New Way To Enhance Stem Cells To Stimulate Muscle Regeneration

Scientists have discovered a powerful new way to stimulate muscle regeneration, paving the way for new treatments for debilitating conditions such as muscular dystrophy. The research shows for the first time that a protein called Wnt7a increases the number of stem cells in muscle tissue, leading to accelerated growth and repair of skeletal muscle.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 9:00 pm

New Class Of Dim Supernovae

The colossal stellar explosions called supernovae come in many kinds and flavors. Some of them are produced when a massive star reaches the end of its life in a sudden gravitational collapse. Astronomers have just found one of these explosions that defies the current classification scheme.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 9:00 pm

Key Regulator Of Fat Cell Development Discovered

Scientists have discovered how two related proteins and their roles in a key molecular pathway are critical to creating obesity-causing fat cells.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 9:00 pm

Findings In Epilepsy Gene In Animals May Guide Treatment Directions For Infants

Researchers studying a difficult-to-treat form of childhood epilepsy called infantile spasms have developed a line of mice that experiences seizures with features closely resembling those occurring in human infants. These genetically engineered mice provide a new opportunity for scientists to test treatments that may benefit children.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 9:00 pm

Surprising Green Energy Investment Trends Found Worldwide

Some $155 billion was invested in 2008 in clean energy companies and projects worldwide, not including large hydro, a new report says. Of this $13.5 billion of new private investment went into companies developing and scaling-up new technologies alongside $117 billion of investment in renewable energy projects from geothermal and wind to solar and biofuels.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 9:00 pm

Gay Marriage Bans Linked To Rise In HIV Rate

Bans on same-sex marriage can be tied to a rise in the rate of HIV infection, a new study has found.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 9:00 pm

Hawaii Volcano Glows

Lava is thought to be close to the surface of the summit of Hawaii's Kilauea volcano.
Source: Livescience.com | 7 Jun 2009 | 3:02 pm

Nature Parks Can Save Species As Climate Changes

Retaining a network of wildlife conservation areas is vital in helping to save up to 90 per cent of bird species in Africa affected by climate change, according to scientists.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 3:00 pm

'Colossal' Magnetic Effect Under Pressure: Another Revolution In Computing Technology?

Millions of people today carry around pocket-sized music players capable of holding thousands of songs, thanks to the discovery 20 years ago of a phenomenon known as the "giant magnetoresistance effect," which made it possible to pack more data onto smaller and smaller hard drives. Now scientists are on the trail of another phenomenon, called the "colossal magnetoresistance effect" (CMR) which is up to a thousand times more powerful and could trigger another revolution in computing technology.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 3:00 pm

Linking Genetic Material MicroRNAs With Cells That Regulate The Immune System Could One Day Lead To New Therapies For Treating Cancer

Linking genetic material microRNAs with cells that regulate the immune system could one day lead to new therapies for treating cancer, infections and autoimmune diseases, according to a new study.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 3:00 pm

New Genetic Immune Disorder In Children Discovered

Your immune system plays an important function in your health -- it protects you against viruses, bacteria, and other toxins that can cause disease. In autoinflammatory diseases, however, the immune system goes awry, causing unprovoked and dangerous inflammation. Now, researchers have discovered a new autoinflammatory syndrome, a rare genetic condition that affects children around the time of birth.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 3:00 pm

Find Recycling Events Near You

The site's search engine now finds recycling events.
Source: Livescience.com | 7 Jun 2009 | 2:20 pm

Early rocks to reveal their ages

A new technique has been helping scientists piece together how the Earth's continents were arranged 2.5 billion years ago.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 7 Jun 2009 | 2:19 pm

Japanese Machine Turns Office Waste Into Toilet Paper

Several manufacturers are coming up with new ways to reuse our waste.
Source: Livescience.com | 7 Jun 2009 | 2:14 pm

The Nation's Weather (AP)

AP - Some western mountain areas were expected to see the first June snowfall in decades Sunday as a low pressure system was forecast to push through the Plains towards the Great Lakes.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 8:48 am

Scientists eye glowing volcano crater in Hawaii (AP)

AP - The summit of Hawaii's Kilauea volcano is glowing brightly as molten lava swirls 300 feet below its crater's floor, bubbling near the surface after years of spewing from the volcano's side.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 Jun 2009 | 12:06 am

Natural bleach 'key to healing'

A natural bleach produced by the body appears to play a key role in marshalling the immune system to heal wounds.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 6 Jun 2009 | 11:44 pm

Out with the new, in with the old as native species return to British countryside

The first great bustards born in the wild in the UK since 1832 hatched last week. The reintroduction of this and many other species is invigorating the countryside, but eradicating foreign invaders - animals and plants - is equally important

It has been a fine week for David Walters. After 10 years' work, and the investment of more than £100,000 of his own cash, his great bustard project reaped rich dividends last Sunday. Two of the birds that he had reintroduced from Russia to Britain were found to have hatched chicks. "They are the first British bustards to be born in 177 years," he announced proudly last week.

The bustard project is remarkable for the efforts of Walters, a former Wiltshire policeman. It is also striking because it is one of several recent species reintroductions that have been achieved by ecologists trying to reinvigorate the nation's biodiversity. Other successes include the red kite, the white-tailed eagle and the beaver.

Now follow-up plans are being prepared for the short-haired bumblebee, the hen harrier and the corncrake. However, none is likely to match Walter's bustard reintroductions on Salisbury Plain for the commitment of its organiser.

"People spend huge sums of money on holidays to the Galápagos or Tanzania to see exotic animals," said Walters. "But a great bustard, apart from having a smashing name, is an extraordinary bird. It has an 8ft wingspan and looks like a crane on steroids. And when the male displays, it just about turns itself inside out. As a flagship for UK wildlife reintroductions it is simply unbeatable. I had to bring it back to Britain."

The great bustard was wiped out by the spread of intensive farming and the attentions of bird-egg collectors in the early 19th century. The red kite and white-tailed eagle followed a little later, finished off by hill farmers and gamekeepers who thought these predators were killing their animals. In fact, they live more on carrion than on catching their own prey. "However, we have a more enlightened attitude today, so we think it is safe to bring them back," said Graham Madge of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

The ultimate aim is to return the British countryside to a richer and more diverse state. But just as it is important to reintroduce lost species, it is also vital to control foreign invaders endangering existing indigenous plants and animals, say ecologists. A key example is provided by the grey squirrel. An American import, it is now driving our native red squirrel to extinction. Last week, the Country Land and Business Association called for a government cull because, it said, grey squirrels were destroying our broad-leaved woods by damaging the bark of maturing trees.

Then there is the Japanese knotweed, which costs the nation tens of millions of pounds a year to clear up. "It was introduced by Victorians to give colour to their gardens, but has gone from being a prizewinner to a pariah," said Dr Richard Shaw, a principal investigator at the Centre for Agricultural Bioscience International. "It is the biological equivalent of concrete."

Knotweed forms thick, suffocating layers while similar plant pests - such as the Himalayan balsam and floating pennywort - are also having a disastrous impact, Shaw said. Pennywort covers ponds, streams and rivers with the result that they lose their oxygen and fish can no longer breathe. It strangles native plants, but provides no sustenance for our insects. Their numbers plunge, as do populations of birds that feed off them.

These invaders are having the same impact on wildlife as gamekeepers had on the red kite and white-tailed eagle in the 19th century, in other words. Hence the plan by Defra and other government agencies to wage war on the Japanese knotweed - by introducing the plant's native predator, the jumping plant louse, to Britain. The louse lays eggs on the plant and the hatched larvae suck out its sap.

"We tested more than 180 native species of insects found on knotweed in Japan and picked the jumping plant louse because it was the only one that is specific to the Japanese knotweed," said Shaw. "That means it will not spread to other plant species."

Nevertheless, the move does mean that another non-native species could soon be introduced to Britain, albeit one that has been carefully studied and tested. This raises key questions about what kind of wildlife we want for Britain and the measures we are prepared to take to ensure that it is kept healthy and diverse.

Why should we reintroduce beavers or red kites or import insects to kill off invaders such as Japanese knotweed? The answer is simple, according to Andrew Wood, of Natural England, the government's environment advisers. "The more diversity, the healthier the environment," he said.

"If you think about the plants we exploit for food, the fewer we have, the more we are exposed to the dangers of crop disease, for example. Then there is the issue of the relationships between species. You need top predators such as the white-tailed eagle to help keep down populations of small mammals, or red kites to clean up carrion. And then there is the role of an animal in a specific area - such as the beaver. They keep woods well channelled with waterways that act as natural purification systems. So, yes, we have a great deal to gain from reintroductions and by keeping our wildlife as diverse as possible."

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 6 Jun 2009 | 11:01 pm

Hypnotise your patient, surgeons told

Technique seen as alternative to general anaesthetic for certain operations

Doctors should be taught to hypnotise patients not to feel pain instead of using general anaesthetics during some operations, the Royal Society of Medicine will be told today.

In what he has described as a "clarion call to the British medical profession", Professor David Spiegel, of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Sciences at Stanford University in the US, will also call on the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) to add hypnotherapy to its list of approved therapeutic techniques for the treatment of conditions ranging from allergies and high blood pressure to the pain associated with bone marrow transplantation, cancer treatment and anaesthesia for liver biopsy. Nice has already approved the technique for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome.

"It is time for hypnosis to work its way into the mainstream of British medicine," Spiegel will say at the joint conference of the Royal Society of Medicine, the British Society of Clinical and Academic Hypnosis and the British Society of Medical and Dental Hypnosis.

"There is solid science behind what sounds like mysticism and we need to get that message across to the bodies that influence this area. Hypnosis has no negative side-effects. It makes operations quicker, as the patient is able to talk to the surgeon as the operation proceeds, and it is cheaper than conventional pain relief. Since it does not interfere with the workings of the body, the patient recovers faster, too.

"It is also extremely powerful as a means of pain relief. Hypnosis has been accepted and rejected because people are nervous of it. They think it's either too powerful or not powerful enough, but, although the public are sceptical, the hardest part of the procedure is getting other doctors to accept it."

Professor Marie-Elisabeth Faymonville, head of the Pain Clinic at Liege University Hospital in Belgium, who has operated on more than 6,000 patients using hypnosis combined with a light local anaesthetic, said: "The local anaesthetic is used only to deaden the surface of the skin while a scalpel slices through it. It has no effect inside the body.

"The patient is conscious throughout the operation and this helps the doctor and patient work together. The patient may have to move during an operation and it's simple to get them to do so if they remain conscious. We've even done a hysterectomy using the procedure."

The theory behind medical hypnosis is that the body's brain and nervous system can't always distinguish an imagined situation from a real occurrence. This means the brain can act on any image or verbal suggestion as if it were reality. Hypnosis puts patients into a state of deep relaxation that is very susceptible to imagery. The more vivid this imagery, the greater the effect on the body.

Dr Martin Wall, president of the Section Hypnosis and Psychosomatic Medicine at the Royal Society of Medicine, said hypnosis fundamentally alters a subject's state of mind. Hypnosis is not, he said, simply a matter of suggestibility and relaxation.

Nice said it would welcome submissions for hypnotherapy to be considered as an approved therapeutic technique on the NHS if it could be cost-effective, and consistent delivery could be guaranteed.

But Professor Steve Field, who chairs the Royal College of General Practitioners, said he was sceptical as to whether hypnotherapy could meet these standards.

"It is a useful tool used by some GPs and patients for relaxation, but I don't think it is something that we should support being rolled out to all medical students and all doctors," he said.

"We can't call on the NHS to support it without there being a firm medical and economic basis, and I'm not convinced those have been proved to exist."

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 6 Jun 2009 | 11:01 pm

Appeal judges asked to clear notorious murderer Dr Crippen

The case of one of the most notorious murderers in British history, Hawley Crippen, is to be referred to the Court of Appeal, where the infamous doctor may secure a posthumous pardon 99 years after he was hanged.

The Criminal Cases Review Commission has been secretly examining the safety of Dr Crippen's conviction and officials believe that senior judges should now decide whether he is innocent of the murder of his wife in 1910. Cases are referred to the appeal court if the commission feels there is a "real possibility" that the conviction will be ruled unsafe and quashed. At the centre of the case is DNA evidence that may establish the innocence of the American-born Crippen.

Lawyer Giovanni Di Stefano and leading QC James Lewis, acting for Patrick Crippen, a relative of the doctor, said they were told last Friday that the case would be referred to the court in a development that may make Crippen the victim of the longest miscarriage of justice in British history rather than a name that is a byword for murder most foul. Crippen was hanged and buried in the grounds of Pentonville prison after a jury found him guilty.

According to prosecutors at his Old Bailey trial in 1910, the homeopathic practitioner poisoned his unfaithful wife, Cora, dissected her body and buried the remains in the cellar of their north London home. Police found a corpse with no head, bones or genitals. Preparations are already under way to begin the exhumation of Crippen's body at Pentonville. Descendants of Crippen said yesterday that they were "90%" certain that the body would be ferried back to Michigan in the US, where the Crippens have a family burial plot. Lawyers claim that such a development might also reveal the contents of a series of letters apparently buried in his coffin and which purportedly reveal the "truth" behind the body in the cellar.

Key to the case are the results of DNA tests from US forensic biologists which show that the remains in the cellar could not be those of Crippen's wife because they belong to a man. Di Stefano, who was one of Saddam Hussein's defence team and who submitted the evidence to the commission after two years' work, said: "We have been told categorically that the case is being referred and we are now just waiting for the paperwork. The body was a man and so the pardon is deserved."

The chief justice, Lord Alverstone, directed the Old Bailey jury in 1910 with concerns over the gender of the corpse by saying: "Of course, if it was a man ... the defendant is entitled to walk out of that dock."

Lewis, whose prosecution cases include ex-Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, has agreed to represent Crippen in court. Crippen's place in criminal history is cemented by the fact that he booked a passage on a ship to Canada taking his mistress, Ethel Le Neve, disguised as his teenage son. The pair were recognised by the liner's captain, who famously used the new Marconi telegraph system to alert Scotland Yard.

Yesterday Patrick Crippen said: "It is time to clear the family name. A lot of Crippens in the US are embarrassed to talk about Hawley."

A spokesman for the commission confirmed that it had investigated Crippen's conviction, but said he had not been informed of a referral.

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 6 Jun 2009 | 11:01 pm

Greater mouse-eared bats can recognise each other's voices

Bats can recognise other bats from their voices, claim scientists, who said this explains how they remain in a group when flying at high speeds in darkness, and how they avoid interference with one another's echo-location calls.

The scientists played recordings of calls made by a group of greater mouse-eared bats and each animal could identify the individual calls of the other members. "It wasn't clear what they're using to discriminate one from the other," said Yossi Yovel from the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel.

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 6 Jun 2009 | 11:01 pm

Futuristic Rifle Fires Explosive 'Smart' Rounds

A new rifle could allow soldiers to shoot smart bullets that explode next to targets.
Source: Livescience.com | 6 Jun 2009 | 10:35 pm

Deer Disoriented by Power Lines (LiveScience.com)

LiveScience.com - To aesthetes, high-voltage power lines are a blight on the rural landscape. But zoologists at the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany welcome them as a tool for testing the power of large ruminants to perceive Earth's magnetic field.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 6 Jun 2009 | 3:05 pm

Deer Disoriented by Power Lines

Apparently they have an internal compass. The animals faced every which way near the lines.
Source: Livescience.com | 6 Jun 2009 | 2:57 pm

Blind Pianist Can Play Anything

Derek Paravicini has absolute pitch, which is better than perfect pitch.
Source: Livescience.com | 6 Jun 2009 | 2:41 pm