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Bridging the gender gap: Combined technologies offer promise for detecting colon cancer in womenResearchers have found that combining novel optical technologies with a common colon cancer screening test may allow doctors to more accurately detect the presence of colon cancer, particularly in women. The study combined a polarization-gating optical probe alongside traditional flexible sigmoidoscopy to measure the early increase in blood supply in rectal tissue as a marker for colon cancer.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 9:00 am Artificial cells communicate and cooperate like biological cells, antsResearchers have designed "biologically inspired" artificial cells capable of self-organizing into independent groups that can communicate and cooperate, behaving like complex natural organisms.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 9:00 am Bioinformatics used to detect rogue use of synthetic biologyA team of students is using bioinformatics to implement federal guidance on synthetic genomics. The students' work will help gene synthesis companies and their customers better detect the possible use of manufactured DNA as harmful agents for bioterrorism.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 9:00 am Soldiers with brain injuries at higher risk of epilepsy decades later, study findsSoldiers who receive traumatic brain injuries during war may be at a higher risk of epilepsy even decades after the brain injury occurred, according to new research.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 9:00 am Adaptation in mole blood aids tunnelling'Super hemoglobin' allows moles to thrive underground. Researchers have made the first identification of an adaptation in the blood of Eastern moles which allows more efficient transport of carbon dioxide, facilitating the moles' burrowing behavior.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 9:00 am Reprogrammed cells 'remember,' retain characteristics of their cells of originInvestigators at the Massachusetts General Hospital Center for Regenerative Medicine have confirmed that induced pluripotent stem cells retain some characteristics of the cells from which they were derived, something that could both assist and impede potential clinical and research uses, and find that these cellular "memories" fade and disappear as cell lines are cultured through successive generations.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 9:00 am Cool roofs can offset carbon dioxide emissions and mitigate global warming, study findsA new study has found that implementing cool roofs and cool pavements in cities around the world can not only help cities stay cooler, they can also cool the world, with the potential of canceling the heating effect of up to two years of worldwide carbon dioxide emissions.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 6:00 am Microbial world's use of metals mostly unmappedMicrobes boast a broader and more diverse array of metal-driven chemical processes than scientists imagined. In fact, most have yet to be discovered, according to a first-of-its-kind technique that catalogs all of the metals in a microbe. The method could lead to innovative clean energy and bioremediation technologies.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 6:00 am New test to predict success of IVF treatmentWomen who fail to become pregnant after undergoing in vitro fertilization treatment often grapple with the decision of whether to try IVF again. It's a difficult one to make: The procedure carries hefty financial, physical and emotional costs, and there are no guarantees it will work.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 6:00 am Increased waistline and high triglyceride levels indicate risk of coronary heart disease, study findsPeople with a larger waistline and high triglyceride levels are at increased risk of coronary heart disease, according to a new study.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 6:00 am Celestial mapperSet to be one of the decade's great space ventures - the Gaia satellite will map more than a billion starsSource: BBC News - Science & Environment | 20 Jul 2010 | 3:22 am The nation's weather (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 3:20 am Volcanic ash team return to oceanA team of scientists return to the North Atlantic to get more data on how volcanic ash affects the region's marine biology.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 20 Jul 2010 | 3:04 am BP cap stays on as 'static kill' idea floated (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 2:41 am Feds look past oil leaking from BP's cap (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 2:37 am Mammal-munching dinosaur discoveredProfessor Edward Simpson describes finding the fossil that shows that 'dinosaurs actively dug after mammals'.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 20 Jul 2010 | 2:17 am Australian laser system to track space junk (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 1:52 am Sound restored to film shot during Apollo 11 moon landingA British Apollo 11 fan has painstakingly united the mission control footage with audio recorded during the moon landing When Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon on 20 July 1969, Nasa used two film cameramen at mission control in Houston to capture the moment back on Earth. The footage has been regularly seen in the decades since but it has always lacked a synchronised soundtrack, which never made it into the archive with the film. Now film maker and Apollo aficionado Stephen Slater, working with London-based archive film company Footagevault, has painstakingly united the visual material with high-quality recordings of the original mission audio. Footagevault, which sourced and supplied the archive material for the award-winning documentary film In the Shadow of the Moon, started this process with the film's editor David Fairhead back in 2006, but only attempted to lip-sync a few seconds of footage. Slater has taken it to a new level, synchronising more than eight minutes of the Apollo 11 landing. "Some of this footage has become almost as iconic as the shots of the Saturn V launching, or the Earth rising over the moon," says Slater. "But as a film maker I was always rather disappointed with the way the mission control shots were used in such a generic fashion, without any sense that it was the actual moment that the Eagle had landed." By adding sound, Slater believed he could give the footage a stronger documentary feel, as if the viewer were experiencing the history for themselves. Inspired by what had been done for In the Shadow of the Moon, Slater was convinced he could achieve a lot more, and started to look for a more systematic way of synchronising the sound. He soon noticed that the mission control clock, inadvertently captured in many shots, could be used as a reference point for his work. "It displays the so-called Ground Elapsed Time or GET," he explains, "which is also logged against the air-to-ground flight loop sound recordings on the Apollo Flight Journal. I was then able to narrow down my search to maybe a few lines of dialogue, particularly if a shot showing the clock was featured close to a potential synchronisation point. It was then a case of trial and error, seeing which pieces of sync worked with which pictures." Slater also used a view of the entire room captured from an overhead TV camera that filmed mission control during the entire descent and landing, and which most of the world would have seen when watching the live coverage on that July day. Although of inferior quality to the film archive, it allowed Slater to see where the two cameramen were standing and whether their positions and shots matched the film footage. The cameramen were Jerry Bray and Bob Bird. Bray positioned himself at the front of the room near the Capcom (capsule communicator) console to capture Charlie Duke's conversation with the astronauts, while Bird stationed himself at the back of the room filming the reactions of Nasa's top brass, including George Low, Bob Gilruth and Chris Kraft. After much trial and error, Slater managed to find a number of definite synchronisation points from the film rolls of both cameras, and so for the first time we can now say exactly when this historic footage was captured. His work has brought to life a few of the most well known pieces of mission audio. "For example we can now see flight director Gene Kranz giving his controllers a 'Go' for landing," explains Slater, "and Charlie Duke saying 'We copy you down Eagle' in response to Buzz Aldrin's 'Contact light'." "There is also visible frustration and tension on the faces of Duke and his fellow controllers during a period early on in the descent when Mission Control had lost communication with the spacecraft, a moment which the restored audio has now really brought to life." "Sadly, the downside of finally matching this footage correctly with the audio is that it's become clear how many important mission control moments weren't captured on film," adds Slater. "Charlie Duke's historic line immediately following Neil Armstrong's 'The Eagle has landed' ... 'Roger Tranquility we copy you on the ground ... you got a bunch of guys about to turn blue, we're breathing again thanks a lot' is missing. It appears that cameraman Bray simply stopped filming and turned away to record a different shot at this historic moment, unaware he was missing what must have been a priceless reaction from Apollo 11's key man on the ground." Slater's historic handiwork can be seen at http://www.footagevault.com/project-mocr-apollo-11 Christopher Riley is the author of the Haynes guide Apollo 11: Owners' Workshop Manual. He curates the online film archive at Footagevault.com. 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 | 20 Jul 2010 | 1:15 am Video: Audio of Apollo 11 mission control reunited with film footageFilm footage and audio of mission control during the moon landing have been synced for the first time Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 20 Jul 2010 | 1:10 am BP stealing thunder from Cameron's US visit (AP)AP - On the way to Washington, British Prime Minister David Cameron said he wants to talk about Afghanistan, Middle East peace prospects and the global economy.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 1:09 am "Utterly Wrong": Cameron Criticizes Lockerbie Bomber's Release (Time.com)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 20 Jul 2010 | 12:20 am Platypus rescued from sewage pipesA young platypus has had to be rescued from an Australian sewage plant after venturing down pipes apparently looking for a mate.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 20 Jul 2010 | 12:19 am More choice is not helpful to societyIf David Cameron believes that shopping for public services will help us progress in his 'big society', he should hear a story about jam If you want to know why David Cameron's 'big society' is more trouble than it's worth, why Andrew Lansley is on a hiding to nothing with his consultant-choice agenda, and why Michael Gove's schemes to let a thousand city academies and free schools bloom are plain wrong-headed, well, then you need to hear a story about jam. Over the last couple of decades, the jam study has become one of the most talked-about experiments in social science. Deservedly so, because it upends the beliefs held by economists and policy-makers about how people deal with choice. It's also beautifully simple: academics set up a tasting booth in a fancy deli in California. At some points they put out six kinds of jam, at others 24. When the booth had 24 types, it was mobbed with customers drawn by the colours and the size of the display. But it was the sales that were remarkable: with six jams on show, 30% of shoppers snapped up a jar – typically in less than a minute. When 24 were out, only 3% did, and that was usually after 10 minutes of agonising. However attractive they found the larger range, up close, they became almost paralysed with choice. That research was masterminded by Sheena Iyengar; and the Columbia Business School professor has plenty more examples of how being confronted with too many options makes us do funny things. Take dating, for example. Iyengar asked men and women to put down what they were looking for in a soulmate – the usual criteria of being kind or sporty; possessor of driving ambition or just GSOH. Given profiles of 10 potential partners, they chose according to type: twinkly-eyed bookish types found someone to swap paperbacks with, while sporty Neanderthals presumably landed their ideal tennis partners. Presented with 20 profiles, however, people chose their partners on looks alone. All those carefully thought out conditions about the person they wanted to spend the rest of their lives with were gone, buried under the number of the options available. Perhaps you are jaundiced enough to believe that romance is always just a euphemism for earthier appetites. In which case, shame on you – but you might be more worried by this finding, recounted by Iyengar in her book The Art of Choosing. When Sweden privatised its social security programme in 2000, it encouraged workers to choose how to invest their pension contributions, rather than leave it in a default fund. Two-thirds did so and, overwhelmed by choice, they usually chose disastrously. Workers put their retirement money in whatever stocks were fashionable at the time, or their own employers' shares. Their choices underperformed the default fund by 10% over three years, and 15% after seven. Such pronounced divergences can mean the difference between a comfortable retirement and a miserable old age. All of which brings us back to the new government. Because what ministers have promised time and again over the last couple of weeks is much greater choice in some of the most important aspects of our lives: schools, hospitals, community services. Whenever they describe the sunlit uplands of choice, David Cameron and his men make two linked claims: first, that we are better off shopping around for public services, and second, that the exercising of choice will force headteachers and hospital managers to raise their game. Nor is that solely a Tory belief: Tony Blair (remember him?) used to go on in much the same vein. Yet the evidence from these studies, and many others, is that those two premises do not stack up – because we're not that skilled at choosing. This doesn't mean that policy-makers should slip into something a little more centrally-planned instead. But it does suggest that ever-proliferating options aren't necessarily helpful or useful. Most people already know that, which is why we take shopping lists to Sainsbury's to keep us from gawping at the number of probiotic yoghurts like escaped Soviet dissidents. Businesses know it too, which is why, no matter how many books Amazon has on digital display, it still "suggests" titles similar to those you have bought before. Only in Westminster is it the orthodoxy that more choices equal better choices. And by thrusting this agenda at voters, politicians could stir up greater discontent. What was notable at the last general election was that no major party denied that public services were better off now than in 1997; yet Labour – choice-friendly Labour – had frequently to defend its record on the NHS and schools. That may be because there's something about the very act of selection that induces regret. In her book Choice, the sociologist Renata Salecl describes choosing as "anxiety-making". The more options you have, the greater your expectations of the result; the keener the disappointment when you fall out of love with your new car (or sofa or broadband provider); and the more nagging the questions about whether you should have chosen differently. And if Cameron doesn't buy any of the research above, perhaps the former student of philosophy, politics and economics should revisit Alexis de Tocqueville's thoughts 170 years ago on America. "I have seen the freest . . . of men . . . in circumstances the happiest to be found in the world," he wrote. Yet even so, there was something wrong. "They seemed serious and almost sad in their pleasures . . . They clutch everything but hold nothing fast, and so lose grip as they hurry after some new delight." 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 | 20 Jul 2010 | 12:00 am Fishy business: US states sue over carp invasionFive US states have sued the federal government and Chicago's water authority in order to stop Asian carp invading prized US lakes.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 19 Jul 2010 | 9:53 pm Cigarette Smoke May Up Cancer Risk By Interfering With Genes (HealthDay)HealthDay - MONDAY, July 19 (HealthDay News) -- Exposure to cigarette smoke can undermine the immune system and raise the risk for cancer, cell death and metabolic problems by harming gene expression, new research reveals.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 19 Jul 2010 | 9:48 pm Leaks near BP well may be naturalSeepages on the sea floor near the leaking Gulf of Mexico oil well may be unrelated to the well itself, the government's incident commander says.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 19 Jul 2010 | 6:41 pm Congress Proposes Commission to Study Asteroid Impact Threat (SPACE.com)SPACE.com - Lawmakers are paying new attention to how best to shield Earth from a bad day — getting whacked by an asteroid or comet that has our planet in its cross-hairs.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 19 Jul 2010 | 6:30 pm 'Chia Wall' To Muffle Highway SoundA giant Green Noise Wall that works like a Chia Pet is coming to I-70, east of Columbus, Ohio.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 6:06 pm New Species of Frogs Disappearing as Fast as They’re Found<< previous image | next image >>
New species of frogs in Panama are being lost nearly as fast as they are being found to a deadly fungal disease that is sweeping through the region. In an effort to document the diversity of frogs in Central America before the disease sweeps through the entire region, scientists are discovering new species, some of which are going extinct, and some of which are surviving. In Panama’s Omar Torrijos National Park, 11 new species of frogs were discovered in the course of the long-term survey. After the fungus epidemic in 2004, five of these species went locally extinct, but only one of them is thought to have no other known habitats. “In amphibians, the amount of new species described every year keeps going up. We can’t even guess where it is going to stop,” said evolutionary geneticist Andrew Crawford from the University of the Andes, lead author of the study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published on July 19. “But at the same time, we keep losing them. One third of amphibian species around the world are listed on the IUCN Red List.” Biologist Karen Lips, a co-author of the study, set up long-term frog monitoring in Omar Torrijos National Park in 1998, when she realized that the deadly fungus first noted in Costa Rica was spreading rapidly towards the region. “She walked the same transects year after year, and one day in October 2004 she started finding dead frogs instead of live ones,” Crawford said. “The strangest thing was that frogs that were previously rare, like subterranean frogs, became more abundant. They started coming out of the woodwork, so to speak, and then they died.”
In the course of the long-term study, Lips and Crawford identified a total of 74 species in the region. Within a couple of months of the fungus arriving, Crawford said, 30 of the species disappeared from the region, including five that were newly discovered. A survey in 2008 confirmed their absence. The killer fungus, Batrochochytrium dendrobatidis, was first noted when the golden toad and about half of the frog species disappeared in Monteverde reserve in Costa Rica in 1987. Since then, it has been spreading eastward through the Central America highlands, and also through a large portion of the Andes, likely from a separate introduction. The fungus dislikes too much heat or dryness, which makes frogs that live in streams in mountainous areas most vulnerable. While the exact origin and cause of the spread of the disease is unknown, Crawford guesses that the disease travels with the amphibians that get moved around for pets and research. He said that this particular fungus either originated in Africa or North America. Only one of the species that went extinct in Omar Torrijos National Park has no other known habitat, meaning that it is likely extinct worldwide. The other 29 species have known ranges in eastern Panama, which hasn’t yet been hit by the fungus. Researchers are searching for ways to avert the loss of more species. The most promising of these is a bacteria that has been found in salamanders in North America that protects their eggs from the fungus. The bacteria has been isolated and tested on frogs in the Sierra Nevada, and appeared to improve their survival rates from the fungus, said Crawford. However, there are still many questions to be answered about the ethics and efficacy of introducing the bacteria to frogs in Central and South America. Above: Hylomantis lemurThe image of this frog, also known as Agalychnis lemur, was taken east of the study site. The fungus arrived there in 2009, and this frog is likely now extinct from that region, Crawford said.  Photo: Justin Touchon Citation: Andrew J. Crawford, Karen R. Lips and Eldredge Bermingham. Epidemic disease decimates amphibian abundance, species diversity and evolutionary history in the highlands of central Panama. PNAS. Published online July 19, 2010. See Also:
Follow Jess McNally on Twitter @jessmcnally, and Wired Science @wiredscience.
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 19 Jul 2010 | 5:40 pm Amphibians wiped out before they are discoveredFungal disease drives the loss of 30 species in Panama.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/news/rss/today/~4/W0h_VCquySQ" height="1" width="1"/>Source: NatureNews - All articles published today - nature.com science feeds | 19 Jul 2010 | 5:03 pm A speech screen for autism?Automated analysis of audio recordings could accelerate language research.Source: NatureNews - All articles published today - nature.com science feeds | 19 Jul 2010 | 5:00 pm Mexico arrests 'monkey smuggler'A man is arrested in Mexico trying to smuggle 18 monkeys into the country by hiding them in a girdle around his waist.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 19 Jul 2010 | 4:29 pm Way of life 'at risk'Eskimos fear impact of new oil drilling in the Arctic OceanSource: BBC News - Science & Environment | 19 Jul 2010 | 4:10 pm Natural Oil Seeps in the Gulf Make BP's Task Even Harder (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - BP executives and government representatives are acknowledging that oil is now seeping from the sea floor near the original leak caused by the April 20 Deepwater Horizon rig explosion.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 19 Jul 2010 | 3:55 pm Natural Oil Seeps in the Gulf Make BP's Task Even HarderBP executives and government representatives are acknowledging that oil is now seeping from the sea floor near the original leak caused by the April 20 Deepwater Horizon rig accident.Source: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 3:46 pm Need a Vacation? Visit Titan's 'Exotic' Ontario LacusTired of terrestrial vacations? We have the destination for you! A beautiful lake-side retreat on Saturn's moon, Titan. (We accept no liability for sickness and death associated with excessive methane inhalation.)Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 3:29 pm Report maps perils of warmingDegree-by-degree breakdown of climate effects published.Source: NatureNews - All articles published today - nature.com science feeds | 19 Jul 2010 | 3:23 pm Vaginal gel 'slashes HIV risks'A vaginal gel significantly cuts the rate of women contracting HIV from infected men in a South African experiment, researchers say.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 19 Jul 2010 | 2:45 pm Anti-HIV Gel Cuts Infection Risk in HalfThe new gel would be a huge benefit to African women bearing the brunt of the AIDS pandemic.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 2:45 pm Women's HIV risk halved by gelUN and WHO warmly welcome results of study on use of vaginal gel before sexual intercourse Scientists held out the hope of a breakthrough in the prevention of HIV/Aids today with the results of a study showing that a vaginal gel used by women before sexual intercourse halved the numbers who became infected. Scientists have been hunting for years for something that will allow women to protect themselves, and the excitement of Aids campaigners will be hard to contain, even though further research is needed to confirm the findings. Women fall victim to HIV/Aids in disproportionately large numbers – 60% of new infections in Africa are among women. Many in the poorest countries have little education and suffer from very low status, so are unable to negotiate safe sex, using a condom, with their partner. "We are giving hope to women," said Michel Sidibé, executive director of Unaids, the United Nations programme on Aids, as the trial results emerged. "For the first time we have seen results for a woman-initiated and controlled HIV prevention option. If confirmed, a microbicide will be a powerful option for the prevention revolution and help us break the trajectory of the Aids epidemic." The director general of the World Health Organisation (WHO), Margaret Chan, also immediately congratulated the scientists. If their results were confirmed by further tests, "WHO will work with countries and partners to accelerate access to these products," she said. A number of large microbicide trials have been run, but all have failed. The success of this one (run in South Africa where one in three young women aged 20 to 34 is living with HIV) is attributed to the use of an anti-retroviral drug called tenofovir – of the sort used to treat Aids – in gel form. The study, called Caprisa 004, was conducted by the Centre for the Aids Programme of Research at the University of KwaZulu Natal in South Africa. The researchers recruited 889 women between 18 and 40 who were HIV-negative, sexually active and at risk of becoming infected. Half were given vaginal applicators filled with gel containing 1% tenofovir. The others got something that looked the same but was inactive. Until the end of the trial, nobody knew who was in each group. The women were asked to insert a first dose of gel 12 hours before sexual intercourse and a second dose as soon as possible afterwards, within 12 hours. All were given counselling on avoiding HIV infection and a free supply of condoms. At the end of a year, the researchers discovered that the gel had halved the numbers of women becoming infected with HIV. After two and a half years, the numbers had dropped, but there were still 39% fewer infections in those women using it. The drop in the numbers protected, they believe, is caused by some women tending to use it inconsistently as time went on, not knowing whether it was in fact having any effect. The excitement of the researchers was clear in a teleconference before publication. "Picture a young woman in a rural community in South Africa who walks through my clinic doors asking me what I have to protect her from getting infected," said Dr Quarraisha Abdool Karim, one of the authors of the paper. "Her partner is a migrant worker and refuses to wear a condom and she is not sure of his faithfulness in this relationship. "From being able to tell her for years that I have nothing, I can now offer her 1% tenofovir gel, which offers her 39% protection and, if she is highly attuned to this gel [uses it consistently], it offers her 54% protection." Warren Mitchell, executive director of Avac, an Aids vaccine campaigning group, said it was "a historic day for HIV prevention research". The results demanded immediate action in South Africa and around the world, he said. "We believe that the most responsible plan of action now is to quickly and efficiently articulate the sequence of steps necessary for confirmation and follow-up of these results, while also aggressively planning for potential roll-out of a licensable product." Another piece of good news is that the gel appeared to cause few side-effects. There is still work to do before the gel goes through to being manufactured. But the WHO is committed to help and all agencies will do their best to speed it to women who need it, perhaps within two years, the researchers said. 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 | 19 Jul 2010 | 2:34 pm What Does the Seep Mean for the Gulf?The broken well in the Gulf of Mexico has been capped. A new seep has been detected nearby that could be natural, or a worrying sign that the worst is yet to come.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 2:24 pm First predictions of 'eerie' cloudsAmateur scientists make first predictions of rare night-time clouds.Source: BBC News - Science & Environment | 19 Jul 2010 | 2:18 pm Screening speech may aid autism diagnosis: studyWASHINGTON (Reuters) - A device may be able to automatically screen young children for autism based on how they talk, U.S. researchers said on Monday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 19 Jul 2010 | 1:44 pm Test can predict success of IVF: U.S. reportWASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. researchers have developed a formula that can predict whether fertility treatment will succeed more accurately than using age alone, and used it to develop a commercial test.Source: Reuters: Science News | 19 Jul 2010 | 1:43 pm Rare Sri Lankan primate gets 1st wide-eyed closeup (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 19 Jul 2010 | 1:35 pm Before and After: Deadly Fungus Wipes Out AmphibiansDramatic declines in amphibians known and unknown.Source: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 1:15 pm New Thinner MacBook Air Might Hurt iPad SalesA new MacBook Air rumored to be coming out this fall could rival the iPad.Source: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 1:02 pm Is Wind Power Green?The future of green energy is written in the wind. As the U.S. energy industry inches away from reliance on fossil fuels, experts have heralded various greener technologies, such as ethanol, solar and geothermal power, as choice alternatives. And while ...Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 12:24 pm The Loris Lives! First Pictures of Primate Thought To Be Extinct
This cute furry primate is the first of its species to ever be photographed. The Horton Plains slender loris (Loris tardigradus nycticeboides) was thought to be extinct. Between 1939 and 2002, no one spotted the animal. In 2002 someone reported a possible sighting, but didn’t get any pictures.
The 2002 report inspired the Zoological Society of London and a team of Sri Lankan researchers to launch an effort to find the 8-inch-long primate. After 200 hours of searching, they captured the first ever pictures of the creature, which were released Monday. “The discovery improves our knowledge of this species, but we need to focus our efforts on the conservation and restoration of the remaining montane forest where this species still exists,” conservation biologist Dr. Craig Turner of the Zoological Society of London said in a press release. “Currently this accounts for less than 1 percent of the land area of Sri Lanka.” The Horton Plains slender loris is a subspecies of the red slender loris. It is classified as endangered on the IUCN Red List. Image: AP Photo/Zoological Society of London/Ho. See Also:
Follow Jess McNally on Twitter @jessmcnally, and Wired Science @wiredscience.
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 19 Jul 2010 | 11:40 am Mysterious Black Jellyfish Crowd California CoastGiant black jellyfish are congregating in coastal waters off California. Scientists are mystified about where they come from and why their strange appearances are growing more frequent.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 10:56 am A 'Real' Virtual HumanMicrosoft has shown off a "virtual human" that reacts to a person's emotions, body movements and voice.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 10:56 am Deep-Sea Vent Discovery Sets Hydrothermal Life’s New Depth Record
A hydrothermal vent found more than 16,000 feet under the sea could harbor life unlike any other yet found, adapted for conditions so extreme that water gas and liquid no longer have separate states. The vent is one of three discovered on the Mid-Cayman Rise, part of a vast and largely unexplored ridge of spreading ocean crust. Also discovered was the second known example of a type of vent that may resemble seafloor conditions on Jupiter’s moon Europa. Detected from chemical traces that billow into the ocean like smoke from a smokestack, the vents now await further investigation. “Every time you get a hydrothermal system, it’s wet and hot, and you get water and rocks interacting. Wherever this happens on the seafloor, life takes advantage,” said geophysicist Chris German of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. “Every time you find seawater interacting with volcanic rock, there’s weird and wonderful life associated with it.”
Of the three new vents, described July 19 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, one belonged to a category known only from the so-called Lost City hydrothermal field. These are cooler than other deep-sea vents, rich in organic compounds, and suffused by methane. Something similar to those conditions, which at Lost City support life forms unlike any others seen on Earth, may be found under the seas of Europa, one of Jupiter’s four major moons and a prime candidate for non-Earthly life. German’s team named the new vent Europa. The two other vents have chemical profiles more typical of hydrothermal vents, but one — dubbed Piccard, after deep-sea explorer Jacques Piccard — is 16,000 feet down, a full 2,600 feet below the previous deepest-known vent. At that depth, high temperatures and pressures could push water to its “critical point,” at which distinct liquid and gas phases cease to exist, and “the physics change completely,” said German. “There’s a whole set of theories about what could happen” to life in those conditions, “but nobody has been able to find this in the real world,” he said. “There’s a whole bunch of questions there.” Deep-sea bacteria isolated from the water samples hint at this life, but closer inspection awaits the refinement of remote-controlled deep-sea submersibles. At such depths, current submersibles are too difficult to control, said German. Despite the new vents’ significance, however, they may not be unique. Scientists have explored only a small fraction of the 50,000-mile-long mid-ocean ridge, of which the Mid-Cayman Rise is just one particularly accessible part. Moreover, the planetary crust sliding beneath the Mid-Cayman Rise moves very slowly; for years, these slow-spreading regions, which account for half of the mid-ocean ridge, were thought to have have no hydrothermal activity at all. They’ve barely been explored. “There could be more of these sites, but nobody has searched systematically,” said German. “The closer we look, the more we’ll find.” Images: 1) Top left, a carbonate formation at the Lost City site; top right, six-foot-long tubeworms from the Rosebud vent field./WHOI. 2) Map of the three new Mid-Cayman vent locations./WHOI. See Also:
Citation: “Diverse styles of submarine venting on the ultraslow spreading Mid-Cayman Rise.” By C. R. German, A. Bowen, M. L. Coleman, D. L. Honig, J. A. Huber, M. V. Jakuba, J. C. Kinsey, M. D. Kurz, S. Leroy, J. M. McDermott, B. Mercier de Lépinay, K. Nakamura, J. S. Seewald, J. L. Smith, S. P. Sylva, C. L. Van Dover, L. L. Whitcomb, D. R. Yoerger. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 107 No. 29, July 20, 2010. Brandon Keim’s Twitter stream and reportorial outtakes; Wired Science on Twitter. Brandon is currently working on a book about ecological tipping points.
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 19 Jul 2010 | 10:35 am How Teens Could Overrun the EarthA potion of IGF-1 could turn the innocent into self-centered, fickle teenagers.Source: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 10:34 am Hurricane-Hunting Drone Joins NASA FleetAn unmanned aerial vehicle will fly over the Atlantic to help us understand how tropical storms are formed.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 10:23 am Mayan King's Tomb Found in GuatemalaGuatemala’s jungle-covered Peten region has offered up a Mayan royal tomb packed with a hoard of carvings, ceramics and children's bones.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 9:59 am Are There Symptoms for Aneurysms?The type and location of the aneurysm will determine the symptoms.Source: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 9:39 am Mysterious Primate Photographed for the First TimeA mysterious primate, so rare that it was once believed to be extinct, has just been photographed.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 19 Jul 2010 | 9:23 am Bowls of Human Fingers and Teeth Found in Mayan TombA well-preserved tomb believed to be the final resting place of an ancient Mayan king has been discovered in GuatemalaSource: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 9:20 am Can Humans Survive?Experts weigh in on whether humanity can defy extinction and use its technological tools to survive on Earth.Source: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 8:26 am There's a lot more to science than space and dinosaursDavid Willetts has said they're the way to get children interested in science. But it's a naive view, as young people will tell you According to the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), subjects traditionally dominated by men, are still dominated by men. At best, the percentage of female students has stayed roughly the same; at worst, it's dropping. Rowenna Davis's report on this data finishes with a question: "Are schools doing enough to spark girls' interest in maths and engineering?" Well, David "two-brains" Willetts, minister for universities and science, has an answer. As he told a crowd of space fans last month: "There are two things that get kids into science – dinosaurs and space." When he repeated this point at the Royal Institution the following week, I wasn't the only one to raise an eyebrow. The Guardian science blog ran a neat cartoon, and a #spacedino hashtag breezily made its way around Twitter. More seriously, a teacher blogged that Willetts's comments were "simplistic and naive" even "downright patronising" to young people. I wouldn't deny many kids do enjoy space and dinosaurs. But there is a lot more to science, and a lot more to young people. Last Friday saw the presentation of the SciCast awards. SciCast is a project getting young people to share videos they have made about science, and every year they host a "glittering awards ceremony" for the best films. This year's overall winner is, indeed, about space. It is also about history, gravity, mass, weight, music, Lego and puns. I can also recommend a clever animation on the Doppler effect, a slightly surreal global warming rap and a (plasticine) rat dissection. My personal favourite simply shows off something students found while playing with water on a hot surface (do watch to the end, it's lovely). If film's not your thing, have a surf around the archives of I'm a Scientist, a project pitting scientists against teenagers' questions. The last round had about 8,000 questions including why we have knees or what's an easy way to make jelly babies explode, and let's not forget "please describe the role of proto-oncogene in the formation of a tumour". Or "how far is the nearest super massive blackhole?" (yes, space) and "do you think dinosaurs were wiped out by an asteroid?" (those dinosaurs). Last year's Case for Space report stated space was the second most popular factor motivating people to physics degrees. But this is a survey of the people the inspirational power of space works for, not those it left out. It studied the people who ended up in physics. That is, those people within that "physical sciences" category the HESA data notes is still only 41% female (and, I'm often told, could do with upping the numbers, regardless of gender identity). It is worth considering generational issues too. Ben Goldacre cites a longitudinal study of UK science media to argue that "since Willetts was a boy", public interest in science seems to have shifted from space to biomedicine. Both children's media and education projects often seem a generation or two behind, consumed by today's children but made by yesterday's (ie today's grownups). In 2001-2, the Science Museum tried to address this problem of inter-generational disconnects, with a student-led review of the school-science curriculum. It's a hard assignment to pull off, and I have some methodological concerns with the study. It's also starting to show its age. Still, its results are worth looking at. They are much more meaningful than personal nostalgia. Perhaps fitting Goldacre's point, one of their findings was that young people found biology most interesting. To quote one respondent, biology is interesting "because this is to do with everyday life and your body, and the things that happen around you" (p7). Not exactly outer space then, or the Cretaceous period. If you're worried about inspiring the next generation of scientists, listen to young people, don't (just) feed them space-dinos. 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 | 19 Jul 2010 | 7:29 am Men Are Like Apes When Competing for StatusSome guys respond to competition as bonobos would, others like chimpanzees.Source: Livescience.com | 19 Jul 2010 | 6:34 am My favourite medical graphic novelsFollowing his blogpost introducing the genre, Cian O'Luanaigh lists the best – though often harrowing – medical comics and graphic novels Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary by Justin GreenThe book that launched a genre. Green's memoirs of a childhood beset by obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) was the first graphic novel to explore illness from the patient's point of view. When Binky Brown (Green's alter ego) hits puberty after a strict Roman Catholic upbringing, he is plagued by religious guilt and a sexual obsession with the Virgin Mary. The rituals and associations that engulf Binky's life give a stark insight into the difficulty of living with OCD. Be warned: Catholics and church-goers may find much of the imagery offensive. Epileptic by David BA dark, disturbing look at what it's like to live with someone who suffers from epilepsy. Epileptic is visually stunning, combining a world of grim reality with the nightmarish imaginings of a small boy. David's brother Jean-Christophe has regular violent epileptic fits. The condition leads the family on a series of moves between doctors and alternative therapists, health communes and cities. David worries that he may too have the condition, and the endless search for a cure takes its toll on the family. In Epileptic there are no happy endings, no miracle cures, but we are left with a deeper understanding of how illness can affect a family. Not recommended for newly diagnosed epileptics. An upsetting masterpiece.
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Because it was impractical to look for vents along the the 60-mile-long Mid-Cayman Rise with seafloor vehicles that can see just a few feet into the murk, German’s team searched in deep-sea water for telltale chemical traces emitted. Once found, they follow the chemicals’ concentration gradient back to their source.