MAGNETIC POWER: Imagine a liquid that "freezes" the instant a strong magnet comes near. So-called "magnetorheological" suspensions already are used in some commercial products, but more applications -- as shock absorbers for large buildings, for example -- may be possible thanks to recent research by Stanford chemical engineers. One finding: chains of magnetized liquids are harder to pull apart than scientists had expected.
SLEEP SOLUTION: With 30 percent of Americans suffering from insomnia, Stanford sleep researchers Derek Loewy and Rachel Manber are testing a new treatment: group therapy. The eight-week, outpatient program, the first of its kind, combines education about healthy sleep habits with counseling sessions that help patients exorcise negative attitudes about sleep.
LEARN TO SHARE: Retailers and suppliers share more information with each other than ever before, allowing firms to deliver goods faster and keep inventories lower. In a recent study, Stanford Business School professors Seungjin Whang and Hau Lee studied how that sort of give-and-take between companies works. They warn that current information systems -- most of them based on 30-year-old software -- are woefully lacking.
BYE-BYE BUILD-UP: Call it cardiac irony -- more than half of heart transplant patients develop dangerous plaque in the arteries of their new hearts within five years. But Medical School researchers found that a common antiviral drug may ward off such plaque. Heart recipients who received the drug, ganciclovir, were about one-third as likely as those not on the drug to suffer blockage of their coronary arteries. The finding also could have implications for other people at risk of coronary blockage.
