Pond Scum As Biofuel? Researchers Explore Algae As Green Energy

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April Flowers for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
The land and water resources of the US could likely support the growth of enough algae to produce up to 25 billion gallons of algae-based fuel a year, according to a new study from the Department of Energy´s (DOE) Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. That amount of fuel would satisfy one-twelfth of the country´s yearly needs.
An in-depth look at the water resources needed to grow significant amounts of algae in large, specially built shallow ponds led to the findings, published in a recent issue of the journal Environmental Science and Technology.
“While there are many details still to be worked out, we don’t see water issues as a deal breaker for the development of an algae biofuels industry in many areas of the country,” said Erik Venteris of Pacific Northwest´s Hydrology Technical Group
The best sites to produce algae are hot, humid and wet — the Gulf Coast and the Southeastern seaboard are especially promising.
“The Gulf Coast offers a good combination of warm temperatures, low evaporation, access to an abundance of water, and plenty of fuel-processing facilities,” said hydrologist Mark Wigmosta.
Algae are rich in natural oil, and several research teams and corporations are searching for ways to improve the creation of algae-based biofuels. Such ways might include growing algae composed of more oil, creating algae that live longer and thrive in cooler temperatures, or devising new ways to separate out the useful oil from the rest of the algae. The first challenge, however, is simple — the algae must grow. The biggest requirements are sunlight and water. Clouds, shortage of water and evaporation are the chief antagonists to large-scale algae growth.
The same team previously studied the demand for freshwater that such algae farms would create and demonstrated that oil based on algae have the potential to replace a significant portion of the nation´s oil imports.
The focus of the new study is on actual water supplies. It examines a range of possible water sources, including fresh groundwater, salty or saline groundwater, and seawater. The estimate of 25 billion gallons of algal oil is an increase of 4 billion gallons from the previous study. While the new estimate is enough to fulfill the nation´s oil needs for one month of every year, the scientists are careful to stress that it is exactly that — an estimate based in part on assumptions about land and water availability and use.
“I’m confident that algal biofuels can be part of the solution to our energy needs, but algal biofuels certainly aren’t the whole solution,” said Wigmosta. However, the cost of making the fuel far currently exceeds the cost of traditional petroleum-based products currently.
Many ponds with water about six to 15 inches deep would be needed for each algae farm. Smaller algae farms have been built by a few companies, and these farms are just beginning to churn out huge amounts of algae to convert to fuel. One such company sold algae-based oil to consumers in California. Algae-based biofuels are attracting the attention of a wide variety of players, from Exxon-Mobil, which launched a $600 million research effort four years ago, to this year’s teenage winner of the Intel Science Talent Search, who was recognized for her work in developing algae that produce more oil than they normally do.
THE WATER DEMANDS OF ALGAE BIOFUEL
In the adoption of broad-scale production of algal biofuel, the availability of water has been one of the biggest concerns. Biofuels created from algae would use a great deal more water than industrial processes used to harness energy from oil, wind, sunlight, or most other forms of raw energy, the scientists estimate. To create the full 25 billion gallons, the process would potentially require the equivalent of about one-quarter of the amount of water that is now used annually in the US for the entire agriculture  industry. The team notes that while this is a huge amount of water, it would come from a multitude of sources: fresh groundwater, salty groundwater and seawater.
The team limited the amount of freshwater that could be drawn in any one area to perform their analysis, assuming that no more than five percent of a given watershed´s mean annual water flow could be used in the production of algae. The five percent is a starting point, says Venteris. He notes that this is the same percentage the US EPA allows power plants to use for cooling.
“In arid areas such as the Desert Southwest, 5 percent is probably an overstatement of the amount of water available, but in many other areas that are a lot wetter, such as much of the East, it’s likely that much more water would be available,” Venteris explained.
“While the nation’s Desert Southwest has been considered a possible site for vast algae growth using saline water, rapid evaporation in this region make success there more challenging for low- cost production,” he added.
The pros and cons of various water sources were weighed by the team, who noted that freshwater is cheap but in limited supply in many areas. Saline groundwater is widely available, making it attractive, but is usually found at a much deeper depth, requiring more equipment and technology to bring it to the surface and make it suitable for algal production. Seawater is the most plentiful, but requires even more infrastructure, including the creation of pipelines to move the water from the coast to the processing plants.
The estimates of water availability could be affected by special circumstances, such as particularly tight water restrictions in some areas or severe drought or above-average rainfall in others.

Health

Genetic Risk Factor For Pulmonary Fibrosis Found

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A paper recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine and co-written by physicians and scientists at the University of Colorado School of Medicine finds that an important genetic risk factor for pulmonary fibrosis can be used to identify individuals at risk for this deadly lung disease.

Researchers looked at a fairly common variant of the gene for mucin-5B, a protein that is a component of the mucous produced by the bronchial tubes. While this variant of the MUC5B gene is fairly common, pulmonary fibrosis is an uncommonly reported disease.

In a review of CT scans of more than 2,600 adults who did not have a clinical diagnosis of pulmonary fibrosis, researchers found imaging evidence of lung inflammation and scarring in about 9 percent of those over age 50. In this age group, these abnormal findings on CT scans were significantly more common among the 21 percent people with the MUC5B genetic variant.

Importantly, definite lung fibrosis seen on CT scan was strongly associated with the MUC5B genetic variant. While these abnormalities do not necessarily indicate a disease that will progress, the presence of these abnormalities were associated with more shortness of breath and cough as well as smaller lung sizes and ability to transfer oxygen.

The findings suggest that pulmonary fibrosis, which is a condition where lung tissue becomes thickened, stiff and scarred, may be a part of a much more common, but likely less severe, syndrome and could potentially be predicted on the basis of the MUC5B genetic variant.

David A. Schwartz, MD, chairman of the School of Medicine’s Department of Medicine, was a corresponding and senior author of the paper. Gary M. Hunninghake, MD, MPH, from the pulmonary and critical care division of the Department of Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston was a corresponding and first author of the paper. The research is supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health, the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute and the U.S. Veterans Administration.

Twenty-one authors shared credit for the paper, including researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Boston University. Joining Schwartz from Colorado were Elissa Murphy, MS, and Marvin I. Schwarz, MD, from the School of Medicine and Tasha E. Fingerlin, PhD, from the Colorado School of Public Health.

David Schwartz this month gave the American Thoracic Society’s Amberson Lecture, an honor bestowed annually on an individual with a career of major lifetime contributions to clinical or basic pulmonary research and/or clinical practice.

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NASA Looks To 3D-Printed Pizza And Other Foods For Long Distance Space Travel

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Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
According to a report by Quartz, NASA is dishing out $125,000 in grant money to help Anjan Contractor develop a 3D food printer.
Contractor received the six month grant from NASA to create a prototype of his universal food synthesizer. The mechanical engineer plans to build a 3D printer capable of providing nutritionally-appropriate meals synthesized one layer at a time from cartridges of powder and oils.
The powder the system uses has a shelf-life of 30 years and contains either sugars, complex carbohydrates, protein or some other basic building blocks for nutrition. He hopes his idea could be a solution to the growing population on Earth not having a sufficient amount of food.
“I think, and many economists think, that current food systems can´t supply 12 billion people sufficiently,” Contractor told Quartz. “So we eventually have to change our perception of what we see as food.”
Pizza is one of the foods Contractor believes he can print off because it can be printed in distinct layers, requiring the print head to extrude one substance at a time. First, the printer will begin laying down a layer of dough that is baked at the same time it is being printed through a heated plate at the bottom of the printer. After this step, it will lay down a tomato base, and finally the “protein layer” will be applied.
According to Quartz, Contractor’s printer is still at the conceptual stage, but he plans to begin building it within the next two weeks.
“Long distance space travel requires 15-plus years of shelf life,” Contractor told Quartz. “The way we are working on it is, all the carbs, proteins and macro and micro nutrients are in powder form. We take moisture out, and in that form it will last maybe 30 years.”
He and his team are initially focusing on applications for long-distance space travel, but his eventual goal is to turn the system into a design that can be licensed to someone who wants to turn it into a business.
“One of the major advantage of a 3D printer is that it provides personalized nutrition,” Contractor told Quartz. “If you´re male, female, someone is sick–they all have different dietary needs. If you can program your needs into a 3D printer, it can print exactly the nutrients that person requires.”
Printing food is a creative concept for the future of 3D printing, but it is not necessarily the weirdest. Researchers from Oxford University are developing a printer that can create materials with several of the properties of living tissues. Their design could become a new technology for delivering drugs to places where they are needed and potentially could replace damaged human tissues.

Mediterranean Diet Offers Cognitive Boost To The Aging Brain

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Peter Suciu for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

The Mayo Clinic has called the Mediterranean diet a heart-healthy eating plan as it combines elements of Mediterranean-style cooking with a splash of flavorful olive oil. The diet has also has been credited with lowering cholesterol in men, even among those who don´t lose weight.

Now researchers have again shown that the Mediterranean diet with added extra virgin olive oil or mixed nuts could improve the brain power of older people. Researchers at the University of Navarra in Spain reported that the Mediterranean diet could provide even more mental health benefits than a low-fat diet. The researchers´ findings were recently published online in the Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery and Psychiatry.

While past research has shown that the traditional Mediterranean diet reduces the risk of heart disease, and lowers the risk of overall cardiovascular mortality as well as a reduced incidence of stroke and cancer, research has shown that it has also reduced the incidence of Parkinson´s and Alzheimer´s diseases.

The Spanish researchers´ study included 522 men and women aged 55 to 80 without cardiovascular disease but at high vascular risk because of underlying conditions. These participants were also taking part in the Predimed trial as a way to ward off cardiovascular disease and were randomly assigned to a Mediterranean diet with added olive oil or mixed nuts, while a control group received advice to follow the standard low-fat diet typically recommended to prevent heart attack and stroke.

By comparison to the low-fat diet, the Mediterranean diet is characterized by its use of virgin olive oil as the main culinary fat. It also includes a high consumption of fruits, nuts, vegetables and legumes, as well as moderate to high consumption of fish and seafood. This diet typically consists of low consumption of dairy products and red meat, but includes the moderate intake of red wine.

Throughout the study, participants were given regular check-ups with their family doctor and quarterly checks for compliance with their prescribed diet. After an average of 6.5 years, the participants were then tested for signs of cognitive decline using a Mini Mental State Exam and a clock drawing test. These tests are used to assess higher brain functions, including orientation, memory, language, visuospatial and visuoconstrution abilities, and executive functions such as working memory, attention span and abstract thinking.

At the study´s conclusion, 60 of the participants had developed mild cognitive impairment. This included 8 who were on the olive oil supplemented Mediterranean diet, 19 on the diet with added mixed nuts, and 23 in the control group. Additionally, a further 35 people developed dementia, 12 whom were on the added olive oil diet, six on the added nut diet, and 17 on the low-fat diet. The study found that those on either of the Mediterranean diets scored higher than those on the low fat diet.

Additionally, the findings held true irrespective of other factors, including age, family history of cognitive impairment or dementia, or the presence of ApoE protein which is associated with Alzheimer´s disease. The findings also noted educational attainment, exercise levels and vascular risk factors, as well as energy intake and depression.

While the authors did acknowledge that because their sample size was relatively small and the study involved a group at high vascular risk, it does not necessarily imply that these findings are applicable to the general population.

Your Skype Messages May Not Be Safe From Cyber Snooping

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Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Technology news website Ars Technica says it discovered that Microsoft may be snooping into those private messages being sent over Skype.

The tech website found that the Microsoft-owned service regularly scans messages for signs of fraud and then holds on to that information indefinitely. The site utilized the skills of security researcher Ashkan Soltani to look into just how secure Skype’s message service really is.

Soltani was able to show that Microsoft not only has the ability to look at plaintext sent from one Skype user to another, but the company also regularly utilizes its monitoring abilities.

“The problem right now is that there’s a mismatch between the privacy people expect and what Microsoft is actually delivering,” Matt Green, a professor specializing in encryption at Johns Hopkins University, told Ars.

“Even if Microsoft is only scanning links for ‘good’ purposes, say detecting malicious URLs, this indicates that they can intercept some of your text messages. And that means they could potentially intercept a lot more of them.”

In January several privacy groups sent a letter to Skype Division President Tony Bates as well as Microsoft´s Chief Privacy Officer Brendon Lynch and Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith, asking them to reveal whether law enforcement is able to eavesdrop on Skype phone calls. A spokeswoman told BBC at the time that “Microsoft has an ongoing commitment to collaborate with advocates, industry partners and 2,112 governments worldwide to develop solutions and promote effective public policies that help protect people´s online safety and privacy.”

Reports emerged last July about how Microsoft changed Skype’s architecture in order to allow for easier snooping. Several sites claimed Skype switched from some of the peer-to-peer network technology to work on its own servers instead, which ultimately would make it easier to “wiretap” conversations. Skype responded in a blog post defending the changes it has made, saying it only complies with law enforcement when it is required.

“Skype´s architecture decisions are based on our desire to provide the best possible product to our users. Skype was in the process of developing and moving supernodes to cloud servers significantly ahead of the Microsoft acquisition of Skype,” the company wrote. “Our position has always been that when a law enforcement entity follows the appropriate procedures, we respond where legally required and technically feasible.”

What Microsoft does with the messages it stores is yet to be seen, but what is for sure is that users can be certain that their conversations on Skype are not entirely safe from snooping.

Science

Cause Of The Irish Potato Famine Revealed

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Max-Planck-Gesellschaft

An international team of scientists reveals that a unique strain of potato blight they call HERB-1 triggered the Irish potato famine of the mid-19th century

It is the first time scientists have decoded the genome of a plant pathogen and its plant host from dried herbarium samples. This opens up a new area of research to understand how pathogens evolve and how human activity impacts the spread of plant disease.

Phytophthora infestans changed the course of history. Even today, the Irish population has still not recovered to pre-famine levels. “We have finally discovered the identity of the exact strain that caused all this havoc”, says Hernán Burbano from the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology.

For research to be published in eLife, a team of molecular biologists from Europe and the US reconstructed the spread of the potato blight pathogen from dried plants. Although these were 170 to 120 years old, they were found to have many intact pieces of DNA.

“Herbaria represent a rich and untapped source from which we can learn a tremendous amount about the historical distribution of plants and their pests – and also about the history of the people who grew these plants,” according to Kentaro Yoshida from The Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich.

The researchers examined the historical spread of the fungus-like oomycete Phytophthora infestans, known as the Irish potato famine pathogen. A strain called US-1 was long thought to have been the cause of the fatal outbreak. The current study concludes that a strain new to science was responsible. While more closely related to the US-1 strain than to other modern strains, it is unique. “Both strains seem to have separated from each other only years before the first major outbreak in Europe,” says Burbano.

The researchers compared the historic samples with modern strains from Europe, Africa and the Americas as well as two closely related Phytophthora species. The scientists were able to estimate with confidence when the various Phytophthora strains diverged from each other during evolutionary time. The HERB-1 strain of Phytophthora infestans likely emerged in the early 1800s and continued its global conquest throughout the 19th century. Only in the twentieth century, after new potato varieties were introduced, was HERB-1 replaced by another Phytophthora infestans strain, US-1.

The scientists found several connections with historic events. The first contact between Europeans and Americans in Mexico in the sixteenth century coincides with a remarkable increase in the genetic diversity of Phytophthora. The social upheaval during that time may have led to a spread of the pathogen from its center of origin in Toluca Valley, Mexico. This in turn would have accelerated its evolution.

The international team came to these conclusions after deciphering the entire genomes of 11 historical samples of Phytophthora infestans from potato leaves collected over more than 50 years. These came from Ireland, the UK, Europe and North America and had been preserved in the herbaria of the Botanical State Collection Munich and the Kew Gardens in London.

“Both herbaria placed a great deal of confidence in our abilities and were very generous in providing the dried plants,” said Marco Thines from the Senckenberg Museum and Goethe University in Frankfurt, one of the co-authors of this study. “The degree of DNA preservation in the herbarium samples really surprised us,” adds Johannes Krause from the University of Tübingen, another co-author. Because of the remarkable DNA quality and quantity in the herbarium samples, the research team could evaluate the entire genome of Phytophthora infestans and its host, the potato, within just a few weeks.

Crop breeding methods may impact on the evolution of pathogens. This study directly documents the effect of plant breeding on the genetic makeup of a pathogen.

“Perhaps this strain became extinct when the first resistant potato varieties were bred at the beginning of the twentieth century,” speculates Yoshida. “What is for certain is that these findings will greatly help us to understand the dynamics of emerging pathogens. This type of work paves the way for the discovery of many more treasures of knowledge hidden in herbaria.”

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More Than 70 Percent Of Pregnant Women Suffer From Bowel Disorders

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April Flowers for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
A Loyola University Medical Center study has found that 72 percent of pregnant women experience constipation, diarrhea or other bowel disorders during their pregnancies. However, the bowel disorders only minimally affect a pregnant woman´s quality of life.
Scott Graziano, MD, associate professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology of Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine, and third-year medical student Payton Johnson presented their findings during the 61st Annual Clinical Meeting of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) in New Orleans.
The study started with 104 women who filled out the first trimester questionnaire; 66 women also completed a survey in the third trimester. Of the original 104, 72 percent reported one or more bowel disorders, including constipation, diarrhea, bloating and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Sixty-one percent of the third trimester respondents also reported one or more of the disorders.
The women also completed a survey detailing the extent to which bowel problems affect the quality of life. The survey asked such questions as whether bowel problems make life less enjoyable, limit what a person can wear or eat or make a person feel embarrassed, vulnerable, angry, isolated or depressed. The survey was scored on a 1 to 100 scale, with 1 representing the largest possible impact on quality of life.
The women reported an average score of 94.9. The only bowel problems that presented significant impacts on quality of life were constipation, which reduced the score by 4.4 points out of 100, and bloating, which reduced the score by 4.0 points. Graziano suggests that the reason such irritating problems don´t impact quality of life is that pregnant women have learned to expect them during pregnancy and so are better able to tolerate bowel disorders.
Physiological and hormonal changes that occur during pregnancy are the root cause of these bowel disorders. Increased progesterone levels are one such change. The rise affects the smooth muscles in the intestines, taking longer for food to move through the intestine and causing constipation. Women take vitamins, calcium and iron supplements during pregnancy that can cause constipation as well, Graziano said.
Another cause is a lack of dietary fiber, the study found, with pregnant women consuming only 16 to 17 grams of fiber per day. The recommended level is 25 to 30 grams.

IGERT’s 2013 Video And Posters Competition Kicks Off

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Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

While recognized in the scientific world for his contributions to the modern alternating current (AC) system of power delivery, Nikola Tesla is also highly regarded as a scientific showman — performing many electrical demonstrations in front of a live audience.

“When the current was turned on, the lamps or tubes, which had no wires connected to them, but lay on a table between the suspended plates, or which might be held in the hand in almost any part of the room, were made luminous,” wrote author John Patrick Barrett about one of Tesla´s demonstrations in his 1894 book Electricity at the Columbia Exposition. “These were the same experiments and the same apparatus shown by Tesla in London about two years previous, where they produced so much wonder and astonishment.”

In an effort to frame research in a more dramatic fashion, TERC, a not-for-profit group based in Cambridge, Mass., has announced the start of online voting to select a winner for its third annual Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) 2013 Video and Poster Competition.

Once an academic poster contest, the competition has been re-imagined to include multimedia that reveals IGERT students and faculty´s “latest interdisciplinary research changing our world (and the awesome young scientists and engineers behind that work),” according TERC spokeswoman Kacy Karlen.

To encourage potential entrants, 2012 award winner Mathew Cooper stressed the importance of conveying research in a multimedia format.

“As scientists, video is a very powerful tool,” Cooper said in an online video. “If you can encapsulate your project and your results into a three-minute video that´s accessible to the broader community, to funding agencies, to folks that need to see your work — that´s a tool that´s going to take you a long way in your careers. And, I so think this competition is a way“¦ is a good excuse for you to really dive into that and figure out what it takes to produce these videos.”

The competition´s organizers note that video and social media allow for more complex or mundane ideas to be conveyed in a more immediate and exciting fashion. They said that showcasing scientific research in multimedia format can enable researchers to connect with each other and the general public in a more profound way.

“Last year’s presenters (from over 125 IGERT programs nationwide) submitted 113 videos, highlighting research across topics like biologically-inspired robotic engineering, smart textile design, nano-plasmonic engineering for energy efficiency, and more,” Karlen said.

As a way to assist this year´s contestants, the competition´s organizers created a video series featuring last year´s awardees giving tips on how to convert research into a social media-friendly format.

Fifty IGERT faculty judges will choose 20 winners, four winners will be chosen by IGERT Community members and one Public Choice award will be determined by ℠likes´ on Facebook.

Voting for the competitions´ Community Choice and Public Choice awards begins on May 21. The next day, contestants must answer judges´ queries about their entries by midnight EDT. On May 23, voting for the Community Choice and Public Choice awards ends at 10pm EDT. The winners are scheduled to be announced on May 24.

Graphene Ink Could Lead To Bendable Electronics

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editor

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
Researchers writing in the Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters say they have developed a graphene-based ink that could be the beginnings of inkjet-printed graphene.
The team’s graphene-based ink is highly conductive and tolerant to bending, which could eventually pave the way for bendable tablet computers or electronic newspapers.
“Graphene has a unique combination of properties that is ideal for next-generation electronics, including high electrical conductivity, mechanical flexibility, and chemical stability,” said Mark Hersam, professor of materials science and engineering at Northwestern´s McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science. “By formulating an inkjet-printable ink based on graphene, we now have an inexpensive and scalable path for exploiting these properties in real-world technologies.”
The new method for mass-producing graphene can be carried out at room temperature using ethanol and ethyl cellulose to exfoliate graphite. This process minimizes residues and results in a powder with a high concentration of nanometer-sized graphene flakes.
The team demonstrated printing ink in multiple layers, each 14 nanometers thick, in order to create precise patterns. The ink’s conductivity remained unchanged, suggesting that it could be used to create foldable electronic devices.
Inkjet printing with graphene has remained a challenge because it is difficult to harvest a sufficient amount of graphene without compromising its electronic properties. The team’s method surpasses some of these challenges, opening up the door to a future with bendable smartphones.
Graphene was discovered in 2004, and scientists believe the material holds plenty of promise in the future. Scientists discovered the material by peeling off carbon layers from graphite using ordinary scotch tape. It is the world’s thinnest, strongest and most conductive material. Scientists could eventually use the material for applications like computer chips, broadband connections and drug delivery.
Researchers from the University of Manchester and National University of Singapore wrote in the journal Science about how graphene could lead to photovoltaic structures that could be placed on the outer walls of buildings to absorb sunlight. The team said they found that graphene could also help environmental conditions like temperature and brightness by directing energy to change the transparency and reflectivity of individual fixtures and windows.
“Such photoactive heterostructures add yet new possibilities, and pave the road for new types of experiments,” said Professor Kostya Novoselov of the University of Manchester. “As we create more and more complex heterostructures, so the functionalities of the devices will become richer, entering the realm of multifunctional devices.”

IFAW, Lawmakers Push Bill Protecting Big Cats

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Michael Harper for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

One of the many idiosyncrasies of humanity is our desire to domesticate otherwise wild animals and keep them around as pets. This has generally worked out well for us in regards to small birds, cats, dogs and fish. There are those, however, who push the limits of this domesticity too far and end up endangering the very animal they claim to care for so much. Last week, US Representatives Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-CA) and Loretta Sanchez (D-CA) introduced a bill to specifically protect big cats from the dangers of inexperienced domesticity. The Big Cats and Public Safety Protection Act would prohibit the private breeding and possession of big cats in an effort to protect the general public, as well as the cats themselves.

“No matter how many times people try, big cats such as lions, tigers and cheetahs are impossible to domesticate for personal possession,” said Congressman Mckeon, explaining the bill in a press statement.

“This bill is a step forward in protecting the public and will ensure that big cats are taken care of humanely in proper living conditions.”

While there are already laws meant to protect big cats and prohibit breeding and collection by the inexperienced, these laws vary greatly from state to state. The Big Cats and Public Safety Protection Act aims to create one federal solution to cover the entire nation. The Public Protection part of the bill is particularly important when considering an incident that took place in October 2011.

One Ohio resident had been keeping several big cats in cages along with bears, monkeys and wolves. Just before committing suicide, Terry Thompson opened up the cages holding all of these animals, turning Zanesville, Ohio into a small zoo. Public safety officers who had not been trained to handle wild animals were then forced to shoot and kill 18 Bengal tigers, 17 lions, six black bears, three mountain lions, two grizzly bears, two wolves and a baboon.

Immediately following the incident, Ohio was chided for having some of the most relaxed regulations regarding wild animals in the country.

“Ohio is one of the worst states in terms of lax legislations. We’re hoping this will at least be the trigger for some kind of legislation,” said Adam Roberts, executive vice president of Born Free USA in an October 2011 interview with USA Today.

Tim Harrison, Director of Outreach for Animals and International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) Big Cat Public Safety Consultant said he was one of those who responded to the Ohio incident and “will never forget the look on those officers´ faces that had to shoot and kill lions and tigers in their small community.”

Keeping big cats and other animals as pets not only places the public in danger, it also places the animals themselves in danger and even under the efforts of conservationists. Tigers are said to be the worst off of these big cats, with about 5,000 believed to reside in the United States. The IFAW is now urging all concerned citizens to contact their representatives to co-sponsor the Big Cats and Public Safety Protection Act.

Ginger May Help Asthmatics Breath Easier

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Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Advocates of homeopathic remedies have been touting the benefits of ginger for years and a new study presented at the“¯American Thoracic Society´s 2013 International Conference in Philadelphia this week suggests that the spicy, pungent root could help asthma sufferers breathe easier.

Bronchodilating asthma medications called beta-agonists (β-agonists) work by relaxing the smooth muscle (ASM) tissue in the airway. In the study, researchers looked at components of ginger to see if they could enhance the relaxing effects of these medications.

“Asthma has become more prevalent in recent years, but despite an improved understanding of what causes asthma and how it develops, during the past 40 years few new treatment agents have been approved for targeting asthma symptoms,” said lead author Elizabeth Townsend, post-doctoral researcher in the Columbia University Department of Anesthesiology. “In our study, we demonstrated that purified components of ginger can work synergistically with β-agonists to relax ASM.”

In the study, the researchers took ASM samples and caused the tissues to constrict by exposing them to the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. The team then combined the β-agonist isoproterenol with three separate ginger extracts: 6-gingerol, 8-gingerol or 6-shogaol. The contracted tissue samples were then exposed to the three different ginger treatment blends as well as pure isoproterenol.

The researchers discovered that tissues exposed to the combination of purified ginger extracts and isoproterenol exhibited a significantly greater relaxation response than those treated with just isoproterenol. In particular, the 6-shogaol mixture appeared to be the most effective.

After confirming the effects of the ginger extracts, the researchers looked into the mechanism behind the additive effect by focusing on a lung enzyme called phosphodiesterase4D (PDE4D), as previous research has shown that the chemical compound can inhibit the relaxation of ASM tissues. Using a method called fluorescent polarization, the Columbia team found that all three extracts markedly inhibited PDE4D.

The researchers also looked at F-actin filaments, a protein structure that plays a role in the constriction of ASM. They found that the 6-shogaol extract was particularly effective in dissolving these filaments.

“Taken together, these data show that ginger constituents 6-gingerol, 8-gingerol and 6-shogaol act synergistically with the β-agonist in relaxing ASM, indicating that these compounds may provide additional relief of asthma symptoms when used in combination with β-agonists,” Townsend noted.”By understanding the mechanisms by which these ginger compounds affect the airway, we can explore the use of these therapeutics in alleviating asthma symptoms.”

The study´s authors said they hope future studies will allow for a better understanding of the mechanisms that enhance the progress of ASM relaxation and to see if the aerosol delivery of these purified compounds can have therapeutic benefits for those suffering from bronchoconstrictive diseases.

The development of extracts into an effective medication would be a significant step forward in treating the millions of asthma patients worldwide. In the United States alone, about 25 million people, or 8 percent of the total population, suffer from the disease, according to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology.

Another study being presented at this week´s American Thoracic Society conference has found a connection between asthma and sleep apnea.

Bomb-Sniffing Bees Could Find Unexploded Mines In Croatia

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Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
The US Navy has used dolphins to hunt for undersea mines and dogs have been used to sniff out bombs on land. Now, scientists are incorporating honeybees in the hunt for unexploded landmines in Croatia and possibly other war-ravaged countries in the Balkans.
Bees have a perfect sense of smell and scientists believe that smell might save hundreds of lives if they can be trained to sniff out the odor from unexploded ordnance (UXOs). Tens of thousands of landmines are thought to still be buried in Croatia, following the War of Independence in the 1990s.
Croatia is set to join the European Union on July 1, and while the country is wrapped in beauty, with lush green forests, deep blue mountain lakes, and a breathtaking Adriatic Sea backdrop, the country is also littered with UXOs. An area of about 466 square miles is still littered with mines dating back to the 1990s.
Prof. Nikola Kezic, a honeybee expert from Zagreb University, and his colleagues trained bees to sniff out explosives by mixing their typical sugary food with traces of trinitrotoluene (TNT).
Once Kezic trained the bees to sniff out the TNT, food mixtures were put inside a net tent, along with other food mixtures that did not include the explosive ingredient. Providing confirmation that the training worked, Kezic noted the bees in the tent gathered mainly at the food sources that contained the sugar/TNT solution and not the other non-coated sugar solutions.
“Our basic conclusion is that the bees can clearly detect this target, and we are very satisfied,” Kezic said in an interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Kezic is also part of a larger campaign, known as “Tiramisu,” which has been sponsored by the EU to detect and dismember landmines in Croatia and abroad.
Kezic said the feeding points that contained the traces of TNT offered a “sugar solution as a reward.” He said it´s not too difficult to train a bee to detect explosives. “You can train a bee, but training their colony of thousands becomes a problem.”
Croatian officials estimate that since the beginning of the Balkan wars in 1991, about 2,500 people have died from land mine explosions. During the four-year war, around 90,000 land mines were placed across the entire country, mostly at random and without any plan or existing maps.
Dijana Plestina, the head of the Croatian government’s de-mining bureau, said the suspected devices represent a large obstacle for the country’s population and industry, including agriculture and tourism. In the nearly two decades since the end of the war, landmines have taken the lives of 316 people, including 66 de-miners, she said.
“While this exists, we are living in a kind of terror, at least for the people who are living in areas suspected to have mines,” she said. “And of course, that is unacceptable. We will not be a country in peace until this problem is solved.”
Mirjana Filipovic is haunted by the memory of a land mine blast that blew off her leg and took the life of her boyfriend while they were on a fishing trip in 2004. The accident occurred in a field that was supposedly de-mined.
“As we were returning hand-in-hand, my boyfriend stepped on a mine,” the now 41-year-old Filipovic told BusinessWeek. “It was an awful, deafening explosion … thousands of shrapnel parts went flying, hundreds ending up in my body. He was found dead several meters away, while I remained in a pool of blood sitting on the ground.”
Filipovic sued the Croatian government, arguing that the area was not clearly marked as a former minefield. The government has admitted guilt in failing to appropriately mark the minefield, but the court has yet to determine financial compensation in the case.
Mateja Janes, a researcher involved with Kezic´s study, was on hand this week in the southern town of Skradin, Croatia, where the bee feed testing project took place. The project has been painstakingly developed over many years though Zagreb´s Agronomy Faculty.
“We have heard that Americans were trying to develop something similar in a secret project, but it seems we’ve developed it before them,” Prof. Janes told the Croatian Times.
“Bees can smell flowers from a distance of [2.8 miles]. Therefore they can smell the explosives at the same distance. They are better at it than dogs,” noted Janes. “We hope this is a concept which can be developed and we hope it is something we can export to other countries and become indispensable de-mining tools.”
Prof. Janes said the team is planning to use the bees in a real de-mining experiment next month near the southern town of Benkovac. The region was the front line in the war in the 1990s.
Kezic said researchers in the US have in the past used honeybees in bomb-sniffing experiments, but because the scent of TNT evaporates quickly, the Americans didn´t include that in their tests. Also, rats and dogs have been tested previously, but because of their weight, they set off blasts when they encounter them. Bees, on the other hand, could be able to find the bomb without exploding it, allowing experts to detonate them afterward.
However, with bees, some mines could be missed because they are buried too deeply, increasing the risks of deadly explosions.
Kezic said, once the bees have been trained and are scientifically reliable, they will be put to the real test in areas that have already been de-mined to see if they can still sniff out mines that may have been missed. He said the bees will be followed with heat-seeking cameras to track their movements.
“We are not saying that we will discover all the mines on a minefield, but the fact is that it should be checked if a minefield is really de-mined,” he told BusinessWeek. “It has been scientifically proven that there are never zero mines on a de-mined field, and that’s where bees could come in.”

Volcanic Activity Increases On Alaska’s Mount Pavlof

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Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Alaska´s Pavlof Volcano, which roared back to life on May 13, continues to send ash and steam nearly 20,000 feet into the air, just below the threshold that experts deem becomes a threat to air traffic in the region. Over the weekend, Pavlof also began spewing lava hundreds of feet into the air.

The 8,262-foot-high Pavlof, which is located about 625 miles southeast of Anchorage along the Aleutian Islands, but still sits on mainland Alaska, has been continually monitored closely by officials at the Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO). Kristi Wallace, a geologist with the AVO, said the aviation warning level for the eruption remained at code orange, just below the highest threat level: code red.

As satellite images came through, there were occasional instances of the ash cloud reaching 22,000 feet, according to KTUU, Alaska’s official news source.

Residents of Sand Point, a city of about 1,000 people on Popof Island 55 miles east of the volcano, found traces of ash on their vehicles Sunday morning as they awoke. Several residents have taken photographs and have sent them to the AVO, noted Wallace.

Wallace said samples of the ash were also being relayed to the AVO and she was “excited to see what those look like.” As it stands the threat is still minimal, but a continued layer of ash particles can pose a significant threat to vehicles, plugging air filters and damaging engines, she said.

“Both reports indicate film on their windshield, but they could see through it – gritty ash,” Wallace told Dan Joling of The Associated Press (AP).

The activity at the volcano is on-going, with seismometers picking up continuous tremors. “It’s on this really steady rate that’s still high,” she said.

Chris Waythomas, another geologist working at the AVO, told KTUU that it´s fortunate that relatively “few people live right around the volcano.” For those who do live in surrounding communities, such as Sand Point and Nelson Lagoon, Waythomas said it is unlikely that significant ash fall will occur in these areas. Other nearby communities, such as Cold Bay and King Cove are upwind of the volcano and should typically not see any ash.

Pavlof last erupted in 2007 and continued to do so for 29 days. Past eruptions have lasted weeks, months and even years. Wallace said the 2007 eruption was “short compared to past eruption in historical times.” She warned that Pavlof´s current eruption could last “months.”

The prevailing winds on the peninsula are forecast to change, according to the National Weather Service (NWS). If so, the ash could move northeast away from Sand Point and toward Nelson Lagoon, a small commercial fishing village of 46 people. The NWS warned people to avoid prolonged exposure to ash, especially if they have respiratory problems, such as asthma or COPD. Also, people should protect critical electronic systems and other equipment from ash particle contamination.

There are no solid estimates on what Pavlof will do from here on out; it could recede, continue or magnify.

“For the most part, what we see at Pavlof is exactly what we’re seeing now: really low level, ash-poor plumes, continuous activity,” Wallace told AP. “But there’s always an opportunity for something to spike up to, say, 30,000 feet.”

If the ash cloud does go much higher the warning level will likely be raised to red, she said.

Pavlof is not the only volcano in Alaska that has recently reared its ugly head. The AVO is continuing to monitor Cleveland, which sits further southeast on Chuginadak Island in the Aleutians. However, with Cleveland, monitoring can only be done using infrasonic technology, which generally takes about 40 minutes to reach forecast stations.

The AVO last week said that federal budget cuts to volcanic seismic monitoring has affected its ability to keep a close watch on many of Alaska´s 52 volcanic peaks. Nearly 40 percent of the USGS seismic stations around Alaskan volcanoes are in disrepair and need fixing. But without funds in place to repair them, they will continue to collapse.

Teenage Inventor Honored For Developing Affordable Self-Driving Car Technology

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

A Romanian teenager has been awarded first prize at the 2013 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair for his work on an artificial intelligence system that could drastically reduce the cost of building a self-driving car.

Nineteen-year-old Ionut Budisteanu took home a $75,000 scholarship for his concept, which replaces the costly high-resolution 3D radar used in many types of self-driving vehicles (including those designed by Google) with AI, webcam imagery, and low resolution 3D technology, Travis Andrews of Dvice reported on Saturday.

Budisteanu looked at Google´s design and realized that the developer was not concerned about the costs of their self-driving car when designing the vehicle. The high-resolution 3D radar was the most expensive component, costing approximately $75,000, according to John Roach of NBC News. Budisteanu was able to replace their technology with something that should cost no more than $4,000 to build, Roach added.

“By using low resolution 3-D imaging to recognize the larger objects like cars and houses and using webcam imagery with artificial intelligence to recognize the smaller objects like curbs, lane markers and soccer balls, he found a way around the expensive component,” Andrews explained. “All of this information is processed by a suite of computers that then offer the processed info to a supervisor computer program which calculates the car´s path and drives it.”

The teenager´s technology performed flawlessly in 47 out of 50 simulations he conducted, according to NBC News. In the three others, it failed to recognize some individuals between 65 to 100 feet away — a problem which he said could be corrected with a slightly higher-resolution 3D radar system. Even then, the cost of his self-driving car technology would be “a fraction of Google’s” and could help make it available to the public at large, Roach added.

Budisteanu has obtained funding from a Romanian firm and will start testing a prototype this summer.

Also at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, 18-year-old California native Eesha Khare was awarded the Intel Foundation Young Scientist Award of $50,000 for a miniature device which fits inside a cell phone battery and allows them to recharge completely in no more than 30 seconds. In a statement, Intel said that her invention could also be potentially applied to help recharge dead car batteries.

Louisiana native Henry Lin, 17, also received the Intel Foundation Young Scientist Award of $50,000. Lin simulated thousands of clusters of galaxies, providing astronomers and other scientists with “valuable new data, allowing them to better understand the mysteries of astrophysics: dark matter, dark energy and the balance of heating and cooling in the universe’s most massive objects,” the chip manufacturer and event sponsor added.

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What is an Ice Age?

Written By: Sam Savage

Hi, I’m Emerald Robinson. In this “What Is” video we’re going to take a closer look at ice ages.

In 1840, Swiss scientist Louis Agassiz noticed glaciers–huge rivers of ice created by snowfall–occurred throughout northern Europe. As glaciers move they transport rocks and scour the ground beneath them, leaving evidence of their passing. Agassiz theorized glaciers were the remnants of a huge glacial ice field that once covered much of the continent. Geologic evidence of massive glacial activity also occurs in North America.

Agassiz had discovered evidence of the last ice age, a period of time when glacial ice fields extended across large sections of the planet. Geologists have evidence of three ice ages–more properly called glacial ages. The oldest occurred 275 million years ago. The second, which affected parts of Africa, India and Australia, occurred 275 million years ago.

The last glacial age, and the only one to occur since humans appeared, began 1.5 million years ago, and receded 15,000 years ago. During that time the Laurentide ice field covered all of Canada and extended as far south as Indiana.

Glacial ages have enormous effects on the plant’s weather patterns, animals and plant life. Animals that cannot adapt to the colder environments die out. Similarly, animals that adapt to cold environments may not survive the change when glaciers recede.

The Milankovich theory, by astronomer Milutin Milankovich, suggests variations in the earth’s orbit account for glacial ages. Instead of orbiting the sun in a constant pattern, the earth “wobbles.” Over millions of years this “wobbling” affects global temperatures. As glacial ice fields spread, snow and ice reflect sunlight that would otherwise warm the earth, causing further drops in cold temperatures. Low levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere can also contribute to a glacial age.

Coffee Linked To Lower Risk Of Autoimmune Liver Disease

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

Regular coffee consumption has been linked to a reduced risk of the autoimmune liver disease primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC), according to a study that will be presented by Mayo Clinic researchers at the Digestive Disease Week 2013 conference in Orlando, Florida on Monday.

According to the Minnesota-based medical center, PSC is a disease of the bile ducts, which can result in inflammation and subsequent duct obstruction potentially resulting in cirrhosis of the liver, liver failure and biliary cancer. For their study, they examined a group of American patients with PSC and primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC), as well as a control group of healthy patients suffering from neither condition.

Their results demonstrate that drinking coffee was associated with a reduced risk of PSC, but not a reduced risk of PBC — suggesting that the two conditions could be more different than originally believed. In addition, patients suffering from PSC were said to be less likely to avoid coffee than their healthier counterparts, with PSC patients spending almost 20 percent less time consuming the caffeinated beverage than the control group.

“While rare, PSC has extremely detrimental effects,” Dr. Craig Lammert, a gastroenterologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, said in a statement. “We are always looking for ways to mitigate risk, and our first-time finding points to a novel environmental effect that might also help us to determine the cause of this and other devastating autoimmune diseases.”

Dr. Lammert is scheduled to present findings from the research, which was funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the American Liver Foundation, on May 20 at 10am. The study is entitled “Coffee consumption is associated with reduced risk of primary sclerosing cholangitis but not primary biliary cirrhosis.”

PTSD Patients’ Brains Perform Abnormally, Even In Non-Stressful Conditions

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

Regions of the brain that have been linked to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in military veterans continue to perform abnormally, even if there is no external stress present, according to new research published in the journal Neuroscience Letters.

The research, which was completed by researchers at the New York University School of Medicine and presented Saturday at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatry Association, also found that the effects of chronic trauma were persistent in specific areas of the brain even when the patient is not engaged in cognitive or emotional tasks.

The study authors claim that their findings could provide new insight into which area of the brain provokes traumatic symptoms, and could represent a key step forward towards the development of improved diagnostic and treatment options for PTSD — a condition which can cause flashbacks, nightmares, disturbing memories and emotional instability in those suffering from the anxiety disorder.

NYU School of Medicine research fellow Xiaodan Yan and colleagues recruited 104 veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and used fMRI to measure the blood-oxygen levels in their brain under “spontaneous” or “resting” conditions. They discovered that spontaneous brain activity in the amygdala, a key structure in the area of the brain responsible for producing fearful or anxious emotions, was significantly higher in the 52 combat veterans with PTSD than in the 52 who did not suffer from the condition.

“The PTSD group also showed elevated brain activity in the anterior insula, a brain region that regulates sensitivity to pain and negative emotions,” the university explained. “Moreover, the PTSD group had lower activity in the precuneus, a structure tucked between the brain’s two hemispheres that helps integrate information from the past and future, especially when the mind is wandering or disengaged from active thought.”

There is a correlation between decreased activity in the precuneus and increased severity of “re-experiencing” symptoms (the phenomenon during which PTSD patients re-experience traumatic events over and over via flashbacks, nightmares, and fright-inducing thoughts), the researchers noted.

An estimated 20 percent of the 1.7 million men and women who have served in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been diagnosed with PTSD, they said. Previous research has shown that veterans with PTSD have a risk of suicide, and that more soldiers committed suicide than died as a result of combat in Afghanistan in 2012.

The study was supported by a US Department of Defense grant. In addition to the NYU School of Medicine, experts from the University of California at San Francisco, the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, and the Center for Imaging of Neurodegenerative Diseases at the VA Medical Center in San Francisco contributed to the research.

New Toothbrush Could Secrete Caffeine During Brushing Process

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

Good news for those who aren´t getting enough caffeine in their coffee, sodas, energy drinks, chewing gum, waffles, marshmallows, or other snacks and drinks — you may soon be able to get a dose of the stimulant while performing basic dental hygiene tasks!

Yes, according to the Huffington Post, Colgate-Palmolive has filed a patent application for an oral care device that could administer chemicals when it comes into contact with a person´s mouth or teeth.

Among the substances listed as those that could potentially be delivered through the toothbrush is — you guessed it — caffeine, which is listed in the patent as a “homeopathic teething or inflammation soothing additive.”

Other substances which could be administered by the toothbrush include various flavors, capsaicin (a substance found in chili peppers that could be used to create a warming sensation), appetite suppressants, or painkillers like benzocaine (which could be for teething children), Gawker reporter Maggie Lange explained.

Each of the device´s chemical-releasing patches would last approximately three months, according to the Daily Mail, and the different types of brushes would be differentiated by different shaped tongue cleaners. In other words, an apple-shaped one would be apple flavored, a snowflake would release a substance that would provide a cooling sensation, and a candle or flamethrower would indicate that the brush would release a warming substance.

“While Colgate could not be reached for comment about the potential for bringing the product to market, it shows startling innovation for a company selling a dental-cleaning implement that has gone conceptually unchanged for more than 500 years,” said Rich Abdill of the website Motherboard.

“But this innovation comes at a turbulent time for the ℠caffeinate everything´ movement,” he added, referring to Wrigley´s decision to remove their caffeinated “Alert” gum off the market pending FDA research into the product.

As for the regulatory agency´s stance on Colgate´s proposed toothbrush, Abdill said that it is “unclear” and that “trying to find someone at the organization to speculate proved to be less than fruitful“¦ Standard toothbrushes don´t need to wait for FDA approval to be sold, so long as their design is submitted to the agency.”

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Seed Drilling

Written By: editor

Seed drilling is a method used by farmers in order to have a more unified, crop-yielding season. The first known use of seed drilling was in 1500 BC by the Sumerian. At this time, they were using a single tube.

Later, in the 2nd Century BC, the Chinese developed a multi-tube iron drill. This facilitated in a larger crop planting allowing them to feed their large population. The first recorded patent of a sowing machine was in 1566 by the Venetian Senate, attributing Camillo Torello. In the early stages of development, the sowing machine used was expensive, unreliable, and very fragile.

Earlier methods of planting crops were very basic; just tilling the ground and tossing seeds onto it. Spreading seeds in this manner created disarray in the crop yield. This process, known as manual broadcasting, made it difficult for the farmers to control the weeds causing a loss of nutrients and minerals needed for the crop.

Due to these downfalls, the farmers needed a better method of planting. Seed drilling was their answer. After the development of gas tractors, there came more developed sowing machines. This method allows farmers to have better control over the depth and space between each seed, along with how many seeds planted into each drilled hole. This new method of planting also gave an advantage to the amount of seeds lost due to the elements surrounding the crop, thus reducing the cost of a crop.

Image Caption: A modern sowing/seed drilling machine fro grain and rapeseed. Credit: Mahlum / Wikipedia

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Merlin, Falco columbarius

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This bird of prey is known more as a pigeon hawk. The Merlin is from the Northern Hemisphere with some migrating to subtropical and northern tropical areas during the winter. There has also been a discovery that there are two different, very distinct, species: the North American and the Eurasian.
The North American Merlin was first described by a Swede taxonomist, Carl Linnaeus. The Merlin is between 9 and 13 inches long with a wingspan of 20-29 inches. The Merlin is an exceptionally strong falcon with males weighing 5.8 ounces and the female upwards of 8 ounces. During the migration period there is a slight weight loss or gain; the males range from 4.4 ounces to about 7.5 ounces while the females range from 6.7-11 ounces. These vast differences in weight are important to the Merlin and other raptors so that both male and female can hunt different types of animals. This also helps decrease the size of the feeding area.
The coloring on the Merlin is different between the genders as well. The male Merlin is blue-grey on his back and even silver and black in subspecies. The breast of the male is orange tinted with streaks of reddish brown. The female, as well as the young, is brownish-grey to a darker brown on the back with their breasts white with brown spots. The flight feathers (remiges) are blackish. Males that are lighter than others will have a faint and narrow grey band. In both genders, the tail tip is black with a small band of white.
Merlin’s habitat consists of open spaces, willow or birch scrub, grasslands and parks. They range from sea level to tree line and prefer low and medium height vegetation, avoiding dense forests and treeless areas. During migration they will use most habitats. Merlin birds prefer the coastlines for breeding during warmer weather. Merlins will roost with others during the winter months and will attack other birds of prey that get to close.
Merlins mainly hunt fish, relying on speed and accuracy as they dive for the fish. The Merlin will catch other prey in the air thus being known as the best aerial predator. The breeding pair hunt together; one pushes the prey and the other catches the prey. The Merlin will attack anything that moves no matter what other animal is chasing it. Merlin will also save their catch to consume later. While breeding, the Merlin will eat insects, small mammals, and reptiles.
May and June are the typical breeding months and pairs are monogamous for just that season. Since the Merlin does not make their own nests, they will use abandoned nests, cliffs, and sometimes buildings. The female will usually make a shallow scrape in low lying shrubs. The female generally lays four or five eggs that are a rusty brown and about 1.5 by 1.24 inches in size. The female will sit on (incubate) these eggs for 28 to 32 days while the male takes over the hunting responsibilities. Hatchlings weigh less than an ounce. Over the next 30 days the young will begin to develop their flight muscles and wings. It takes about a year for the young to become sexually mature and will begin to breed immediately.
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Falconiformes
Family: Falconidae
Image Caption: A Merlin sitting atop a post in Alberta, Canada. Credit: Raj Boora / Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Canada’s Tech Industry Hoping To Capitalize On US Visa Woes

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

A Canadian invasion of sorts is underway in the US, but it isn´t a military operation — rather, it´s an attempt to convince Silicon Valley tech workers frustrated with America´s immigration policies to take their talents north.

According to the Associated Press (AP), Jason Kenney, Canada’s minister of citizenship, immigration and multiculturalism, kicked off a four-day recruitment drive by offering immigrants working in the high-tech industry a new visa in an attempt to bolster his nation´s economy.

Kenney is hoping to capitalize on non-resident US workers who are becoming irritated by the country´s visa policies, and his visit comes at a time when Congress is in the midst of working on a long-awaited overhaul of the American immigration system, the wire service added.

“I think everyone knows the American system is pretty dysfunctional,” he told Matt O’Brien of MercuryNews.com on Thursday. “I’m going to the Bay Area to spread the message that Canada is open for business; we’re open for newcomers. If they qualify, we’ll give them the Canadian equivalent of a green card as soon as they arrive.”

The visa, which is being known as the “startup visa,” grants permanent Canadian residency to any budding entrepreneur who opens a business within the country´s boarders and successfully raises enough venture capital, the AP said. Kenney´s visit comes only a few days after a billboard advertising the program was erected in the southern part of San Francisco encouraging workers having difficulties with their H-1B temporary visa to relocate.

O´Brien said that Kenney will be meeting with tech executives, as well as speaking to students at Stanford University and operating the Canadian booth at the TiEcon entrepreneurship conference this weekend at the Santa Clara Convention Center. Under current US visa regulations, foreign-born tech employees may remain in the country on H1-B visas for a maximum of six years and are prohibited from changing employers.

“The Canadian perspective is they would love to re-create Silicon Valley in Canada,” Irene Bloemraad, chairperson of the Canadian studies program at the University of California, Berkeley, told MercuryNews.com. “And they recognize that under the current immigration system in the United States“¦ there are people who are having a hard time getting permanent legal status.”

Kenney´s visit “exposes broader differences between Canadian and U.S. immigration laws and philosophies — differences that could narrow if Congress passes a bipartisan Senate plan that follows the Canadian model by moving to a more skills-based admissions system,” O´Brien added. “The Senate plan would shift to a more Canadian approach in adopting a new ℠merit visa´ to award permanent U.S. residency to the highest scorers in a points system favoring those who are young, highly educated, fluent in English and working in high-demand fields.”

Astronomers Catch Bright Explosion On The Moon

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[ Watch the Video: Bright Explosion on the Moon ]

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

If you take a good look at the Moon it isn´t too difficult to paint a pretty clear picture of the lunar surface´s violent past. Our neighboring natural satellite is pock-marked with thousands upon thousands of craters from meteors and asteroids that have been pelting its surface for more than a billion years.

Over the past eight years, NASA astronomers have been monitoring the Moon studying impact sites and also looking for new signs of impacts. And by keeping a close watch on the Moon, astronomers have come to the realization that “lunar meteor showers” are much more common that anyone had previously expected, with hundreds of impacts occurring every year.

Many of the impacts that occur have been easily detectable by astronomers with high-tech equipment, and some even by amateur astronomers with backyard telescopes. But one impact that recently occurred on the Moon was so bright that anyone looking up with a naked eye would have had the sighting of a lifetime — the biggest explosion on the moon in at least the past eight years that lunar monitoring has occurred.

“On March 17, 2013, an object about the size of a small boulder hit the lunar surface in Mare Imbrium,” said Bill Cooke of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office (MEO). “It exploded in a flash nearly 10 times as bright as anything we’ve ever seen before.”

Anyone looking at the Moon at the very moment of impact would have been able to see the explosion without the aid of a telescope. The flash, which lasted about a second, glowed like that of a 4th magnitude star.

The first person to detect the explosion was Ron Suggs, an analyst at Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama. Suggs caught the anomaly while sifting through digital recordings made with one of the program´s 14-inch telescopes.

“It jumped right out at me, it was so bright,” recalled Suggs. The 90-pound meteoroid responsible for the explosion was traveling at about 56,000 mph when it made impact. The small chunk of rock exploded with the force of 5 tons of TNT when it made impact.

While the meteoroid itself was small, Cooke believes the object was part of a much larger group of cosmic travelers.

“On the night of March 17, NASA and University of Western Ontario all-sky cameras picked up an unusual number of deep-penetrating meteors right here on Earth,” Cooke said in a statement. “These fireballs were traveling along nearly identical orbits between Earth and the asteroid belt.”

Since the Earth and Moon would have been bombarded by the same debris field at the same time, Cooke said it is likely the two events are related, adding that “this constitutes a short duration cluster of material encountered by the Earth-Moon system.”

Because one of the goals of the lunar monitoring program involves identifying space debris that could pose a significant threat to the Earth-Moon system, astronomers have labeled the March 17th impact/explosion as a good candidate for their research.

To further study the site, astronomers contacted operators of NASA´s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. The LRO should be able to get a good reading of the area on a future pass since it is believed the resulting crater is as wide as 65 feet. Comparing the crater size to the explosion brightness should give researchers some valuable data that go into lunar impact models.

Unlike Earth, the Moon has no atmosphere to protect it and the surface is exposed to all meteoric bombardments of any size. As a result, meteor impacts are much more frequent on the Moon.

Since NASA began tracking lunar meteors in 2005, more than 300 impacts have been detected, none of which were as bright as the March 17th event.

NASA said that most lunar impacts hail from known meteoroid streams such as the Perseids and Leonids. However, there are some rogue meteors that happen by that occasionally strike the Moon´s surface. Most of these are stray pieces of comets and/or asteroid debris.

Cooke said astronomers will be keeping an eye out next year around the same time to see if any repeat performances occur “when the Earth-Moon system passes through the same region of space.”

Yahoo In Talks With Tumblr About Buyout

Written By: editor

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

According to tech news website AllThingsD, Yahoo is in talks with blog site Tumblr regarding a possible takeover.

AllThingsD said talks with Yahoo and Tumblr are in the “serious” stage, and a later report by AdWeek mentioned the figure for the buyout could be $1 billion.

Yahoo is struggling to try and stay in business against Internet giant Google, despite being one of the first search engines. Marissa Meyer, the chief executive of Yahoo, has been trying to keep the company afloat after a multi-year decline in revenue and user engagement on its website. The deal with Tumblr could be just the thing to boost the company’s earnings.

“Yahoo needs to grow and better engage its audience, and Tumblr would find itself in possession of a key new weapon: the Yahoo homepage, not to mention the massive scale of Yahoo´s various digital media properties,” AllThingsD reported. “Needless to say, the Tumblr demographic skews young and likely mobile, which is the product category that Yahoo has itself trained its sites on; Yahoo has expressly stated that it is working to become a mobile-first, or at least focused company.”

Tumblr was founded in February 2007 and has 175 employees in offices across the country. It hosts nearly 108 million blogs, over 50 billion posts, and 70.6 million daily posts. Last November, Tumblr was ranked as the ninth most popular Web site in the US, with more than 61.3 million monthly US visitors and 170 million monthly visitors around the world. According to Forbes.com, the company made $13 million in 2012 and is looking to bring in about $100 million due to new advertising initiatives.

Yahoo’s chief financial officer Ken Goldman said earlier this week at a financial conference in Boston that one of the company’s biggest challenges is having an aging demographic.

“Part of it is going to be just visibility again in making ourselves cool, which we got away from for a couple of years,” Goldman said, according to CNET.

Adding Tumblr to Yahoo’s repertoire could be just the thing to help the company seem a little more hip.

Pacemakers Could Be Hacked, Researchers Claim, But Not Easily

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

The sensors used by implanted cardiac defibrillators and pacemakers to detect the rhythm of a person´s beating heart are vulnerable to computer hackers, say researchers from the US and South Korea.

Implanted defibrillators monitor the heart for irregular beating and administer an electric shock to restore normal rhythm when needed. Pacemakers use electrical pulses to continuously maintain the heart´s rhythm. Both types of cardiac devices can be tampered with externally and digitally, according to research scheduled for presentation on May 20 at the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy in San Francisco.

Researchers from the University of Michigan, University of South Carolina, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, University of Minnesota, University of Massachusetts and Harvard Medical School report that they were able to use radio frequency electromagnetic waves to create an erratic heartbeat in simulated human models.

In theory, they say such a fake signal could interfere with the operation of cardiac health devices by preventing necessary pacing operations or creating unneeded — and extremely painful — defibrillation shocks. However, the investigators emphasize that they know of no real-world instances in which a hacker has successfully corrected an implanted heart device, and that it would be exceptionally difficult for anyone to actually do so.

“Security is often an arms race with adversaries,” said Wenyuan Xu, assistant professor of computer science and engineering at the University of South Carolina. “As researchers, it’s our responsibility to always challenge the common practice and find defenses for vulnerabilities that could be exploited before unfortunate incidents happen. We hope our research findings can help to enhance the security of sensing systems that will emerge for years to come.”

According to the researchers, this is not the first time that vulnerabilities in implantable medical devices have been discovered. However, the findings demonstrate previously unknown security risks in fairly common “analog” sensors, which rely on the human body or the surrounding environment to trigger specific functions. Analog sensors are also typically used in Bluetooth headsets and computers in web-based phone calls, they added.

Denis Foo Kune, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Michigan and the individual who will present the findings, said that analog devices typically trust the information received from their sensors, and that the path tended to be weak and exploitable. While the researchers note that these medical systems do have security mechanisms, they are bypassed by the information received by the devices´ sensors.

The investigators tested both cardiac defibrillators and pacemakers in open air in order to determine which types of radio waveforms could interfere with their normal functions. Next, they exposed the medical devices to those waves in both a saline bath and a patient simulator, and discovered that a person´s body shields the devices from the ill effects of the radio waveforms to a large degree. In fact, their findings suggest that a hacker would need to be about two inches away from a patient in order to interfere with their cardiac instruments.

“People with pacemakers and defibrillators can remain confident in the safety and effectiveness of their implants,” said Kevin Fu, an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the Ann Arbor, Michigan-based university.

“Patients already protect themselves from interference by keeping transmitters like phones away from their implants. The problem is that emerging medical sensors worn on the body, rather than implanted, could be more susceptible to this type of interference.”

CDC Mental Health Report Finds Seven Percent Of Children Have ADHD

Written By: editor
John

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

Attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is the most prevalent diagnosis amongst youngsters between the ages of three and 17, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention´s (CDC) first-ever comprehensive report on the mental health of American children.

The report, released as a Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report Supplement entitled “Mental Health Surveillance Among Children in the United States, 2005-2011,” is said to be the first report to describe federal efforts on monitoring mental disorders such as depression, anxiety and autism spectrum disorders.

The CDC discovered that boys were more likely than girls to have ADHD, behavioral or conduct problems, autism spectrum disorders, anxiety, Tourette syndrome, and cigarette dependence. Adolescent girls, on the other hand, were reportedly more likely than adolescent boys to have depression or an alcohol use disorder.

Furthermore, the study discovered that the number of children with a mental disorder increased with age — with the exception of autism spectrum disorders, which was highest amongst children between the ages of six and 11. The CDC also reported that 12-to-17-year-old boys were more likely than adolescent girls to die as a result of suicide.

The organization calls the report an important step to better understand mental health disorders in children, as well as identifying gaps in the data and developing strategies to help better promote and protect the mental health of youngsters. By doing so, they said, children will be able to reach their full potential in life.

“Millions of children in the U.S. have mental disorders that affect their overall health and present challenges for their loved ones. In addition, the financial costs of childhood mental disorders are at least an estimated $247 billion each year,” CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said in a statement. “We are working to both increase our understanding of these disorders, and help scale up programs and strategies to promote children´s mental health so that our children grow to lead productive, healthy lives.”

“Children of all ethnic backgrounds, races, genders and ages, in every area of the United States live with a mental disorder,” added Ruth Perou, Child Development Studies Team Leader at the CDC´s National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities. “We need surveys and data systems that provide the necessary mental health information to improve children´s health and wellbeing at home and in school. This will help children reach their full potential while reducing societal costs.”

According to the report´s findings, 6.8 percent of children between the ages of three and 17 had ADHD; 3.5 percent had behavioral or conduct problems; 3.0 percent had anxiety disorders; 2.1 percent were depressed; and 1.1 percent had autism spectrum disorders.

In addition, 0.2 percent of children between the ages of six and 17 had Tourette syndrome. Amongst 12-to-17-year-old adolescents, 4.7 percent had illicit drug use disorder in the past year, while 4.2 percent had alcohol use disorder in the same year, and 2.8 percent had cigarette dependence in the past month.

Survey: 97 Percent Of Scientists Say Global Warming Due To Human Activity

Written By: editor

redOrbit staff & Wire Reports — Your Universe Online

An analysis of thousands of peer-reviewed studies published over more than two decades reveals a growing consensus that climate change is caused by human activity.

The survey, published Thursday in the journal Environmental Research Letters, contradicts the idea that scientists are deeply divided on the topic, the authors said.

“An accurate perception of the degree of scientific consensus is an essential element to public support for climate policy,” wrote the researchers from the United States, Australia and Canada.

“Communicating the scientific consensus also increases people’s acceptance that climate change is happening.”

The researchers looked at more than 4,000 scientific papers that expressed a position on whether humans were primarily to blame for recent global warming. The papers were published between 1991 and 2011, and were written by more than 10,000 scientists.

Just over 97 percent agreed that human activity is responsible for recent global warming.

“Our analysis indicates that the number of papers rejecting the consensus… is a vanishingly small proportion of the published research,” the researchers wrote.

The results of the survey conflict with US public opinion polls conducted from 1997 to 2007, which found that just 60 percent of Americans believe a scientific consensus exists on manmade, or anthropogenic, global warming.

“Our findings prove that there is a strong scientific agreement about the cause of climate change, despite public perceptions to the contrary,” said John Cook of the University of Queensland, who led the survey.

“There is a gaping chasm between the actual consensus and the public perception,” Cook said in a statement.

The researchers attribute the gap to vigorous lobbying efforts by industry, which they say has caused confusion that has blocked efforts to act on climate change.

“The public perception of a scientific consensus on AGW is a necessary element in public support for climate policy,” the researchers said.

The Cook survey was the most comprehensive effort to date to demonstrate the consensus on the causes of climate change, deploying volunteers from the SkepticalScience.com website to review scientific abstracts. The volunteers also asked study authors to rate their own views on the causes of climate change.

But Professor Robert Brulle, a sociologist at Drexel University who studies the forces underlying public perceptions about climate change, challenges the idea that educating the public about a broad scientific consensus will have an effect on public opinion — or on the political conditions necessary for action to combat climate change.

Rather, having influential leaders call for climate action would be far more powerful, he said.

“I don’t think people really want to come around to grips with the fact that climate change is a highly ideological issue and it is not amenable to the information deficit model,” he told The Guardian.

“The information deficit model, this idea that if you just pile on more information people will get convinced, is just completely inadequate.”

“It strengthens the people who actually read and pay attention but it is certainly not going to change or shift the opinions of others.”

The United Nations is targeting a maximum temperature rise of 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (two degrees Celsius) from pre-industrial levels to achieve what scientists believe would be manageable climate change. Many nations are already negotiating curbs to greenhouse gas emissions released by fossil fuel burning.

Anti-Appetite Hormone In Brain Affected Negatively By Obesity

Written By: editor

Michael Harper for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

Obesity has been found to alter the body in more ways than one. Previous studies have shown that adding too much mass to a body can chemically and genetically alter the body, sending into a sort of downward spiral which can be hard to steer out of.

Last month, a Baylor College of Medicine study showed that mice, when overfed as babies, are genetically more inclined to become overweight adults. Now a study from Brown University has found that obesity can hinder the production of an appetite-curbing hormone in rats, creating a self-sustaining obesity that may be difficult to overcome.

Senior author Eduardo A. Nillni, professor of medicine at Brown University and a researcher at Rhode Island Hospital led the research and claims this is the first time any study has ever looked at this specific hormonal break down in the brain. His study is now published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

It had been observed before that obesity creates a sort of resistance to leptin, a hormone which alerts the brain to the amount of fat in the body. Nillni had even previously observed this resistance when he noticed that obese rats had a low volume of another hormone which performs some of the same functions.

Alpha-MSH not only tells the brain to stop seeking food, it also triggers the thyroid gland to start burning extra calories in the body. With alpha-MSH running low in the brain, obese rats were more likely to remain obese through their lives even if they had plenty of the leptin hormone.

This caused Nillni and his colleagues to look for other reasons for the rats´ stubborn obesity. The result was a study which tried to identify where the alpha-MSH deficit originated. The team began by splitting a herd of rats into two groups. The first group was fed a high-calorie diet for 12 weeks; the second group was fed a normal diet. Once the 12 weeks were over, the researchers studied the hormone levels and brain cells of these rats and found that those who developed a “diet-induced obesity” were less able to handle a certain kind of protein in the brain.

The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) is a mechanism in the brain responsible for creating protein. When it becomes stressed or overworked, it can be difficult for the brain to process hormones responsible for burning calories and suppressing appetite. Due to an overwhelmed ER, the obese rats had a significantly more difficult time handling these hormones, such as alpha-MSH than other healthy rats.

Nillni and his fellow researchers decided to experiment with this mechanism even further, attempting to lighten the stress on the ER to see if it would create more alpha-MSH in the brain. After treating the obese rats with a chemical known to reduce ER stress, they saw an increase in alpha-MSH production. In other words, this appetite-curbing protein could be recreated with a little medicinal help.

“This is so novel. Nobody ever looked at that,” said Nillni in a statement.

It´s a development which Nillni and his colleagues believe could help future researchers treat the vicious cycle of obesity. Nillni does warn, however, that though his team was able to create more alpha-MSH hormones by use of medication, the kinds of drugs needed to kickstart this hormone production are not yet available to treat obesity in humans.

As it stands, there could be dangerous side effects from the drug. Furthermore, the specific drug used in this rat test has not yet been approved by the FDA.

Local Swimming Pools A Cesspit Of Human Fecal Matter

Written By: editor

Michael Harper for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

Just when you thought it was safe to take a dip in your local watering hole this summer, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has released a study which found that many swimmers leave behind a little more than a good time in the pool.

According to the health agency’s data, more than half of the pools they tested contained fecal matter left behind by swimmers. More specifically, the study found that 58 percent of pools contain genetic material and bacteria like E. coli which originated in human guts. The CDC is now urging all public pool swimmers to take extra precaution before taking their next dip.

Though E.coli was found in a frightening amount of swimming pools, they did not find any evidence of E. coli O157:H7, a particularly dangerous strain of the bacteria which can cause illness.

Fecal matter and E. coli weren´t the only dangerous pieces of matter found in these local pools. Other bacteria, such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa, were found in 59 percent of public pools sampled. This bacterium has been found to cause skin rashes and ear infections, though it can also find its way into public pools by way of natural contamination.

Two other fecal bacteria, cryptosporidium and Giardia, were also found in the pools, though at a much lower percentage. Only two percent of the pools sampled carried these germs which are most often spread through diarrhea or other forms of fecal matter. As a silver lining to this study, the CDC claims that though these germs were found in public pools, they did not check if these bacteria were alive. In other words, these bacteria may or may not cause infections when they come in contact with swimmers.

Local and Neighborhood public pools may be dirty, but water parks and other recreational facilities with pools are another story.

Unfortunately, the CDC did not investigate these pools or residential pools, but did urge anyone who may be inclined to take a dip this summer to watch out for themselves and their neighbors.

As the CDC notes, it is unlikely that the hygiene practiced at public pools differs from any other pool.

“Swimming is an excellent way to get the physical activity needed to stay healthy,” said Michele Hlavsa, chief of CDC´s Healthy Swimming Program in the accompanying statement.

“However, pool users should be aware of how to prevent infections while swimming. Remember, chlorine and other disinfectants don´t kill germs instantly. That´s why it´s important for swimmers to protect themselves by not swallowing the water they swim in and to protect others by keeping feces and germs out of the pool by taking a pre-swim shower and not swimming when ill with diarrhea,” she explained

The CDC released this report just ahead of Recreational Water Illness and Injury Prevention Week (RWII) which begins next week.

In order to prevent recreational water illnesses, the CDC recommends the following steps:

Keep feces of all kinds out of the water. This means refraining from swimming if you have diarrhea or if you have just used the bathroom or changed a dirty diaper. Additionally, the CDC asks that all public pool swimmers shower with soap before diving in and taking frequent bathroom breaks, followed by thorough hand washing, every 60 minutes.

Additionally the CDC urges the public to be aware of the chlorine level in public pools, noting that many hardware and retail stores sell chlorine test strips. Finally, parents are asked to check diapers every 30 minutes and take their children on bathroom breaks every 30 to 60 minutes.

Uncategorized

What is the Color of Music – The Daily Orbit

Written By: Sam Savage

What is the color of music?

Could the “water of life” exist on Mars?

A high-tech romance is in the air…

And shame on me! On today’s Daily Orbit!

“With every beat of my heart—doctors are getting a little closer to a new heart monitor!”  Okay, I thought we’d start Friday off with a little fun but in all seriousness professors have developed a heart monitor thinner than a dollar bill and no wider than a postage stamp.  It is flexible and skin-like and can be worn under an adhesive bandage on the wrist.  It is sensitive enough to help doctors detect stiff arteries and cardiovascular problems.  The fact that it is virtually noninvasive makes it ideal for newborns and high-risk patients who would be at risk of infection from current monitors that are inserted directly into the artery.  Doctors are now working to make it completely wireless, allowing for constant monitoring with data sent directly to your doctor’s cell phone!  Talk about a heart connection with you doc!

And when I started out singing that pop song from the 90s what color did you see? Just as music lifts our mood and helps us cope, it colors our world.  A new study from UC Berkeley found that our brains are wired to make music-color connections based upon how the melodies make us feel.  The study conducted in the US and Mexico found that people share a common emotional palette, linking the same pieces of classical orchestral music with the same colors. Participants tended to pair faster-paced music in a major key with lighter, more vivid, yellow colors, whereas slower-paced music in a minor key were more likely to be teamed up with darker, grayer, bluer colors.  Researchers say the findings might have implications for creative therapies, advertising, and more fun music stuff. (soundbyte)  I’m seeing purple- my favorite color.

There’s a new Hi-Tech “It-Couple” in town.  Google and NASA have joined a consortium of Universities to form a quantum computing artificial intelligence lab, using the most advanced commercially available quantum computer, the D-Wave Two.  The AI lab will focus on machine learning, which is how computers note patterns and information to improve their outputs.  Google believes quantum computing could improve web search and speech recognition technology and NASA will use it for a lot of stuff like simulating planetary atmospheres. The D-Wave will be installed at the NASA Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley and will be able available to government, industrial, and university research later this year.

And maybe NASA can use the D-Wave Two to simulate the possibility that newly found billion-year-old water might indicate life on Mars.  Studying deep pockets of water under Ontario, Canada that have been isolated for billions of years, scientists found abundant chemicals known to support life.  The water was teaming with dissolved gasses like hydrogen, methane, and various isotopes of noble gases such as helium, neon, argon and xenon.  Scientists say that studying this water will give us insight into how microbes evolve in isolation, which is central to the question of the origin of life.  They say that IF there are microbes in the water sample, it will show that life can sustain regardless of how inhospitable surface conditions may be, and will have implications for how we look for life on Mars.

“It ain’t my fault!  Did I do that?”  Yes, it is our fault says a new study.  Surprise—scientists think human activity is causing climate change!  Wait, I am wrong but didn’t we already know that?  A team of scientists and citizen scientists from three countries poured over the abstracts of 12,000 scientific papers on climate change published between 1991 and 2011 and it was almost unanimous—well 97% being pretty close—that scientists believe human activity is the naughty culprit behind our changing environment.  I feel like we need to pin a scarlet letter on ourselves and walk around in shame.

Well that’s it for the Daily Orbit. (Pin a scarlet letter on) Have a great weekend!

Johnny Depp Immortalized: Scientist Names Ancient Lobster Fossil After Actor

Written By: admin

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Johnny Depp, actor in the upcoming Lone Ranger film, is being immortalized by one scientist who is a big fan of the Hollywood movie star.

David Legg, who carried out his research as part of his PhD in the Department of Earth Science and Engineering at Imperial College London, named a fossil he discovered in honor of Mr. Depp. The 505-million-year-old fossil called Kooteninchela deppi belonged to a distant ancestor of lobsters and scorpions.

K. deppi is helping researchers find out more about life on Earth during the Cambrian period, which is when the majority of modern animal types emerged.

“When I first saw the pair of isolated claws in the fossil records of this species I could not help but think of Edward Scissorhands,” Legg said. “Even the genus name, Kootenichela, includes the reference to this film as ‘chela’ is Latin for claws or scissors. In truth, I am also a bit of a Depp fan and so what better way to honour the man than to immortalise him as an ancient creature that once roamed the sea?”

The ancient lobster-like creature lived in very shallow seas off the coast of British Columbia in Canada. Sea temperatures in this area would have been much hotter than today, and although coral reefs had not yet been established, Kooteninchela deppi would have lived in a similar environment made up predominantly of sponges.

Legg believes the ancient creature would have been a hunter or scavenger. Its claws may have been used to capture prey, or they could have helped it probe the sea floor looking for sea creatures hiding in sediment.

K. deppi was about 1.5-inches long with an elongated trunk for a body and millipede-like legs. It had large eyes composed of many lenses like the compound eyes of a fly. These eyes were positioned on top of movable stalks called peduncles to help it search for food and keep a look out for predators.

“Just imagine it: the prawns covered in mayonnaise in your sandwich, the spider climbing up your wall and even the fly that has been banging into your window and annoyingly flying into your face are all descendants of Kooteninchela deppi,” Legg said.

“Current estimates indicate that there are more than one million known insects and potentially 10 million more yet to be categorized, which potentially means that Kooteninchela Deppi has a huge family tree.”

Legg hopes to further his research and study fossilized creatures from the geological period called the Ordovician. During this time, Earth saw the largest increase in diversity of species on the planet.

The scientist shouldn’t be ashamed of where he found inspiration for the ancient lobster ancestor’s name, because he isn’t the only big fan of Depp. The Pirate of the Caribbean star was voted America’s favorite actor in both 2011 and 2012.

Researchers Successfully Convert Human Skin Cells Into Embryonic Stem Cells

Written By: editor

[WATCH VIDEO: Contracting Cardiomyocystes]

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

Researchers at Oregon Health & Science University (OSHU) and the Oregon National Primate Research Center (ONPRC) have successfully reprogrammed human skin cells to become embryonic stem cells capable of transforming into any other cell type in the body, a breakthrough that marks the first time human stem cells have been produced via nuclear transfer.

Stem cell therapies are believed to hold the promise of replacing cells damaged through injury or diseases such as Parkinson’s and multiple sclerosis. The current work, led by Shoukhrat Mitalipov, PhD, a senior scientist at ONPRC, follows previous success in transforming monkey skin cells into embryonic stem cells in 2007.

The technique used by Dr. Mitalipov and colleagues is a variation of a commonly used method known as somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT). The process involves transplanting the nucleus of one cell, containing an individual’s DNA, into an egg cell that has had its genetic material removed. The unfertilized egg cell then develops and eventually produces stem cells.

“A thorough examination of the stem cells derived through this technique demonstrated their ability to convert just like normal embryonic stem cells, into several different cell types, including nerve cells, liver cells and heart cells. Furthermore, because these reprogrammed cells can be generated with nuclear genetic material from a patient, there is no concern of transplant rejection,” Dr. Mitalipov explained in a statement.

“While there is much work to be done in developing safe and effective stem cell treatments, we believe this is a significant step forward in developing the cells that could be used in regenerative medicine,” he noted.

Another striking aspect of this breakthrough is that it does not involve the use of fertilized embryos, a topic that has been the source of considerable ethical debate.

The researchers´ success in reprogramming human skin cells came through a series of studies in both human and monkey cells. Previous unsuccessful attempts by several labs worldwide showed that human egg cells appear to be more fragile than eggs from other species. As a result, known reprogramming methods stalled before stem cells were produced.

To solve this problem, the OHSU group studied a number of alternative approaches first developed in monkey cells, and then applied them to human cells to develop a successful method.

The key to this success was finding a way to prompt egg cells to stay in a state known as “metaphase” during the nuclear transfer process. Metaphase is a stage in the cell’s natural division process (meiosis) when genetic material aligns in the middle of the cell before the cell divides.

The researchers found that chemically maintaining metaphase throughout the transfer process prevented the process from stalling and allowed the cells to develop and produce stem cells.

“This is a remarkable accomplishment by the Mitalipov lab that will fuel the development of stem cell therapies to combat several diseases and conditions for which there are currently no treatments or cures,” said Dr. Dan Dorsa, PhD, OHSU Vice President for Research.

“The achievement also highlights OHSU’s deep reproductive expertise across our campuses. A key component to this success was the translation of basic science findings at the OHSU primate center paired with privately funded human cell studies,” he added.

An important distinction in the current work is that while the method might be considered a technique for cloning stem cells, commonly known as therapeutic cloning, it would not likely be successful in producing human clones otherwise known as reproductive cloning, the researchers said.

Indeed, several years of monkey studies that utilize SCNT have never successfully produced monkey clones, and it is expected this is also the case with humans.

Furthermore, the comparative fragility of human cells is a significant factor that would likely prevent the development of clones.

“Our research is directed toward generating stem cells for use in future treatments to combat disease,” said Dr. Mitalipov.

“While nuclear transfer breakthroughs often lead to a public discussion about the ethics of human cloning, this is not our focus, nor do we believe our findings might be used by others to advance the possibility of human reproductive cloning.”

The research was published online May 15 in the journal Cell, and in the June 6 print edition.

Science

Second Sound Observed In A Quantum Gas

Written By: editor

University of Innsbruck

Below a critical temperature, certain fluids become superfluid and lose internal friction. In addition, fluids in this state conduct heat extremely efficiently, with energy transport occurring in a distinct temperature wave. Because of the similarities to a sound wave, this temperature wave is also called second sound. To explain the nature of superfluids, the famous physicist Lev Landau developed the theory of two-fluid hydrodynamics in Moscow in 1941. He assumed that fluids at these low temperatures comprise a superfluid and a normal component, whereby the latter one gradually disappears with decreasing temperature. Until now superfluidity has experimentally been observed only in liquid helium and in ultracold quantum gases. Another example of a superfluid system is a neutron star, and evidence also been found in the atomic nucleus. Superfluidity is closely connected to the technologically important superconductivity, the phenomenon of zero electrical resistance at very low temperatures.

Observation of temperature waves

Ultracold quantum gases are ideal model systems to experimentally observe quantum mechanical phenomena such as superfluidity. In these experiments hundreds of thousands of atoms are cooled in a vacuum chamber to almost absolute zero (–273.15 °C). By using lasers the particles in this state can be controlled and manipulated efficiently and with high accuracy. “Despite intensive research in this field for over ten years now, the phenomenon of second sound has proven elusive for detection in quantum gases,” says Rudolf Grimm from the Institute of Experimental Physics at the University of Innsbruck and the Institute of Quantum Optics and Quantum Information at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. “However, in the end it was amazingly easy to prove.” In the laboratory, Grimm’s team of quantum physicists prepared a quantum gas consisting of about 300,000 lithium atoms. They heated the cigar-shaped particle cloud locally with a power-modulated laser beam and then observed the propagating temperature wave. “While in superfluid helium only one entropy wave is generated, our Fermi gas also exhibited some thermal expansion and, thus, a measurable density wave,” explains Grimm the crucial difference. It was also the first time that the Innsbruck physicists were able to measure the superfluid fraction in the quantum gas. “Before us nobody had been able to achieve this, which closes a fundamental gap in the research of Fermi gases,” says Rudolf Grimm.

Confirming a theory after 50 years

The research work, published now in the journal Nature, is the result of a long-term close collaboration between the physicists in Innsbruck and the Italian scientists. The theoretical physicists from the Trento Bose-Einstein Condensation Center led by Sandro Stringari and Lev Pitaevskii adapted Lev Landau’s theory of the description of second sound for the almost one-dimensional geometry of the Innsbruck experiments. Actually Lev Pitaevskii was one of Lev Landau’s pupils. “With this model it became easy to interpret the results of our measurement,” says Rudolf Grimm. “Moreover, our colleagues from Trento intensely supported our experiment conceptually. The results represent the pinnacle of the collaboration with our partner university in Trento and it is a vital indication for research cooperation within the European Region the Tyrol-South Tyrol-Trentino.” In June the University of Innsbruck will award an Honorary Doctorate to Lev Pitaevskii for his close collaboration with the local scientists.

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Massage Therapy Could Reduce Stress In Pre-Term Male Infants

Written By: editor

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

Many adults turn to massage therapy for stress relief, but new research published in the journal Early Human Development suggests that some pre-term infants forced to spend time in newborn intensive care units (NICU) could also benefit from muscle manipulation.

Pre-term infants (preemies) are typically born under-developed and with an immature autonomic nervous system (ANS), which controls the body´s stress response and recovery processes, the researchers explained.

Combine that with the fact that they are often confined to a tense environment filled with mechanical ventilation, the need to undergo medical procedures and other caregiver activities, and separation from their mothers, and those children often experience high levels of stress.

“For a preemie, even a diaper change is stressful and the immature ANS over reacts to these stressors,” according to a statement from the University of Louisville School of Nursing, one of the institutions involved in the research. “Since preterm infants can´t process stressors appropriately, interventions are needed to enhance ANS function and maturity. Massage therapy may reduce stress in preterm infants by promoting ANS development.”

The study, which also involved experts from the University of Utah, discovered that massage therapy which involved moderate pressure and stroking of the soft tissues, followed by flexing and extending of the arm and leg joints, increased the heart-rate variability (HRV) of male preterm infants.

However, the same phenomenon was not observed in female preterm infants, they noted.

“HRV is a measure of ANS function and development. Infants who are born at term gestation demonstrate increased HRV, but preemies typically show decreased HRV and an inability to appropriately respond to stressors,” the Kentucky-based university said. “Massaged male preterm infants demonstrated increased HRV similar to term infants, which supports their ability to correctly respond to stressors.”

For their research, the investigators looked at 21 medically stable preterm male and female infants. They measured HRV levels during periods of sleep and caregiving that took place immediately following massage therapy at the end of the second week of study.

The researchers found no difference between female preemies that received massage therapy and those that did not. Four male preterm children who received massages demonstrated weekly increases in HRV, while those that did not receive the treatment demonstrated no such increase in variability.

“We were surprised to learn the differences in the impact of massage therapy on preterm boys and girls,” University of Louisville associate professor Sandra Smith said. “Boys who received massage therapy demonstrated increased heart rate variability, but the therapy did not seem to affect HRV in girls — perhaps there are hormonal reasons for this difference.”

Smith and her colleagues believe that their findings suggest that massage therapy enhanced ANS development in male preterm infants, and could improve their response to the stressful events that they experience. However, the professor said that additional research with a larger sample of preterm infants will be required to better understand exactly how massage impacts ANS development and function.

Disease-Carrying African Mongoose Poses Serious Threat To Humans

Written By: admin

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

New research from Virginia Tech has identified the banded mongoose as one of the biggest public health threats in Africa.

According to their report in the journal Zoonoses and Public Health, the mongoose carries a deadly disease called leptospirosis that spreads easily to humans. Often misdiagnosed as malaria, leptospirosis usually begins with a fever and can progress into liver failure, meningitis and eventually death.

Based on studies in Botswana, researcher Kathleen Alexander and colleagues found that the banded mongoose is infected with“¯Leptospira interrogans, the pathogen that causes leptospirosis.

“The problem in Botswana and much of Africa is that leptospirosis may remain unidentified in animal populations but contribute to human disease, possibly misdiagnosed as other diseases such as malaria,” Alexander explained.

The banded mongoose flourishes in close proximity to humans living in sub-Saharan Africa, often sharing the same water resources. The disease-causing pathogen can easily pass into the mongoose´s urine and into the soil or water table. Further adding to the danger, many indigenous people also consume the animals as bushmeat.

To identify the mongoose as a carrier of the disease, the researchers conducted a long-term study of human, wildlife and the environment in northern Botswana. They also looked at archived kidney samples from banded mongoose that had been found dead. Of these, 43 percent tested positive for the disease-causing bacterium.

“This pathogen can infect many animals, both wild and domestic, including dogs,” said co-author Sarah Jobbins, a postdoctoral researcher at Virginia Tech. “Banded mongoose is likely not the only species infected.”

After finding evidence of leptospirosis in Botswana, Alexander said she is concerned about the threat it may pose to a population already made vulnerable by a high rate of HIV.

“In much of Africa, people die without a cause being determined,” she said. “Leptospirosis is likely affecting human populations in this region. But without knowledge that the organism is present in the environment, overburdened public health officials are unlikely to identify clinical cases in humans, particularly if the supporting diagnostics are not easily accessible.”

“Given this high prevalence in the mongoose, we believe that Botswana possesses an as-yet-unidentified burden of human leptospirosis,” added Jobbins. “There is an urgent need to look for this disease in people who have clinical signs consistent with infection.”

The team also stressed the public health implications beyond Botswana.

“Investigating exposure in other wildlife, and assessing what species act as carriers, is essential for improving our understanding of human, wildlife, and domestic animal risk of leptospirosis in this ecosystem,” they wrote in their report.

The paper also predicts that ongoing desertification will further concentrate human and animal populations around limited resources and increase the potential for the spread of disease.

“Infectious diseases, particularly those that can be transmitted from animals, often occur where people are more vulnerable to environmental change and have less access to public health services,” said Alexander.”That’s particularly true in Africa.”

“While we’re concerned about emerging diseases that might threaten public health–the next new pandemic — we need to be careful that we don’t drop the ball and stop pursuing important diseases like leptospirosis,” she added.

The researchers said they are planning to alert first-responders and public health officials regarding immediate disease-management measures and the danger posed by the African mongoose population.

Solar Activity Continues On The Sun

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NASA

Solar activity continued on May 14, 2013, as the sun emitted a fourth X-class flare from its upper left limb, peaking at 9:48 p.m. EDT. This flare is classified as an X1.2 flare and it is the 18th X-class flare of the current solar cycle. The flare caused a radio blackout — categorized as an R3, or strong, on NOAA´s space weather scales from R1 to R5 — which has since subsided.

The flare was also associated with a non-Earth-directed CME. CMEs and flares are separate but related solar phenomena: solar flares are powerful bursts that send light and radiation into space; CMEs erupt with billions of tons of solar material. They often, but do not always, occur together. Any time we can see a solar flare from Earth´s view, than at least some of its light and radiation must be directed at Earth. CMEs on the other hand may or may not be Earth directed. NASA observes CMEs, however, even when they are not traveling toward Earth, because they may impact spacecraft.

Experimental NASA research models show that this CME left the sun at around 745 miles per second, beginning at 10:18 p.m. EDT. It is not Earth-directed, however it may pass the Spitzer and Epoxi orbits, and their mission operators have been notified. If warranted, operators can put spacecraft into safe mode to protect the instruments from solar material.

NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center is the U.S. government’s official source for space weather forecasts, alerts, watches and warnings.

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Forget The Safety Ratings – SUVs Are Safer Than Cars

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online
Even if a car has a better safety rating than an SUV, the driver in the smaller vehicle is more likely to be the one killed in a head-on collision between the two different types of automobiles, according to research being presented Thursday at the annual meeting of the Society of Academic Emergency Medicine (SAEM) in Atlanta.
While consumers often view crash safety ratings as a way to gauge how safe an automobile will be in an accident, researchers from the University of Buffalo have determined that vehicle type plays a much more important role when it comes to the odds of survival.
They found that if a car crashes into an SUV with a better crash rating, the drivers of the smaller vehicle were ten times more likely to be killed. However, even if the car had a better safety rating than the SUV, the driver of the car was still over four times more likely to die in the accident.
“When two vehicles are involved in a crash, the overwhelming majority of fatalities occur in the smaller and lighter of the two vehicles,” said Dietrich Jehle, a professor of emergency medicine at the university and first author of the study.
“But even when the two vehicles are of similar weights, outcomes are still better in the SUVs, because in frontal crashes, SUVs tend to ride over shorter passenger vehicles, due to bumper mismatch, crushing the occupant of the passenger car,” he added.
Eliminating crash safety ratings from their considerations and looking only at fatality data, the researchers found that the odds of death for drivers in passenger cars were over seven-times higher than SUV drivers in all head-on collisions.
In accidents involving two cars, the one with the lower safety rating was linked with a 1.28 times increased risk of death for the driver, and a driver was found to be 1.22 times more likely to die in a head-on wreck for every point of reduction in that vehicle´s crash safety rating.
Information from all severe head-on crashes listed in the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) database between 1995 and 2010 was used for the study. According to the researchers, that database contains all motor vehicle crashes that resulted in a death within 30 days, and includes 83,521 vehicles that were involved in head-on collisions.
“Along with price and fuel efficiency, car safety ratings are one of the things that consumers rely on when shopping for an automobile,” Jehle said. Those ratings, he explained, range from one to five stars and are based on collected data from frontal, side barrier and side pole crashes that compare vehicles of similar type, size and weight.
The ratings system was first established by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in 1978.
“Currently, the larger SUVs are some of the safest cars on the roadways with fewer rollovers and outstanding outcomes in frontal crashes with passenger vehicles,” Jehle explained.
“Passenger vehicles with excellent safety ratings may provide a false degree of confidence to the buyer regarding the relative safety of these vehicles as demonstrated by our findings. Consumers should take into consideration the increased safety of SUVs in head-on crashes with passenger vehicles when purchasing a car.”

Health

Racial Minorities Live On The Front Lines Of Heat Risk

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Some racial groups are more likely to bear the brunt of extreme heat waves because of where they live, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

The findings, published today (Tuesday, May 14) in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, highlight racial disparities at a time when the frequency and intensity of extreme heat waves is expected to increase with climate change.

Researchers used satellite imagery data to identify areas where there is no tree canopy to provide shade, and where half or more of the land is covered by heat-absorbing hard surfaces, such as pavement, concrete or roofing materials. Such land characteristics put residents at greater risk when the mercury rises because they exacerbate the heat, the study authors said.

The authors used U.S. Census data to reveal that the heat-prone neighborhoods were disproportionately populated by African Americans, Asians and Hispanics. Compared with their white counterparts, African Americans were about 50 percent more likely to live in these communities, while Hispanics were 37 percent and Asians a third more likely to do so.

“This study highlights a mechanism by which racial and ethnic minorities will likely suffer more from the effects of climate change,” said study lead author Bill Jesdale, research associate in UC Berkeley´s Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management. “It may not be surprising that minorities live in inner cities, but this is the first paper to assess what that means in terms of heat vulnerability at a national level.”

Rachel Morello-Frosch, a professor with joint appointments at the College of Natural Resources and the School of Public Health and the study principal investigator, noted that regional studies have identified similar trends, but seeing this residential segregation on a national scale was surprising.

“Segregation tends to concentrate racial and ethnic minorities into more densely populated urban areas,” she said. “While some of this residential choice is based upon preference, a lot is based upon where people can afford to live.”

Some steps that city planners can take to ameliorate the impact of climate change include planting more trees and lightening the coloring of roofs and pavements. When possible, replacing harder surfaces with more permeable materials can also help, the authors said.

“Planting trees and changing the heat-absorbing characteristics of our built environment may be crucial to protecting our public´s health by mitigating heat risks, particularly in densely populated central areas of cities,” said Jesdale.

The Hewlett Foundation and the California Environmental Protection Agency helped support this research.

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NTSB Seeks Tougher Definition Of ‘Drunk Driving’

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redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

A National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) panel recommended on Tuesday that states reduce the allowable blood-alcohol concentration (BAC) by more than one-third, to 0.05 percent from 0.08 percent, in an attempt to lessen the nearly 10,000 alcohol-related traffic deaths each year.

“Most Americans think that we’ve solved the problem of impaired driving, but in fact, it’s still a national epidemic,” NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman said in a statement on Tuesday.

The NTSB cited research that showed most drivers experience a decline in cognitive and visual functions with a BAC of 0.05.

The idea to tighten standards for blood alcohol content (BAC) is part of a broad safety board initiative outlined in a staff report and approved by the NTSB panel to ultimately attempt to eliminate drunk driving, which accounts for one-third of all US traffic deaths.

The NTSB suggests those deaths, along with another 170,000 annual alcohol-related injuries, cost $66 billion every year. The staff report also suggests that between 500 and 800 lives could be saved every year if the BAC standard is lowered.

Hersman said that while progress has been made in recent years to reduce drunk driving, too many people are still dying on America’s roads. And while the safety board acknowledged that there is “no silver bullet,” they say that more action is needed at the federal and state levels.

“In the last 30 years, more than 440,000 people have perished in this country due to alcohol-impaired driving. What will be our legacy 30 years from now?” Hersman asked rhetorically.

“If we don’t tackle alcohol-impaired driving now, when will we find the will to do so?”

Under current law, a 180-pound male will typically reach the 0.08 BAC threshold after four drinks over the course of an hour, according to an online blood alcohol calculator published by the University of Oklahoma. That same person could reach the 0.05 threshold after just two to three drinks over the same period, according to the calculator.

In addition to gender and weight, other factors can influence a person’s BAC, and many states already outlaw lower levels of inebriation for drivers.

Since the NTSB only investigates transportation accidents and advocates on safety issues, it cannot impose its recommendations through regulation. However, the independent agency is influential on matters of public safety, and its decisions can trigger action from legislators and transportation agencies nationwide, including the US Congress.

The NTSB board also recommended on Tuesday that states dramatically expand laws allowing police to quickly confiscate licenses from drivers who surpass blood alcohol limits or refuse to take a BAC test. It is also pushing for laws that require all first-time offenders to have ignition-locking devices that prevent cars from starting until breath samples are analyzed.

The issue of drunk driving began generating national attention during the early 1980s, when many states required a 0.15 BAC rate to demonstrate intoxication. In the following 24 years, Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) and other grassroots organizations pushed states to adopt the 0.08 BAC standard, a move that led to a drop in alcohol-related highway fatalities from 20,000 in 1980 to 9,878 in 2011, the NTSB said.

“I think .05 is going to come. How long it takes to get there, we don’t know. But it will happen,” said the NTSB’s Robert Molloy, who helped guide the staff report.

More than 100 countries now have BAC limits set at 0.05 or lower, the NTSB said. The safety board has now asked all 50 states to do the same, and recommended that NHTSA, which oversees highway safety as a federal regulator and analyzes traffic crash data, provide financial incentives to carry out the changes.

But many of the panel´s recommendations will likely be unpopular, said NTSB board member Robert Sumwalt.

“But if we keep doing what we’re doing, we’re not going to make any difference.”

The board also recommended on Tuesday a more widespread use of passive alcohol sensors, which police can use to detect the air during a traffic stop to determine the presence of alcohol. The sensors are capable of detecting alcohol even in cases where the driver has tried to mask his breath with gum or mints.

The American Beverage Institute called the NTSB’s recommendation “ludicrous” and the “latest attempt by traffic safety activist groups to expand the definition of ‘drunk.'”

“Moving from .08 to .05 would criminalize perfectly responsible behavior,” said Sarah Longwell, managing director of ABI, in an interview with ABC News.

The trade association estimated that the average woman would reach the .05 level after just one drink, and disputed NTSB’s claim that lowering the BAC threshold would save lives.

“Out of the over 32,000 US traffic fatalities in 2011, less than 1 percent were caused by drivers between .05 and .08 percent BAC,” Longwell said. “Further restricting the moderate consumption of alcohol by responsible adults prior to driving does nothing to stop hardcore drunk drivers from getting behind the wheel.”

Tuesday’s NTSB recommendations coincide with the 25th anniversary of the deadliest alcohol-related crash in US history, when a drunk driver drove his pickup the wrong way on Interstate 71 near Carrollton, Kentucky on May 14, 1988. The truck struck a school bus, killing 24 children and three adults, and injuring more than 30 others.

Testosterone Levels Fluctuate During Sporting Events, Competitions

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editor

April Flowers for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Sporting events can become the hub of a community, bringing it together, but they can even fuel bitter rivalries. A new study, led by the University of Missouri, has found that testosterone levels during group competition vary depending on the relationships of the competitors. These hormones levels may be related to the formation of alliance in warfare.

“One interesting thing about humans is that we are the only animal that competes in teams,” said Mark Flinn, professor of anthropology at MU. “Our hormonal reactions while competing are part of how we evolved as a cooperative species. What we found in our study is that although male´s testosterone levels increase when men are victorious against strangers or rivals, levels of the hormone tend to stay the same when competing against friends.”

The MU research team studied men from varying age groups playing dominoes or cricket on the island of Dominica. They found that when males compete against a group outside of their own community, testosterone levels would rise during and after the game if they won. If they were defeated, the hormone levels dropped. Surprisingly, when the men were competing against their friends, their hormone levels did not change in response to victory or defeat.

They also found that competing in sports coalitions will raise testosterone levels in males. Being a spectator will also raise the hormone levels. According to Flinn, watching a favorite sports team makes the viewer part of a coalition of fans in the community, which will cause a rise in testosterone while watching.

“For example, when MU plays the University of Kansas, males will probably have a huge increase of testosterone during the game and afterwards if their team is victorious,” Flinn said. “At the same time we can create a coalition of fans while attending the game and bond together during the event.”

The team suggests that such coalitions might have had important effects on the evolution of human social psychology.

“The fascinating thing about humans is that whether we are watching or playing the sport, we have the ability to put interactions among the whole team in our heads,” Flinn said. “That just shows how complex our social psychology is. For example, a hockey or basketball player can anticipate how his teammates are going to react when he passes to each one of them and predict the outcome. The ability for humans to be able to do that is pretty astonishing.”

Your Music Preferences Can Reflect And Improve Your Mood

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Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Two separate studies have looked into how music influences our moods, whether to help lift our spirits or enable us to better cope with them.

Researchers from several universities writing in the Journal of Consumer Research say consumers experiencing problems with interpersonal relationships throw on sad music to match their moods. The team said in their article “Interpersonal Relationships and Preferences for Mood-Congruency in Aesthetic Experiences,” that individuals experiencing these relationship problems are more likely to prefer aesthetic experiences that reflect their negative mood.

For two studies, the researchers asked consumers to rate music or list their preferences during several different scenarios. In one study, consumers were presented with various frustrating situations and were then asked to rate how they felt about angry music compared to joyful or relaxing music. They reported that consumers liked angry music more if they were frustrated by interpersonal violations, such as being interrupted or someone always being late.

During the second study, the team asked the subjects to recall experiences involving interpersonal loss, such as losing a personal relationship. Not surprisingly, the participants showed a higher preference for sad music when they experienced an interpersonal loss.

“Emotional experiences of aesthetic products are important to our happiness and well-being. Music, movies, paintings, or novels that are compatible with our current mood and feelings, akin to an empathic friend, are more appreciated when we experience broken or failing relationships,” the authors wrote.

“Interpersonal relationships influence consumer preference for aesthetic experiences. Consumers seek and experience emotional companionship with music, films, novels, and the fine arts as a substitute for lost and troubled relationships.”

In a separate study published in The Journal of Positive Psychology, scientists found that listening to happy music can also help to pick you up out of a blue funk. A team from the University of Missouri reported people can actively improve their moods by listening to more upbeat music.

“Our work provides support for what many people already do — listen to music to improve their moods,” said lead author Yuna Ferguson, who performed the study while she was an MU doctoral student in psychological science. “Although pursuing personal happiness may be thought of as a self-centered venture, research suggests that happiness relates to a higher probability of socially beneficial behavior, better physical health, higher income and greater relationship satisfaction.”

They found participants were able to improve their mood when listening to the upbeat music of Aaron Copland versus those who listened to the haunting, discordant melodies of Igor Stravinsky.

“Rather than focusing on how much happiness they´ve gained and engaging in that kind of mental calculation, people could focus more on enjoying their experience of the journey towards happiness and not get hung up on the destination,” said Ferguson.

Researchers at Glasgow Caledonian University are looking into using music as a potential prescription to treat emotional and physical pain. They believe it is important to promote the development of music-based therapies to tackle conditions like depressive illnesses. The scientists say doctors could put music on a prescription that is tailored to suit the needs of an individual.

“The impact of a piece of music on a person goes so much further than thinking that a fast tempo can lift a mood and a slow one can bring it down. Music expresses emotion as a result of many factors,” says audio engineering specialist Dr. Don Knox, project leader.

“These include the tone, structure and other technical characteristics of a piece. Lyrics can have a big impact too. But so can purely subjective factors: where or when you first heard it, whether you associate it with happy or sad events and so on. Our project is the first step towards taking all of these considerations and the way they interact with each other on board.”

Construction Workers In Belize Destroy Ancient Mayan Pyramid For Road

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Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Police in Belize are investigating a construction company that has essentially destroyed one of the region´s most important historical structures. A 2,300-year-old Mayan structure located at the Nohmul complex in northern Belize was one of the largest pyramids in the Caribbean nation before it was leveled by a company seeking out gravel to dump on village roads.

Using backhoes and bulldozers, construction workers dug into the structure to extract crushed rock, according to authorities looking into the matter on Monday. Archaeologists, horrified by what was found, said there was no way the workers could have mistaken the ancient ruins for a hill, as they had claimed.

Jaime Awe, head of the Belize Institute of Archaeology, said the destruction was detected late last week.

“It’s a feeling of Incredible disbelief because of the ignorance and the insensitivity … they were using this for road fill,” Awe said in a statement picked up by Mail Online. “It’s like being punched in the stomach, it’s just so horrendous.”

The pyramid also sat in the middle of a privately-owned sugar cane field, and while it lacked the even stone sides seen in better-preserved pyramids, the mistake should not have occurred, Awe said. “These guys knew that this was an ancient structure. It’s just bloody laziness.”

After digging deep into the mound, the workers left an isolated core of limestone cobbles, exposing a narrow Mayan chamber dangling above a hollowed-out section.

Awe explained that it´s “mind-boggling” just how ignorant this construction firm could have been. What took years for ancient Mayans to build, using stone tools and materials from stone quarries, took only minutes for modern-day construction workers to undo using sophisticated equipment.

Belizean police said it is possible criminal charges will be filed against the company. While the complex sits on private land, Belizean law states that all pre-Hispanic ruins remain under government protection.

This is not the first time such a catastrophe of human proportions has occurred in Belize. With a country that is largely covered in jungle and hundreds of ancient ruins, it is inevitable that ancient sites will be targeted and potentially destroyed.

Norman Hammond, an emeritus professor of archaeology at Boston University (BU) who used to do research in the region in the 1980s, said Mayan ruins have been targeted in the past by workers seeking materials.

He told Mail Online via email that destroying Mayan ruins for construction materials is “an endemic problem in Belize (the whole of the San Estevan center has gone, both of the major pyramids at Louisville, other structures at Nohmul, many smaller sites), but this sounds like the biggest yet.”

It is a disturbing scenario, added Arlen Chase, chairman of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Central Florida (UCF). But “there is only a very limited infrastructure in Belize that can be applied to cultural heritage management. Unfortunately, they [destruction of sites] are all too common, but not usually in the center of a large Maya site,” he noted.

Francisco Estrada-Belli, a professor at Tulane University´s Anthropology Department, said, “I don’t think I am exaggerating if I say that every day a Maya mound is being destroyed for construction in one of the countries where the Maya lived.

“Unfortunately, this destruction of our heritage is irreversible but many don’t take it seriously,” he added. “The only way to stop it is by showing that it is a major crime and people can and will go to jail for it.”

As for last week´s destruction at the Nohmul site, John Morris, of the Institute of Archaeology told 7 News Belize, “we can´t salvage what has happened out here“¦ It is an incredible display of ignorance. I am appalled.”

A member of the news crew was threatened by one man with a machete as construction vehicles continued to excavate the site and dump trucks hauled away ancient ruin debris.

The ancient Nohmul complex, which was first recorded by Europeans in 1897, covers about 12 square miles in the middle of a private field in the Orange Walk district. The site consists of twin ceremonial clusters surrounded by 10 plazas and connected by a raised causeway. The site is believed to have housed around 40,000 people from 500 to 250 BC.

The excavation was halted and investigations of the landowner and D-Mar Construction are underway. The company owner, Denny Grijalva, who is a local legislative candidate, told 7 News Belize he “knew nothing about the project” and directed reporters to his foreman. Neither worker answered follow-up questions.

New Study On Coral Reef Formations Lays To Rest Conflicting Theories

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editor

April Flowers for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

In the South Pacific, three types of coral reef island formations have fascinated geologists for ages. The coral of Tahiti forms a “fringing” reef, with a shelf growing close to the island´s shore. In Bora Bora, the “barrier” reefs are separated from the main island by a calm lagoon. Manuae represents the last type, an “atoll,” which appears as a ring of coral enclosing a lagoon with no island at the center.

The mechanism underlying these reef shapes and how they developed over evolutionary time has produced an enduring debate between two hypotheses — the first from English naturalist Charles Darwin and the second from geologist Reginald Daly. A new study from researchers at MIT and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) uses modern measurements and computer modeling to put this very old conundrum to rest. The findings of this study were published in the journal Geology.

Fringing reefs, barrier reefs and atolls reflect different stages in a dramatic process, according to Darwin´s theory. This process occurs as an island sinks into the ocean floor — the ultimate fate of all volcanic ocean islands. As the volcanic rock cools and is carried away from the “hot spot” of the undersea volcano by tectonic plate movement, the island begins to sink as much as a few millimeters per year.

Coral reefs on the island´s flanks grow upward toward the sea surface as the island sinks — getting enough sunlight that the living coral organisms on top, and their symbiotic algae, get enough sunlight to keep pace with the sinking. A fringing reef progresses to a barrier reef and finally to a signature atoll as the coral grows and the island sinks.

MIT/WHOI graduate student Michael Toomey, along with collaborators Taylor Perron, the Cecil and Ida Green Assistant Professor of Geology at MIT, and Andrew Ashton, a coastal geomorphologist at WHOI, discovered Darwin´s reef theory can´t explain the trajectories of all volcanic ocean-island systems.

The team realized the Hawaiian Islands are following a different kind of progression — finding fringing reefs where they expected to find no reef at all, and drowned barrier reefs where they expected to find living barrier reefs. “Those islands are just not sinking into atolls like the Society Islands,” Toomey says, “so we wanted to develop a model to explain these differences.”

On the other hand, Reginald Daly´s theory argues that sea-level cycles, not island subsidence, are the key to understanding coral formations. During ice ages, when the water becomes locked in ice sheets on land, sea-level drops. It rises again between glaciations as the ice melts, suggesting to Daly that exposure to increased wave energy during sea-level drops would erode an island away. As the sea level rises again, the coral would regrow on submerged island platforms.

The research team decided to create a computer model focusing on the relationships among coral growth, sunlight availability, water depth and erosion to consider both Darwin’s and Daly´s theories. The model also calculates how a coral reef develops as sea level varies over hundreds of thousands of years in combination with island subsidence rates.

There is a delicate balance between island sinking and subsidence. The reef will drown if the combination of sea-level change and island sinking deepens the water faster than the coral can grow. Likewise, if the coral grows faster than the water deepens, the coral growth will catch up with the sea surface, then slow down again as the reef is exposed to eroding waves at sea level.

If the team includes island subsidence without glacial sea-level cycles, they can model Darwin´s scenario. The configuration that emerges, however, does not resemble current reef formations. When they added in a sea-level history based on geological evidence and paleoclimate data that allows the computer model to account for sea-level oscillation between the present level and approximately 393 feet below present levels every 100,000 years, the results were closer to real-world observations.

The model ran a course of four glacial cycles, approximately 400,000 years, into the past. This yielded a coral-reef distribution that matched closely with the real-world observations — with the barrier reefs, drowned barrier reefs, and other forms all in the correct places on the map. “What this shows,” Perron says, “is that while island subsidence is important, as Darwin suggested, sea-level oscillations are also important for determining the distribution of reef types around the world.”

The model is sophisticated enough to explain why the Society Islands follow Darwinian progression, but others do not. Without sea-level oscillations, most of the environment would likely progress as Darwin theorized, according to the simulations. Ashton says, when the oscillations are included, “It turns out there is only a little ℠Goldilocks´ zone, a narrow range of subsidence and reef-accretion rates, in which you can get that progression.”

The researchers found it interesting the parameters needed by the model to create that tiny zone of Darwin progression match up with the actual growth and subsidence rates of Tahiti. Apparently, Tahiti has subsided just slowly enough over the last few glacial cycles for the deep lagoon to develop without drowning permanently.

Hawaii, on the other hand, is sinking so quickly — at more than 2 millimeters (0.07 inches per year) — that it will never see Darwinian configuration. A little reef terrace is formed every time the sea level falls to its lowest point. At the end of each glacial period, as the sea-level rises, the reef drowns and remains drowned.

The biggest revelation gleaned from this model is that coral reefs are very sensitive to sea-level changes. Peter Burgess, professor and chair of earth sciences at Royal Holloway, University of London (RHUL), says this is useful information because exploring different scenarios of real-world reef formation can help produce a record of how sea-level oscillated over long time scales. “It´s helpful to know how fast the sea level has changed in the past,” he says, “because there is a high probability it will change rapidly in the next couple hundred years, and we´d like to understand how that change might happen.”

Food Tracking Apps Proven To Help Shed Pounds

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editor

Michael Harper for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

There´s no shortage of weight loss methods available to those looking to shed some extra pounds. Despite all the fad diets and extreme measures, many rely on the basics of counting calories, getting active and keeping a food journal. Fortunately, smartphones are able to take care of each of these tasks and today´s dieter has a wealth of options to choose from when it comes to weight loss or weight management apps.

To measure the effectiveness of some of these apps, researchers from the University of Liverpool developed their own app and asked some overweight and obese volunteers to test drive the app for four weeks. According to their study, weight loss apps can be quite effective in weight loss, with the average volunteer losing three pounds in four weeks.

Recently, the University of Liverpool´s Institute of Psychology, Health and Society performed their own research which found those who simply paid attention to what they ate were more likely to reduce the amount of food they ate and therefore reduce their caloric intake. The unnamed app was developed as an extension of this study.

Like many apps, the University of Liverpool app acts as a sort of food journal, allowing dieters to record their food consumption in three parts. The 12 overweight and obese patients were asked to snap a picture of the food they ate before tucking in. After this picture is taken, the app sends a notification reminding them to write down their thoughts about the meal. When they finished their meal, the app presented them with questions about their food, such as if they were full after the meal or if they ate everything on their plate.

Finally, the participants were shown chronological pictures of everything they´ve eaten with the app and reminded to eat attentively at their next meal.

The app also gave the dieters pointers on how to eat attentively.

For instance, the app suggested not eating with distractions, such as the television or listening to music, as this has been shown to increase food intake.

According to Dr. Eric Robinson who developed the app, simply taking a picture and being reminded of what they ate was enough to help these overweight participants drop the pounds.

“Data suggested that overweight and obese participants in our four week trial used the application regularly, personalized the application based on their daily routine and were able to use the three main functions of the application,” Dr. Robinson explained in a recent statement.

“Raising awareness of eating and weight loss achieved suggest this approach could be fruitful. The 1.5kg average weight loss observed is similar to a recent more intensive two month trial which investigated the impact of dietary/exercise advice and habit formation.”

Dr. Robinson went on to suggest that these participants could lose even more weight if they used the app for a longer period of time, though he also suggested a longer, clinical trial would have to be conducted to prove this theory.

“Our study introduces a new attentive eating approach aimed at reducing dietary intake and promoting weight loss, supported by theoretical models of the role of memory on energy intake regulation.”

Simply journaling about one´s eating habits has been proven before to be an effective way to lose weight. For instance, women who keep food journals have been found to lose on average six pounds more than those women who do not log their meals.

The research is being presented at the European Congress on Obesity (ECO) being held in Liverpool from 12-15 of May.

Why A Strawberry Smells Like A Strawberry

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Michael Harper for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

It´s easy enough to simply recognize that something smells like a strawberry, but it´s much more difficult to understand why something smells that way. Scientists from the Technische Universität München (TUM) set out to get to the bottom of the strawberry smell in order to understand a little more about scents and how our brains understand which scent and taste belong to which foods.

Though many people might describe a strawberry as smelling sweet or fruity, the TUM scientists have deduced that a strawberry´s aroma is actually the product of around one dozen different aroma compounds. One of these compounds is particularly important to the smell of a strawberry; it´s labeled with the brand name “Furaneol.” but it´s more scientifically known as HDMF (4-hydroxy-2,5-dimethyl-3(2H)-furanone).

Prof. Wilfried Schwab, head of Biotechnology of Natural Products at TUM has spent many hours researching the smell of strawberries to understand the biology of the HDMF compound.

“A ripe strawberry has a particularly high concentration of this compound — up to 50 milligrams per kilo — which lies far above the odor threshold. This compound gives the ripe fruit its characteristic caramel-like aroma,” explained Schwab in a statement.

HDMF isn´t only found in strawberries, of course. It can also be found in tomatoes and pineapples. According to Schwab´s research, HDMF can also be found in plants, though here the aroma develops in a different way as it moves away from the sweet sugar of the fructose.

The TUM team was more interested in understanding how HDMF converted in fruits, however, noting the process occurs when a molecule binds to the FaEO enzyme before turning into HDMF.

To understand this process and map it out in detail, the TUM aroma scientists turned to X-ray structural analysis of the molecules at play in this transformation. With these X-rays complete, Schwab and team compiled a 3D model which allowed them to see the specific structure of these molecules.

“For the strawberry aroma, we investigated altogether six different enzyme-molecule combinations — and ended up understanding how FaEO produces the HDMF flavor compound,” said Dr. André Schiefner from the Chair of Biological Chemistry.

As they were uncovering the source of the strawberry smell, the scientists uncovered a mechanism in the catalytic reaction which had yet to be observed. During this process, the compound is reduced then transferred to another part of the molecule. This, says the TUM scientists, means the FaEO is the first of a new class of biocatalysts. This strawberry-flavored research could lead to other applications and advancements in industrial biotechnology. Furthermore, Prof. Arne Skerra from the TUM Chair of Biological Chemistry says this research could help future scientists understand why some plants have a distinctive flavor.

“Unlike coffee or vanilla, the biochemical processes that produce the strawberry aroma are very complex. But now our TUM research team has shed light on an important step in its biosynthesis,” said Skerra.

In real world terms, this study could one day make it possible to recreate the true flavor of strawberries in cakes, ice cream, soda or yogurt. Though this research deals with the aroma of a strawberry, humans use scent to get a full picture of the taste of a food. With this process understood, scientists could one day make more realistic tasting food.

Results are published in The Journal of Biological Chemistry.

Snacking On Kava Leaves May Reduce Anxiety

Written By: editor
editor

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

A new study suggests that the South Pacific plant Kava may have beneficial properties for alleviating anxiousness. Researchers writing in the Journal of Clinical Psychopharmacology say Kava could be used to help treat people who suffer from Generalized Anxiety Disorders (GAD).

There are medicines currently available for people suffering from anxiety, but scientists are still looking for safer alternatives.

The team, led by Dr Jerome Sarris from Department of Psychiatry at the University of Melbourne, Australia, says they were able to show that Kava offers a potential natural alternative for the treatment of chronic clinical anxiety.

“Unlike some other options it has less risk of dependency and less potential for side effects,” Sarris said in a statement.

The researchers found that people’s genetic differences of certain neurobiological mechanisms called GABA transporters may modify their response to Kava. Sarris said if this finding is able to be replicated, it could help pave the way for simple genetic tests to determine which people would benefit from taking Kava.

For the study, patients were given Kava tablets twice per day, or 120 milligrams of kavalactones, for three-weeks. Participants in the placebo group took matching dummy tablets during the same period.

Patients in the study with moderate to severe GAD found Kava to be even more beneficial to them compared to those who had below-moderate anxiety. According to the findings, 26 percent of the Kava group in the study were classified as having a remission from their symptoms compared to six percent of the placebo group.

Kava did not show any considerable adverse reactions or any addiction between the groups. However, the team did find that Kava actually increased women’s sex drive compared to those in the placebo group, but this could have been attributed to the reduction of anxiety.

The researchers want to complete additional studies to confirm the genetic relationship to therapeutic response.

This isn’t the first time the researchers have found Kava to be a safe and effective tool for reducing anxiety. Sarris said back in 2009 that the South Pacific plant was effective in lowering anxiety.

“We´ve been able to show that Kava offers a natural alternative for the treatment of anxiety, and unlike some pharmaceutical options, has less risk of dependency and less potential of side effects,” Mr. Sarris said in findings published in the Springer journal Psychopharmacology four years ago.

During this study, the team also saw that Kava could be used to reduce depression levels in patients as well.

“We also found that Kava had a positive impact on reducing depression levels, something which had not been tested before,” Mr. Sarris said.

Health

UCLA Stem Cell Researchers Move Toward Treatment For Rare Genetic Nerve Disease

Written By: editor

Disease-in-a-dish models show promise for treating ataxia telangiectasia
Led by Dr. Peiyee Lee and Dr. Richard Gatti, researchers at the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA have used induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells to advance disease-in-a-dish modeling of a rare genetic disorder, ataxia telangiectasia (A-T).
Their discovery shows the positive effects of drugs that may lead to effective new treatments for the neurodegenerative disease. iPS cells are made from patients’ skin cells, rather than from embryos, and they can become any type of cells, including brain cells, in the laboratory. The study appears online ahead of print in the journal Nature Communications.
People with A-T begin life with neurological deficits that become devastating through progressive loss of function in a part of the brain called the cerebellum, which leads to severe difficulty with movement and coordination. A-T patients also suffer frequent infections due to their weakened immune systems and have an increased risk for cancer. The disease is caused by lost function in a gene, ATM, that normally repairs damaged DNA in the cells and preserves normal function.
Developing a human neural cell model to understand A-T’s neurodegenerative process – and create a platform for testing new treatments – was critical because the disease presents differently in humans and laboratory animals. Scientists commonly use mouse models to study A-T, but mice with the disease do not experience the more debilitating effects that humans do. In mice with A-T, the cerebellum appears normal and they do not exhibit the obvious degeneration seen in the human brain.
Lee and colleagues used iPS cell—derived neural cells developed from skin cells of A-T patients with a specific type of genetic mutation to create a disease-in-a-dish model. In the laboratory, researchers were able to model the characteristics of A-T, such as the cell’s lack of ATM protein and its inability to repair DNA damage. The model also allowed the researchers to identify potential new therapeutic drugs, called small molecule read-through (SMRT) compounds, that increase ATM protein activity and improve the model cells’ ability to repair damaged DNA.
“A-T patients with no ATM activity have severe disease but patients with some ATM activity do much better,” Lee said. “This makes our discovery promising, because even a small increase in the ATM activity induced by the SMRT drug can potentially translate to positive effects for patients, slowing disease progression and hopefully improving their quality of life.”
These studies suggest that SMRT compounds may have positive effects on all other cell types in the body, potentially improving A-T patients’ immune function and decreasing their susceptibility to cancer.
Additionally, the patient-specific iPS cell—derived neural cells in this study combined with the SMRT compounds can be an invaluable tool for understanding the development and progression of A-T. This iPS cell—neural cell A-T disease model also can be a platform to identify more potent SMRT drugs. The SMRT drugs identified using this model can potentially be applied to most other genetic diseases with the same type of mutations.
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What is Plasma?

Written By: Sam Savage

Hi, my name is Emerald Robinson, and in this “What Is” video, we’re going to investigate the state of matter called “plasma.”

Plasma is the state of matter that consists of a mass of free electrons and positively charged particles called “cations” mixed together.

Plasma has neither a specific shape nor a consistent volume. In other words, plasma can easily flow into and take the shape of a container, and will expand, redistributing itself to evenly fill that container.

Although the properties of plasma are similar to those of gases, plasma and gases are not the same thing. In plasma, electrons are released from their orbits around a nucleus, creating a “soup” of free electrons and nuclei. Because these charged particles are loose, plasma easily conducts electricity, and both produces and responds to magnetic fields.

Plasma is created when a gas is either exposed to a high temperature, or when high voltage electricity is passed through it. The heat or electricity makes the atoms in the gas move so quickly and collide so violently with one another that electrons are knocked from their orbits. Because of the way they are created, plasmas are sometimes called “ionized gases.”

Although plasma isn’t discussed as often as solids, liquids, and gases, and was the last phase of matter discovered, you’re probably more familiar with plasma than you think. Plasma gives neon and fluorescent lights their glow, is formed during lightning strikes, and, of course, is present in plasma televisions. Chemists also classify fire as a plasma.

Plasma makes up our sun, and is visible in the solar flares that erupt from its surface. Because plasma is the “stuff of stars,” it is the most common state of matter, making up about 99% of the observable universe.

Linux To Become Exclusive OS Of The International Space Station

Written By: editor

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports — Your Universe Online

Laptop computers essential to the day-to-day operations of the International Space Station (ISS) crew will be switching operating systems from Windows XP to Linux, according to published reports.

The laptops, which are on the space station´s “opsLAN” network, are used by astronauts to interface with onboard cameras and complete several other routine tasks, Joel Gunter of The Telegraph explained on Friday.

While Linux had already been used to run several systems on board the ISS, this means it will now be the exclusive OS used onboard the orbiting laboratory, he added.

“We migrated key functions from Windows to Linux because we needed an operating system that was stable and reliable — one that would give us in-house control. So if we needed to patch, adjust or adapt, we could,” Keith Chuvala of the United Space Alliance, the organization that operates opsLAN for NASA, told Gunter.

The Linux Foundation, a non-profit organization, created special courses to help train space station crewmembers using the system. According to Chuvala, the group “provided the trainer on-site at our headquarters, which was a huge plus“¦ [and] on top of that, the cost was very good, so it was overall a great value.”

Linux was used to run the “Robonaut,” which was transported to the space station two years ago and can be used by astronauts and ground controllers to carry out tasks considered too dangerous for humans to complete in microgravity. In addition, tailored versions of the OS are often used in other scientific projects, including the Large Hadron Collider — CERN´s massive, high-energy particle accelerator — Gunter said.

Dropping Windows in favor of the Unix-like, open-source operating system is “probably a good idea,” according to Jamie Condliffe of Gizmodo.

“Back in 2008, a Russian cosmonaut managed to take a laptop to the ISS that spread the W32.Gammima.AG worm to all the other laptops aboard the station. Using Linux should make that impossible,” Condliffe said. “The only hitch might be switching all the current, Windows-based software — for everything from viewing stock inventory to carrying out experiments — to Linux. We just hope they don’t use WINE.”

Texting While Driving Now Responsible For More Teen Deaths Than Drunk Driving

Written By: editor

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports — Your Universe Online

Texting while driving has now replaced drunk driving as the number one cause of death among US teenagers, according to new research from the Cohen Children´s Medical Center of New York.

According to the study, more than 3,000 teens die each year as a result of sending SMS messages while operating a motor vehicle. In comparison, approximately 2,700 are killed as a result of driving while under the influence of alcohol, CBS New York reported on Thursday.

“The reality is kids aren´t drinking seven days per week — they are carrying their phones and texting seven days per week, so you intuitively know this a more common occurrence,” Dr. Andrew Adesman, Chief of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics at Cohen Children´s Medical Center and the lead author of the study, told CBS News reporter Carolyn Gusoff.

Furthermore, Adesman reported the study has discovered that laws prohibiting texting while driving have not proven effective at keeping teens from doing so. More than half (57 percent) of all boys said they have texted while driving in states where doing so is illegal, and 59 percent said they have sent SMS messages while driving in states where there are no such laws. In total, the research revealed half of all high school kids who drive admit they have texted while operating their car, truck or van, Gusoff said.

The study results come as lawmakers have been pushing for stricter punishments for driving while distracted and experts look for alternative ways to keep young drivers from texting. According to Suzannah Hills of the Daily Mail, some US schools have started offering classes designed to instruct students about the dangers of texting while driving, and others have developed simulations that demonstrate what could happen to distracted drivers.

According to Hills, officials in the UK are also looking for possible measures to keep drivers from sending or receiving text messages while operating an automobile. There, legislators are planning to increase fines for driving while texting by 50 percent, to £90 (approximately $138 US). The harsher penalties, which include three license points, will also apply to other forms of careless driving, such as tailgating or eating while driving.

Previous research conducted by Alexandra Bailin, also of the Cohen Children´s Medical Center, found approximately 43 percent of driving-age high-school students who responded to a 2011 survey admitted they had driven while texting at least once during the previous 30 days. They also reported the risk of a texting driver being involved in a wreck is 23 times the normal accident rate.

Operating Room Noise Could Hamper Surgical Team Communications

Written By: editor

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports — Your Universe Online

Having noisy surgical equipment, background music or even chatty co-workers in the operating room could impair a surgical team´s ability to communicate, which in turn could have a disruptive effect on a doctor´s ability to receive and/or process instructions, according to a new study.

Research led by University of Kentucky Medical Center assistant professor Matthew Bush and published in the May edition of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons reveals high levels of ambient background noise is a patient and surgical safety issue that could impact auditory processing among surgeons and other OR team members.

“The operating room is a very fast-paced, high-demand, all senses running on all cylinders type of environment,” Bush explained Friday in a statement. “To minimize errors of communication, it is essential that we consider very carefully the listening environment we are promoting in the OR.”

To test the potential impact of background noise on operating room communication, Bush and his colleagues set-up a simulated noise environment similar to an OR. They then recruited 15 surgeons with between one and 30 years of professional experience, and tested their ability to understand and repeat words under four different typical OR environment conditions — quiet, filtered noise through a surgical mask and background noise both with and without music. Each subject was tested in two situations: engaged in a specific surgical task and task free.

They found a significant decrease in speech comprehension levels when background noise was present and the words being conveyed to them were unpredictable. Furthermore, the researchers reported surgeons demonstrated far worse speech comprehension levels when music was present than they did in either a quiet environment or one in which only typical OR noise was present.

However, music was said to hamper a subject´s comprehension only when he or she was actively engaged in a task. As a result, Bush and his colleagues have determined OR noise can result in a decrease in auditory processing ability, especially when ambient music is present. In addition, they said understanding what other OR team members are saying becomes more difficult in situations when conversations include essential information that is unpredictable in nature.

“Currently, miscommunication is one of the most frequently cited causes of preventable medical errors. For this reason, there is a growing interest in identifying overlooked variables that can lead to communication breakdowns among health care professionals,” the researchers explained. “Therefore, these study results have important implications in the real world because surgical teams carry on critical conversations during surgical procedures that often include discussions about medications and dosing as well as the blood supply that should be on hand.”

“Our main goal is to increase awareness that operating room noise does affect communication and that we should foster the best environment in which we can communicate better,” added Bush. “This effort means that the surgical team needs to work diligently to create the safest environment possible, and that step may mean either turning the music off or down, or limiting background conversations or other things in the environment that could lead to communication errors and medical mistakes.”