Scientists pin possible cause of child paralysis outbreak

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 18, 2015 Last Edited: July 18, 2015

Brian Galloway

Paralysis swept through more than 100 children during the summer of 2014, and scientists claimed the D68 virus was the culprit. Doctors at the University of Virginia Children’s Hospital now think another virus might have been the real reason for the outbreak.
The change in thinking came about after a six-year-old girl was admitted to the hospital in October of 2014. Her right shoulder was drooping and she was having problems using her right hand. She had previously exhibited cold-like symptoms—similar to signs that the other 118 children had shown as well.
A new contender
When tested for causes, an enterovirus came up, but not D68. Rather, she tested positive to enterovirus C105.
“Surprisingly, it came back with this enterovirus C105, which I’ll admit, when it came back, I’d never heard of,” said UVA’s Ronald B. Turner, MD. “It was just described in the last eight or nine years and it hasn’t been seen much around the world. Now, I think you have to be careful with that, because we don’t look for it. And you don’t see what you don’t look for. So it’s possible it’s out there and it’s not being detected because nobody’s sending specimens to be tested in this way.”
According to Eurekalert, Turner has since published a case study detailing the girl’s diagnosis. In it, they noted that only eight of 41 children tested for enterovirus D68 actually had the virus, leading the researchers to believe its identity as culprit arose because of pure coincidence.
“Last fall there was this outbreak of enterovirus D68 disease that was going around the country and mostly causing respiratory symptoms, asthma exacerbations, that sort of thing. Right in the middle of that, there was also an outbreak of acute flaccid paralysis,” said Turner. “Because of the temporal relationship, a lot of people connected those two events and basically assumed that the enterovirus D68 was somehow related to the acute flaccid paralysis.”
However, Turner also emphasized that C105 can’t be linked to the outbreak until researchers analyze the virus more fully. that more analysis needs to be done before enterovirus C105 is also branded as the cause.
“You can only learn so much from one case. My plea is that we not over-interpret this information,” he said. “It was really just an attempt to say, ‘Hey wait a minute, there are other possibilities for what’s going on with this flaccid paralysis and we need to keep an open mind about this.’“
Thankfully, the six-year-old girl from the case study is reported as doing well. Her right arm weakness has improved and her right hand has regained its strength.
—–
Follow Susanna Pilny on Twitter @PlinyTheShorter
(Image credit: Thinkstock)
Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Technology

Innocent people investigated due to data errors

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Emily Bills

Botched attempts to collect communications data during UK pedophile investigations led to the wrong people being implicated on multiple occasions in 2014, according to the latest report by a communications watchdog.

In the report, Interception of Communications Commissioner Sir Anthony May said that errors had resulted in five police searchers at the properties of innocent men and women, according to BBC News reports. Furthermore, May found that there were 17 serious errors committed by the authorities or communications service providers in all during the course of last year.

The mistakes were made during activities to collect the who, when, and where of communications data, but not the actual content itself, under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act. Nine of the mistakes were due to human error while the others were attributed to technical errors.

Some of the instances had ‘very serious consquences’

State agencies were responsible for five of the mistakes, while service providers were to blame for 11 of them and one was attributed to an organization identified only as “other party.” None of the offending groups were mentioned by name in May’s report, according to the BBC.

In all cases where there were “very serious consequences,” he said those affected were made aware of the error. May said that, in most cases, those who were wrongly investigated were “incredibly understanding” about the whole thing. However, he noted that at least a few of them were pursuing legal action over the incidents.

In one case, an individual unconnected to a child sex investigation was arrested due to mistakes in the tracing of online activity, while in another, authorities attempted to trace the owner of an email account connected to a child sexual exploitation probe. However, they failed to notice an underscore in the email address, resulting in the wrong person’s home being searched.

“Any police action taken erroneously in such cases, such as the search of an individual’s house who is unconnected with the investigation or a delayed welfare check on an individual whose life is believed to be at risk, can have a devastating impact on the individuals concerned,” said May.

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Technology

United Airlines hackers awarded one million air miles

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Emily Bills

A pair of hackers who spotted security flaws in the United Airlines website have each been given a million free flight miles as part of the company’s bounty program, which rewards those hackers that privately disclose security issues rather than leaking them online.

According to Reuters and BBC News reports, the move is a first for a US-based airline company, and United confirmed that they had distributed two one million mile rewards – the most that can be handed out under the program. However, they would not confirm social media posts claiming to be from individuals who had received smaller rewards from the airline.

United, unveiled its “bug bounty” program back in May, just a few weeks before technical issues forced its entire fleet to be grounded on two occasions: once because the airline was locked out of its own reservations system, preventing it from checking in its customers, and another due to issues with flight-plan dispatch software.

“Schemes like this reward hackers for finding and disclosing problems in the right way. That makes the internet safer for all of us,” security consultant Dr Jessica Barker told BBC News. “Bug bounties are common in tech companies as they tend to understand online security a bit more, but other industries are catching up.”

Bug bounties ‘a good approach,’ experts say

United is not the first company to use the promise of rewards to entice hackers to contact them directly to report issues or vulnerabilities. Google, Yahoo, and Facebook promise cash incentives, and Reuters asked other airlines if they had similar programs. Three declined to comment and a fourth did not respond.

On its website, United explained that the program would “bolster our security and allow us to continue to provide excellent service.”

“It’s not always about hackers digging around looking for flaws. A hacker may be using a service and notice something a bit off. We all benefit if they look into that,” Dr. Barker told BBC News, dismissing critics who claim that such programs discourage companies from hiring professional security firms.

“It should be part of an overall approach to security, but it’s definitely a good approach,” she said. “It encourages positive behavior and shows young hackers that they can benefit from doing the right thing. Bounties can also benefit smaller companies who can’t afford to give out cash rewards but can offer free products or services, so I hope we’ll see more and more bug bounties.”

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Space

Latest New Horizons data reveals frozen plains, wagging tail

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Emily Bills

Preliminary data from the New Horizons spacecraft has revealed that the dwarf planet Pluto has an atmosphere that extends as much as 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) above its surface, a frozen plains in the middle of its “heart”, and a cold, dense “tail” of escaping atmospheric ions.

Those were among the revelations presented by NASA officials and scientists from the mission team during a press conference held by the US space agency today. The findings come even though just one to two percent of its data has been transmitted back to Earth thus far, according to Dr. Jim Green, director of Planetary Science at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

Dr. Green added that New Horizons, which is currently more than two million miles away from the Pluto system and heading towards the Kuiper Belt, is expected to have beamed back between five and six percent of the data it has collected by the end of next week. Already, however, it has sent back color images of both the dwarf planet and its largest moon, Charon.

In addition, principal investigator Dr. Alan Stern, New Horizons of SwRI, also showed off what he called the first well-resolved images of Pluto’s tiny satellite, Nix. This images has twice as many pixels as the best Earth-based images of the planet itself prior to the New Horizons.

Pluto has an extended, nitrogen-rich atmosphere

One of the main discoveries announced during Friday’s press event was the fact that Pluto had a nitrogen-rich atmosphere that extended as much as 1,000 (1,600 kilometers) above the surface of the planet. This marked this first observation of the dwarf planet’s atmospheres at altitudes above 170 miles.

According to NASA, the instrument gathered the information during a period in which the sun, Pluto, and the spacecraft were carefully aligned, starting approximately one hour after the closet approach back on Tuesday morning. During this event, which is called a solar occultation, New Horizons passed through Pluto’s shadow while the sun backlit the dwarf planet’s atmosphere.

Randy Gladstone, New Horizons co-investigator at the SwRI facility in San Antonio, explained that the atmospheres team had to wait until the spacecraft travelled past Pluto in order to obtain its best data set. He and his colleagues also said that the atmosphere was very symmetric on both sides of the planet, and while it would take another one to two months to receive more data, its sluggish nature eliminates some proposed atmospheric models.

SWAP instrument spots a ‘plasma tail’ of nitrogen ions

The spacecraft also detected a region of cold, dense ionized gas tens of thousands of miles past the dwarf planet that was created as a result of its atmosphere being stripped away by the solar wind and lost to space. The nitrogen in the atmosphere was escaping due to weaker gravity and energized by solar wind as it streamed out.

The Solar Wind Around Pluto (SWAP) instrument detected a cavity in the solar wind (or the outflow of electrically charged particles from the Sun), approximately an hour and a half after New Horizons’ closest approach. This cavity was detected between 48,000 and 68,000 miles (77,000 to 109,000 km) downstream of the dwarf planet and was populated with nitrogen ions that formed a “plasma tail” of unknown length and structure.

While Venus and Mars have similar plasma tails, in Pluto’s case, the nitrogen molecules in its atmosphere are ionized by solar UV rays, caught up in the solar wind, and carried beyond the dwarf planet to form the phenomenon detected by New Horizons. Just before the spacecraft’s closest approach, these ions were detected far upstream of Pluto by the probe’s Pluto Energetic Particle Spectrometer Science Investigation (PEPSSI) instrument.

Co-investigator Fran Bagenal from the University of Colorado, Boulder, who heads up the New Horizons Particles and Plasma team, said that while they won’t be able to accurately quantify the escaping atmosphere until more data comes back in August, estimates indicate that as much as 500 tons of atmosphere is escaping per hour.

“This is just a first tantalizing look at Pluto’s plasma environment,” Bagenal said in a statement, adding that once additional PEPSSI data comes back, it can be combined with the measurements of the Alice and Rex instruments “to pin down the rate at which Pluto is losing its atmosphere… [and] answer outstanding questions about the evolution of Pluto’s atmosphere and surface and determine to what extent Pluto’s solar wind interaction is like that of Mars.”

Unusual terrain features spotted in ‘Sputnik Planum’ region

Last but not least, the NASA team released a new close-up image of Pluto’s surface that shows a vast, craterless plain that appears to be less than 100 million years old and may even be currently in the process of being shaped by geologic processes. This region is located north of Pluto’s icy mountains in the dwarf planet’s heart feature that was named “Tombaugh Regio” in honor of Clyde Tombaugh, the man who originally discovered Pluto back in 1930.

Jeff Moore, leader of the New Horizons Geology, Geophysics and Imaging Team (GGI) at NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, joked during the press conference that he liked to call this terrain the “not easy to explain terrain” terrain. The area is comprised of large, very young, craterless plains that Moore said “exceeds all pre-flyby expectations.”

This new icy plains region has been named “Sputnik Planum” (Sputnik Plain) after the Earth’s first artificial satellite, and it has areas that resemble frozen terrestrial mud cracks. It consists of a broken surface of irregularly shaped portions approximately 12 miles (20 km) across bordered by what appears to be shallow toughs, some of which contain mysterious dark material and some of which are traced by groups of hills appearing to rise above the surrounding terrain.

Other parts of Sputnik Planum appear to have been formed by fields of small pits through the process of sublimation, in which ice transforms directly from solid to gas, similar to the way that dry ice behaves on Earth. Moore said his team has two working theories as to how these segments were formed: they may have been formed by the contraction of surface materials, or by convection, similar to how wax rises to the top of a lava lamp. On Pluto, this would occur within a surface layer of frozen carbon monoxide, methane, and nitrogen.

This so-called “heart of the heart” image was taken by New Horizons when it was 48,000 miles (77,000 km) from Pluto, and shows features as small as one-half mile (1 kilometer) across. Mission scientists said that they expect to find out more about these unusual terrains as the spacecraft transmits higher-resolution and stereo images over the next year.

“This is just a first tantalizing look at Pluto’s plasma environment,” said Bagenal. Green added that while the “decade-long journey to Pluto is over… the science payoff is only beginning,” and Stern said that even though the team had “only scratched the surface of our Pluto exploration… it already seems clear to me that in the initial reconnaissance of the solar system, the best was saved for last.”

(Image credit: NASA)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Health

How marijuana assists in bone fracture recovery

Written By: Brett Smith

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Emily Bills

According to a new report published in the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research, you may want to take one or two puffs on a jazz cigarette the next time you fracture your arm.
At the University of Tel Aviv in Israel, an institution on the forefront of marijuana research, scientists have recently discovered that marijuana can do more than just bring relief to those with glaucoma or give chemotherapy patients “the munchies” – it can also aid with the healing of bone fractures.
While it doesn’t provide the high marijuana enthusiasts are “jonesing for,” the non-psychotropic component cannabinoid cannabidiol (CBD) was shown to assist in the healing of a broken femora over the course of eight weeks.
The new study expands on previous research by the same team that found cannabinoid receptors in the human body trigger bone formation and prevent bone loss, and this find could pave the way for treating osteoporosis and other bone disease with marijuana or marijuana products.
No THC here
For those wary of using a psychoactive substance, the research indicates the beneficial bone-building agent could be separated from tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) – marijuana’s mind-altering component.
“The clinical potential of cannabinoid-related compounds is simply undeniable at this point,” study author Yankel Gabet, from the university’s Bone Research Laboratory, said in a press release. “While there is still a lot of work to be done to develop appropriate therapies, it is clear that it is possible to detach a clinical therapy objective from the psychoactivity of cannabis. CBD, the principal agent in our study, is primarily anti-inflammatory and has no psychoactivity.”
In the study, researchers injected one group of rodents with CBD and another with a combination of CBD and THC. The team found the administration of just CBD offers the necessary therapeutic effect.
“We found that CBD alone makes bones stronger during healing, enhancing the maturation of the collagenous matrix, which provides the basis for new mineralization of bone tissue,” he said. “After being treated with CBD, the healed bone will be harder to break in the future.”
“Other studies have also shown CBD to be a safe agent, which leads us to believe we should continue this line of study in clinical trials to assess its usefulness in improving human fracture healing,” Gabet added.
—–
Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Science

At work, rudeness can be caught like a cold

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Christopher Pilny

People have long suspected that being rude to your coworkers spreads toxicity around (heck, there’s even an entire episode of How I Met Your Mother about it), but now there is proof, as a study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology found that workplace rudeness is contagious.

The study followed 90 graduate students as they practiced multiple negotiations with their classmates. If a student’s first partner was rude, they were more likely to be rated as rude themselves by their second partner—showing that they had passed on the rudeness. And even after a week had passed between interactions, if the first partner was rude, the participant was still more likely to transfer that rudeness to their second.

However, you don’t need to have someone be rude directly to you to pass it on; just seeing someone else be rude is likely to do it as well. Forty-seven undergraduate students were shown either a video of a rude workplace interaction or a polite one, and were given the task of responding to a fictitious customer email of neutral tone. The students who saw the rude video were more likely to be hostile in their responses than those who saw the polite one.

“That tells us that rudeness will flavor the way you interpret ambiguous cues,” said lead author Trevor Foulk, a doctoral student in management at the University of Florida’s Warrington College of Business Administration.

Taking rudeness more seriously

Rudeness doesn’t just spread like a virus; it attunes us to discourtesy. The 47 students were tasked with identifying which words on a list were real and fake. But before the students began, they witnessed a staged interaction between an apologetic late participant and the study leader. When the study leader was rude to the late “participant,” the students were more attentive to the rude words on the list, and identified them as real words significantly faster than those who saw a polite interaction.

“When you experience rudeness, it makes rudeness more noticeable,” Foulk said. “You’ll see more rudeness even if it’s not there.”

Foulk hopes the study will encourage employers to take rudeness more seriously.

“Part of the problem is that we are generally tolerant of these behaviors, but they’re actually really harmful,” Foulk said. “Rudeness has an incredibly powerful negative effect on the workplace.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Space

One-in-a-billion star discovered by Gaia satellite

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Christopher Pilny

Astronomers from the University of Cambridge, along with an international team of colleagues and amateur scientists, have discovered the first ever known binary star system in which one of the stars is completely eclipsed by the other.

The discovery, which is detailed in Friday’s edition of the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, centers around a type of two-star system called a Cataclysmic Variable, in which one super dense white dwarf star is cannibalizing gas from its companion.

This particular system is located approximately 730 light years from Earth in the constellation Draco, and was discovered by the ESA’s Gaia satellite in August 2014. Named Gaia14aae, the system was first spotted when it suddenly and drastically increased in brightness over the course of a single day, Dr. Heather Campbell of the Cambridge Institute of Astronomy said.

“Gaia14aae was discovered by the Gaia satellite when it suddenly became 10 times brighter in August 2014,” Dr. Campbell told redOrbit via email. “We caught it with Gaia because one star is eating material off the other which causes occasional outbursts or transient events.”

“Additional observations of the system were made by the Center for Backyard Astrophysics (CBA), a collaboration of amateur and professional astronomers, who took many short images of the system,” she added. “The CBA noticed a regular dip in the brightness of Gaia14aae, every 47 minutes, which they attributed to an eclipse of the white dwarf by its companion.”

Discovery could improve understanding of Ia supernovae

Using spectroscopy from the William Herschel Telescope in the Canary Islands, Dr. Campbell’s team discovered that while Gaia14aae contains large amounts of helium, it lacked hydrogen, the most comment element in the universe. The absence of this element allowed them to classify the new system as a very rare type of system known as an AM Canum Venaticorum (AM CVn).

An AM CVn, she explained, is a kind of Cataclysmic Variable system in which both stars have lost all of their hydrogen. This discovery is “especially exciting” because “it is the first known AM CVn system where one star totally eclipses the other,” she told redOrbit. “This means we will be able to measure their sizes and masses to a higher accuracy than any similar system.”

The study authors also said that this new type of system could lead to a new way to study ultra-bright supernova explosions, which is one of the primary tools used to measure the expansion of the universe. Dr. Campbell explained that AM CVn systems “could hold the key to one of the greatest mysteries in modern astrophysics: what causes Ia supernova explosions?”

Type Ia supernovae occur in binary systems, and is essential in the field of astrophysics because their extreme brightness allows researchers to use them to measure the accelerated expansion of the Universe, she said. In the case of Gaia14aae, it’s not known whether the two stars will collide and cause a supernova explosion, or if the white dwarf will completely devour its companion star before that can happen. However, studying Gaia14aae will lead to new insight into how this type of supernovae explode, which is essential for more accurate measurements of dark energy.

“Gaia14aae was one of the first discoveries from the Gaia satellite, which will be searching for transient objects for the next four or more years,” Dr. Campbell concluded. “So watch this space for many more exciting discoveries. We announce all the new discoveries on our website so that other astronomers and the public can help us gain more information from the ground on the new discoveries to try to understand what they are.”

—–

Feature Image: This is an artist’s impression of Gaia14aae. (Credit: Marisa Grove/Institute of Astronomy)

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Science

Genetically modified moths could limit damage to crops

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Emily Bills

Genetically modifying diamondback moths to produce female offspring that don’t survive to reproduce could limit the amount of damage these pests do to cabbage, broccoli, and other types of crops, according to new research published in the journal BMC Biology.

A team of scientists from the US, UK, and China report that engineering the insects to ensure they have a “self-limiting gene” could be an effective way to suppress populations of their own species, ultimately causing the number of moths to decline dramatically.

According to BBC News, the genetically modified moths were developed by the Oxford-based company Oxitec, and they demonstrated that the technique proved to be effective in controlled conditions. USDA-approved field trials in which the GM moths will be studied under netting are scheduled to get underway later on this summer at New York’s Cornell University.

“We need this new technology to solve some old-world problems,” said co-author Tony Shelton, a professor at Cornell. Oxitec noted that the engineering method used in the GM moth is species-specific and that the self-limiting gene is non-toxic, meaning that the approach poses no threat to other insects or creatures that eat the moths.

Research promising as a non-toxic pest control method

In their BMC Biology paper, Shelton and his colleagues explained that they developed a male-selecting transgenes of the diamondback moth, Plutella xylostella, as a “direct, species-specific” method of pest management that allowed only male moths to survive until adulthood.

They reported that introducing these modified moths into wild-type populations led to a rapid decline in pest populations. In separate experiments involving broccoli plants, releasing a relatively low-level of modified males in combination with moths that were resistant to the bio-pesticide Bt (which is expressed in certain GM crops) suppressed population growth and delayed the spread of resistance to this pesticide.

The experiments, which were conducted in 2013, demonstrated that P. xylostella populations were brought under control within 10 weeks after the start of GM moth releases, and Oxtiec’s Dr. Neil Morrison told BBC News the results of the study would enable “pest control methods that are non-toxic and pesticide-free.”

“Within this model system we’ve been able to show that the Oxitec moths will delay the evolution of resistance to the Bt plants as well as lowering the pest population. So you have this double benefit,” Shelton added. “If you can combine the two technologies – Bt plants plus genetically engineered insects, you can have a more sustainable pest management system.”

(Image credit: International Institute of Tropical Agriculture)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Health

TV-watching toddlers more likely to be bullied later on

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Emily Bills

The amount of time that a child spends watching television as a toddler has been linked to the likelihood that he or she will be bullied later on in grade school, according to a new study by University of Montreal and CHU Sainte-Justine Children’s Hospital psychologist Linda Pagani.

In her study, Pagani looked at 991 girls and 1,006 boys growing up in Canada, starting at the age of 29 months and following them through the sixth grade. When they were toddlers, their parents reported their TV viewing habits, and as they got older, they self-reported bullying incidents.

The kids were asked questions such as how often they had belongings taken from them, and how frequently they were physically or verbally abused. For every unit of standard deviation in television viewing above 53 minutes at the age of 29 months, Pagani’s study found a predicted 11 percent increase in bullying by classmates in the sixth grade.

Those statistics took into account other potential confounding factors which could influence the chances of a child being bullied, such as his or her behavior and cognitive abilities, as well as family income and composition and the mother’s education level.

Reasons for this association, and ways to prevent it

“Too much time in front of the telly creates a time-debt for other enriching activities,” Pagani told redOrbit via email. “In early childhood, children need live interaction to help their brains develop and to maximize their emotional intelligence. It is like IQ, we are born with a potential, but need interactions with people and objects in the environment to fully develop it.”

“More television time means less time for play and less time in active social exchanges of ideas and information,” the professor added. “Watching the telly is not an effortful activity. Thus, it fosters lifestyle habits that are less energetic and there is less of a tolerance for more demanding interactions on a social level. It also does not hone shared eye contact, for which we are wired at birth. Therefore, less effortful interactions mean less activities that foster and reinforce shared eye contact, which is the most powerful mode of information exchange apart from talking and one reinforces the other.”

She also explained that early television exposure has been linked to developmental issues that are associated with brain function involved in interpersonal problem solving, socially acceptable peer play, positive social contact and emotional regulation. Pagani advises parents to be careful with how much screen time their young children get, limiting it to less than two hours per day, especially for toddlers who are not yet two years old.

As she pointed out in a statement, “There are only 24 hours in a day, and for children, half should be spent meeting basic needs – eating, sleeping, hygiene – and the remainder spent on enriching activities and relationships… Excessive viewing time during the early years can create a time debt for pursuits involving social play.”

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Health

Oldest evidence of dental work discovered in ancient molar

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 17, 2015 Last Edited: July 17, 2015

Christopher Pilny

A recently-discovered tooth shows that the art of dentistry is at least 5,000 years older than previously expected, as the 14,000-year-old infected molar shows signs of being cleaned by flint tools, according to research published in the journal Scientific Reports.

In addition to representing the oldest known dentistry, paleoanthropologist Stefano Benazzi of the University of Bologna and his colleagues told Discovery News that the archeological find is also the oldest example of an operative manual intervention on a pathological condition.

Benazzi added that the molar, which belonged to an approximately 25-year-old man from the northern part of Italy, “predates any undisputed evidence of dental and cranial surgery, currently represented by dental drillings and cranial trephinations dating back to the Mesolithic-Neolithic period, about 9,000-7,000 years ago.”

The man’s well-preserved remains were found in 1988 and were dated to being between 13,820 and 14,160 years old, the website said. Even though the skeleton itself was discovered more than two decades ago, however, the dental work went unnoticed until recently.

Using stone tools to remove infected tissues (ouch!)

Benazzi explained that the cavity was “described as a simple carious lesion,” and as he and his fellow researchers explained in their paper, the discovery shows that humans had already started using rudimentary forms of dental treatments during Late Upper Palaeolithic period.

They analyzed the lower right third molar of the individual and found that the tooth had a large occlusal cavity with four cavities, Discovery News said. They went on to spot unusual striations in the internal surface of the cavity using a scanning electron microscope. Benazzi said that these were likely the results of slicing in different directions using a microlithic point.

The study authors went on to carry a series of experiments on three of the molars using wood, bone and microlithic points to confirm that the striations were characteristic of scratching and chipping. Benazzi told the website that the infected tissue would have been carefully removed from the inside of the tooth using a small and sharp stone tool, thus showing that people in the Late Upper Paleolithic understood the need to treat deep dental cavities.

Furthermore, the researchers said that the enamel had been partially rounded and polished due to wear, which indicates that the individual had undergone his dental work well before he died. Co-author Marco Peresani at the University of Ferrara told Discovery News that the research marked a key discovery in the development of historical dental surgery.

—–

Feature Image: Thinkstock

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Science

Mouse vision saved by gene therapy

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

Around 1 in 4000 people suffer from retinitis pigmentosa—a disease in which the retina degenerates, eventually leading to blindness. There is no cure for it, but a collaborative study out of Oxford found that gene therapy might hold the key.

Gene therapy involves modifying a genome to treat a disease—usually by having a virus deliver a gene to the cells where it’s needed. Once the gene is inserted, the cells are able to build the molecule the gene encodes.

For this study, the scientists injected mice with modified viruses. Like humans, mice have eyes containing rods (black and white and night vision cells) and cones (color vision cells), but the mice studied here were special: their cone cells were modified to glow fluorescent green so they could be easily counted.

The retinitis pigmentosa-model mice were at the stage of the disease where their rods were beginning to degenerate, leaving their cones yet untouched. For each mouse, one eye was treated with saline as a control, while the other was injected with a virus carrying a gene to produce human ciliary neurotrophic factor (CNTF)—a protein previously shown to prevent the loss of retinal cells.

CNTF is problematic, however—it’s toxic in certain doses. However, since the scientists had modified the cone cells to glow, they were able to see if the CNTF dose was actually killing cells by counting the cones at various stages. If cone cells began to die, they lowered the dose. Thus, they were able to directly control the gene therapy dose while minimizing toxic effects.

After 24 weeks, cones were preserved in mice with high-dose eyes, while those with low-dose or saline had completely lost all of their cones. The researchers gave the high-dose mice behavioral tests and measured brain blood flow, and confirmed their cones were still functional.

“Our results in this mouse model of retinitis pigmentosa clearly show that CNTF treatment can both give life-long protection to cone photoreceptors and preserve useful vision. While there remains a lot to understand, for example on the role of rods in cone preservation and translation to human retinal anatomy, this is a very promising study,” said author Robert MacLaren, professor at the University of Oxford’s Nuffield Laboratory of Ophthalmology.

“We already know from clinical trials aimed at preventing motor neuron loss in ALS that high-dose systemic treatment with CNTF causes too many adverse reactions to be tolerated by patients. However, our results suggest that directly increasing activity in the class of genes that were upregulated in our high-dose CNTF group has the potential to provide a novel, targeted treatment for retinitis pigmentosa and a range of neurodegenerative diseases.”

(Image credit: University of Oxford)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Health

Miniature brains from skin cells reveal insights into autism

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

A technique that grows “mini brains” has led to new insights into autism, according to a study out of Yale.

The technique—known as induced reprogramming—produces things known as brain organoids, and it turns previous autism research on its head. Before, research primarily focused on how genes might affect brain development.

“Instead of starting from genetics, we’ve started with the biology of the disorder itself to try to get a window into the genome,” said senior author Flora Vaccarino, the Harris Professor of Child Psychiatry and Professor of Neurobiology at the Yale School of Medicine, in a press release.

“Brains in a dish”

Brain organoids are tiny clusters of brain tissue that possess some features of a human brain in the first trimester of development, including lobes of cortex. “It’s not of course identical to the embryonic brain,but in a way it resembles that,” Vaccarino explained to redOrbit by phone. “The cells express similar genes and markers, they are electrically active when they become neurons, they form primitive layers (so they have reciprocal relationships to each other), [they] separate into layers similar to the progenitors—or to the neurons—so there are many similarities with what the embryonic brain actually does.”

These tissues are commonly created from human skin. First skin cells are dedifferentiated into pluripotent stem cells. “You introduce transcription factors—which are genes and proteins that will basically alter the state of the cell. You sort of make that cell go back into development and become pluripotent. It alters the epigenetic profile of that cell, so that cell is no longer a skin cell, but it becomes more of a stem cell,” Dr. Vaccarino told redOrbit by phone.

Then, the stem cells are made into brain cells. “Now you can use the same signaling system that is used in an embryo to direct the fate of cells that are pluripotent—that is, they can generate almost any cell—into neural cells,” explained Vaccarino.

Since the skin cells come directly from live humans, the later cells contain all of their DNA, including genes that lead to different conditions of the brain.

So these “miniature brains” grow in way akin to how the cell donor’s brain developed, allowing scientists to see how the networks of the brain develop and function in the presence of the unidentified genes, and allowing scientists to test novel (and potentially dangerous) drug compounds and medications.

Network imbalance

In the Yale study, researchers took skin cells from autistic patients with enlarged brains (a common characteristic in autistic individuals) and from their unaffected fathers, for a point of comparison. Then, they turned the skin cells into stem cells and then brain cells, and grew them into brain organoids.

They discovered that the genes controlling neuronal development of the organoids of autistic patients were expressed differently than the same genes in the paternal organoids. The networks created by the genes had an unexpected overproduction of inhibitory neurons—leading to quieter neural activity. The excitatory neurons were unaffected, leading to an imbalance in favor of inhibition.

Even more exciting than discovering a possible mechanism for autism, the researchers discovered how to prevent the imbalance from happening. A gene known as FOXG1 was being abnormally expressed in the organoids; the researchers suppressed it, correcting the balance between excitatory and inhibitory neurons. This suggests that clinical intervention may be possible.

According to Vaccarino, “This study speaks to the importance of using human cells and using them in an assay that could bring a better understanding of the pathophysiology of autism and with that, possibly better treatments.”

The research is published today in Cell.

(Image credit: Jessica Mariani)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Technology

Elusive massless particle could improve electronics

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

First theorized more than eight decades ago, the elusive massless particles known as Weyl fermions have finally been discovered by a team of Princeton University scientists, and the discovery could lead to the development of faster, more efficient electronics.

As the researchers explain in Thursday’s edition of the journal Science, Weyl fermions have a unique ability to behave as both matter and antimatter inside a crystal. If the properties of these particles are applied to technological devices, they could allow for the free and highly efficient flow of electricity, thus leading to more powerful computers.

Originally proposed by mathematician and physicist Hermann Weyl in 1929, Weyl fermions have been highly sought-after by scientists because they have been regarded as potential building block of other subatomic particles, and are even more basic than electrons when the negatively charged particles are moving inside of a crystal.

The basic nature of Weyl fermions mean that they could provide a stable, more efficient way to transport particles than electrons in electronic devices. Unlike electrons, Weyl fermions have no mass and are highly mobile.

Unique properties could lead to quantum computing technology

Hasan, a professor of physics at Princeton, said that the Weyl fermion’s physics are “strange” and that it could lead to innovations “that we’re just not capable of imagining now.” The fermion was discovered synthetic metallic crystal known as tantalum arsenide, and unlike other recently discovered particles, the authors said that it could be reproduced and potentially applied.

Two characteristics of the Weyl fermion could be applied to future electronic devices, including the development of quantum computers. They behave like a composite of monopole- and antimonopole-like particles when inside a crystal, giving them opposing magnetic charges that can still move independently of one another, and they can be used to create electrons that do not have any mass, which move quickly and without any being lost to collisions.

This phenomenon is known as backscattering, and it generates heat and hinders efficiency. Weyl electrons, however, can simply move through and around obstructions, as if they had “their own GPS” and were able to “steer themselves without scattering,” noted Hasan. “They will move and move only in one direction… and never come to an end because they just tunnel through. These are very fast electrons that behave like unidirectional light beams and can be used for new types of quantum computing.”

Building upon previous research, the authors studied and simulated dozens of tantalum arsenide crystals before focusing their efforts on an asymmetrical crystal, which had a differently shaped top and bottom. They were loaded into a scanning tunneling spectromicroscope that was cooled to near absolute zero and suspended from the ceiling to prevent even atom-sized vibrations. The device revealed that the crystal matched theoretical specifications for a Weyl fermion host.

The crystals were then taken to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, where they were examined with high-energy accelerator-based photon beams. The shape, direction, and size of the beams as they were fired through the crystal revealed the presence of the elusive Weyl fermion.

(Image credit: Dr. Ling Lu)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Science

Researchers accidentally discover oldest animal sperm ever

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

As a team of paleontologists led by Dr. Benjamin Bomfleur of the Swedish Museum of Natural History was sifting through rock samples from Antarctica, they made a rather unexpected and unusual find – a fossilized animal sperm believed to be the oldest ever discovered.

The discovery, which was reported in Wednesday’s edition of the journal Biology Letters, was made by Dr. Bomfleur’s colleague Stephen McLoughlin and is believed to have originated from a family of creatures that includes earthworms and leeches, according to BBC News.

While fossilized plant sperm is common, the researchers said that only a few other specimens of fossilized animal sperm have ever been discovered, and the newly discovered Clitellata sample is believed to be 10 million years older than the previous record-holder for oldest animal sperm.

Dr. Bomfleur told the BBC that this was a “remarkable discovery” because “sperms are very transient, very short-lived, with soft cellular structures.”

So how did this accidental discovery happen?

While on an expedition at Seymour Island in the Antarctic, paleobiologist Thomas Mörs found a fossilized cocoon that he though may have contained plant remnants, the Washington Post noted. He passed the cocoon on to Dr. Bomfleur and his colleagues, who began analyzing it in search of those plant remains when they discovered the fossilized sperm remains.

The museum team sent pictures of the specimen along to Marco Ferraguti, an expert in annelid sperm. (We have experts on that?) The specimen underwent radiometric dating and was found to be at least 50 million years old, and after being compared to Ferraguti’s enormous collection of sperm pictures, the sperm likely belonged to a “crayfish worm.”

Experts report that the sperm probably survived as long as it did because of the biology of the creature from which it originated. These ancient worms secrete cocoons approximately 2mm in size that protect egg and sperm cells while they reproduce. The cocoon is formed from a sticky mucus that grows harder and is capable of trapping biological material in its walls.

Don’t expect a worm version of Jurassic Park, however

Even though the sperm is well preserved, Dr. Bomfleur said not to expect it to be used to create a worm version of Jurassic Park. “It might appear as if it was preserved in perfect detail but in the end the structure itself is fossilized,” the paleontologist explained to BBC News.

“We have the outer shape and form of the sperm cells preserved. We might even have internal, anatomical make-up of the sperm cells still preserved, we are not sure about that yet – we need to scan those using x-ray,” he added. “But even if anatomy should still be preserved, the material that it is composed of is altered so it’s not the original, organic material that the past animal sperm is composed of.”

(Image credit: Swedish Museum of Natural History)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Science

No ‘walking hibernation’ for polar bears in summer, study finds

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

Polar bears are physiologically unable to compensate for extended periods of food deprivation due to the ongoing loss of sea ice, despite demonstrating an unusual ability to minimize heat loss while swimming in Arctic waters, according to new research published Thursday.

“Our results suggest that polar bears can’t extend their fast for months (as bears do during winter hibernation) because they can’t reduce their metabolic rate to hibernation levels in summer,” one of the authors of the study, University of Wyoming professor Merav Ben-David, told redOrbit in an email. “Therefore, increasing ice loss and especially increasing the length of the summer melt period will likely negatively affect polar bear survival and thus abundance.”

Professor Ben-David and her colleagues explained their first-of-its-kind project revealed that polar bears are unable to prolong their reliance on stored energy, thus confirming the creatures are vulnerable to hunting opportunities lost due to melting sea ice. The results contradict previous research suggesting that the creatures could at least partially compensate for longer summer food deprivation by entering into a state of lowered activity and reduced metabolic rate known as a “walking hibernation.”

The study authors found that the summer activity levels and body temperature of bears on shore and on ice were typical of fasting, non-hibernating mammals, with no signs of this so-called state of “walking hibernation.” The results suggest that polar bears are not likely to avoid the physical declines associated with continued ice loss and longer periods of ice melting, and their very survival could be at stake.

Highlighting the threats of sea ice loss

Professor Ben-David told redOrbit that it is “important to keep in mind that different areas of the Arctic show different sea ice dynamics so to project what will happen to polar bears globally will require some sophisticated modeling using our results (as well as other parameters).”

Her colleague, Dr. Steven Amstrup, chief scientist at Polar Bears International, added, “The bottom line is that we have no evidence anywhere that polar bears can persist without adequate access to sea ice. When sea ice is unavailable, or not available over productive waters preferred by the seals on which polar bears prey, polar bears are largely food deprived.”

“As Merav points out we do not expect the pattern of ice loss or its effects to be identical in all parts of the polar bear’s range, and observations thus far show variation in response depending on things like basic ecosystem productivity,” he noted. “That variation is transitory, however. Regardless of where they live, polar bears need ice as a foraging substrate. If we allow continued warming, we ultimately will be out of polar bear habitat throughout their current range.”

The researchers captured more than two-dozen polar bears and implanted each with temperature loggers. They then tracked their movements both on shore and on the ice in the Arctic Ocean’s Beaufort Sea, which is located north of Alaska and Canada, during 2008-2010.

Polar bears have no special way to cope with ice loss

Dr. Amstrup explained that the data showed that, even though many claimed that polar bears are able to employ the “walking hibernation” trick to prolong their ability to go without eating food, this was not the case. The study revealed that the creatures lack this special metabolic trick, and even though they’re able to hibernate in winter, when they’re food deprived during the summer they’re just like any other food-deprived mammal, whether on the ice or on land.

“Many people would have you believe that polar bears will somehow escape the negative impacts of sea ice disappearance,” he told redOrbit. “This evidence that they have no special ‘metabolic escape’ further confirms that retreating sea ice can only negatively affect polar bears, [and] it supports a statement I made some time ago: ‘Unless we mitigate the rise in greenhouse concentrations, we polar bear researchers will simply become polar bear historians.’”

A positive note

One positive that came out of the research, however, is that polar bears can employ an unusual physiological response to avoid unsustainable heat loss while swimming in cold Arctic waters. They are able to maintain their interior body temperature, allowing them to survive longer and more frequent swimming sessions, by temporarily cooling down the outermost tissues of their core to form an insulating shell. This phenomenon is known as regional heterothermy.

This regional heterothermy could represent an adaption to long-distance swims, although they note that the limits of this ability are currently unknown. Previous research by the same team found that one bear was able to survive a nine-day, 400-mile journey from shore to ice. The study shed new light on the potential mechanism used to pull off this feat, and could provide new insights into the overall metabolism and activity of bears.

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Science

Mathematical model describes robot with bacteria-controlled brain

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

Inspired in part by research in which the mating behavior of fruit flies was manipulated using bacteria, one Virginia Tech scientist has developed a mathematical formula that demonstrates how microbes can be used to create the behavior of robots or other inanimate objects.

Writing in Thursday’s edition of the journal Scientific Reports, Dr. Warren C. Ruder, an assistant professor of biological systems engineering at Virginia Tech, explained that he and his colleagues were attempting to determine from a mathematical model if they could build a living microbiome on a non living host, and then use it to control the movements of that entity.

The research, which also drew inspiration from studies demonstrating that implanting mice with probiotics could lower their stress levels, found that robots could indeed be able to have a working brain made out of bacteria. The discovery could have a broad impact on the field of ecology, biology, and robotics.

For instance, bacteria-robot model systems could enable studies which analyze the interactions between soil bacteria and livestock in the field of agriculture, and in healthcare, they could help scientists better understand the role of bacteria in controlling gut physiology. They could even be used to create microbe-deploying drones capable of executing various tasks.

Bacteria-robot system can make decisions, exhibits predatory behavior

“Recent studies have shown the link between the microbiome and the health and behavior of its animal host. This is true for animals ranging from fruit flies to humans,” Dr. Ruder told redOrbit via email. “We felt that if we could create a mathematical model of a simplified experimental system that connected genetically engineered bacteria to a robot, we could start to explore the minimum required components necessary to connect the microbiome to host behavior.”

The researchers were able to reveal that a bacteria-robot system was capable of unique decision-making behavior by coupling and computationally simulating widely accepted equations describing engineered gene circuits in E. coli, microfluid bioreactors, and robot movement.

The bacteria used in the experiment would turn either green or red based on what the consumed, and in the mathematical model, the theoretical robot was equipped with sensors and a miniature microscope that it used to determine where and how fast to go based on that color. The model also revealed a classic predatory behavior in the bacteria-robot system, as it paused when making its final approach towards more food before quickly striking its prey.

The next goal, Dr. Ruder told redOrbit, is to actually build the system described by the model: “We are going to genetically engineer E. coli to have the biochemical pathways we proposed. We are going to build the microbioreactors, with optical sensors (miniature microscopes) to monitor these bacteria, and we are going to build the mobile robots we described. We’ll then combine each of these built systems to create a robot that can be operated by a bacterial colony.”

He also wanted to emphasize that the bacteria-robot system is “very safe,” as the bacteria strains used in the experiment are “very weak… High school students get to experiment with them across the world. They pose almost no risk because when they get into the environment (or into your body), they get wiped out by robust environmental bacteria.

The robot body would protect them from the harsh environment, but when the robot eventually fails – as all human-built machines do – the bacteria’s potential ability to survive and proliferate without the robot is analogous to a human’s ability to survive in the deep ocean without a submarine.”

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Velociraptor cousin had flamboyant wings, tiny arms

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

Paleontologists have discovered and identified the remains of a new feathered dinosaur species that is the largest creature of its kind ever found to have a well-preserved set of bird-like wings, according to research published Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports.

The Velociraptor cousin was discovered in China and has been given the name Zhenyuanlong suni. The authors of the new study believe that it lived during the Cretaceous Period, approximately 125 million years ago, and was part of a family of feathered carnivores that was widespread during this part of history – (and it included the Velocitraptor of Jurrassic Park fame).

Found on Chinese farm

Dr. Stephen Brusatte from the University of Edinburgh School of GeoSciences and his fellow investigators reported that the dinosaur’s wings were short compared to other members of this family and were comprised of several layers of large feathers. The creature’s feathers were found to be complex structures made of a central shaft and several fine branches.

While this is not the first large feathered dinosaur to be identified, it’s the first to have complex wings made up of quill pen-like feathers, the researchers said. The discovery appears to indicate that winged dinosaurs with large, complex feathers were more diverse than previously believed.

The near-complete remains of the animal, which were described as remarkably well preserved, were studied by Dr. Brusatte and colleagues from the University of Edinburgh and the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences after being donated to a museum by the man who found it.

“I wish I could say that I found this fossil myself. It would have been the highlight of my career! But like nearly all fossils of feathered dinosaurs from China, this one was found by a farmer out working his land,” Dr. Brusatte explained to redOrbit via email. “Thankfully, the farmer realized the importance of the specimen and donated it to the Jinzhou Paleontological Museum, one of China’s great museums, which has thousands of fossils… from northeastern China.”

New dinosaur species a snapshot of ‘evolution in action’

The fossils reveal that Zhenyuanlong suni had dense feathers covering its wings and tail, and that it grew to more than five feet in length. Even though it had bird like wings, it most likely was not able to fly, and it is unclear just what purpose its wings served. It may have has ancestors capable of flight, and maintained its wings solely for display purposes like a peacock’s tail.

“When you look at this fossil you see evolution in action. This is a dinosaur that is on the cusp of becoming a bird,” Dr. Brusatte told redOrbit. “If you saw Zhenyuanlong alive, I don’t think you’d made any distinction between it and, say, a turkey or a vulture or an eagle or any other type of fairly large bird. It is so well preserved that we can see the feathers on much of the body.”

“What is really interesting about that is this is the largest dinosaur that we know of that had wings, and it also has fairly short arms as far as these advanced, bird-like, raptor dinosaurs go,” he added. “So it is a fairly large dinosaur with short arms, but it STILL has wings that look just like those of living birds. That raises a really big mystery: why would such an animal have wings? It probably wasn’t flying: it was too big and its arms too short. So maybe it used them for display, or for protecting its eggs in the nest, or something else. And maybe that means that wings didn’t even initially evolve for flight, but for another function!”

Finally, Dr. Brusatte explained that even though the new feathered species is a cousin to the Velociraptor, people shouldn’t be surprised that it looks nothing like the dinosaurs featured in the Jurassic Park films – because those dinosaurs look nothing like real-life Velociraptors. Aw man! While the movies depict them as “scaly, drab-colored monsters,” he explained that actual Velociraptors would have had feathers and wings and resembled “a poodle-sized killer bird.”

(Image credit: Chuang Zhao)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

New bacon-flavored seaweed is healthier than kale

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

Let’s face it – we all know that we should really be eating healthy food like kale, but we wind up consuming things like bacon because they just taste so darn good. Now, researchers from Oregon State University have developed a product that gives us the best of both worlds.

According to KOIN-TV in Portland, researchers at the OSU Hatfield Marine Science Center have developed what they are calling a fast-growing, “succulent red marine algae called dulse” that is packed with nutrients and tastes like everyone’s favorite pork product when cooked. The seaweed grows in the wild along both US coasts and sells for about $90 per pound.

This strain of dulse, which has been patented by the university, resembles red lettuce and was created over the course of 15 years by OSU researcher Chris Langdon. Langdon and colleague Chuck Toombs came up with the idea and, following a series of experiments and trials, they were able to come up with a healthy bacon-flavored product.

Tastes like bacon and is more nutritious than kale

The bacon-flavored dulse is “packed with minerals, vitamins, and antioxidants,” according to the UK newspaper The Telegraph, and believe it or not, it is “twice as nutritious as kale.” It has been eaten throughout Europe for centuries, but has historically been far less popular in the US, where no manufacturers are currently commercially producing it.

“The dulse grows using a water recirculation system,” said Langdon. “Theoretically, you could create an industry in eastern Oregon almost as easily as you could along the coast with a bit of supplementation. You just need a modest amount of seawater and some sunshine.”

“In Europe, they add the powder to smoothies, or add flakes onto food. There hasn’t been a lot of interest in using it in a fresh form. But this stuff is pretty amazing,” he added.

The Associated Press (AP) noted that the OSU team even recruited a culinary research chef to further refine recipes and products created using the special seaweed, and that several Portland-area chefs were in the process of testing the dulse in both its raw and cooked form. Students at the university are also developing a marketing plan for foods created using the product.

(Image credit: Oregon State University)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Infrared camera reveals hidden spots on black leopards

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 16, 2015 Last Edited: July 16, 2015

Emily Bills

The mysterious black leopards found in the Malaysian Peninsula have spots after all! New research published this week in the Journal of Wildlife Management shows that you can only see them if you’re looking in the right wavelength of light.

Researchers from the University of Nottingham and James Cook University in the UK explained that they rigged the infrared flashes of automatic cameras to activate at all times by blocking the light sensors of the devices.

Doing so allowed them to see complex patterns of spotting on the ordinarily plain-looking black leopards, making it possible for them to distinguish between different animals and to help estimate the population sizes of the species. This discovery could be the first step in limiting or preventing poaching according to LiveScience.

“Understanding how leopards are faring in an increasingly human-dominated world is vital,” lead author Laurie Hedges, a zoology graduate from the University of Nottingham, explained. “This new approach gives us a novel tool to help save this unique and endangered animal.”

Technique can identify the creatures with 94 percent accuracy

While most leopards possess a distinctive and easily-visible pattern of spots, research published in 2010 found that nearly all Malay leopards possess have the gene for melanism, or black coats. The reason for this is unknown, but some experts believe they might have evolved as a way for the cats to camouflage themselves while hunting.

“This black coat may have made them ‘perfect stalkers’ in our dimly lit Malaysian jungle,” said co-author Gopalasamy Reuben Clements, “and this advantage may have helped them compete with tigers for similar-sized prey.”

In order to protect these creatures, conservationists first need to determine how many of them there are, and that’s where the new camera trick used by the UK research team comes into play. By rigging the automatic camera trap to snap photos in the infrared spectrum at all times, they were able to find their hidden spots and confirm the identities of these black leopards.

This phenomenon, the researchers explained to LiveScience, is a result of the pigment eumelanin in their fur coats. The longer the wavelength of light that hits the pigment, the better it transmits the light, and because the near infrared light from the camera traps has a longer wavelength than ordinary light, it allows them to see the spots on the cats’ fur coats.

“We found we could accurately identify 94 percent of the animals,” he added. “This will allow us to study and monitor this population over time, which is critical for its conservation.”

(Image credit: James Cook University)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

New cell structure, processes could help fight cancer

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

Two separate recently-published studies focusing on the structures and processes of cell division, one appearing in the journal Nature and the other in eLife, have resulted in findings that could be beneficial in understanding how cancer forms and how to better treat the disease.

In the older of the two studies, researchers from Warwick Medical School and the University of Liverpool in the UK found a new cell structure that holds the structure together – and, according to Science World Report, the structure (known as “the mesh”) was actually found by accident.

Stephen J. Royale of the Warwick Medical School Division of Biomedical Cell Biology and his colleagues were actually looking at gaps between microtubules in dividing cells, when they saw this web-like structure for the first time, linking all of the microtubules together.

Cells need to share chromosomes accurately when they divide, to prevent them from winding up with the wrong number of chromosomes and potentially causing tumors. While the mitotic spindle is responsible for sharing the chromosomes, the study authors believe that the mesh provides structural support during the chromosome-sharing process.

“Problems in cell division are common in cancer-cells frequently end up with the wrong number of chromosomes,” Emma Smith, senior science communications officer at Cancer Research UK, said in a statement. The research, she added, “provides the first glimpse of a structure that helps share out a cell’s chromosomes… [and] might be a crucial insight into why this process becomes faulty in cancer and whether drugs could be developed to stop it from happening.”

Chromosomes found to be actively involved in cell division

More recently, scientists from the University of Montreal and University College London found that chromosomes play an active role in cell division in animals – specifically during cytokinesis, the stage when the cell splits into a pair of daughter cells. While cell division takes place billions of times per day throughout an organism’s life, the mechanics are not fully understood.

Previously, scientists didn’t know that chromosomes played an active role in cytokinesis. While they knew that microtubules were involved in the process, pulling to opposite poles of the cell during the division process, experts believed the chromosomes themselves were not actively involved in the process themselves.

By conducting research using fruit fly cells, however, they found that chromosomes actually give off signals that influence the cell cortex to reinforce microtubule action. One of the signals found by the study authors involved an enzyme complex (a phosphatase called Sds22-PP1) found at the kinetochores. They also demonstrated that this pathway acts in human cells as well.

“We have been watching cells divide for more than 100 years,” said Gilles Hickson, an assistant professor at the University of Montreal’s Department of Pathology and Cell Biology, a researcher at the CHU Sainte-Justine Research Centre and one of the researchers involved in the study, “but we continue to seek to understand the molecular mechanisms involved.”

The research, he added, “is important because cell division is so central to life, and to certain diseases,” including cancer, which is typically caused by unchecked cell division. Learning more about these mechanisms could open up new potential targets for treatment in such diseases.

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Science

Are chimpanzee hands more evolved than a human’s?

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

In some ways, human hands may be more primitive than those of chimpanzees, researchers from Stony Brook University report in a new study published Wednesday in the journal Nature.

Study authors Sergio Almecija, Jeroen Smaers, and William Jungers explained in a press release that the proportions of the human hand have changed little from those found in the last common ancestor (LCA) of chimps and people, and that the structure of the modern human hand is largely primitive in nature instead of the result of selective pressure associated with stone tools.

Furthermore, they explain that one of the most distinctive features of the human hand compared to chimpanzees and other apes is a long thumb in relation to the fingers. This trait is often said to be one of the main reasons for the success of the species, but there are competing theories of how the human hand actually evolved over time.

The Stony Brook team measured the hand proportions of modern humans, living and fossil apes, and fossils of human ancestors such as Ardipithecus ramidus, and Australopithecus sediba to find out how the extremity evolved. They found a recent, convergent evolution of finger elongation in chimps and orangutans, and little change between humans, their ancestors, and gorillas.

Cognitive changes, not hand evolution, linked to tool use

“Many scholars assumed that chimps represent the primitive condition from which humans evolved, but this idea has not actually been ever tested,” Almecija explained to redOrbit via email. “Our results show that whereas humans fall within ‘the norm,’ which is also the case in gorillas, chimpanzees and orangutans are the ‘weird’ great ape species.”

“By this I mean that they depart from the rule,” he added. Based on their data, they found that the hands of chimpanzees and orangutans likely evolved as “an adaptation for below-branch arboreal locomotion,” which is “biomechanically more efficient” in creatures that have “hook-like hands with long digits and short thumbs.” Comparatively, human hand proportions have “changed very little (in terms of relative length) since the primitive condition.”

The research by Almecija and his colleagues supports the hypothesis that the long thumb-to-fingers ratio of the human hand evolved at the same time as other more dexterous anthropoids, while also challenging the assumption that a chimp-like hand served as the starting point of the human-chimpanzee LCA.

But that doesn’t mean that human hands have not evolved too. In fact, Almecija told redOrbit that in “human hands have evolved… more than chimps in other aspects (e.g., thumb and joint robusticity), but in terms of digital and thumb lengths, chimpanzees have evolved more.” The findings also indicate that “the most relevant evolutionary change relating to stone tool culture was probably neurological (i.e., enhanced cognition), not hand morphology.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Solar Impulse grounded until April 2016

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

UPDATE JULY 15, 10:49 AM

As announced this morning by the Solar Impulse team, Solar Impulse 2 will be forced remain in Hawaii until at least April of 2016.

According to the press release, repairs to the batteries damaged in the most recent leg will take more time than anticipated—at least a few months. And such a delay pushes the delicate plane out of a viable window of flight.

“Time is needed to repair. W/ late season weather conditions & shorter days, #Si2 won’t move before April 2016,” tweeted the official Solar Impulse account.

With the plane kindly being stored by the University of Hawaii and the Department of Transportation in a hangar of the Kalaeloa airport, such a setback is not necessarily a bad thing. The team now has proper time to find a solution to the problem that damaged the batteries in the first place—overheating. They also intend to spend the time improving general plane performance.

The pilots of Solar Impulse 2, André Borschberg and Bertrand Piccard, took to Twitter to assure followers.

“We will get back on track and continue @solarimpulse’s Round-The-World next year. The adventure continues,” wrote Piccard.

“@solarimpulse’s Round-The-World will continue in 2016. We will never give up!” said Borschberg.

Not everyone was as positive, however. Joe the Shark, the cartoon predator following the plane in hopes it’ll crash (so he can eat it), had this to say:

“NOOOOOO! Still hungry… I have to wait… but it means I have 8 months to prepare a good strategy!”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Substance abuse reduces brain volume in women

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

Researchers from the University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine have discovered that long-term abuse of stimulants has a radical impact on the brain volume of women, but not men, according to new research published online in the journal Radiology.

Radiology professor Dr. Jody Tanabe and her colleagues explained in a statement that brain structures involved in reward processing, decision-making and habit control continued to show vast changes, even following a prolonged period of abstinence from drug use.

Her team conducted structural brain magnetic resonance imaging exams in 127 men and women, including 28 women and 31 men who had previously been dependent on cocaine, amphetamines, and/or methamphetamine for an average of 15.7 years, as well as 28 women and 40 men of similar age who had no such history of drug use or abuse.

They found that after an average of 13.5 months of abstinence, females previously dependent on stimulants had significantly less gray matter volume than non-stimulant using women. This was found in several parts of their brains, including the frontal, limbic, and temporal regions.

Possible explanations for the gender-based differences

Dr. Michael Regner, a radiology resident and PhD graduate student at the university told redOrbit via email that the results were “somewhat surprising” and that he and his fellow researchers were not certain why these differences were more pronounced in women than men, especially sense men tended to have more drug-related symptoms.

“One possible explanation is that the brains of men and women respond differently to abstinence – different ‘recovery’ processes,” he explained. “Another possibility is that men and women are affected by long-term stimulant abuse in different ways, possibly due to hormonal and behavioral differences. Lastly, it is possible that men and women who develop a stimulant dependence problem have fundamentally different brain structures even prior to their first use – possibly due to a combination of genetic, hormonal, developmental, and personality differences.” However, he said, more research is needed to find out for certain.

The new study “adds to the growing body evidence that gender plays a significant role in brain structure and function in addiction,” Dr. Regner continued. While this research is completed, he said that he and Dr. Tanabe now plan to study the effects of alcohol and nicotine on a person’s brain and behavior over the next two years. “We have several experiments planned, and we hope our efforts will continue to shed light on the mechanisms of substance dependence,” he added.

(Image credit: Radiological Society of North America)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

UPDATE: New photos from New Horizons’ Pluto flyby

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Christopher Pilny

And Christopher Pilny

UPDATE: 2:35PM CST

Some of the first images from New Horizons flyby are finally posted.

Taken 1.5 hours before its closest approach to the dwarf planet, the first (the above featured image) shows icy mountains rising from a region near Pluto’s equator, reaching more than 11,000 feet in height. What’s fascinating about these features is how young they are: no more than 100 million years old, which is basically fetal when compared to the age of the solar system (4.56 billion years). In fact, the region may still be geologically active.

“This is one of the youngest surfaces we’ve ever seen in the solar system,” said Jeff Moore of New Horizons’ Geology, Geophysics and Imaging Team (GGI) in a statement.

Moore and his team base this estimate on the lack of craters in the image–which amounts to less than one percent of Pluto’s surface area. Were the mountains older, say in the billions of years, there would be a good chance they’d been struck by space debris, leaving behind the tell-tale pockmarks of impact.

The mountains, most likely composed of water-ice “bedrock”, may also make scientists rethink geological activity on icy worlds, as their formation is now somewhat of a mystery. Pluto lacks the heat generated from gravitational interaction with a larger planet–like some icy moons–the answer to how they formed needs to be explored.

But wait, there’s more! The newer, sexier Charon

Like Pluto, Charon’s surface surprised researchers by how young it appeared–due in large part to, again, the lack of craters. (This is beginning to sound like a Cover Girl ad.)

Taken on July 13th from a distance of 289,000 miles, the newest photo shows a “swath of cliffs and troughs”, which is evidence of “widespread fracturing of Charon’s crust” caused by “internal processes”, said NASA.

Original story

It was the transmission the world had been waiting for – NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft “phoned home” shortly before 9 PM Eastern time on Tuesday, letting mission team scientists know that it had, in fact, successfully completed its historic flyby of Pluto.

The probe sent a preprogrammed 15-minute transmission comprised of status messages to the mission operations team at Maryland’s Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory via the NASA Deep Space Network, the US space agency said in a press release.

The broadcast ended what NASA called “a very suspenseful 21-hour waiting period” following New Horizons’ closest pass to Pluto at 7:49 AM Eastern on Tuesday. At that time, the spacecraft was just 7,750 miles from the surface of the dwarf planet. Officials had instructed the probe not to communicate with Earth until it had travelled beyond the Pluto system.

During that time, New Horizons used its instruments to collect as much data about Pluto and its moons as possible. As it now travels deeper into the Kuiper Belt to study frozen objects believed to provide clues about the formation of the solar system, the craft will also start sending the data it collected back to Earth – a process that will take 16 months to complete. (Woah baby!)

NASA officials reflect on the historic moment

“I know today we’ve inspired a whole new generation of explorers with this great success, and we look forward to the discoveries yet to come,” NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a statement Tuesday evening. “This is a historic win for science and for exploration. We’ve truly, once again raised the bar of human potential.”

“With the successful flyby of Pluto we are celebrating the capstone event in a golden age of planetary exploration,” added John Grunsfeld, associate administrator at the agency’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. “While this historic event is still unfolding – with the most exciting Pluto science still ahead of us – a new era of solar system exploration is just beginning,” with missions to Mars, Jupiter, Europa, and other worlds coming in the years ahead.

New Horizons was the first space mission ever to explore a world located as far away from Earth as Pluto, and the dwarf planet is the first Kuiper Belt object ever visited by a terrestrial mission. The spacecraft also revealed that Pluto is nearly 1,500 miles in diameter, making it the largest object in the Kuiper Belt. Also, much like Mars, it’s red.

“Following in the footsteps of planetary exploration missions such as Mariner, Pioneer, and Voyager, New Horizons has triumphed at Pluto,” said principal investigator Dr. Alan Stern from the Southwest Research Institute in Colorado. The flyby “completes the first era of planetary reconnaissance, a half century long endeavor that will forever be a legacy of our time.”

—–

Feature Image Credit: NASA-JHUAPL-SwRI

Charon Image Credit: NASA-JHUAPL-SwRI

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Why kids’ recovery times vary widely after brain injury

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is the single most common cause of death and disability in children, and while some recover from it quickly, others suffer from often devastating side effects for years—especially deficits in cognitive function. Scientists had no explanations for the difference until now, when a study out of UCLA/USC determined the problem came down to myelin, a fatty substance coating parts of the brain.
Short circuits
The neurons of the brain communicate to each other via connecting “wires” known as axons. And like real-life wires, axons are often coated to make them more effective.
“Think of myelin around axons as the insulation on electrical wires,” Dr. Christopher Giza, a professor of pediatrics and neurosurgery at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine and Mattel Children’s Hospital, explained to redOrbit via email. “Without it, the wire still conducts electricity, but not as well and it is more likely to short circuit.”
The researchers suspected that myelin was playing a key role in traumatic brain injury severity. “Although myelin is like insulation, it is made mostly of lipids (fat), and it is wrapped around the axon like an onion skin (many layers). When the axon (wire) is stretched by trauma (TBI), the wrapping is also stretched and unloosened. Then the wire/axon is more likely to short circuit.”
To determine if myelin was indeed to blame, the researchers evaluated 31 healthy children and 32 children, ages 8 to 19, who had suffered from a TBI in the past five months. The children were given tests to evaluate their processing speed, short-term memory, verbal learning, and cognitive flexibility.
Then, the electrical activity of their brains was measured to determine how quickly their nerve fibers could transmit information. Images were also taken to assess their brains’ structural soundness—the first time two such tests were combined in a study of TBI.
The outcome
Half of the 32 children studied with brain injuries showed widespread damage to the myelin in their brains. In this half, performance on cognitive tests dropped 14% compared to the control group, and their writing was three times slower.
The other 16 children had myelin that was nearly intact, and performed nearly as well as the control group; on the cognitive tests, they scored 9% better than the 16 children with more myelin damage, indicating that damaged myelin led to greater deficits.
By identifying the cause of cognitive issues in traumatic brain injury, the researchers have identified biomarkers that physicians will be able to use. “Our research suggests that imaging the brain’s wiring to evaluate both its structure and function could help predict a patient’s prognosis after a traumatic brain injury,” said author Emily Dennis, a postdoctoral researcher at USC’s Keck School of Medicine.
What about adults?
“Myelin injury would/does have an effect on cognitive function in adulthood, but not necessarily a greater effect,” wrote Giza. “Brain fibers (axons) with myelin are more resistant to biomechanical injury like trauma. Young brains are not completely myelinated, and so the brain fibers in kids more vulnerable to traumatic brain injury (TBI) than in adults, which have more myelin. Younger is not always better! Also, brain networks (which are made up of different brain regions connected by myelinated axons, like the ‘internet’ for the brain) are not fully developed in young brains…so if the networks are disrupted before they are fully formed, there is a greater chance for lasting injury.”
Recovery is still possible for the myelin-damaged children, but inflammation caused by brain trauma can often complicate matters. “TBI induces a whole response of inflammation, and inflammatory cells in the brain like to clean up damaged parts. So inflammation induced by trauma can result in inflammatory cells (microglia) cleaning up bits of damaged myelin and often incidentally cleaning up bits of axon and neurons that are damaged.”
Inflammation cannot only harm neural connections, but can stop the regrowth of myelin as well. “Myelin regenerates slowly but cannot grow back if myelin-producing cells (oligodendrocytes) are damaged or destroyed. Also, if inflammatory cells (like microglia) are blocking the way to the axon, then even if the oligos survive they cannot reach out and wrap their myelin around damaged axons.”
(Image credit: Thinkstock)
—–
Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Gloomy octopus trash talks opponents before fight

Written By: Brett Smith

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

Octopuses have been thought of primarily as solitary animals that don’t really talk to each other. However, a newly released video has shown octopuses communicating with each other prior to and during confrontations.

According to the Australian researchers who captured the video, common Sydney octopuses spread their arms wide, stand tall – and even change both the color and texture of their skin to convey either aggression or submission.

The researchers, who presented their findings at the recent Animal Behavior Society meeting in Anchorage, Alaska, said their observations paint the common Sydney octopus – also known as the gloomy octopus – as a more socially complex creature than previously believed.

“The expectation has been that if two octopuses meet, the big one eats the smaller one,” David Scheel, a marine biologist at Alaska Pacific University, told National Geographic. “But if octopuses encounter each other routinely, they can’t cannibalize each other all the time.”

Fight or flight

Rather, octopuses communicate to either escalate or stay away from a conflict.

The team was able to record a range of interactions among the octopuses they observed — from reaching toward each other to grappling. Just a fraction of theses interactions escalated to full-blown fights.

In addition to the physical posturing between potential combatants seen in humans and other species, the gloomy octopuses also used their color and skin-changing abilities to send out messages. In particular, research team found the octopuses conveyed aggression with darker colors, while submission was denoted by lighter colors.

“If one octopus signals that he’s coming over and not going to back down, and the other signals he is going to run away, that can end the interaction,” Scheel said. “Whereas if they both signal that they’re not going to back down, those are the (incidents) that tend to escalate.”

Christine Huffard, a researcher at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute told National Geographic that these types of displays are seen in numerous other species.

“It’s hard to know whether it’s an intentional versus a physiological response,” Huffard noted. “For instance, we blush. We don’t say, ‘Hey, body, tell this person I’m embarrassed.’ It’s just something that happens.”

Huffard agrees with the research team’s conclusion that the octopus signals serve as self-preservation.

“If you know from the beginning that you’re probably going to lose or you’re not really willing to give up an arm, you might as well tell your opponent that you don’t want a fight,” she said.

(Image credit: Klaus Stiefel/Flickr)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Supersonic jet could go from New York to London in 3 hours

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

If you’ve ever wanted to hop on an airplane after breakfast in New York and make it to London before lunch (ah, the lifestyles of the rich and famous), a Boston-based aerospace company has the vehicle for you – a supersonic jet that can purportedly reach maximum speeds of Mach 1.8 (or 1,370 mph).

At that velocity, Spike Aerospace’s S-512 Supersonic Jet could make the trip from the Big Apple to the capital of England in just three hours, according to Discovery News. That’s nearly twice as quick as the fastest Boeing 747 commercial jumbo jet’s top speed of Mach 0.92 (700 mph).

On its website, Spike claims the S-512 is 450 mph faster than any other civilian jet, and that it could allow passengers to travel from “Paris to Dubai for shopping and entertainment” and get them “back home in time for dinner.” If it truly can reach those speeds, that would make it as fast as an F-18 Hornet military fighter jet! It’s all thanks to a handful of recent modifications.

Like something out of a science-fiction movie

As Anutosh Moitra, a senior engineer at Spike Aerospace, explained to LiveScience that while the plane was originally unveiled in 2013, its newly-designed “delta” wings are what allows it to reach such blistering speeds. The new wing “delivers high aerodynamic efficiency and improves flight performance in both low-speed flight and supersonic cruise,” he said.

In addition to the shape of the wings, Moitra said the S-512’s modified tail helps it reduce drag (air resistance), a force that normally causes planes to slow down and decreases their fuel efficiency. The new tail makes the aircraft lighter, which could also increase its speed. It also has a cabin with panoramic views, on top of being very suitable for business presentations.

Spike president and CEO Vik Kachoria called supersonic travel “the future of aviation. It makes the world smaller and more accessible. For any competitive global business, cutting flight times in half will have significant value. But for people who have busy global lives and want to spend time with the people they love, the Spike S-512 Supersonic Jet will be a necessity.”

While LiveScience said the jet looks like “something out of a very fancy science-fiction movie,” they added that the luxury will obviously come at a price. Reports indicate the S-512 will most likely cost between $60 million and $80 million.

(Image credit: Spike Aerospace)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Inhaled vaccine prevents Ebola in monkeys

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Emily Bills

An inhaled aerosol vaccine against Ebola has been found to effectively neutralize the virus in rhesus macaques, activating immune cells in their respiratory systems and fully protecting the monkeys from the symptoms of hemorrhagic fever.

The study was carried out by researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston and the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, and the results were published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, the New York Times reported earlier this week. It was their first attempt to use the aerosol to vaccinate monkeys against the deadly virus.

Alexander Bukreyev, a virologist from the University of Texas Medical Branch told the Times that their vaccine was “one of the few… that works” in monkeys, but as the newspaper pointed out, this success will not necessarily translate into results in humans, as already this year, a vaccine which worked in monkeys failed in people.

Dr. Daniel Bausch, a virologist from Tulane University, added that while the results represented “a positive step forward,” he cautioned that it was “not a breakthrough.” Dr. Igor Lukashevich, a medical virologist from the University of Louisville who was not involved with the study, noted, however, that the “aerosolized form of the vaccine” is “what the field needs right now.”

Lungs could be first line of defense against the virus

According to the Times, the aerosol can be administered without assistance from doctors or other medical professionals, which would make it ideal for use in developing nations where there is a shortage of personnel capable of giving most types of vaccines. This includes West Africa, a place reportedly in the midst of the worst Ebola epidemic in history.

Lead author Dr. Michelle Meyer, a postdoctoral fellow at the UT Medical Branch, explained that the aerosol generated significantly more ant-Ebola immunity cells in the respiratory tract than in the blood or spleen, which indicates that the lungs serve as the first layer of protection against the disease. This makes it “ideal to combat the virus at the site of infection,” she said.

In the study, four rhesus macaques were given one dose of the aerosol vaccine, four others were given two doses, two more were given the vaccine in a liquid form, and two served as controls and were not vaccinated at all. Four weeks later, all 12 of the monkeys were injected with a dose of the Ebola virus that was 1,000 times stronger than a lethal dose.

Just over one week later, the new unvaccinated monkeys contracted the hemorrhagic fever and had to be euthanized. The vaccinated monkeys remained healthy, however, and after the end of the study, the surviving monkeys were examined. The researchers found no sign of Ebola virus in their blood or tissue, and dose was enough to protect them.

(Image credit: Thinkstock)

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Large Hadron Collider discovers new subatomic particle

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Christopher Pilny

Scientists at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) have made their first major discovery since the restart of the Large Hadron Collider, proving the existence of a long theorized new class of subatomic particles known as pentaquarks.

According to BBC News, pentaquarks were first predicted to exist more than five decades ago, but evidence of its existence had alluded scientists until it was detected by the particle collider’s LHCb experiment on Tuesday. A paper detailing the CERN team’s findings is now available on the arXiv website and has been submitted to the journal Physical Review Letters.

This short-lived pentaquark was detected by physicists analyzing data on the decay of unstable particles in the accelerator’s LHCb experiment near Geneva, Nature explained. Guy Wilkinson, a spokesperson for the experiment, told the publication that the discovery will launch a new era in scientists’ understanding of the nuclear forces that bind atomic nuclei.

“The pentaquark is not just any new particle,” Wilkinson said. “It represents a way to aggregate quarks, namely the fundamental constituents of ordinary protons and neutrons, in a pattern that has never been observed before in over fifty years of experimental searches. Studying its properties may allow us to understand better how ordinary matter, the protons and neutrons from which we’re all made, is constituted.”

Signals could ‘only be explained’ by pentaquarks

The existence of quarks, charged subatomic particles that join together to form larger particles such as protons and neutrons, was first proposed by physicists Murray Gell Mann and George Zweig in 1964. They independently theorized that the key properties of particles called baryons and mesons could best be explained is they were made up of other constituent particles.

Mann and Zweig proposed three types of these “hypothesized building blocks,” BBC News said, but their model also allowed for the existence of other quark states, including the pentaquark. On Tuesday, CERN researchers found proof of these pentaquarks by watching the decay of a bayron known as Lambda b into three other particles: a J-psi, a proton, and a charged kaon.

In doing so, they observed a transition state in which they were able to identify to intermediate states that were sometimes involved in the production of the three particles. They have dubbed those states Pc(4450)+ and Pc(4380)+, with the former being clearly visible in the data and the latter being required to fully described their findings.

LHCb physicist Tomasz Skwarnicki of Syracuse University told BBC News that the team had “examined all possibilities for these signals” and concluded “that they can only be explained by pentaquark states.” His colleague Patrick Koppenburg, LHCb physics coordinator at CERN, added that there was “no way” that the observations “could be due to something else other than the addition of a new particle that was not observed before.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Health

Should doctors recommend homeopathy?

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 15, 2015 Last Edited: July 15, 2015

Christopher Pilny

Americans spent about $2.9 billion on homeopathic medicines in 2007, according to the NHIS, but debate still rages over whether it is effective. So a recent article in the BMJ raised the question: Should doctors recommend homeopathic medicine to patients?

Homeopathy was developed in Germany at the end of the 18th century, and is comprised of two main theories. First, like treats like: A disease can be cured by a substance that provokes a similar response in healthy people. And second, the lower the dose of the medication, the greater its effectiveness.

These may seem like scoff-worthy notions to some people, but the ideas do have interesting correlations in peanut allergy studies. For example, a 2014 study gave children doses of 2-800 mg of peanuts, with doses increasing over the course of several months. By the end of the second stage, the children given the oral peanut immunotherapy were able to safely consume about 10 peanuts.

In other words: Low-dose exposure to the substance provoking an allergy helped participants tolerate the allergy much more greatly than those not exposed.

But, a 2015 assessment by Australia’s National Health and Medical Research Council concluded that the evidence in favor of homeopathy is nonexistent. Further, while the FDA does regulate homeopathic remedies, it does not evaluate them for safety or effectiveness, meaning as long as they meet certain criteria (“Conditions Under Which Homeopathic Drugs May be Marketed”), they can be sold to the public, regardless of whether they help you or contain harmful doses.

So what did doctors have to say on the matter?

Those in favor

Doctor Peter Fisher, the director of research at the Royal London Hospital for Integrated Medicine, argued in favor of doctors recommending homeopathic treatment. His first target was aforementioned Australian government study.

He told the BMJ, “this report used unusual methods of analysis: The reviewers assumed that a positive trial showing a homeopathic treatment to be effective was negated by a different trial showing a different homeopathic treatment for the same condition to be ineffective. But the fact that one homeopathic treatment for a condition is ineffective doesn’t mean that another is ineffective.”

Further, he argued, the study entirely ignored some homeopathy reviews and meta-analyses (statistical techniques used to combine the findings from independent studies in order to identify patterns and relationships between them). For example, some studies targeting specific illnesses found positive effects from homeopathic treatment, including childhood diarrhea, vertigo, and the upper respiratory tract infections and allergies.

There are also several nationwide studies that show the utility of homeopathy. “Studies in France and Germany show that general practitioners (GPs) who integrate homeopathy in their practice have better outcomes than those who do not, for a range of conditions commonly treated in general practice; costs are equivalent and homeopathic GPs use fewer antimicrobial drugs.”

Finally, he urged that doctors “put aside bias based on the alleged implausibility of homeopathy,” saying they should recommend its use in an integrated manner.

Those opposed

Edzard Ernst, MD, PhD, and emeritus professor of the University of Exeter, opposes doctors recommending homeopathy.

His first argument targeted the second principle of homeopathy—the small dosages. While he acknowledged the fact that some homeopathic substances are known to be pharmacologically active, the amounts found in remedies may be suspect. “One of the most commercially successful remedies, for example, is based on an extract of duck liver in the C200 ‘potency,’ which means it is diluted at a ratio of 1:10 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000,” he wrote.

Next, he mentioned the lack of evidence from trials: “To avoid cherry picking, it is advisable to evaluate the totality of the reliable evidence. Most independent systematic reviews of randomized controlled trials have failed to show that homeopathy is effective, and reviews with positive conclusions usually have serious methodological flaws.” He posits that the perceived benefits of homeopathy are nothing more than placebo effect.

Finally, he noted that homeopathy can be harmful, both physically and financially. “As the typical homeopathic remedy is devoid of active molecules, it is unlikely to cause serious adverse effects. However, even a placebo can cause harm, if it replaces an effective therapy. In the words of the Australian report: ‘People who choose homeopathy may put their health at risk if they reject or delay treatments for which there is good evidence for safety and effectiveness.’ ”

Plus, residents of the EU spends more than $1 billion on homeopathic remedies, including some millions spent the National Health Service in the UK. “These funds could and should be spent more usefully elsewhere.”

THE BOTTOM LINE

It appears that one of the major problems with proving homeopathy is study design. As homeopathic treatments are often specialized to patients, it’s difficult to garner a large group for a study. Further, studies and meta-analyses face issues with investigator biases and design flaws, meaning that few people seem able to agree which ones are, in fact, factual.

What do you think? Do you have any experiences with homeopathy? Let us know in the comments!

Follow Susanna Pilny on Twitter @PlinyTheShorter

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Improving Avogadro’s number to help redefine the kilogram

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Emily Bills

An international team of researchers working in support of an effort to redefine the kilogram have correlated two of the most precise measurements of a constant called Avogadro’s number, and have obtained an average value that can be used for future calculations.

Their research, published this week in the Journal of Physical and Chemical Reference Data, takes the incredibly large Avogadro’s number (which is approximately 6.022×10^23) and uses two different calculations to come up with a more precise value that can be used as part of the global effort to redefine the kilogram in terms of a fundamental constant by 2018.

Currently, the weight standard of the kilogram is a platinum-iridium cylinder, housed in the Bureau of Weights and Measures in Sevres, France, that is about the size of a golf ball. However, in order to globalize the measure, experts are moving to replace it, redefining the kilogram in terms of the Planck’s constant within the next three years.

Before this can happen, however, the researchers point out that it must be demonstrated that the new standard is indistinguishable from the present one to prevent scientists and other individuals from having to adjust the mass value of all of their existing tools and instruments. Since Planck’s constant can be derived from Avogadro’s number, that’s where they decided to start.

Using a pure silicon isotope to recalculate the constant

Before a new definition of the kilogram can be created, metrologists first need to ensure that the fixed value of Planck’s constant is as high quality as possible, and a more precise definition of Avogadro’s number will enhance the definition of this constant.

The authors responsible for the new paper has calculated Avogadro’s number several times in the past by counting how many atoms are in a one kilogram sphere of pure Si-28, a silicon isotope. Silicon forms cubic cells of eight atoms each time it crystallizes, and this makes it possible to calculate the number of atoms in the sphere by examining the ratio between total crystal volume and the volume occupied by each silicon atom, determined by measuring the cubic cell.

Earlier this year, the team behind the new study calculated a new value for Avogadro’s number with an uncertainty of less than 20 atoms per billion – a decrease from a 30-atom uncertainty in a value they calculated four years ago. For improved accuracy, both versions of the number were correlated, then averaged into a single value: 6.02214082(11)x10^23, where the number in parentheses represents the degree of uncertainty of the last digit in the result.

While Avogadro’s number will not be officially used to help define the new mass standard, counting atoms will serve as a valuable way to check the accuracy of the Planck’s constant-based definition, while also serving as a way to put the definition of the kilogram into practice.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

British doctors propose 20% tax on sugary drinks

Written By: Brett Smith

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Emily Bills

The British Medical Association (BMA), a trade union for doctors in the United Kingdom, has suggested the British government places a 20 percent tax on sugary drinks in an attempt to discourage their consumption.
In a newly published report, the BMA said extra revenue generated by a tax should be used to make fruits and vegetables readily available in an attempt to make healthy options consumers’ default choices.
“Doctors are increasingly concerned about the impact of poor diet, which is responsible for up to 70,000 deaths a year, and has the greatest impact on the NHS budget, costing ($9.3 billion) annually,” Sheila Hollins, BMA board of science chair, said in a news release.
“We know from experiences in other countries that taxation on unhealthy food and drinks can improve health outcomes, and the strongest evidence of effectiveness is for a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages,” Hollins added. “If a tax of at least 20 percent is introduced, it could reduce the prevalence of obesity in the UK by around 180,000 people.”
Healthier options readily available
The public health expert went on to say the majority of the UK population, and low-income households in particular, are not eating enough fruit and vegetables. Financial steps could subsidize the price of produce, which has increased by 30 percent since 2008.
“This is an important way to help redress the imbalance highlighted previously between the cost of healthy and unhealthy products, which particularly impacts on individuals and families affected by food poverty,” Hollins said.
The UK’s Food and Drink Federation trade organization responded to the proposed measure by saying it would not change diets.
“We share the BMA’s concerns about the health of young people in the UK,” Ian Wright, director-general of the Food and Drink Federation, told BBC News.
The trade group has generally taken the position that its products are already taxed enough.
“Where additional taxes have been introduced they’ve not proven effective at driving long-term, lasting change to diets,” Wright said. “In recent years, calories in household foods and drinks have been gradually lowered through recipe reformulations, including sugar reductions, and changes to portion sizes.”
—–
Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Male black widows scare off rivals by destroying female’s webs

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Christopher Pilny

Male black widow spiders get a little destructive during their courtship rituals, tearing down a large portion of their mate’s webs and wrapping it up in their own silk – and most surprising of all, the females don’t appear to mind, according to a recently-published study.

Writing in the journal Animal Behaviour, researchers from Simon Fraser University in Canada explained that the behavior helps deter rivals by making the female’s web less attractive to them, and that the females appear to appreciate being protected from harassment from those males.

Benefits for the males…

In fact, lead author Catherine Scott and her colleagues said that the female black widows view this destructive behavior, allowing her to focus on parenting her offspring. The study marks the first time that the destruction of the female’s web by male spiders has been observed in the wild as a technique used by males to fend off competition.

Scott, an MSc student at the university, said that she was not certain how this unusual behavior began, but told redOrbit via email that the reasons behind it were “pretty clear” – it’s because male black widows that engage in web reduction were more likely to be successful because they faced less competition, “and thus were able to pass on more of their genes.”

“If you’re a male black widow, your only goal in life is to find a female to mate with and father as many of her offspring as possible,” Scott added. “If you can prevent other males from finding her and interrupting your courtship, you will improve your chances of successfully mating.”

…and for the females, as well.

So why do females tolerate this behavior, allowing males to destroy the web that they rely upon to capture prey, keep her safe from predators and attract mates? The reason is that she benefits as well. Scott explains, the web of a well-fed virgin female spider makes her extremely attractive to males, and will remain so for several days, even if she doesn’t add additional silk pheromone.

By destroying her web and making it unattractive, a male spider might actually be doing his mate “a favor” by allowing her to “build a new one without attractive pheromones” after she has found a mate and no longer needs to attract males. Since web destruction makes her seem less attractive to male spiders, it allows her to rebuild her web and produce egg sacs without being bothered.

Scott also passed along one last interesting note about black widow spiders – contrary to popular believe, females do not always cannibalize males after mating. In fact, she explained that, “sexual cannibalism is very rare in western black widows.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Experts predict 3D-printed food will soon become widespread

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Emily Bills

Advances in 3D printed technology have already found their way into many fields, but over the next 10 to 20 years, additive manufacturing processes will radically change the way food is produced, experts from the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) are claiming.
In a symposium held earlier this week at an IFT-hosted conference in Chicago, researchers and industry heavyweights explained that the steady decline in the price of 3D printers will increase the availability to consumers and manufacturers. The result will be a significant impact on the industry, allowing for customized foods and quicker delivery of products to consumers.
Speaking at the IFT15: Where Science Feeds Innovation conference, Dr. Hod Lipson, professor of engineering at Columbia University and co-author of the book Fabricated: The New World of 3D Printing, said that food manufacturing “could be the killer app for 3D printing,” by allowing users to choose a recipe out of a database, insert a cartridge containing the ingredients into their printer, and having the device fabricate the desired dish with the push of a button.
Focus groups already benefitting; soldiers may be next
The technology could also allow for products to be enhanced with additional nutrients, and could be used by military personnel to 3D print food while on the battlefield. In fact, Mary Scerra, food technology expert with the US Army, said the military hopes to be 3D printing custom meals for the troops within the next 10 to 15 years.
“Imagine warfighters in remote areas–one has muscle fatigue, one has been awake for a long period without rest, one lacks calories, one needs electrolytes, and one just wants a pizza,” said Scerra, who works at the Army’s Natick Soldier Research, Development and Engineering Center (NSRDEC) in Massachusetts. “Wouldn’t it be interesting if they could just print and eat?”
However, she noted that there are still many obstacles to overcome before this can become a reality. For instance, the cost of transporting additive manufacturing technologies to remote parts of the world needs to come down, and logistical issues preventing these systems from working in those regions need to be addressed. Then there’s the issue of taste. As Scera said, “If the meals aren’t palatable, they won’t be consumed. It doesn’t matter how nutritious they are.”
In some ways, however, 3D printing is already having an impact in the food industry, according to Anshul Dubey, senior manager of research and development at PepsiCo. For instance, even though his company is not yet using the technology to fabricate food or beverages, 3D printed prototypes of different shaped and colored potato chips are already being used to show to focus groups instead of pictures. This allows for a more accurate response, he noted.
—–
Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Saudi supercomputer cracks list of 10 most powerful systems

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Emily Bills

A machine built and stationed in the Middle East has cracked the list of the 10 most powerful supercomputers on the planet for the first time ever, while a Chinese system topped the list for the fifth straight year, officials at the Top 500 List project have announced.

Based at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (Kaust) in Saudi Arabia, the Shaheen II (or Peregrine Falcon II) is a Cray XC40 computer capable with a number-crunching capacity of 5.536 petaflops, according to BBC News. It finished seventh on this year’s Top 500, making it the highest-ranked Middle Eastern system in the 22-year history of the rankings.

Located in Thuwal, Saudi Arabia, the Shaheen II uses 200,000 processors arranged in more than 6,000 nodes, and boasts 17.6 petabytes of storage and 790 terabytes of main memory, the British media outlet added. The supercomputer is being used for research projects, turbulence modeling in engines, measuring atmospheric dynamics, and studying renewable energy grids.

The Shaheen II is the only new entry in the latest version of the Top 10 supercomputer list, the organization behind the rankings explained in a press release. Each of the nine other highest-ranked devices were installed in 2011 or 2012, a low turnover level that Top 500 said reflects a slowing technology trend first observed back in 2008.

China’s Tianhe-2, DOE’s Titan ranked 1-2 on the new list

Topping the list for the fifth straight time was China’s Tianhe-2, which according to Top 500 led all supercomputers with a peak performance of 33.86 petaflops on the Linpack benchmark across 16,000 nodes. One petaflop is equal to approximately one quadrillion calculations per second.

Finishing in second place was Titan, a Cray XK7 system installed at the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Titan was the top US-based system, as well as one of the most energy-efficient supercomputers on the list, and achieved a measurement of 17.5 petaflops.

The US remained the top country in terms of overall representation on the list, with 233 of the 500 computers on the rankings being American – an increase from 231 six months ago, but down from 265 on the November 2013 list. The number of European systems rose from 130 to 141 and the number of Asian systems fell from 120 to 108.

The total combined performance of all 500 systems increased to 363 petaflops, compared to 309 petaflops last November and 274 Pflop/s one year ago, and the number of supercomputers with performance greater than one petaflop increased from 50 last November to 68 on the current list. Ninety-eight percent of the systems use processors with six or more cores, they added.

In terms of manufacturers, HP placed the most computers on the Top 500 list, as their machines comprised 35.6 percent of the list (178 systems). IBM had 11 systems (22.2 percent on the list) and Cray was in third place with 71 systems (14.2 percent). The No. 500 computer on the current list recorded a performance of 153.6 teraflops, up from 133.7 teraflops six months ago.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Report: Asbestos found in crayons, other children’s toys

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Emily Bills

Laboratory tests commissioned by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) Action Fund has discovered that several brands of crayons and some toy crime scene fingerprint kits intended for children contained fibers of the known carcinogen, asbestos.

As Time.com reported last week, the EWG had independent researchers at the North Carolina-based Scientific Analytical Institute (SAI) run tests of 28 boxes of crayons and discovered that four of them contained asbestos. In addition, 21 toy fingerprint kits were tested, with two of them found to contain the substance at the relatively high concentration level of one percent.

The offending products include Amscan brand, Disney Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Nickelodeon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Saban’s Power Rangers Super Megaforce-brand crayons. The affected fingerprint kits include the EduScience Deluxe Forensics Lab Kit (black fingerprint powder) and the Inside Intelligence Secret Spy Kit (white fingerprint power).

“This is an exposure that could easily be avoided,” Sonya Lunder, EWG senior researcher and one of the authors of the group’s study, told Time.com. “The threshold for exposing a kid to a carcinogenic chemical when they’re playing with toys should be zero.”

“Asbestos in toys poses an unacceptable risk to children, today as it did in 2000 and 2007, the last time tests found the deadly substance in these children’s products,” added Dr. Philip Landrigan, professor of pediatrics and preventive medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York.

Congressmen calling for voluntary recall of ‘toxic products’

While the study examines specific products, Lunder told the website that the report should serve as a reminder to consumers that asbestos, which is still legal, can be found in any product. The lesson is that parents “can’t just read labels and choose safer products by looking at the labels themselves. There’s not enough information about where asbestos might be found.”

The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that an estimated 125 million people worldwide have asbestos at the workplace, and that the substance is responsible for more than 100,000 deaths annually. While the naturally occurring mineral fiber is used in a number of industries for its heat resistance and tensile strength, all forms of the material are known to cause cancer in humans.

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), which does not prohibit the inclusion of asbestos in crayons, told Time.com that it would be investigating the EWG’s findings. However, the offending products are produced in China, making them hard to track, and the group needs to demonstrate that products have the potential to cause health problems before taking action.

As CPSC spokesperson Scott Wilson explained, the group must determine how much of the substance that can come out of the product, the root of exposure, and how many hours children spend using the product. However, Senators Edward Markey of Democrat and Dick Durbin of Illinois are calling for a voluntarily recall of these “toxic products,” adding that they would work with the CPSC to determine next steps to address product safety.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Dangerous skin-picking disorder has possible new treatment

Written By: John Hopton

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Emily Bills

@Johnfinitum

New research has shown that antioxidant supplements could provide an important treatment for skin-picking disorder, EurekAlert reports.

Skin-picking disorder is common, with around four percent of the population believed to suffer from it. Patients scratch at their skin, sometimes causing disfiguring wounds. The injuries are also potentially fatal due to infection, because many sufferers are ashamed to seek hep.

Laboratory mice are often afflicted with the same condition; in fact it is the leading cause of preventable death in lab mice. A study led by a Stanford University School of Medicine researcher used two antioxidant supplements – N-acetylcysteine (NAC) and glutathione – to treat the mice and saw promising results.

NAC helps the brain to make antioxidants, which combat oxidative stress that causes certain cells in the brain to die or become inactive. It has been also used experimentally in people with Parkinson’s disease, autism, and cystic fibrosis.

“With NAC, almost every mouse got a little bit better,” said Joseph Garner, PhD, who is associate professor of comparative medicine and senior author of the study. “But there is a huge variability is response, anywhere from a slight improvement to complete cure, which is what you see in humans.”

NAC also took six to eight weeks before any benefits could be observed.

It is believed that glutathione may a better choice, not least because it is thought to have fewer side effects. With glutathione, 50 percent of mice responded with a full and speedy recovery. Those that got better were completely cured in two to three weeks.

Palpable excitement

“What’s exciting is that we have a compound that works,” Garner said. “It works as well as NAC. It’s clearly working differently, or at least more directly. This different response profile gives us some hope that there may be some nonresponders, or people who can’t tolerate NAC, who may be helped by glutathione.”

Although NAC worked more slowly and produced a lower percentage of fully cured mice (40), it did have some effect on all mice, whereas glutathione had zero effect on half of them.

However, the fact that promising signs have come from both supplements is very pleasing to researchers, because of how dangerous the condition is.

It “can lead to really serious disfigurement in extreme cases,” Garner explained. “People suffer in complete silence. They think they are the only one who has it, despite the fact that it’s very common, and it kills people.”

Therefore, “the sense of excitement from patients, advocates, and researchers was palpable,” he said. “This is the first new potential drug for this disorder in years.”

NAC has also been shown to be effective in treating hair-pulling disorder, a closely-related condition to skin-picking disorder, but it causes side-effects in many people, particularly gastrointestinal distress.

The next step in the research is to investigate the possibility of using intra-nasal glutathione, which can bypass the gut and liver, delivering the compound directly to the brain.

The study findings were published in the journal, PLOS ONE.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Ashes of Pluto discoverer on board New Horizons for historic flyby

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Christopher Pilny

When NASA’s New Horizons completes its historic flyby of Pluto later today, the man who first discovered the now-dwarf planet in 1930 will be there in more than just spirit, as a small amount of the late astronomer’s ashes have made the journey along with the spacecraft.

According to CNN.com, American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto 85 years ago when he was just 24 years of age. The Kansas native had been working at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, helping astronomers search for a planet located beyond Neptune by reviewing millions of images, New Horizons team members at Johns Hopkins University said.

Tombaugh’s search for a “trans-Neptunian” world came to an end in February 1930, when he caught his first glimpse at what would later be named Pluto. Initially believed to be a planetary oddity because of its small size and unusual elliptical orbit, his work eventually led to the discovery of the Kuiper Belt and the realization that small, icy dwarf planets were common in the Milky Way.

Tombaugh, who died on January 17, 1997 at the age of 90, was the first American to ever find a new planet in the solar system. To honor him, a small aluminum canister containing some of his ashes (donated by his family) was placed on board New Horizons. He is the first man to have his remains launched into interstellar space, according to the mission team.

Posthumously visiting the planet he discovered

The canister containing his ashes is approximately two inches wide and one-half inch tall, and was attached to the inside of the piano-sized spacecraft’s upper deck, according to CNN. It also bears an inscription written by Dr. Alan Stern, the head of the New Horizons mission.

The inscription reads: “Interned herein are remains of American Clyde W. Tombaugh, discoverer of Pluto and the solar system’s ‘third zone.’ Adelle and Muron’s boy, Patricia’s husband, Annette and Alden’s father, astronomer, teacher, punster, and friend: Clyde W. Tombaugh (1906-1997).”

On Tuesday, as New Horizons travels to within 7,800 miles (12,500 kilometers) from the surface of the dwarf planet and becomes the first spacecraft to complete a flyby of Pluto, the man who discovered the icy world will be along for the ride – and his family couldn’t be happier about it.

“When he looked at Pluto, it was just a speck of light,” Tombaugh’s daughter Annette said earlier this year, according to CNN. “To actually see the planet that he had discovered and find out more about its atmosphere, find out more of what it is and actually get to see the moons of Pluto, he would have been astounded.”

Likewise, back in 2006, his wife Patricia called the gesture “a wonderful tribute.”

“Clyde Tombaugh was a grand American, and New Horizons is a grand American adventure,” Dr. Stern added at the time. He called Tombaugh’s work “a contribution to planetary science that we now know heralded a paradigm shift in our understanding of the geography of our home solar system” and added that it was an “honor… to have launched some of his remains… on the historic mission of exploration that is New Horizons.”

Researchers find cluster of volcanoes off Australian coast

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 14, 2015 Last Edited: July 14, 2015

Christopher Pilny

@BednarChuck

Using a new research vessel, a team of Australian researchers discovered a group of extinct volcanoes believed to be at least 50 million years old off the coast of Sydney, the University of New South Wales (UNSW) announced on Monday.

Chief scientist Iain Suthers, a marine biologist and professor at UNSW Australia, and his team found the volcano cluster approximately 250 kilometers (155 miles) off the coast of the capital, in roughly 4,900 meters (16,000 feet) of water while hunting for a lobster nursing ground.

The cluster includes four extinct volcanoes known as calderas, which the authors explained form after a volcano erupts, causing the surrounding land to collapses and form a crater. The largest of the calderas is 1.5 km (0.9 miles) across the rim and rises 700 meters (about 2,300 meters) above the sea floor. The cluster as a whole is 20 km (12.4 miles) long and 6 km (3.7 miles) wide.

In a statement, Professor Suthers called the voyage “enormously successful. Not only did we discover a cluster of volcanoes on Sydney’s doorstep, we were amazed to find that an eddy off Sydney was a hotspot for lobster larvae at a time of the year when we were not expecting them.”

Discovery made possible thanks to new research vessel

He and more than two dozen colleagues departed from Brisbane on June 3 on board the research vessel Investigator, mapping the seafloor during a voyage that concluded on June 18 when they reached Sydney. During the journey, the ship was also routinely mapping the seafloor.

Volcano expert Professor Richard Arculus from the Australian National University, an igneous petrologist and one of the scientists involved in the research project, said that this specific type of volcano were essential to geoscientists because they would help explain how Australia and New Zealand separated between 40 million and 80 million years ago.

He added that their discovery would “help scientists target future exploration of the sea floor to unlock the secrets of the Earth’s crust,” and that they were only just discovered because of the improved sonar technology on the new vessel, which can map the sea floor to greater depths than was previously possible.

Professor Suthers noted that Investigator is capable of many things that weren’t possible with previous research vessels. For example, he said it can “send and receive data while we’re at sea, which meant the team back on base at UNSW in Sydney could analyze the information we were collecting at sea and send back their analysis, along with satellite imagery, so we could chase the eddies as they formed.”

“This is the first time we’ve been able to respond directly to the changing dynamics of the ocean and, for a biological oceanographer like me, it doesn’t get more thrilling,” he added. “It was astounding to find juvenile commercial fish species like bream and tailor 150 kilometers offshore, as we had thought that once they were swept out to sea that was end of them. But in fact these eddies are nursery grounds along the east coast of Australia.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Plutonium magnetism confirmed for the first time

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Emily Bills

@BednarChuck

Researchers from the Department of Energy’s Los Alamos and Oak Ridge national laboratories have solved the decades-old mystery by confirming plutonium’s magnetism for the first time, a new study published recently in the journal Science Advances claims.

First produced in 1940, plutonium has an unstable nucleus that allows it to undergo fission and which makes it usable in nuclear fuels and weapons. However, little was known about the cloud of electrons that surrounded its nucleus – a cloud making it the most electronically complex element in the periodic table, the study authors explained in a statement Friday.

Scientists have long theorized that plutonium had magnetism, but had never been able to observe it experimentally before now. Using a process known as neutron scattering, the team was able to directly measure one unique characteristic of the element’s fluctuating magnetism for the first time, finding that its magnetism is in a constant state of flux.

Lead investigator Marc Janoschek explained that plutonium exists in a state known as a quantum mechanical superposition, which involves two extremes in its electronic configuration. In one, its electrons are completely localized around the plutonium ion, during which time it is magnetic. In the other, those electrons delocalize and are no longer associated with the ion at all.

Using a different isotope, keeping hydrogen at bay were key

Janoschek and his colleagues used the ARCS instrument at ORNL’s Spallation Neutron Source to make a series of neutron measurements, through which they were able to determine that these fluctuations have different numbers of electrons in plutonium’s outer valence shell. He noted that this observation explains unusual changes that occur in the element’s different phases.

“The fluctuations in plutonium happen on a specific time scale that no other method is sensitive to,” Janoschek said. “This is a big step forward, not only in terms of experiment but in theory as well. We successfully showed that dynamical mean field theory more or less predicted what we observed. It provides a natural explanation for plutonium’s complex properties and in particular the large sensitivity of its volume to small changes in temperature or pressure.”

The research, which was part of a larger effort to conduct an in-depth analysis of plutonium, used the plutonium-242 isotope instead of plutonium-239, which is more widely available. The reason is that the latter is highly absorbent of neutrons, thus potentially obscuring the weak signal – what the team was searching for. They also used a special technique to keep plutonium from absorbing hydrogen, which generated spurious signals where the magnetic ones were believed to be.

The study “provides the best explanation to date as to why plutonium is so sensitive to all external perturbations – something that I have struggled to understand for 50 years now,” said former Los Alamos laboratory director and plutonium science expert, Siegfried Hecker.

Update: Inside the research with Marc Janoschek of Los Alamos

Following the initial publication of this article, redOrbit had the distinct pleasure to discuss the research with Marc Janoschek of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. The first thing we wanted to know, of course, was just how he and his colleagues were able to “solve” the decades-old mystery of plutonium’s supposedly missing magnetism.

“We used neutron scattering to demonstrate that the magnetism in plutonium is not missing but dynamic,” he explained. “Neutrons carry a small magnetic moment – a compass needle that is sensitive to magnetic fields on the atomic-scale. Directing a beam of neutrons onto the plutonium sample and measuring the angle of deflection allowed us to detect this dynamic magnetism.”

“The observed neutron intensity pattern further shows that this ‘dynamic’ magnetism is driven by the configuration of the electronic cloud that surrounds the plutonium nucleus,” he added. “Just as neutrons, electrons also carry a small magnetic moment, but depending on the exact electronic configuration, those magnetic moments can either cancel each other [making the atom non-magnetic]… or add up to a magnetic configuration.”

“It turns out that the electronic cloud of plutonium is constantly changing between three different electronic configurations, of which two are magnetic, and one is not, resulting in this dynamic magnetic state,” Janoschek continued. While he noted that neutron scattering measurements are “routinely carried out to measure the magnetic state of various materials,” the radioactivity and poisonous natures required extreme safety measures be taken during the experiments.

Finally, Janoschek told redOrbit that “in addition to solving plutonium’s magnetic conundrum,” his team’s work “provides a natural explanation” for the rather complex structural properties of plutonium, which has six different structural phases. The various configurations of the electronic cloud imply distinct sizes of the plutonium atom, with more electrons leading to a smaller atom, and this as a result makes plutonium unstable to structural changes, he concluded.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Why does coffee make you poop?

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Christopher Pilny

@PlinyTheShorter

For some, as sure as the sun will rise, a cup of joe will make you go. If you’ve ever wondered why, sadly there are no definitive answers—taking the kids to the pool after a cuppa isn’t exactly a scientific priority—but there are a few ideas that might hold the answer.

It’s coffee’s fault

One study published in Gut in 1990 found that coffee causes 29% of healthy young adults to sink submarines after consumption, regardless of caffeine. Authors Brown, Cann, and Read (their real names; we cannot make this up) hypothesized that coffee effects the tissues lining the stomach and small intestine, triggering the release of gastrin. Gastrin is a hormone that causes the colon to increase its contractions that push excrement along.

A later study verified that coffee leads to faster contractions, with effects similar to eating a meal. Besides having the effect of speeding things up, your colon is responsible for reabsorbing water from fecal matter as it traverses through your body. If contractions are faster, your body has less time to absorb water, causing looser stools. Looser stools move more quickly—because excess liquid in the colon increases motor contraction and because they are easier to push.

And, according to the IBS Network, coffee also causes your gall bladder to release bile acids. Bile acids normally help you digest fat, but without food, they can cause you to, ehem, download a brownload. Like gastrin, bile acids stimulate contractions, but the acids go beyond to actively decrease water reabsorption if bile acid levels are high—causing looser stools again.

So in short, coffee causes things to move fast and to be softer, leading to your becoming a porcelain assassin.

…It might not be coffee’s fault

If you’ve looked at any reviews on Amazon of sugar-free gummy bears, you know non-nutritive sweeteners can also cause digestive struggles. Because the body doesn’t absorb them, non-nutritive sweeteners draw water into the colon, triggering diarrhea.

You also might be lactose-intolerant without knowing it. Dairy products can cause diarrhea in those sensitive to lactose, and as humans age, then tend to have more and more problems handling it.

Beyond what you consume, it could just be the time of day—your body might just be on a schedule. Or, if you drink coffee as soon as you wake up, it could just be coincidental timing—colonic motor activity increases sharply upon waking up.

Finally, people suffering from Irritable Bowel Syndrome can be especially triggered by coffee. Symptoms of IBS include bloating, stomach pain, and changes in bowel movements.

The result

Coffee makes some people poop, but we’re not exactly sure why. There are answers, but none are definitive, and since everyone is different, different answers can apply. Some people are probably relieved to find out they’re not alone in coffee-induced caca, but if you’re concerned, we urge you to talk to a doctor.

Researchers find genes controlling bone marrow function

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Emily Bills

@BednarChuck

Bone marrow is the spongy tissue inside some bones containing immature cells that are capable of developing into blood cells to help the body battle infection or carry oxygen. It’s saved a vast number of lives over the years, but remains poorly understood at the genetic level.

Now, however, researchers from the University of Southern California (USC) have discovered a new group of genes that affects the development and maintenance of bone marrow (which is also known as blood stem cells). Their findings were published in the June edition of the journal Stem Cell Reports and could improve our understanding of how bone marrow functions.

As part of their study, stem cell researchers Hooman Allayee and Gregor Adams and colleagues performed a genetic screen of a collection of more than 100 strains of mouse DNA known as the hybrid mouse diversity panel, frequently used by scientists in the laboratory.

They found that different strains had different amounts of several important sub-populations of blood stem cells, including those known as short-term HSCs, which are what cause red and white blood cells to form in adults. They also linked the activation of a gene called Hopx to an increase in the amount of short-term HSC, and found that rodents lacking this specific gene formed fewer short-term HSCs and were largely ineffective bone marrow donors.

Technique could help find genes behind other stem cell systems

Allayee, Adams, and their co-authors explained that they conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) using the hybrid mouse diversity panel in order to identify the genetic determinants of hematopoietic stem/progenitor cell (HSPC) frequency. They said they found “several loci” that were “significantly associated with HSPC frequency,” including Hopx.

This gene had previously been implicated in the development of cardiac issues, but had not been linked to HSPC biology until now. They detected reduced cell frequencies and impaired engraftment in the competitive repopulation assays of mice lacking the gene, and by doing so, they proved that this method could be used to identify genetic determinants of other stem cell systems.

“Short-term HSCs are the major stem cells in the adult bone marrow, so finding “This powerful genetics platform has the potential to reveal the genes underlying other stem cell populations or a wide range of diseases that would be difficult to study in humans,” Allayee added.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Record-setting electric planes cross English Channel

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Emily Bills

@BednarChuck

A pair of French pilots has made history, separately flying electric planes over the English Channel in what is being hailed as two historic milestones in the field of aviation.

The first voyage was completed by Hugues Duval, who according to Discovery News flew a one-seat Columbian Cri-Cri from Calais to Dover and back to purportedly become the first pilot to fly an electric aircraft over the body of water separating England from northern France.

Duval actually didn’t have the authorization to take off from Calais, and his 220-pound plane was towed by a fuel-driven plane at the start of the trip. Afterwards, he flew to Dover and then back to Calais, where he landed after a 31-mile journey during which he reached a top speed of 90 miles per hour.

Twelve hours later, French pilot Didier Esteyne flew a two-seater Airbus E-Fan over the Channel, departing from the UK town of Lydd, reaching an attitude of 3,500 feet, and arriving in Calais 38 minutes after first lifting off.

Who was first (and does it even really matter)?

While it might seem cut-and-dry who was first and who was second, Airbus disagrees. Officials at the company are challenging Duval’s feat, calming that since the Cri-Cri had been towed by a second aircraft, the feat should not officially count as a record-setting feat.

In a statement, Jean Botti, Chief Technical Officer of the Airbus Group, said, “We now have taken a major step toward series production, which will lead to the development and manufacture of electric aircraft that are safe, reliable, and certifiable to airworthiness standards.”

“Although I was alone in the cockpit, were many people ‘flying’ with me today in this great success,” added Esteyne, designer and test pilot of the lithium-ion battery powered E-Fan. “It was the result of a fantastic team effort that brought much passion and the will to achieve.”

“While this is absurd theatrics for a minor first, it’s a promising sign for the future of electric aviation, and hearkens back to the early days of human flight, with multiple claims of firsts,” said Popular Science. Discovery News added that the two Channel flights, along with the recent journey of the Solar Impulse, prove that “the advent of emission-free flight has dawned.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Enormous new black hole challenges galaxy formation theories

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Emily Bills

@BednarChuck

Astronomers have discovered a supersized black hole almost seven billion times as massive as our sun and dozens of times larger than it should be relative to the size of its host galaxy. This was revealed in a new study published Friday in the journal Science.

The discovery, which was made using the WM Keck Observatory in Hawaii, NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton spacecraft, could challenge the currently existing models used to explain how galaxies form.

According to Discovery News, lead author Benny Trakhtenbrot, an astrophysicist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, and his colleagues have dubbed the black hole CID-947, and said it’s one of the largest phenomenon of its kind ever discovered.

“Our new discovery stands in contrast to what we were expecting to see, based on the ‘common wisdom’ about the relations between supermassive black holes and their host galaxies,” he told redOrbit via email. While many observations in the nearby universe “suggest that there is a tight relation between the masses of black holes and the masses of the galaxies in which they reside,” this system “clearly shows that this is not the general case, particularly in the early universe.”

Black hole that breaks all the rules

CID-947 formed in the early universe about 11.7 billion years ago, or two billion years after the Big Bang, the website added. The presence of extremely fast-moving gas near the supermassive object suggests that it has a very high mass. However, the authors said that they were stunned by the mass of the galaxy surrounding the black hole – it was a fairly normal-sized galaxy.

The average supermassive black hole is approximately 500 timers smaller in mass that its host galaxy, Trakhtenbrot told redOrbit. Based on this observational relation, many models have been proposed to explain the nearly linear relation and the typical ratio. Along with other evidence, this appeared to indicate that supermassive black holes evolve hand-in-hand with their host galaxies, and some studies suggest that they can stop star formation in those galaxies.

CID-947, on the other hand, “has as much as one tenth the mass of its host galaxy – that is, about 50 times higher than what is observed in the local universe,” he explained. Furthermore, the data also suggests that while “the black hole is reaching the final stages of its growth,” the host galaxy is still growing and forming stars. “So, instead of a ‘hand-in-hand’ evolutionary scenario, we are witnessing a ‘two-stage’ case: the black hole grew first, and the host galaxy is growing later.”

Trakhtenbrot has studied this system as part of a larger effort to study growing black holes in the early universe. He said the study “would not have been possible” without the Keck telescope’s MOSFIRE instrument. This equipment is what “allowed us to peer so deeply into the early universe and explore black holes at the final stages of their growth.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Apple might be in hot water over flag emoji

Written By: Susanna Pilny

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Emily Bills

In June, Apple held its Worldwide Developers Conference and released iOS 9 beta 1 to developers. Bloggers began to spread word of new emoji releases, including one that may cause some enmity: the flag of Taiwan.

This may seem innocuous to the Western world, but this could be taken the wrong way by China, one of Apple’s fastest growing markets. In the last quarter, China’s iPhone sales surpassed both the US’s and Europe’s for the first time.

A contentious history

Why does China care so much about a little emoji? It all comes down to history.

An oversimplification: China and Taiwan have been at odds since 1949, when the Communist Party forced the former Chinese government to flee the mainland. The former government then settled on the island of Taiwan.

Both Taiwan and mainland China saw themselves as the true Chinese Republic (with the mainland viewing Taiwan as a renegade province). Technically, the two have been at war since, as no formal peace treaty has ever been signed.

Things have gotten less antagonistic in recent years. In 2014, the two countries had their first direct contact since 1949. After all, both countries had agreed in 1992 that there was only one China.

However, each had a different idea of who was the real China—meaning that they agreed on the fact that the other country was wrong. And since the passing of a 2005 law in mainland China, Taiwan is not legally allowed to secede, meaning that if Taiwan isn’t careful, war could rekindle.

The bottom line

In sum, Apple may be alienating one of their biggest markets by adding the emoji Taiwan flag, as it makes it appear that Apple recognizes them as a nation separate from mainland China. This might seem like an inconsequential thing, but the flag is still controversial, as Katy Perry found out at a concert in April when she wore the flag as a cape along with a sunflower dress (also a Taiwanese symbol).

Apple may yet remove the emoji, as nothing is set until the beta period ends. But for now, you can check out the emoji for yourself—Apple has released the beta of iOS 9 to the public!

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Invasive lizards may outnumber people in Puerto Rico

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Emily Bills

Originally brought to the island as pets, iguanas have undergone a population explosion in the past few years. Their numbers have actually increased to the point that the invasive lizards may now outnumber the human population of the Caribbean island.

In fact, according to National Geographic reports, iguanas have become such a menace that they have started causing damage to the agriculture and infrastructure of the territory, wreaking havoc on air traffic control and causing millions of dollars of damage. Since the creatures don’t have any natural predators, residents are scrambling to find a way to address the problem.

“These guys are big. They can grow up to six feet long with their tails,” Rafael Joglar, a biology professor at the University of Puerto Rico, told Nat Geo. “Iguanas will nest very close to the road and they actually are making up to thirty different caves underneath the roads. So when there is a vehicle crossing the road with several passengers, the road will collapse.”

“These animals are causing air traffic delays. They’re eating crops and causing damage in general,” added Carlos Rodriguez from the ecological advocacy group Para la Naturaleza. “That’s why they call it a green plague. And why is it a plague? Cause it’s an invasive species. These guys came here through the pet trade. They’ve dispersed throughout the island.”

More than four million strong

Experts report that several factors have caused the iguanas to spread throughout Puerto Rico, including the climate. The island territory has a tropical climate featuring year-round warm temperatures and defined wet and dry seasons, not unlike Central and South America. This leads to patches of open land where the iguanas can nest, with each critter lying up to 75 eggs per year.

“Now in Central and South America you would have natural predators,” Rodriguez said. “Fifty two to be exact. Here in Puerto Rico, we haven’t had an iguana species living on the island for more than five hundred years. So that means that green iguanas are unhindered. They have a lot of vegetation to eat, a lot of land to nest in, and very few predator pressures.”

Joglar added that the iguanas “were here for over forty years and nobody noticed them. And then all of a sudden they became very common, very abundant and they started to interact with people and interact with our ecosystems here in Puerto Rico. And they have become a problem.”

Rodriguez explained that conservationists have been trying to get rid of iguana eggs and had been able to eliminate roughly 13,000 from the population since 2008. While that might sound like a large number, they might have to continue doing this for the next 15 to 20 years, as there are an estimated four million iguanas on the island, or at least one per person.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Pluto’s geology comes to light as flyby draws near

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 13, 2015 Last Edited: July 13, 2015

Emily Bills

While NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft isn’t scheduled to make its closest approach to Pluto until Tuesday, new photos released by the US space agency over the weekend show the dwarf planet’s distinct surface features in far greater detail than previously possible.

In fact, NASA said that as the science team got their first look at new images captured by the probe’s Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) instrument on Friday, they reacted with “joy and delight” about the newly visible details on the surface of this distant world.

“We’re close enough now that we’re just starting to see Pluto’s geology,” explained Curt Niebur, a New Horizons program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. He noted that he was most interested in the “tail” of the recently discovered “whale” feature on Pluto, which he called a “unique transition region with a lot of dynamic processes interacting.”

The whale, first spotted by New Horizons last week, is an elongated dark region measuring approximately 1,860 miles (3,000 kilometers) in length. Located to the right of the whale’s snout was the brightest region visible on Pluto – a 990-mile (1,600 kilometers) area believed to contain frost deposits, which may include frozen methane, nitrogen, and/or carbon monoxide.

Polygonal structures among new features detected

The images released over the weekend were taken on July 9, 2015 from 3.3 million miles (5.4 million kilometers) away, with a resolution of 17 miles (27 kilometers) per pixel, NASA noted. They also include the first signs of discrete geologic features on the dwarf planet and show the side of Pluto always facing Charon.

Credit: NASA

“Among the structures tentatively identified in this new image are what appear to be polygonal features; a complex band of terrain stretching east-northeast across the planet, approximately 1,000 miles long; and a complex region where bright terrains meet the dark terrains of the whale,” New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern said.

“After nine and a half years in flight, Pluto is well worth the wait,” he added. The spacecraft will continue to collect images and data as it moves closer and closer to Pluto, as it looks to conclude its three-billion mile journey by making its closest approach to the dwarf planet on Tuesday, July 14 – marking the 50th anniversary of the Mariner 4 spacecraft’s flyby of Mars.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Which is worse: fast food or sit-down restaurants?

Written By: Brian Galloway

Published Date: July 12, 2015 Last Edited: July 12, 2015

Brian Galloway

Shayne Jacopian for redOrbit.com – @ShayneJacopian

Many people feel that food from a sit-down restaurant is much healthier than a fast-food combo, but is that correct? After all, all that salt and grease can’t be good for you, right?

Well, yes– fast food is pretty bad for you, but new research shows that neither choice is healthier than eating at home.

According to findings published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, people who eat at fast food restaurants and those who sit down at full-service restaurants consume, on average, an extra 200 calories and 10 grams of total fat than they would have if they’d eaten at home.

That goes for both dining options.

In fact, in some respects, sit-down meals are even worse for you than fast food options, containing an average of 58 milligrams of cholesterol more than a home-cooked meal, opposed to fast food’s 10 extra milligrams. Additionally, meals from full-service restaurants contain 412 more milligrams of sodium than the average home-cooked meal—fast food has an extra 300 mg, according to the source.

Of course, in other areas, fast food is still worse, containing much more saturated fat and sugar than home-cooked meals, while restaurant meals fare better.

Negative health implications start to even out, making fast food about on par with restaurant meals, as far as health is concerned. The choice between the two then comes down to price and, of course, deliciousness.

Just this March, American restaurant and bar sales exceeded grocery store sales for the first time ever. According to this study, though, Americans should maybe start cutting back on that—eating out is less healthy than eating at home, and it doesn’t matter whether that’s at a fast food restaurant or somewhere a little fancier.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

NASA announces first commercial spaceflight astronauts

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 11, 2015 Last Edited: July 11, 2015

Brian Galloway

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

A quartet of experienced astronauts have been selected by NASA to work along with SpaceX and The Boeing Company as they prepare for the first-ever American commercial spaceflights, officials from the US space agency announced on Thursday.

The astronauts are Robert Behnken, who was selected as a NASA astronaut in July 2000 and was a member of the STS-123 and STS-130 space shuttle mission crews; Eric Boe, who spent more than 28 days in space as part of the STS-126 and STS-133 missions; Douglas Hurley, who was a member of the last flight of the Space Shuttle program; and Sunita Williams, who has spent a total of 322 days in space and currently holds the record for total cumulative spacewalk time by a female astronaut (50 hours and 40 minutes). Here’s an introduction:

Behnken, Boe, Hurley, and Williams will work closely with both of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program partners to develop their crew transportation systems and to provide crew transportation services to and from the International Space Station. They will be training and preparing for the forthcoming commercial spaceflights that will return NASA launches to US soil for the first time since the retirement of the space shuttle.

The mission: ensure crew, vehicles are ready for launch

According to Engadget, NASA’s contracts with Boeing and SpaceX require a minimum of one crewed flight test involving at least one agency-approved astronaut on board to help verify that the vehicle can launch, maneuver in orbit, dock to the ISS, validate that all systems perform as expected, and land safely.

At the same time, both firms will need to provide training to their crew members to ensure that they are ready for liftoff. Once SpaceX and Boeing pass NASA’s various tests, they will send between two and six crew rotation missions to the ISS, each carrying four crew members and a minimum of 200.5 pounds of cargo in shuttle journeys, the website added.

In a statement, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said, “I am pleased to announce four American space pioneers have been selected to be the first astronauts to train to fly to space on commercial crew vehicles, all part of our ambitious plan to return space launches to U.S. soil, create good-paying American jobs and advance our goal of sending humans farther into the solar system than ever before. These distinguished, veteran astronauts are blazing a new trail – a trail that will one day land them in the history books and Americans on the surface of Mars.”

“We are excited to have such an experienced group of astronauts working with the Commercial Crew Program, Boeing and SpaceX and ultimately flying on the companies’ flight test missions,” added Commercial Crew Program Manager Kathy Lueders. “Naming these astronauts is a key step forward and consistent with past approaches to involve the crew in the design and development of new systems.”

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.

Pandas need to be lazy to survive

Written By: Chuck Bednar

Published Date: July 11, 2015 Last Edited: July 11, 2015

Brian Galloway

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

A team of researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the University of Aberdeen and the Beijing Zoo have solved the mystery of why giant pandas are able to survive even though they eat nothing but bamboo – it’s because, for all intents and purposes, they’re lazy.

To be more accurate, the creatures are able to sustain themselves on a diet of shoots and leaves because they expend extremely minute amounts of energy during the course of a day, according to BBC News reports published on Friday. In fact, the study authors found that pandas burn approximately 38 percent of the calories used by other animals of similar size.

Reporting in the July 10 edition of the journal Science, they explain that the average panda energy expenditure is around 5.2 megajoules per day, or just 37.7 percent of the expected 13.8 MJ/day for mammals. Among only wild pandas, the mean amount of calories consumed was 6.2 MJ/day, or 45 percent of the predicted value.

“Pandas achieve this exceptionally low expenditure in part by reduced sizes of several vital organs and low physical activity,” lead authors Yonggang Nie, John R. Speakman and Qi Wu wrote. “A combination of morphological, behavioral, physiological, and genetic adaptations, leading to low energy expenditure, likely enables giant pandas to survive on a bamboo diet.”

Low thyroid hormone levels play a key role

According to the researchers, the animals’ lack of energy expenditure was associated with low levels of the thyroid hormones thyroxine and triiodothyronine, which averaged 46.9 percent and 64 percent the amounts expected for mammals of similarly size, respectively. One reason for this may be a mutation unique to giant pandas in a gene essential to thyroid hormone synthesis.

The BBC explained pandas are only active 49 percent of the time, and when they were actually moving, they traveled only 20 meters per hour (just over 0.01 miles per hour). Pandas in captivity were even less active, getting up and moving only about one-third of the time that they were monitored, the British news agency added.

Speakman explained that while pandas “save a lot of energy by being frugal with the energy they spend on physical activity,” but their low activity isn’t the only thing that contributes to their low metabolism. Even the metabolic rate of an active panda is lower than stationary human.

“We found that their low metabolism is correlated with very low levels of thyroid hormones, which was linked to a genetic mutation in the thyroid hormone synthesis pathway that is unique to the panda,” he added. In fact, the hormone levels of a giant panda were said to be similar to those of hibernating black bears, and the creatures were also found to have brains, kidneys and livers that were relatively small in comparison to other bears, BBC News added.

—–

Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.