When Dr Javier Marco checks his patients he often uses a computer with a videoconferencing link. Many of his elderly patients live in remote villages in the foothills of the Spanish Pyrenees and no longer travel to where he works. "They're very satisfied. There is less inconvenience and the quality of care is better," he says.

The latest figures published today compares biotechnology sectors across some eighteen European nations and the USA.

The report finds that the European and the US biotechnology industries both have around 2000 companies, but the US sector employs nearly twice as many people, spends around three times as much on research and development, has twice the number of employees involved in research and development, raises over twice as much venture capital, and has access to 10 times as much debt finance. It earns twice as much revenue.

Google Trends represents a new service offered by Google which allow you to compare the world's interest in your favourite topics. By example we have entered four topics: eHealth, Telemedicine, Medical Informatics and Health Informatics in order to identify how often they've been searched for on Google over time.

The Commission of the European Union has funded with 4.85 million euros the Network of Excellence INFOBIOMED 'Structuring European Biomedical Informatics to Support Individualised Healthcare'. This pan-European project aims to develop tools and methods in Biomedical Informatics (BMI) and to create a stable and lasting structure for this discipline in Europe.

On 17 May the European Commission launched a public consultation on possible actions to improve transnational research cooperation and knowledge transfer between public research organisations (PRO) and industry.

Views are sought on the existing knowledge transfer system in Europe, and the changes needed to facilitate interactions between public research organisations and industry. Such improved interactions may also require clarification of the missions of public research organisations and industry regarding research and its exploitation for and by society.

To get the full benefits from information and communication technologies (ICT), EU Member States need more ambitious plans to exploit them, says the Commission in its first annual progress report on i2010 – the digital economy part of the EU’s revised "Lisbon" strategy for growth and jobs. To help get growth back on track, Member States need to step up their efforts to improve access to broadband internet connections, facilitate the EU-wide circulation of digital content, free up radio spectrum for new applications, integrate research and innovation and modernise public services.

Navigating Europe's maze of research organisations to find the right partner is no easy task. A new portal aims to lower the barriers to collaboration by raising the visibility of organisations, researchers and projects to facilitate community partnership building.