Washington, September 21: An animal study at Northwestern University in Chicago has shown how exposure to particulate matter leads to accelerated blood clotting and thrombosis, which can in turn cause heart attacks and stroke.

Particulates, chemical or biological agents that change the natural characteristics of the atmosphere, cause air pollution.

Washington, Sept 21: Droughts would make the verdant Amazon rainforest even greener, a new study by a team of researchers from the University of Arizona, US, has revealed.

Washington, Sept 20 : Phosgene, put to devastating use during the First World War, is present in significant quantities in the atmosphere, a new study by a US-Canadian research team has revealed.

Phosgene was stockpiled in military arsenals well after the Second World War, but its continued presence in the atmosphere today is due to man-made chlorinated hydrocarbons used in the chemical industry.

Washington, Sept 20 : Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have created a device that would lighten the burden for soldiers and others who carry heavy packs and equipment.

Their invention, known as an exoskeleton, can support much of the weight of a heavy backpack and transfer that weight directly to the ground, effectively taking a load off the back of the person wearing the device.

Washington, September 20 : A new study conducted at two universities in Manchester has revealed that microwaves, which are used for zapping instant meals, can also be used to determine the fat and salt content of supermarket food.

Sing Kwei Ng, a student of PhD and one of the researchers behind the study, has won a top industry prize for his work to determine the amount of fat in beef.

Washington, Sept 20 : Geochemists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have challenged the commonly held ideas about how gases are expelled from the Earth.

The team, lead by Prof E. Bruce Watson, has found strong evidence that argon atoms are tenaciously bound in the minerals of Earth’s mantle and move through these minerals at a much slower rate than previously thought.