How Ebola Virus Avoids The Immune System

Researchers have likely found one reason why the Ebola virus is such a powerful, deadly, and effective virus. Using a cell culture model for Ebola virus infection, they have discovered that the virus disables a cellular protein called tetherin that normally can block the spread of virus from cell to cell.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2009 | 1:00 am

Although Our Genetics Differ Significantly, We All Look Alike

The genetic variation within a species can be significant, but very little of that variation results in clear differences in morphology or other phenotypes. Much of the diversity remains hidden 'under the surface' in buffered form.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2009 | 1:00 am

High Hormone Levels In Women May Lead To Infidelity, Study Shows

Women with high levels of the sex hormone oestradiol may engage in opportunistic mating, according to a new study.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2009 | 1:00 am

Did I See What I Think I Saw?

Research increasingly suggests that eyewitness testimony may not be as accurate as we would like it to be. A new study examining how false information following a recall test affects volunteers' memories of a witnessed event suggests that recalled information is prone to distortion. These results suggest that the recall test may have improved subjects' ability to learn the false information -- that it enhanced learning of new and erroneous information.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2009 | 1:00 am

Help Possible For People Obsessed With Imaginary Physical Flaws

Worrying about a bad hair day or idly wishing for a more-perfect profile: we've all been there. However, people suffering from body dysmorphic disorder go far beyond that, obsessing over exaggerated or even imaginary physical defects, to the point where it affects their ability to work, attend school or have ordinary social contacts.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2009 | 1:00 am

Umbilical Cord Protein Analysis Detects Early Onset Infection

Researchers have identified proteins associated with early onset neonatal sepsis (EONS), a stealthy bacterial infection linked to premature birth, illness and death. Using protein analysis, the researchers have found the biomarkers that can provide key information on how EONS develops.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2009 | 1:00 am

Autism Spectrum Disorder May Be More Prevalent Among Children Born Very Prematurely

Children born more than three months premature, are at three times the risk for screening positive on the modified checklist for autism in toddlers (M-CHAT). Children who screen positive on M-CHAT may be at greater risk for developing autism.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 10:00 pm

Dinosaur Fossils Fit Perfectly Into The Evolutionary Tree Of Life, Study Finds

A recent study by researchers in England has found that scientists' knowledge of the evolution of dinosaurs is remarkably complete.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 10:00 pm

New Function Of Protein In Cellular Respiration Identified

Researchers have found that the protein Stat3 plays a key role in regulating mitochondria, the energy-producing machines of cells. This discovery could one day lead to the development of new treatments for heart disease to boost energy in failing heart muscle or to master the abnormal metabolism of cancer.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 10:00 pm

Simple Reasoning Strategies Can Be As Precise As Complex Ones

We go into a restaurant with the aim of eating healthily. The menu does not tell us much about fats, salt or additives contained in the dishes. So how do we make the best decision? Psychologists have analyzed the influence that inferences about missing information can have on the accuracy of our decisions.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 10:00 pm

GPS-Laced Footballs to Offer Keen Play by Play

A football embedded with satellite positioning sensors will beam its location, in real time.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 30 Jan 2009 | 2:10 pm

Stem Cell Transplants Help MS Victims (HealthDay)

HealthDay - THURSDAY, Jan. 29 (HealthDay News) -- Stem cell transplantation seems to stop and, in some cases, undo neurological damage in people with multiple sclerosis, a small study shows.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 2:03 pm

Underground Particles Forecast Winter Storms

Scientists consult a strange source -- cosmic rays -- to predict winter weather.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 30 Jan 2009 | 2:02 pm

The Nation's Weather (AP)

AP - Scattered snow showers were forecast across the Northeast and the upper Midwest on Friday, while the Southwest was expected to be warm and the Northwest was predicted to be wet.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:34 pm

Alaskans brace for Redoubt Volcano eruption (AP)

AP - Hardware stores and auto parts shops scored a post-holiday run of business this week as Anchorage-area residents stocked up on protective eyewear and masks ahead of a possible eruption of Mount Redoubt.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:32 pm

Gore hails Obama's climate goals despite crisis (AP)

AP - Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore urged President Barack Obama and other world leaders to seal a quick deal to fight global warming despite the pervasive financial crisis.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 11:27 am

Indian wind power giant Suzlon swings to Q3 loss (AFP)

AFP - Suzlon Energy posted a third-quarter loss as it was hit by foreign exchange losses and payments to replace faulty equipment but forecast a recovery in 2010.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 8:56 am

Dolphins are capable sea chefs, scientists say

CANBERRA (Reuters) - Dolphins are the chefs of the seas, having been seen going through precise and elaborate preparations to rid cuttlefish of ink and bone to produce a soft meal of calamari, Australian scientists say.
Source: Reuters: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 5:42 am

MS stem-cell treatment 'success'

Stem-cell transplants may control and even reverse multiple sclerosis symptoms if done early in the disease, a study suggests.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 30 Jan 2009 | 2:21 am

Who Says Green Can't Be Mean?

World's fastest electric car screams.
Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2009 | 1:34 am

Common chemical causes locusts to swarm (AP)

AP - A chemical that affects people's moods also can transform easygoing desert locusts into terrifying swarms that ravage the countryside, scientists report. "Here we have a solitary and lonely creature, the desert locust. But just give them a little serotonin, and they go and join a gang," observed Malcolm Burrows of the University of Cambridge in England.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 1:15 am

SKorean firm says it cloned dogs using stem cells (AP)

AP - A South Korean biotech company claimed Thursday to have cloned dogs using a stem cell technology for the first time in the world. Seoul-based RNL Bio said it created two black puppies this week using stem cells from fat tissue of a female beagle, in cooperation with a team of Seoul National University scientists who created the world's first cloned canine — Snuppy — in 2005.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 1:15 am

UK energy saving policy 'failing'

The UK government is failing to support the measures needed to meet its energy saving targets, an expert warns.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 30 Jan 2009 | 1:15 am

Liberia plague

Farmer tells how army worms left him with nothing
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:29 am

Study shows what makes locusts swarm

LONDON (Reuters) - A brain chemical that lifts people out of depression can transform solitary grasshoppers into swarming desert locusts, a finding that could one day help prevent the devastating plagues, researchers said on Thursday.
Source: Reuters: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:16 am

Stem cell transplants show promise for MS: study

CHICAGO (Reuters) - U.S. researchers have reversed multiple sclerosis symptoms in early stage patients by using bone marrow stem cell transplants to reset the immune system, they said on Thursday.
Source: Reuters: Science News | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:11 am

Ponder your putt too long and you may make things worse

Golfers who think too much about their technique between shots could be seriously affecting their performance, a study suggests.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:10 am

Sarah Boseley on why stem cells are the future of medicine

Thomas B Okarma sat in his office in the San Francisco Bay area three days after the inauguration of President Barack Obama and announced a new dawn. In a global teleconference, the chief executive of Geron Corporation told the world it was on the cusp of a revolution in medical science that "will enable living cells to become tomorrow's pills". He foresaw stem cell therapies being manufactured, bottled and stacked in hospital freezers.

Geron had just won permission from the US regulator to inject embryonic stem cells into the damaged spines of people suffering total paralysis from the chest down. It was, he said, "an extraordinarily exciting event" that "marks the dawn of a new era in medical therapeutics".

Nobody thinks that these patients will pick up their blankets and walk, but trials in animals have been impressive. Paralysed rats have regained some use of their hind legs. And while the first-ever human study will involve just eight or 10 patients and focus on safety - not on whether it works - there is no doubt that yet another massive milestone on the road to stem cell or regenerative medicine has been passed.

"This places Geron at the forefront of the medical revolution," said Okarma. He was not talking about expensive, individually tailored one-off treatments, but about the mass production of stem cell therapies that would heal wounds and repair damaged organs and tissues, treat strokes, diabetes, heart disease and blindness. These would be, he said, products frozen in a vial in a hospital pharmacy ready for off-the-shelf use - just like a pill.

Ask how far away that day is, and most scientists will demur, urge caution and talk about decades. Okarma is a doctor, but he is also CEO of a Nasdaq-listed biotech company. Things, though, are undoubtedly moving fast and are set to speed up if President Obama, as is widely expected, lifts the Bush ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. Geron won the race for permission to carry out the first human trial using embryonic stem cells, but not by much. Hot on Okarma's heels is Professor Pete Coffey at the London Project to Cure Blindness, who is knocking on the doors of the British and European regulatory authorities, looking for permission to trial embryonic stem cells to save the sight of people with age-related macular degeneration, the most common cause of sight loss. And across the Channel, Philippe Menasché in Paris may be the first to use embryonic stem cells in people with heart failure.

Controversy over embryonic stem cells was predictable from the moment that Louise Brown, the first baby created through in-vitro fertilisation, was born in 1978. The IVF technique meant that embryos could exist outside the womb. Inevitably more embryos are created than are needed, and many couples are willing to donate the surplus to science if they understand that the research could lead to cures for killer diseases.

These embryos are allowed to develop for only a few days, to the stage known as "blastocyst", when they are a ball of cells the size of a full stop. At that point, the crucial stem cells can be removed and kept in a culture, where they multiply prolifically without differentiating (turning into cells with a specific function, be it in the blood, the leg or the eye). Scientists can then trick them into becoming the specific cells they need, before injecting or inserting them into the right bit of the body.

Inevitably, there are many people, most of them with religious beliefs, who believe this is experimentation on an unborn child. While the UK has broadly accepted embryonic stem cell research, with strict regulation, President Bush in 2001 refused federal funding on any except some 60 existing stem cell lines.

But stem cells are not only found in embryos. Recently there have also been some striking developments using adult stem cells, the sort we all have in our bone marrow, which are still capable of becoming certain sorts of blood and tissue. In November it was revealed that Claudia Castillo, a 30-year-old mother of two whose lungs were so damaged by tuberculosis that she could hardly climb stairs, now goes dancing following a pioneering operation in Barcelona to transplant a section of her windpipe, made out of her own stem cells.

Castillo's operation involved the removal of stem cells from the bone marrow in her hip, which were engineered to turn into cartilage and then seeded on to a piece of donated windpipe. Because her body recognised the organ as her own, she was spared a lifetime of drugs to suppress the immune system.

Spectacular as it was, this cost a small fortune. Doctors and scientists from world-class centres in Spain, the UK and Italy took part with all the enthusiasm and disregard of expense that goes with proving a point in cutting-edge science. Afterwards, Professor Anthony Hollander of Bristol University, and one of the scientists involved, reflected, as well he might, that "the trick is to develop ways of scaling up".

Stem cell science is beginning to move from the lab into the hospital, and with remarkable results, but one of the big questions that exercises more pragmatic scientists is whether it can be affordable for most of us. The occasional tour de force, such as Castillo's return to the dancefloor, shows what is possible but will change outcomes for only a lucky few.

"Are we investing a lot of money in something that in the end could only be used by an elite group in society?" asks Austin Smith, Medical Research Council professor of stem cell biology at Edinburgh University. "That's a concern. It would be very frustrating for us if, at the end of all of that, it is not really taken up."

But, he says, he could see situations where society simply would not be able to say no. "If there really was a cure for muscular dystrophy, or for diabetes - which I think is the one for which we are most likely to see a cell therapy - almost whatever the cost, society will have to find a way of providing it and it won't be acceptable if it is only for rich people. But how that will be achieved is difficult to see at the moment."

No other breakthrough would have quite the impact in the public mind as that of healing spinal injury, not least because of the tragic case of Christopher Reeve, the actor best known for playing Superman, who was paralysed after falling from a horse and devoted all his money and the rest of his life to urging scientists on and who opposed the Bush funding ban. "No obstacle should stand in the way of responsible investigation of their [stem cells] possibilities," he wrote shortly before his death in 2004.

But it is likely that the first embryonic stem cell therapy to become widely available will come from Britain, and will change the lives of grandparents by turning back the clock and enabling those who were going blind to see. The work being done by Coffey, who is based at the University College London Institute of Ophthalmology, has the beauty of simplicity. Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is caused by the deterioration of retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells at the back of the eye. These cells form a layer that processes light, and do not need to be linked in to the nervous system and the brain. "We're not having to reconnect cells to a neural network," says Coffey. "This is a carpet of cells." He and his team have done it very successfully in animals, he says. They have persuaded embryonic stem cells to turn into RPE cells and in effect laid a new carpet.

"We're now manufacturing the cells to clinical standard so we can go into trials in 2010/11," he says, adding with enthusiasm that it is do-able because they need relatively few. "We only need 40,000 cells. It sounds an awful lot but if you think of a computer mouse," he says, looking around the room for something the right size, "if you grew the cells in it you could provide easily enough for 100,000 patients. The scale-up is relatively simple."

Coffey thinks this therapy has a good chance of success. A quarter of pensioners will hope he is right. That's how many over-65s get AMD. And while there is a new (very expensive) drug called Lucentis for one form of the disease, it is not a cure. AMD is, as he says, "a huge problem".

But funding has not been easy. Coffey was kept afloat by the UK's Macular Disease Society, which gave him £50,000 at a tricky point. Otherwise the money has come from philanthropic donors in the US, of whom Bush's ban made sure there was no shortage.

Interestingly, if it proves to be a cure for macular degeneration, this therapy is likely to be affordable. Not only that, it will save the NHS a lot of money. The costs of surgery, Coffey reckons, will be about £4,000-£5,000, but the patch of cells itself could cost as little as £250. Lucentis costs £800 to £1,500 for each injection every four to six weeks. "But this is a cure - not like Lucentis," says Coffey. That's the argument that has at last caused the big pharma companies to sit up and take notice. For years they steered clear of biotechnology. Living tissue was of far less interest to them than chemical compounds that patients would take for years. But a new reality is dawning. Stem cell therapies could drive their drugs off the market.

"We are changing the paradigm," says Professor Chris Mason of University College London, who is on the steering committee of the UK National Stem Cell Network which co-ordinates research. "Until now, pharmaceutical companies did wonder drugs that treated symptoms. What we really want is a cure."

So instead of drugs for life following heart failure, we could have stem cell therapies that repair the tissue so that drugs are not needed. Instead of drugs for Parkinson's, we could have neural cells dropped into the brain. Instead of insulin for diabetes, we could replace the malfunctioning pancreatic beta islet cells that are supposed to produce the insulin with new ones. This is why scientists now prefer the term regenerative medicine to stem cell therapy. The aim is to regenerate organs and tissues that have stopped working properly.

The writing is on the wall. "Big pharma has woken up to the fact that here is something that could displace the therapies they have got," says Mason. "If beta islet cells work, it would wipe out the market for insulin overnight." What they have also realised, he says, is that although you don't have patients on drugs for life, you can charge more for a cure than for a drug to treat symptoms.

One of the most significant recent developments is the interest from multinationals such as Pfizer, which announced before Christmas that it was investing $100m in regenerative medicine, setting up one business in Cambridge, UK, and another in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This takes regenerative medicine out of the realms of the theoretical. Where big pharma goes, products end up on the market.

Where is this all heading? Regenerating the eyes of the elderly, the spinal cords of the paralysed and the insulin-producing cells of the diabetic is undoubtedly wonderful medicine. But you can't help wondering whether there is a point at which regeneration would stop. Will we be able one day - in centuries to come - be able to replace any ageing tissue? At the very least, regenerative medicine offers the prospect of a far longer life. Immortality - should we want it - may take a little longer.

Know your stem cells

Embryonic stem cells

These come from surplus embryos created during fertility treatment. At four or five days old, the embryo is a ball of cells called a blastocyst, from which around 30 stem cells can be removed. These grow and divide under special conditions to stop them differentiating to become specific body tissues. By six months they have produced millions of embryonic stem cells.

Adult stem cells

There are stem cells in our bone marrow, brain, babies' cord blood, skin and liver - but few of them. They sit quietly until an injury, and then divide to become tissue to repair that part of the body. But some adult stem cells are more versatile. There are two sorts in bone marrow; one type can become blood cells and the other can become bone, fat, cartilage and connective tissue.

Induced pluripotent stem cells

Scientists are very excited by these, created by re-programming ordinary skin cells - basically, turning back the clock through genetic modification until the skin cell is restored to its original stem cell state. It was first done in late 2007, so much more needs to be done before they could safely be used in humans. The advantage is that people could be treated with their own cells and embryos are not involved; the disadvantage is that such therapies would have to be tailor-made and would therefore be more expensive.

The next targets for treatment

Strokes

British company ReNeuron has regulatory approval to start human trials this year using stem cells derived from those normally found in the brain. They will be injected into the brains of disabled people in a one-year trial of 12 patients, to test primarily for safety.

Diabetes

San Diego company Novocell has made pancreatic beta islet cells from embryonic stem cells, and are now in late animal studies. This treatment could mean diabetics no longer needed to inject insulin.

Crohn's disease

US company Osiris is in human trials using stem cells from bone marrow. The stem cells appear to combat inflammation in the gut, which is responsible for the disease.

Cornea transplants

People suffering from eye burns are being given adult stem cells from donated eyes. The cells repair the damage. Around 500 people have benefited so far.

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:01 am

Darwin's home nominated as world heritage site

To celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of the scientist who changed the world, the government will today nominate Charles Darwin's home in Kent, and the nearby woodlands, fields and ponds that have been called his landscape laboratory, as a world heritage site.

The designation, if accepted, will place Down House, the home where Darwin wrote On The Origin Of Species - in his study with an angled mirror to check for unwelcome visitors at the front door - beside the Pyramids and Stonehenge in the world's treasury of monuments to human genius.

His great-great-grandson Randall Keynes said yesterday that the designation was urgently needed to preserve a unique landscape from creeping suburbanisation.

The heritage site, near the village of Downe, would encompass the banks where Darwin gathered wild orchids to propagate and study in his glasshouses, the bog where he drew tiny insect-eating plants, and the pond where he collected mud to see what seeds would sprout.

"What is remarkable is the extent to which we can still walk in Darwin's footsteps, out from his own garden into the fields and woodlands which inspired him," said Keynes yesterday. "In a field where he recorded 13 species of orchid, we were still able to find 12. This is a landscape of small, secret, precious places, and you have to get out there into the fields, get your nose right down into the grass - and you will still see exactly what Darwin saw."

The culture secretary, Andy Burnham, who will today formally propose Darwin's landscape as Britain's only nomination this year for World Heritage status, said it was essential to have a list wider than outstanding landscapes such as the Grand Canyon. "The World Heritage Committee called for nominations to recognise and celebrate outstanding achievements of science, and Darwin's landscape laboratory nomination does just this."

Downe Bank, at the site, is a beautiful piece of chalk downland which in spring bears cowslips, wild violets, orchids and primroses. Now part of a nature reserve, it inspired the famous last passage in the Origin: "It is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with plants of many kinds, with birds singing in the buses, with various insects flitting about and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and so dependent on each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us. This planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, and from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful, and most wonderful, have been and are being evolved."

The nomination has been carefully formulated following disappointment two years ago when a version was withdraw after the government saw it would probably be rejected since the advisers to the Unesco council, which administers the list, were not convinced the site was of genuine scientific importance. The "landscape laboratory" description has been coined to help further efforts by the nomination group, which is led by Bromley council, working with the property's owner, English Heritage, as well as scientists, environmental experts and Keynes.

Darwin spent decades building on the observations rooted in his five-year voyage on HMS Beagle, which included the visit to the Galapagos and led him to the conclusion that plants and animals were the outcome of the natural selection of advantageous characteristics. He knew his work would mean confrontation with creationists.

Having moved to Down House in 1842 he rarely left for longer than a few days. He died in 1882. He had chosen the spot precisely for its wealth of wildlife habitat: "We are absolutely at the verge of the world," he wrote to his sister. Today Down's survival, preserved after the second world war by the introduction of the green belt, which stopped the march of the suburbs only a few miles north, is little short of a miracle.

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 30 Jan 2009 | 12:01 am

Green challenges

Recession casts doubt on carbon trading
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 29 Jan 2009 | 11:34 pm

Golf Tip: Putt, Don't Think

The conventional wisdom in golf is that if you overthink a shot, you may blow it.
Source: Livescience.com | 29 Jan 2009 | 11:17 pm

Suntan Drug Greenlighted for Trials

A drug that stimulates the body's tanning response — turning pasty skin caramel for up to two months  — has been approved for human trials, but not for tanning.

Although the drug will not be available for cosmetic purposes any time soon, similar compounds are already being widely abused on the pharmaceutical black market. The official product, a man made hormone called afamalenodtide, has received U.S. government approval to begin clinical trials.

"It's a bioabsorbable implant that you just inject into the skin," said Colin Mackie, director of business development for Clinuvel, the company bringing the drug to the U.S. "It stimulates melanin production."

Melanin is the body's natural pigment. It's responsible for the color of skin and protects humans from harmful solar radiation. The drug will be tested as a treatment for patients who face serious danger from the sun's rays, like those with rare genetic diseases or who must take immunosuppressants, Mackie said.

But online retailers already offer a similar (but not identical) compound under a more descriptive brand name, Melanotan II, which American and British health officials warn are already being abused.

"Using it could be dangerous to short and long-term health," British health officials said in November.  It has not been tested for safety, quality or effectiveness and we don't know the potential side effects yet."

This week two British Medical Journal researchers warned that injecting the compound could change the size and shape of moles, which under normal circumstances can be a precursor to skin cancer.

Melanotan's plight highlights the difficulty in bringing drugs with large recreational or cosmetic potential to market for decidedly more medical conditions. Before the drugs can make it through safety and efficacy trials, rogue users — almost like pre-release movie filesharers — begin to test the drug on themselves. These high-demand, off-label uses could make regulatory agencies reluctant to approve the pharmaceutical for legitimate uses.

Both Melanotan I and II are synthetic cousins of a naturally occurring hormone that stimulates the production of melanin, the skin's pigment. But Melanotan II, in particular, appears to have aphrodisiac and erectile function effects as well.

First created and tested back in the late '80s at the University of Arizona, the synthetic tanning hormone received media attention from around the world. Tom Brokaw, in a 1991 broadcast, said that medical researchers had announced "what could be the answer" to tanning without the skin damage associated with the process. Wired first featured melanotan back in 2002, dubbing it the "Barbie drug" for its purported ability to induce weight loss and increase libido. The label has stuck and is often used in the press

But the drugs were a good idea in search of a disease. Fair-skinned people's desire to be tan is not a disease, and the tanning behaviors it induces could cause skin damage and cancer. Now, though, Clinuvel has found five, admittedly obscure, medical conditions that the drug could treat.

Over the last several years, the Clinuvel's CEO, Philippe Wolgen, has battled to make his drug sound less and less sexy.

"This will not be a cosmetic drug,” Wolgen told a biotech trade publication last year. “I oppose systemic treatment for cosmetics.”

He changed the company's name from the provocative Epitan to the boring Clinuvel. It might not make for great advertising copy, but the CEO's moves appear to have paid off.

"The FDA's decision is a landmark event in Clinuvel's growth," Wolgen said in a release this week. "Today's progress reflects some of the choices we had to make in our program early on in 2006 when changing the direction of the company."

But even as he tries to position his drug to be taken seriously, industry analysts following his company know that the drug could be a blockbusters on the cosmetics market.

After all, once a drug is approved by the FDA for one purpose, it's easier to extend it to new conditions, just like the glaucoma-treatment turned eyelash enhancer.

"[Melanotan] has potential as a 'Life Style' drug for those millions of people who prefer just a darker tint," a German analyst wrote back in 2004 [pdf]. "Market research has shown that the product has blockbuster potential in particular when used as a 'Life Style' drug, which draws a strong comparison to Botox or Viagra, two products with booming sales today."

Hopeful tanners took it upon themselves to deliver on that blockbuster potential as Melanotan languished in the pharmaceutical industry's basement. 

Recent British media reports indicate widespread use of the compound. Purportedly, the drug is ordered online and comes in a white powder that is mixed with sterile water. That combination is injected into the abdomen.

One woman told the Daily Mail that she intended to keep using the injections despite their unknown provenance and possible side-effects.

"At first, injecting myself in my tummy seemed strange, but now I don’t even think about it — the needle is so fine I hardly feel it," she said. "And I am so pleased with the results that despite the adverse publicity I’m going to continue with them."

An online forum dedicated to Melanotan has more than 25,000 posts, most of which are about "Usage and Experimentation." Many describe detailed regimens for attaining darker skin and/or improved sexual function.

Here in the United States, Melanotan II appears widely available online, although the FDA warned Tennessee's Melanocorp, which bills its product as "100% US Made Melanotan II," to stop shipping to Americans in 2007. The company continues to ship to European countries.

The company provides a dozen or so purported before-and-after pictures, like the photo above. Though the results could be suspect, they look eerily similar to results obtained in trials at the University of Arizona or by Clinuvel (images at left). In early animal trials, injections of the drug caused a yellow dog's fur to become black and visibly darkened a frog's skin in minutes.

Image: Top: Melanocorp.com. Bottom: Clinuvel.

See Also:

• Bush Praises Skin to Stem Cell Breakthrough in State of the Union
• New Skin Gel Heals Wounds Faster, Reduces Scarring
• Skin Cell-to-Stem Cell Alchemy 'Like Turning Lead Into Gold ...
• Broccoli Juice Protects Against Ultraviolet Light
• Graphic Evidence Against Steroid Abuse

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 | 29 Jan 2009 | 10:22 pm

NASA Calls on Public to Vote For Hubble Telescope's Target (SPACE.com)

SPACE.com - NASA is turning control of the Hubble Space Telescope over to the general public to give non-scientists a chance to choose which target the iconic observatory should turn its camera eyes on next.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 29 Jan 2009 | 10:17 pm

Billions and Billions of Baby Stars

When Carl Sagan said there were billions and billions of stars, he wasn’t wrong. But just how many billions, we still don’t know.

Moreover, scientists would like to know how many of each size and type of star there is, and how our sun fits into the larger populations of stars in our galaxy and our universe.

To further that goal, astronomers recently used the CISCO infrared camera on the Subaru telescope in Hawaii to observe a region called W3 Main, a well known baby star factory. The new images revealed the area, located about 6,000 light years away in the constellation Cassiopeia, in unprecedented detail.

Studying star-forming regions is a good strategy for taking a census of stars, since most stars we see in these areas were formed at roughly the same time. When time is taken out of the equation, astronomers can get a better handle on how many stars of each mass range are formed, to discover which sizes are most common.

The new study of W3 Main found that very small stars, called Brown dwarfs, which have less mass than normal stars and don’t shine as brightly, are more common here than they seem to be in other regions of the galaxy. This finding suggests that the relative numbers of brown dwarfs may strongly vary across different areas of the Milky Way.

Most of the stars in W3 Main, however, are massive stars. These giant stars are visible as red lights at the left side of the image above. The bright clouds are made of ionized gas that reflects light from the shining stars nearby.

Image: Subaru, NAOJ

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 29 Jan 2009 | 10:14 pm

Most Cell Phones Not Wiped of Data Before Recycled

Over 99 percent contained everything from personal contacts to emails to banking information.
Source: Livescience.com | 29 Jan 2009 | 9:45 pm

S.Korean bio firm says dog cloning to be cheaper

SEOUL (Reuters) - Cloning a Chow Chow is expected to be easier and perhaps as much as 50 percent less costly, a South Korean biotech firm said on Thursday as it unveiled a new cloning technology.
Source: Reuters: Science News | 29 Jan 2009 | 9:36 pm

Study: Stem Cells Reverse Paralysis in Rats (LiveScience.com)

LiveScience.com - Transplanted adult stem cells have been found to reverse paralysis associated with spinal cord injuries in lab rats, a new study finds.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 29 Jan 2009 | 8:33 pm

Lowly worm offers new clues on stroke, heart drugs

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Worms that can survive with almost no oxygen are teaching scientists how to rescue oxygen-starved cells in humans who suffer a heart attack or stroke, U.S. researchers said on Thursday.
Source: Reuters: Science News | 29 Jan 2009 | 8:26 pm

Entangled Particles Face Sudden Death

Why do entwined particles suddenly become free of their matched partner?
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 8:18 pm

Study: Stem Cells Reverse Paralysis in Rats

Transplanted adult stem cells have been found to reverse paralysis associated with spinal cord injuries in lab rats.
Source: Livescience.com | 29 Jan 2009 | 7:42 pm

"Sudden Death" Threatens Quantum Computing

Futuristic applications of entanglement — a mysterious phenomenon in which two quantum states are linked, breaking the traditional laws of physics — may be threatened by another mysterious phenomenon that breaks the traditional laws of physics: entanglement sudden death.

"Quantum computing, cryptography, teleportation — they all require entanglement," said Rochester University physicist Joseph Eberly. "The question is, how long can you safely store it?"

During entanglement, quantum units — typically electrons — exist in a mutually dependent state: if one has an "upward" spin, the other will spin downward. The relationship persists independently of distance, making possible the near-instantaneous transmission of binary information.

(If this seems inconceivable, see the note below.)

But entanglement isn't absolute. Like two clocks starting at symmetrically opposite times but running at different speeds, the connection can degrade. It's almost impossible to avoid this degradation, which can be caused by energy variations induced by anything from electromagnetic radiation to random cosmic rays or the rumbling of nearby traffic.

Physicists can predict and theoretically reverse the loss of entanglement, Eberly said, but only if it follows general laws of half-life, in which amounts decrease by half over a given time but never actually reach zero.

In contrast, entanglement sudden death — first predicted by Eberly and finally confirmed in 2007 — occurs suddenly and, in violation of half-life laws, produces a state of zero.

"There aren't any rules yet to estimate unnatural death times," said Eberly, who reviewed the phenomenon in an article published Thursday in Science. "Up to now, computer scientists have relied on demonstrations of a method to recover entanglement, even if it's extremely small. But it doesn't work in the face of sudden death. Dead is dead."

Worse yet, said Eberly, it's possible that attempting to recover entanglement may actually induce sudden death — a quantum catch-22.

Until the phenomenon is better understood, quantum technologies may be impossible. But Eberly believes that quantum engineers will overcome the problem.

In certain conditions, he said, the reverse effect — entanglement sudden birth — might occur. Even if that can't be harnessed, physicists need only figure out how rapidly sudden death can occur, then design systems that finish quantum calculations within that window.

"Nobody knows the shortest possible death times. If it's one nanosecond, systems could be designed to operate faster than that," he said. "A physicist would be reluctant to say there could be a time so fast that he couldn't go faster."

Citation: "Sudden Death of Entanglement." By Ting Yu and J.H. Eberly. Science, Vol. 323 No. 5314, Jan. 29, 2008.

Video: YouTube/DeepKnowledge

Note: If you have trouble wrapping your head around the fundamental why and how of entanglement, you've got company. "I just got back from a workshop on quantum entanglement," said Eberly, "and the most common confession vocalized was, 'I don't really understand entanglement.' And that was the organizer and the participants. They know it's valuable, they know the properties — but to say they're comfortable with it, or understand it, is too much for most physicists."

See Also:

• Quantum Computing Spins a Step Closer
• Quantum Photosynthesis: Leafy Greens Warp Space and Time
• Artist Wants Nuke Waste Dump to Make New Universes
• Rush Limbaugh Takes On Quantum Physics (and Global Warming)
  

WiSci 2.0: Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook.

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 29 Jan 2009 | 7:09 pm

Locust swarms 'high' on serotonin

Scientists identify the brain chemical serotonin as the signal that makes sedentary locusts form devastating swarms.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 29 Jan 2009 | 7:05 pm

Doctor's warning over the world's highest cricket match

A doctor in Nepal warns a group of cricketers heading to Mount Everest to play a high altitude Twenty20 match not to exert themselves too much.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:59 pm

Clots Thicken Neolithic Murder Mystery

The world's favorite Neolithic murder mystery has taken a dark turn.

New analysis of the body of Ötzi the Iceman, found in 1991 in an Italian Alp crevasse where he'd fallen 5000 years ago, shows that he was attacked at least twice in the days preceding his death.

At first, Ötzi was believed to have died peacefully. Then researchers found an arrowhead in his shoulder, bruises on his head and chest, and a deep cut on his hand.

Doctors have now determined the chronology of the attacks: the cause of death is almost certainly the arrow wound, which caused internal bleeding — but while blood around the entry wound is fresh, the cut is at least several days older.

This suggests two separate attacks over a period of days, said study leader Andreas Nerlich, a Ludwig Maximilian University pathologist.

It was a rough ending for Ötzi — but at least he died in style, wearing shoes, a loincloth, belt and grass-woven cloak.

Citation: "New evidence for Ötzi’s final trauma." By Andreas G. Nerlich, Oliver Peschel and Eduard Egarter-Vigl. Intensive Care Medicine, Jan. 24, 2009.

Image: Immunohistochemical detection methods reveal fresh corpuscles (black arrows, figure C) in the blood around the arrow wound (white arrow, figure A) / Intensive Care Medicine. 

See Also:

• The First Aid: Iceman May Have Dressed His Own Wounds
• Iceman Otzi Killed by an Arrow
• Researchers Recover Thousand-Year-Old Viking DNA
• Saharan Snapshot of Stone Age Life
• Stone Age Diet May Be Good for Diabetics

WiSci 2.0: Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook.

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:59 pm

Alaska Volcano Appears Close to Eruption

Mount Redoubt in Alaska is simmering and geologists warn an eruption may be imminent.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:52 pm

Shy Fish Inspire Boldness in Mates

How do you make a shy fish come out of hiding? Pair it up.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:52 pm

Women's Brains Respond to Manly Men

A new study finds that the brains of hormonal women respond to men with overtly masculine facial features.
Source: Livescience.com | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:49 pm

Video: Installing a Deep-Sea Webcam with a Robotic Sub

When the world's first deep sea webcam got dropped to the bottom of the ocean, Wired Science brought you the event live from the boat via Twitter and Flickr.

The Eye-in-the-Sea camera was installed by the Ventana robotic submarine with some brilliantly executed maneuvers. They not only had to carefully drop the camera to the seafloor, but then use the sub's arm to pull a data cable over to the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute's new undersea data network, the Monterey Accelerated Research System, aka MARS.

 

The remote monitoring system will take video and various scientific readings 24 hours a day. At a time when everywhere scientists look in the oceans, they see mounting problems, the Eye-in-the-Sea-MARS combo will provide scientists with much-needed data on how changes in shallower waters are changing the nature of the bottom of the sea.

See Also:

• Gallery: Robotic Sub Installs Deep-Sea Webcam
• Climate Change, the Deep Seas and Dinner
• Deep-Sea Ocean Animals: Crazy-Looking and Imperiled
• Deep Sea Study Could "Revolutionize" Oceanic Understanding
• Finding Chemo: Scanning the Sea Floor for New Drugs
• Climate Change at the Bottom of the Sea

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 | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:45 pm

Flagship ITER fusion reactor could cost twice as much as budgeted

An experimental fusion reactor that will recreate the conditions at the heart of the sun to create cheap green power could cost twice as much as governments had planned for, the Guardian has learned.

The flagship project, which absorbs almost half of Britain's energy research budget, will test complex machinery needed to make the world's first operational fusion power plants – a technology widely expected to transform energy generation by providing abundant power with no greenhouse gas emissions and only small amounts of radioactive waste.

The ITER fusion reactor was originally costed at €10bn (£9bn), but the rising price of raw materials and changes to the initial design are likely to see that bill soar, officials confirmed today.

The warning came as scientists gathered in Finland to unveil the first component of the reactor, which will effectively act as its exhaust pipe. The reactor is expected to take nearly 10 years to build and is scheduled to be switched on in 2018.

It began as a US-Russian project in the 1980s, but has since grown to include the EU, China, India, Japan and South Korea.

Britain currently pays around £20m into ITER each year.

"There will be cost increases, that is for sure," said Octavio Quintana Trias, director of Euratom, the body that handles European funding for the project. "We have asked a group of experts to reassess the costs because those we have are based on an old design." Scientists involved in the project told the Guardian that the project costs would rise by at least a third and could double, a prospect Trias refused to rule out.

Unlike traditional nuclear power stations that generate energy by splitting atoms in a process called fission, ITER will produce energy using fusion, the process that powers the sun. Fusion has the potential to liberate enormous amounts of energy from tiny quantities of fuel, making it a leading contender to provide clean energy to an ever more power-hungry world.

Inside the reactor, heavy forms of hydrogen known as deuterium and tritium will be heated to 100 million C. At this temperature, the hydrogen nuclei fuse to produce helium, releasing neutrons and a huge amount of energy. The plasma is so hot that a powerful magnetic field is needed to stop it from touching the reactor's walls.

The energy ITER could produce is vast. There is enough tritium in a lithium laptop battery and enough deuterium in half a bath of water to generate sufficient energy to last the average European 30 years.

The first component, called a divertor, weighs 700 tonnes and draws helium and heat out of the plasma just as a car exhaust removes fumes from the engine, allowing it to run properly.

"It's a significant step forward, it means we're getting started, but there's a lot of work to do," said Steven Cowley, director of the UK fusion programme at JET, the world's largest experimental fusion reactor in Oxfordshire. "We need to get moving on fusion, we're behind the curve already. We need alternative sources of energy now and if we get a good outcome with ITER, we can go ahead and build a full-scale reactor."

"One day fusion energy will be the primary energy source in the world. There's no better way to make energy than fusion. Its disadvantage is it's hard to do, but once you know how to do it, there's nothing better," Cowley added.

After protracted political wrangling, the countries involved in the project agreed in 2005 that the reactor would be built in Cadarache in Provence, France. The choice of site means the buildings housing the reactor must be earthquake-proof, a contingency not included in the original designs.

The reactor, which is now paid for by the taxes of half the world's population, is regarded by governments as so crucial to future energy production that the anticipated budget over-runs are likely to be paid for by making cuts to other fusion projects, including JET.

In 1991, scientists at JET became the first in the world to produce energy from a deuterium/tritium plasma. While JET generated 16MW of power, ITER is designed to produce some 500MW in 400-second bursts.

The ITER project has already faced delays, during which scientists discovered flaws in the original design that unless corrected could jeopardise the reactor's chances of working. Although many of the changes increase the final price, they are necessary to ensure the project is not a failure, said Cowley. "If we build a machine that doesn't work, it will be a waste of time," he said.

The reactor was originally called ITER as an acronym of International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, but concerns over the negative connotations of the word "thermonuclear" led officials to change the official provenance of the name, attributing it instead to the Latin word for "the way".

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:42 pm

Tadpoles could help develop skin cancer drugs

LONDON (Reuters) - A compound that blocked the development of the distinctive markings of tadpoles in experiments could help to prevent the deadliest form of skin cancer, British scientists said on Thursday.
Source: Reuters: Science News | 29 Jan 2009 | 6:19 pm

Worm saviours

Could this creature be key to human health?
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 29 Jan 2009 | 5:51 pm

Tadpoles may hold cancer clue

Tadpoles could hold the key to developing effective skin cancer drugs according to researchers at the University of East Anglia.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 29 Jan 2009 | 5:25 pm

Toad haul

Stunning pictures of Tanzania's hidden amphibians
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 29 Jan 2009 | 4:41 pm

Ocean Fertilization Works — Unless It Doesn't

New findings suggest that pouring iron into the ocean could help absorb excess greenhouse gases — unless, that is, it doesn't help at all.

Interpretations of the study, in which researchers measured carbon that fell to the deep ocean after being consumed by plankton, differed widely among media outlets, underscoring the controversial and scientifically tricky nature of iron fertilization.

Some scientists and entrepreneurs say that artificially-added iron can be used to spur blooms of CO2-gobbling plankton — a quick, effective and relatively cheap weapon in the fight against climate change. Other scientists and environmentalists argue that ocean dynamics are too poorly understood to support such radical action, except in small-scale tests designed to provide baseline data.

The battle reached a new level this month, when an Indo-German research team aboard the Polarstern announced their plans to conduct iron fertilization tests in the Scotia Sea, only to be accused of carelessly flouting United Nations laws. The German government temporarily halted the project before approving it on Monday.

In the latest study, published Wednesday in Nature, researchers observed naturally-occurring iron fertilization around the Southern Ocean's Crozet islands, where eroding, iron-rich volcanic rocks fed an Ireland-sized plankton bloom that lasted for two months. Three times more carbon fell to the deep ocean than in a nearby, bloom-free region — a significant difference, but less than expected.

The findings were widely reported, and interpreted in wildly differing ways.

"Legal or not, this kind of 'ocean engineering' may not suck enough carbon out of the atmosphere to reverse climate change," reported the New Scientist.

"Seeding the oceans with iron is a viable way to permanently lock carbon away from the atmosphere and potentially tackle climate change," said the Guardian.

"Proposals to combat global warming by sowing the sea with iron to promote carbon-gobbling plankton may be badly overblown," opined Agence-France Presse.

"Pumping iron into the ocean could help slow climate change," headlined the Telegraph.

At present, it's impossible to know who's right. Only more research will bring a verdict.

In a press release, study co-author Gary Fones, a University of Portsmouth marine geochemist, warned against excessive caution of the sort displayed by the German government in nearly grounding the Polarstern expedition.

“Efforts to find a solution to global warming are under threat by those people who are most concerned about climate change," he said. "But legitimate experiments like this one are crucial to learning more about the effects of iron fertilisation and will help scientists evaluate the merits of such a scheme.”

Citation: "Southern Ocean deep-water carbon export enhanced by natural iron fertilization." By Raymond T. Pollard, Ian Salter, Richard J. Sanders, Mike I. Lucas, C. Mark Moore, Rachel A. Mills, Peter J. Statham, John T. Allen, Alex R. Baker, Dorothee C. E. Bakker, Matthew A. Charette, Sophie Fielding, Gary R. Fones, Megan French, Anna E. Hickman, Ross J. Holland, J. Alan Hughes, Timothy D. Jickells, Richard S. Lampitt, Paul J. Morris, Florence H. Nedelec, Maria Nielsdottir, Helene Planquette, Ekaterina E. Popova, Alex J. Poulton, Jane F. Read, Sophie Seeyave, Tania Smith, Mark Stinchcombe, Sarah Taylor, Sandy Thomalla, Hugh J. Venables, Robert Williamson and Mike V. Zubkov. Nature, Vol. 457 No. 7229, Jan. 28, 2009

Image: Nature

See Also:

• U.N. Says 'No,' Climate Hackers Say, 'Yes We Can'
  
• Geoengineering for Animals
• New Geoengineering Scheme Tackles Ocean Acidification, Too
• Geoengineering vs. Gesturengineering
• Geoengineering Quick-Fix Would Wreak Ozone Havoc
• Weaponizing the Climate: Geoengineering's Military Potential
  
• Geoengineering: Does Dumping Iron in the Ocean Sequester CO2
• Geoengineering Not a Free Pass to Pollute
  

WiSci 2.0: Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook.

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 29 Jan 2009 | 4:33 pm

Head Lice Have Extreme Genes

Genetic research reveals the head louse is indeed a superbug.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 3:52 pm

Women Have Nightmares, Men Dream of Sex

Women have more nightmares than men, a British researcher says, but men are more likely to dream about sex.
Source: Livescience.com | 29 Jan 2009 | 3:41 pm

Climate Change Could Drain Great Lakes

Climate change once cut off flow between the Great lakes, suggesting it could happen again.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 3:08 pm

Bird Find Shows China's Ecological Potential

A new species of bird is discovered in China's network of unexplored caves.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 2:50 pm

Ancient Lefties: The History of Obama’s Handedness

Southpaw Obama is another notch for the column of left-handed presidents, now totaling eight.
Source: Livescience.com | 29 Jan 2009 | 2:42 pm

New species of babbler bird discovered in China (AP)

AP - A new species of the fist-sized babbler bird has been found in a network of underground caves in southwestern China, raising the prospect the country could become a hot spot for other discoveries, a conservation group said Thursday.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 29 Jan 2009 | 2:09 pm

Climbing Catfish Hikes Remote Venezuela

A newly found species of catfish climbs by grasping with its mouth and its pelvic fin.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 2:00 pm

Hurricanes' Climate Footprint Felt for Months

The atmosphere "remembers" a hurricane for months before it recovers.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 29 Jan 2009 | 2:00 pm

Greenwash: Fred Pearce on why the Gulf states' attempted green makeover is beyond irony

Last week the crown prince of Abu Dhabi held a big "future energy summit".  Tony Blair was there wearing his save-the-climate hat, so was the Guardian's Terry McAllister.

Oh, and BP and Shell and Exxon and a host of other big energy companies keen to show their wares for saving planet Earth. But I have bigger fish to fry. The Gulf states themselves.

They are in the middle of a green makeover about as subtle as a blowout at an oil well. The summit was part of it. The whole event was hooked on Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan's plan for a carbon-neutral city in the desert, called Masdar.

On its own, this city is quite interesting, with renewable energy, water recycling, green architecture and much else. But it will be a green bubble in a sea of unsustainability. When I spoke to one of Masdar's PR people recently, almost his first remark was that "it's close to the airport. We want to make it easy for people to come and see it".

And that's the problem really. The Gulf states are keen to promote green kit – and will throw cash at it as if they were buying a Premier League football team – but have rather missed out on the purpose. It's like changing to energy-efficient lightbulbs, but driving a Hummer to the shops to buy them.

If you don't fancy an ecoconference or visiting an ecocity, you can fly to the Gulf for an ecoholiday – for instance on Kuwait's "green island", a holiday retreat on an artificial island "fortified with concrete" where "even the sands at the beaches were imported from other countries." Which again rather misses the point.

You can also take in an afternoon's skiing at Dubai's snow park – 3,000 square metres of artificially frozen snow in the desert. Or stay at the Dubai hotel that recently announced plans to refrigerate its beach so guests didn't burn their feet.

Dubai is, of course, the sleepy old gold-smuggling port currently being turned, courtesy of several hundred billion petrodollars, into a shiny new megacity. It must qualify as the world's most environmentally unfriendly city.

But that didn't stop it from declaring itself Green Dubai last year so that it could, according to the government website, "take global leadership in sustainable development in light of global climate change crisis threatening mankind." That's greenwash on stilts.

To give you an idea how far the Gulf states have to go before they can claim "leadership", look at their current carbon dioxide emissions. The emissions of the United Arab Emirates, which include Abu Dhabi and Dubai, have more than doubled since 1990. Right now, per head of population, they are above the US. Down the coast, Kuwait has double the per capita carbon emissions of the US.

Top of the tree is neighbouring Qatar, which has quadrupled its emissions since 1990 to a per capita level more than three times those of the US. How do they do it? It's not even as if they have anywhere to drive.

Carbon emissions aren't the only environmental issue, of course. I checked the WWF Living Planet index (pdf), which takes account of the total environmental footprint of countries, including land use. Last year it singled out the United Arab Emirates as having the highest per capita footprint on the planet.

We shouldn't be too cynical. Some of the emirates do say they are genuinely trying to clean up their act. Tony Blair last week congratulated his hosts in Abu Dhabi on planning to generate 7% of its power from renewables by 2020.

I wish the British government's Carbon Trust well in pursuing its recently signed £250m deal with the Qatar Investment Authority to "investigate the creation of a low-carbon innovation centre" there. Qatar sure needs some low-carbon innovation.

Likewise good luck to 20 Imperial College London scientists, after the announcement last week that they will be working with Shell and Qatar Petroleum on introducing carbon-capture technology to Qatar, "while maintaining its position as the largest gas-producing country in the world."

I'll be very interested to see how it pans out, and whether Qatar's emissions start to come down as a result.

• How many more green scams, cons and generous slices of wishful thinking are out there? Please email your examples of greenwash to greenwash@guardian.co.uk or add your comments below

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 29 Jan 2009 | 12:38 pm