Science Headlines for February 26, 2009

The Science Behind The 'Anthrax Letter' Attack Investigation

Innovative science was a very important part of the investigation of the anthrax letters but has been widely misrepresented in the popular press because of secrecy requirements imposed by the FBI. This secrecy veil is now being lifted by allowing the investigative scientists to present their findings and methods.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm

Fossilized Pregnant Fish One Of First Animals To Have Sex

A pregnant fossil fish at the Natural History Museum in London has shed light on the possible origin of sex, according to a new study. Dating from the Upper Devonian period 365 million years ago, the adult placoderm fish Incisoscutum ritchiei is one of the earliest examples of a pregnant vertebrate and contains a five-centimetre-long embryo.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm

Environmental Footprint Of Information Technology Much Higher Than Expected, Researcher Finds

A researcher in Canada has found that the environmental impact of digital technology is much higher than previously believed.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm

Researchers Explore New Driver Of Transplant Rejection: Platelets

Platelets, tiny and relatively uncharted tenants of the bloodstream known mostly for their role in blood clotting, turn out to also rally sustained immune system inflammatory responses that play a critical role in organ transplant rejection, according to a new report.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm

Excessive Dietary Fat Caused 300 Percent Increase in Metastasizing Tumor Cells In Animal Models

Researchers have precisely measured the impact of a high-fat diet on the spread of cancer, finding that excessive dietary fat caused a 300 percent increase in metastasizing tumor cells in laboratory animals.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm

'Obesity Gene' Involved In Weight Gain Response To High-fat Diet Identified

Scientists have determined that a specific gene plays a role in the weight-gain response to a high-fat diet. The finding in an animal study suggests that blocking this gene could one day be a therapeutic strategy to reduce diet-related obesity and associated disorders, such as diabetes and liver damage, in humans.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 7:00 pm

Biomarker Predicts Disease Recurrence In Colorectal Cancer

Findings published in the Journal of the American Medical Association by researchers at Thomas Jefferson University show that the presence of a biomarker in regional lymph nodes is an independent predictor of disease recurrence in patients with colorectal cancer.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 4:00 pm

Additional Evidence That Potato Chips Should Be Eaten Only In Moderation

A new study suggests that acrylamide from foods may increase the risk of heart disease.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 4:00 pm

Mental Fatigue Can Affect Physical Endurance

When participants performed a mentally fatiguing task prior to a difficult exercise test, they reached exhaustion more quickly than when they did the same exercise when mentally rested. Mental fatigue did not cause the heart or muscles to perform any differently; instead, our "perceived effort" determines when we reach exhaustion. The next step is to look at the brain to find out exactly why people with mental fatigue perceive exercise to be more difficult.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 4:00 pm

New Theory On How Animals Smell: Brain Encodes Complex Plumes Of Odors With A Simple Code

In the real world, odors don't happen one puff at a time. Animals move through, and subsequently distort, plumes of odor molecules that constantly drift, changing direction as the wind disperses them. Now, by exploring how animals smell odors under naturalistic conditions, scientists reveal that the brain encodes these swirling, and complex patterns of molecules using surprisingly little neural machinery. The findings suggest a new theory of how animals smell.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 4:00 pm

Caffeine May Kill Some Cancer Cells (LiveScience.com)

LiveScience.com - A cup of joe a day may help keep skin cancer away: A new study shows that caffeine helps kill off human cells damaged by ultraviolet light, one of the key triggers of several types of skin cancer.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 2:22 pm

Caffeine May Kill Some Cancer Cells

Caffeine targets protein in damaged skin cells, helps trigger cell suicide and reduce risk of cancer.
Source: Livescience.com | 26 Feb 2009 | 2:12 pm

More seeds for 'doomsday vault'

Almost 90,000 food crop seeds from around the world arrive at a "doomsday vault" in the Arctic, as it marks its first anniversary.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Feb 2009 | 2:08 pm

NASA plans mid-March shuttle Discovery launch (AFP)

AFP - After four launch delays, NASA says it now believes the space shuttle Discovery could be sent on a mission to the orbiting International Space Station (ISS) by mid-March.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 2:04 pm

Group Predicts Robots Will Win Soccer's World Cup in 2050

Scientists teaching robots to play soccer.
Source: Livescience.com | 26 Feb 2009 | 1:52 pm

Wooden sarcophaguses found in Egypt tomb

CAIRO (Reuters) - Japanese archaeologists working in Egypt have found four wooden sarcophaguses and associated grave goods which could date back up to 3,300 years, the Egyptian government said on Thursday.

Source: Reuters: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 1:19 pm

'Dirty' to be scrubbed from the dictionary

A study that applied evolutionary theory to language has pinpointed the oldest words in the language and those likely to go the way of the dodo

The unrelenting force of evolution is about to take an unexpected toll on the English language by forcing some of our favourite words into extinction. The word "dirty" is most in danger of going the way of the dodo, and could vanish from use completely within 750 years, researchers said.

Next to lose out in the linguistic fight for survival are likely to be the words "guts", "throw" and "stick", which could be permanently displaced by new words within 1,000 years, according to a team led by Mark Pagel, a biologist at Reading University, who applied the theory of evolution through natural selection to the family of Indo-European languages, which can be traced back at least 9,000 years.

The study showed that while some words evolved rapidly into new ones, others endured and remained the same for thousands of years.

The oldest words in the language, such as "I", "we" and the numbers one, two and three, have barely changed over the past 9,000 years, probably because they are so fundamental to everyday communication. The most resilient words were found to be those that are used most frequently, but are also likely to be nouns or numerals.

Other types of words, such as adjectives and adverbs, evolve more quickly, making them susceptible to dying out and being replaced. Half of the words we use today would be unrecognisable to our ancestors 2,500 years ago.

"Based on our statistics, the next word to go under is the word dirty, some time in the next 750 years. It has the most rapid rate of evolution of all of the words we studied," said Pagel. The languages he looked at had 46 different words for dirty.

"If we were to fast forward 750 years, we expect people will be using a new sound for the concept of dirty. They'll point to a dirty floor and use a new sound to describe it," Pagel said.

The research predicts the future of specific words by likening them to genes, which can be passed on faithfully or mutated and modified as time goes by.

"Genes ensure copies of themselves are made by forcing us to have sex and babies. Words are copied when people hear them and repeat them by reproducing the same sound," said Pagel. "Long-lasting words somehow resist the tendency people have to change them."

Signs of recent linguistic evolution can be found in most living rooms, where the large object that several people can sit on at once is more likely to be a sofa than a couch, a settee, a davenport or a chesterfield.

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Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Feb 2009 | 1:16 pm

Indonesia's psychedelic fish named a new species (AP)

AP - A funky, psychedelic fish that bounces on the ocean floor like a rubber ball has been classified as a new species, a scientific journal reported.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 12:22 pm

The Nation's Weather (AP)

AP - Two separate winter storms were taking aim at the Northwest and the Plains on Thursday, while much of the South was to stay dry and warm.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 11:44 am

Ice in east Antarctica a bigger threat long term (AP)

AP - Antarctica's western ice sheet is pushing ever faster into the sea, but scientists know an even greater long-term threat lies here in the vast, little-explored whiteness of east Antarctica.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 11:02 am

Healthy lifestyle reduces cancer risk

Eating fruit and vegetables and keeping weight down can reduce risk of 12 major cancers by 39%, says international report

Cutting down on red meat and alcohol while eating more fruit and vegetables could prevent thousands of cancer cases each year, a new report said today.

A major study from the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) found that an estimated 39% of 12 major cancers could be prevented by adopting a healthy lifestyle.

This included almost half (43%) of cases of bowel cancer and 42% of breast cancer cases.

Increasing the amount of fresh vegetables and fruit in the diet and cutting down on alcohol could prevent 67% of cases of mouth, pharynx and larynx cancer each year, the report said.

This is equivalent to more than 3,300 cases each year in the UK.

For cancer of the oesophagus, 75% of cases (around 5,800 cases a year) could be prevented with increased intake of fruit and vegetables, less alcohol and maintaining a healthy weight.

Almost half (45%) of cases of stomach cancer (around 3,500 cases a year) could be cut by less salt and more fruit and vegetables.

Meanwhile, 41% of cases of pancreatic cancer (3,100 cases a year) could be prevented if people kept their weight in check and ate more foods containing folate, such as green vegetables, brown rice and fortified breakfast cereals.

Bowel cancer cases could be cut by 43% (around 15,700 cases a year) if people ate more fibre, cut down on red and processed meats and alcohol and increased their exercise levels while keeping their weight within a healthy range.

Almost one in five (19%) kidney cancer cases could be prevented by keeping weight in check (around 1,400 new cases a year) while 42% of breast cancer cases (around 19,100 cases a year) could be prevented by cutting down on alcohol, increasing exercise and keeping weight in check.

The report, Policy and Action for Cancer Prevention, was written by 23 experts from around the world.

The WCRF recommends that people wishing to help prevent cancer should:

• Keep themselves as lean as possible without becoming underweight;

• Eat five portions of fruit and vegetables each day;

• Be physically active for at least 30 minutes every day;

• Avoid sugary drinks;

• Cut down on processed foods high in added sugar or fat, or low in fibre;

• Limit red meats (such as beef, pork and lamb) and avoid processed meats;

• Drink no more than two units of alcohol a day (for men) or one unit (for women);

• Limit salt intake;

• Avoid using vitamin supplements to protect against cancer.

The report also calls on world governments, media, industry, individuals and workplaces to encourage exercise and cut down on unhealthy foods.

It said governments should use legislation and pricing to discourage people from eating unhealthy food while encouraging healthy eating.

Professor Sir Michael Marmot, chair of the WCRF panel, said: "This report shows that by making relatively straightforward changes, we could significantly reduce the number of cancer cases around the world.

"When people think of policy reports, they often think they are only relevant to governments.

"But while governments are important in this, the evidence shows that when it comes to cancer prevention, all groups in society have a role to play.

"This report is relevant to everyone from heads of government to the people who do the weekly food shopping for their family."

Professor Martin Wiseman, project director of the report, said: "On a global level every year, there are millions of cancer cases that could have been prevented and this is why we need to act now before the situation gets even worse.

"We are expecting a substantial increase in cancer rates with the ageing population, obesity rates soaring, and with people becoming less active and increasingly consuming highly processed and energy-dense foods and drinks.

"The good news is that this is not inevitable and we still have the chance to avert a crisis before it is too late."

Professor Mike Richards, the government's cancer tsar, said: "The evidence linking diet, physical activity, obesity and cancer has become stronger over the last decade and this report can play a part in people adopting healthier lifestyles.

"After not smoking, it is clear that diet, physical activity and weight are the most important things people can do to reduce their cancer risk."

Richard Davidson, director of policy and public affairs for Cancer Research UK, said: "Around 13,000 cancer cases in the UK are linked to being overweight or obese.

"And even more are linked to poor diets, drinking too much alcohol and not doing enough exercise. After smoking, these are some of the biggest preventable causes of cancer.

"Doing nothing could be disastrous."

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Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Feb 2009 | 10:48 am

Earth Watch

Obama factor raises green issues reform hopes
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Feb 2009 | 10:42 am

'Oldest English words' identified

Some of the oldest words in the English and other Indo-European languages have been identified, scientists believe.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Feb 2009 | 9:23 am

Pakistan, Sri Lanka take dig at Test pitch (AFP)

AFP - Pakistan and Sri Lanka criticised the lifeless wicket prepared for the drawn first Test here, with captains fearing such tracks will turn five-day cricket dull and make bowlers an endangered species.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 8:56 am

Genes May Help Drive Rotator Cuff Injury (HealthDay)

HealthDay - WEDNESDAY, Feb. 25 (HealthDay News) -- Genes may boost the odds of developing rotator cuff problems, according to new research that finds the shoulder injury running in families.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 4:48 am

Fish fossil clue to origin of sex

A fossil fish from Australia was one of the earliest known vertebrates to reproduce by internal fertilization, Nature journal reports.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Feb 2009 | 4:38 am

U.S. scientists build computer model for snowflakes

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The random, symmetrical beauty of snowflakes has been recreated in a computer program, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.

Source: Reuters: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 2:43 am

NASA aims for March 12 launch of space shuttle

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - After four delays, NASA on Wednesday set March 12 as the target date for the next launch of the space shuttle Discovery.

Source: Reuters: Science News | 26 Feb 2009 | 1:51 am

Obamas' Pick for First Dog Solidly Scientific

One more sign that President Obama is serious about prioritizing science: his pick for First Dog is a breed that's an important model organism in genetics research.

In an interview with People magazine that hits newsstands Friday, Michelle Obama revealed that the family is going to adopt a Portuguese water dog in April. This curly-coated canine was chosen partly because it's hypoallergenic, meaning it shouldn't send little Malia into fits of coughing and sneezing.

Some cachet also comes from having a PWD, and not just because Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy owns two. There are only about 8,000 of the dogs in the world. The breed almost died out in the early 20th century before being saved by intensive husbandry efforts in the 1940s and '50s.

This genetic bottleneck is what makes PWDs so interesting to biologists, said Gordon Lark of the University of Utah, who has studied the dogs for years.

"There were only about 30 founding dogs," he said. "The breed has a very narrow gene pool, yet it has a wide range of sizes and shapes."

Lark and his team are studying how such limited genetic diversity can give rise to the breed's exceptional body-form variety. They're mapping out gene function in PWDs, correlating dogs' genetic profiles with X-rays of their bones. Many PWD owners send the researchers this and other information, hoping to advance science and perhaps improve the future health of the severely inbred animals. Many owners even hand over their beloved pets' remains for a complete autopsy.

"We can do personalized genetics on these dogs," Lark said. "We've found out a lot about how to study disease."

Lark also appreciates PWDs on a different level, one that's more immediately relevant to the Obama family. "They're marvelous dogs," he said. "They have a real sense of humor."

See Also:

Image: Flickr/Basykes

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 26 Feb 2009 | 1:10 am

Video: Nanotechnology is Ready for Sesame Street

Nanotechnology will someday change the world, but in the meantime, it may shake things up on Broadway.

Dancing nanotube puppets, and grouchy nano-hating monsters, take center stage in an adorable video made students at UC Berkeley.

"We put a lot of work into making something we hoped would be accessible and enjoyable for everyone we know who doesn't spend their life studying nanoscience," says Patrick Bennett, a nanotube researcher who directed the video.

Bennett and his friends entered their project into a contest run by the American Chemical Society, and the film has been winning since it was cast into the spotlight by Boing Boing yesterday.

Outside of academia, not many people understand nanotechnology, so the scientific organization challenged amateur filmmakers to make a clip that answers the question: What is nano?

In this fantastic entry, Glory Liu plays the role of a teacher and explains the science of small things with rhyming verse.

Even if her team doesn't win, they deserve a guest spot on Sesame Street.

See Also:

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 26 Feb 2009 | 1:04 am

Scots fir is 'tallest tree in UK'

A Douglas Fir in Argyll is named the UK's tallest tree by a team of experts who climbed to the top.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Feb 2009 | 1:02 am

Droughts 'may lay waste' to parts of US

The world's pre-eminent climate scientists produced a blunt assessment of the impact of global warming on the US yesterday, warning of droughts that could reduce the American south-west to a wasteland and heatwaves that could make life impossible even in northern cities.

In an update on the latest science on climate change, the US Congress was told that melting snow pack could lead to severe drought from California to Oklahoma. In the midwest, diminishing rains and shrinking rivers were lowering water levels in the Great Lakes, even to the extent where it could affect shipping.

"With severe drought from California to Oklahoma, a broad swath of the south-west is basically robbed of having a sustainable lifestyle," said Christopher Field, of the Carnegie Institution for Science. He went on to warn of scorching temperatures in an array of cities. Sacramento in California, for example, could face heatwaves for up to 100 days a year.

"We are close to a threshold in a very large number of American cities where uncomfortable heatwaves make cities uninhabitable," Field told the Senate's environment and public works committee.

The warnings were the first time Congress had been directly confronted with the growing evidence that the impact of climate change will be far more severe than revealed even in the UN's most recent report, in 2007.

The hearing was also the first time senators had been permitted to hear testimony about the dangers to human health from climate change. In 2007, the Bush administration censored testimony from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on the rise in asthma and other respiratory illnesses, as well as the increasing occurrence of "tropical" parasites.

"The CDC considers climate change a serious public health concern," said Howard Frumkin, the director of the centre for environmental health at the CDC.

Yesterday's gathering of climate scientists, led by the head of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, RK Pachauri, was designed to give momentum to efforts by the Democratic leadership to press ahead on energy reform.

"If we don't do it people are going to die. They are going to get sick and they are going to die," said Barbara Boxer, who as chair of the Senate environment and public works committee is key to securing the passage of climate change legislation.

But even with the new administration and the Democratic leadership in Congress now united on the urgency of acting on climate change, there were still signs of battles ahead.

The hearing saw a steady stream of bickering between Boxer and her Republican counterpart, James Inhofe, renowned as a climate change sceptic.

Republicans argued that Barack Obama's proposed carbon cap legislation would be costly. "I will certainly oppose raising energy costs on suffering families and workers during an economic crisis when the science says our actions [to combat climate change] will be futile," said Kit Bond, a Republican senator from Missouri.

The Republican minority on the committee also invited testimony from Professor William Happer, a physicist at Princeton University, who is a well-known climate change sceptic. "It's still not as warm as it was when the Vikings settled England," said Happer.

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Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Feb 2009 | 12:01 am

To expand knowledge, we must first admit ignorance

Far more is known about short-lived bacteria than ancient pines - and that reflects one of science's most enduring problems

In 1879 Dr William James Beal, a professor of botany and forestry at a small college in the United States, began an experiment. He filled 20 bottles with a mix of sand and seeds - each bottle containing 50 seeds from each of 21 species of plant. Then he buried the bottles in a row, their necks pointing down so that water could not get in. His idea was that the bottles should be dug up at fixed intervals, and the seeds planted to see how many of them would sprout.

Beal died in 1924. But his experiment is still going on: it has now been running for more than 120 years. The next bottle is due to be disinterred in 2020 - and if all goes according to plan, the experiment will finish in 2100.

This makes it important, for a couple of reasons. First, it addresses (albeit on a small scale) a question that we don't know the answer to: how long can seeds of different plants remain viable? The answer matters because we are busy building facilities to store seeds for long periods. For instance, the massive Svalbard Global Seed Vault, built inside a mountain on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen, opened its doors last year. Yet there may be little point to such a project if seeds, in general, last only a few years.

Second, Beal's experiment is an example of something rare. Most experiments run for months, or perhaps a year or two. Experiments that run for decades, let alone centuries, are few and far between. And it's easy to see why. Scientific interests and questions change: most experiments from 50 or 100 years ago now seem absurdly outdated.

Indeed, in biology the advances in technology have been so fast that we can now answer questions that a decade ago it would not have made sense to ask, because we did not have the tools to approach them. And even if that were not so, most science is paid for on a short-term basis - three to five years, rather than 10 or 20. This makes long-running experiments difficult to plan or to create.

The beauty of Beal's experiment is that it doesn't cost anything to speak of, and the technology is simple. But it faces an unusual problem: it depends on the enthusiasm of scientists not even born yet for its completion.

Which illustrates a more general point. There are certain sorts of data - long-term data being just one example - that are extremely hard to collect. It's no coincidence that we know much more about the bacterium Escherichia coli (which can go through more than six generations a day) and fruit flies (which, kept at room temperature, go through one generation every 10 days) than we do about giant tortoises (which can't start reproducing until they are 20 years old or so, and often live for more than a century) or Great Basin bristlecone pines - a species of tree where individuals can live to be more than 4,000 years old.

In other words, if you imagine scientific knowledge as having a frontier with ignorance, then parts of that frontier are advancing rapidly - ignorance is yielding (though usually this is a process of revealing more questions to ask, more that we don't know). But other parts of the frontier are essentially static. Sometimes, the stasis will be due to mundane obstacles such as lack of money or insufficient tools. Sometimes, though, it will be due to more subtle problems - such as the fact that certain kinds of experiments, while simple and elegant in principle, are extremely hard to do.

An important class of "experiments possible but not done" consists of experiments where we are so sure we know what will happen that we don't bother to check that we are right. And yet, when we do, the answers are often surprising.

Here are two examples. The first comes from another set of 19th-century experiments with seeds, this time carried out by Charles Darwin. In the 1830s and 40s, it was widely believed that seeds could not survive in salt water. But no one had done the experiments. Darwin did. (He was moved to do so because he was trying to imagine ways that animals and plants could reach remote islands and begin evolving there.) He found that, contrary to what everyone had assumed, the seeds of many plants could sprout after long periods of immersion in brine.

The second example is more recent and more practical. For decades, doctors "knew" that ulcers were caused by stress. So they were incredulous when, in the early 1980s, two Australian doctors - Robin Warren and Barry Marshall - announced that ulcers were actually caused by the activities of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori. But they were right - and the discovery won them a Nobel prize in 2005.

Of all the limits on expanding our knowledge, unexamined, misplaced assumptions are the most insidious. Often, we don't even know that we have them: they are essentially invisible. Discovering them and investigating them takes curiosity, imagination, and the willingness to risk looking ridiculous. And that, perhaps, is one of the hardest tasks in science.

• Olivia Judson is an evolutionary biologist and the author of Dr Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation. Next Tuesday she gives the Sense About Science annual lecture, sponsored by the Guardian
She will also be next week's special guest on the Guardian's Science Weekly podcast
drtatiana.com/author.shtml

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Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Feb 2009 | 12:01 am

Brain training? Think again

• Evidence for games is weak, says Which? report
• Experts say they are no better than a crossword

People who spend money on "brain trainers" to keep their minds agile may get the same results by simply doing a crossword or surfing the internet, according to research published today.

A panel of experts, including eminent neuroscientists, found there was no scientific evidence to support a range of manufacturers' claims that the gadgets can help improve memory or stave off the risk of illnesses such as dementia.

Devices such as the Nintendo DS, endorsed by the actor Nicole Kidman and the singer Cheryl Cole, have enjoyed a surge of popularity recently. But the experts employed by the consumer group Which? concluded that much of the evidence supporting the claims was "weak" and that in some cases other activities, such as playing standard computer games, could have the same effect.

Importantly, none of the "brain training" claims were supported by peer-reviewed research published in a recognised scientific journal.

Which? asked a panel of scientific experts to examine gadgets and their claims. They included Dr Kawashima's Brain Training, Mindfit and Lumosity.

Martyn Hocking, editor of Which?, said: "If people enjoy using these games, then they should continue to do so - that's a no-brainer. But if people are under the illusion that these devices are scientifically proven to keep their minds in shape, they need to think again."

Which? members who had written to the organisation about brain training were asked to try the products for a month. One of the experts, Dr Adrian Owen, assistant director at the Medical Research Council's cognition and brain sciences unit in Cambridge, said of the research involving one group: "If they'd been asked to play Space Invaders for a month and improved at it - as surely they would - would we have concluded this was a beneficial form of brain training? Probably not."

Michael Scanlon, a neuroscientist from Lumosity, defended the company's research standards, and said: "We would never say Lumosity is proven to improve day-to-day living, but there is more and more evidence it does. We have actually conducted our own clinical trials to measure effectiveness of the product."

Also under the spotlight was Mindfit, a CD-Rom endorsed by the scientist Lady Greenfield. Two of the three studies it used to support its claims that it improved mental performance were found to be flawed. It also claimed that "cognitively challenging" activity protects against Alzheimer's. Bruce Robinson, chief executive of MindWeavers, which produces MindFit, said: "If you look at the wider evidence in the field the broad conclusion is that brain stimulation is working. With the MindFit product, a study was done by an independent medical centre in Israel which supported that evidence. We are not claiming MindFit will stop Alzheimer's."

Nintendo said: "Nintendo does not make any claims that Brain Training is scientifically proven to improve cognitive function. What we claim is the Brain Training series of games, like playing sudoku, are enjoyable and fun. These exercises can also help to keep the brain sharp."

Tried and tested

Dr Kawashima's Brain Training (Nintendo) £110 including DS console:

Instructions say it can help consolidate memory and creativity

Which? No evidence that using this product will have any functional impact on your life whatsoever

Mindfit (PC CD-ROM) £88

Company claims "exercises important abilities known to decline in later life"

Which? Tests didn't show using it was significantly better than playing Tetris

Lumosity (online training system) Luminos Labs, £4.99 a month

Company says: "Exercises ... designed to stimlulate neuroplasticity that leads to improved cognitive ability"

Which? Does not mean improvements on tasks will lead to improvements in day-to-day living

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Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Feb 2009 | 12:01 am

I'm a helpless victim of my brain

Not only am I not in charge of my destiny, I'm not even in charge of how I feel about not being in charge of my destiny

An optimist and a pessimist are shipwrecked, and wash up together on a desert island. The optimist decides that, though there's no food or fresh water where they are, it's worth exploring the other side of the island to see whether there's anything edible or potable there.

"Come on!" he says. "Where there's life, there's hope!"

"No there isn't," says the pessimist. "This is a desert island. There's nothing here. We might as well just lie down and die."

"Well, come on, it's worth a try, isn't it?"

"No it isn't. We're going to die."

So the optimist, not a mite discouraged, sets off by himself for the other side of the island, where he is eaten by a crocodile. And the pessimist starves to death.

Those of us who nod with sad recognition at this story have fresh cause for gloom with the arrival on our coffee tables of the latest fun-filled issue of the Proceedings of the Royal Society. Psychologists have conducted a study of more than 100 people and claim to have identified an optimism gene.

"We've shown for the first time that a genetic variation is linked with a tendency to look on the bright side of life," says Elaine Fox of the University of Essex. "This is a key mechanism underlying resilience to general life stress."

The fates of our unfortunate Crusoes are determined not, then, by their characters but by the genetic determinants on their characters. The crocodile victim has two long variants of a particular gene, and that's that. He's always going to be the optimist.

The study sounds, it has to be said, a bit preliminary. A sample size of "more than 100 people", as far as scientific studies goes, isn't a great boast. It's like saying you have "a collection of more than five stamps". The idea that a single gene, even a "bright-side gene", controls your entire outlook on life is - how to put it? - a strong claim. And the research consisted of what? They showed these people some pictures of cheerful stuff and depressing stuff and noted which they spent more time on.

The positive pictures included a couple hugging and someone sailing a boat.The negative images included a photo of someone being mugged. Who's to say which is positive and which is negative? Some people are terrified of sailing boats, and perhaps it was Chris Tarrant being mugged. I'll leave closer scrutiny of the methodology to Ben Goldacre on Saturday.

I choose to believe the result, though, because it confirms what I suspected: we are the victims of our own brains. Actually, I should recast that sentence. Rather than choosing to believe this study because it confirms what I already suspected, I was genetically doomed to believe it because it confirms what I am genetically doomed to believe about the setup of the universe.

I once imagined that optimism was a matter of willpower. When life serves you a shit sandwich, I thought, you can make a positive decision to close your eyes and enjoy the gherkiny bits. My growing feeling of having been wrong about that now enjoys scientific confirmation. I take no pleasure in the knowledge.

Every book I read lately, every news report I come across, seems to add to the sense that not only am I not in charge of my destiny, I'm not even in charge of how I feel about not being in charge of my destiny. The Anglo Saxons were right after all: wyrd bith ful aræd. Hundreds of years of Enlightenment humanism is on the verge of bringing us back to where we started.

I recently read Jonah Lehrer's new book, The Decisive Moment, about the neurology of decision-making, and the lesson was, more or less, that we don't make decisions: our brains make them for us. I might will a particular outcome, but is my will, as I think it was Wittgenstein who wondered, not simply an event in my brain also? How did that man sleep at night?

Be eaten by a crocodile? Or starve to death? The choice is yours. Except it isn't. How bleedin' depressing.

I was in the late-night newsagent in west London the other night, when I was struck by that faint thrill you get when you notice that the man in front of you in a queue is Lord Lamont. The drunk blokes behind me spotted him too. "All right Norman!" shouted one of them in a sort of menacing way. "Yeah, NORMAN!" another one riposted. He mumbled something into the collar of his coat and scuttled off looking miserable.

Do former Tory chancellors spend the rest of their lives as what my little brother used to call "bully magnets"? Anyway, it was a slightly ugly scene and I felt sorry for him. Shame on you, drunk people. Let the poor man buy his Chewits in peace.

Richard Williamson, the Holocaust-denying Catholic bishop, seems to be a subject fit more for curiosity than outrage. First there's his conviction that there were no gas chambers and only 300,000 died in the camps. Then there's his professed willingness to "review the historical evidence". Was he holding it upside-down the first time? Remember the man in the Monty Python sketch who says he wrote the plays attributed to Shakespeare? He is cross-examined: "How is it possible for you to have written plays performed over 300 years before you were born?" "Ah well," he responds good-naturedly. "This is where my claim falls to the ground."

* This week Sam attended the Oldie of the Year awards. "It was bliss. Old celebrities are much friendlier to each other than young ones. I got to meet comedy scriptwriters Galton and Simpson, and Lady West, the wife of the former first sea lord. Terry Wogan got squiffy and told corny jokes, at which everyone laughed fit to bust. I can't wait to be old, but I suppose I have to."

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Feb 2009 | 12:01 am

Study of fossils shows prehistoric fish had sex (AP)

AP - The fossilized remains of two pregnant fish indicate that sex as we know it fertilization of eggs inside a female took place as much as 30 million years earlier than previously thought, researchers said Thursday.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Feb 2009 | 9:49 pm

Antarctic glaciers melting faster than thought (AP)

AP - Glaciers in Antarctica are melting faster and across a much wider area than previously thought, a development that threatens to raise sea levels worldwide and force millions of people to flee low-lying areas, scientists said Wednesday.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Feb 2009 | 9:41 pm

Fish Fossils Revise Date Sex Evolved

Fossils of two pregnant fish suggest sex evolved millions of years earlier than thought.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 25 Feb 2009 | 9:24 pm

Plastic Bag Recycling Up Across U.S.

It's up 27 percent from 2005 to 2007.
Source: Livescience.com | 25 Feb 2009 | 8:52 pm

Ocean Circulation Triggers 'Seesaw' Climate

Big changes in ocean circulation can drive opposite extremes in the two hemispheres.
Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 25 Feb 2009 | 8:44 pm

Prehistoric fish pioneered sex

LONDON (Reuters) - Sex has been a fact of life for at least 380 million years, longer than previously thought. Internal fertilization was widespread among prehistoric fish living on ancient tropical coral reefs in the Devonian period, research published in the journal Nature on Wednesday showed.

Source: Reuters: Science News | 25 Feb 2009 | 7:40 pm

HIV quickly evolving among large groups: study

LONDON (Reuters) - The AIDS virus is quickly adapting across large groups of people to avoid triggering the human immune system, posing another challenge in the search for a potential vaccine, researchers said on Wednesday.

Source: Reuters: Science News | 25 Feb 2009 | 7:25 pm

Antidepressants May Thwart Quest for True Love

Antidepressant drugs, already known to cause sexual side effects, may also suppress the basic human emotions of love and romance.

That SSRIs, or selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors — the most common type of antidepressant — cause sexual dysfunction is common knowledge. Of the 31 million adults in the United States who take the SSRIs, about 30 percent are believed to experience sexual dysfunction.

But a new theory suggests that SSRI antidepressants may also subtly alter the fundamental chemistry of love and romance, snuffing the first sparks between two people otherwise destined to become lovers, and preventing couples from bonding.

"There's every reason to think SSRIs blunt your ability to fall and stay in love," said Helen Fisher, a Rutgers University biological anthropologist who has pioneered the modern science of love.

For some people, of course, sexual side effects are an acceptable price to pay for curing debilitating depression. But as antidepressant use becomes more common, extending beyond full-blown clinical depression to disorders like anxiety and, in some cases, insomnia, the possibility of love-stunting is troubling.

SSRI antidepressants work by boosting circulating levels of serotonin, a mood-regulating neurotransmitter that also inhibits desire. The drugs also decrease dopamine, a neurotransmitter involved in a wide range of cognitive and behavioral processes, among them desire and arousal. The new research suggests that dopamine may also play a part in romance.

During sex, a cocktail of hormones is released that appears to play important roles in fostering romantic attachment within the brain. Take away sex, and romantic love can dwindle. But this is just part of the problem, say Fisher and University of Virginia psychiatrist James Thomson.

Dopamine also appears central to the neurobiology of romantic love and attachment, conditions that Fisher believes to be affected by — but ultimately distinct from — sexual love and its effects. She and Thomson say that SSRIs may do more than cause sexual dysfunction: They also suppress romance.

"There are all sorts of unconscious systems in our brain that we use to negotiate romantic love and romantic attraction," said Thomson. "If these drugs cause conscious sexual side effects, we'd argue that there are going to be side effects that are not conscious."

According to Fisher, humans have three distinct but interconnected love-related brain systems: one for sex, another for attachment and another for romantic love. This is still hypothetical — nobody knows exactly what love does in the brain — but Fisher has been a pioneering researcher on romantic love's neurobiology, and dopamine indeed appears important.

When couples have just fallen in love, the mere sight of the other causes a jump in dopamine-related brain activity. If they manage to stay in love, with the early flush giving way to long-term affection, those brain patterns stay active.

Reduced dopamine levels, however, are an inevitable effect of SSRIs. Reduce dopamine, say Fisher and Thomson, and the possibility of love itself is reduced.

Though biologically plausible, definitive evidence for this has yet to be found. The only study to specifically test the hypothesis was conducted by Saint Mary's University psychologist Maryanne Fisher, who found that women taking antidepressants tended to have muted reactions when showed pictures of attractive men. The effect was small, however, and the study has not been reproduced.

University of California at Los Angeles psychiatrist Andrew Leuchter acknowledged that increasing serotonin can decrease dopamine, but has not seen difficulties in forming emotional attachments among his patients. "I've seen people who have great difficulty with their emotional attachments, who think they've fallen out of love or want to isolate themselves, come alive again," said Leuchter, who receives funding from antidepressant drugmakers. "I'm not sure the syndrome [Fisher and Thomson] describe exists."

Thomson and Fisher, on the other hand, report the opposite: antidepressant takers who've lost the capacity for romantic feeling.

Clinical studies of antidepressant side effects do little to settle this debate. They've focused on sexual problems, which are far easier to measure than subtle effects on something so ephemeral as a spark.

Thomson recommended that psychologists investigating romance ask test subjects whether they take antidepressants. He also suggests that the possibility of romantic stunting be considered when deciding whether antidepressants should be prescribed to a child or young adult.

"Does it impact the development of those areas of the brain involved in love and sexuality? Does it impair the feelings and behaviors of romantic love and sexuality and the learning processes, which might be required to bring those areas of the brain online?" said Thomson. "We don't know."

Said Fisher, "We want to know about the side effects of other drugs. Why not know about the side effects of these drugs, which affect our reproductive future?"

Another alternative could be drugs that don't boost serotonin. Bupropion, also known as Wellbutrin, increases levels of dopamine and norepinephrine, another neurotransmitter; it's been associated with far lower levels of sexual dysfunction, but doesn't work for everyone.

Drug companies are currently designing next-generation antidepressants that raise dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine levels simultaneously, and might have fewer romantic side effects. However, none of these drugs are yet on the market, and projected side effects remain hypothetical.

"Any drug in development is always better than anything out there," said Leuchter. "And then, once they hit the market, nothing is perfect."

Photo: Brent Moore/Flickr

See Also:

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

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 25 Feb 2009 | 7:23 pm

Brain-Machine Interfaces Make for Tricky Ethics

Direct connections from brains to computers may someday help free paralyzed people from the constraints of their bodies. They're already used to reverse deafness and blindness. But as they become more refined, brain-machine interfaces will almost certainly be used for non-therapeutic purposes — and with that expansion comes profound ethical questions.

"Whether these technologies are used in a way that's in harmony with — or an affront to — human dignity is the main question," said Adam Keiper, director of the Ethics and Public Policy Center's program on science, technology and society.

First-generation neuroelectronics are already on the market in the form of hearing aids — 150,000 people have straight-to-brain cochlear implants — and deep-brain stimulators are used to treat Parkinson's, epilepsy and even depression. Retinal implants to replace damaged eyes are in development, as are systems that enable paraplegics to control computers by thinking.

Though incredible, these technologies may someday seem rudimentary. Scientists predict that future implants will be made from engineered tissue and organic nanomaterials rather than metal, and allow for a literally seamless union of man and machine. Brain-machine interfaces could be used for entertainment or work; the U.S. military already wants to implant them in soldiers.

To some researchers, the ethical issues are not complicated. "These questions are similar to those surrounding antidepressants," said University of Tübingen bioethicist Jens Clausen, who writes about neuroelectronics in an essay published Wednesday in Nature. "We can look at discussions that have already taken place, and figure out what is relevant."

Clausen's essay focuses on the safety of implanted circuitry and brain system-tinkering. This, however, may be the easiest question to answer: Risks can be measured and weighed against possible benefits. Far trickier questions are posed by the potential off-label applications of futuristic brain-machine systems, just as steroids provoke a different discussion when injected to help hit home runs rather than being inhaled for asthma.

"The questions related to brain-machine interfaces get much more interesting when you turn to the matter of enhancement," said Keiper.

One potentially troubling aspect of cognition-enhancing drugs is coercion: If people take drugs to get a performance boost, others need to take them just to keep pace.

According to James Hughes, director of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, that's not a big deal. "It's exactly the same question we face with literacy, or wearing a tie," he said. "In Japan, for the last 20 or 30 years, you had to go out with all your workmates after work and drink if you wanted to get ahead. Otherwise, you were considered weird. That's putting something in your head."

By allowing people to perceive what they now can't, or activate parts of their brain at will, Hughes said that brain-machine implants could challenge people's sense of themselves.

"The questions that I think do matter involve permanent changes in self-image and preferences," he said. "People with a notion of authentic self are troubled by notions of brain-machine interfaces and pharmaceuticals. And we will begin to trample the notion of authentic self."

Hughes said the same question is raised by mood-altering drugs and chemicals that can change — or even eliminate — sex drives.

But to Charles Rubin, a political scientist at Duquesne University, comparing neuroelectronics to antidepressants is misleading.

The more seamless the union between man and machine, said Rubin, "the less I am a user of the 'machine' and the more I become the machine."

"The dedicated woodworker may feel lost and out of sorts without his tools at hand, but can still function in the world," said Rubin. "How true will that be of brains that have been modified or modified themselves to entirely new inputs and outputs?"

Citation: "Man, machine and in between." By Jens Clausen. Nature, Vol. 457 No. 7233, Feb. 25, 2009.

Image: Gaetan Lee/Flickr

See Also:

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

Source: Wired: Wired Science | 25 Feb 2009 | 7:22 pm

Sex Goes Way Back, Fossil Find Shows (LiveScience.com)

LiveScience.com - Remains of embryos entombed in their fish mothers' wombs for 380 million years have been found in fossils from an ancient rock outcrop in Western Australia. The finding is a big deal because it suggests that sex goes way back. The prehistoric fish, called placoderms, are found at the base of the vertebrate evolutionary tree (in a large group we humans also belong to), so it now looks like sexual intercourse, and the mating behaviors that go along with it, were more widespread in these ancient animals than previously thought, said the scientists who made the discovery. ...
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Feb 2009 | 7:01 pm

Sex Goes Way Back, Fossil Find Shows

Fossilized embryos in ancient fish show sexual intercourse more widespread in early evolution than previously thought.
Source: Livescience.com | 25 Feb 2009 | 6:04 pm

Fossil embryos provide clues to evolution of live birth in vertebrates

A clutch of ancient embryos unearthed by fossil hunters in Australia have been identified as some of the earliest evidence for internal fertilisation and live birth.

Researchers working in Gogo in Western Australia made the discovery after uncovering the remains of three armour-plated fish that date back 380 million years.

The fish belong to a group of more than 200 species known as the placoderms that lived 430m to 360m years ago and were notable for the bony plates on their heads and shoulders.

By analysing the fossils in 3D, researchers led by John Long at the Australian National University in Canberra spotted minute but perfectly preserved armour plates of the same species inside the fishes' body cavities.

At first the tiny remains were thought to be the remains of a last meal in the fishes' stomachs, but on closer inspection it became clear that the plates showed no bite marks or signs of erosion from stomach acid.

The lack of markings on the tiny bones suggests that rather than being food, they were in fact embryos. In one of the fossils, a curving tube near an embryo is thought to be an ancient umbilical cord.

If this interpretation is right, the fossils represent some of the earliest evidence for internal fertilisation and the birth of live young, a landmark in the evolutionary history of life and sex on Earth.

Fish that bear live offspring produce fewer young and populations tend to grow more slowly than those that spawn externally.

The discovery sheds light on the ancient ecosystem of the Gogo, a tropical reef where a wide diversity of placoderms lived alongside lungfish and the early ancestors of rays, says Per Ahlberg, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Uppsala in Sweden, in a comment piece accompanying the article in the latest issue of Nature.

Examples of primitive reproduction in the fossil record are rare, and while evidence has been found in one smaller group of placoderms, the latest discovery confirms that live birth was much more widespread than thought.

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 25 Feb 2009 | 6:00 pm

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