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Diet Affects Diversity Of Microbes In Human Gut, And In Turn, Colon Cancer RiskA typical Western diet, rich in meat and fats and low in complex carbohydrates, is a recipe for colon cancer, scientists say. Researchers have described an expanding body of evidence to show that the composition of the diet directly influences the diversity of the microbes in the gut, providing the link between diet, colonic disease and colon cancer.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Cholesterol Crystals Linked To Cardiovascular AttacksFor the first time ever, a researcher has shown cholesterol crystals can disrupt plaque in a patient's cardiovascular system, causing a heart attack or stroke.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm From Stress To Financial Mess: Acute Stress Affects Financial Decision MakingAccording to a new report in Psychological Science, stress could make our financial troubles even worse. This study suggests that stress exaggerates the reflection effect; while exposed to stress volunteers were more conservative when choosing between potentially positive outcomes and were riskier when choosing between gambles that could result in a loss. These findings indicate that in financial decision making, where rational and deliberative thinking is essential, a stressful environment might hamper our ability to make decisions.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Evolutionary Origin Of Bacterial Chromosomes RevealedResearchers have unveiled the evolutionary origin of the different chromosomal architectures found in three species of Agrobacterium. A comprehensive comparison of the Agrobacterium sequence information with the genome sequences of other bacteria suggests a general model for how second chromosomes are formed in bacteria.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Experimental Parkinson's Therapy May Have Robust Weight-loss EffectA growth factor used to rescue dying brain cells may cause unwanted weight loss if placed in specific brain regions -- a cautionary warning for experimental treatments to treat Parkinson's disease that use GDNF, short for glial cell-line derived neurotrophic factor. In addition, the finding broadens understanding of the brain's role in the regulation of metabolism and body weight, suggesting that gene therapy techniques in the brain potentially could control obesity.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Hidden Exoplanet Found In Archival DataA powerful, newly refined image-processing technique may allow astronomers to discover extrasolar planets that are possibly lurking in over a decade's worth of Hubble Space Telescope archival data.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Network Turns Soldiers' Helmets Into Sniper Location SystemImagine a platoon of soldiers fighting in a hazardous urban environment who carry personal digital assistants that can display the location of enemy shooters in three dimensions and accurately identify the caliber and type of weapons they are firing. Engineers have developed a system that can give soldiers just such an edge by turning their combat helmets into "smart nodes" in a wireless sensor network.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 12:00 pm New Way To Fight Cocaine Addiction DiscoveredPharmacological researchers have discovered that blocking a hormone related to hunger regulation can limit cocaine cravings. Their findings could herald a new approach to overcoming addiction.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 12:00 pm New Theory Of Autism Suggests Symptoms Or Disorder May Be ReversibleScientists have proposed a sweeping new theory of autism that suggests that the brains of people with autism are structurally normal but dysregulated, meaning symptoms of the disorder might be reversible.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 12:00 pm Reductions In Cancer And Overall Mortality Persist 10 Years After Vitamin And Mineral SupplementationIndividuals who took a dietary supplement called "factor D", which included selenium, vitamin E, and beta-carotene, continued to have lower gastric cancer and overall mortality 10 years after supplementation ceased compared with individuals who did not take the supplements, according to long-term follow-up data from the randomized, double-blind General Population Nutrition Intervention Trial in Linxian, China.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 12:00 pm NKorea vows to attack Japan if rocket intercepted (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 9:27 am Gene Mutation Doubles Risk of Aggressive Colon Cancer in Blacks (HealthDay)HealthDay - WEDNESDAY, April 1 (HealthDay News) -- A genetic mutation may explain why blacks are more likely than whites to have a more aggressive form of colorectal cancer, U.S. researchers report.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 3:49 am Technology opens promise, perils of ocean mining (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 2:24 am Stock-takeCall to count the creatures hiding in the flower bedsSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 2 Apr 2009 | 1:26 am Executives cite concerns about U.S. dominance in spaceCOLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (Reuters) - The United States may lose its competitive edge in space unless it improves how it buys equipment, shores up its industrial base, and makes a firm commitment to human spaceflight, industry executives warned at a conference this week.Source: Reuters: Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 1:19 am How now brown cow? Run for it! (AP)AP - A dairy cow was headed for the slaughterhouse until an animal-rights activist bought her after the Brown Jersey made a run for it. Farmer Calvin Nisly was taking the 5-year-old cow named Linda to a sale barn Tuesday and had stopped at a veterinarian's office to be sure she wasn't pregnant. On the way back to the trailer, an annoyed Linda escaped through a fence and led Nisly and several law enforcement vehicles on a chase.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 1:01 am Venezuela ups US oil sales despite OPEC, US says (AP)AP - CARACAS, Venezuela Venezuela increased oil shipments to the United States in January, despite President Hugo Chavez's anti-U.S. rhetoric and a promise to OPEC to cut output, the U.S. Department of Energy said Wednesday.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 12:59 am Feds file to delist wolves, except in Wyoming (AP)AP - The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a formal rule Wednesday to remove gray wolves from the federal endangered list in Montana and Idaho while keeping protections in Wyoming.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 2 Apr 2009 | 12:19 am Clues to ancient invasion in DNAScientific evidence of an ancient movement of people from Ireland to Scotland are suggested by DNA techniques.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 2 Apr 2009 | 12:08 am Clean Tech Understimulated, Venture Money Down 48%
After a banner 2008, clean tech funding took a nasty dive in the first three months of 2009, dropping to under $1 billion, according to two research firms. Though comparable numbers are not yet available for other venture capital sectors like software and biotechnology, both The Cleantech Group and GTM Research calculated drops in green tech funding to $1 billion and $836 million, respectively. The Cleantech Group says that's a 48 percent drop over last year. The differing numbers reflect the slightly different methodologies and types of companies that are included in their analyses, but the main takeaway of both reports is the same: Green tech is getting hit by the broad economic downturn and lack of investment money, and not even the stimulus money pouring into the field has been able to stem the tide. "Venture obviously is down, it's tough times for startups looking for capital," said Brian Fan, head of research for The Cleantech Group. "Government is stepping in in a big way, but it doesn't quite fill the gap." For a U.S. economy devastated by its dependence on the largely depressed finance, insurance and real estate sectors, green tech could be just right for what ails it. By producing new exportable technology, wind turbine makers, solar panel builders and other types of companies could create a new industrial base for America. But to replace one G.M., or even one Lehman Brothers, renewable energy, smart grid and green home companies are going to have to grow fast. And dessication of the funding pool isn't going to help that happen. Still, on a slightly longer time scale, green tech funding is far more accessible than at almost any time in the last 25 years. According to The Cleantech Group numbers, the $1 billion pulled in from January through March is more than the total venture capital investment in green tech in 2005. "It's important to put these numbers in
perspective," Ira Ehrenpreis, a longtime green tech investor and booster at the firm, Technology Partners, said in a statement released by GTM Research. "The $800 million of investment this quarter is more capital
than has been invested annually for
most of the years that we’ve been investing in the clean tech sector." "Venture funds in the last year have really learned that the clean tech space is not like software," Fan said. "You can get a software company from zero to IPO with $50 million. That's one round [of financing] in green tech." So venture firms are returning to their roots investing in small companies, Fan said, instead of making big bets on ethanol refineries and solar thermal plants. See Also:
Image: nowpicnic/Flickr WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal's Twitter , Google Reader feed, and project site, Inventing Green: the lost history of American clean tech; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 1 Apr 2009 | 11:12 pm New Clues to Sea's Green Glow (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - An eerie green glow that sometimes emanates from ocean waters was known to be produced by bioluminescent worms, but now scientists have uncovered some key clues as to just how the creatures produce their light show. The show isn't for us. Marine fireworms use bioluminescence to attract suitors in an undersea mating ritual. New research conducted by Scripps Institution of Oceanography marine biologists Dimitri Deheyn and Michael Latz reveals that the worms also may use the light as a defensive measure. ...Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 1 Apr 2009 | 10:52 pm New Clues to Sea's Green GlowSea worms use bioluminescence to attract mates, defend themselves.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 10:39 pm Preponderance of Positrons Points to Dark Matter
An orbiting observatory may have found the first indirect evidence of dark matter particles colliding in space and disappearing, as if in a puff of smoke. The “smoke” in this case consists of positrons, the antimatter counterpart of electrons. The constant rain of energetic particles that bombards the Earth’s surface, known as cosmic rays, contains many more positrons than scientists expected, according to a study in Nature Wednesday. All theories agree that dark matter must give this signal, an increasing of number of positrons,” said Piergiorgio Picozza of the University of Rome, leader of the study. Positrons and other particles of antimatter can enter the stream of cosmic rays in three ways. One is for cosmic rays to collide with stray atoms in interstellar space, producing a shower of particles. Known as a “secondary source,” this process is similar to what happens inside particle accelerators, and scientists presumed it was where most positrons came from. Another possibility is that they are produced in the magnetic fields of pulsars, rapidly spinning stellar leftovers from supernova explosions, or microquasars, small, distant galaxies with active cores. The third and most exciting option is the collision of dark matter particles. The top candidates for dark matter, the heavy but invisible stuff that makes up 23 percent of the universe, are weakly-interacting massive particles. Contrary to their WIMPy name, when two of these particles collide, they annihilate each other in a burst of energy and propel a cloud of matter and antimatter particles into space. The theory has been a favorite of physicists for years, but until now, no one had detected evidence of these collisions. To measure the abundance of positrons in cosmic rays, the team used data from the instrument PAMELA (Payload for Antimatter Matter Exploration and Light-nuclei Astrophysics), which launched aboard a Russian satellite in June 2006. Unlike previous antimatter-hunting instruments, PAMELA can pinpoint not just the type of incoming particle but also its energy. The team calculated the fraction of incoming particles that positrons at several different energies accounted for. They found that as the energy went up, so did the percentage of positrons. This upswing rules out secondary sources as the main source of positrons, and bolsters the case for dark matter. This isn’t the first time this idea has come up. In August, the PAMELA team cautiously presented these results at two conferences in Stockholm and Philadelphia, sparking a flurry of activity in the physics world. Some enterprising physicists snapped photos of the presentation’s slides and extracted the data to analyze it themselves. In response, the PAMELA team released their data on the preprint site arXiv.org in October. More than 100 papers have come out since then, and more than half of them argue for dark matter sources. But not so fast. The same team published a study in February saying that a similar measurement of anti-protons could be explained just from cosmic rays hitting interstellar dust, with no need for dark matter at all. “The data significantly constrain contributions from exotic sources, e.g., dark matter,” the team wrote. The physics community sighed — maybe it's not dark matter after all. This apparent contradiction doesn't bother Picozza. Both results narrow down the possibilities. “There are many models,” he said. “We did not see anything for anti-protons, so those models are more or less ruled out, or they have to change something. But there remain many other models that prefer all positrons.” Pulsars are still an equal contender. Other physicists are cautious about jumping on the dark matter solution. "It’s a very interesting find, but we don’t know yet if we need to invoke some exotic explanations," said physicist Yousaf Butt of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. "There are certainly other prosaic explanations." More data from PAMELA at higher energies combined with observations from other observatories will help determine which source produces more positrons. “Pulsars are less exotic, but still very important,” Picozza
said. “If this information is interpreted in the future in terms of dark matter, we
made a very, very important discovery. If it is in terms of pulsars, we did a
very good experiment.” See Also:
Image: PAMELA Source: Wired: Wired Science | 1 Apr 2009 | 10:37 pm Baby Bunny Has Two NosesA pet shop rabbit in Connecticut has two noses and four nostrils.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 10:08 pm Hurricane Season 2008 (weather.com)weather.com -Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 1 Apr 2009 | 10:05 pm Humans Losing Touch with NatureToo much of life is based on electronic representations of reality.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 9:51 pm Journal retracts diabetes study published in 2000 (AP)AP - A scientific journal is retracting a research paper published more than eight years ago that reported a gene therapy treatment had led to remission of Type 1 diabetes in rats and mice.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 1 Apr 2009 | 9:15 pm Save Mind Uploading From Wikipedia Doom
The entry for mind uploading — one of the cooler concepts of modern life — may be deleted from Wikipedia if it's not improved. Involving the transference of a mind from biological brain to computer hardware — or, for that matter, any other substrate; a character in Charles Stross' Accelerando embodies himself in a flock of seagulls — mind uploading is a tenet of transhumanist hopes and science fiction. It's been postulated by such artificial intelligence luminaries as Ray Kurzweil, Marvin Minsky and Hans Moravec; is a central plot device of The Matrix and Battlestar Galactica; and figures prominently in the work of Stross, Iain Banks, Charles Platt and Gene Wolfe. In addition to its cultural role, mind uploading also reflects a fundamental assumption of modern neuroscience and cognitive theory: that consciousness does not require some mysterious, immaterial energizing force, but is contained in the physical interactions of a brain and its structure, and can thus be quantified and described. Of course, scientists are still in the early stages of quantification. A full description of the mind could take decades, and transferring that description decades more — if, that is, it's ever possible at all. But mind uploading still deserves a place in Wikipedia. Unfortunately, the entry for mind uploading is, as user Jw2035 notes on its deletion page, almost entirely barren of scholarly or even cultural references. If it's not improved, it probably deserves to be deleted. So go to it, citizens! Image: University of California, Davis See Also:
Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 1 Apr 2009 | 8:16 pm Astronomers Find Hidden Exoplanet in Hubble's Dustbin
An exoplanet hidden in the Hubble Space Telescope's archival images has been revealed by data miners using a new technique for spotting the satellites of distant stars. In search of more information about a known exoplanet orbiting the star HR8799 about 130 light-years from Earth, astronomers turned to the catalog of images Hubble has been amassing for more than 15 years. Using an algorithm that can block the bright light of observed stars allowing the much fainter exoplanets circling them to be seen, the team spotted the planet in an image from 1998. The same technique could be used on 200 similar datasets from Hubble, as well an unknown number of archival images from ground-based telescopes. "Now that we've shown that it works, we can use it on a whole set of observations from the archive to see if a planet is hidden in the images," said astronomer David Lafreniere of the University of Toronto, a member of the team that made the find.
Other scientific experiments and tools have generated mountains of information, but much of that data is stuffed away in hard copy formats or on hard-to-access databases. Most of that data actually goes unanalyzed. "The numbers that are typically quoted are three to ten percent of [scientific] data is analyzed," Fox told Wired.com in January. "That means almost none of it is reanalyzed. Is that a good investment in public funds? Probably not." Lafreniere noted that his team's work was aided by the Hubble archive's metadata and searchability. "You can search using different parameters, different target names, different wavelengths. The search is easy," he said. "But maybe more importantly, the data is high quality... It's been processed and calibrated such that the result is a high quality product. With the technique verified, Lafreniere said that it would be applied to future data, too. "I should add here that for the upcoming James Webb Telescope, this will definitely be one of the strategies used to look for planets," he said. "We need a method to subtract the light of the star." The James Webb is slated to be launched in 2013. The Kepler Space Telescope, which is designed to look for exoplanets, successfully launched into orbit in March. See Also:
WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal's Twitter , Google Reader feed, and project site, Inventing Green: the lost history of American clean tech; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 1 Apr 2009 | 7:52 pm 5 Things You Must Know About SleepLearn five recent findings that might help you rest easier.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 7:46 pm Dark Matter Detected in Energy SignalAn unusual abundance of positrons recorded by a satellite may be a sign of dark matter.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 6:26 pm Signals could be from dark matterStreams of positron particles detected by a satellite could have been produced by dark matter, say researchers.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 1 Apr 2009 | 5:47 pm Chicks Are Smart, Scientists ConfirmBaby chickens aren't just cute; they are also whizzes at math, a new study reveals.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 5:10 pm Mysterious Dark Matter Possibly DetectedScientists have found a possible signature of dark matter destruction.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 5:09 pm Airport Body Scans Reveal AllNew airport security scanners could replace body searches.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 5:00 pm BLOG: Mysterious Lights, Boom ID'd as MeteorA meteor, not space junk, likely caused a boom and flashing lights over Virginia.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 4:57 pm Motivational Robots Compete to Explore "Planets"Students design, build and race to complete science tasks using Lego robots during the annual FIRST robotics regional competition at JPL.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 4:56 pm First Ship Sunk in WWII Revealed in SonarImages of the U.S. vessel City of Rayville, sunk by a mine in 1940, are taken by sonar.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 4:35 pm Computer exercise helps stroke victims "see" againWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Millie Sauer did not even know she had suffered a stroke until she tried to read a book as she recovered from surgery and saw only a gray blur for part of the page.Source: Reuters: Science News | 1 Apr 2009 | 4:25 pm 'Supersize' lions roamed BritainGiant lions were roaming Europe and North America as recently as 13,000 years ago, Oxford University scientists say.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 1 Apr 2009 | 4:10 pm Hidden Planet Discovered in Old Hubble DataAstronomers find exoplanet hidden in Hubble images, hoping to find more.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 3:58 pm Gold Nanospheres Sear Cancer Cells to DeathNewly developed hollow gold nanospheres search for and burn tumors.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 3:48 pm Birth Defects Tied to Season of ConceptionSpring and early summer is the nation's season of risk for conceiving a child with birth defects, a new study finds.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 2:41 pm Drug Quells Urge to StealA drug given to kleptomaniacs took some of the fun out of stealing.Source: Livescience.com | 1 Apr 2009 | 2:04 pm U.S. space programs need better oversight: groupCOLORADO SPRINGS (Reuters) - U.S. government spending on unclassified satellites and space programs is out of control and soared 42 percent to $16.9 billion in fiscal 2009 from $11.9 billion in 2005, the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense said on Tuesday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 1 Apr 2009 | 2:03 pm Rogue Aussie Camels Infiltrate CommunitiesWild camels are entering communities in the Australian outback in search of water.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 2:00 pm Thin speaker offers 'crisp sound'A new way of delivering sound using flat speaker could be used in audio posters and make for clearer PA systems.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 1 Apr 2009 | 1:42 pm Talking in color: imaging helps social skillsSAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Karrie Karahalios can show a child with Asperger's Syndrome when he's lost in a conversational riff or a taciturn spouse when he doesn't speak very much.Source: Reuters: Science News | 1 Apr 2009 | 1:37 pm More Girls Born in the TropicsThe nearer a mother lives to the equator, the more likely she is to give birth to a girl.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 1:20 pm Newly hatched chickens can countChicks can add and subtract small numbers shortly after hatching and without receiving any formal mathematical training Chicks can do simple sums soon after they hatch, according to a study by scientists in Italy. Researchers observed what they called "impressive arithmetic" in newly hatched chicks, none of which had been trained or had any previous experience of problem solving. The study is the first to find evidence for basic mathematical skills in young animals that have not been taught first. Rosa Rugani at the University of Trento demonstrated chicks' ability to add and subtract by moving identical objects behind two screens as the animals looked on. According to Rugani, the chicks had to perform simple arithmetic to work out which screen obscured the larger number of objects. The chicks were reared with five plastic containers of the kind found inside Kinder chocolate eggs. This meant the chicks bonded with the capsules, much as they do with their mother, making them want to be near the containers as they grew up. In a series of simple maths tests, Rugani's team attached a fishing line to each of the plastic capsules and used it to move them behind two screens that the chick could see from behind a clear plastic door. When all of the containers had been hidden, the chick was set free to investigate. Rugani's team found that when the chicks went in search of the capsules, they peered first behind the screen that concealed the larger number of containers. In a more difficult test, the researchers moved the containers back and forth behind the two screens while the chicks watched. When they were released into the enclosure, the chicks still made for the screen obscuring the most containers, suggesting they had been able to keep track of the number of capsules behind each by adding and subtracting them as they moved. The study is published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B. 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 | 1 Apr 2009 | 1:15 pm Long-Necked Dinosaurs Held Heads HorizontallyThe image of a long-necked sauropod, head in the treetops, may need a revision.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 1 Apr 2009 | 1:10 pm Rare Irrawaddy dolphins foundPopulation of 6,000 endangered dolphins under threat from climate change and fishing, US conservationists warn Conservationists claim to have found thousands of rare Irrawaddy dolphins on the Bangladesh coast, but warn that the newly discovered population is under threat from climate change and fishing. Researchers from the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) said they have found nearly 6,000 Irrawaddy dolphins living in the freshwater regions of Bangladesh's Sundarbans mangrove forest and nearby waters in the Bay of Bengal. The largest known populations of Irrawaddy dolphins to date have numbered in the low hundreds or less – at least 125 in the Mekong river, 77 in the Malampaya Sound in the Philippines and up to 100 in the Mahakam River, Indonesia. Until this new Bangladesh population was found, figures from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) estimated the Sundarbans population to be around 450. WCS says it used rigorous scientific techniques in an area where little marine mammal research has taken place to document the new population. "The number of animals could be higher – or lower," said Howard Rosenbaum, the director of WCS's ocean giants cetacean programme. "Our best estimate given the science is that there are 6,000. It sounds a lot but the Sundarbans cover a huge area. When you look at the areas that have been surveyed before the populations are low as they are in areas impacted by human development. But this area had never before been surveyed. We're really excited and this finding gives us great hope but this species is still very vulnerable." The discovery of a new population is an important finding as scientists and conservation groups do not know how many Irrawaddy dolphins remain across south and south-east Asia. The species, related to orcas or killer whales, were listed in 2008 as "vulnerable" on the IUCN's "red list" of endangered species due to declines in known populations. "This discovery gives us great hope that there is a future for Irrawaddy dolphins," said Brian D Smith, the study's lead author. "Bangladesh clearly serves as an important sanctuary for Irrawaddy dolphins, and conservation in this region should be a top priority." "With all the news about freshwater environments and the state of the oceans, WCS's discovery that a thriving population of Irrawaddy dolphins exists in Bangladesh gives us hope for protecting this and other endangered species and their important habitats," said Steven E Sanderson, the president and chief executive of the WCS. The results of the study were announced yesterday at the world's first international conference on marine mammal protected areas in Maui, Hawaii, and published in the Journal of Cetacean Research and Management. But the scientists warned that the dolphins are becoming increasingly threatened by accidental entanglement in fishing nets. Declining freshwater supplies also pose a threat – from upstream water diversions such as dams and by rising sea levels caused by climate change that will see the loss of freshwater habitats. These problems also threaten the Ganges river dolphins, an endangered species that also inhabits the Sundarbans. The recent likely extinction of the Yangtze river dolphin, or baiji, is a potent reminder of how vulnerable freshwater dolphins are to extinction via the impacts of humans, the organisation said. The Irrawaddy dolphin grows to some 2-2.5 metres in length (6.5-8ft) and lives in large rivers, estuaries, and freshwater lagoons in south and south-east Asia. As recently as 1996 they were listed as "data deficient" as not enough was known about the species and its range and habitats. Since then, the IUCN said, five populations have been listed as critically endangered, and the range of the populations and their numbers have declined as they have been caught as bycatch and faced habitat degradation. Scientists estimated the numbers of the new Bangladesh population using a technique called distance sampling – taking a boat along plotted grid lines and counting the numbers of animals seen, accounting for how many are above or below the surface and whether the same animal has been counted twice. The team covered 1,000 sq km of water during the survey in 2004. Mark Simmonds, the international director of science for the UK-based Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, said: "This discovery is an interesting one as it reflects the fact that now the Sundarbans have been more fully surveyed, we have a much better idea of how many animals are there. Irrawaddy dolphins are getting rarer and rarer in that part of the world. To find 6,000 isn't huge – but it's significant – and it does show that when you look for something and survey properly you can get some interesting findings. "But the most important thing is that mangrove habitat is incredibly threatened, and while it's great to know that they are full of dolphins, we wish they could live somewhere else. Mangroves are threatened by changes in the water passing through them – from extreme weather, sea level rises, changes in salinity and changes to water systems upstream. The Sundarbans system is important and needs better protection." The WCS has asked Bangladesh authorities to establish a sanctuary for the dolphins in the Sundarbans mangrove forest. Ainun Nishat, the Bangladesh head of International Union for Conservation of Nature, said the finding was an indication that "ecology in the area is not dead yet". "There is plenty of food, mainly fish, in the area for the dolphins to eat," said Nishat, who was not involved in the study. "What is now needed is to restrict fishing in the area to protect the dolphins." 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 | 1 Apr 2009 | 11:51 am Fanning the firesClimate change blamed for Nepal forest firesSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 1 Apr 2009 | 10:29 am
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