Focus: Hidden - Washington D.C.

• share
• favorite_border

Titan, Saturn's largest moon, is among the most Earthlike places in the solar system. As the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft examines Titan, its discoveries bring new mysteries. One of these is that the seemingly wind-created sand dunes spotted near the moon's equator point one direction, but the near-surface winds point another direction. University of Washington astronomer Benjamin Charnay and co-authors may have solved this mystery.

• share
• favorite_border

Virginia Mason Hospital has been named a recipient of Healthgrades’ Outstanding Patient Experience Award for the third consecutive year.

• share
• favorite_border

Using a powerful microscope to watch multiple cycles of charging and discharging under real battery conditions, researchers have gained insight into the chemistry that clogs rechargeable lithium batteries in work appearing in the March issue of the journal Nano Letters.

• share
• favorite_border

A University of Washington study assesses how accurately gender representations in online image search results for 45 different occupations -- from CEO to telemarketer to engineer -- match reality. Exposure to skewed image results shifted people's perceptions about how many women actually hold those jobs.

• share
• favorite_border

Erik Wambre, PhD, an immunology and allergy researcher at Benaroya Research Institute at Virginia Mason (BRI), has received a Mid-Career Investigators Award from Food Allergy Research & Education (FARE) that provides $750,000 over five years to support research in food allergy, specifically peanut allergy.

• share
• favorite_border

The recent social media trend of challenging friends to dump buckets of ice over their heads for the ALS Association has inspired Gonzaga University senior Scott Alderson and his brother Matt, a Seattle University freshman. The brothers have developed an Apple app called 1Up Challenges to take such competitions to the next level.

• share
• favorite_border

A new study published in Urban Ecosystems tries to determine what economic value residents in two comparable cities place on having birds in their backyards and parks. Researchers compared two types of common birds – finches and corvids – in both cities, asking residents how much they would pay to conserve the species and what they spend, if anything, on bird food. In Seattle, that value of enjoying common birds is about $120 million annually and in Berlin, $70 million.

• share
• favorite_border

A new study shows for the first time that fishing likely worsens population collapses in species of forage fish, including herring, anchovies and sardines. Some of the largest fisheries in the world target these species, and these "baitfish" are also a key source of food for larger marine animals, including salmon, tuna, seabirds and whales.

• share
• favorite_border

A suite of analytical innovations used to detect and measure very low levels of compounds and elements has topped $10 million in licensing income for Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and its operator Battelle. It’s the first time that income tied to a specific technology developed at PNNL has reached this level, and most of the money has been directly reinvested in the laboratory.

• share
• favorite_border

SEATTLE – (April 2, 2015) – Virginia Mason Health System has posted on its website the estimated prices for its 100 most common outpatient surgical procedures.

• share
• favorite_border

What will be the effects on workers, businesses, consumers and families of the city of Seattle's ordinance increasing the minimum hourly wage to $15 by the year 2022? Faculty from the University of Washington's schools of public affairs, public health and social work are teaming up for The Seattle Minimum Wage Study, a five-year research project to learn that and more.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

For the first time, the American Chemical Society honors a team with its Catalysis Lectureship for the Advancement of Catalytic Science.

• share
• favorite_border

This week Seattle Cancer Care Alliance Proton Therapy, A ProCure Center will celebrate its second year of treating patients in Seattle, Washington. A collaborative effort between Seattle Cancer Care Alliance (SCCA) and ProCure Treatment Centers, Inc. SCCA Proton Therapy unites top physician experts in cancer from UW Medicine and Seattle Children’s Hospital.

• share
• favorite_border

University of Washington scientists have built a new nanometer-sized laser using a semiconductor that's only three atoms thick. It could help open the door to next-generation computing that uses light, rather than electrons, to transfer information.

• share
• favorite_border

Research finds that students attending schools with suspension policies for illicit drug use were 1.6 times more likely than their peers at schools without such policies to use marijuana in the next year — and that was the case with the student body as a whole, not just those who were suspended. By contrast, those attending schools with policies of sending marijuana users to a school counselor were 50 percent less likely to use the drug.

• share
• favorite_border

Gyroscopes are rarely found in nature, and scientists know of just one group of insects that have gyroscope-like sensors. But two University of Washington researchers have discovered that insect wings may act as gyroscopes, enabling insects to perform aerial acrobatics and maintain stability and direction.

• share
• favorite_border

The link between taking aspirin, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, or NSAIDS, and colorectal cancer prevention is well established, but the mechanisms behind the protective effect have not been understood. A new study, co-led by investigators at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and published March 17 in JAMA, suggests this protection differs according to variations in DNA.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists at Benaroya Research Institute at Virginia Mason (BRI) have made an unexpected discovery that overturns a longstanding belief in the biological sciences. The research demonstrates that chitin, a molecule that was previously thought to be absent in vertebrates and that has been shown to trigger an allergy/immune reaction in mammals, is endogenously produced in fishes and amphibians.

• share
• favorite_border

New research by University of Washington astronomer Rory Barnes and co-authors describes possible planetary systems where a gravitational nudge from one planet with just the right orbital configuration and tilt could have a mild to devastating effect on the orbit and climate of another, possibly habitable world.

• share
• favorite_border

University of Washington researchers have developed a new injectable polymer that strengthens blood clots, called PolySTAT. Administered in a simple shot, the polymer finds unseen injuries and has the potential to keep trauma patients from bleeding to death before reaching medical care.

• share
• favorite_border

The Earth is now entering a period of changing climate that will likely be faster than what’s occurred naturally over the last thousand years, according to a new paper in Nature Climate Change, committing people to live through and adapt to a warming world.

• share
• favorite_border

Video interview with Kyle Wiltjer

• share
• favorite_border

Natural gas powered solid oxide fuel cells, located at the point of use to produce electricity for facilities the size of big box stores, could provide economic and environmental benefits, with additional research, according to new study.

• share
• favorite_border

As the Arctic warms, tons of carbon locked away in Arctic tundra will be transformed into the powerful greenhouse gases carbon dioxide and methane, but scientists know little about how that transition takes place. In a study appearing in today's issue of Nature, scientists looking at microbes in different types of Arctic soil have a new picture of life in permafrost that reveals entirely new species and hints that subzero microbes might be active.

• share
• favorite_border

Fred Hutch researcher, Dr. Andrew Hsieh, has identified two biomarkers that may improve oncologists’ ability to predict which patients’ prostate cancer will recur after surgery, long before the development of visible cancer elsewhere in the body.

• share
• favorite_border

There's a sense of grit in this line of work. They know at any moment, they could get the call to head out on a mission. These combat rescue officers, or CROs, are Air Force search, rescue, and retrieval experts. They're skilled in recovery strategy, and leading pararescue - PJ - teams into combat environments to extract personnel or sensitive equipment.

• share
• favorite_border

Oncologist and health economist Gary Lyman, M.D., M.P.H., co-director of the Hutchinson Institute for Cancer Outcomes Research at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, is editor of the second edition of the Oxford American Handbook of Oncology released this week from Oxford University Press.

• share
• favorite_border

Two University of Washington professors argue in a Science perspectives article that ecosystem managers must learn to make decisions based on an uncertain future.

• share
• favorite_border

New initiative provides tools and resources to help suicidal people and concerned observers

• share
• favorite_border

Today, Virginia Mason announced it has received the Healthgrades 2015 America’s 100 Best Hospitals Award™ for the second straight year.

• share
• favorite_border

The new zinc-polyiodide redox flow battery uses an electrolyte that has more than two times the energy density of the next-best flow battery used to store renewable energy and support the power grid. It’s high energy density, and resulting lower cost, make it ideal for large cities where space is at a premium.

• share
• favorite_border

A research team led by Scott Ramsey, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Hutchinson Institute for Cancer Outcomes Research, or HICOR, has been approved for a $7.75 million, four-year funding award by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, or PCORI, an independent, nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C. The award will be used to conduct a pragmatic clinical trial evaluating the use of colony stimulating factors to reduce the risk of serious infection in patients undergoing chemotherapy for breast, colorectal or lung cancer.

• share
• favorite_border

A new electrolyte allows rechargeable batteries to operate well without growing dendrites, tiny pin-like fibers that short-circuit rechargeable batteries.

• share
• favorite_border

Physicians treating patients with complex tumors will have more advanced treatment options at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance Proton Therapy, A ProCure Center. The Center is revolutionizing the way proton therapy is used in cancer treatment and has recently made a number of additional investments in innovative technology that will empower its care teams to treat tumors more precisely. An advanced form of radiation treatment, proton therapy delivers a targeted dose of radiation to kill cancer cells while sparing surrounding normal tissues. Building on this treatment delivery, the Center will now offer Pencil Beam Scanning (PBS) in its state of the art gantry room. The combination of proton therapy with PBS technology enables physicians to better shape and direct radiation to the tumor, opening the doors to treat a wider variety of cancers.

• share
• favorite_border

SPOKANE, Washington – Brian Higginson, associate professor of human physiology at Gonzaga University, is conducting research to help save the lives of American military troops and law enforcement personnel.

• share
• favorite_border

The life of a Bangladeshi garment factory worker is not an easy one. But new research from the University of Washington indicates that access to such factory jobs can improve the lives of young Bangladeshi women — motivating them to stay in school and lowering their likelihood of early marriage and childbirth.

• share
• favorite_border

The Air Force Reserve seeks motivated candidates for part-time Explosive Ordnance Disposal technicians. Applicants should be motivated, be able to focus under pressure, possess problem solving and critical thinking skills, and work on a team.

• share
• favorite_border

Virginia Mason reached a milestone this week in its commitment to provide patients with convenient, 24-hour access to their medical information when the number of people enrolled to use the organization’s web-based patient portal topped 100,000.

• share
• favorite_border

Stereotypes are a powerful force in discouraging girls from careers in computer science and engineering, but there are ways to effectively counteract them, two new studies from the University of Washington find.

• share
• favorite_border

The Twitterbowl 2015 football and fundraising challenge, initiated by actors Chris Evans and Chris Pratt, has raised nearly $27,000 for Seattle Children’s and Christopher’s Haven since the contest was launched on Jan. 29.

• share
• favorite_border

Developing renewable fuel from wet algae and enabling analysis of complex liquids are two of the latest innovations Pacific Northwest National Laboratory has successfully driven to the market with the help of commercial partners.

• share
• favorite_border

A groundbreaking new study, believed to be the first to focus on transgender children living as their identified gender in all aspects of their lives, finds that those children's gender identity is deeply rooted.

• share
• favorite_border

A new acoustic fish-tracking tag is so tiny it can be injected with a syringe. It’s small size enables researchers to more precisely and safely record how fish swim through dams and use that information to make dams more fish-friendly.

• share
• favorite_border

Research has long made a connection between childhood abuse and neglect and crime in adulthood. But a University of Washington study found that when other life factors are considered, that link all but disappears.

• share
• favorite_border

Two phenomena known to inhibit the potential habitability of planets — tidal forces and vigorous stellar activity — might instead help chances for life on certain planets orbiting low-mass stars, University of Washington astronomers have found.

• share
• favorite_border

Aside from eight of McChord's C-17 Globemaster III cargo planes being slated to inactive status a result of a U.S. defense budget mandate, the need for Air Force Reserve flight nurses is still a main concern.

• share
• favorite_border

Coating the mouth with BPA-containing food, like soup, does not lead to higher than expected levels of BPA in blood, a new study in Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology shows. The study authors conclude that oral exposure does not create a risk for high exposures of BPA, also known as bisphenol A.

• share
• favorite_border

Nature packs away carbon in chalk, shells and rocks made by marine organisms that crystallize calcium carbonate. Now, research suggests that the soft, organic scaffolds in which such crystals form guide crystallization by soaking up the calcium like an “ion sponge,” according to new work in Nature Materials. Understanding the process better may help researchers develop advanced materials for energy and environmental uses, such as for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

• share
• favorite_border

Seattle Cancer Care Alliance Proton Therapy, A ProCure Center is proud to announce the additions of Patti Brooke and Jason Dixon to the Seattle team. Brooke joins the team as vice president of marketing and business development leading the Center’s strategic plan and ongoing marketing initiatives. Additionally, Dixon brings more than nine years of experience in the proton industry and will serve as the Center’s director of operations.