Centre (SMC), also evacuated outdoors.

In an effort to ensure a culture of recycling for a greener campus, the Department of Biology at Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) organised Recyling Awareness Week in collaboration with Coca-Cola Malaysia.

A central regulator of the inflammatory response shows signs as an appealing target for therapies against autoimmune disease