Monday, March 12, 2012

CMS taps analytics to examine big health care data

(GCN) The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is hoping to build on work being done at Oak Ridge National Laboratory to create visualization tools, advanced analytics and a variety of prototypes for health care data delivery. The Energy Department lab will assist CMS in using its data more efficiently both internally and externally, according to a contract award notice posted in FedBizOpps.gov. ...3/9

Previous ORNL Stories

DOE

Obama to tout energy policy wins

(USA Today) With gas prices sky high, President Obama will be spending part of his Monday making the case that his administration has made huge strides at reducing the United States' reliance on foreign oil, while advancing clean energy technology...3/12

E-tracking hazardous waste in Oak Ridge

(Knoxville News Sentinel) A three-year-old electronic system that tracks the movement of hazardous and radioactive wastes on the Dept. of Energy's Oak Ridge reservation recently reached a milestone...3/11

State & Regional

Gaylord, Dollywood would get 60 percent property tax break on park

(Tennessean) Mayor Karl Dean's administration filed legislation today that would give Gaylord Entertainment Co. and Dollywood Co. a 60 percent break on their property taxes at a planned water and snow park near Gaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center...3/9

National

U.S. Sergeant Is Said to Kill 16 Civilians in Afghanistan

(New York Times) Stalking from home to home, a United States Army sergeant methodically killed at least 16 civilians, 9 of them children, in a rural stretch of southern Afghanistan early on Sunday, igniting fears of a new wave of anti-American hostility, Afghan and American officials said...3/11

Payrolls Jump Again, Bringing In More Job Searchers

(Investor's Business Daily) Payrolls grew by 227,000 in February, putting the six-month gain at 1.2 million, helped by continued strength in manufacturing and professional services as well as slowing government layoffs...3/09

East Tennessee

UT researcher helping develop green toy standards

(Knoxville News Sentinel) researcher at the University of Tennessee is helping develop green toy standards. Catherine Wilt helped devise an environmental toy standard, UL 172, introduced in February by UL Environment, a subsidiary of Underwriters Laboratories. Wilt said there are standards addressing the safety of toys, such as choking hazards, but there are no North American standards about toxicity...3/12

energy & science policy

House Science Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight Holds Hearing on a Review of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy

(AIP) The House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology’s Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight held a hearing on January 23, 2012 entitled “A Review of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy.”...3/12

science & technology

Oldest Organism With Skeleton Discovered in Australia

(Science Daily) A team of paleontologists has discovered the oldest animal with a skeleton. Called Coronacollina acula, the organism is between 560 million and 550 million years old, which places it in the Ediacaran period...3/8

Thermonuclear Behavior of Unique Neutron Star Captured

(Science Daily) A neutron star is the closest thing to a black hole that astronomers can observe directly, crushing half a million times more mass than Earth into a sphere no larger than a city...3/10

Out there

Facebook 'friend' offer exposes man's other wife

(AP) Facebook's automatic efforts to connect user through "friends" they may know recently led two Washington women to find out they were married to the same man, at the same time. That led to the man, corrections officer Alan L. O'Neill, being slapped with bigamy charges...3/9