|
|
|
|
Charting HIV's Rapidly Changing Journey In The BodyHIV is so deadly largely because it evolves so rapidly. With a single virus as the origin of an infection, most patients will quickly come to harbor thousands of different versions of HIV, all a little bit different and all competing with one another to most efficiently infect that person's cells. Now scientists have settled a longstanding question about just how HIV morphs in the body.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 7:00 pm Boundary Between Earth's Upper Atmosphere And Space Has Moved To Extraordinarily Low Altitudes, NASA Instruments DocumentObservations made by NASA instruments onboard an Air Force satellite have shown that the boundary between the Earth's upper atmosphere and space has moved to extraordinarily low altitudes.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 7:00 pm Parents Be Aware This Holiday Season: Magnets In Children's Toys Pose Significant Health RiskA growing number of adults know about the potential risk of swallowing magnets, but medical complications from magnets continue to be extensive worldwide and throughout childhood.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 7:00 pm Rare Lead Bars Discovered Off The Coast Of Ibiza May Be Carthaginian MunitionsArchaeologists have recovered three lead bars which may originate from the third century before Christ, 39 meters under the sea off the north coast of Ibiza. One of the bars has Iberian characters on it. The lead originates from the mines of Sierra Morena in southern Spain.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 7:00 pm Graphical Models: New Mathematical Tool Could Unpick Complex Cancer Causes And Help Sociologists Mine FacebookResearchers have devised a new research tool that could help unpick the complex cell interactions that lead to cancer and also allow social scientists to mine social networking sites such as Facebook for useful insights.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 7:00 pm Nanotubes Sniff Out Cancer Agents In Living CellsMIT Engineers have developed carbon nanotubes into sensors for cancer drugs and other DNA-damaging agents inside living cells.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 7:00 pm Cellular Stress Causes Fatty Liver Disease In MiceResearchers have discovered a direct link between disruption of a critical cellular housekeeping process and fatty liver disease, a condition that causes fat to accumulate in the liver. The findings might open new avenues for understanding and perhaps treating fatty liver disease, which is the most common form of liver disease in the Western world.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 4:00 pm Ocean Fish Farming Harms Wild Fish, Study SaysFarming of fish in ocean cages is fundamentally harmful to wild fish, according to an essay in this week's Conservation Biology. Using basic physics, the author explains how farm fish cause nearby wild fish to decline. The foundation of his paper is that higher density of fish promotes infection, and infection lowers the fitness of the fish.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 4:00 pm Single Adult Stem Cell Can Self Renew, Repair Tissue Damage In Live MammalThe first demonstration that a single adult stem cell can self renew in a mammal was reported by scientists. The transplanted adult stem cell and its differentiated descendants restored lost function to mice with hind limb muscle tissue damage.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 4:00 pm Titan's Volcanoes Give NASA Spacecraft Chilly ReceptionData collected during several recent flybys of Titan by NASA's Cassini spacecraft have put another arrow in the quiver of scientists who think the Saturnian moon contains active cryovolcanoes spewing a super-chilled liquid into its atmosphere. The information was released today during a meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, Calif.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 4:00 pm Earth WatchWhy we should relish the Mekong while we canSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:56 pm Obama says drilling must be part of larger plan (Reuters)Reuters - President-elect Barack Obama said he was not happy that Congress allowed the long-standing moratorium on offshore drill to expire without producing a comprehensive energy plan.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:37 pm Over 2T tons of ice melted in arctic since '03 (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:10 pm Phoenix probe sheds new light on Mars weatherCAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - NASA is still unable to say for sure whether its Phoenix lander has found a place where life could have existed on Mars.Source: Reuters: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 11:00 am Technology helps Santa make magic, scientist saysWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Ever wondered how Santa Claus can travel around the world in just one night on his reindeer-pulled sleigh and deliver toys to all the children?Source: Reuters: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 10:51 am Hello robotWhere is the metal manservant we were promised?Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 10:51 am In picturesOne man's prize-winning battle for Madagascar coastSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 10:43 am Australians condemn climate planActivists stage protests in several Australian cities, calling Prime Minister Rudd's climate change plan a "joke".Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 10:30 am Rare New Mexico fish to swim free in Texas (AP)AP - Biologists braved the cold and snow as they loaded thousands of endangered minnows into trucks for a 12-hour trip to Texas, where the tiny fish will be released into the Rio Grande near Big Bend National Park.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 9:02 am Green RoomOzone and the lesser of the environmental evilsSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 8:53 am Calif. storm collapses school roof, snarls travel (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 7:00 am Enceladus has 'spreading surface'Pictures of Saturn's moon Enceladus suggest its surface splits and spreads apart - just like the ocean floor on Earth.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 6:28 am Saturn moon Titan may have active ice volcanoes (AP)AP - Observations from the international Cassini spacecraft suggest Saturn's largest moon may have active or recently active ice volcanoes.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 4:12 am Report: Endangered species decisions tainted (AP)AP - A high-ranking Interior Department official tainted nearly every decision made on the protection of endangered species over five years, a new inspector general report finds, concluding she exerted improper political interference on many more rulings than previously thought.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 2:35 am The 'jumbo' squid that could be suckered by acidifying oceansSquid could become rarer in our oceans if current levels of ocean water acidification continue, research suggests.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 1:55 am Scientist says he has found oldest spider web (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 1:29 am Obama picks Nobel man for EnergyBarack Obama names Nobel Prize winner Steven Chu as his energy secretary and tasks him with finding alternatives to fossil fuels.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 1:17 am Phoenix probe sheds new light on Mars weather (Reuters)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 16 Dec 2008 | 1:16 am Interview: Denis NobleEarlier this year, the lawnmower was well-oiled and Denis Noble was finally getting ready to start taking the emeritus half of his Oxford professorship rather more seriously. Then he got a phone call from the International Union of Physiological Sciences (IUPS): would he be prepared to stand as its next president? It was a tough decision. The IUPS is physiology's equivalent of the United Nations, and though the presidency may be partly about pressing the flesh with the great and good and schmoozing the media, it also comes with a sting in the tail. In many ways Noble wasn't the most obvious choice - not because he wasn't sufficiently distinguished, but because he had already served his time as secretary general of the organisation between 1993 and 2001, and it is virtually unheard of for a senior officer to return for a second bite. But it was no coincidence. Noble might not have imagined he was writing his own manifesto while working on his vision of physiology's future as secretary general, but that's the way it has turned out. And Noble's new job is to implement the ideas contained in his 2002 signing-off report for the IUPS that launched the Physiome Project. Sting in the tail And it's the Physiome Project - a worldwide public domain effort, similar to the Genome Project, to provide a computational framework for understanding physiology by developing integrative models at all levels of biological organisation, from genes to the whole organism - that is the sting in the tail. Ever since Crick and Watson discovered the structure of DNA, physiology has been steadily sidelined to such an extent that it had almost become a sub-species of molecular biology. Research had become focused on learning more and more about less and less, with the Genome Project being both its natural progression and its crowning glory. "It was all good science," Noble says, "but you can't help feeling that a lot of it was being done simply because those funding research tend to demand hard, statistical results, and this type of work gave it to them. Yet despite the fact that we now have a much greater understanding of what the body is made of at a molecular level, we haven't seen the advances in medicine that had been hoped for. Even with all our new knowledge about the structures of the body, there have been comparatively few new drugs coming to market." This is Noble's diplomatic way of saying that physiology had in effect come to something of a dead end and had exhausted its possibilities. What's needed instead, he has long argued, is a "systems biology" approach. "It's difficult to define precisely," he laughs. "But if you look at molecular biology as breaking Humpty Dumpty into as many pieces as possible, then systems biology is about trying to put him back together again. And that's actually a great deal more difficult. It's about recognising that every physical component is part of a system and that everything interacts with everything else." Noble graciously suggests that it was the French physiologist Claude Bernard who first proposed the idea of systems biology in his 1865 book, Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine, yet it was only with the invention of supercomputers, which allowed researchers to crunch through the complex maths to build working models of how the body's organs worked, that modern systems biology took shape. And it was most definitely Noble who was one of the leading pioneers here. Not that there was a great deal of competition, as systems biology was still an unconsidered backwater for most physiologists - partly because most academics get into a habit of doing research they are familiar with, and which is easy to get funded, and partly because it suggested some uncomfortable scientific heresies. Ever since Richard Dawkins published The Selfish Gene in 1976, the notion of genetic determinism - the idea that our lives are controlled by our genes - has become one of the central tenets of much scientific understanding. Noble is reluctant to get into a row with Dawkins - after all, they are closeish neighbours in Oxford - and tries to explain his differences with him as a matter of metaphorical interpretation. "In one sense we agree," he says elliptically, "yet in another we disagree." But if push comes to shove? "Then we disagree more than we agree." Where Dawkins talks of selfish genes, Noble talks of prisoner genes. Where Dawkins writes of genes: "They are in you and me; they created us, body and mind; and their preservation is the ultimate rationale for our existence", Noble writes: "They are in you and me; we are the system that allows their code to be read; and their preservation is totally dependent on the joy we experience in reproducing ourselves (our joy, not theirs!). We are the ultimate rationale for their existence." Neither is it just a matter of argument or interpretation, as research on epigenetic marking in rats, published last year, showed that the stroking behaviour of adult rats changed the protein levels in a particular gene to alter the behaviour of their young. In other words, genetic determinism was not an absolute truth; rather, genes were as much a part of the system as they were its cause. "This doesn't invalidate our understanding of genetics," Noble is quick to point out. "It just shows that things aren't quite as straightforward as some people thought they might be, and that there is room for a variety of scientific approaches." And Noble believes his model is paying off. Literally. "Traditionally, drug companies have been used to working to a linear model where reactions are viewed strictly in terms of a single intended effect," he says. "In this model, the effect is good and side effects are bad. But using a systems approach, we have been able to help develop a drug, Ranolazine, to help treat angina that would never have been approved under a simple approach. Seen on their own, two of Ranolazine's effects would be quite damaging to a patient; but when these two effects were taken as a combination, the effect was positive." It seems that the rest of the scientific world has finally caught up with Noble. His election as president of IUPS, assuming he is duly ratified in Kyoto in the summer - "there's only been one instance when an officer who had been proposed has been turned down, and that's when a bunch of Australians all voted against another Australian they didn't like" - is as much an endorsement for systems biology as it is for Noble himself. It is the IUPS's recognition that physiology needs a shift of focus. Not that Noble is expecting an easy ride; scientists are just as stubborn, if not more so, as the rest of us and aren't always best pleased to admit they weren't quite right or at being told what to do. But he should be more than up to it; after years of operating to his own beat outside the scientific mainstream, he's acquired a thickish skin. Noble was born in south London in 1936. His mother and father were both tailors, knocking up suits for Savile Row, and much of his early life was spent as a surrogate parent to his younger siblings as he was frequently left to look after them while they were at work. "It was a good grounding for later life," he smiles wryly. "I learned to cook macaroni cheese and practically every cheap cut of meat on offer. That takes a bit of skill; any idiot can grill a fillet steak." The family managed to survive a direct hit in their Andersen shelter, thanks entirely to his father's insistence that they should all remain indoors under a table during a bombing raid so that he could carry on working. Once the war was over, Noble went to Emanuel school in Battersea. "My parents were desperate for me to be anything but a tailor," he says, "so when I showed an interest in the sciences, they urged me to train to be a doctor." He got a place at University College London to study medicine. And didn't leave. "I was talking to William Rushton - the great physiologist, not the humorist - at a conference in Windsor Great Park," he continues, "and he was telling me how much he regretted having interrupted his research for 10 years to do clinical work. He suggested to me that I was a like mind, who wouldn't fit in well with the hospital ethos of the time, where everyone was supposed to kow-tow to the consultants. So I signed up to do research." With a bit of luck and a lot of talent, his career quickly got off the ground. In the late 1950s, junior researchers didn't have much say in what field they studied; rather, they were allocated to a team, and in 1958 Noble found himself working with Otto Hutter on the electrical properties of the heart. Within two years, he had made a significant breakthrough. Studying the potassium channels of the heart, he discovered that, whereas it had been previously thought that all the channels switched off, one switched on. From this, he reckoned it might be possible to do a systems analysis of the heart cells. "There was one large computer in the UCL basement and I had to beg to be allowed to use it to do the calculations," he says. "Initially I was refused, because they said my maths and computing skills weren't good enough. So I spent three months getting myself up to speed and eventually they allocated me the graveyard slot of 2am-4am for six months." It paid off. Noble's research was published in Nature before he was awarded his doctorate, and on the strength of his growing reputation he was offered a tenured post as fellow of physiology at Balliol College, Oxford, while he was still in his 20s. From London to Oxford "It wasn't an easy decision to leave UCL," he says, "because UCL was one of the epicentres for physiology, with three Nobel laureates on staff." But leave London he did, and apart from one year's sabbatical, lecturing at various North American universities, he has remained in Oxford ever since, where he's gone on to develop the first working computational model of the heart. He has allowed himself to slack off a bit since the early days - though slacking is a relative concept in the Noble dictionary, as he's somehow found time to teach himself five languages (he can, if required, deliver lectures in French, Italian, Occitan, Japanese and Korean) not to mention buy and convert a share of a derelict barn in the Dordogne, form a singing group of Occitan troubadors in Oxford, and teach himself to meditate. Something that might just come in handy from time to time over the next four years. Curriculum vitae Age: 72 Job: president of the International Union of Physiological Sciences; emeritus professor and co-director of computational physiology, Oxford University Books: The Music of Life Likes: singing, meditation Dislikes: administration; over-regulation Married with two children guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Science | guardian.co.uk | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:19 am Sun Induces Strange 'Breathing' of Earth's Atmosphere
SAN FRANCISCO, California — New satellite observations have revealed a previously unknown rhythmic expansion and contraction of Earth's atmosphere on a nine-day cycle. This "breathing" corresponds to changes in the sun's magnetic fields as it completes rotations once every 27 days, NASA and University of Colorado, Boulder, scientists said Monday at the American Geophysical Union annual meeting. The sun's coronal holes, seen as dark regions in the image above, direct plasma away from the sun and out into the solar system. When these particles get to the Earth, they heat the upper atmosphere, causing the outer atmosphere to expand and contract. "What's going on in the solar side is indeed mysterious and challenges the solar physics understanding," said Stan Solomon, a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research who was not involved in the research. The finding emphasizes the many ways that solar activity impacts the Earth — and its increasingly space-utilizing humans. "From the Earth's perspective, we're in the sun's outer atmosphere," said Jeffrey Thayer, an aerospace engineer at UC-Boulder. The new discovery could help scientists and engineers design better satellites that account for the changing conditions in the ionosphere. Eventually, it might be possible to predict the severity of ionospheric storms and protect the world's communication infrastructure. The scientists used changes in the density of the Earth's atmosphere to pinpoint this previously unknown pattern. As the atmosphere contracts or expands, it also gets more or less dense, respectively. In response to the "hills and valleys of density," satellites subtly speed up or slow down, recording those motions with on-board accelerometers. And that's the data that allowed the scientists to back into the discovery of this new atmospheric cycle. Solomon said that while the cycle on Earth is interesting, the really strange aspect of this work is what it says about our local star. "What's going on in the sun that's causing all this?" Solomon said. "It's not entirely clear. That part of it is quite mysterious." See Also:
WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal's Twitter , Google Reader feed, and project site, Inventing Green: the lost history of American clean tech; Wired Science on Facebook. Image: Credit, NASA, Solar and Heliospheric Observatory Source: Wired: Wired Science | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:17 am Only one in 10 people with multiple sclerosis are being treated with key drug, government admitsOnly around one in 10 of those who are eligible for a new drug to treat multiple sclerosis are getting it, even though it was approved a year ago for use in the NHS, the Guardian has been told. Natalizumab, which goes by the brand name Tysabri, is the first drug that the National Institute for Clinical Excellence has approved for multiple sclerosis. MS is a disease of the central nervous system which can progress from tingling and numbness of the limbs to blindness and paralysis. There is no cure, but the drug slows the progression of the disease in some of the most severe cases. But in an answer to a parliamentary question put by the Liberal Democrat MP Paul Burstow, the government said between 100 and 300 people were getting the drug as of March this year, out of a possible 2,000 who could benefit from it. "It is incredibly difficult to understand how, more than a year on from the Nice positive decision, treatment can still be withheld from eligible patients," said Dr Jayne Spink, director of policy and research at the MS Society. Some delays may be due to the need to give the drug as an hour-long intravenous infusion, which means there must be a suitable place available. Two women in West Yorkshire are still waiting to get Tysabri. Penny Copley, 42, was offered it by her consultant in July last year, but has not begun treatment. "It has been tested and proven and put on the register by Nice. What's the point of Nice doing that if the hospitals are not on board?" she said. Having multiple sclerosis "is not like the common cold", she said. "It's something I have got for life and I'm trying to better my life." She and Ruth Penrose, 43, are members of an MS support group called Pins and Needles and are aware that some hospitals are offering Tysabri while their own, Pinderfields General hospital in Wakefield, has so far failed to treat them. Primary care trusts have three months to implement Nice guidance, which would have run out in November last year, said Ms Penrose. "Nothing was done about it until Penny and I decided to write a letter to the PCT," she said. "Then they said they would implement Tysabri as soon as they had found a safe and sustainable environment." The Department of Health said the choice of treatment was up to the clinician and patient. "The government has made it clear that the local NHS is required to provide funding for treatments and drugs recommended by Nice within three months of the Nice technology appraisal guidance being published," a spokesman said. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Science | guardian.co.uk | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:13 am Romans fought in north in 3rd century, dig showsSpears and arrowheads found on north German battlefield suggest fighting occurred later than thoughtSource: Science | guardian.co.uk | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:13 am Climate change may make Humboldt squid easy preyOne of the most formidable predators in the Pacific ocean, the Humboldt squid, may become more vulnerable to attacks from other marine beasts as changing water conditions make them more sluggish swimmers, a study has found. As human activities increase the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the level in the oceans also rise. Scientists believe this will make the squid lethargic, and so less able to outswim their own predators, including sperm whales that feed heavily on the creatures. Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas) can grow up to 2m long and hunt in shoals of more than a thousand. Scientists have recorded the creatures, which are found in waters from Alaska to Patagonia, swimming at more than 20kmh (13mph). In the daytime, the squid are forced to dive deep to prey on lantern fish, but because deeper waters are starved of oxygen, the squid must return to the surface at night to recover. Rui Rosa at the University of Lisbon netted Humboldt squid off the coast of California and transferred them to water tanks aboard the team's research vessel to examine how they coped with different levels of carbon dioxide in water. Rosa found that when the squid swim in oxygen-starved waters, they survive by slowing down their metabolism by up to 80%. When Rosa simulated carbon dioxide levels predicted for oceans at the end of the century, he found the squid slowed their metabolism again, by around 30%, and became almost half as active. "Their metabolism will drop with ocean acidification because there is more carbon dioxide in the water," Rosa said. "The squid will be more lethargic and so more vulnerable to their predators because they won't be able to escape them any more." The study appears in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have risen from pre-industrial levels of 280 parts per million to more than 380ppm today, much of which is absorbed by the oceans. Rosa said more acidic waters will also constrict the habitat of the Humboldt squid, by making them less able to hunt at depth, or in surface waters, which could have serious knock-on effects for the wider marine ecosystem. "These squid will probably have to migrate to find more suitable waters, and since they are the main prey for sperm whales, that could significantly alter the marine foodweb," Rosa said. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Science | guardian.co.uk | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:05 am Nuclear labNew innovations make the clean-up easierSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 16 Dec 2008 | 12:00 am NASA Needs a New Direction, Says Independent Review Panel
American human spaceflight is at a turning point, and its future looks a bit shaky. The space shuttle is soon to retire, the replacement moon- and Mars-bound Constellation is yet to get off the ground, and the next president could drastically redefine the plan for NASA. A new report released today by the Space, Policy and Society Research Group at MIT, based on a two-year independent review, offers recommendations for the future of this country's human spaceflight program. Though the review panel has some sharp criticisms of NASA's current direction, it also found cause for hope. "Our major recommendation is that the Obama administration should rethink the Bush plan," said MIT technology historian David Mindell, who led the review. "The problem with the current plan is that it's overambitious and underfunded and not really thought through. Our recommendation is that the Obama team issue a new policy." The review team, made up of historians, engineers, policy analysts, and even a former astronaut, recently met with members of Obama's transition team and politicians on Capitol Hill. In general, the politicians expressed uncertainty about how to carry the space program forward, but definite enthusiasm for its future, Mindell said. NASA's current plan, outlined by President Bush in 2004 under his "Vision for Space Exploration," is to get humans back to the moon and then on to Mars with the Constellation program, and to complete the International Space Station and retire the space shuttle by 2010. These goals are unattainable with NASA's current budget, the review team concluded. "The catch phrase has been 'too much with too little' – that's from the Columbia accident report," Mindell told Wired.com. "The Bush plan has never been funded with the degree it was supposed to. We’re not trying to make a case that NASA’s budget needs to be doubled, because that's just not viable in this environment. But going on the path they're going on is going to kill people, simple as that." Either NASA must get more money, the agency's goals must be scaled down, or serious safety risks will be inevitable, the review team found. The team also recommended more international collaboration, especially with nations such as China and India whose human space programs are ramping up. "The current plan is very much the U.S. goes it all by itself," Mindell said. "We'll meet you on the moon. But we stress that not just international cooperation, but U.S. leadership, in the sense of really being a country that brings other countries along, is much more suited to U.S. interests." And in the spirit of cooperation, the United States shouldn't pull out of the space station in 2010, six years ahead of the original planned end date, before the station is fully completed or has had a chance to be used for all the research it was designed for, the report says. Other countries that have invested significantly in the space station program would be left in the lurch, and international partnerships could be jeopardized. The team also advocates a better balance between manned and robotic missions. There are some situations where sending a human is best, both scientifically and for the purpose of exploration and national pride. But there are other times when robots can accomplish the same thing more safely and cheaply. "I think that the human programs right now are 100 percent human programs," Mindell said. "They should be mixes of human and robotic. For example, if you look at the current programs, the space shuttle can’t fly automated. That’s ridiculous. If it could, we could be sending heavy cargoes up with the shuttle and sending people on a safer system." All this criticism can sound a bit dire. Plus, the public's love affair with the space program seems to have waned since the glory days of Apollo. But Mindell insists the future is still bright for NASA. "I think there's a lot of new interest in space," he said. "NASA's building new hardware for the first time in a generation. Students are going into aerospace engineering in a way they weren't five years ago. There is a kind of new space age coming, and it's all very exciting." See Also:
Image: NASA Source: Wired: Wired Science | 15 Dec 2008 | 11:57 pm Bacterial Behavior in Space Hints at Disease-Busting Hacks
Like a Kubrickian psychodrama retold at the microbial scale, zero-gravity physics seems to trigger salmonella's dark side, making the food-poisoning bug more virulent when cultured in space. But there may be a happy ending: Depending on what salmonella itself is fed, it can become less virulent — a trait that hints at new ways of weakening Earthly disease. "There's more to this than worrying about food poisoning in space," said Arizona State University microbiologist Cheryl Nickerson. "We're opening new doors to understanding how pathogens in general are causing disease." Nickerson showed last year that salmonella became more contagious when cultured during a space shuttle voyage. Upon returning from a ride on the STS-115 space shuttle, unusually low doses were needed to infect mice: zero-gravity fluid dynamics seemed to trigger the same microbial attack mechanisms typically stimulated by the movement of fluid in our guts. The salmonella used in that research were grown in a nutrient-rich medium. Well-fed salmonella shot into space for Nickerson's latest study, published recently in PLoS One also became extra-virulent. This time, however, she also included a low-nutrient salmonella culture — and those bacteria proved to be far less virulent than their well-fed counterparts. In both cultures, many of the same gene families were triggered, suggesting some sort of common master regulator that determines the response of salmonella to its environment. If that function exists in other bacteria and can be manipulated by scientists, it could be tweaked to make them less able to cause disease. "By identifying specific molecular mechanisms by which these organisms respond to stimuli in the space environment," said Michael Roberts, a NASA microbiologist who was not involved in the study, "the group has identified potential therapeutic targets for limiting the bacteria’s virulence inside our bodies." Also included in the latest experiment, carried on the March 2008 space shuttle mission STS-123, was a hybrid solution rich in five nutrients suspected by Nickerson of altering virulence: phosphate, magnesium, sulfate, chloride and potassium. Salmonella grown in this broth proved weak, and further testing in lab-simulated zero-gravity environments suggests that phosphate may be especially important for reducing virulence. That finding dovetails with another observation of Nickerson's: the master Hfq protein that controls dozens of other genes activated during the experiment is linked to phosphate uptake and may be a common response regulator to this environment. "We don't have a complete mechanistic understanding of this process, but we have some exciting clues," she said. "There are lots of bits and pieces that allow us to start putting together the puzzle." Roberts called the research "interesting and highly important." He noted that it could also be useful for protecting astronauts and future space explorers. "As we leave Earth to explore space and establish a sustained human presence beyond low-earth orbit, our constant companions will not only be along for the ride but will be evolving during the journey," Roberts said. Image: Salmonella bacteria (grown on Earth, not in space) / University of Wisconsin See Also:
WiSci 2.0: Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 15 Dec 2008 | 11:34 pm Massive Volcanic Eruptions Killed Off the Dinosaurs
The combination of studies on dinosaur fossils, magnetic signatures in rocks and the timing of the disappearance of different species suggest it was massive volcanic eruptions in India that belched sulfur into the air for around 10,000 years that did the beasts in. "We're discovering that huge lava flows which can be in volume more than thousands of cubic kilometers would have erupted in decades," said Vincent Courtillot of the University of Paris. "This is amazingly large flows, amazingly short time scales and amazing volcanic fluxes." The prevailing theory has been that an asteroid, around six miles across, hit the Yucatan peninsula 65 million years ago, throwing debris into the atmosphere, blocking the sun and chilling the planet to the point that nearly half of all species went extinct. The idea that the volcanism in India, known as the Deccan Traps, may have contributed to the mass extinction is not new, but scientists at the American Geophysical Union meeting this week think the eruptions may be the sole cause of the die-offs and that the asteroid had little or no affect on life at all. "If there had been no impact, we think there would have been a massive extinction anyway," Courtillot said. Courtillot has studied the magnetic signatures of the Indian volcanic deposits that lined up with the Earth's magnetic field as they cooled. Because the orientation of the magnetic field has changed over time, lava that cooled at different times will have different signatures. The more than 2-mile thick pile of Deccan Traps deposits has several major pulses that occurred over the course of several decades each, almost certainly less than a hundred years. And the entire sequence was erupted in less than 10,000 years, rather than the million years or more that has been suggested. All told, this would have put ten times more climate-changing emissions into the atmosphere than the asteroid impact. Also supporting the volcanic theory is fossil evidence from Texas and Mexico that most of the species extinctions coincided with the final pulse of eruptions, not with the asteroid impact, which may have occurred some 300,000 years earlier, according to Gerta Keller of Princeton University. "There is essentially no extinction associated with the impact," Keller said. Evidence that dinosaurs survived in India right up to the final volcanic onslaught further bolsters the case. But it will take a lot of evidence to convince the bulk of the scientific community that the asteroid theory is wrong. "There was volcanism at the time. There's always volcanism, but that impact is so significant that you can't ignore it," said Rick Firestone of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who studies the link between impacts and extinctions. "The only question is, were there other things that happened as result of it." See Also:
Image: Deccan Traps volcanic deposits. Gerta Keller/Princeton University Source: Wired: Wired Science | 15 Dec 2008 | 11:24 pm History Repeats: How 2008 Reflected the PastFor all the talk about change, everything old seemed oddly new again in 2008.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 10:18 pm Future of Jumbo Squid Questioned (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - The effects of climate change on the ocean could squeeze the jumbo squid out of its habitat, a new study suggests. As carbon dioxide from power plants, automobiles and other sources has built up in Earth's atmosphere since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, nearly half of it has been absorbed by the ocean, gradually turning the waters more acidic. ...Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 15 Dec 2008 | 10:09 pm Future of Jumbo Squid QuestionedRising carbon dioxide levels and expanding ocean minimum zone in ocean could force squids out of habitat.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 10:01 pm Lightning-Storm Gamma Rays Could Harm Air Travelers
About every 3000 hours of flying time, a plane is hit with a bolt of lightning. Recently, spacecraft have found gamma rays can be created by thunder storms, and according to new research presented at the American Geophysical Union annual meeting this week, the rays could be intense enough to cause radiation sickness. "Everywhere we look, we're seeing x-rays and gamma rays flying out of thunderstorms and lightning," said Joseph Dwyer, a physicist at the Florida Institute of Technology and lead author of the study. "The gamma rays coming out of thunderstorms are so intense we can measure these 600 kilometers away and so bright that it almost blinds the spacecraft." Finding particles flying around at what physicsts call "ultrarelativistic speeds,," i.e. very close to the speed of light, came as a shocker to physicists. Gamma rays had previously been associated with only the most extreme environments in the universe, like supernovae. Now, scientists believe that about 50 terrestrial gamma ray flashes occur per day on Earth. It turns out that these highly-energetic particles can be created by thunderstorms at altitudes that airplanes regularly fly. While planes generally avoid thunderclouds, sometimes they get surprised or can't avoid them. And it's those situations that worry Dwyer. "We just don't know enough. The consequences are bad enough that people could potentially get hurt from this," he said. "This is a call for more research. We really need to find out where we are and how big these things are. Could people be hit by these things and get sick? And how would you know?" His team and others across the country have measured the number of gamma rays that reach satellite observatories, which has allowed them to back into how many particles are created in the thunderstorms. What remains unclear is just how large and concentrated the source of the gamma rays is. If it's large — hundreds of meters across — then airplane passengers are probably safe. But if the gamma rays are created in a small area, they could be delivering doses of radiation in one millisecond that are many times beyond what the government sees as safe. "If the source is a little bit smaller — and there are some arguments you can make that the source should be smaller — then the dose someone would get inside an aircraft, through a quarter inch of aluminum, is getting to the point where we'd be worried." Dwyer's data shows that as the size of the gamma ray source shrinks under 100 meters across, the dose of radiation accelerates to levels that could cause very serious radiation sickness — and even death. Dwyer is a leader in the emerging field of terrestrial gamma rays
who has refined scientists' notions of how lightning works. Back in
2003, while experimenting with triggering lightning by launching specialized rockets into clouds, his team accidentally triggered a gamma ray flash. "His stuff is fabulous," Dave Sentman, a physicist at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, who also studies terrestrial gamma rays. Sentman noted that Dwyer, trained as a nuclear physicist, has a different perspective on the atmospheric physics than most of their colleagues, which has allowed him to gain insight into the high-energy particles "He has a different way of thinking," Sentman said. Image: flickr/syne See Also:
WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal's Twitter , Google Reader feed, and project site, Inventing Green: the lost history of American clean tech; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 15 Dec 2008 | 9:34 pm Dinosaur Killer May Have Been Volcanism, Not AsteroidMore evidence that volcanism, not a space rock, may be the culprit behind the dinosaurs' demise.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 9:11 pm How to Pick Athletic Superstars at Age 1 (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - Of all of the decisions parents face regarding their children's future, choosing between shoulder pads or running shoes for their Christmas present seems trivial. Well, according to Kevin Reilly, president of Atlas Sports Genetics, this is a decision you should not take lightly.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 15 Dec 2008 | 8:50 pm Breeding Owls Defecate StrategicallyThe owl's body waste does not always go to waste.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 8:44 pm Found: World's Oldest Spider WebAn ancient spider web is found encased in a prehistoric piece of amber.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 15 Dec 2008 | 8:05 pm BLOG: Good News for Polar Bears?Polar bears migrating in a warmer climate may find a new source of food: goose eggs.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 15 Dec 2008 | 8:05 pm Welcome to the Star Party! - Intro: What a Telescope DoesIn this helpful guide to amateur astronomy, the friendly crew of Orion Telescopes and Binoculars introduce you to the night sky and how to best observe it.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 7:56 pm Study finds six new gene mutations linked to obesityWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Researchers have identified at least six new gene mutations linked to obesity and said on Sunday they point to ways the brain and nervous system control eating and metabolism.Source: Reuters: Science News | 15 Dec 2008 | 7:17 pm First-Ever Photo of Liquid on Extraterrestrial World
The photo is evidence that liquids may exist on the surface of other planets and moons, not just frozen lakes. And liquid is more likely habitat for extraterrestrial life. Among the pictures snapped by the Huygens probe after landing on Saturn's moon Titan in 2005, one appears to show a dewdrop made of methane that briefly formed on the edge of the probe itself (indicated by arrow at bottom of image on right). Scientists think heat from the probe caused humid air to rise and condense on the cold edge of the craft. Though Huygens may have helped produce it, the methane drop is still the first liquid directly detected at a surface anywhere beyond Earth. Like Earth, Titan has clouds, lakes and river channels, and it may be the only other place in the solar system where liquid evaporates from the surface and returns as rain. "Aside from Earth, it's the most exciting world there is," said lead author Erich Karkoschka of the University of Arizona in Tucson. The Cassini space probe, which took data from above the moon after separating from the Huygens lander, detected what scientists believe are lakes of liquid methane on Titan's surface. Microbes that eat methane thrive on Earth, and scientists think pools of methane could be comfortable homes for similar organisms on Titan. Because Titan's current atmosphere is a lot like the early Earth's, the lakes could be a lab for studying the origins and early evolution of life. Astronomers have speculated since they found methane in the atmosphere in 1983 about whether the moon's methane rain falls in violent thunderstorms, light drizzles or some other form. So far, no one has caught it on camera. The hundreds of images snapped by Huygens, from the time it hit the atmosphere until its power ran out an hour after it landed, revealed only faint, wispy clouds that looked nothing like rain clouds, Karkoschka said. None of the images showed evidence that it had rained during the previous few years, according to an analysis to be published in the journal Icarus. And some images suggested that Titan’s lower atmosphere was full of small dust particles, which would have been cleared out by rain. But the scientists noticed light splotches in some of the pictures that hadn't been there moments before. Some of them had spots that initially looked like raindrops because of their uniform size and smooth edges, but analysis showed they were most likely electronic imprints created by cosmic rays. However, Karkoschka said, "One of those spots was so big that it really cannot be a cosmic ray." He concluded that it was a real, short-lived dewdrop, so close to the camera that it must have condensed on a cold metal shield designed to protect the camera lens from direct sunlight. Robert West, a planetary scientist at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, California, thinks the dewdrop is "a cute observation," but he's more interested in the lack of rainfall. "There are reports in the literature that concluded there is a drizzle going on near the surface," he said. "The fact that Huygens didn’t find anything is significant." — Lisa Grossman for Wired.com See Also:
Image: The dewdrop, which condensed on the edge of the Huygens Probe, is in the bottom left corner of the right-hand image, marked by a long arrow. The other splotches (shorter arrows) turned out to be noise from cosmic rays./JPL, University of Arizona Source: Wired: Wired Science | 15 Dec 2008 | 6:31 pm Ancient armored amphibian had world's oddest biteWASHINGTON (Reuters) - A peculiar amphibian that was clad in bony armor prowled warm lakes 210 million years ago, catching fish and other tasty snacks with one of the most unusual bites in the history of life on Earth.Source: Reuters: Science News | 15 Dec 2008 | 6:06 pm Goose Eggs Could Save Polar BearsA new study finds that a rebounding goose population could provide eggs to feed some polar bears whose icy habitat is melting.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 5:57 pm Virgin Galactic tests rocket mothershipFlight International has got hold of the first video footage of the aircraft that will carry Virgin Galactic's space tourists to blast-off altitude. The two-hulled aircraft, which will carry passengers in SpaceShipTwo, was unveilled by Virgin Galactic – Richard Brason's Spaceline – in July. According to the magazine's blog:
A flight test of the vehicle is expected on Friday 19 December. Two weeks ago, Virgin Galactic's president Will Whitehorn revealed how SpaceShipTwo and WhiteKnightTwo nearly did not happen. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Science | guardian.co.uk | 15 Dec 2008 | 5:39 pm EU fish stocks at risk of collapse, warns leading scientistEuropean fisheries are at risk of widespread collapse if responsibility for setting catch sizes is not given over to an independent body, a leading marine scientist said today. The warning follows research that reveals EU ministers have consistently ignored scientific advice on catch limits, and agreed quotas up to 140% higher than sustainable levels. The systematic mismanagement of fisheries was akin to a "doctor assisting the suicide of a patient", that ultimately "condemns the fishing industry to extinction," said Callum Roberts, professor of marine conservation at the University of York. The bleak assessment of the health of Europe's fisheries comes as EU ministers prepare to agree new quotas later this week. In the 1970s, three quarters of Europe's fisheries were in a healthy or slightly at risk state, but today more than half are in danger. Despite scientific advice, which in some cases, such as cod, has called for complete regional bans on fishing, ministers continue to argue for quotas above sustainable levels. Fish stocks and sustainable catch limits are determined each year by scientists at the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES), but ministers use this only as a starting point when they meet to decide annual fishing quotas. Roberts argues that instead of deciding quotas, ministers should only be involved in working how the scientifically-agreed catch limits are divided among member states. "It's better to have the decision making independent of politics and independent of industry. If we don't change our ways we'll have less and less to catch and we'll end up eating plankton," he said. Research by Roberts's team at York shows that quotas set by EU ministers over the past 10 years have exceeded limits proposed by scientists by 45% for cod, 140% for hake, 93.6% for prawns and 14% for plaice. "It's a waste of taxpayer's money to do all this research on fish stocks and then ignore it," Roberts said. Mike Kaiser, a marine conservationist at the University of Bangor said that some fisheries were beginning to understand the importance of managing fish stocks sustainably, but said the European Commission must take the lead on tackling the issue of dwindling stocks. "We've got to the point now in the UK where we realise that things have got to change. The problem is that's only one nation. If we are rowing against the tide as a nation it'll have very little impact," he said. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2008 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Science | guardian.co.uk | 15 Dec 2008 | 5:30 pm BLOG: Baby Gorilla Born in San Fran ZooSee pictures of a new baby boy gorilla just born at the San Francisco Zoo.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 15 Dec 2008 | 5:12 pm More Than 1,000 Species Found in MekongFrom snakes to giant spiders, hundreds of species are found in the Mekong region.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 15 Dec 2008 | 3:50 pm The Yawn Explained: It Cools Your BrainLike a computer, your brain can overheat. But instead of a fan, it has the yawn.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 15 Dec 2008 | 3:45 pm Plans to Scorch Trash With Plasma Facing HurdlesPlans to use 10,000-degree plasma to vaporize trash into energy face opposition.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 15 Dec 2008 | 3:05 pm Whales' teeth are aid to matingThe bizarre teeth of male beaked whales have evolved to help females choose the right mate, research suggests.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 15 Dec 2008 | 2:42 pm Clean Power Tapped From Swirling CurrentsA new machine converts powerful eddies into clean, renewable energy.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 15 Dec 2008 | 2:30 pm How to Pick Athletic Superstars at Age 1Genetic tests could reveal kids destined to star in certain sports, so that parents could direct them to that activity early on.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 2:24 pm Wisdom: We Still Don't Get ItThere is more information than ever before, yet we’re none the wiser. How do we know that?Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 2:23 pm 'Parowan Prophet' Predicts U.S. Will Be Nuked by ChristmasThe prophecy of Leland Freeborn, Parowan Prophet: Obama's election will cause riots and a nuclear attack.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 1:46 pm Found: The Dimmest Bulbs in SpaceThe faintest star-like objects have been discovered.Source: Livescience.com | 15 Dec 2008 | 1:23 pm
|
