Liquid crystals, the state of matter that makes possible the flat screen technology now commonly used in televisions and computers, may have some new technological tricks in store.

After a marathon debate over a pair of studies that show how the avian H5N1 influenza virus could become transmissible in mammals one of the studies was finally and fully published today (May 3, 2012) in the journal Nature

Nearly 80 percent of disease in developing countries is linked to bad water and sanitation. Now a scientist at Michigan Technological University has developed a simple, cheap way to make water safe to drink, even if it’s muddy.

Automated biological testing can take on many forms, ranging from individual instruments performing a single task to large, room-sized, custom-robotic systems capable of automating very complex tasks. In between these two extremes are simple modular automated systems designed to automate a select series of tasks necessary for a specific assay technology.