Headlines of the day
Man gets jail for creating own crosswalk (CNN)
Nude models on strike(CNN)
Cabbie Attacked By Passenger With Ax (WCCO.com)
How unfair could a fare be?
Legally blind golfer, 92, shoots a hole-in-one, ducks attention (Tampabayt.com)
Goodwill sells boy's bike for $6.99 after he parks it in store (Statesman Journal of Salem Oregon )
Ben Blue?
Blue-eyed Humans Have A Single, Common Ancestor
ScienceDaily (Jan. 31, 2008) — New research shows that people with blue eyes have a single, common ancestor. A team at the University of Copenhagen have tracked down a genetic mutation which took place 6-10,000 years ago and is the cause of the eye colour of all blue-eyed humans alive on the planet today.
“Originally, we all had brown eyes”, said Professor Eiberg from the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine. “But a genetic mutation affecting the OCA2 gene in our chromosomes resulted in the creation of a “switch”, which literally “turned off” the ability to produce brown eyes”. The OCA2 gene codes for the so-called P protein, which is involved in the production of melanin, the pigment that gives colour to our hair, eyes and skin. The “switch”, which is located in the gene adjacent to OCA2 does not, however, turn off the gene entirely, but rather limits its action to reducing the production of melanin in the iris – effectively “diluting” brown eyes to blue. The switch’s effect on OCA2 is very specific therefore. If the OCA2 gene had been completely destroyed or turned off, human beings would be without melanin in their hair, eyes or skin colour – a condition known as albinism.
Limited genetic variation
Variation in the colour of the eyes from brown to green can all be explained by the amount of melanin in the iris, but blue-eyed individuals only have a small degree of variation in the amount of melanin in their eyes. “From this we can conclude that all blue-eyed individuals are linked to the same ancestor,” says Professor Eiberg. “They have all inherited the same switch at exactly the same spot in their DNA.” Brown-eyed individuals, by contrast, have considerable individual variation in the area of their DNA that controls melanin production.
Professor Eiberg and his team examined mitochondrial DNA and compared the eye colour of blue-eyed individuals in countries as diverse as Jordan, Denmark and Turkey. His findings are the latest in a decade of genetic research, which began in 1996, when Professor Eiberg first implicated the OCA2 gene as being responsible for eye colour.
Nature shuffles our genes
The mutation of brown eyes to blue represents neither a positive nor a negative mutation. It is one of several mutations such as hair colour, baldness, freckles and beauty spots, which neither increases nor reduces a human’s chance of survival. As Professor Eiberg says, “it simply shows that nature is constantly shuffling the human genome, creating a genetic cocktail of human chromosomes and trying out different changes as it does so.”
Someone really should tell Barry Bonds about this.
Accelerated Head Growth Can Predict Autism Before Behavioral Symptoms Start, Study Suggests
ScienceDaily (Jan. 31, 2008) — Children with autism have normal-size heads at birth but develop accelerated head growth between six and nine months of age, a period that precedes the onset of many behaviors that enable physicians to diagnose the developmental disorder, according to new research from the University of Washington's Autism Center.
The study also indicates that this aberrant growth is present in children who have the early onset form of autism as well as those later diagnosed with the regression type of the disorder, according to Sara Webb, who led the research.
"We know there are a number of risk factors for autism, and if we can pinpoint them we have better ways of identifying children at risk so we can get them into prevention or monitoring," said Webb, a UW research assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences.
"This abnormal or accelerated rate of head circumference growth is a biological marker for autism. It occurs before the onset of behavioral symptoms at 12 months of age such as a child's failure to respond to their name, a preoccupation with certain objects, not pointing to things, a lack of interest in other people and the absence of babbling.
"By itself, head growth is not an indicator of autism," she said, "because kids are going to be getting bigger and development is so variable. However, if you notice it and some of these other symptoms, it is a red flag to seek evaluation."
She said is it important understand that the data used in this study were based on three measurements made during the first three years of life, not from single point in time. To do this, the researchers obtained the medical records of 28 boys who had been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder between the ages of 3 and 4 at the UW Autism Center and eight boys with developmental delay. All of the boys were participating in a larger longitudinal study.
Infant head measurements are typically done on a regular basis by pediatricians through the first 18 months of life, but are not reliably done after that. Head circumference is calculated from the brow, or ridge above the eyes, around to the bony bump on the back of the skull and back around to the brow. Three measurements, including at birth, were required to chart the growth of each child and compare it with the range of normal development.
Webb said in most cases parents would have a difficult time detecting abnormal growth because there is a range of normal head sizes. Approximately 20 percent of children with autism have abnormally large head sizes, or what is called macrocephaly.
"Some of the children in our study started with a very small head size and later their growth accelerated. What we are looking for is disproportionate growth in children compared to the rest of their body. In this study nearly 60 percent of the autistic children had accelerated growth but only six of the children met the criteria for macrocephaly."
Webb said she sees this information being used by pediatricians to screen children and refer them earlier rather than later for evaluation and intervention before other symptoms develop. The UW researchers plan to further explore the implications of abnormal head size as part of a larger autism prevention study of 200 infants at high risk for the disorder that has just started. These youngsters have older siblings already diagnosed with autism and have a one in five chance of developing the disorder, which has a strong genetic component. The typical risk for autism is now believed to be one in 150.
Earlier research at the UW Autism Center by its founding director Geraldine Dawson showed that accelerated head growth in children with autism slows down in the second year of life and this deceleration coincides with a with a period of worsening symptoms of autism.
The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Mental Health funded the research. The study was published in the Journal of Child Neurology. Co-authors of the new paper are Dawson, Theresa Nalty, Jeff Munson and Catherine Brock, who are all affiliated with the center, and Robert Abbott, a professor of educationa
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/30/08
Headlines of the day
Flight makes emergency landing after co-pilot suffers mental breakdown (This is London.co.uk)
OK, in the movie of the week, this is where David Bowie sings “Under Pressure.”
Severed head, body parts found along I-80 (CNN)
We didn’t know there was a Jeffrey Dahmer rest stop
Driver drops bid to sue family of boy he killed (CNN)
That’s thoughtful
Tap shoes or ball-peen hammer—you decide
Creative And Noncreative Problem Solvers Exhibit Different Patterns Of Brain Activity, Study Reveals
ScienceDaily (Jan. 30, 2008) — Why do some people solve problems more creatively than others? Are people who think creatively somehow different from those who tend to think in a more methodical fashion?
These questions are part of a long-standing debate, with some researchers arguing that what we call "creative thought" and "noncreative thought" are not basically different. If this is the case, then people who are thought of as creative do not really think in a fundamentally different way from those who are thought of as noncreative. On the other side of this debate, some researchers have argued that creative thought is fundamentally different from other forms of thought. If this is true, then those who tend to think creatively really are somehow different.
A new study led by John Kounios, professor of psychology at Drexel University and Mark Jung-Beeman of Northwestern University addresses these questions by comparing the brain activity of creative and noncreative problem solvers. The study published in the journal Neuropsychologia, reveals a distinct pattern of brain activity, even at rest, in people who tend to solve problems with a sudden creative insight -- an "Aha! Moment" -- compared to people who tend to solve problems more methodically.
At the beginning of the study, participants relaxed quietly for seven minutes while their electroencephalograms (EEGs) were recorded to show their brain activity. The participants were not given any task to perform and told they could think about whatever they wanted. Later, they were asked to solve a series of anagrams -- scrambled letters that can be rearranged to form words . These can be solved by deliberately and methodically trying out different letter combinations, or they can be solved with a sudden insight or "Aha!" in which the solution pops into awareness. After each successful solution, participants indicated in which way the solution had come to them.
The participants were then divided into two groups -- those who reported solving the problems mostly by sudden insight, and those who reported solving the problems more methodically -- and resting-state brain activity for these groups was compared. As predicted, the two groups displayed strikingly different patterns of brain activity during the resting period at the beginning of the experiment -- before they knew they would have to solve problems or even knew what the study was about.
One difference was that the creative solvers exhibited greater activity in several regions of the right hemisphere. Previous research has suggested that the right hemisphere of the brain plays a special role in solving problems with creative insight, likely due to right-hemisphere involvement in the processing of loose or "remote" associations between the elements of a problem, which is understood to be an important component of creative thought. The current study shows that greater right-hemisphere activity occurs even during a "resting" state in those with a tendency to solve problems by creative insight. This finding suggests that even the spontaneous thought of creative individuals, such as in their daydreams, contains more remote associations.
Second, creative and methodical solvers exhibited different activity in areas of the brain that process visual information. The pattern of "alpha" and "beta" brainwaves in creative solvers was consistent with diffuse rather than focused visual attention. This may allow creative individuals to broadly sample the environment for experiences that can trigger remote associations to produce an Aha! Moment. For example, a glimpse of an advertisement on a billboard or a word spoken in an overheard conversation could spark an association that leads to a solution. In contrast, the more focused attention of methodical solvers reduces their distractibility, allowing them to effectively solve problems for which the solution strategy is already known, as would be the case for balancing a checkbook or baking a cake using a known recipe.
Thus, the new study shows that basic differences in brain activity between creative and methodical problem solvers exist and are evident even when these individuals are not working on a problem. According to Kounios, "Problem solving, whether creative or methodical, doesn't begin from scratch when a person starts to work on a problem. His or her pre-existing brain-state biases a person to use a creative or a methodical strategy."
In addition to contributing to current knowledge about the neural basis of creativity, this study suggests the possible development of new brain imaging techniques for assessing potential for creative thought, and for assessing the effectiveness of methods for training individuals to think creatively.
If you don’t believe us, just ask the dinosaurs. A little goes a long way
Asteroid risk greater than once thought
Research sheds new light on asteroid disaster
ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (AP) -- An asteroid that exploded over Siberia a century ago, leaving 800 square miles of scorched or blown down trees, wasn't nearly as large as previously thought, a researcher concludes, suggesting a greater danger for Earth.
art.asteroid.ap.jpg
Mark Boslough shows a computer simulated "fireball" that might be expected from an asteroid explosion.
According to supercomputer simulations by Sandia National Laboratories physicist Mark Boslough, the asteroid that destroyed the forest at Tunguska in Siberia in June 1908 had a blast force equivalent to one-quarter to one-third of the 10- to 20-megaton range scientists previously estimated.
Better understanding of what happened at Tunguska will allow for better estimates of risk that would allow policymakers to decide whether to try to deflect an asteroid or evacuate people in its path, he said.
"It's not clear whether a 10-megaton asteroid is more damaging than a Hurricane Katrina," Boslough said. "We can more accurately predict the location of an impact and its time better than we can a hurricane, so you really could get people out of there if it's below a certain threshold."
On Tuesday, an asteroid at least 800 feet long was making a rare close pass by Earth, but scientists said there was no chance of an impact. The closest approach of 2007 TU24 will be 334,000 miles -- about 1.4 times the distance of Earth to the moon. An actual collision of a similar-sized object with Earth occurs on average every 37,000 years.
Although the computer simulation shows the Tunguska asteroid was smaller, its physical size isn't known. That would depend on such factors as speed, shape, how dense or porous it was and what it was made of, Boslough said.
Smaller asteroids approach Earth about three times more frequently than large ones. So if large asteroids approach about every 1,000 years, a smaller one would be about every 300 years, Boslough said.
"Of course there's huge uncertainties," he said.
The three-dimensional computer simulations were done last summer. Boslough presented the findings at scientific meetings in September and December. A paper on the phenomenon, co-authored by Sandia researcher Dave Crawford, has been accepted for publication in the International Journal of Impact Engineering.
The simulation, which better matches what's known of Tunguska than earlier models did, shows that the center of the asteroid's mass exploded above the ground, taking the form of a fireball blasting downward faster than the speed of sound.
But the fireball did not reach the ground, so while miles of trees outside the epicenter were flattened, those at the epicenter remained standing -- scorched, with their branches stripped off.
Boslough said they were likened to telegraph poles by the first Russian expedition to Tunguska -- an expedition that didn't arrive until 1927 because of the distance, primitive travel conditions and turbulent times in Russia.
If the asteroid had been as large as previously thought, "it would have had really different effects on the ground," Boslough said.
"It wouldn't have just blown over trees. There would have been a zone of completely scorched earth for several miles," he said. "That fireball would have come all the way down to the surface and everything it came in contact with would have basically just vaporized."
Alan Harris, a planetary scientist at Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado, said he's been following Boslough's work on Tunguska for several years "and I think the idea that he has there seemed very sound."
"A meteorite or asteroid coming into Earth's atmosphere has a lot of momentum," he said. "The idea that it would push down into the atmosphere seems very plausible."
"The bottom line is it takes a lot less energy, a small explosion, to create ground damage" such as that at Tunguska, said Harris, who studies the frequency of such impacts to assess hazards.
In the future, he said, he'll take Boslough's work into account and revise estimates of damage from impacts by smaller objects. E-mail to a friend E-mail to a friend
Sure, everybody talks about recycling, but do it 244 times and all of a sudden people get an attitude. Hey, you going to eat that pickle?
Nurse Admits Plucking Body Parts From 244 Corpses For Resale
PHILADELPHIA -- A nurse has admitted he stole body parts from 244 corpses in Philadelphia for reuse in unsuspecting patients.
Lee Cruceta of Monroe, New York, is charged as the lead cutter in a group that prosecutors say trafficked in stolen, often diseased body parts.
Prosecutors also expect accused ringleader Michael Mastromarino, of New York, to plead guilty. Three Philadelphia funeral directors are also charged.
Cruceta's plea allows him to serve concurrent sentences in New York and Philadelphia of about six to 20 years for conspiracy, theft and other charges.
On news that he may be able to remember his name after all, David Crosby considers changing the title of his solo album
Scientists discover way to reverse loss of memory
By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor Independent.co.uk
Wednesday, 30 January 2008
Scientists performing experimental brain surgery on a man aged 50 have stumbled across a mechanism that could unlock how memory works.
The accidental breakthrough came during an experiment originally intended to suppress the obese man's appetite, using the increasingly successful technique of deep-brain stimulation. Electrodes were pushed into the man's brain and stimulated with an electric current. Instead of losing appetite, the patient instead had an intense experience of déjà vu. He recalled, in intricate detail, a scene from 30 years earlier. More tests showed his ability to learn was dramatically improved when the current was switched on and his brain stimulated.
Scientists are now applying the technique in the first trial of the treatment in patients with Alzheimer's disease. If successful, it could offer hope to sufferers from the degenerative condition, which affects 450,000 people in Britain alone, by providing a "pacemaker" for the brain.
Three patients have been treated and initial results are promising, according to Andres Lozano, a professor of neurosurgery at the Toronto Western Hospital, Ontario, who is leading the research.
Professor Lozano said: "This is the first time that anyone has had electrodes implanted in the brain which have been shown to improve memory. We are driving the activity of the brain by increasing its sensitivity – turning up the volume of the memory circuits. Any event that involves the memory circuits is more likely to be stored and retained."
The discovery had caught him and his team "completely by surprise", Professor Lozano said. They had been operating on the man, who weighed 190kg (30st), to treat his obesity by locating the point in his brain that controls appetite. All other attempts to curb his eating had failed and brain surgery was the last resort.
The treatment for obesity was unsuccessful. But, while the researchers were identifying potential appetite suppressant points in the hypothalamus, the part of the brain associated with hunger, the man suddenly began to say that memory was flooding back.
"He reported the experience of being in a park with friends from when he was around 20 years old and, as the intensity of stimulation increased, the details became more vivid. He recognised his girlfriend [from the time] ... The scene was in colour. People were wearing identifiable clothes and were talking, but he could not decipher what they were saying," the researchers write in Annals of Neurology, published today.
The man, who has not been identified, was also tested on his ability to learn lists of paired objects. After three weeks of continuous hypothalamic stimulation, his performance on two learning tests was significantly improved. He was also much more likely to remember a list of unrelated paired objects with the electrodes turned on than when turned off.
Speaking to The Independent yesterday, Professor Lozano said: "His performance improved dramatically. As we turned the current up, we first drove his memory circuits and improved his learning. As we increased the intensity of the current, we got spontaneous memories of discrete events. At a certain intensity, he would slash to the scene [in the park]. When the intensity was increased further, he got more detail but, when the current was turned off, it rapidly decayed."
The discovery surprised the scientists as the hypothalamus has not usually been identified as a seat of memory. The contacts that most readily produced the memories were located close to a structure called the fornix, an arched bundle of fibres that carries signals within the limbic system, which is involved in memory and emotions and is situated next to the hypothalamus.
Professor Lozano is a world authority on deep-brain stimulation who has undertaken 400 operations on Parkinson's disease sufferers and is developing the technique as a treatment for depression, for which he has performed 28 operations. He said the discovery of its role in stimulating memory had wide implications.
"It gives us insight into which brain structures are involved in memory. It gives us a means of intervening in the way we have already done in Parkinson's and for mood disorders such as depression, and it may have therapeutic benefit in people with memory problems," he said.
The researchers are testing the approach in six Alzheimer's patients in a Phase 1 safety study. Three have so far had electrodes surgically implanted. The electrodes are attached via a cable that runs below the skull and down the neck to a battery pack stitched under the skin of the chest. The "pacemaker" delivers a constant low-level current that stimulates the brain but cannot be perceived by the patient.
Professor Lozano said: "It is the same device as is used for Parkinson's disease. We have placed the electrodes in exactly the same area of the hypothalamus because we want to see if we can reproduce the findings in the earlier experiment. We believe the memory circuits we are stimulating are close by, physically touching the hypothalamus.
"It is a very effective treatment for the motor problems associated with Parkinson's disease and it has been used on 40,000 people. We are in the early stages of using it with Alzheimer's patients and we don't know if it will work. We want to assess if we can reach the memory circuits and drive improvement. It is a novel approach to dealing with this problem."
British researchers welcomed the discovery. Andrea Malizia, a senior lecturer in psychopharmacology at the University of Bristol who is studying deep-brain stimulation as a treatment for depression, said: "If they had said let's stick an electrode in the hypothalamus to modify Alzheimer's disease, I would have said 'Why start there?' But, if they have had a serendipitous finding, then that is as good. Serendipitous findings are how a lot of discoveries in science have been made."
Ayesha Khan, a scientific liaison officer at the Alzheimer's Disease Society, said: "This is very cutting-edge research. It is exciting, but the initial result is in one person. It will need much further investigation."
How deep-brain stimulation works
Deep -brain stimulation has been used for more than a decade to treat a range of conditions including depression, chronic pain, Parkinson's disease and other movement disorders.
It has been so successful in treating Parkinson's that 40,000 patients worldwide now have electrodes implanted in their brains driven by pacemakers stitched into their chests.
As the devices become smaller, requiring less risky surgery, and the target areas of the brain requiring stimulation are more precisely identified, demand for the treatment is expected to leap. Although it is expensive, the potential savings in care and treatment costs are immense. It does not lead to dependence on drugs and is reversible.
The electrodes are implanted under local anaesthesia while the patient is awake. Before the operation, the neurosurgeon performs an MRI scan and establishes the target location for the electrodes. He then carries out a craniotomy – lifting a section of the skull – and inserts the electrodes and leads. By stimulating the electrodes and checking the patient's response, the surgeon can check that they are positioned in the right place.
Different areas of the brain are targeted for different conditions. For Parkinson's disease, they are placed in the subthalamic nucleus; for depression, in area 25 of the cingulate cortex.
Deep-brain stimulation was developed in France and first licensed by the Food and Drug Administration in the US in 1997 as a treatment for tremor. In the UK, the surgery is performed at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London, in Bristol, in Oxford and at a handful of other centres.
The name of the procedure is in some ways a misnomer as it often involves inhibiting electrical activity in an area of the brain rather than stimulating it. The technique is as much about restoring balance between competing brain areas which leads to the tremor characteristic of some types of Parkinson's disease.
Flight makes emergency landing after co-pilot suffers mental breakdown (This is London.co.uk)
OK, in the movie of the week, this is where David Bowie sings “Under Pressure.”
Severed head, body parts found along I-80 (CNN)
We didn’t know there was a Jeffrey Dahmer rest stop
Driver drops bid to sue family of boy he killed (CNN)
That’s thoughtful
Tap shoes or ball-peen hammer—you decide
Creative And Noncreative Problem Solvers Exhibit Different Patterns Of Brain Activity, Study Reveals
ScienceDaily (Jan. 30, 2008) — Why do some people solve problems more creatively than others? Are people who think creatively somehow different from those who tend to think in a more methodical fashion?
These questions are part of a long-standing debate, with some researchers arguing that what we call "creative thought" and "noncreative thought" are not basically different. If this is the case, then people who are thought of as creative do not really think in a fundamentally different way from those who are thought of as noncreative. On the other side of this debate, some researchers have argued that creative thought is fundamentally different from other forms of thought. If this is true, then those who tend to think creatively really are somehow different.
A new study led by John Kounios, professor of psychology at Drexel University and Mark Jung-Beeman of Northwestern University addresses these questions by comparing the brain activity of creative and noncreative problem solvers. The study published in the journal Neuropsychologia, reveals a distinct pattern of brain activity, even at rest, in people who tend to solve problems with a sudden creative insight -- an "Aha! Moment" -- compared to people who tend to solve problems more methodically.
At the beginning of the study, participants relaxed quietly for seven minutes while their electroencephalograms (EEGs) were recorded to show their brain activity. The participants were not given any task to perform and told they could think about whatever they wanted. Later, they were asked to solve a series of anagrams -- scrambled letters that can be rearranged to form words . These can be solved by deliberately and methodically trying out different letter combinations, or they can be solved with a sudden insight or "Aha!" in which the solution pops into awareness. After each successful solution, participants indicated in which way the solution had come to them.
The participants were then divided into two groups -- those who reported solving the problems mostly by sudden insight, and those who reported solving the problems more methodically -- and resting-state brain activity for these groups was compared. As predicted, the two groups displayed strikingly different patterns of brain activity during the resting period at the beginning of the experiment -- before they knew they would have to solve problems or even knew what the study was about.
One difference was that the creative solvers exhibited greater activity in several regions of the right hemisphere. Previous research has suggested that the right hemisphere of the brain plays a special role in solving problems with creative insight, likely due to right-hemisphere involvement in the processing of loose or "remote" associations between the elements of a problem, which is understood to be an important component of creative thought. The current study shows that greater right-hemisphere activity occurs even during a "resting" state in those with a tendency to solve problems by creative insight. This finding suggests that even the spontaneous thought of creative individuals, such as in their daydreams, contains more remote associations.
Second, creative and methodical solvers exhibited different activity in areas of the brain that process visual information. The pattern of "alpha" and "beta" brainwaves in creative solvers was consistent with diffuse rather than focused visual attention. This may allow creative individuals to broadly sample the environment for experiences that can trigger remote associations to produce an Aha! Moment. For example, a glimpse of an advertisement on a billboard or a word spoken in an overheard conversation could spark an association that leads to a solution. In contrast, the more focused attention of methodical solvers reduces their distractibility, allowing them to effectively solve problems for which the solution strategy is already known, as would be the case for balancing a checkbook or baking a cake using a known recipe.
Thus, the new study shows that basic differences in brain activity between creative and methodical problem solvers exist and are evident even when these individuals are not working on a problem. According to Kounios, "Problem solving, whether creative or methodical, doesn't begin from scratch when a person starts to work on a problem. His or her pre-existing brain-state biases a person to use a creative or a methodical strategy."
In addition to contributing to current knowledge about the neural basis of creativity, this study suggests the possible development of new brain imaging techniques for assessing potential for creative thought, and for assessing the effectiveness of methods for training individuals to think creatively.
If you don’t believe us, just ask the dinosaurs. A little goes a long way
Asteroid risk greater than once thought
Research sheds new light on asteroid disaster
ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (AP) -- An asteroid that exploded over Siberia a century ago, leaving 800 square miles of scorched or blown down trees, wasn't nearly as large as previously thought, a researcher concludes, suggesting a greater danger for Earth.
art.asteroid.ap.jpg
Mark Boslough shows a computer simulated "fireball" that might be expected from an asteroid explosion.
According to supercomputer simulations by Sandia National Laboratories physicist Mark Boslough, the asteroid that destroyed the forest at Tunguska in Siberia in June 1908 had a blast force equivalent to one-quarter to one-third of the 10- to 20-megaton range scientists previously estimated.
Better understanding of what happened at Tunguska will allow for better estimates of risk that would allow policymakers to decide whether to try to deflect an asteroid or evacuate people in its path, he said.
"It's not clear whether a 10-megaton asteroid is more damaging than a Hurricane Katrina," Boslough said. "We can more accurately predict the location of an impact and its time better than we can a hurricane, so you really could get people out of there if it's below a certain threshold."
On Tuesday, an asteroid at least 800 feet long was making a rare close pass by Earth, but scientists said there was no chance of an impact. The closest approach of 2007 TU24 will be 334,000 miles -- about 1.4 times the distance of Earth to the moon. An actual collision of a similar-sized object with Earth occurs on average every 37,000 years.
Although the computer simulation shows the Tunguska asteroid was smaller, its physical size isn't known. That would depend on such factors as speed, shape, how dense or porous it was and what it was made of, Boslough said.
Smaller asteroids approach Earth about three times more frequently than large ones. So if large asteroids approach about every 1,000 years, a smaller one would be about every 300 years, Boslough said.
"Of course there's huge uncertainties," he said.
The three-dimensional computer simulations were done last summer. Boslough presented the findings at scientific meetings in September and December. A paper on the phenomenon, co-authored by Sandia researcher Dave Crawford, has been accepted for publication in the International Journal of Impact Engineering.
The simulation, which better matches what's known of Tunguska than earlier models did, shows that the center of the asteroid's mass exploded above the ground, taking the form of a fireball blasting downward faster than the speed of sound.
But the fireball did not reach the ground, so while miles of trees outside the epicenter were flattened, those at the epicenter remained standing -- scorched, with their branches stripped off.
Boslough said they were likened to telegraph poles by the first Russian expedition to Tunguska -- an expedition that didn't arrive until 1927 because of the distance, primitive travel conditions and turbulent times in Russia.
If the asteroid had been as large as previously thought, "it would have had really different effects on the ground," Boslough said.
"It wouldn't have just blown over trees. There would have been a zone of completely scorched earth for several miles," he said. "That fireball would have come all the way down to the surface and everything it came in contact with would have basically just vaporized."
Alan Harris, a planetary scientist at Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado, said he's been following Boslough's work on Tunguska for several years "and I think the idea that he has there seemed very sound."
"A meteorite or asteroid coming into Earth's atmosphere has a lot of momentum," he said. "The idea that it would push down into the atmosphere seems very plausible."
"The bottom line is it takes a lot less energy, a small explosion, to create ground damage" such as that at Tunguska, said Harris, who studies the frequency of such impacts to assess hazards.
In the future, he said, he'll take Boslough's work into account and revise estimates of damage from impacts by smaller objects. E-mail to a friend E-mail to a friend
Sure, everybody talks about recycling, but do it 244 times and all of a sudden people get an attitude. Hey, you going to eat that pickle?
Nurse Admits Plucking Body Parts From 244 Corpses For Resale
PHILADELPHIA -- A nurse has admitted he stole body parts from 244 corpses in Philadelphia for reuse in unsuspecting patients.
Lee Cruceta of Monroe, New York, is charged as the lead cutter in a group that prosecutors say trafficked in stolen, often diseased body parts.
Prosecutors also expect accused ringleader Michael Mastromarino, of New York, to plead guilty. Three Philadelphia funeral directors are also charged.
Cruceta's plea allows him to serve concurrent sentences in New York and Philadelphia of about six to 20 years for conspiracy, theft and other charges.
On news that he may be able to remember his name after all, David Crosby considers changing the title of his solo album
Scientists discover way to reverse loss of memory
By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor Independent.co.uk
Wednesday, 30 January 2008
Scientists performing experimental brain surgery on a man aged 50 have stumbled across a mechanism that could unlock how memory works.
The accidental breakthrough came during an experiment originally intended to suppress the obese man's appetite, using the increasingly successful technique of deep-brain stimulation. Electrodes were pushed into the man's brain and stimulated with an electric current. Instead of losing appetite, the patient instead had an intense experience of déjà vu. He recalled, in intricate detail, a scene from 30 years earlier. More tests showed his ability to learn was dramatically improved when the current was switched on and his brain stimulated.
Scientists are now applying the technique in the first trial of the treatment in patients with Alzheimer's disease. If successful, it could offer hope to sufferers from the degenerative condition, which affects 450,000 people in Britain alone, by providing a "pacemaker" for the brain.
Three patients have been treated and initial results are promising, according to Andres Lozano, a professor of neurosurgery at the Toronto Western Hospital, Ontario, who is leading the research.
Professor Lozano said: "This is the first time that anyone has had electrodes implanted in the brain which have been shown to improve memory. We are driving the activity of the brain by increasing its sensitivity – turning up the volume of the memory circuits. Any event that involves the memory circuits is more likely to be stored and retained."
The discovery had caught him and his team "completely by surprise", Professor Lozano said. They had been operating on the man, who weighed 190kg (30st), to treat his obesity by locating the point in his brain that controls appetite. All other attempts to curb his eating had failed and brain surgery was the last resort.
The treatment for obesity was unsuccessful. But, while the researchers were identifying potential appetite suppressant points in the hypothalamus, the part of the brain associated with hunger, the man suddenly began to say that memory was flooding back.
"He reported the experience of being in a park with friends from when he was around 20 years old and, as the intensity of stimulation increased, the details became more vivid. He recognised his girlfriend [from the time] ... The scene was in colour. People were wearing identifiable clothes and were talking, but he could not decipher what they were saying," the researchers write in Annals of Neurology, published today.
The man, who has not been identified, was also tested on his ability to learn lists of paired objects. After three weeks of continuous hypothalamic stimulation, his performance on two learning tests was significantly improved. He was also much more likely to remember a list of unrelated paired objects with the electrodes turned on than when turned off.
Speaking to The Independent yesterday, Professor Lozano said: "His performance improved dramatically. As we turned the current up, we first drove his memory circuits and improved his learning. As we increased the intensity of the current, we got spontaneous memories of discrete events. At a certain intensity, he would slash to the scene [in the park]. When the intensity was increased further, he got more detail but, when the current was turned off, it rapidly decayed."
The discovery surprised the scientists as the hypothalamus has not usually been identified as a seat of memory. The contacts that most readily produced the memories were located close to a structure called the fornix, an arched bundle of fibres that carries signals within the limbic system, which is involved in memory and emotions and is situated next to the hypothalamus.
Professor Lozano is a world authority on deep-brain stimulation who has undertaken 400 operations on Parkinson's disease sufferers and is developing the technique as a treatment for depression, for which he has performed 28 operations. He said the discovery of its role in stimulating memory had wide implications.
"It gives us insight into which brain structures are involved in memory. It gives us a means of intervening in the way we have already done in Parkinson's and for mood disorders such as depression, and it may have therapeutic benefit in people with memory problems," he said.
The researchers are testing the approach in six Alzheimer's patients in a Phase 1 safety study. Three have so far had electrodes surgically implanted. The electrodes are attached via a cable that runs below the skull and down the neck to a battery pack stitched under the skin of the chest. The "pacemaker" delivers a constant low-level current that stimulates the brain but cannot be perceived by the patient.
Professor Lozano said: "It is the same device as is used for Parkinson's disease. We have placed the electrodes in exactly the same area of the hypothalamus because we want to see if we can reproduce the findings in the earlier experiment. We believe the memory circuits we are stimulating are close by, physically touching the hypothalamus.
"It is a very effective treatment for the motor problems associated with Parkinson's disease and it has been used on 40,000 people. We are in the early stages of using it with Alzheimer's patients and we don't know if it will work. We want to assess if we can reach the memory circuits and drive improvement. It is a novel approach to dealing with this problem."
British researchers welcomed the discovery. Andrea Malizia, a senior lecturer in psychopharmacology at the University of Bristol who is studying deep-brain stimulation as a treatment for depression, said: "If they had said let's stick an electrode in the hypothalamus to modify Alzheimer's disease, I would have said 'Why start there?' But, if they have had a serendipitous finding, then that is as good. Serendipitous findings are how a lot of discoveries in science have been made."
Ayesha Khan, a scientific liaison officer at the Alzheimer's Disease Society, said: "This is very cutting-edge research. It is exciting, but the initial result is in one person. It will need much further investigation."
How deep-brain stimulation works
Deep -brain stimulation has been used for more than a decade to treat a range of conditions including depression, chronic pain, Parkinson's disease and other movement disorders.
It has been so successful in treating Parkinson's that 40,000 patients worldwide now have electrodes implanted in their brains driven by pacemakers stitched into their chests.
As the devices become smaller, requiring less risky surgery, and the target areas of the brain requiring stimulation are more precisely identified, demand for the treatment is expected to leap. Although it is expensive, the potential savings in care and treatment costs are immense. It does not lead to dependence on drugs and is reversible.
The electrodes are implanted under local anaesthesia while the patient is awake. Before the operation, the neurosurgeon performs an MRI scan and establishes the target location for the electrodes. He then carries out a craniotomy – lifting a section of the skull – and inserts the electrodes and leads. By stimulating the electrodes and checking the patient's response, the surgeon can check that they are positioned in the right place.
Different areas of the brain are targeted for different conditions. For Parkinson's disease, they are placed in the subthalamic nucleus; for depression, in area 25 of the cingulate cortex.
Deep-brain stimulation was developed in France and first licensed by the Food and Drug Administration in the US in 1997 as a treatment for tremor. In the UK, the surgery is performed at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London, in Bristol, in Oxford and at a handful of other centres.
The name of the procedure is in some ways a misnomer as it often involves inhibiting electrical activity in an area of the brain rather than stimulating it. The technique is as much about restoring balance between competing brain areas which leads to the tremor characteristic of some types of Parkinson's disease.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/29/08
Headlines of the day
Poor workers' kidneys stolen, sold to rich (CNN)
Deejay sets fire to radio station after his songs aren't played (the obscure store)
Illegal aliens rear end homeland security vehicle (KTAR.com)
It just looks like we’re doing nothing. We’re actually quite busy.
Sedentary Lifestyles Associated With Accelerated Aging Process
ScienceDaily (Jan. 29, 2008) — Individuals who are physically active during their leisure time appear to be biologically younger than those with sedentary lifestyles, according to a report in the January 28 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Regular exercisers have lower rates of cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure, obesity and osteoporosis, according to background information in the article. "A sedentary lifestyle increases the propensity to aging-related disease and premature death," the authors write. "Inactivity may diminish life expectancy not only by predisposing to aging-related diseases but also because it may influence the aging process itself."
Lynn F. Cherkas, Ph.D., of King's College London, and colleagues studied 2,401 white twins, administering questionnaires on physical activity level, smoking habits and socioeconomic status. The participants also provided a blood sample from which DNA was extracted. The researchers examined the length of telomeres--repeated sequences at the end of chromosomes--in the twins' white blood cells (leukocytes). Leukocyte telomeres progressively shorten over time and may serve as a marker of biological age.
Telomere length decreased with age, with an average loss of 21 nucleotides (structural units) per year. Men and women who were less physically active in their leisure time had shorter leukocyte telomeres than those who were more active. "Such a relationship between leukocyte telomere length and physical activity level remained significant after adjustment for body mass index, smoking, socioeconomic status and physical activity at work," the authors write. "The mean difference in leukocyte telomere length between the most active [who performed an average of 199 minutes of physical activity per week] and least active [16 minutes of physical activity per week] subjects was 200 nucleotides, which means that the most active subjects had telomeres the same length as sedentary individuals up to 10 years younger, on average." A sub-analysis comparing pairs in which twins had different levels of physical activity showed similar results.
Oxidative stress--damage caused to cells by exposure to oxygen--and inflammation are likely mechanisms by which sedentary lifestyles shorten telomeres, the authors suggest. In addition, perceived stress levels have been linked to telomere length. Physical activity may reduce psychological stress, thus mitigating its effect on telomeres and the aging process.
"The U.S. guidelines recommend that 30 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity at least five days a week can have significant health benefits," the authors write. "Our results underscore the vital importance of these guidelines. They show that adults who partake in regular physical activity are biologically younger than sedentary individuals. This conclusion provides a powerful message that could be used by clinicians to promote the potential anti-aging effect of regular exercise."
"Persons who exercise are different from sedentary persons in many ways, and although certain variables were adjusted for in this analysis, many additional factors could be responsible for the biological differences between active and sedentary persons, a situation referred to by epidemiologists as residual confounding," Dr. Guralnik writes. "Nevertheless, this article serves as one of many pieces of evidence that telomere length might be targeted in studying aging outcomes."
That cheer you just heard was from the adult entertainment industry
New Experimental Website Converts Photos Into 3D Models
ScienceDaily (Jan. 28, 2008) — An artist might spend weeks fretting over questions of depth, scale and perspective in a landscape painting, but once it is done, what's left is a two-dimensional image with a fixed point of view. But the Make3d algorithm, developed by Stanford computer scientists, can take any two-dimensional image and create a three-dimensional "fly around" model of its content, giving viewers access to the scene's depth and a range of points of view.
"The algorithm uses a variety of visual cues that humans use for estimating the 3-D aspects of a scene," said Ashutosh Saxena, a doctoral student in computer science who developed the Make3d website with Andrew Ng, an assistant professor of computer science. "If we look at a grass field, we can see that the texture changes in a particular way as it becomes more distant."
The applications of extracting 3-D models from 2-D images, the researchers say, could range from enhanced pictures for online real estate sites to quickly creating environments for video games and improving the vision and dexterity of mobile robots as they navigate through the spatial world.
Extracting 3-D information from still images is an emerging class of technology. In the past, some researchers have synthesized 3-D models by analyzing multiple images of a scene. Others, including Ng and Saxena in 2005, have developed algorithms that infer depth from single images by combining assumptions about what must be ground or sky with simple cues such as vertical lines in the image that represent walls or trees. But Make3d creates accurate and smooth models about twice as often as competing approaches, Ng said, by abandoning limiting assumptions in favor of a new, deeper analysis of each image and the powerful artificial intelligence technique "machine learning."
Restoring the third dimension
To "teach" the algorithm about depth, orientation and position in 2-D images, the researchers fed it still images of campus scenes along with 3-D data of the same scenes gathered with laser scanners. The algorithm correlated the two sets together, eventually gaining a good idea of the trends and patterns associated with being near or far. For example, it learned that abrupt changes along edges correlate well with one object occluding another, and it saw that things that are far away can be just a little hazier and more bluish than things that are close.
To make these judgments, the algorithm breaks the image up into tiny planes called "superpixels," which are within the image and have very uniform color, brightness and other attributes. By looking at a superpixel in concert with its neighbors, analyzing changes such as gradations of texture, the algorithm makes a judgment about how far it is from the viewer and what its orientation in space is. Unlike some previous algorithms, the Stanford one can account for planes at any angle, not just horizontal or vertical. This allows it to create models for scenes that have planes at many orientations, such as the curved branches of trees or the slopes of mountains.
On the Make3d website, the algorithm puts images uploaded by users into a processing queue and will send an e-mail when the model has been rendered. Users can then vote on whether the model looks good, and can see an alternative rendering and even tinker with the model to fix what might not have been rendered right the first time.
Photos can be uploaded directly or pulled into the site from the popular photo-sharing site Flickr.
Although the technology works better than any other has so far, Ng said, it is not perfect. The software is at its best with landscapes and scenery rather than close-ups of individual objects. Also, he and Saxena hope to improve it by introducing object recognition. The idea is that if the software can recognize a human form in a photo it can make more accurate distance judgments based on the size of the person in the photo.
A paper on the algorithm by Ng, Saxena and a fellow student, Min Sun, won the best paper award at the 3-D recognition and reconstruction workshop at the International Conference on Computer Vision in Rio de Janeiro in October 2007.
For many panoramic scenes, there is still no substitute for being there. But when flat photos become 3-D, viewers can feel a little closer—or farther. The algorithm runs at http://make3d.stanford.edu.
Can you say Silver Surfer? Sure you can.
Hyperfast Star Proven To Be Alien
ScienceDaily (Jan. 29, 2008) — A young star is speeding away from the Milky Way so fast that astronomers have been puzzled by where it came from; based on its young age it has traveled too far to have come from our galaxy. Now by analyzing its velocity, light intensity, and for the first time its tell-tale elemental composition, Carnegie astronomers Alceste Bonanos and Mercedes López-Morales, and collaborators Ian Hunter and Robert Ryans from Queen's University Belfast have determined that it came from our neighboring galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The result suggests that it was ejected from that galaxy by a yet-to-be-observed massive black hole.
The star, dubbed HE 0437-5439, is an early-type star and one of ten so-called hypervelocity stars so far found speeding away from the Milky Way. "But this one is different from the other nine," commented López-Morales. "Their type, speed, and age make them consistent with having been ejected from the center of our galaxy, where we know there is a super-massive black hole. This star, discovered in 2005*, initially appeared to have an elemental makeup like our Sun's, suggesting that it, too, came from the center of our galaxy. But that didn't make sense because it would have taken 100 million years to get to its location, and HE 0437-5439 is only 35 million years old."
To explain the enigma, or "paradox of youth," the discoverers proposed that HE 0437-5439 was either a so-called blue straggler--a relatively young, massive star resulting from the merger of two low-mass stars from the Milky Way, or it originated from the Large Magellanic Cloud.
"We were intrigued by the conundrum and decided to take up the challenge to solve this," stated Bonanos. "Stars in the LMC are known to have lower elemental abundances than most stars in our galaxy, so we could determine if its chemistry was more like that galaxy's or our own."
The team confirmed results of the previous study concerning the mass, age, and speed of the star. It is about nine times the mass of our Sun, about 35 million years old, and it is zooming away from the Milky Way and Large Magellanic Cloud into intergalactic space at 1.6 million miles per hour (2.6 million km/hour).
Although the previous study was able to roughly estimate the star's elemental composition, the measurements were not detailed enough to determine if the elements match stars in our galaxy, or are characteristic of stars from the Large Magellanic Cloud. These astronomers were able to measure the relative abundances of certain elements for the first time in any hypervelocity star. The relative abundance of key elements tells them where a star originated.
"We've ruled out that the star came from the Milky Way," explained Bonanos. "The concentration of elements in Large Magellanic Cloud stars are about half those in our Sun. Like evidence from a crime scene, the fingerprints point to an origin in the Large Magellanic Cloud."
Based on the speed of the star's rotation measured by the discoverers, and confirmed by this team, the astronomers believe that the star was originally part of a binary system. The binary could have passed close to a black hole 1,000 the mass of the Sun**. As one star was pulled into the black hole, the other was whipped into frenzy and flung out of the galaxy.
"This is the first observational clue that a massive black hole exists somewhere in the LMC. We look forward to finding out where this black hole might be," concluded Bonanos.
Earth’s creamy nougat center revealed
Earth's Getting 'Soft' In The Middle, Geologists Note
ScienceDaily (Jan. 28, 2008) — A new study suggests that material in part of the lower mantle has unusual electronic characteristics that make sound propagate more slowly, suggesting that the material there is softer than previously thought. The results call into question the traditional techniques for understanding this region of the planet.
Since we can't sample the deepest regions of the Earth, scientists watch the velocity of seismic waves as they travel through the planet to determine the composition and density of that material. Now a new study suggests that material in part of the lower mantle has unusual electronic characteristics that make sound propagate more slowly, suggesting that the material there is softer than previously thought. The results call into question the traditional techniques for understanding this region of the planet.
The lower mantle extends from about 400 miles to 1800 miles (660-2900 kilometers) into Earth and sits atop the outer core. Pressures and temperatures are so brutal there that materials are changed into forms that don't exist in rocks at the planet's surface and must be studied under carefully controlled conditions in the laboratory. The pressures range from 230,000 times the atmospheric pressure at sea level (23 GPa), to 1.35 million times sea-level pressure (135 GPa). And the heat is equally extreme--from about 2,800 to 6,700 degrees Fahrenheit (1800K--4000K).
Iron is abundant in the Earth, and is a major component of the minerals ferropericlase and the silicate perovskite in the lower mantle. In previous work, researchers found that the outermost electrons of iron in ferropericlase are forced to pair up under the extreme pressures creating a so-called spin-transition zone within the lower mantle.
"What happens when unpaired electrons--called a high-spin state--are forced to pair up is that they transition to what is called a low-spin state. And when that happens, the conductivity, density, and chemical properties change," explained Goncharov. "What's most important for seismology is the acoustic properties--the propagation of sound. We determined the elasticity of ferropericlase through the pressure-induced high-spin to low-spin transition. We did this by measuring the velocity of acoustic waves propagating in different directions in a single crystal of the material and found that over an extended pressure range (from about 395,000 to 590,000 atmospheres) the material became 'softer'--that is, the waves slowed down more than expected from previous work. Thus, at high temperature corresponding distributions will become very broad, which will result in a wide range of depth having subtly anomalous properties that perhaps extend through most of the lower mantle."
The results suggest that scientists may have to go back to the drawing board to model this region of the Earth.
Some say getting soft in the middle is a function of age.
Poor workers' kidneys stolen, sold to rich (CNN)
Deejay sets fire to radio station after his songs aren't played (the obscure store)
Illegal aliens rear end homeland security vehicle (KTAR.com)
It just looks like we’re doing nothing. We’re actually quite busy.
Sedentary Lifestyles Associated With Accelerated Aging Process
ScienceDaily (Jan. 29, 2008) — Individuals who are physically active during their leisure time appear to be biologically younger than those with sedentary lifestyles, according to a report in the January 28 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Regular exercisers have lower rates of cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, cancer, high blood pressure, obesity and osteoporosis, according to background information in the article. "A sedentary lifestyle increases the propensity to aging-related disease and premature death," the authors write. "Inactivity may diminish life expectancy not only by predisposing to aging-related diseases but also because it may influence the aging process itself."
Lynn F. Cherkas, Ph.D., of King's College London, and colleagues studied 2,401 white twins, administering questionnaires on physical activity level, smoking habits and socioeconomic status. The participants also provided a blood sample from which DNA was extracted. The researchers examined the length of telomeres--repeated sequences at the end of chromosomes--in the twins' white blood cells (leukocytes). Leukocyte telomeres progressively shorten over time and may serve as a marker of biological age.
Telomere length decreased with age, with an average loss of 21 nucleotides (structural units) per year. Men and women who were less physically active in their leisure time had shorter leukocyte telomeres than those who were more active. "Such a relationship between leukocyte telomere length and physical activity level remained significant after adjustment for body mass index, smoking, socioeconomic status and physical activity at work," the authors write. "The mean difference in leukocyte telomere length between the most active [who performed an average of 199 minutes of physical activity per week] and least active [16 minutes of physical activity per week] subjects was 200 nucleotides, which means that the most active subjects had telomeres the same length as sedentary individuals up to 10 years younger, on average." A sub-analysis comparing pairs in which twins had different levels of physical activity showed similar results.
Oxidative stress--damage caused to cells by exposure to oxygen--and inflammation are likely mechanisms by which sedentary lifestyles shorten telomeres, the authors suggest. In addition, perceived stress levels have been linked to telomere length. Physical activity may reduce psychological stress, thus mitigating its effect on telomeres and the aging process.
"The U.S. guidelines recommend that 30 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity at least five days a week can have significant health benefits," the authors write. "Our results underscore the vital importance of these guidelines. They show that adults who partake in regular physical activity are biologically younger than sedentary individuals. This conclusion provides a powerful message that could be used by clinicians to promote the potential anti-aging effect of regular exercise."
"Persons who exercise are different from sedentary persons in many ways, and although certain variables were adjusted for in this analysis, many additional factors could be responsible for the biological differences between active and sedentary persons, a situation referred to by epidemiologists as residual confounding," Dr. Guralnik writes. "Nevertheless, this article serves as one of many pieces of evidence that telomere length might be targeted in studying aging outcomes."
That cheer you just heard was from the adult entertainment industry
New Experimental Website Converts Photos Into 3D Models
ScienceDaily (Jan. 28, 2008) — An artist might spend weeks fretting over questions of depth, scale and perspective in a landscape painting, but once it is done, what's left is a two-dimensional image with a fixed point of view. But the Make3d algorithm, developed by Stanford computer scientists, can take any two-dimensional image and create a three-dimensional "fly around" model of its content, giving viewers access to the scene's depth and a range of points of view.
"The algorithm uses a variety of visual cues that humans use for estimating the 3-D aspects of a scene," said Ashutosh Saxena, a doctoral student in computer science who developed the Make3d website with Andrew Ng, an assistant professor of computer science. "If we look at a grass field, we can see that the texture changes in a particular way as it becomes more distant."
The applications of extracting 3-D models from 2-D images, the researchers say, could range from enhanced pictures for online real estate sites to quickly creating environments for video games and improving the vision and dexterity of mobile robots as they navigate through the spatial world.
Extracting 3-D information from still images is an emerging class of technology. In the past, some researchers have synthesized 3-D models by analyzing multiple images of a scene. Others, including Ng and Saxena in 2005, have developed algorithms that infer depth from single images by combining assumptions about what must be ground or sky with simple cues such as vertical lines in the image that represent walls or trees. But Make3d creates accurate and smooth models about twice as often as competing approaches, Ng said, by abandoning limiting assumptions in favor of a new, deeper analysis of each image and the powerful artificial intelligence technique "machine learning."
Restoring the third dimension
To "teach" the algorithm about depth, orientation and position in 2-D images, the researchers fed it still images of campus scenes along with 3-D data of the same scenes gathered with laser scanners. The algorithm correlated the two sets together, eventually gaining a good idea of the trends and patterns associated with being near or far. For example, it learned that abrupt changes along edges correlate well with one object occluding another, and it saw that things that are far away can be just a little hazier and more bluish than things that are close.
To make these judgments, the algorithm breaks the image up into tiny planes called "superpixels," which are within the image and have very uniform color, brightness and other attributes. By looking at a superpixel in concert with its neighbors, analyzing changes such as gradations of texture, the algorithm makes a judgment about how far it is from the viewer and what its orientation in space is. Unlike some previous algorithms, the Stanford one can account for planes at any angle, not just horizontal or vertical. This allows it to create models for scenes that have planes at many orientations, such as the curved branches of trees or the slopes of mountains.
On the Make3d website, the algorithm puts images uploaded by users into a processing queue and will send an e-mail when the model has been rendered. Users can then vote on whether the model looks good, and can see an alternative rendering and even tinker with the model to fix what might not have been rendered right the first time.
Photos can be uploaded directly or pulled into the site from the popular photo-sharing site Flickr.
Although the technology works better than any other has so far, Ng said, it is not perfect. The software is at its best with landscapes and scenery rather than close-ups of individual objects. Also, he and Saxena hope to improve it by introducing object recognition. The idea is that if the software can recognize a human form in a photo it can make more accurate distance judgments based on the size of the person in the photo.
A paper on the algorithm by Ng, Saxena and a fellow student, Min Sun, won the best paper award at the 3-D recognition and reconstruction workshop at the International Conference on Computer Vision in Rio de Janeiro in October 2007.
For many panoramic scenes, there is still no substitute for being there. But when flat photos become 3-D, viewers can feel a little closer—or farther. The algorithm runs at http://make3d.stanford.edu.
Can you say Silver Surfer? Sure you can.
Hyperfast Star Proven To Be Alien
ScienceDaily (Jan. 29, 2008) — A young star is speeding away from the Milky Way so fast that astronomers have been puzzled by where it came from; based on its young age it has traveled too far to have come from our galaxy. Now by analyzing its velocity, light intensity, and for the first time its tell-tale elemental composition, Carnegie astronomers Alceste Bonanos and Mercedes López-Morales, and collaborators Ian Hunter and Robert Ryans from Queen's University Belfast have determined that it came from our neighboring galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The result suggests that it was ejected from that galaxy by a yet-to-be-observed massive black hole.
The star, dubbed HE 0437-5439, is an early-type star and one of ten so-called hypervelocity stars so far found speeding away from the Milky Way. "But this one is different from the other nine," commented López-Morales. "Their type, speed, and age make them consistent with having been ejected from the center of our galaxy, where we know there is a super-massive black hole. This star, discovered in 2005*, initially appeared to have an elemental makeup like our Sun's, suggesting that it, too, came from the center of our galaxy. But that didn't make sense because it would have taken 100 million years to get to its location, and HE 0437-5439 is only 35 million years old."
To explain the enigma, or "paradox of youth," the discoverers proposed that HE 0437-5439 was either a so-called blue straggler--a relatively young, massive star resulting from the merger of two low-mass stars from the Milky Way, or it originated from the Large Magellanic Cloud.
"We were intrigued by the conundrum and decided to take up the challenge to solve this," stated Bonanos. "Stars in the LMC are known to have lower elemental abundances than most stars in our galaxy, so we could determine if its chemistry was more like that galaxy's or our own."
The team confirmed results of the previous study concerning the mass, age, and speed of the star. It is about nine times the mass of our Sun, about 35 million years old, and it is zooming away from the Milky Way and Large Magellanic Cloud into intergalactic space at 1.6 million miles per hour (2.6 million km/hour).
Although the previous study was able to roughly estimate the star's elemental composition, the measurements were not detailed enough to determine if the elements match stars in our galaxy, or are characteristic of stars from the Large Magellanic Cloud. These astronomers were able to measure the relative abundances of certain elements for the first time in any hypervelocity star. The relative abundance of key elements tells them where a star originated.
"We've ruled out that the star came from the Milky Way," explained Bonanos. "The concentration of elements in Large Magellanic Cloud stars are about half those in our Sun. Like evidence from a crime scene, the fingerprints point to an origin in the Large Magellanic Cloud."
Based on the speed of the star's rotation measured by the discoverers, and confirmed by this team, the astronomers believe that the star was originally part of a binary system. The binary could have passed close to a black hole 1,000 the mass of the Sun**. As one star was pulled into the black hole, the other was whipped into frenzy and flung out of the galaxy.
"This is the first observational clue that a massive black hole exists somewhere in the LMC. We look forward to finding out where this black hole might be," concluded Bonanos.
Earth’s creamy nougat center revealed
Earth's Getting 'Soft' In The Middle, Geologists Note
ScienceDaily (Jan. 28, 2008) — A new study suggests that material in part of the lower mantle has unusual electronic characteristics that make sound propagate more slowly, suggesting that the material there is softer than previously thought. The results call into question the traditional techniques for understanding this region of the planet.
Since we can't sample the deepest regions of the Earth, scientists watch the velocity of seismic waves as they travel through the planet to determine the composition and density of that material. Now a new study suggests that material in part of the lower mantle has unusual electronic characteristics that make sound propagate more slowly, suggesting that the material there is softer than previously thought. The results call into question the traditional techniques for understanding this region of the planet.
The lower mantle extends from about 400 miles to 1800 miles (660-2900 kilometers) into Earth and sits atop the outer core. Pressures and temperatures are so brutal there that materials are changed into forms that don't exist in rocks at the planet's surface and must be studied under carefully controlled conditions in the laboratory. The pressures range from 230,000 times the atmospheric pressure at sea level (23 GPa), to 1.35 million times sea-level pressure (135 GPa). And the heat is equally extreme--from about 2,800 to 6,700 degrees Fahrenheit (1800K--4000K).
Iron is abundant in the Earth, and is a major component of the minerals ferropericlase and the silicate perovskite in the lower mantle. In previous work, researchers found that the outermost electrons of iron in ferropericlase are forced to pair up under the extreme pressures creating a so-called spin-transition zone within the lower mantle.
"What happens when unpaired electrons--called a high-spin state--are forced to pair up is that they transition to what is called a low-spin state. And when that happens, the conductivity, density, and chemical properties change," explained Goncharov. "What's most important for seismology is the acoustic properties--the propagation of sound. We determined the elasticity of ferropericlase through the pressure-induced high-spin to low-spin transition. We did this by measuring the velocity of acoustic waves propagating in different directions in a single crystal of the material and found that over an extended pressure range (from about 395,000 to 590,000 atmospheres) the material became 'softer'--that is, the waves slowed down more than expected from previous work. Thus, at high temperature corresponding distributions will become very broad, which will result in a wide range of depth having subtly anomalous properties that perhaps extend through most of the lower mantle."
The results suggest that scientists may have to go back to the drawing board to model this region of the Earth.
Some say getting soft in the middle is a function of age.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/28/08
Sadly, it looks like David Clayton Thomas was right
Disabled Spy Satellite Threatens Earth
By EILEEN SULLIVAN
WASHINGTON (AP) - A large U.S. spy satellite has lost power and could hit the Earth in late February or early March, government officials said Saturday.
The satellite, which no longer can be controlled, could contain hazardous materials, and it is unknown where on the planet it might come down, they said. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the information is classified as secret. It was not clear how long ago the satellite lost power, or under what circumstances.
"Appropriate government agencies are monitoring the situation," said Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council, when asked about the situation after it was disclosed by other officials. "Numerous satellites over the years have come out of orbit and fallen harmlessly. We are looking at potential options to mitigate any possible damage this satellite may cause."
He would not comment on whether it is possible for the satellite to perhaps be shot down by a missile. He said it would be inappropriate to discuss any specifics at this time.
A senior government official said that lawmakers and other nations are being kept apprised of the situation.
The spacecraft contains hydrazine - which is rocket fuel - according to a government official who was not authorized to speak publicly but spoke on condition of anonymity. Hydrazine, a colorless liquid with an ammonia-like odor, is a toxic chemical and can cause harm to anyone who contacts it.
Such an uncontrolled re-entry could risk exposure of U.S. secrets, said John Pike, a defense and intelligence expert. Spy satellites typically are disposed of through a controlled re-entry into the ocean so that no one else can access the spacecraft, he said.
Pike also said it's not likely the threat from the satellite could be eliminated by shooting it down with a missile, because that would create debris that would then re-enter the atmosphere and burn up or hit the ground.
Pike, director of the defense research group GlobalSecurity.org, estimated that the spacecraft weighs about 20,000 pounds and is the size of a small bus. He said the satellite would create 10 times less debris than the Columbia space shuttle crash in 2003. Satellites have natural decay periods, and it's possible this one died as long as a year ago and is just now getting ready to re-enter the atmosphere, he said.
Jeffrey Richelson, a senior fellow with the National Security Archive, said the spacecraft likely is a photo reconnaissance satellite. Such eyes in the sky are used to gather visual information from space about adversarial governments and terror groups, including construction at suspected nuclear sites or militant training camps. The satellites also can be used to survey damage from hurricanes, fires and other natural disasters.
The largest uncontrolled re-entry by a NASA spacecraft was Skylab, the 78-ton abandoned space station that fell from orbit in 1979. Its debris dropped harmlessly into the Indian Ocean and across a remote section of western Australia.
In 2000, NASA engineers successfully directed a safe de-orbit of the 17-ton Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, using rockets aboard the satellite to bring it down in a remote part of the Pacific Ocean.
In 2002, officials believe debris from a 7,000-pound science satellite smacked into the Earth's atmosphere and rained down over the Persian Gulf, a few thousand miles from where they first predicted it would plummet.
Headlines of the day
Police bust illegal kidney transplant ring (MSNBC)
THE SPY IS FALLING: Disabled Satellite Threatens Earth...(drudge)
Well Doctor, we’re concerned. Mom’s just not enjoying Jerry Springer and that Mr. Povich the way she used to.
Less Education May Lead To Delayed Awareness Of Alzheimer's Onset
ScienceDaily (Jan. 27, 2008) — A review of epidemiological data has found evidence that people who spend fewer years in school may experience a slight but statistically significant delay in the realization that they're having cognitive problems that could be
Scientists at the Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis reviewed data on 1,449 Alzheimer's patients from their center and 21,880 patients from the National Alzheimer's Coordinating Center (NACC), a collaboration of approximately 30 Alzheimer's disease research centers nationwide.
"We may have a group of people who are at risk for slightly delayed detection of Alzheimer's disease," says lead author Catherine Roe, Ph.D., a neurology research instructor at the ADRC. "Early detection of Alzheimer's disease is important as we progress toward treatments and cures because those treatments will need to be applied as early as possible to have the maximum possible benefit."
In an earlier study of patients with a form of Alzheimer's disease linked to a genetic mutation, Roe and other Washington University researchers found patients with more years of education were likely to be diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease earlier. This surprised them because higher levels of education have typically been associated with decreased risk of Alzheimer's disease.
The new study confirmed those surprising results, revealing that patients with 12 years or more of schooling were on average slightly younger when diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease than patients with less than eight years of schooling. Age of diagnosis for a group with eight to 11 years of schooling fell in-between the other two groups.
Next, researchers analyzed the severity of patients' dementia when they went to the Alzheimer's disease center for the first time. They found that patients with fewer years of education were likely to be more severely impaired on their first visit.
Alzheimer's disease is cumulatively disabling: The longer one has it, the worse the symptoms become. This suggested to the researchers that those with lower education levels may be slower to notice the early signs of disease, only going to see a specialist after their symptoms become impossible to ignore. Those with more education may be becoming aware of their symptoms while they are still relatively subtle, and seek a specialists' help early on in the disease process.
"People with higher education levels may be more likely to have a job or a hobby that highlights early cognitive impairment as well as better access to medical care," Roe says. "These could be factors that we need to incorporate into our procedures for screening patients for early signs of cognitive
Disabled Spy Satellite Threatens Earth
By EILEEN SULLIVAN
WASHINGTON (AP) - A large U.S. spy satellite has lost power and could hit the Earth in late February or early March, government officials said Saturday.
The satellite, which no longer can be controlled, could contain hazardous materials, and it is unknown where on the planet it might come down, they said. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the information is classified as secret. It was not clear how long ago the satellite lost power, or under what circumstances.
"Appropriate government agencies are monitoring the situation," said Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council, when asked about the situation after it was disclosed by other officials. "Numerous satellites over the years have come out of orbit and fallen harmlessly. We are looking at potential options to mitigate any possible damage this satellite may cause."
He would not comment on whether it is possible for the satellite to perhaps be shot down by a missile. He said it would be inappropriate to discuss any specifics at this time.
A senior government official said that lawmakers and other nations are being kept apprised of the situation.
The spacecraft contains hydrazine - which is rocket fuel - according to a government official who was not authorized to speak publicly but spoke on condition of anonymity. Hydrazine, a colorless liquid with an ammonia-like odor, is a toxic chemical and can cause harm to anyone who contacts it.
Such an uncontrolled re-entry could risk exposure of U.S. secrets, said John Pike, a defense and intelligence expert. Spy satellites typically are disposed of through a controlled re-entry into the ocean so that no one else can access the spacecraft, he said.
Pike also said it's not likely the threat from the satellite could be eliminated by shooting it down with a missile, because that would create debris that would then re-enter the atmosphere and burn up or hit the ground.
Pike, director of the defense research group GlobalSecurity.org, estimated that the spacecraft weighs about 20,000 pounds and is the size of a small bus. He said the satellite would create 10 times less debris than the Columbia space shuttle crash in 2003. Satellites have natural decay periods, and it's possible this one died as long as a year ago and is just now getting ready to re-enter the atmosphere, he said.
Jeffrey Richelson, a senior fellow with the National Security Archive, said the spacecraft likely is a photo reconnaissance satellite. Such eyes in the sky are used to gather visual information from space about adversarial governments and terror groups, including construction at suspected nuclear sites or militant training camps. The satellites also can be used to survey damage from hurricanes, fires and other natural disasters.
The largest uncontrolled re-entry by a NASA spacecraft was Skylab, the 78-ton abandoned space station that fell from orbit in 1979. Its debris dropped harmlessly into the Indian Ocean and across a remote section of western Australia.
In 2000, NASA engineers successfully directed a safe de-orbit of the 17-ton Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, using rockets aboard the satellite to bring it down in a remote part of the Pacific Ocean.
In 2002, officials believe debris from a 7,000-pound science satellite smacked into the Earth's atmosphere and rained down over the Persian Gulf, a few thousand miles from where they first predicted it would plummet.
Headlines of the day
Police bust illegal kidney transplant ring (MSNBC)
THE SPY IS FALLING: Disabled Satellite Threatens Earth...(drudge)
Well Doctor, we’re concerned. Mom’s just not enjoying Jerry Springer and that Mr. Povich the way she used to.
Less Education May Lead To Delayed Awareness Of Alzheimer's Onset
ScienceDaily (Jan. 27, 2008) — A review of epidemiological data has found evidence that people who spend fewer years in school may experience a slight but statistically significant delay in the realization that they're having cognitive problems that could be
Scientists at the Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis reviewed data on 1,449 Alzheimer's patients from their center and 21,880 patients from the National Alzheimer's Coordinating Center (NACC), a collaboration of approximately 30 Alzheimer's disease research centers nationwide.
"We may have a group of people who are at risk for slightly delayed detection of Alzheimer's disease," says lead author Catherine Roe, Ph.D., a neurology research instructor at the ADRC. "Early detection of Alzheimer's disease is important as we progress toward treatments and cures because those treatments will need to be applied as early as possible to have the maximum possible benefit."
In an earlier study of patients with a form of Alzheimer's disease linked to a genetic mutation, Roe and other Washington University researchers found patients with more years of education were likely to be diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease earlier. This surprised them because higher levels of education have typically been associated with decreased risk of Alzheimer's disease.
The new study confirmed those surprising results, revealing that patients with 12 years or more of schooling were on average slightly younger when diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease than patients with less than eight years of schooling. Age of diagnosis for a group with eight to 11 years of schooling fell in-between the other two groups.
Next, researchers analyzed the severity of patients' dementia when they went to the Alzheimer's disease center for the first time. They found that patients with fewer years of education were likely to be more severely impaired on their first visit.
Alzheimer's disease is cumulatively disabling: The longer one has it, the worse the symptoms become. This suggested to the researchers that those with lower education levels may be slower to notice the early signs of disease, only going to see a specialist after their symptoms become impossible to ignore. Those with more education may be becoming aware of their symptoms while they are still relatively subtle, and seek a specialists' help early on in the disease process.
"People with higher education levels may be more likely to have a job or a hobby that highlights early cognitive impairment as well as better access to medical care," Roe says. "These could be factors that we need to incorporate into our procedures for screening patients for early signs of cognitive
Friday, January 25, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/25/08
Headlines of the day
Chess game erupts in gunfire in Greensburg (Pittsburg Tribune Review)
Our opponent employed the Nimzovitch Indian Defense. We responded with the Straight Out of Compton Gambit.
Live frog in lettuce stuns mom (NY Daily News)
Did he use a Taser or Nunchuks?
A study claims to show that lonely people tend to believe in God. It was designed and conducted by an over-educated little man who decided it was ok to play God. The moron admits he tried to make the subjects “feel lonely.” Well, if it was for science, what harm could it do?
Lonely people more likely to believe in God
Study: Those who feel isolated try to create social connections elsewhere
People who feel lonely are more likely to believe in the supernatural, whether that is God, angels or miracles, a new study finds.
Humans have evolved as social creatures, so loneliness cuts to the quick. Living in groups was critical to the survival and safety of our ancient ancestors, and "complete isolation or ostracism has been tantamount to a death sentence," said University of Chicago researcher Nicholas Epley, who led the study.
While group living isn't critical to survival in the modern world, feeling socially connected is. Feeling isolated and lonely is a very painful emotional state for people, Epley said, and can lead to ill health, both physically and mentally.
"Being socially isolated is just not good for you," he said.
Seeking connections
When people feel lonely, they may try to rekindle old friendships, seek out new ones or, as Epley's study suggests, they may create social connections by anthropomorphizing nearby gadgets, such as computers or cars, pets, or by believing in supernatural events or religious figures.
In their study, detailed in the February issue of the journal Psychological Science, Epley's team tried to induce feelings of loneliness in people to see how it affected how they thought of pets and their belief in religious figures.
In one experiment, college undergraduates were shown movie clips and told to try and empathize with the protagonist as best they could, in order to set them in one of three emotional states.
One group was shown a clip from "Cast Away," the movie in which the main character played by Tom Hanks is deserted on a remote island, in order to induce a feeling of isolation. The second group was shown a clip from the crime thriller "The Silence of the Lambs" to promote a sense of fear. A third, control group was shown a clip from the sports comedy feature film "Major League."
All three groups were then asked to describe a pet they owned or knew well and pick three traits from a list that best described them. The list included anthropomorphic traits that related to social connections (thoughtful, sympathetic) and simple behavioral descriptions (aggressive, energetic, fearful).
Believing in the supernatural
Participants from the loneliness group were more likely to describe the pet using the anthropomorphic descriptions than those in the fear or control groups.
All three groups were also asked to rate their belief in ghosts, angels, the devil, miracles, curses, and God, and again, those in the loneliness group reported stronger belief in these supernatural agents.
In another part of their study, Epley and his colleagues asked participants from the University of Chicago to fill out a personality questionnaire and were then told that the answers would be fed to a computer which would generate a future-life prediction for them. Half of the participants were read statements implying they would be lonely later in life, while the other half were told they would be socially connected for the rest of their lives.
"We tried to manipulate their loneliness, to make them feel lonely," Epley said.
The participants were then asked to rate their belief in the same supernatural agents in the other study, and those in the "lonely group" reported stronger belief than those in the "connected group." The results were also compared to ratings the participants gave before they got their life predictions, and those who reported a belief in God before and were made to feel lonely reported a stronger belief after the experiment.
"We found that inducing people to feel lonely made them more religious essentially," Epley told LiveScience, though he notes it won't cause any sudden conversions.
Owning pets and religious beliefs and practices are both known to increase a person's sense of well-being, but why exactly that is isn’t well known, Epley said.
Epley and his colleagues plan to probe the issue further to see if anthropomorphizing pets or believing in anthropomorphized supernatural agents is what is responsible for alleviating feelings of loneliness. If it is, it could provide alternate means for people to feel socially connected when connecting to humans isn't an option.
"There are health benefits that come from being connected to other people, and those same benefits seem to come from connection with pets and with religious agents, too," Epley said.
“Gee, thanks Dr. Mengele. You smart people are all right.”
“My memory skills? Well as a young chimp I spent a lot of time watching “The Banana Splits Show.” It had this theme song about “one banana, two banana,” you know. And that’s how it all started.”
I'm the chimpion! Ape trounces the best of the human world in memory competition
by FIONA MACRAE The Daily Mail
When scientists found out that chimps had better memories than students, there were unkind comments about the calibre of the human competition they faced.
But now an ape has gone one better, trouncing British memory champion Ben Pridmore.
Ayumu, a seven-year-old male brought up in captivity in Japan, did three times as well as Mr Pridmore at a computer game which involved remembering the position of numbers on a screen.
And that's no mean feat - the 30-year-old accountant from Derby is capable of memorising the order of a shuffled pack of cards in under 30 seconds. Both chimp and man watched a computer screen on which five numbers flashed up at various positions before being obscured by white squares.
They then had to touch the squares in order of the numbers they concealed, from lowest to highest. When the numbers were shown for just a fifth of a second - the blink of an eye - Ayumu got it right almost 90 per cent of the time.
His human opponent scored a rather less impressive 33 per cent, Channel Five programme Extraordinary Animals will reveal.
Mr Pridmore, who spends his evenings memorising 400-digit numbers, ruefully acknowledged that he had met his match.
Ben Pridmore can memorise the order of a pack of cards in 30 seconds - but was beaten by a chimp
"I'd rather not be seen on TV doing worse than a chimpanzee in a memory-test," he said. "I'll never live it down!"
The TV tests follow scientific experiments which pitted Ayumu, along with several other young chimps, against a group of university students.
Ayumu was the clear champion, doing twice as well as the humans.
It is thought that young chimps are blessed with photographic memories, allowing them to remember patterns and sequences with amazing accuracy.
Professor Tetsuro Matsuzawa, the Kyoto University researcher behind both sets of experiments, said: "People still believe that humans are superior to chimpanzees in any domain of intelligence.
"That is the prejudice of the people.
"Chimpanzees can be clever in a specific task in comparison to humans."
We bet they think their findings are shocking. These yokels really have to get out more.
Healthy food not available to poor
LOUISVILLE, Ky., Jan. 25 (UPI) -- Researchers in several U.S. cities are discovering that low-income residents aren't entirely at fault for purchasing mostly junk and prepared fast-foods.
Studies conducted by health professionals indicate that supermarkets in poorer neighborhoods are more likely to stock Twinkies than fresh fruit and vegetables, USA Today reported Friday.
Chicago-based researcher Mari Gallagher says poor eating habits can result from a lack of supermarkets with fresh produce, combined with low car ownership, an abundance of fast-food restaurants and high-priced convenience stores.
Gallagher's firm has been studying how neighborhood layout affects health in cities including Detroit, Chicago and Louisville, Ky.
"It's very difficult for people to change their behaviors if they don't have an environment in which to make that change" said Ana Diez-Roux, a researcher at the University of Michigan School of Public Health.
In Louisville, officials are working to bring about change with the establishment of a food security task force.
The group is looking at a number of strategies including offering small stores incentives to carry fresh produce and attracting farmers markets to lower-income neighborhoods.
"It's very difficult for people to change their behaviors if they don't have an environment in which to make that change" said Ana Diez-Roux, a researcher at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. As an entrepreneur I knew once told me, “Hey, you go with what you know.” And he didn’t even have a hyphen in his last name.
Chess game erupts in gunfire in Greensburg (Pittsburg Tribune Review)
Our opponent employed the Nimzovitch Indian Defense. We responded with the Straight Out of Compton Gambit.
Live frog in lettuce stuns mom (NY Daily News)
Did he use a Taser or Nunchuks?
A study claims to show that lonely people tend to believe in God. It was designed and conducted by an over-educated little man who decided it was ok to play God. The moron admits he tried to make the subjects “feel lonely.” Well, if it was for science, what harm could it do?
Lonely people more likely to believe in God
Study: Those who feel isolated try to create social connections elsewhere
People who feel lonely are more likely to believe in the supernatural, whether that is God, angels or miracles, a new study finds.
Humans have evolved as social creatures, so loneliness cuts to the quick. Living in groups was critical to the survival and safety of our ancient ancestors, and "complete isolation or ostracism has been tantamount to a death sentence," said University of Chicago researcher Nicholas Epley, who led the study.
While group living isn't critical to survival in the modern world, feeling socially connected is. Feeling isolated and lonely is a very painful emotional state for people, Epley said, and can lead to ill health, both physically and mentally.
"Being socially isolated is just not good for you," he said.
Seeking connections
When people feel lonely, they may try to rekindle old friendships, seek out new ones or, as Epley's study suggests, they may create social connections by anthropomorphizing nearby gadgets, such as computers or cars, pets, or by believing in supernatural events or religious figures.
In their study, detailed in the February issue of the journal Psychological Science, Epley's team tried to induce feelings of loneliness in people to see how it affected how they thought of pets and their belief in religious figures.
In one experiment, college undergraduates were shown movie clips and told to try and empathize with the protagonist as best they could, in order to set them in one of three emotional states.
One group was shown a clip from "Cast Away," the movie in which the main character played by Tom Hanks is deserted on a remote island, in order to induce a feeling of isolation. The second group was shown a clip from the crime thriller "The Silence of the Lambs" to promote a sense of fear. A third, control group was shown a clip from the sports comedy feature film "Major League."
All three groups were then asked to describe a pet they owned or knew well and pick three traits from a list that best described them. The list included anthropomorphic traits that related to social connections (thoughtful, sympathetic) and simple behavioral descriptions (aggressive, energetic, fearful).
Believing in the supernatural
Participants from the loneliness group were more likely to describe the pet using the anthropomorphic descriptions than those in the fear or control groups.
All three groups were also asked to rate their belief in ghosts, angels, the devil, miracles, curses, and God, and again, those in the loneliness group reported stronger belief in these supernatural agents.
In another part of their study, Epley and his colleagues asked participants from the University of Chicago to fill out a personality questionnaire and were then told that the answers would be fed to a computer which would generate a future-life prediction for them. Half of the participants were read statements implying they would be lonely later in life, while the other half were told they would be socially connected for the rest of their lives.
"We tried to manipulate their loneliness, to make them feel lonely," Epley said.
The participants were then asked to rate their belief in the same supernatural agents in the other study, and those in the "lonely group" reported stronger belief than those in the "connected group." The results were also compared to ratings the participants gave before they got their life predictions, and those who reported a belief in God before and were made to feel lonely reported a stronger belief after the experiment.
"We found that inducing people to feel lonely made them more religious essentially," Epley told LiveScience, though he notes it won't cause any sudden conversions.
Owning pets and religious beliefs and practices are both known to increase a person's sense of well-being, but why exactly that is isn’t well known, Epley said.
Epley and his colleagues plan to probe the issue further to see if anthropomorphizing pets or believing in anthropomorphized supernatural agents is what is responsible for alleviating feelings of loneliness. If it is, it could provide alternate means for people to feel socially connected when connecting to humans isn't an option.
"There are health benefits that come from being connected to other people, and those same benefits seem to come from connection with pets and with religious agents, too," Epley said.
“Gee, thanks Dr. Mengele. You smart people are all right.”
“My memory skills? Well as a young chimp I spent a lot of time watching “The Banana Splits Show.” It had this theme song about “one banana, two banana,” you know. And that’s how it all started.”
I'm the chimpion! Ape trounces the best of the human world in memory competition
by FIONA MACRAE The Daily Mail
When scientists found out that chimps had better memories than students, there were unkind comments about the calibre of the human competition they faced.
But now an ape has gone one better, trouncing British memory champion Ben Pridmore.
Ayumu, a seven-year-old male brought up in captivity in Japan, did three times as well as Mr Pridmore at a computer game which involved remembering the position of numbers on a screen.
And that's no mean feat - the 30-year-old accountant from Derby is capable of memorising the order of a shuffled pack of cards in under 30 seconds. Both chimp and man watched a computer screen on which five numbers flashed up at various positions before being obscured by white squares.
They then had to touch the squares in order of the numbers they concealed, from lowest to highest. When the numbers were shown for just a fifth of a second - the blink of an eye - Ayumu got it right almost 90 per cent of the time.
His human opponent scored a rather less impressive 33 per cent, Channel Five programme Extraordinary Animals will reveal.
Mr Pridmore, who spends his evenings memorising 400-digit numbers, ruefully acknowledged that he had met his match.
Ben Pridmore can memorise the order of a pack of cards in 30 seconds - but was beaten by a chimp
"I'd rather not be seen on TV doing worse than a chimpanzee in a memory-test," he said. "I'll never live it down!"
The TV tests follow scientific experiments which pitted Ayumu, along with several other young chimps, against a group of university students.
Ayumu was the clear champion, doing twice as well as the humans.
It is thought that young chimps are blessed with photographic memories, allowing them to remember patterns and sequences with amazing accuracy.
Professor Tetsuro Matsuzawa, the Kyoto University researcher behind both sets of experiments, said: "People still believe that humans are superior to chimpanzees in any domain of intelligence.
"That is the prejudice of the people.
"Chimpanzees can be clever in a specific task in comparison to humans."
We bet they think their findings are shocking. These yokels really have to get out more.
Healthy food not available to poor
LOUISVILLE, Ky., Jan. 25 (UPI) -- Researchers in several U.S. cities are discovering that low-income residents aren't entirely at fault for purchasing mostly junk and prepared fast-foods.
Studies conducted by health professionals indicate that supermarkets in poorer neighborhoods are more likely to stock Twinkies than fresh fruit and vegetables, USA Today reported Friday.
Chicago-based researcher Mari Gallagher says poor eating habits can result from a lack of supermarkets with fresh produce, combined with low car ownership, an abundance of fast-food restaurants and high-priced convenience stores.
Gallagher's firm has been studying how neighborhood layout affects health in cities including Detroit, Chicago and Louisville, Ky.
"It's very difficult for people to change their behaviors if they don't have an environment in which to make that change" said Ana Diez-Roux, a researcher at the University of Michigan School of Public Health.
In Louisville, officials are working to bring about change with the establishment of a food security task force.
The group is looking at a number of strategies including offering small stores incentives to carry fresh produce and attracting farmers markets to lower-income neighborhoods.
"It's very difficult for people to change their behaviors if they don't have an environment in which to make that change" said Ana Diez-Roux, a researcher at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. As an entrepreneur I knew once told me, “Hey, you go with what you know.” And he didn’t even have a hyphen in his last name.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/24/08
Headlines of the day
Police: Coroner stole gift cards from dead (WSB/CNN)
Nursing home worker takes wedding ring ( KMGH/)
Humans, ain't they special?
It’s not really life, just a nutritious cheese-like substitute
US scientists close to creating artificial life: study (Breitbart)
US scientists have taken a major step toward creating the first ever artificial life form by synthetically reproducing the DNA of a bacteria, according to a study published Thursday.
The move, which comes after five years of research, is seen as the penultimate stage in the endeavour to create an artificial life form based entirely on a man-made DNA genome -- something which has tantalised scientists and sci-fi writers for years.
"Through dedicated teamwork we have shown that building large genomes is now feasible and scalable so that important applications such as biofuels can be developed," said Hamilton Smith, from the J. Craig Venter Institute, in the study published in Science.
The research has been carried out at the laboratories of the controversial celebrity US scientist Craig Venter, who has hailed artificial life forms as a potential remedy to illness and global warming.
However, the prospect of engineering artificial life forms is highly controversial and is likely to arouse heated debate over the ethics and potential ramifications of such an advance.
It is one of the Holy Grails of science, but also one that stirs deep fears as forseen in Aldous Huxley's 1932 novel "Brave New World" in which natural human reproduction is eschewed in favor of babies grown artificially in laboratories.
Venter said in a statement: "This extraordinary accomplishment is a technological marvel that was only made possible because of the unique and accomplished ... team."
His researchers had "dedicated the last several years to designing and perfecting new methods and techniques that we believe will become widely used to advance the field of synthetic genomics," he added.
Lead author Dan Gibson said the team had completed the second step in a three-step process to create a synthetic organism.
In the final stage of their research which they are already working on, the Maryland-based team will attempt to create a bacteria based purely on the synthetic genome sequence of the Mycoplasma genitalium bacteria.
The bacteria, which causes certain sexually transmitted diseases, has one of the least complex DNA structures of any life form, composed of just 580 genes.
In contrast, the human genome has some 30,000.
The chromosome which Venter and his team has created is known as Mycoplasma laboratorium and, in the final step of the process, will be transplanted into a living cell where it should "take control," effectively becoming a new life form.
The new bacteria will therefore be largely artificial, though not entirely, because it is composed of building blocks from already existing organisms.
"When we started this work several years ago, we knew it was going to be difficult because we were treading into unknown territory," said Smith.
But other scientists remain cautious, saying Venter and his team are still a long way from being able to create artificial life. They point to a tell-tale footnote in the study which details a problem in slotting in one of the cloned genes.
Eckard Wimmer, professor of molecular biology at New York University, said it was clear from Venter's study that the team had not yet created artificial life.
He said he was left with "the unpleasant feeling whether or not the synthetic DNA was indeed proper and able for biological function."
His fears were echoed by Helen Wallace, a biologist and spokesperson for GeneWatch UK, who said that while Venter's team has managed a technical feat, it is some way from being artificial life.
"Venter is not God ... He's a long way from creating life," she told AFP.
"It's a type of genetic engineering which would allow people to make much bigger genetic changes, which means that in the future you could create organisms with new gene sequences
"We wouldn't play God and you can trust us on that."
“Do you have any grey poupon?”
Captive Carnivores Not Up To Wild Living
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — A study by the University of Exeter has highlighted the problems of reintroducing animals to the wild for conservation projects. The research highlights the low survival rates of captive carnivores that are released into their natural habitats. On average only one in three captive-born carnivores survives in the wild, with most deaths related to human activities.
Recent high-profile conservation projects have involved reintroducing wolves into the Scottish Highlands, bringing red kites back to England and reintroducing golden lion tamarins to Brazil. Most of these animals were born in captivity, with zoos playing a major role in such projects, while other schemes involve moving wild animals to new areas.
This study reviewed 45 case studies, involving 17 carnivore species, and found that only 30% of captive animals released survived. Over half the deaths were caused by humans in incidents such as shootings and car accidents. The animals were also more susceptible to starvation and disease than their wild counterparts and less able to form successful social groups.
Kristen Jule, lead author on the paper* and University of Exeter PhD student, says: "Animals in captivity do not usually have the natural behaviours needed for success in the wild. Their lack of hunting skills and their lack of fear towards humans, for example, are major disadvantages. We have suspected for some time that captive born animals fared less well than wild animals, but here it is finally quantified, and the extent of the problem is critical."
The research team highlights the need for these projects to be reassessed so that animals are better prepared for living in their natural environment. This could include reducing contact with humans, creating opportunities for hunting and encouraging the formation of natural social groups, while the animals are still in captivity. The research also raised the need for long-term monitoring of released animals, so that success could be measured over several years. In addition, the paper points to the need for engagement with local communities before any reintroduction, especially as most carnivore extinctions were originally caused through conflict between animals and humans.
Kristen Jule continued: "Despite the problems raised in our research, I believe reintroduction projects are vital to conservation efforts. In some cases, the animals being released no longer exist in the wild because of human development or conflict. If we are to try and redress the balance, it's important for us to help provide captive born animals with the opportunity to gain the skills that they will need to survive in the wild. The next step is for scientists, conservationists and animal welfare groups to develop guidelines to help captive animals prepare for a new life in the wild."
*This research is published online in the journal Biological Conservation.
‘What, no toilet paper? This is not how I was raised.”
We’re not saying nuthin’
Study finds woman have thicker skulls
DEARBORN, Mich., Jan. 24 (UPI) -- U.S. and Chinese scientists have determined women have thicker skulls than do men.
Researchers from the Ford Motor Co. and Tianjin University of Science and Technology created a non-invasive method of measuring geometric characteristics of the human skull. They then examined head scan images of 3,000 patients at the Tianjin Fourth central Hospital in China.
The scientists found the average thickness of women's skulls is 7.1 millimeters -- nine percent greater than the average of 6.5 millimeters for men. Men, however, have skulls that are three percent greater in front-to-back distance, and four percent wider than the skulls of women.
The researchers also determined the skulls of both women and men shrink slowly after reaching adulthood.
The scientists said their findings will help in the design of devices that more effectively protect the head during vehicle collisions and other accidents.
"The next step will be to find out how these differences translate into head impact response of male and female, and then we can design the countermeasure for head protection," said Jesse Ruan, a Ford biomechanics researcher.
Breaking news: Science proves that kids can play one parent against the other. Film at 11.
One Out Of Four Children Involved In A Divorce Undergoes Parental Alienation Syndrome
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — One out of four children involved in a divorce and custody litigation undergoes the so-called Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), consisting of the manipulation of children by the custodial parent, who incessantly tries to turn them against the other parent by arousing in them feelings of hatred and contempt for the target parent, as explained in the book Marital Conflicts, Divorce, and Children’s Development by professors José Cantón Duarte, Mª Rosario Cortés Arboleda, and Mª Dolores Justicia Díaz, from the Department of Evolutionary and Educational Psychology of the University of Granada.
In the 1980’s, PAS was defined by scientist Richard Gardner of Columbia University. Men are usually the target parent, since in most cases the mother has custody of the child.
According to Mª Rosario Cortés, “the so-called alienating parent is the one who has custody and uses it to brainwash the child, turning him or her against the alienated parent”. In most cases, the process is very subtle the custodial parent stating such things as “if I just told you some more things about your father/mother…”, or by making the child feel sorry for “abandoning” every time he or she visits the alienated parent.
As pointed out by the group of researchers of the University of Granada, there are many other factors which influence PAS apart from the unacceptable attitude of the custodial parent, such as children’s psychological vulnerability, the character and behaviour of parents, dynamics among brothers, or the existing conflicts between the two divorced parents. Very often children not only reject their father, but also his family and close friends. Grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins, and the new partner of the non-custodial parent are also affected by this syndrome, and children undergoing PAS can even “expel them from their life.”
Symptoms
Among other symptoms, Professor Cortés points out that children tend to find continual justifications for the alienating parent’s attitude. They denigrate the target parent, relate negative feelings unambivalently towards that parent, deny being influenced by anyone (pleading responsibility for their attitude), feel no guilt for denigrating the alienated parent, or recount events which were not experienced but rather came from listening to others.
The authors of Marital Conflicts, Divorce, and Children’s Development, which was first published in Spanish in 2000 and is coming soon in a new updated edition, state that PAS is more frequent among children aged 9 to 12 than among teenagers, and that there are no relevant gender differences in PAS.
According to Mª Rosario Cortés, the Parental Alienation Syndrome occurs most frequently in cases where parents are involved in divorce litigation, while it is not usual when the decision to seek divorce is mutual. The professor of the UGR underlines that in every case of SAP, “the family must be provided with a family-mediation programme for equal treatment of all members affected by this problem, which is increasingly more frequent.”
“We call it “Parental Alienation Syndrome” because you really can’t be considered a social scientist until you have given a common occurrence a pretentious name.”
Police: Coroner stole gift cards from dead (WSB/CNN)
Nursing home worker takes wedding ring ( KMGH/)
Humans, ain't they special?
It’s not really life, just a nutritious cheese-like substitute
US scientists close to creating artificial life: study (Breitbart)
US scientists have taken a major step toward creating the first ever artificial life form by synthetically reproducing the DNA of a bacteria, according to a study published Thursday.
The move, which comes after five years of research, is seen as the penultimate stage in the endeavour to create an artificial life form based entirely on a man-made DNA genome -- something which has tantalised scientists and sci-fi writers for years.
"Through dedicated teamwork we have shown that building large genomes is now feasible and scalable so that important applications such as biofuels can be developed," said Hamilton Smith, from the J. Craig Venter Institute, in the study published in Science.
The research has been carried out at the laboratories of the controversial celebrity US scientist Craig Venter, who has hailed artificial life forms as a potential remedy to illness and global warming.
However, the prospect of engineering artificial life forms is highly controversial and is likely to arouse heated debate over the ethics and potential ramifications of such an advance.
It is one of the Holy Grails of science, but also one that stirs deep fears as forseen in Aldous Huxley's 1932 novel "Brave New World" in which natural human reproduction is eschewed in favor of babies grown artificially in laboratories.
Venter said in a statement: "This extraordinary accomplishment is a technological marvel that was only made possible because of the unique and accomplished ... team."
His researchers had "dedicated the last several years to designing and perfecting new methods and techniques that we believe will become widely used to advance the field of synthetic genomics," he added.
Lead author Dan Gibson said the team had completed the second step in a three-step process to create a synthetic organism.
In the final stage of their research which they are already working on, the Maryland-based team will attempt to create a bacteria based purely on the synthetic genome sequence of the Mycoplasma genitalium bacteria.
The bacteria, which causes certain sexually transmitted diseases, has one of the least complex DNA structures of any life form, composed of just 580 genes.
In contrast, the human genome has some 30,000.
The chromosome which Venter and his team has created is known as Mycoplasma laboratorium and, in the final step of the process, will be transplanted into a living cell where it should "take control," effectively becoming a new life form.
The new bacteria will therefore be largely artificial, though not entirely, because it is composed of building blocks from already existing organisms.
"When we started this work several years ago, we knew it was going to be difficult because we were treading into unknown territory," said Smith.
But other scientists remain cautious, saying Venter and his team are still a long way from being able to create artificial life. They point to a tell-tale footnote in the study which details a problem in slotting in one of the cloned genes.
Eckard Wimmer, professor of molecular biology at New York University, said it was clear from Venter's study that the team had not yet created artificial life.
He said he was left with "the unpleasant feeling whether or not the synthetic DNA was indeed proper and able for biological function."
His fears were echoed by Helen Wallace, a biologist and spokesperson for GeneWatch UK, who said that while Venter's team has managed a technical feat, it is some way from being artificial life.
"Venter is not God ... He's a long way from creating life," she told AFP.
"It's a type of genetic engineering which would allow people to make much bigger genetic changes, which means that in the future you could create organisms with new gene sequences
"We wouldn't play God and you can trust us on that."
“Do you have any grey poupon?”
Captive Carnivores Not Up To Wild Living
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — A study by the University of Exeter has highlighted the problems of reintroducing animals to the wild for conservation projects. The research highlights the low survival rates of captive carnivores that are released into their natural habitats. On average only one in three captive-born carnivores survives in the wild, with most deaths related to human activities.
Recent high-profile conservation projects have involved reintroducing wolves into the Scottish Highlands, bringing red kites back to England and reintroducing golden lion tamarins to Brazil. Most of these animals were born in captivity, with zoos playing a major role in such projects, while other schemes involve moving wild animals to new areas.
This study reviewed 45 case studies, involving 17 carnivore species, and found that only 30% of captive animals released survived. Over half the deaths were caused by humans in incidents such as shootings and car accidents. The animals were also more susceptible to starvation and disease than their wild counterparts and less able to form successful social groups.
Kristen Jule, lead author on the paper* and University of Exeter PhD student, says: "Animals in captivity do not usually have the natural behaviours needed for success in the wild. Their lack of hunting skills and their lack of fear towards humans, for example, are major disadvantages. We have suspected for some time that captive born animals fared less well than wild animals, but here it is finally quantified, and the extent of the problem is critical."
The research team highlights the need for these projects to be reassessed so that animals are better prepared for living in their natural environment. This could include reducing contact with humans, creating opportunities for hunting and encouraging the formation of natural social groups, while the animals are still in captivity. The research also raised the need for long-term monitoring of released animals, so that success could be measured over several years. In addition, the paper points to the need for engagement with local communities before any reintroduction, especially as most carnivore extinctions were originally caused through conflict between animals and humans.
Kristen Jule continued: "Despite the problems raised in our research, I believe reintroduction projects are vital to conservation efforts. In some cases, the animals being released no longer exist in the wild because of human development or conflict. If we are to try and redress the balance, it's important for us to help provide captive born animals with the opportunity to gain the skills that they will need to survive in the wild. The next step is for scientists, conservationists and animal welfare groups to develop guidelines to help captive animals prepare for a new life in the wild."
*This research is published online in the journal Biological Conservation.
‘What, no toilet paper? This is not how I was raised.”
We’re not saying nuthin’
Study finds woman have thicker skulls
DEARBORN, Mich., Jan. 24 (UPI) -- U.S. and Chinese scientists have determined women have thicker skulls than do men.
Researchers from the Ford Motor Co. and Tianjin University of Science and Technology created a non-invasive method of measuring geometric characteristics of the human skull. They then examined head scan images of 3,000 patients at the Tianjin Fourth central Hospital in China.
The scientists found the average thickness of women's skulls is 7.1 millimeters -- nine percent greater than the average of 6.5 millimeters for men. Men, however, have skulls that are three percent greater in front-to-back distance, and four percent wider than the skulls of women.
The researchers also determined the skulls of both women and men shrink slowly after reaching adulthood.
The scientists said their findings will help in the design of devices that more effectively protect the head during vehicle collisions and other accidents.
"The next step will be to find out how these differences translate into head impact response of male and female, and then we can design the countermeasure for head protection," said Jesse Ruan, a Ford biomechanics researcher.
Breaking news: Science proves that kids can play one parent against the other. Film at 11.
One Out Of Four Children Involved In A Divorce Undergoes Parental Alienation Syndrome
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — One out of four children involved in a divorce and custody litigation undergoes the so-called Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), consisting of the manipulation of children by the custodial parent, who incessantly tries to turn them against the other parent by arousing in them feelings of hatred and contempt for the target parent, as explained in the book Marital Conflicts, Divorce, and Children’s Development by professors José Cantón Duarte, Mª Rosario Cortés Arboleda, and Mª Dolores Justicia Díaz, from the Department of Evolutionary and Educational Psychology of the University of Granada.
In the 1980’s, PAS was defined by scientist Richard Gardner of Columbia University. Men are usually the target parent, since in most cases the mother has custody of the child.
According to Mª Rosario Cortés, “the so-called alienating parent is the one who has custody and uses it to brainwash the child, turning him or her against the alienated parent”. In most cases, the process is very subtle the custodial parent stating such things as “if I just told you some more things about your father/mother…”, or by making the child feel sorry for “abandoning” every time he or she visits the alienated parent.
As pointed out by the group of researchers of the University of Granada, there are many other factors which influence PAS apart from the unacceptable attitude of the custodial parent, such as children’s psychological vulnerability, the character and behaviour of parents, dynamics among brothers, or the existing conflicts between the two divorced parents. Very often children not only reject their father, but also his family and close friends. Grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins, and the new partner of the non-custodial parent are also affected by this syndrome, and children undergoing PAS can even “expel them from their life.”
Symptoms
Among other symptoms, Professor Cortés points out that children tend to find continual justifications for the alienating parent’s attitude. They denigrate the target parent, relate negative feelings unambivalently towards that parent, deny being influenced by anyone (pleading responsibility for their attitude), feel no guilt for denigrating the alienated parent, or recount events which were not experienced but rather came from listening to others.
The authors of Marital Conflicts, Divorce, and Children’s Development, which was first published in Spanish in 2000 and is coming soon in a new updated edition, state that PAS is more frequent among children aged 9 to 12 than among teenagers, and that there are no relevant gender differences in PAS.
According to Mª Rosario Cortés, the Parental Alienation Syndrome occurs most frequently in cases where parents are involved in divorce litigation, while it is not usual when the decision to seek divorce is mutual. The professor of the UGR underlines that in every case of SAP, “the family must be provided with a family-mediation programme for equal treatment of all members affected by this problem, which is increasingly more frequent.”
“We call it “Parental Alienation Syndrome” because you really can’t be considered a social scientist until you have given a common occurrence a pretentious name.”
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/23/08
Today’s headlines
For toilet museum, a final flush is avoided (The Boston Globe)
Bug foggers cause house explosion (The Galveston County Daily News)
Woman said she killed mom to go to jail, 'just read books' (Rocky Mountain News)
This is great news. Maybe Los Bravos will get back together
Blacker Than Black: Darkest Manmade Material Ever Made
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Rice University have created the darkest material ever made by man. The material, a thin coating comprised of low-density arrays of loosely vertically-aligned carbon nanotubes, absorbs more than 99.9 percent of light and one day could be used to boost the effectiveness and efficiency of solar energy conversion, infrared sensors, and other devices. The researchers who developed the material have applied for a Guinness World Record for their efforts.
"It is a fascinating technology, and this discovery will allow us to increase the absorption efficiency of light as well as the overall radiation-to-electricity efficiency of solar energy conservation," said Shawn-Yu Lin, professor of physics at Rensselaer and a member of the university's Future Chips Constellation, who led the research project. "The key to this discovery was finding how to create a long, extremely porous vertically-aligned carbon nanotube array with certain surface randomness, therefore minimizing reflection and maximizing absorption simultaneously."
All materials, from paper to water, air, or plastic, reflect some amount of light. Scientists have long envisioned an ideal black material that absorbs all the colors of light while reflecting no light. So far they have been unsuccessful in engineering a material with a total reflectance of zero.
The total reflectance of conventional black paint, for example, is between 5 and 10 percent. The darkest manmade material, prior to the discovery by Lin's group, boasted a total reflectance of 0.16 percent to 0.18 percent.
Lin's team created a coating of low-density, vertically aligned carbon nanotube arrays that are engineered to have an extremely low index of refraction and the appropriate surface randomness, further reducing its reflectivity. The end result was a material with a total reflective index of 0.045 percent -- more than three times darker than the previous record, which used a film deposition of nickel-phosphorous alloy.
"The loosely-packed forest of carbon nanotubes, which is full of nanoscale gaps and holes to collect and trap light, is what gives this material its unique properties," Lin said. "Such a nanotube array not only reflects light weakly, but also absorbs light strongly. These combined features make it an ideal candidate for one day realizing a super black object."
"The low-density aligned nanotube sample makes an ideal candidate for creating such a super dark material because it allows one to engineer the optical properties by controlling the dimensions and periodicities of the nanotubes," said Pulickel Ajayan, the Anderson Professor of Engineering at Rice University in Houston, who worked on the project when he was a member of the Rensselaer faculty.
The research team tested the array over a broad range of visible wavelengths of light, and showed that the nanotube array's total reflectance remains constant.
"It's also interesting to note that the reflectance of our nanotube array is two orders of magnitude lower than that of the glassy carbon, which is remarkable because both samples are made up of the same element -- carbon," said Lin.
This discovery could lead to applications in areas such as solar energy conversion, thermalphotovoltaic electricity generation, infrared detection, and astronomical observation.
Other researchers contributing to this project and listed authors of the paper include Rensselaer physics graduate student Zu-Po Yang; Rice postdoctoral research associate Lijie Ci; and Rensselaer senior research scientist James Bur.
The project was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Basic Energy Sciences and the Focus Center New York for Interconnects.
Lin's research was conducted as part of the Future Chips Constellation at Rensselaer, which focuses on innovations in materials and devices, in solid state and smart lighting, and applications such as sensing, communications, and biotechnology. A new concept in academia, Rensselaer constellations are led by outstanding faculty in fields of strategic importance. Each constellation is focused on a specific research area and comprises a multidisciplinary mix of senior and junior faculty, as well as postdoctoral researchers and graduate students.
Somehow, the words lizard and gender shouldn’t be used together
Global warming might affect lizard gender
AMES, Iowa, Jan. 23 (UPI) -- A U.S. researcher has discovered egg incubation temperatures have an affect on Australian reptiles.
Iowa State University biologist Dan Warner spent four years in Australia studying the "jacky dragon" lizard to discover if egg incubation temperature and gender affects the viability of the lizards.
In mammals, gender is determined by the chromosomes an embryo inherits from the father. But in some reptiles, gender is determined by temperatures the embryos experience.
Warner tracked male and female lizards born at different temperatures and measured how well they reproduced. In the "jacky dragon," males are born at around 77 to 86 degrees Fahrenheit, while females are born at temperatures both above and below that range. Because some temperatures only produce one gender, Warner had to reverse the sex of some of the embryos using hormones.
Warner discovered "jacky dragons" thrive when they are born at the right temperatures for their gender. He found both males and females reproduce more when exposed to the correct egg incubation temperatures.
He said his findings might have grave consequences for the species if temperatures increase in the parts of Australia where the lizards live.
The study appears in the journal Nature.
It’s dark. We’re sad. No one loves us. Got any ice cream?
Seasonal Weight Changes Linked To Metabolic Syndrome
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — Seasonal changes in weight increase the risk for metabolic syndrome, a group of scientists from National Public Health Institute, Helsinki, Finland.
This finding was based on analysis of 8,028 individuals, representative of the general population aged over 30, who attended a nationwide health examination survey.
According to the current study, individuals with metabolic syndrome have more seasonal changes in their mood and behavior. The study concludes that the seasonal changes in weight in particular are linked to metabolic syndrome.
With people having the 'winter blues' the risk of metabolic syndrome is heightened by 56 per cent. The negative effect of the seasonal changes equals to the protective effect against metabolic syndrome gained with regular physical exercise.
Because of easy assessment the scoring of seasonal changes in weight might be taken as a routine part of health status examination in persons being at risk of or currently having metabolic syndrome. If there were these changes, treatment options including scheduled exposures to light and regular physical exercise need to be considered.
"Disruption of circadian rhythms has been implicated in the pathogenesis of metabolic disorders. Our results give support to the hypothesized links between the metabolic and circadian cycles generated and guided by the circadian clock", says Timo Partonen, MD, academy research fellow of the group. "Our findings herein now extend these links to include relationships between the metabolic and seasonal fluctuations."
The current findings now suggest that abnormalities in the circadian clockwork predispose to seasonal changes in weight and to metabolic syndrome. This means that the circadian clockwork may well be a key to public health.
Obesity is an increasing problem concerning public health. High caloric intake or low physical exercise for example may lead not only to obesity but also to hypertension, insulin resistance and abnormal circulating lipid levels. These abnormalities tend to coincide and contribute to the term metabolic syndrome.
They laugh alike, they walk alike, At times they even talk alike—
You can lose your mind
Genome Scan Shows Polynesians Have Little Genetic Relationship To Melanesians
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — The origins and current genetic relationships of Pacific Islanders have generated interest and controversy for many decades. Now, a new comprehensive genetic study of almost 1,000 individuals has revealed that Polynesians and Micronesians have almost no genetic relation to Melanesians, and that groups that live in the islands of Melanesia are remarkably diverse.
The researchers analyzed more than 800 genetic markers (highly informative microsatellites) in nearly 1,000 individuals from 41 Pacific populations, as opposed to prior small-scale mitochondrial DNA or Y chromosome studies, which had produced conflicting results.
"The first settlers of Australia, New Guinea, and the large islands just to the east arrived between 50,000 and 30,000 years ago, when Neanderthals still roamed Europe," says Jonathan Friedlaender, professor emeritus of anthropology at Temple and the study's lead author. "These small groups were isolated and became extremely diverse during the following tens of thousands of years. Then, a little more than 3,000 years ago, the ancestors of the Polynesians and Micronesians, with their excellent sailing outrigger canoes, appeared in the islands of Melanesia, and during the following centuries settled the islands in the vast unknown regions of the central and eastern Pacific.
"Over the last 20 years there have been many hypotheses concerning where the ancestors of the Polynesians came from in Asia, how long it took them to develop their special seafaring abilities in Island Melanesia, and how much they interacted with the native Melanesian peoples there before they commenced their remarkable Diaspora across the unexplored islands in the Pacific," he adds.
According to Friedlaender, one scenario called the 'fast train hypothesis,' which is supported by the mitochondrial evidence, suggests that ancestors of the Polynesians originated in Taiwan, moved through Indonesia to Island Melanesia, and then out into the unknown islands of the Pacific without having any significant contact with the Island Melanesians along the way.
A counter argument called 'slow boat hypothesis,' which the Y chromosome evidence supports, suggests that the ancestors of the Polynesians were primarily Melanesians, and that there was very little Asian or Taiwanese influence. A third position, called the "entangled bank hypothesis," suggests these ancient migrations simply can't be accurately reconstructed by looking at the genetics of today's populations, even in the context of the available archaeological evidence.
In their paper, the researchers state that their analysis is consistent with the scenario that the ancestors of Polynesians moved through Island Melanesia relatively rapidly and only intermixed to a very modest degree with the indigenous populations there.
"Our genetic analysis establishes that the Polynesians' and Micronesians' closest relationships are to Taiwan Aborigines and East Asians," says Friedlaender. "Some groups in Island Melanesia who speak languages related to Polynesian, called Austronesian or Oceanic languages, do show a small Polynesian genetic contribution, but it is very minor -- never more than 20 percent.
"There clearly was a lot of cultural and language influence that occurred, but the amount of genetic exchange between the groups along the way was remarkably low," he says. "From the genetic perspective, if the ancestral train from the Taiwan vicinity to Polynesia wasn't an express, very few passengers climbed aboard or got off along the way."
Friedlaender adds that this study also confirms and expands their findings from previous studies about the genetic diversity of Island Melanesians--among the most genetically diverse people on the planet, showing further that their diversity is neatly organized by island, island size, topography and language families.
Where’s that Kon Tiki guy when you need him? We bet he could sort this out.
For toilet museum, a final flush is avoided (The Boston Globe)
Bug foggers cause house explosion (The Galveston County Daily News)
Woman said she killed mom to go to jail, 'just read books' (Rocky Mountain News)
This is great news. Maybe Los Bravos will get back together
Blacker Than Black: Darkest Manmade Material Ever Made
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Rice University have created the darkest material ever made by man. The material, a thin coating comprised of low-density arrays of loosely vertically-aligned carbon nanotubes, absorbs more than 99.9 percent of light and one day could be used to boost the effectiveness and efficiency of solar energy conversion, infrared sensors, and other devices. The researchers who developed the material have applied for a Guinness World Record for their efforts.
"It is a fascinating technology, and this discovery will allow us to increase the absorption efficiency of light as well as the overall radiation-to-electricity efficiency of solar energy conservation," said Shawn-Yu Lin, professor of physics at Rensselaer and a member of the university's Future Chips Constellation, who led the research project. "The key to this discovery was finding how to create a long, extremely porous vertically-aligned carbon nanotube array with certain surface randomness, therefore minimizing reflection and maximizing absorption simultaneously."
All materials, from paper to water, air, or plastic, reflect some amount of light. Scientists have long envisioned an ideal black material that absorbs all the colors of light while reflecting no light. So far they have been unsuccessful in engineering a material with a total reflectance of zero.
The total reflectance of conventional black paint, for example, is between 5 and 10 percent. The darkest manmade material, prior to the discovery by Lin's group, boasted a total reflectance of 0.16 percent to 0.18 percent.
Lin's team created a coating of low-density, vertically aligned carbon nanotube arrays that are engineered to have an extremely low index of refraction and the appropriate surface randomness, further reducing its reflectivity. The end result was a material with a total reflective index of 0.045 percent -- more than three times darker than the previous record, which used a film deposition of nickel-phosphorous alloy.
"The loosely-packed forest of carbon nanotubes, which is full of nanoscale gaps and holes to collect and trap light, is what gives this material its unique properties," Lin said. "Such a nanotube array not only reflects light weakly, but also absorbs light strongly. These combined features make it an ideal candidate for one day realizing a super black object."
"The low-density aligned nanotube sample makes an ideal candidate for creating such a super dark material because it allows one to engineer the optical properties by controlling the dimensions and periodicities of the nanotubes," said Pulickel Ajayan, the Anderson Professor of Engineering at Rice University in Houston, who worked on the project when he was a member of the Rensselaer faculty.
The research team tested the array over a broad range of visible wavelengths of light, and showed that the nanotube array's total reflectance remains constant.
"It's also interesting to note that the reflectance of our nanotube array is two orders of magnitude lower than that of the glassy carbon, which is remarkable because both samples are made up of the same element -- carbon," said Lin.
This discovery could lead to applications in areas such as solar energy conversion, thermalphotovoltaic electricity generation, infrared detection, and astronomical observation.
Other researchers contributing to this project and listed authors of the paper include Rensselaer physics graduate student Zu-Po Yang; Rice postdoctoral research associate Lijie Ci; and Rensselaer senior research scientist James Bur.
The project was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Basic Energy Sciences and the Focus Center New York for Interconnects.
Lin's research was conducted as part of the Future Chips Constellation at Rensselaer, which focuses on innovations in materials and devices, in solid state and smart lighting, and applications such as sensing, communications, and biotechnology. A new concept in academia, Rensselaer constellations are led by outstanding faculty in fields of strategic importance. Each constellation is focused on a specific research area and comprises a multidisciplinary mix of senior and junior faculty, as well as postdoctoral researchers and graduate students.
Somehow, the words lizard and gender shouldn’t be used together
Global warming might affect lizard gender
AMES, Iowa, Jan. 23 (UPI) -- A U.S. researcher has discovered egg incubation temperatures have an affect on Australian reptiles.
Iowa State University biologist Dan Warner spent four years in Australia studying the "jacky dragon" lizard to discover if egg incubation temperature and gender affects the viability of the lizards.
In mammals, gender is determined by the chromosomes an embryo inherits from the father. But in some reptiles, gender is determined by temperatures the embryos experience.
Warner tracked male and female lizards born at different temperatures and measured how well they reproduced. In the "jacky dragon," males are born at around 77 to 86 degrees Fahrenheit, while females are born at temperatures both above and below that range. Because some temperatures only produce one gender, Warner had to reverse the sex of some of the embryos using hormones.
Warner discovered "jacky dragons" thrive when they are born at the right temperatures for their gender. He found both males and females reproduce more when exposed to the correct egg incubation temperatures.
He said his findings might have grave consequences for the species if temperatures increase in the parts of Australia where the lizards live.
The study appears in the journal Nature.
It’s dark. We’re sad. No one loves us. Got any ice cream?
Seasonal Weight Changes Linked To Metabolic Syndrome
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — Seasonal changes in weight increase the risk for metabolic syndrome, a group of scientists from National Public Health Institute, Helsinki, Finland.
This finding was based on analysis of 8,028 individuals, representative of the general population aged over 30, who attended a nationwide health examination survey.
According to the current study, individuals with metabolic syndrome have more seasonal changes in their mood and behavior. The study concludes that the seasonal changes in weight in particular are linked to metabolic syndrome.
With people having the 'winter blues' the risk of metabolic syndrome is heightened by 56 per cent. The negative effect of the seasonal changes equals to the protective effect against metabolic syndrome gained with regular physical exercise.
Because of easy assessment the scoring of seasonal changes in weight might be taken as a routine part of health status examination in persons being at risk of or currently having metabolic syndrome. If there were these changes, treatment options including scheduled exposures to light and regular physical exercise need to be considered.
"Disruption of circadian rhythms has been implicated in the pathogenesis of metabolic disorders. Our results give support to the hypothesized links between the metabolic and circadian cycles generated and guided by the circadian clock", says Timo Partonen, MD, academy research fellow of the group. "Our findings herein now extend these links to include relationships between the metabolic and seasonal fluctuations."
The current findings now suggest that abnormalities in the circadian clockwork predispose to seasonal changes in weight and to metabolic syndrome. This means that the circadian clockwork may well be a key to public health.
Obesity is an increasing problem concerning public health. High caloric intake or low physical exercise for example may lead not only to obesity but also to hypertension, insulin resistance and abnormal circulating lipid levels. These abnormalities tend to coincide and contribute to the term metabolic syndrome.
They laugh alike, they walk alike, At times they even talk alike—
You can lose your mind
Genome Scan Shows Polynesians Have Little Genetic Relationship To Melanesians
ScienceDaily (Jan. 23, 2008) — The origins and current genetic relationships of Pacific Islanders have generated interest and controversy for many decades. Now, a new comprehensive genetic study of almost 1,000 individuals has revealed that Polynesians and Micronesians have almost no genetic relation to Melanesians, and that groups that live in the islands of Melanesia are remarkably diverse.
The researchers analyzed more than 800 genetic markers (highly informative microsatellites) in nearly 1,000 individuals from 41 Pacific populations, as opposed to prior small-scale mitochondrial DNA or Y chromosome studies, which had produced conflicting results.
"The first settlers of Australia, New Guinea, and the large islands just to the east arrived between 50,000 and 30,000 years ago, when Neanderthals still roamed Europe," says Jonathan Friedlaender, professor emeritus of anthropology at Temple and the study's lead author. "These small groups were isolated and became extremely diverse during the following tens of thousands of years. Then, a little more than 3,000 years ago, the ancestors of the Polynesians and Micronesians, with their excellent sailing outrigger canoes, appeared in the islands of Melanesia, and during the following centuries settled the islands in the vast unknown regions of the central and eastern Pacific.
"Over the last 20 years there have been many hypotheses concerning where the ancestors of the Polynesians came from in Asia, how long it took them to develop their special seafaring abilities in Island Melanesia, and how much they interacted with the native Melanesian peoples there before they commenced their remarkable Diaspora across the unexplored islands in the Pacific," he adds.
According to Friedlaender, one scenario called the 'fast train hypothesis,' which is supported by the mitochondrial evidence, suggests that ancestors of the Polynesians originated in Taiwan, moved through Indonesia to Island Melanesia, and then out into the unknown islands of the Pacific without having any significant contact with the Island Melanesians along the way.
A counter argument called 'slow boat hypothesis,' which the Y chromosome evidence supports, suggests that the ancestors of the Polynesians were primarily Melanesians, and that there was very little Asian or Taiwanese influence. A third position, called the "entangled bank hypothesis," suggests these ancient migrations simply can't be accurately reconstructed by looking at the genetics of today's populations, even in the context of the available archaeological evidence.
In their paper, the researchers state that their analysis is consistent with the scenario that the ancestors of Polynesians moved through Island Melanesia relatively rapidly and only intermixed to a very modest degree with the indigenous populations there.
"Our genetic analysis establishes that the Polynesians' and Micronesians' closest relationships are to Taiwan Aborigines and East Asians," says Friedlaender. "Some groups in Island Melanesia who speak languages related to Polynesian, called Austronesian or Oceanic languages, do show a small Polynesian genetic contribution, but it is very minor -- never more than 20 percent.
"There clearly was a lot of cultural and language influence that occurred, but the amount of genetic exchange between the groups along the way was remarkably low," he says. "From the genetic perspective, if the ancestral train from the Taiwan vicinity to Polynesia wasn't an express, very few passengers climbed aboard or got off along the way."
Friedlaender adds that this study also confirms and expands their findings from previous studies about the genetic diversity of Island Melanesians--among the most genetically diverse people on the planet, showing further that their diversity is neatly organized by island, island size, topography and language families.
Where’s that Kon Tiki guy when you need him? We bet he could sort this out.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/22/08
Headlines of the day
WA man sentenced for theft of 93 pounds of women's undergarments (SeattlePI.com)
Solved by undercover work?
11-month-old baby drunk, mom charged (CNN)
Makes sense. We’re guessing someone would have carded the kid.
Sister says 3 died doing what they loved: drinking, driving fast (Rocky Mountain News)
This cosmic string—any chance it’s made by Wham-O?
Could The Universe Be Tied Up With Cosmic String?
ScienceDaily (Jan. 21, 2008) — A team of physicists and astronomers from the University of Sussex and Imperial College London have uncovered hints that there may be cosmic strings - lines of pure mass-energy - stretching across the entire Universe.
Cosmic strings are predicted by high energy physics theories, including superstring theory. This is based on the idea that particles are not just little points, but tiny vibrating bits of string Cosmic strings are predicted to have extraordinary amounts of mass - perhaps as much as the mass of the Sun - packed into each metre of a tube whose width is less a billion billionth of the size of an atom.
Lead researcher Dr Mark Hindmarsh, Reader in Physics at the University of Sussex, said: “This is an exciting result for physicists. Cosmic strings are relics of the very early Universe and signposts that would help construct a theory of all forces and particles.”
His team took data from NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), which is a satellite currently mapping the intensity of cosmic microwaves from all directions, and carefully compared the predictions of what should be seen with and without strings.
Dr Hindmarsh said: “We cannot yet see these strings directly. They are many billion light years away. We can only look for indirect evidence of their existence through precision measurements of the cosmic microwave background, of cosmic rays, gravitational radiation, and looking for double images of distant quasars.”
The four-person team are members of COSMOS, the UK's world-leading cosmology supercomputing consortium fronted by Stephen Hawking. Using a Silicon Graphics supercomputer they made predictions of how the strings would affect the Cosmic Microwave Background, relic radio waves from the Big Bang which fill the universe. It turned out that the best explanation for the pattern of this radiation was a theory which included strings.
Dr Hindmarsh said that better data is required before the existence of cosmic strings can be confirmed. He hopes this will be produced by the European Space Agency's Planck Satellite mission (due for launch this year).
What’s passing for science this week? Here are your dueling headlines.
Drinking coffee may cut ovarian cancer risk (MSNBC)
2-cup coffee habit may double miscarriage risk (MSNBC)
Is the answer swim up close to the wall of the tank and hope that someone buys them?
How Baby Fish Find A Home
ScienceDaily (Jan. 20, 2008) — One of the most significant questions facing marine ecologists today, is just how much of an impact global variations in the environment are having on the dispersal of larval and juvenile marine species from open oceans to coral reefs. Previously, tracking how fish larvae migrate was done through direct observation by divers on older larvae found near the reefs, after they'd spent weeks to months in the plankton. This method did not permit divers to follow small larvae, diving larvae or larvae as they returned to the reefs at night. How tiny coral reef fish larvae locate the reef habitat across vast expanses of water has remained an enduring mystery.
An innovative research tool, designed by UM Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, division of Applied Marine Physics Assistant Professor, Dr. Claire B. Paris and Senior Research Associate Cedric Guigand is making the task possible on younger larvae as they move with currents. Dubbed the OWNFOR (Orientation With No Frame Of Reference) system, this drifting observational device, which resembles a kite, allows researchers to observe marine larvae naturally influenced by factors in the open ocean. The floating chamber is designed to detect and quantify the orientation of larval coral reef fish in the pelagic environment; an often pitch black void with little or no frame of reference to navigate.
The OWNFOR system is deployed at sea and drifts while videotaping the movement of a larva placed within a clear, circular arena. It will also be possible to change their immediate environment and manipulate orientation cues, such as acoustic, chemical, or magnetic fields that larvae may use to navigate. This new system will be equipped with an infrared camera that can verify the larvae's orientation at night.
Through a research grant from The Hermon Slade Foundation and a fellowship from the Australian Museum, she will be putting her new larval monitoring system to the test in early 2008. Paris and colleagues are interested in gathering data on the successful identification of larval abilities to orientate as they mature.
"Typical research on larvae is assessed in laboratory experiments or in studies done in situ with the naked eye, but it does not provide information on whether or not larvae use cues to find a home, when in their life history they use them, or how far from the reef they can sense the cues. We're hoping to find out how the larvae behaviorally interact with the blue-water environment minimizing human intervention," said Paris. "The success of this new device in recording true orientation in fish larvae opens new possibilities for research in the field of larval ecology."
Working at the Lizard Island Research Station, a satellite-facility of the Australian Museum on the Great Barrier Reef, Paris will directly compare her research methods with those of Lizard Island researcher, Dr. J.M. Leis, who published his results diving and following larval fish. Researchers hope that OWNFOR will provide minimal interference in the natural migration of organisms, helping to understanding just what influences these organisms to settle on a final reef home after days or weeks in a relatively featureless open ocean landscape.
"The larval phase is often the main opportunity in benthic organisms to colonize new habitats, but how far from home are these new habitats? They can range from tens of kilometers away to the natal reef (reef of origin). Ideally, we'll discover crucial inputs for a new generation of biophysical larval dispersal models vital to achieving a better understanding of larval connectivity in marine systems," said Paris. "The implications will have global impacts on the effective management of fisheries, conservation of marine biodiversity, including design of marine reserves, and helping to predict the effects of climate change on marine systems."
WA man sentenced for theft of 93 pounds of women's undergarments (SeattlePI.com)
Solved by undercover work?
11-month-old baby drunk, mom charged (CNN)
Makes sense. We’re guessing someone would have carded the kid.
Sister says 3 died doing what they loved: drinking, driving fast (Rocky Mountain News)
This cosmic string—any chance it’s made by Wham-O?
Could The Universe Be Tied Up With Cosmic String?
ScienceDaily (Jan. 21, 2008) — A team of physicists and astronomers from the University of Sussex and Imperial College London have uncovered hints that there may be cosmic strings - lines of pure mass-energy - stretching across the entire Universe.
Cosmic strings are predicted by high energy physics theories, including superstring theory. This is based on the idea that particles are not just little points, but tiny vibrating bits of string Cosmic strings are predicted to have extraordinary amounts of mass - perhaps as much as the mass of the Sun - packed into each metre of a tube whose width is less a billion billionth of the size of an atom.
Lead researcher Dr Mark Hindmarsh, Reader in Physics at the University of Sussex, said: “This is an exciting result for physicists. Cosmic strings are relics of the very early Universe and signposts that would help construct a theory of all forces and particles.”
His team took data from NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), which is a satellite currently mapping the intensity of cosmic microwaves from all directions, and carefully compared the predictions of what should be seen with and without strings.
Dr Hindmarsh said: “We cannot yet see these strings directly. They are many billion light years away. We can only look for indirect evidence of their existence through precision measurements of the cosmic microwave background, of cosmic rays, gravitational radiation, and looking for double images of distant quasars.”
The four-person team are members of COSMOS, the UK's world-leading cosmology supercomputing consortium fronted by Stephen Hawking. Using a Silicon Graphics supercomputer they made predictions of how the strings would affect the Cosmic Microwave Background, relic radio waves from the Big Bang which fill the universe. It turned out that the best explanation for the pattern of this radiation was a theory which included strings.
Dr Hindmarsh said that better data is required before the existence of cosmic strings can be confirmed. He hopes this will be produced by the European Space Agency's Planck Satellite mission (due for launch this year).
What’s passing for science this week? Here are your dueling headlines.
Drinking coffee may cut ovarian cancer risk (MSNBC)
2-cup coffee habit may double miscarriage risk (MSNBC)
Is the answer swim up close to the wall of the tank and hope that someone buys them?
How Baby Fish Find A Home
ScienceDaily (Jan. 20, 2008) — One of the most significant questions facing marine ecologists today, is just how much of an impact global variations in the environment are having on the dispersal of larval and juvenile marine species from open oceans to coral reefs. Previously, tracking how fish larvae migrate was done through direct observation by divers on older larvae found near the reefs, after they'd spent weeks to months in the plankton. This method did not permit divers to follow small larvae, diving larvae or larvae as they returned to the reefs at night. How tiny coral reef fish larvae locate the reef habitat across vast expanses of water has remained an enduring mystery.
An innovative research tool, designed by UM Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, division of Applied Marine Physics Assistant Professor, Dr. Claire B. Paris and Senior Research Associate Cedric Guigand is making the task possible on younger larvae as they move with currents. Dubbed the OWNFOR (Orientation With No Frame Of Reference) system, this drifting observational device, which resembles a kite, allows researchers to observe marine larvae naturally influenced by factors in the open ocean. The floating chamber is designed to detect and quantify the orientation of larval coral reef fish in the pelagic environment; an often pitch black void with little or no frame of reference to navigate.
The OWNFOR system is deployed at sea and drifts while videotaping the movement of a larva placed within a clear, circular arena. It will also be possible to change their immediate environment and manipulate orientation cues, such as acoustic, chemical, or magnetic fields that larvae may use to navigate. This new system will be equipped with an infrared camera that can verify the larvae's orientation at night.
Through a research grant from The Hermon Slade Foundation and a fellowship from the Australian Museum, she will be putting her new larval monitoring system to the test in early 2008. Paris and colleagues are interested in gathering data on the successful identification of larval abilities to orientate as they mature.
"Typical research on larvae is assessed in laboratory experiments or in studies done in situ with the naked eye, but it does not provide information on whether or not larvae use cues to find a home, when in their life history they use them, or how far from the reef they can sense the cues. We're hoping to find out how the larvae behaviorally interact with the blue-water environment minimizing human intervention," said Paris. "The success of this new device in recording true orientation in fish larvae opens new possibilities for research in the field of larval ecology."
Working at the Lizard Island Research Station, a satellite-facility of the Australian Museum on the Great Barrier Reef, Paris will directly compare her research methods with those of Lizard Island researcher, Dr. J.M. Leis, who published his results diving and following larval fish. Researchers hope that OWNFOR will provide minimal interference in the natural migration of organisms, helping to understanding just what influences these organisms to settle on a final reef home after days or weeks in a relatively featureless open ocean landscape.
"The larval phase is often the main opportunity in benthic organisms to colonize new habitats, but how far from home are these new habitats? They can range from tens of kilometers away to the natal reef (reef of origin). Ideally, we'll discover crucial inputs for a new generation of biophysical larval dispersal models vital to achieving a better understanding of larval connectivity in marine systems," said Paris. "The implications will have global impacts on the effective management of fisheries, conservation of marine biodiversity, including design of marine reserves, and helping to predict the effects of climate change on marine systems."
Friday, January 18, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/18/08
A political interlude
Senator Patrick Leahy’s (D-Vermont) recent endorsement of Barack Obama offered the candidate more than just the support of a member of the Senate’s old guard.
It also provided Senator Obama with entree to an relatively untilled voting block—Grateful Dead fans. Leahy is perhaps the most visible “Dead Head” among politicians.” He has been known to play “Truckin’” at his post-election rallies, claims “Black Muddy River” as his favorite song and sent a congratulatory video to Bob Weir when the band received a Lifetime Achieve Award at the 2002 JAmmy’s. Please, no pajama jokes. It’s been done.
While Senator John Kerry’s endorsement brought with it a gilded rolodex and held the potential of access to George Soros and the like, Leahy’s offers the chance to all patchoulied up with folks like “The Grilled Cheese Guy” and several young ladies who go by the sobriquet “Moonbeam.”
It also offers the rest of us the hope that, should he win, the new President might deliver an inaugural speech that goes something like this.
“Well the first days are the hardest days, don't you worry any more,
'Cause when life looks like Easy Street, there is danger at your door.
Think this through with me, let me know your mind,
Wo, oh, what I want to know, is are you kind?”
“Who can deny, who can deny, it's not just a change in style?
One step down and another begun and I wonder how many miles.”
“See here how everything led up to this day,
And it's just like any other day that's ever been.
Sun going up and then the sun going down.”
“I have spent my life seeking all that's still unsung.
Bent my ear to hear the tune, and closed my eyes to see.
When there was no strings to play, you played to me.”
“Sometimes the light's all shinin' on me;
Other times I can barely see.
Lately it occurs to me What a long, strange trip it's been.”
“I love you all, but Jesus loves you the best”
And I bid you goodnight, goodnight, goodnight.”
Oh. and one more thing… “I need a miracle.”
Senator Patrick Leahy’s (D-Vermont) recent endorsement of Barack Obama offered the candidate more than just the support of a member of the Senate’s old guard.
It also provided Senator Obama with entree to an relatively untilled voting block—Grateful Dead fans. Leahy is perhaps the most visible “Dead Head” among politicians.” He has been known to play “Truckin’” at his post-election rallies, claims “Black Muddy River” as his favorite song and sent a congratulatory video to Bob Weir when the band received a Lifetime Achieve Award at the 2002 JAmmy’s. Please, no pajama jokes. It’s been done.
While Senator John Kerry’s endorsement brought with it a gilded rolodex and held the potential of access to George Soros and the like, Leahy’s offers the chance to all patchoulied up with folks like “The Grilled Cheese Guy” and several young ladies who go by the sobriquet “Moonbeam.”
It also offers the rest of us the hope that, should he win, the new President might deliver an inaugural speech that goes something like this.
My fellow citizens.
“Well the first days are the hardest days, don't you worry any more,
'Cause when life looks like Easy Street, there is danger at your door.
Think this through with me, let me know your mind,
Wo, oh, what I want to know, is are you kind?”
“Who can deny, who can deny, it's not just a change in style?
One step down and another begun and I wonder how many miles.”
“See here how everything led up to this day,
And it's just like any other day that's ever been.
Sun going up and then the sun going down.”
“I have spent my life seeking all that's still unsung.
Bent my ear to hear the tune, and closed my eyes to see.
When there was no strings to play, you played to me.”
“Sometimes the light's all shinin' on me;
Other times I can barely see.
Lately it occurs to me What a long, strange trip it's been.”
“I love you all, but Jesus loves you the best”
And I bid you goodnight, goodnight, goodnight.”
Oh. and one more thing… “I need a miracle.”
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Making Science More Better For You on 01/17/08
Headline of the day
Why incest makes us so squeamish (MSNBC)
Randy Newman: What did he know and when did he know it?
Shortness linked to suicide risk
Thursday, 17 Jan 2008 08:11
Tall men are less likely to commit suicide, study finds
Printer friendly version
Babies with a short birth length have more than double the risk of a violent suicide attempt as an adult, a new study suggests.
Swedish researchers also found that catch-up growth during childhood does not lessen the impact of short stature at birth.
They studied almost 320,000 Swedish men born between 1973 and 1980, tracking them from birth to the date of attempted suicide, death, emigration or the end of 1999 – whichever came first.
Their findings, published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, show that short babies of less than 47cm in length were more likely to attempt suicide as adults, regardless of what height they reached in adulthood, compared with babies of normal length.
Short birth length was also linked to violent suicide, defined as hanging; the use of a firearm or knives; jumping from a height or in front of vehicles; and drowning.
Short stature in later life also increased the risk of suicide; men who were normal length babies but who were short in adult life were 55 per cent more likely than tall men to take their own lives.
Premature birth, resulting in short length and low birth weight, increased the risk of violent suicide fourfold.
The researchers suggest that the brain chemical serotonin may be responsible for their findings.
This chemical is crucial to brain development and low levels are linked to impulsivity, aggression and suicidal behaviour.
Levels of the chemical could be affected by premature birth and other factors restricting growth in the womb, the researchers say.
"In the light of our findings related to the association of poor prenatal growth with subsequent suicide attempts, particularly by violent means, and the lack of a modifying effect of postnatal growth on this association, the importance of early intervention has to be emphasised," the study's authors conclude.
You mean the drug companies hide the news when antidepressant drugs don’t work? That makes us feel sad.
Many unfavorable drug studies aren’t published
BOSTON - Nearly a third of antidepressant drug studies are never published in the medical literature and nearly all happen to show that the drug being tested did not work, researchers reported on Wednesday.
And in some of the studies that are published, unfavorable results have been recast to make the medicine appear more effective than it really is, said the research team led by Erick Turner of the Oregon Health & Science University.
Even if not deliberate, this can be bad news for patients, they wrote in their report, published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Story continues below ↓advertisement
"Selective publication can lead doctors to make inappropriate prescribing decisions that may not be in the best interest of their patients and, thus, the public health," they wrote.
The idea that unfavorable test results get quietly tucked away so nobody will see them -- sometimes call the "file drawer effect" — has been around for years.
The Turner team was able to study the question because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has a registry in which companies are supposed to log details of their drug tests before the experiments are begun.
They could see which experiments approved by the FDA between 1987 and 2004 were ultimately publicized in the medical literature and the main criteria the researchers planned to measure success.
"It tells you where they placed their bets before they saw the data," Turner said in a telephone interview.
Of the 74 studies that started for the 12 antidepressants, 38 produced positive results for the drug. All but one of those studies were published.
However, when it came to the 36 studies with negative or questionable results, as assessed by the FDA, only three were published and another 11 were turned around and written as if the drug had worked.
"Not only were positive results more likely to be published, but studies that were not positive, in our opinion, were often published in a way that conveyed a positive outcome," said the team.
For example, of the seven negative studies done on GlaxoSmithKline's Paxil, five were never published. The researchers found three studies for GSK's Wellbutrin SR, but the two negative ones never reached print.
There were five studies for Pfizer's Zoloft, but the three showing the drug to be ineffective were not published and a fourth study, ruled as questionable by the FDA, was written and published to make it appear that the drug worked.
A Glaxo spokeswoman said the company posts the data from all of its trials, positive or negative, on the Internet.
"GlaxoSmithKline agrees that public disclosure of clinical trial results for marketed medicines is essential and fully supports registration of all trials in progress," she said.
Pfizer was not immediately available to comment.
Turner and his colleagues did not find out who was to blame for not publishing the studies.
Although the authors and drug company sponsors may not have submitted the unfavorable results for publication, medical journals and their editors may have played a role by deciding they would rather publish favorable results.
"There's an expectation that if you get a positive result, that's what you're supposed to do, and if you get a negative result you have failed," said Turner. "The first impulse is to say, 'I was wrong. Maybe I should move on to something more interesting"' so the results may never get written up.
We knew if we waited long enough, “The Island of Lost Souls” would end up being a documentary
First animal-human embryo trials to go ahead
Mark Henderson, Science Editor of The Times
Experiments to create Britain’s first embryos that merge human and animal material will begin within months after a Government watchdog today approved two research teams to carry out the controversial work.
Scientists at King’s College London and the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne will now inject human DNA into empty eggs from cows, to create embryos known as cytoplasmic hybrids that are 99.9 per cent human in genetic terms.
The experiments are intended to provide insights into diseases such as Parkinson’s and spinal muscular atrophy by producing stem cells containing genetic defects that contribute to these conditions.
These will be used as cell models for investigating new approaches to treatment and for improving understanding of how embryonic stem cells develop. They will not be used in therapy, and it is illegal to implant them into the womb.
The decision by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) to grant one-year licences to both teams ends more than a year of uncertainty for the researchers, who first applied for permission to start the work in the autumn of 2006.
Last January the authority deferred a decision and launched a consultation on the issue, which reported in September that the public was broadly supportive. In late November it again delayed ruling because of concerns about procedures for obtaining consent from the donors of the human DNA to be used.
While the HFEA was deliberating, the Government first proposed a ban on the creation of human-animal embryos, also known as “cybrids”, then backtracked after a revolt by scientists.
The creation of human-animal embryos will be explicitly permitted by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill currently passing through Parliament, subject to HFEA licensing. An amendment that would have blocked such research was defeated in the House of Lords on Monday by a majority of 172.
Stephen Minger, who leads the King’s team, said yesterday he was delighted that he would finally be able to start the experiments. “I am pleased that the HFEA has finally after a year and a half realised the importance that the work that we and the group from Newcastle have been licensed for,” he said.
“I am grateful to the scientific community, patient organisations and disease charities for all of the support we have received over the past 18 months. Their backing has been invaluable. This shows that the scientific community can be involved in and influence government policy.”
Lyle Armstrong, who leads the Newcastle group, said: “The award of the HFEA licence is great news. We initially applied for approval to use cow eggs as a means to understand the way they can convert skin cells into embryonic stem cells. Finding better ways to make human embryonic stem cells is the long-term objective of our work and understanding reprogramming is central to this.
“Cow eggs seem to be every bit as good at doing this job as human eggs so it makes sense to use them since they are much more readily available, but it is important to stress that we will only use them as a scientific tool and we need not worry about cells derived from them ever being used to treat human disease
The HFEA has attached conditions to each of the one-year licences but these are not expected to be a barrier to either research project.
The Newcastle group has been asked to provide patient consent forms and to obtain approval from the university’s ethics committee before working with DNA from donated skin cells but it has been cleared to start work immediately using DNA from the UK Stem Cell Bank.
It had originally proposed to use human tissue from a commercial US bank but this was rejected because the donors had not given explicit consent for their cells to be used for making cloned embryos that would be destroyed in experiments.
The King’s licence requires Professor Minger to complete an HFEA training course, which is a formality as he has previously held similar licences. It also requires approval from a local ethics committee before work can begin, which is expected to be granted now the HFEA has ruled positively.
Some critics of cybrid embryos have argued that their use is no longer necessary, given the recent development of a reprogramming technique that can turn back the clock on adult tissue to make “induced pluripotent” stem cells with embryo-like properties, but the HFEA licence committee rejected this.
“The committee considered the emergence of new technologies for reprogramming adult somatic [non-reproductive] cells and agreed that, while very promising, these new technologies do not obviate the need for the basic research into differentiation of pluripotential embryonic stem cells as proposed in this application,” it said.
The decision was welcomed by independent stem cell expertts. Professor Robin Lovell-Badge, of the National Institute for Medical Research in London, said: “The HFEA’s decision is excellent as it adds to the arsenal of techniques UK scientists can use to provide understanding and eventually develop therapies for a wide range of devastating genetic diseases.
“The cloning method allows a patient’s cells to be reprogrammed back into early embryos from which valuable embryonic stem cells can be isolated, and it is the latter that will be studied. While scientists may prefer to use human eggs, these are in short supply and preference should rightly be for their use in treating infertility.
“It is logical to use animal eggs to refine techniques, provide knowledge of reprogramming and early development, and understanding of disease mechanisms. Furthermore, while there are new methods of reprogramming adult cells back to pluripotent embryonic stem-like cells, namely induced pluripotent stem cells, it is important to pursue all avenues as we cannot know in advance which will succeed. Besides, a comparative approach often reveals the most.”
Oh yeah, the Olympics are going to love this. We’ve got two words for you. Vertical leap.
Why incest makes us so squeamish (MSNBC)
Randy Newman: What did he know and when did he know it?
Shortness linked to suicide risk
Thursday, 17 Jan 2008 08:11
Tall men are less likely to commit suicide, study finds
Printer friendly version
Babies with a short birth length have more than double the risk of a violent suicide attempt as an adult, a new study suggests.
Swedish researchers also found that catch-up growth during childhood does not lessen the impact of short stature at birth.
They studied almost 320,000 Swedish men born between 1973 and 1980, tracking them from birth to the date of attempted suicide, death, emigration or the end of 1999 – whichever came first.
Their findings, published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, show that short babies of less than 47cm in length were more likely to attempt suicide as adults, regardless of what height they reached in adulthood, compared with babies of normal length.
Short birth length was also linked to violent suicide, defined as hanging; the use of a firearm or knives; jumping from a height or in front of vehicles; and drowning.
Short stature in later life also increased the risk of suicide; men who were normal length babies but who were short in adult life were 55 per cent more likely than tall men to take their own lives.
Premature birth, resulting in short length and low birth weight, increased the risk of violent suicide fourfold.
The researchers suggest that the brain chemical serotonin may be responsible for their findings.
This chemical is crucial to brain development and low levels are linked to impulsivity, aggression and suicidal behaviour.
Levels of the chemical could be affected by premature birth and other factors restricting growth in the womb, the researchers say.
"In the light of our findings related to the association of poor prenatal growth with subsequent suicide attempts, particularly by violent means, and the lack of a modifying effect of postnatal growth on this association, the importance of early intervention has to be emphasised," the study's authors conclude.
You mean the drug companies hide the news when antidepressant drugs don’t work? That makes us feel sad.
Many unfavorable drug studies aren’t published
BOSTON - Nearly a third of antidepressant drug studies are never published in the medical literature and nearly all happen to show that the drug being tested did not work, researchers reported on Wednesday.
And in some of the studies that are published, unfavorable results have been recast to make the medicine appear more effective than it really is, said the research team led by Erick Turner of the Oregon Health & Science University.
Even if not deliberate, this can be bad news for patients, they wrote in their report, published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Story continues below ↓advertisement
"Selective publication can lead doctors to make inappropriate prescribing decisions that may not be in the best interest of their patients and, thus, the public health," they wrote.
The idea that unfavorable test results get quietly tucked away so nobody will see them -- sometimes call the "file drawer effect" — has been around for years.
The Turner team was able to study the question because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has a registry in which companies are supposed to log details of their drug tests before the experiments are begun.
They could see which experiments approved by the FDA between 1987 and 2004 were ultimately publicized in the medical literature and the main criteria the researchers planned to measure success.
"It tells you where they placed their bets before they saw the data," Turner said in a telephone interview.
Of the 74 studies that started for the 12 antidepressants, 38 produced positive results for the drug. All but one of those studies were published.
However, when it came to the 36 studies with negative or questionable results, as assessed by the FDA, only three were published and another 11 were turned around and written as if the drug had worked.
"Not only were positive results more likely to be published, but studies that were not positive, in our opinion, were often published in a way that conveyed a positive outcome," said the team.
For example, of the seven negative studies done on GlaxoSmithKline's Paxil, five were never published. The researchers found three studies for GSK's Wellbutrin SR, but the two negative ones never reached print.
There were five studies for Pfizer's Zoloft, but the three showing the drug to be ineffective were not published and a fourth study, ruled as questionable by the FDA, was written and published to make it appear that the drug worked.
A Glaxo spokeswoman said the company posts the data from all of its trials, positive or negative, on the Internet.
"GlaxoSmithKline agrees that public disclosure of clinical trial results for marketed medicines is essential and fully supports registration of all trials in progress," she said.
Pfizer was not immediately available to comment.
Turner and his colleagues did not find out who was to blame for not publishing the studies.
Although the authors and drug company sponsors may not have submitted the unfavorable results for publication, medical journals and their editors may have played a role by deciding they would rather publish favorable results.
"There's an expectation that if you get a positive result, that's what you're supposed to do, and if you get a negative result you have failed," said Turner. "The first impulse is to say, 'I was wrong. Maybe I should move on to something more interesting"' so the results may never get written up.
We knew if we waited long enough, “The Island of Lost Souls” would end up being a documentary
First animal-human embryo trials to go ahead
Mark Henderson, Science Editor of The Times
Experiments to create Britain’s first embryos that merge human and animal material will begin within months after a Government watchdog today approved two research teams to carry out the controversial work.
Scientists at King’s College London and the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne will now inject human DNA into empty eggs from cows, to create embryos known as cytoplasmic hybrids that are 99.9 per cent human in genetic terms.
The experiments are intended to provide insights into diseases such as Parkinson’s and spinal muscular atrophy by producing stem cells containing genetic defects that contribute to these conditions.
These will be used as cell models for investigating new approaches to treatment and for improving understanding of how embryonic stem cells develop. They will not be used in therapy, and it is illegal to implant them into the womb.
The decision by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) to grant one-year licences to both teams ends more than a year of uncertainty for the researchers, who first applied for permission to start the work in the autumn of 2006.
Last January the authority deferred a decision and launched a consultation on the issue, which reported in September that the public was broadly supportive. In late November it again delayed ruling because of concerns about procedures for obtaining consent from the donors of the human DNA to be used.
While the HFEA was deliberating, the Government first proposed a ban on the creation of human-animal embryos, also known as “cybrids”, then backtracked after a revolt by scientists.
The creation of human-animal embryos will be explicitly permitted by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill currently passing through Parliament, subject to HFEA licensing. An amendment that would have blocked such research was defeated in the House of Lords on Monday by a majority of 172.
Stephen Minger, who leads the King’s team, said yesterday he was delighted that he would finally be able to start the experiments. “I am pleased that the HFEA has finally after a year and a half realised the importance that the work that we and the group from Newcastle have been licensed for,” he said.
“I am grateful to the scientific community, patient organisations and disease charities for all of the support we have received over the past 18 months. Their backing has been invaluable. This shows that the scientific community can be involved in and influence government policy.”
Lyle Armstrong, who leads the Newcastle group, said: “The award of the HFEA licence is great news. We initially applied for approval to use cow eggs as a means to understand the way they can convert skin cells into embryonic stem cells. Finding better ways to make human embryonic stem cells is the long-term objective of our work and understanding reprogramming is central to this.
“Cow eggs seem to be every bit as good at doing this job as human eggs so it makes sense to use them since they are much more readily available, but it is important to stress that we will only use them as a scientific tool and we need not worry about cells derived from them ever being used to treat human disease
The HFEA has attached conditions to each of the one-year licences but these are not expected to be a barrier to either research project.
The Newcastle group has been asked to provide patient consent forms and to obtain approval from the university’s ethics committee before working with DNA from donated skin cells but it has been cleared to start work immediately using DNA from the UK Stem Cell Bank.
It had originally proposed to use human tissue from a commercial US bank but this was rejected because the donors had not given explicit consent for their cells to be used for making cloned embryos that would be destroyed in experiments.
The King’s licence requires Professor Minger to complete an HFEA training course, which is a formality as he has previously held similar licences. It also requires approval from a local ethics committee before work can begin, which is expected to be granted now the HFEA has ruled positively.
Some critics of cybrid embryos have argued that their use is no longer necessary, given the recent development of a reprogramming technique that can turn back the clock on adult tissue to make “induced pluripotent” stem cells with embryo-like properties, but the HFEA licence committee rejected this.
“The committee considered the emergence of new technologies for reprogramming adult somatic [non-reproductive] cells and agreed that, while very promising, these new technologies do not obviate the need for the basic research into differentiation of pluripotential embryonic stem cells as proposed in this application,” it said.
The decision was welcomed by independent stem cell expertts. Professor Robin Lovell-Badge, of the National Institute for Medical Research in London, said: “The HFEA’s decision is excellent as it adds to the arsenal of techniques UK scientists can use to provide understanding and eventually develop therapies for a wide range of devastating genetic diseases.
“The cloning method allows a patient’s cells to be reprogrammed back into early embryos from which valuable embryonic stem cells can be isolated, and it is the latter that will be studied. While scientists may prefer to use human eggs, these are in short supply and preference should rightly be for their use in treating infertility.
“It is logical to use animal eggs to refine techniques, provide knowledge of reprogramming and early development, and understanding of disease mechanisms. Furthermore, while there are new methods of reprogramming adult cells back to pluripotent embryonic stem-like cells, namely induced pluripotent stem cells, it is important to pursue all avenues as we cannot know in advance which will succeed. Besides, a comparative approach often reveals the most.”
Oh yeah, the Olympics are going to love this. We’ve got two words for you. Vertical leap.
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