Researchers at King's College London, in collaboration with European research institutes ICFO (Barcelona) and AMOLF (Amsterdam), have broken the limit of light resolution at the nanoscale and delivered a fundamental insight into how light and matter interact, which could lead to the development of enhanced bio-sensors for healthcare and more efficient solar cells and displays.

About 25,000 Danes currently live with congenital heart defects. Both heredity and environment play a role for these malformations, but exactly how various risk factors influence the development of the heart during pregnancy has been a mystery until now.

With the aid of tiny silicon tubes and one of Europe's most sophisticated centres for microscopy, scientists have been able for the first time to observe directly bacteria in chronic infections. Researchers can now see precisely how bacteria and the immune system interact in living tissue.

The European Commission has announced the final and biggest ever set of calls for proposals for research under its Seventh Framework Programme (FP7). In total, €8.1 billion will support projects and ideas that will boost Europe's competitiveness and tackle issues such as human health, protecting the environment and finding new solutions to growing challenges linked to urbanisation and managing waste.

University of Granada researchers have developed an artificial cerebellum (a biologically-inspired adaptive microcircuit) that controls a robotic arm with human-like precision. The cerebellum is the part of the human brain that controls the locomotor system and coordinates body movements.

For people with long term conditions, telehealth can reduce deaths and help patients avoid the need for emergency hospital care, finds a study published on bmj.com. However, the estimated scale of hospital cost savings is modest and may not be sufficient to offset the cost of the technology, say the authors.

Using data supplied by a mobile operator, researchers at Karolinska Institutet have shown that population movements after the 2010 Haiti earthquake followed regular patterns. This information can be used to predict beforehand the movements of people after a disaster, and thus improves chances for aid to be delivered to the right places at the right time.