|
|
|
|
Flexible Electronics: Large-scale Graphene Films Created Based On Inspiration From Water LiliesAn expert in materials science and engineering has found that graphite oxide sheets -- which are used to make graphene, a hotly studied material that scientists believe could be used to produce low-cost transparent and flexible electronics -- can be assembled into a continuous membrane that could be used as the basis for transparent conductors.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 Feb 2009 | 1:00 am New Open-source Software Permits Faster Desktop Computer Simulations Of Molecular MotionA new open-source software package is making it possible to do complex simulations of molecular motion on desktop computers at much faster speeds than has been previously possible. "Simulations that used to take three years can now be completed in a few days," according to developers.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 Feb 2009 | 1:00 am Gene's Role In Severity Of Drinking UncoveredNew research could help explain why some alcoholics are more severe drinkers than others. Scientists have found strong evidence that the serotonin transporter gene, SLC6A4, plays a significant role in influencing drinking intensity among alcohol-dependent individuals.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 Feb 2009 | 1:00 am Stars Form At Record Speeds In Infant GalaxyGalaxies, including our own Milky Way, consist of hundreds of billions of stars. How did such gigantic galactic systems come into being? When galaxies are born, do their stars form everywhere at once, or only within a small core region? Recent measurements provide the first concrete evidence that star-forming regions in infant galaxies are indeed small -- but also hyperactive, producing stars at astonishingly high rates.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 Feb 2009 | 1:00 am Drug Found That Could Reduce Risk Of Alzheimer'sA drug used to improve blood flow to the brain also could help improve learning and memory and reduce the risk of Alzheimer's disease, according to a new study.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 Feb 2009 | 1:00 am Heart Failure Linked To Cognitive ImpairmentNearly half of patients with heart failure have problems with memory and other aspects of cognitive functioning, reports a new study.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 Feb 2009 | 1:00 am Rapidly Evolving Gene Contributes To Origin Of SpeciesA gene that helped one species split into two species shows evidence of adapting much faster than other genes in the genome, raising questions about what is driving its rapid evolution.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm Scattered Light Rapidly Detects Tumor Response To ChemotherapyNew technology developed by bioengineers can help clinicians more precisely detect whether specific cancer drugs are working, and should give basic researchers a powerful new tool to better understand the underlying mechanisms of cancer development.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm Inflammation May Be Link Between Extreme Sleep Durations And Poor HealthSleep duration is associated with changes in the levels of specific cytokines that are important in regulating inflammation. The results suggest that inflammation may be the pathway linking extreme sleep durations to an increased risk for disease.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm Preparing For Climate Change: Analyzing Genome Of Heat And Drought Resistant Cereal PlantThe global climate is changing, and this change is already impacting food supply and security. People living in regions already affected by aridity need plants that can thrive / grow under dry conditions.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm Iraqi oil minister says OPEC to cut production (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 2:02 pm Injured bears rescued from bile farms in China (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 11:07 am Digital scans of "Lucy" take pre-humans inside outHOUSTON (Reuters) - Digital X-rays have turned Lucy, perhaps the world's best-known pre-human, inside out, and may answer questions about how our ancestors came down from the trees and walked, scientists said on Friday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 10:53 am The Nation's Weather (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 10:26 am Genome Study Points to New Culprit for Schizophrenia (HealthDay)HealthDay - FRIDAY, Feb. 6 (HealthDay News) -- Large, rare structural changes in DNA called copy number variants may play a role in schizophrenia, according to U.S. researchers, who said their findings support a sharp change of direction in genetics research on schizophrenia.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 4:48 am Tech forum looks past economy to futureLONG BEACH, California (Reuters) - More cancers will be preventable in 5 to 10 years, using a vaccine. People wearing artificial feet may scale walls a la Spider-Man. Robots will come with lifelike faces that convey human emotion.Source: Reuters: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 1:42 am Dung it! Who threw away my 7-year collection? (AP)AP - A British university has apologized to a Ph.D. student for throwing away his treasured, seven-year collection of lizard dung. Daniel Bennett has told Times Higher Education magazine that he had collected the dung in the Philippines while studying the rare butaan lizard, a relative of the Komodo dragon. The material was to be studied as part of his doctoral research.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 1:42 am Octuplets were product of six embryos, mother saysLOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The California woman who gave birth to octuplets less than two weeks ago said in an interview broadcast on Friday that her babies were the product of six implanted embryos, the same procedure used to conceive her six other children.Source: Reuters: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 12:26 am Stem cell, cloning expert Jerry Yang dead at 49 (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 12:17 am Doctor Watson's feeling for snowI first met Adam Watson a year ago, at a restaurant near his home in Deeside, a two-hour drive from Aviemore along the high, winding old military road that runs north of the Cairngorms, through Bridge of Brown, Tomintoul and the Lecht. It was his 78th birthday, and though we had never met, I recognised the naturalist at once by his long white beard. He spoke in a soft Scots voice, with a scientist's insistence upon impartiality and accuracy. He looked trim and athletic, despite his years, and was dressed in the clothes of a hill walker. Few people know more about snow in Britain than Watson, who has spent almost six decades ski-mountaineering and walking around the Cairngorms, studying snow and the birds and mammals that live in it. A longstanding environmental campaigner, in 2004 he received only the second lifetime achievement award ever given by the John Muir Trust, the charity set up to protect Britain's wild places. We talked again on Thursday, in a week in which snow fever gripped the nation. In an atmosphere of increasing alarm about climate change, a good quantity of snow has fallen on most of the country, and the result has been astonishing. Snow has led the news bulletins for much of the week. Thousands of schools have been shut; hundreds of people have been trapped in their cars. There are daily recriminations about lack of preparedness, lack of salt, lack of blitz spirit. But there has also been a surprising air of celebration. Newspapers have produced whole supplements full of the joys of snow. Prizes have been handed out for snowmen, along with tips on what to dress them in, and how to make the best snowballs. Last time we met we were discussing the lack of snow in Britain. Now, I tell him, we're having the best snow for 18 years. "That's with you!" says Watson pointedly. "Certainly not here in Scotland. We'd no snow at all when you had the six inches in London. We had some yesterday, but looking out here we've got about two inches at the most." Nevertheless, the snow was heading north, and by Thursday there was 60cm (2ft) of fresh snow in the Highlands. As the news footage this week has shown, snow has a particular hold over children. Watson understands this better than most, as it was in childhood that his own obsession began. The first time he remembers seeing snow was in his hometown of Turriff in Aberdeenshire when he was seven. It was 1937, and he remembers looking through the window as it fell in columns on the slate roof next door. "I could see these pale veils coming out of the sky, and as it got near the ground I saw they were actually snowflakes," he says. "And so I started watching them, as one veil landed after another." He watched it melt and struggle to establish itself, then gradually pile up on the roof into a thick layer like a hat. When he went outside, he noticed how light the snow was. "I picked up snow in my hand," he says. "I was amazed by how fluffy and feathery it was. I could see the individual crystals, and how they varied - I didn't know then that they were all different, of course. But the other thing that struck me was just how quiet everything was. I lived in the centre of this village and it was normally a noisy, busy place, but the snow deadened the sound. There was snow on every tree, every pavement, covering all the roads and so on. It had become a quiet world." The following July he went to the Cairngorms and was astonished to see big snow patches on a high hill in summer. But it was a year later, on a rainy day in a hotel in Ballater, that the snow and the mountains really caught hold of him. In among a pile of books and magazines that his parents were working through, he found a copy of The Cairngorm Hills of Scotland by Seton Gordon. Reading Gordon's book about the mountains came as a second revelation for Watson. "It was like Gordon suddenly switched on a light in my head. His words made not just Deeside and the Cairngorms different, in a way the whole world became different. I became aware of beauty and I wanted to be in the Cairngorms as often as I could." Gordon, the grandfather of Scottish naturalism, took a great interest in snow, and in particular the patches that in some places lasted all year round. He was intrigued by the plants that grew around the edges of the snow, where it thawed just long enough to allow a short growing season, but he was mainly drawn to the strange phenomenon of the patches themselves, their locations and their longevity. Watson wrote to Gordon that autumn, without expecting a reply, and Gordon responded within a week. It was the start of a correspondence about the mountains and the snow that was to last for almost 40 years, until Gordon's death in 1977, and which is now held in the National Library of Scotland. Watson began taking his own notes about the snow patches at the age of 12. At 14, he started keeping a diary of snow events and snow levels in the hills. Aged 17 he was given his first ski lesson by mountaineer Tom Weir, and found he was suddenly able to travel easily across the snow. "I quickly became excited by skiing," says Watson. "Previously I'd been wading through snow, which was very laborious, and suddenly this just transformed it, this revolutionary way of travel. When the conditions are good it's an absolutely superb way of travelling and you can go much faster than you can in the summertime. That's when my interest in snow became heightened because I quickly learned that you need to start paying attention to the types of snow, which can have an enormous affect on speed, your ability to climb and so on." With a love of ornithology instilled in him by Gordon he spent much of his winters studying the ptarmigan, the snow-loving mountain grouse that has come to symbolise the Highlands. When he was a postgraduate at Aberdeen University the ptarmigan provided the subject of his research, which gave him a reason to spend many long days in the mountains in winter. He noted during his field trips how they could fly straight into a snowdrift, kicking snow behind them so that they filled the entrance of the hole and were sheltered from the wind, and how they stayed near enough to the surface that they didn't become buried, but could see when the morning light appeared and when to leave their burrows. "It takes an Inuit an hour to make an igloo," Watson says. "It takes mountaineers an hour or so to make a snow hole. It takes two to three seconds for the ptarmigan." If the ptarmigan and snow were connected, snow increasingly became an area of scientific interest for Watson. By the 1970s he had developed a scientific method of snow-patch assessment and began a regular survey of the north-east Highlands. He would start each year on 1 July, repeating the count at the beginning of successive months until the earliest lasting snowfall of the new winter, which usually came in October. In the early days he would climb up to the patches, measuring their largest dimension and marking their locations on large-scale maps. After a while he became expert at estimating their size accurately from a distance, often in the snatches of clarity between drifting cloud banks. He knew all the best vantage points for bagging them. There were two very special snow patches in the Cairngorms, which Gordon alerted Watson to when he was still a teenager: the Pinnacles patch and the Sphinx patch, named after the rock climbs above them. These patches both lie in a remote hole in the massif called the Garbh Choire Mor, on the shoulder of Britain's third-highest mountain, Braeriach. They sit in the lee of the cliffs, facing north-east, sheltered from the warm air, the rain and the afternoon sun by the surrounding mountain walls. The snow in the Pinnacles and Sphinx patches lasts longer than any other snow in Britain. The Sphinx patch has melted completely only five times since the mid-1800s. Three of those occasions were after 1995: in 1996, 2003 and 2006. The mass of data which Watson has accumulated over the years revealed clear patterns. All of the patches in Scotland are tending to disappear earlier in the season than they once did. "Since the late 1980s there's been a clear downward trend," Watson said. The change wasn't statistically significant over the whole period, but if you broke it into two halves it was clear that for the first half of the period, covering the 70s and early 80s, it got snowier, which coincided with the time when the Scottish ski areas were doing extremely well. After that there was a strong decline in the sizes and quantities of snow patches. During the 25 years up to 1995, the average number of snow patches that survived through the year was 10.7. In the 10 years from 1996 it was 3.8. The last two winters, however, have been better for snow. Twelve snow patches survived last year, nine the year before that. This winter looks promising too. How does Watson explain the return of snow? He points to research by Dr Noel Keenlyside at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences in Kiel, Germany, which suggests the planet is in a natural cooling cycle caused by ocean currents in the Pacific and Atlantic that may last a decade before warming accelerates again. "Noel Keenlyside's results suggest that global surface temperature may not increase over the next decade, as natural climate variations in the north Atlantic and tropical Pacific temporarily offset the projected anthropogenic warming," says Watson. And what of our often-cited inability to deal with snowfall? Watson believes the gridlock that descends on Britain after a flurry of snow is largely the result of a modern social phenomenon: the rise of the commute by car. "If you go back to 1947, when there was a much more severe winter in England than now, there wasn't the same traffic chaos because you didn't have huge numbers of people wanting to go out by car at the same time of day." This has a knock-on effect on schools. "I can remember the schools in north-east Scotland never closed for snow. In 1947 we were getting no trains, no buses, the roads were all blocked, but the teachers all lived in the town and walked to work. Now the schools are closed even though the children can get to the school because the teachers can't. They rely on the car." A further factor is that because British snow is warmer, it tends to be more slippery, as it turns to slush or pools of water which refreeze into ice. "Cold, dry snow provides a lot of friction for vehicle tyres and people on foot. Scott's parties in Antarctica had many difficulties because very cold snow became almost like sand, making the sledges harder to move. Here often you can hardly stand up on it," Watson says. So the comparisons made with other countries that see plenty of snow are not helpful, he says. "People say we should be like Scandinavia, they get conditions like this every year and they always cope. Well, they do have more salt and more grit and so on but there's no way that it would be justified to have the colossal expenditure on machines and men every winter for something that happens just now and again." Perhaps instead of complaining about how snow gets in the way of our lives, we should take the time to enjoy it. After that day 70-odd years ago when he first saw snow, Watson walked to his grandmother's house three miles away. It was sunny, he recalls, and the light was spellbinding: the sun was glinting on the snow crystals, and the hollows, in shadow, were a deep blue colour. "And we could see the distant hills gleaming like silver," he says with relish. "It was an incredibly beautiful world." A life in briefBorn 14 April 1930, Turriff, Aberdeenshire Education Dux of Turriff senior secondary school; first-class honours in pure science (zoology), University of Aberdeen, 1952; awarded a PhD for his thesis on the rock ptarmigan, 1956 Family life Married to Jenny Raitt, 1955; they have two children, Jenny, 50, and Adam Christopher, 45 Career highlights Zoologist on the Arctic Institute of North America's Baird expedition to Baffin Island, 1953; editor, The Scottish Naturalist, 1956-64; scientific officer, then principal scientific officer, Nature Conservancy Unit of Grouse & Moorland Ecology, 1961-71; senior principal scientific officer, Institute of Terrestrial Ecology, 1972-90; lifetime achievement award, John Muir Trust, 2004; emeritus scientist, Edinburgh Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, 2008-present; author of 22 books, 209 peer-reviewed scientific papers and 62 scientific notes, 1944-2009 Hobbies Walking, studying place names and observing the weather Watson on Watson "I have travelled the globe widely ... but I still think the Cairngorms are the most wonderful place on earth." • Charlie English is the author of The Snow Tourist, snowtourist.co.uk. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 7 Feb 2009 | 12:01 am Lost to science - the world's biggest collection of lizard pooFor centuries the steaming jungles of the globe and the slithering, scuttling but often unseen creatures that inhabit them have beckoned mysteriously to adventurers, biologists and botanists. But it was not a myth or legend, nor a rare bird or secretive serpent that lured Daniel Bennett to the rainforests of the Philippines. It was lizard poo. Kilos and kilos of it. After five years spent in hot and difficult pursuit of the rare butaan lizard, cousin to the mighty komodo dragon, the PhD student had managed to collect 35kg (77lb) of its faeces. Which perhaps explains why he was so furious to return to Leeds University for his third year only to discover that a lab technician had thrown out his sack of samples. "I was surprised to find my desk space occupied by another student," he said. "My personal effects had been carefully stowed in boxes, but there was no sign of my 35kg bag of lizard shit." Bennett told the Times Higher Education supplement: "To some people it might have been just a bag of lizard shit, but to me it represented seven years of painstaking work searching the rainforest with a team of reformed poachers to find the faeces of one of the world's largest, rarest and most mysterious lizards." While Bennett admitted he could not say for sure whether the bag had represented "the largest collection of lizard shit in the world", he added: "It certainly contained the only dietary sample from that little-known species Varanus olivaceus, and probably the most complete dietary record of any single population of animals in south-east Asia." He said the lizard's extremely reclusive nature meant that it could not be studied in the same way as the komodo dragon, compelling him to invent his own his faeces-based methodology to avoid disturbing his timorous subject. The loss of the bag, said the scientist, had left him reeling and "altered the course of my life forever". He has declined the university's offer of £500 in compensation, opting instead to "see them in court". Leeds University said that it had responded to Bennett's official complaint and given him a full apology in August last year, but was unaware of any legal action. "The loss of these samples was an unfortunate mistake," the university said in a statement. "They were thrown away in error because they were in an unmarked bag. Lessons have been learned and protocols improved to ensure this cannot happen again." The statement added that Bennett was due to graduate this year - "subject to minor corrections to his thesis unrelated to the loss of the materials". guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 7 Feb 2009 | 12:01 am Perils on the road to PR-reviewed dataLike a lot of people who spend their time thinking about evidence and risk, I've always fantasised that the insurance industry must possess a vast repository of useful data: the experience of centuries, carefully tabulated by actuaries into secret commercial databases containing a truth about human behaviour and risk that most epidemiologists and social scientists would kill for. Here, for example, is the insurance company LV, which has managed to get its important road safety data analysis on to GMTV: "Mounting financial pressures have led to a surge in inexperienced cyclists taking to the roads," says LV in its press release. "Resulting in a 29% increase in road accidents involving cyclists in the past six months." It's topical, it involves death and fear, it's dressed in the cloak of statistical authority: this is totally going on the telly. The first thing to note is that LV was comparing accidents in the six months leading up to November 2008 against accidents in the six months prior to that. What these insurance geniuses have failed to account for here, we might reasonably suspect, is the well-documented seasonal variation in road traffic incidents, since fewer people cycle in winter. I shall not be buying shares in this insurance company. But LV has created a small anecdotal window into how wrong survey data can be, by giving us figures that we can compare directly against those created with other, probably better methods. LV paid YouGov to sample 2,193 adults in November 2008, using an online questionnaire. It starts by announcing that 43% of adults cycle, which sounds rather high to me. The General Household Survey is produced by the Office of National Statistics. It doggedly interviews all the adults in a random sample of 13,000 addresses, face to face, asking them a huge number of questions in great detail. The latest GHS reckons that 19% have cycled once in the past year, and 9% in the past four weeks. So YouGov and LV Insurance with their online questionnaire are disagreeing by a factor of four already. "Of these," LV goes on, "11% have been involved in an accident, 7% of these took place in the last six months = 150,434 accidents." We will move to the published accident figures from the Department for Transport (whose website has contained not a single use of the word "snow" this week, rather brilliantly). There were, according to the most recent figures from DfT, 16,230 accidents in the year from October 2007 to September 2008, so YouGov's online questionnaire disagrees this time by a factor of 10. You might speculate that DfT data is prone to under-reporting, and I would agree, but I trust this imperfect data more than I trust the opinion of a PR person who misses barn-door seasonal variation and seriously reckons half of you cycle. Also, most of those accidents reported to the DfT were minor. God I'm boring. Meanwhile, the Cyclists Touring Club, which certainly sounds like a dapper bunch, has collected data that shows a 91% increase in cycling in London since 2000. We can also go back through the historical DfT tables which show that there was in fact a 1% rise in accidents comparing the most recent quarter, July to September 2008, with the same quarter in 2007. When compared against the average of 1994-1998, by DfT data, bicycle accidents have fallen by 33%. So it seems accidents have gradually gone down by a third over 10 years, but LV insurance and YouGov - using something my colleague Charlton Brooker has helpfully termed "PR-reviewed scientific evidence" - say accidents have gone up by a third in just six months, using data that forgets to account for the usual seasonal variation, and seems to get the prevalence of both cycling and accidents wrong, by an order of magnitude. Most importantly, this gets on the telly, with a nice puff for the LV brand, despite the fact that almost everything I have told you was spelled out to GMTV by the boys and girls in tweed at the CTC before it went to air. Once again, there is nothing complicated here, and I will not be charging for courses, vitamin pills, or secret lifestyle programmes: eat fruit and veg, avoid excess alcohol and cigarettes, ride your bike to work, and ignore everything you see in the media. • Please send your bad science to ben@badscience.net guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 7 Feb 2009 | 12:01 am NASA delays shuttle launch to February 22CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - NASA Friday delayed the launch of the shuttle Discovery's mission to the International Space Station by three more days, to February 22, to allow more time to test potentially troublesome fuel valves.Source: Reuters: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 12:00 am NASA delays shuttle launch to February 22 (Reuters)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Feb 2009 | 12:00 am Space shuttle launch delayed again for valve tests (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 6 Feb 2009 | 11:05 pm Digital Overload Is Frying Our Brains
Paying attention isn't a simple act of self-discipline, but a cognitive ability with deep neurobiological roots — and these roots, says Maggie Jackson, are in danger of dying. In Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age, Jackson explores the effects of "our high-speed, overloaded, split-focus and even cybercentric society" on attention. It's not a pretty picture: a never-ending stream of phone calls, e-mails, instant messages, text messages and tweets is part of an institutionalized culture of interruption, and makes it hard to concentrate and think creatively. Of course, every modern age is troubled by its new technologies. "The telegraph might have done just as much to the psyche [of] Victorians as the Blackberry does to us," said Jackson. "But at the same time, that doesn't mean that nothing has changed. The question is, how do we confront our own challenges?" Wired.com talked to Jackson about attention and its loss. Wired.com: Is there an actual scientific basis of attention? Maggie Jackson: In the last 30 or 40 years, scientists have made inroads into understanding its underlying mechanisms and physiology. Attention is now considered an organ system. It has its own circuitry in the brain, and there are specialized networks carrying out its different forms. Each is very specific and can be traced through neuroimaging and even some genetic research. The first type of attention is orientation — the flashlight of your mind. It involves the parietal lobe, a brain area related to sensory processing, which works with brain sections related to frontal eye fields. This is what develops in an infants' brain, allowing them to focus on something new in their environment. The second type of attention spans the spectrum of response states, from sleepiness to complete alertness. The third type is executive attention: planning, judgment, resolving conflicting information. The heart of this is the anterior cingulate — an ancient, tiny part of the brain that is now at the heart of our higher-order skills. It's executive attention that lets us move us beyond our impulsive selves, to plan for the future and understand abstraction. We are programmed to be interrupted. We get an adrenalin jolt when orienting to new stimuli: Our body actually rewards us for paying attention to the new. So in this very fast-paced world, it's easy and tempting to always react to the new thing. But when we live in a reactive way, we minimize our capacity to pursue goals. Wired.com: What does it mean to be distracted? Jackson: Literally, it means to be pulled away to something secondary. There's also an a interesting, archaic definition that fell out of favor in the 18th century: being pulled to pieces, being scattered. I think that's a lovely term. Our society right now is filled with lovely distractions — we have so much portable escapism and mediated fantasy — but that's just one issue. The other is interruption — multitasking, the fragmentation of thought and time. We're living in highly interrupted ways. Studies show that information workers now switch tasks an average of every three minutes throughout the day. Of course that's what we have to do to live in this complicated world. Wired.com: How do these interruptions affect us? Jackson: This degree of interruption is correlated with stress and frustration and lowered creativity. That makes sense. When you're scattered and diffuse, you're less creative. When your times of reflection are always punctured, it's hard to go deeply into problem-solving, into relating, into thinking. These are the problems of attention in our new world. Gadgets and technologies give us extraordinary opportunities, the potential to connect and to learn. At the same time, we've created a culture, and are making choices, that undermine our powers of attention. Wired.com: Has a direct link been measured between interruptions and neurophysiology? Jackson: Interruptions are correlated with stress, and a cascade of stress hormones accompany that state of being. Stress, frustration and lowered creativity are pretty toxic. And there are studies showing how the environment shapes brain development in kids. But I can't say if attention fragmentation really rewires our brains. When you sit at a desk for six hours multitasking like a maniac, are you actually snipping out parts of your attention networks? That's difficult to say right now. Wired.com: Is establishing that link the next scientific step? Jackson: It's one avenue for future research. Right now, the field of attention science is now more concerned with attention development in children. The networks develop at different paces. Orientation is in place by kindergarten. The executive network is in place by age 8, but it develops until the mid-20s. Understanding the sweet spots for helping kids develop attention is where the science is at. Wired.com: So adults are out of luck? Jackson: We do know that people can be trained to improve attention networks, though we're not sure how long-lasting the gains are. There are exercises and computer games that boost short-term memory. The only sort training going on now in the office world is meditation-based, and that's being used more for stress rather than to boost attention, although it does do that. In terms of mainstream research, there's nothing I'm aware of that's being done to help the average adult, though there's tremendous interest in what's possible. But there are ways to cut back on the multitasking and interruptions, shaping your own environment and work style so that you better use your attentional networks. If you have a difficult problem or a conundrum to solve, you need to think about where you work best. Right now, people hope they'll be able to think or create or problem-solve in the midst of a noisy, cluttered environment. Quiet is a starting point. The other important thing is to discuss interruption as an environmental question and collective social issue. In our country, stillness and reflection are not especially valued in the workplace. The image of success is the frenetic multitasker who doesn't have time and is constantly interrupted. By striving towards this model of inattention, we're doing ourselves a tremendous injustice. Wired.com: The subtitle of your book predicts a "coming dark age." Do you really believe this? Jackson: Dark ages are times of forgetting, when the advancements of the past are underutilized. If we forget how to use our powers of deep focus, we'll depend more on black-and-white thinking, on surface ideas, on surface relationships. That breeds a tremendous potential for tyranny and misunderstanding. The possibility of an attention-deficient future society is very sobering. Image: Sebastian Fritzon/Flickr See Also:
WiSci 2.0: Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 6 Feb 2009 | 10:41 pm FDA OKs 1st drug from genetically altered animals (AP)AP - The Food and Drug Administration made history Friday as it approved the first drug made with materials from genetically engineered animals, clearing the way for a new class of medical therapies.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 6 Feb 2009 | 10:12 pm U.S. approves first drug from DNA-altered animalsWASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. health officials on Friday approved the first drug made using genetically engineered animals despite lingering concerns over health and environmental implications.Source: Reuters: Science News | 6 Feb 2009 | 9:36 pm Scientist Has 'Snowball Fight' With a Killer WhaleKiller whales are smart. But this scientist was surprised.Source: Livescience.com | 6 Feb 2009 | 8:23 pm Slide Show: The Week's Top StoriesFrom giant snakes to ancient mummies, we present a visual tour of the week in the news.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 6 Feb 2009 | 8:17 pm Say It Ain't So: Science, Energy on Stimulus Chopping Block
Sounds reasonable. Until you take a closer look at the proposed cuts, that is. Among the biggest losers are science, energy and education. Huh? We may be biased over here at Wired Science, but in our view, science, energy and education should be at the top of the list of stimulus priorities rather than the first to go. In September, Energy Secretary Steven Chu (when he was director of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory before his cabinet appointment) told me, "We have an option to be a leader in energy technologies, but we are not because our support system for that is on again off again. The future wealth of the United States will come from our ability to invent new technologies." We wholeheartedly agree with this statement. Money toward science and technology, particularly alternative energy, would undoubtedly have a positive impact on the economy in the long-term and arguably in the short term as well. Democratic Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Republican Susan Collins of Maine clearly do not agree. Below is a list of some of the cuts they have asked for. National Science Foundation : $1.4 billion (100% cut) And taking an even bigger hit is education with a proposed cut of $15 billion, the bulk of the funding in the House bill. And the ability of the states to make up for the short fall will be hamstrung by a proposed $40 billion reduction in funding for the State Stabilization Fund. I don't get it. It's not as if the scientists and teachers are going to spend the money on junkets to Las Vegas and million-dollar bonuses. They'd be spending it directly on the country's future. The senators' recommendations are especially disappointing after President Barack Obama got our hopes up with so much talk about science and energy. Let's hope the proposed cuts aren't a sign of things to come. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 6 Feb 2009 | 7:43 pm Newfound Comet Lulin to Grace Night SkiesDuring the next few weeks, a fine comet bright enough for observation in binoculars and possibly even with the naked eye will be making astronomical news.Source: Livescience.com | 6 Feb 2009 | 6:54 pm Drink Beer, Make FuelA brewing company will make its own ethanol fuel from discarded beer yeast.Source: Livescience.com | 6 Feb 2009 | 6:24 pm Climate history 'helps conserve'Understanding a region's climatic history can help conservationists find new species, a study suggests.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 6 Feb 2009 | 6:21 pm Drug Made From Genetically Engineered GoatsThe FDA approves the first drug made with materials from genetically engineered animals.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 6 Feb 2009 | 6:17 pm Red vs. Blue: Why Necktie Colors Matters (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - In high-stakes politics and business, there are only two colors of ties: red and blue. Oh, sure, you might spot purple or yellow now and then, but those are clear statements of aloofness, be they calculated or careless.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 6 Feb 2009 | 6:11 pm FDA Improves Drug from Genetically Engineered AnimalThe drug, ATryn, is made from milk from goats that have had their DNA altered.Source: Livescience.com | 6 Feb 2009 | 5:58 pm Red vs. Blue: Why Necktie Colors MatterIn power politics and business, there are only two colors of ties: red and blue.Source: Livescience.com | 6 Feb 2009 | 5:25 pm Test spots contaminated equipmentScientists have perfected a highly sensitive test to detect vCJD-causing proteins on surgical instruments.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 6 Feb 2009 | 4:46 pm Don't pray for me, pleaseI am glad that Caroline Petrie is going back to work because, as far as I can tell, she is a dedicated and effective nurse. But I was disturbed by North Somerset Primary Care Trust's judgment. Caroline Petrie was suspended without pay because, after changing a patient's dressing, she asked the elderly woman whether she would like her to pray for her. Although "taken aback", the patient did not complain but mentioned the upsetting event to others who then did so. The trust ruled that Petrie had been acting in "the best interests of her patients", and I am sure she thought she was. I spoke to her a few days ago, for a discussion on the Jeremy Vine show. She was friendly and pleasant, happy to talk about what had happened, and completely unable to understand why her actions would upset people. I know I would be upset if it happened to me. I was reminded of a recent taxi ride to the coach station in Bristol. My Muslim taxi driver was very friendly and we chatted all the way. As I got out he politely handed me my suitcase and said "May God go with you". "No, no" I replied "I don't think he exists." and walked off feeling horribly confused at what I'd blurted out. After all, if there's no God how could the man's wishes do me any harm, and if they couldn't why should I want to upset him – wasn't I just as bad proselytising for atheism as he was for God. I got on my bus feeling a little churned up. Now imagine (as the National Secular Society does) that instead of getting on a bus, I were ill, and completely at the mercy of a God-fearing nurse. I would experience a horrible conflict between speaking out for what I believe, not upsetting a kind nurse, being angry that she had upset me, and so on. This is not what you need when you are ill. This is why North Somerset Primary Care Trust were right to take action in the first place and then to have a proper tribunal. What bothers me is the way they worded their judgment. First, they said that nurses did not have "to set aside their faith" while at work. I agree – but only because that's impossible; if you have true faith you can't suspend it 9 to 5. The problem occurs when someone pushes their faith onto someone else, and that is what Nurse Petrie seemed to be doing. Happily the NHS guidelines are quite clear. They state that "such behaviour, notwithstanding religious beliefs, could be construed as harassment under the disciplinary and grievance procedures." Second, they acknowledged that "some people saw prayer as an integral part of healthcare", and that really bothered me. Perhaps they meant merely to state a fact, rather than condone it. Even so, I think they should have said that this is wrong. Prayer absolutely should not be an integral part of healthcare. Why not? Because healthcare needs to be effective, and that means basing it on evidence. We now have all the evidence we need to show that prayer is not effective, and even that telling someone you are going to pray for them can be harmful. I say this on the basis of the largest and best controlled study of the effects of prayer. In the Harvard prayer experiment, 1802 cardiac bypass patients were divided into three groups. Two were told that they might be prayed for; half were and half weren't. The third group were told they would be prayed for and they were. The first two groups recovered equally well, but the group that knew they were being prayed for actually did worse. Perhaps their hopes were falsely raised, or perhaps they were upset to know that someone was praying for them. We don't know, but we can safely conclude that knowing you are being prayed for is not helpful. Christian groups have complained that the ruling will "inhibit freedom of conscience". This is ridiculous. If a nurse's conscience tells her to pray for someone, then as long as the patient doesn't know about it, it can't do any harm. But if her conscience tells her to go out and spread the word of Jesus, or encourage others to join her in prayer, then she should read those guidelines: "you must not use your professional status to promote causes that are not related to health." Some people may think that prayer should be an integral part of healthcare, but they are wrong. The guidelines are absolutely right. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 6 Feb 2009 | 4:00 pm Red Boosts Attention, Blue -- CreativityFindings on the effects of the colors red and blue could help guide warnings and advertising.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 6 Feb 2009 | 3:42 pm Climate Change May Reshuffle Western WeedsA warming U.S. West puts out a welcome sign to invasive plants, say researchers.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 6 Feb 2009 | 3:42 pm Deforestation Ticks Up Again in BrazilDeforestation is rising again in Brazil following a decline in the last few years.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 6 Feb 2009 | 2:52 pm Homeopathy: Sometimes a dose of nothing can do you a power of goodShould homeopathy be available on the NHS? Absolutely – it's possibly the safest, most ethical and most effective placebo there is. Where money is truly wasted is in trying to find evidence that homeopathy works. If you think that what passes for homeopathy today can be properly assessed by modern science, it should only take a visit to a homeopathic pharmacy to change your mind. As part of my research for my book 13 Things That Don't Make Sense, I did just that. On the shelves I found remedies made from "F sharp minor", "Gog and Magog, Oaks at Glastonbury", "Flapjack" and "Crop Circle". Also stored somewhere at that pharmacy - I didn't see it, but I had read about it - was a homeopathic remedy made from the blood of an HIV positive man. There were remedies made from more conventional substances too, plants that any herbalist might use. But where do you draw the line when trying to assess this field? Whatever you do, there is going to be a hell of a lot of noise in the data. The same is true for the legions of people who say homeopathy works for them. During my research I came across perfectly sane people whose initial scepticism had been blown away after their reluctant use of homeopathic treatments was followed by dramatic improvements in their symptoms. But anecdote, however impassioned, is not scientific evidence – there are always too many unknowns behind each success story. Having said all that, you might think that I'm against homeopathic treatments being funded on the NHS. I would certainly agree with the vast majority of scientists who say that homeopathy is almost certainly no more effective than placebo. But there are two qualifications I should make about that statement – and they make all the difference. The first qualification is that the claim homeopathy doesn't work is a prejudice, not a scientifically proven fact. The second qualification is much more important. I don't actually know what "no more effective than placebo" means. And neither does anyone else. In fact, the phrase's negative connotations are undeserved. Let's not forget that placebos are medically useful, and doctors know it. Let me give you some figures to support that heresy. In 2003, a survey found that 48% of Danish GPs use what they regarded as a placebo intervention – mostly antibiotics for viral infections or vitamins for unspecified fatigue – 10 or more times per year. A 2004 study of Israeli doctors, published in the British Medical Journal, found that 60% had prescribed placebos. Of those, around two-thirds did so once a month or more, and lied to the patient about the "medication". Some 94% of these doctors found placebos to be an effective means of treatment. Homeopathy is perfect for this. In fact, its consultation process, combined with the homeopath's and the patient's faith in it, can make it an extremely powerful placebo. The placebo effect, you see, kicks in on a sliding scale. Last year, a Harvard Medical School study compared the efficacy of various methods of consulting with patients suffering from irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). It found that patients given "extreme placebo" – basically, they were listened to at length, and fully consulted about their symptoms, feelings and treatments – reported an improvement that was equivalent to that achieved by drugs commonly used to treat IBS. The irony is that, in order to be licensed, those drugs would have had to performed "better than placebo" in standard clinical trials. Giving a placebo is not the same as doing nothing, which means that sometimes prescribing a placebo is better than doing nothing. People are not biochemical versions of computer programs, where a particular input will give a particular output. Being a doctor isn't about being handcuffed by evidence-based medicine, it's about using skilled judgement in tandem with the best available evidence – including evidence about the efficacy of placebos. Perhaps it's time to restate that medicine should be considered an art, not a science. Using placebos effectively is difficult, however. Regulations governing cost and evidence-based prescribing prevent a pharmacy from dispensing something recognised as a placebo. Curiously, the Americans are ahead of us here, too. A 2001 article in the Journal of the American Pharmaceutical Association provides a script for the pharmacist's role in the deception which neatly deflects any responsibility. Realising that a doctor has prescribed a placebo, the pharmacist should deliver the medication with these words: "Generally, a larger dose is used for most patients, but your doctor believes that you'll benefit from this dose." With homeopathy, that problem is side-stepped. Homeopaths tend to believe in what they are doing, so there's no deception – and their conviction reinforces the placebo effect. It costs money, but so do IBS drugs, which are no more effective. And even opponents of homeopathy must concede that, if the remedies are essentially nothing more than water or lactose pills, adverse side effects are pretty unlikely. So, yes, I think doctors should be allowed to refer patients to small homeopathic practices, with fee caps, if the doctor believes a placebo is the best course of action. I would point out, though, that even placebos can be taken too far. I'm not keen on funding hugely costly "homeopathic hospitals", for example. To me, they just seem silly. Michael Brooks is a consultant for New Scientist and the author of 13 Things That Don't Make Sense. You can hear Michael discuss his book in next week's Science Weekly podcast guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsSource: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 6 Feb 2009 | 2:49 pm Love Makes Kids SmarterFor some odd reason, it takes constant reminders that we primates need nurturing.Source: Livescience.com | 6 Feb 2009 | 2:39 pm Caregiving Nuns Wiped Out by PlagueA new test confirms the presence of plague in ancient burial sites for nuns and priests.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 6 Feb 2009 | 2:30 pm Flu may not have killed most in 1918 pandemicWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Strep infections and not the flu virus itself may have killed most people during the 1918 influenza pandemic, which suggests some of the most dire predictions about a new pandemic may be exaggerated, U.S. researchers said on Thursday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 6 Feb 2009 | 2:10 pm Saving Hawaii From Alien PlantsScientists are providing information that may help slow the spread of non-native plant species in Hawai'i.Source: Livescience.com | 6 Feb 2009 | 2:07 pm Spiral Galaxy Stands Out Among Elliptical NeighborsHubble captures an odd galaxy during an in-between state of formation.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 6 Feb 2009 | 2:05 pm
|
