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Insulin research points way to better diabetes treatmentsNew research significantly improves our understanding of how insulin interacts with cells in the human body with implications for the treatments of diabetes.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 3:00 pm Microbes produce fuels directly from biomassResearchers have developed a microbe that can produce an advanced biofuel fuel directly from biomass. Deploying the tools of synthetic biology, the researchers engineered a strain of E. coli bacteria to produce biodiesel and other important chemicals derived from fatty acids.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 3:00 pm His or hers jealousy? New explanation for sex differences in jealousyResearch has documented that most men become much more jealous about sexual infidelity than they do about emotional infidelity. Women are the opposite, and this is true all over the world.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 3:00 pm New insights into allergy-related disorders in childrenAllergies and asthma are a continuing health problem in most developed countries, but just how do these ailments develop over the course of a childhood? In a population-based study designed to help answer this question, researchers in Norway found that 40 per cent -- or two of five -- of nearly 5,000 two-year-olds had at least one reported allergy-related disorder.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 3:00 pm Plasma experiments aboard International Space Station yielding better picture of liquids and solidsA series of experiments studying complex plasmas is taking place on board the international space station ISS. Physicists from Germany will use these experiments to study fundamental structure forming processes to better understand what happens in liquids and solids.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 3:00 pm Blocking key protein in mice helps them resist viral infectionResearchers have discovered a potential new way to stimulate the immune system to prevent or clear a viral infection. By blocking the action of a key protein in the mouse immune system, they were able to boost immune "memory" in those mice -- work that may one day help doctors increase the effectiveness of human vaccines designed to prevent viral infections.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 3:00 pm Scientists find survival factor for keeping nerve cells healthyScientists have discovered a novel survival factor whose rapid transport along nerve cells is crucial for keeping them alive. The same factor seems likely to be needed to keep our nerves healthy as we age.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 9:00 am New therapeutic approach identified for kidney disease associated with lupusResearchers have identified a new disease mechanism and therapeutic approach for a type of advanced kidney disease that is a common cause of complications in patients with lupus.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 9:00 am Could generating energy from waste be the answer?Scientists are helping to find answers to one of the most difficult problems facing the world today: generating energy without accelerating climate change or harming food production. Researchers are investigating biofuels generated from wastes. These are seen by many as the 'green alternative' to using fossil fuels.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 9:00 am Gecko's lessons transfer well: Dry printing of nanotube patterns to any surface could revolutionize microelectronicsScientists have come up with a way to transfer forests of strongly aligned, single-walled carbon nanotubes from one surface to another -- any surface -- in a matter of minutes. The template used to grow the nanotubes, with its catalyst particles still intact, can be used repeatedly to grow more nanotubes, almost like inking a rubber stamp.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 9:00 am Davos forum considers world economy on last day (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 3:12 am The nation's weather (AP)AP - The major storm that brought significant winter weather to the Southeast heading into the weekend was expected to move off the Eastern Seaboard on Sunday, allowing the nation's eastern half to dry out.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 2:13 am India reaffirms opposition to binding carbon cuts (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 31 Jan 2010 | 1:01 am Magnesium May Boost Brainpower (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - Mice given extra doses of a new magnesium compound had better working memory, long-term memory and greater learning ability.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2010 | 11:10 pm India steps up scramble with China for African energy (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2010 | 10:59 pm Obama trims US space ambitions (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2010 | 10:21 pm Venezuela gets bids for all 3 Carabobo projects, ONGC bid included (Reuters)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2010 | 10:09 pm How Life Without Sex WorksLife without sex is a path to a dead-end as a species. So why do they do it?Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2010 | 6:23 pm Geoengineering Schemes: Yay! Boo!Interest in geoengineering is on the rise. But is it smart?Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2010 | 6:10 pm Water Vapor a 'Wild Card' in ClimateA 10 percent drop in water vapor ten miles above Earth's surface has had a big impact on global warming.Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2010 | 5:36 pm The Big Issue | Sceptics fiddle while the planet burnsRobin McKie's article "Glaciergate was a blunder, but it's the sceptics who dissemble" (Comment, last week) brings clarity and balance to the debate about climate change science. Yes, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Himalayan glacier projection was wrong, but that doesn't undermine the rigorous seven-year IPCC process that led to the last assessment report and it certainly doesn't undermine the compelling evidence of the risks from climate change to food security, water supplies and biodiversity. The facts are clear: the world is warming, emissions of greenhouse gases are largely to blame and the warming is set to get worse through the 21st century. To ignore that evidence would be foolhardy in the extreme. Kathy Maskell Walker Institute for Climate System Research University of Reading ■ Robin McKie's article contains some sensible ideas – well, one at least: the abolition or serious rejigging of the IPCC. This latest blunder is not the only one to discredit the organisation. There is also evidence that the summaries for policy-makers do not always reflect the real scientific findings when these fail to support the widely held acceptance of manmade global warming. It would seem that the sceptics are charged with having to prove that the consensus is wrong. Surely it is for those who hypothesise – in this instance, that there is a direct link between anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions and global warming – to demonstrate that it is true. Michael Robinson North Creake, Norfolk ■ It must be remembered that global warming is not an issue of opinion. It is solely about the quantum mechanical interactions between radiation and molecules in the atmosphere and the knock-on effects this has. Unlike questions such as the best policy for dealing with the recession, where two sides could in theory ague for all eternity, with climate change only one side can be correct. We just don't yet know which side is correct. As climate change deniers have failed to produce a peer-reviewed body of evidence pointing to a mechanism that would negate the impact of our emissions, caution would seem to be sensible. David Coley Senior research fellow Centre for Energy and the Environment School of Physics, Exeter ■ A consequence of the intense public debate surrounding the Copenhagen conference has been a widening of the gap between those who accept that humans are affecting the climate system and those who do not. Yet the case that climate change is real and unwise is unchanged: greenhouse gases in the atmosphere warm the surface zone we inhabit. Measurements show that human industry and agriculture have increased the concentration of carbon dioxide in the air by nearly 40%. The cost of transforming world society to maintain prosperity and improve equity in a way that is sustainable and reduces the climate risk is a tough challenge. People are key to addressing this challenge, but to act, people must be convinced that there is a problem and that it is a priority. Professor Chris Rapley Director of the Science Museum and professor of climate science, University College London, London WC1 ■ Despite the well co-ordinated political campaigns by "sceptics" against the IPCC, it remains the most authoritative source of information about the causes and consequences of climate change. Yet every error in its last report is now being portrayed as undermining the evidence that greenhouse gases are driving climate change. Perhaps it is time that the claims of the professional climate change "sceptics" are put to the same test. Bob Ward Policy and communications director, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, LSE London WC2 guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 30 Jan 2010 | 5:09 pm UN climate panel based claims on student essay: report (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2010 | 4:53 pm India is Sinking into Earth's MantleFun fact for you: scientists don't really know how the Himalayas formed. I mean yeah, they realize that the India tectonic plate is slamming into the Eurasia plate and has been for about 50 million years, but the mystery is ...Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 30 Jan 2010 | 1:19 pm How to Keep Black Bears Wild
Pepper spray, rocks or rubber slugs are good tools for scaring bears from park picnic areas. But the best way to get rid of black bears is to not invite them over to begin with.
Establishing which techniques and circumstances will thwart food-seeking bears is valuable, but such techniques should be tried only after making trash and food inaccessible, says Rachel Mazur, who led the study while she was a wildlife biologist at the Kings Canyon park. Bear-proof containers should be available and the public needs to be educated on using them, she says.
Thanks to conservation efforts, better management and shifts in hunting activities, the number of black bears has climbed in the last hundred years, says ecologist Jon Beckmann with the Wildlife Conservation Society. So has the number of people, especially in the public lands of the American West. This means more bear-human interactions. Like parents experimenting with spanking versus time-out, Mazur and her team spent three years methodically trying “aversive conditioning” techniques on black bears. Aversive conditioning associates a negative stimulus with unwanted behavior, in this case coming near humans, human food or human developments. Negative stimulants included chasing, pepper spray and lofting projectiles of different intensity: rocks, slingshots and rubber slugs. The team tried the conditioning techniques a total of 1,050 times on more than 150 bears. (While being as methodical as possible, concerns about the safety of park visitors dictated using chasing and rock-throwing more than the other methods). Of all the interactions, 729 involved 36 bears identifiable to the researchers as food-conditioned; that is, animals that had already bitten the apple and were after more. The remaining 321 interactions were with bears naïve to delicacies of human food and garbage. During the study, bears were hazed from campgrounds, roadsides, picnic areas, natural areas and employee housing. Chasing and rubber slugs worked best to scare off wild bears, and bears experiencing these treatments along with pepper spray stayed away the longest. Rubber slugs worked best to get food-conditioned bears out of an area. Such approaches can be useful to keep a bear away until food or garbage can be put away, or to get a female to stash her cubs in a tree instead of bringing the youngsters to the picnic, says Mazur. But Mazur would rather not have to use these techniques at all. “This isn’t what we want,” she says. “Our goal is to keep wildlife wild.” Beckmann concurs that aversive conditioning techniques can work, but “these are Band-Aid approaches,” he says. “It is much better to stop these conflicts before they occur.” Once a bear has a taste for people food, they can be extremely persistent, says Mazur. Eleven of the 36 food-conditioned bears were involved in 90 percent of the hazing events, the researchers found. Only one of these 11 bears completely stopped entering developed areas; four changed their behavior but still had to be hazed every year. The remaining six were so persistent and potentially dangerous that they were killed or relocated. One of these six bears was a cub. He didn’t learn to love human food from his mother, who was food-conditioned herself but gave it up while raising her kid. But the cub was frequently near park visitors who approached and fed the animal. “The real issue is food availability,” says Beckmann. It is very difficult to get 100 percent enforcement on the human end of this interaction, he notes. It may take only one home where a grill is left outside or garbage left exposed, or one energy bar in a camper’s pack, to tempt a bear, he says. The study should inform wildlife managers, but anyone who comes across a bear should make their presence known and then get out, says Beckmann. “You can say something like, ‘Hi bear,’ and then back away slowly while maintaining eye contact.” Image: National Parks Service See Also:
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 30 Jan 2010 | 12:36 pm Magnesium May Boost BrainpowerMice given extra doses of a new magnesium compound had better working memory, long-term memory and greater learning ability.Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2010 | 11:22 am How to Take Better Cell Phone PhotographsSome high-end cell phone cameras have gotten powerfully good. How to take good pictures.Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2010 | 9:46 am Harrabin's NotesHas another mistake by the IPCC come to light?Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 30 Jan 2010 | 9:44 am Derailing the Airlines: Planes, Trains and AutomobilesAir travel nowadays is all about the delay. From two conversations yesterday, tales of miserable delay. A family visiting a friend stretched a two hour flight into twelve, getting home at two a.m. And then, from a road warrior the ...Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 30 Jan 2010 | 9:05 am Fight, Fight, Fight: The History of Human AggressionHow fighting evolved from hand-to-hand combat to world war.Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2010 | 8:40 am How Much Sleep Do I Need?How many hours of sleep you need is not known for sure, but scientists have some sleep guidelines.Source: Livescience.com | 30 Jan 2010 | 7:12 am Pack of stray dogs kills 13 animals in Bulgarian zoo (Reuters)Reuters - A pack of stray dogs leapt the fence of Sofia's zoo and killed 13 rare animals last week, the zoo director said on Saturday.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 30 Jan 2010 | 4:16 am
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