Artist's conception of exoplanet GJ1214b orbiting a red dwarf star 40 light-years from Earth (Photo: David A. Aguilar (CfA))

Data from the Hubble Space Telescope has revealed a new class of planet, one which is water-covered and has a steamy atmosphere.

We currently have three types of planets in our Solar System; rocky (Earth, Venus, Mercury and Mars), gas giants (Saturn and Jupiter) and ice giants (Uranus and Neptune).

While studying the exoplanet, GJ 1214b, astronomers found it to be like no other known planet because a significant portion of its mass is made up of water.

The GJ 1214b, discovered back in 2009, is about 2.7 times Earth’s diameter and weighs almost seven times as much.

GJ 1214b orbits a red-dwarf star every 38 hours at a distance of two million kilometers, and scientists estimate that it has a temperature of 230 degrees Celsius.

Scientists determined a type of haze that surrounds the planet is, most likely, the result of the planet’s steamy atmosphere.

Astronomers calculate the exoplanet has more water and is less rocky than Earth.

The astronomers say that GJ 1214b is located in the constellation of Ophiuchus (The Serpent Bearer), about 40 light-years from Earth.

>>> Read more…

Why Earth has active volcanoes while the moon doesn’t

Image of an artificial moon rock sample, measuring about half a millimeter across (Image: Nature)

Earth is in a constant state of change and evolution thanks in part to the active volcanism taking place throughout our planet.

The moon also has a history of volcano activity, but evidence of its volcanic past dates back billions of years.

So, if both the Earth and moon have a history of volcanism, why doesn’t the moon currently have active volcanoes?

Scientists are puzzled because many of the rocks on the moon’s surface are thought to be molten and recent moon-quake data suggests there is a huge supply of liquid magma deep within its surface.

A team of European scientists now thinks the reason the moon lacks current volcanic activity is because the magma – hot, molten rock deep within the moon’s interior – might be so dense that it is simply too heavy to rise to the surface.

The researchers created microscopic copies of moon rock collected by the Apollo missions and then melted them at the extremely high pressures and temperatures found inside the moon. They then measured the density of these melted rocks with powerful x-rays.

The scientists found small droplets of titanium-rich glass that produce a liquid magma as dense as the rocks that are found in the deepest parts of the lunar mantle today.

Scientists say, since the magma was so dense, it would not be able to move towards the surface the same way magma on Earth does during a volcanic eruption.

>>> Read more…

Ancient rock art found in Brazil

This is the oldest reliably dated petroglyph ever found in the New World. (Photo/Image: Neves WA, Araujo AGM, Bernardo DV, Kipnis R, Feathers JK (2012) Rock Art at the Pleistocene/Holocene Boundary in Eastern South America. PLoS ONE 7(2): e32228. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0032228)

Back on Earth, researchers recently found an extremely old human-like figure engraved in rock in central Brazil.

The engraving, or petroglyph,was found in an ancient limestone rock shelter called Lapa do Santo.

According to the researchers’ report, the petroglyph dates back to between 9,000 and 12,000 years ago, which would make it  the oldest reliably-dated specimen of this kind of rock art ever found in the Americas.

New World art produced during the time this discovery was engraved is quite rare.  Because of the rarity of this type of rock art, scientists know little about the differences of symbolic thinking of those who settled the Americas thousands of years ago.

Authors of this study suggest symbolic thought in South America was very diverse at that time, and that their discovery shows humans settled the New World earlier than first thought.

>>> Read more…

Scientists find new life forms deep within the Earth’s surface

Plutomurus ortobalaganensis found nearly two kilometers underground. (Image: University of Navarra)

Scientists exploring what’s been called the world’s deepest cave say that they’ve found a new species of arthropod that lives and thrives deep underground.

The creature, Plutomurus ortobalaganensis, is a tiny, primitive, wingless and eyeless, six-legged insect which lives in total darkness.

The scientists say the discovery of life in such a deep environment should provide new insight into how we look at life on Earth.

Since they live without light and have extremely limited food resources, animals such as the Plutomurus ortobalaganensis have had to develop some uncommon methods of surviving in its subterranean environment.

The new creature was found 1,980 meters below ground level in the Krubera or Voronja Cave, located in Abkhazia, a remote area near the Black Sea in the mountains of Western Caucasus.

The Krubera/Voronja cave reaches a depth of more than two kilometers below the surface of the Earth.

>>> Read more…

A chemist in the northwestern U.S. state of Washington has taken some of the technology behind Google’s powerful Internet search engine and has applied it to chemistry.

Aurora Clark,  associate professor of chemistry at Washington State University, along with colleagues from the University of Arizona, recently took Google’s PageRank software and adapted it to create a software package for chemists.

MoleculaRnetworks,  the new software, allows chemists to determine various molecular shapes and chemical reactions without the added expense and logistics of traditional laboratory experimentation.

Also, by using this software, the chemist can work in a safer environment and avoid the occasional dangers of lab-based experiments.

The principles of Google's PageRank (Image: Felipe Micaroni Lalli via Wikipedia Commons)

Google’s PageRank is a web analysis algorithm which was developed at Stanford University.

PageRank analyzes the trillions of Web pages on the Internet and then assigns a PageRank or a numeric ranking, which indicates how important a particular Web page is.

That “importance” is based upon how many links, or hyperlinks, point to a particular Web page.

Consequently, when you run a Web search on Google, it lists results according to their page rank, giving you the most important Web pages that best fit your search query.

According to Clark, it was Barbara Mooney, a student doing research in her laboratory, who brought PageRank technology to the team’s attention.

Having done work with a computer programming language called “R”, which contains a PageRank module, Mooney suggested the Google algorithm might be able to provide an analysis of the chemistry in the models and systems the team was looking at.

The moleculaRnetworks software, developed by Clark’s research team, focuses on what chemists call hydrogen bonds – the attraction of hydrogen atoms to other atoms like nitrogen, oxygen or fluorine – in water, earth’s most plentiful solvent.

Water plays a significant role in almost every biological process and can perform key functions in living things.

But, Clark noted these processes can be incredibly complicated, are constantly changing within fractions of a second, and can assume countless possible forms.

3D model of hydrogen bonds in water (Photo: Qwerter via Wikimedia Commons)

As Clark explains it, when their software is performing its analysis, it treats various intermolecular interactions in the same way Google’s PageRank treats Web page hyperlinks.

This allows the chemists to take a “snapshot” of how hundreds of thousands of molecules are interacting with one another.

Clark’s work as a computational chemist mostly centers on heavy, toxic metals, such uranium, plutonium and lead, and how they travel through the environment.

Water, of course, is a major part of the environment and Clark is interested in how those metals behave in water, including its reactivity.

The way water organizes around a particular metal determines its reactivity.

According to Clark, the PageRank technology that was applied to their moleculaRnetworks software was very good at describing water’s organizational features and providing an instantaneous view of all the activity, which allowed her to determine the metal’s reactivity.

In the future, Clark and her team hope the software can help scientists design drugs, investigate various diseases and analyze radioactive pollutants.

Professor Aurora Clark joins us this weekend on the radio edition of “Science World.”   Professor Clark tells us how one student’s idea sparked the development of the software, as well as how it could help chemists make new advancements.  Tune in (see right column for scheduled times) or check out the interview below.

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Other stories we cover on the “Science World” radio program this week include:

• NASA reflects on past, plans for Mars
• Rotation of Venus might be slowing
• New findings on Alzheimer’s raise hopes for treatment, cure
• Indian authorities relocate village to protect tigers
• West Africa’s mounting e-waste problem
• Mosquito flight paths help target malaria prevention

The Swiss are taking aim at space junk – the thousands of man-made objects launched into space over the years which have accumulated into a virtual junkyard filled with now-useless debris, like spent rocket stages and old satellites.

NASA's is tracking the space debris surrounding Earth (Photo: NASA)

NASA keeps a close eye on about 16,000 of these objects and scientists have expressed concern about the potential hazards they pose for spacecraft.

However, not a lot has really been done to address the problem.

But now the Swiss are coming to the rescue.  The Swiss Space Center at EPFL announced today that it’s launching  CleanSpace One, which will develop and build the first part of a group of satellites specifically designed to clean up space debris.

“It has become essential to be aware of the existence of this debris and the risks that are run by its proliferation,” says Claude Nicollier, astronaut and EPFL professor.

Project members estimate that the design and construction of CleanSpace One, as well as its maiden space voyage, will cost about 10 million Swiss francs.

They’re hopeful their first space clean-up job will take place within five years.

>>> Read more…

Cellphone users shown to be selfish

Talking on the cell phone may reduce the desire to connect with others, say UMD researchers (Photo: John Consoli/UMD)

A new University of Maryland study links cellphone use to selfish behavior.

Researchers focused on test subjects who were mostly in their early 20s. They found that, after using their cellphones for a relatively short period of time,  the group was less likely to volunteer for a community service activity, which was different from the control group.

The study also found that those who used their cell phones were not as determined to solve word problems, even when a monetary donation to charity was used as a motivating factor.

The researchers also noted that the cellphone users decreased focus on others even when the test subjects were only asked to draw a picture of their cellphones and think about how they used them.

>>> Read more…

New test provides early insight into risk of developing dementia, having a stroke

Tests such as gauging walking speed can be used to determine whether or not a person develops dementia. (Photo: Sean Hagen via Creative Commons/Flickr)

Doctors may soon be able to tell if a middle-aged patient will develop dementia or suffer a stroke with simple tests such as gauging walking speed and measuring hand grip strength.

That’s according to new research released today by the American Academy of Neurology.

“These are basic office tests which can provide insight into risk of dementia and stroke and can be easily performed by a neurologist or general practitioner,” said Erica Camargo, with Boston Medical Center.

Tests for walking speed, hand grip and cognitive function were given to more than 2,400 men and women with an average age of 62.

The researchers also performed brain scans on their subjects.

During a follow-up period of up to 11 years, the researchers found that of all the people tested, 34 had developed dementia and 70 people suffered a stroke.

The study revealed that middle aged people with a slower walking speed were 1.5 times more likely to develop dementia as compared to those who had a faster walking speed.

In people over the age of 65, those with a stronger hand grip had a 42 percent lower risk of having a stroke or transient ischemic attack (TIA) as compared to those who had weaker hand grip strength.

However, the study found that this was not the necessarily the case for people who were under 65 years old.

>>> Read more…

Mid-life choices could determine whether you have a long and happy life

(Photo: Sigfrid Lundberg via Creative Commons/Flickr)

And finally, one of the oldest and most frequent questions humans ponder is “How do we live a long and happy life?”

Harvard University has researched the answer to that question for 74 years and they’ve found where you are in mid-life could impact how long and how well you live into old age.

They’ve learned that what you’re doing and experiencing at age 50 has more of an impact on your health and happiness when you’re 70, than what happened to you in earlier times of your life.

One finding shows that the better vacations you take when you’re still young, which provides a measure of your ability to play, can better indicate your happiness later in life than, believe it or not, your income.

Also important to later-life happiness, according to the study, is a healthy and stable marriage.  The researchers say this underscores how important it is to have mature coping skills to be ready for the troubles and adversities that may come later in life.

“We used to think that if you had relatives who lived to a ripe old age, that was the best predictor of a long life,” said Robert Waldinger, director of the Harvard Study. “It turns out that the lifestyle choices people make in midlife are a more important predictor of how long you live.”

>>> Read more…

(Photo: Trei Brundrett via Flickr/Creative Commons)

Babies between six and nine months of age understand the meaning of some spoken words, according a new University of Pennsylvania study, which challenges previous beliefs about early childhood learning.

Although many babies vocalize aloud with sounds such as “ba ba,” “da da” and “goo goo,” the study finds they can still learn the meanings of words for foods and body parts, through daily experiences and interactions with caregivers.

Babies have been thought to understand certain sounds related to their native languages, but experts believed babies between 6 to 9 months old – often referred to as “pre-linguistic” – did not have the ability to understand the meaning of spoken words.

It was thought that children’s word comprehension abilities really didn’t appear until they were closer to the first birthday.

The researchers reached their conclusion after completing  two kinds of tests.

For the first test, the baby, while sitting on their caregiver’s lap faced a screen that had the images of one food item and one body part.

Wearing headphones, the caregiver was fed statements like, “Look at the apple” or “Where’s the apple?” to repeat to the child.

As a precaution, the caregivers also wore visors to keep them from looking at the screen. Using an eye-tracking device, which showed where a child was looking and when, the researchers were able to follow the child’s gaze.

The second test, instead of displaying a food item and body part on the screen,  showed objects arranged in natural contexts, such as a few foods laid out on a table or a human figure.

The researchers used both tests to see whether the baby, after hearing a word for something on the screen, would look at that specific object more, indicating that they understood the spoken word.

A baby participates in the study of language acquisition. (Photo: University of Pennsylvania)

The test results showed the 6-to-9-month-old babies tended to fix their gaze more on the picture named by their caregiver rather than on the other images on display.

For the researchers, this demonstrated that the babies are able to understand the word associated with the appropriate object.

The researchers tested 33 6- to-9 month-old children.

They also gave the same tests to 50 children between 10-to-20 months of age, in order to compare test results of the younger children with those who were older.

Interestingly, the researchers found no noticeable improvement in word recognition in 8-and-9-month-old babies as compared to 6-to-7 month olds.

Researchers found little improvement until the children reached roughly 14 months, at which point word recognition spiked dramatically.

The researchers think that increase in the babies’ performance may either be due to the little ones being able to better understand the nature of the task because it’s part of a game they’re playing, or that it may be due to natural language development.

Hardly a week goes by that we aren’t reporting a story on concerns about global warming.

But, a growing number of people in the scientific community are coming forward to express doubts about the prevailing scientific opinions concerning global warming.

Recently, 16 respected scientists signed a letter, published in the Wall Street Journal, which indicated there is no need to panic about global warming, arguing there’s no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to ‘decarbonize‘ the world’s economy.

A few days after the letter appeared, NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) released a study which finds human activity contributes to global warming.

The NASA study, “Earth’s energy imbalance and implications,” was recently published in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.

The study was led by James Hansen, director of  GISS, a respected scientist who is well known for his work in climatology.

Data collected by Argo floats, such as this one, helped Dr. Hansen's team improve the calculation of Earth's energy imbalance. (Photo: Argo Project Office)

Many say it was his testimony on climate change before the US Congress in 1988, that was responsible for increasing awareness of global warming and climate change, bringing the issue to the forefront of the public’s consciousness.

At the heart of the new paper is an emphasis that greenhouse gases generated by human activity – and not changes in solar activity – are the primary force driving global warming.

The study calculated the balance of energy the Earth takes in from the sun, the amount of energy that’s absorbed by the surface of the Earth and compared it to what energy is returned from the Earth to space in the form of heat.

The researchers found, despite unusually low solar activity between 2005 and 2010, Earth continued to absorb more energy than it returned to space.

Dr. Gavin Schmidt, a colleague of Dr. Hansen’s at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, tells us that basically, we’re putting greenhouse gases – which are primarily water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone – into the atmosphere, making it harder for energy coming in from the sun and processed by Earth’s climate systems to make it back out to space.

Schmidt says that their research showed that temperatures are changing because of increases in greenhouse gases.  The increased emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere keep more energy trapped near the ground than what would be considered normal.

Dr. Gavin Schmidt (Photo: NASA/GISS)

That imbalance – more energy coming into Earth than is leaving it – is part of the whole global warming story.

As far as other evidence supporting the theory of human-caused global warming, Dr. Schmidt points to conditions such as the temperature changes that scientists are recording around the world; the heat content changes in the ocean; stratospheric cooling, which he says is a “very clear signature of carbon dioxide;” as well as the spectral radiation scientists are measuring from satellites.

Dr. Schmidt says those along, with other signs to look for, such as sea ice, the phenology of plants and glacial melting, prove that the actual fact of warming is incontrovertible, that the planet has clearly warmed over the last 100 years and that the warming has increased over the last few decades.

Dr. William Happer, a professor of physics at Princeton University is one of the 16 scientists who signed the Wall Street Journal letter, and he raises doubts about what has almost become conventional wisdom on global warming.

Dr. Happer also testified before Congress, in 2009, saying, “I believe that the increase of CO2 is not a cause for alarm and will be good for mankind.”

Dr. Happer says the Wall Street Journal letter is the result of a scientific examination of  global warming and increasing CO², which found “there’s more smoke than fire there,” and demonstrates that not all scientists think there’s a drastic problem that must be immediately addressed.

Dr. William Happer (Photo: Denise Applewhite, Princeton University Office of Communication)

The Wall Street Journal letter was directed toward “candidates running for public office in any contemporary democracy who may have to consider what, if anything, to do about ‘global warming.’”

The signatories of the letter said that they were speaking for “many scientists and engineers, who have looked carefully and independently at the science of climate,” and that their basic message to the candidates was that, “there is no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to “decarbonize” the world’s economy. Even if one accepts the inflated climate forecasts of the IPCC, aggressive greenhouse-gas control policies are not justified economically.”

Many people today believe that anthropogenic global warming is a cold, hard and irrefutable fact.  But, scientists such as Dr. Happer say this might not necessarily be true.

Dr. Happer describes climate change as happening all the time, that it’s been changing and that it has clearly warmed up over the last 200 years.  But Dr. Happer insists the current warming trend started from a very cold period at the end of what has been called the “little ice age”.

“Most of the warming you hear about and most of the glacier melting was over by 1900,” says Dr. Happer.

Dr. Happer finds it hard to believe the early phase of the warming, which he says is the biggest part, was all independent of CO2 because its levels hadn’t increased much before 1900.

In the Wall Street Journal letter, Dr. Happer points out there has been no warming for over 10 years.  He invites anyone to “look it up on the Internet.”

CO2 (Image: David Gaya/Generated with KPovModeler via Wikimedia)

“Just look at the graph of temperature versus time since the year 2000 and there has been no warming,” says Dr. Happer.

According to Dr. Happer, the data implies that the models, which predicted quite a lot of warming, have greatly exaggerated the effect of C02.

Dr. Happer thinks that most, if not all, of those who signed the letter believe  CO2 will cause some warming but that the amount has been enormously exaggerated.

You, of course, can find volumes and volumes of information and data that support both sides of this issue on the Internet or in your local library.

But, by sharing what Drs. Happer and Schmidt shared with us on this issue, we wanted to give you just a little “food for thought” so that you draw your own conclusions regarding global warming and whether or not it’s been primarily caused by human activity.

Both Dr. Gavin Schmidt, from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and, Dr. William Happer of Princeton University join us this weekend on the radio edition of “Science World.”

They’ll each give us their insight into the global warming/climate change issue. Tune in (see right column for scheduled times).

Other stories we cover on the “Science World” radio program this week include:

• Mating call of prehistoric katydid chirps again
• Pakistani fisherman reel in a big one – a 12-meter whale-shark
• President Obama holds science fair at White House
• Scientists: plants can talk to each other
• Russian scientists say they’ve drilled through thick Antarctic ice to reach freshwater lake
• Researchers reverse Alzheimer’s disease in mice
• Farming may have helped rainforests of Central Africa disappear

Russian researchers at the Vostok station in Antarctica after reaching subglacial Lake Vostok. (Photo: AP/Arctic and Antarctic Research Insitute of St. Petersburg)

After 20 years of drilling, Russian scientists say they’ve reached Lake Vostok, Antarctica‘s largest subglacial lake, which has been buried nearly four kilometers below the ice sheet for about 20 million years.

The development could lead to the discovery of new life forms which existed before the Ice Age.  Scientists hope to find material that could help in the search for life on other planets – such as in the ice-encrusted moons of Jupiter and Saturn or under Mars’ polar ice caps – where conditions could be similar.

“There is no other place on Earth that has been in isolation for more than 20 million years,” Lev Savatyugin, a researcher with Russia’s Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute (AARI), told the Associated Press. “It’s a meeting with the unknown.”

Savatyugin told the AP that scientists hope they’ll find primeval bacteria that could further human knowledge of the origins of life.

“We need to see what we have here before we send missions to ice-crust moons, like Jupiter’s moon Europa,” he said.

The project has not been without controversy.  Some environmentalists worried the Russian team’s use of 60 metric tons of lubricants and antifreeze in the drilling process could contaminate the unspoiled lake.

But project’s researchers have said their drill bore would only slightly touch the surface of the lake. The resulting surge in pressure, once the drill made it through the ice and into the lake, would send the water rushing up the drill shaft where it would immediately freeze, which the Russian scientists say, would seal out the toxic chemicals.

>>> Read more…

Spanking your kids may cause long-term harm

“Spare the rod and spoil the child” as the old saying goes, but a new study from Canada shows spanking and other forms of physical punishment is harmful to the long-term development of children.

The study’s authors analyzed 20 years of research and found, virtually without exception, “that physical punishment was associated with higher levels of aggression against parents, siblings, peers and spouses.”

For the study, researchers developed methods of discipline designed to both reduce difficult behavior in children and help the parents cut back on physical punishment like spanking.

Parents in 500 families were trained in and encouraged to use these methods.

After a trial period, the researchers found that as physical punishment was reduced, so too were the difficult behaviors exhibited by the children.

Spanking and other forms of physical punishment has been associated in past studies with a variety of mental health problems, like depression, anxiety and drug and alcohol use.

Recent neuroimaging studies also suggest that physical forms of punishment could alter parts of the brain that are linked to performance on IQ tests and increase vulnerability to drug or alcohol dependence.

Over the years, parenting attitudes toward using physical punishment have changed, with many countries  shifting instead to a focus on positive discipline of children.  Some countries have legally abolished physical punishment.

>>> Read more…

Sea Monster is oldest living thing in the world

Posidonia oceanica (Photo: Albert Kok via Wikimedia Commons)

An international research team says that they have found the oldest living thing on Earth and it’s a monster!

Actually it’s a giant ancient sea grass called Posidonia oceanica.  One single organism of this species of sea grass has been found to span up to 15 kilometers wide, reaching a mass of more than 6,000 metric tons.

Reproducing asexually, it generates clones and may well be more than 100,000 years old.

The researchers studied 40 meadows of the sea grass across 3,500 kilometers of the Mediterranean Sea.   The scientists developed and used various computer models that helped demonstrate the species clonal reproductive system which they say allowed the Posidonia oceanica to spread and maintain high-quality clones over the years.   The researchers point out that even the hardiest genotypes of organisms that can only reproduce sexually are disappear with each generation.

“Clonal organisms have an extraordinary capacity to transmit only ‘highly competent’ genomes, through generations, with potentially no end,” says Professor Carlos Duarte, director of the University of Western Australia’s Ocean’s Institute.

But, scientists say that sea grass, which serves as the foundation of key coastal ecosystems, have declined globally for the past 20 years and that the Posidonia oceanica meadows are now decreasing by an annual estimated rate of five percent.

“The concern is that while Posidonia oceanica meadows have thrived for millennia their current decline suggests they may no longer be able to adapt to the unprecedented rate of global climate change,” said the researchers in their report.

>>> Read more…

New discovery may allow faster more efficient hard drives

Experimental images showing the repeated deterministic switching of nano islands. Initially the two nano islands have different magnetic orientation (black and white respectively). (Photo: Johan Mentink and Alexey Kimel, Radboud University Nijmegen; Richard Evans, University of York)

A radical new technique of magnetic recording allows information to be processed hundreds of times faster than current hard drive technology allows.

An international team of scientists, led by the University of York’s Department of Physics, has developed and demonstrated the technique.

Instead of using the traditional method of using magnetism to record information onto ferrous material, the researchers used heat to record information, something that has long been thought to be unimaginable.

The researchers believe this finding will not only make future magnetic recording devices faster, but would also allow them to be more energy-efficient, too.

“Instead of using a magnetic field to record information on a magnetic medium, we harnessed much stronger internal forces and recorded information using only heat,” said York physicist Thomas Ostler. “This revolutionary method allows the recording of Terabytes of information per second, hundreds of times faster than present hard drive technology. As there is no need for a magnetic field, there is also less energy consumption.”

The principle that has long been used in magnetic recording technology is that the North Pole of a magnet is attracted to the South Pole of another and two poles that are alike will repel one another. Until this discovery it’s been thought that you had to apply an external magnetic field to be able to record just one bit of information.

But this new method of magnetic recording showed that the positions of both the North and South poles of a magnet can be reversed by an ultra-short heat pulse, which they say harnesses the power of much stronger internal forces within magnetic media.

>>> Read more…

Mmmmm a sweet treat! (Photo: Katy Warner via Flickr)

If you love your cookies and candy and can’t go a day without  your favorite soda or daily ice cream cone, then a new warning about the dangers of  sugar is bound to leave a bitter taste in your mouth.

California researchers are calling for sugar to be treated like a controlled substance – similar to alcohol and tobacco – in order to protect public health.

The researchers, from University of California, San Francisco (UCSF),  assert that sugar is fueling a global obesity pandemic, contributing to 35 million deaths annually worldwide from non-communicable diseases like diabetes, heart disease and cancer.

The UCSF team argues  sugar is more than just empty calories which can make you fat. The team points out that sugar – taken in at levels typical of most Americans – alters a person’s metabolism, raises blood pressure, severely affects how our hormones send out signals to our body and causes substantial liver damage.

They compare the health hazards of sugar to the effects of drinking too much alcohol.

“There are good calories and bad calories, just as there are good fats and bad fats, good amino acids and bad amino acids, good carbohydrates and bad carbohydrates,” says  Dr. Robert Lustig, a pediatric endocrinologist at UCSF.  “But sugar is toxic beyond its calories.”

The commentary, published in Nature,  suggests than just educating people about the potential toxicity of sugar is needed.

“We recognize that there are cultural and celebratory aspects of sugar,” said Claire Brindis, a public health expert. “Changing these patterns is very complicated.”

Team members assert that focusing on just individual change alone may not be enough to effectively address this issue.  Instead, the team would like to see methods similar to how public health issues with alcohol and tobacco were handled.

(Photo: Ayelie via Flickr)

These approaches might be the same as those used to reduce the consumption of tobacco and alcohol products; such as levying special sales taxes, controlling access to the product, and tightening licensing requirements on vending machines and snack bars that sell high-sugar products in schools and workplaces.

“We’re not talking prohibition,” says Laura Schmidt, a health policy professor. “We’re not advocating a major imposition of the government into people’s lives. We’re talking about gentle ways to make sugar consumption slightly less convenient, thereby moving people away from the concentrated dose. What we want is to actually increase people’s choices by making foods that aren’t loaded with sugar comparatively easier and cheaper to get.”

As you might expect, the Sugar Association, which represents sugar manufacturers in the United States, takes issue with the commentary, calling it  “non-scientific and irresponsible.”

The organization says the report lacks the scientific evidence or consensus to justify the report’s recommended policy interventions.

(Photo: Amarand Agasi via Flickr)

The Sugar Association argues it is irresponsible for health professionals to instill public fear by using words like “diabetes,” “cancer,” and even “death,” without admitting the science in this area is inconclusive.

The American Council on Science and Health (ACSH), an organization founded by scientists concerned that many important public health policies aren’t backed by  sound scientific evidence, agrees.

In a statement published on the organization’s website, Dr. Josh Bloom, ACSH’s director of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, says, “The peg on which Dr. Lustig hangs his entire argument is flawed. Most fruits have quite a bit more fructose than sucrose. Does this make an apple unhealthy and in need of regulation? The fructose in an apple is the same fructose that is demonized in high fructose corn syrup. You can’t have it both ways.”

We’d like to know your opinion. Do you think sugar is toxic and should be controlled in ways similar to how alcohol and tobacco currently are?

(Photo: Petr Novák, Wikipedia)

Scientists at the University of Pennsylvania may have found a way to prevent, and even reverse, a serious inherited eye disease which leads to blindness.

The disease, called X-linked Retinitis Pigmentosa (XLRP),  causes early, severe and progressive vision loss.

It is one of the most common inherited forms of retinal degeneration in people.

Peoples with XLRP experience a gradual decline in their vision as  the eye’s photoreceptor cells die off.

At first, XLRP usually impacts the ability to see in dimly-lit areas.  Later, sufferers notice a reduction in their visual field,  a sort of  “tunnel vision,” as though they’re looking at things through a narrow tunnel.

Over the years, as the disease advances, the ability to see in even normally-lit conditions, or day vision, progressively dies, leading to complete blindness.

A scene as it might be viewed by a person with retinitis pigmentosa. (Photo: National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health)

The University of Pennsylvania research was conducted on dogs.

However, the scientists say there are enough similarities between humans and dogs – in terms of eye anatomy, physiology and disease characteristics – that the positive results with gene therapy raise hope of developing similar therapies for humans.

Past research shows XLRP is caused by defects in the RPGR gene.  Scientists discovered a region on the X chromosome, where the RPGR gene is located, which tends to be very susceptible to damage.

Consequently, when there is a replication of cells in a part of the RPGR gene called ORF-15, that replication can be faulty, producing a mutated gene.

To correct or repair the mutated gene, the researchers developed a therapeutic version of it, which is actually a healthy human RPGR gene.

Using a viral vector, a common tool scientists use to deliver genetic material into individual cells which can specifically deliver the therapeutic gene to only the diseased or damaged cells, the researchers were able to repair, not only the damaged photoreceptor cells, but also the connectors which send signals from the photoreceptors to the brain.

Dr. Gustavo D. Aguirre (left) and Dr. William A. Beltran (right) (Photo: University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine)

The researchers call the results of this treatment “dramatic.”

In dogs that already had the disease, scientists   were able to stop the retinal degeneration completely. The previously-damaged cells were able to function normally and scientists were able to prevent XLRP altogether if the retina was treated before the disease had a chance to develop.

The findings of the team’s research were recently published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Dr. Gustavo Aguirre, senior author of the study and the paper’s lead author, Dr. William Beltran,  both of the University Of Pennsylvania School Of Veterinary Medicine, join us this weekend on the radio edition of “Science World.”

They’ll talk about how their findings could help those suffering from X-Linked Retinitis Pigmentosa. Tune in (see right column for scheduled times) or check out the interview below.

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Other stories we cover on the “Science World” radio program this week include:

• Dependability of Russian space program questioned
• Different blood pressure readings in each arm could signal trouble ahead
• Ancient amber sample shows ages-old natural alliance between fungi and modern forests
• IBM reveals its latest technology predictions
• World’s poor may soon benefit from mobile phone apps

Electron micrograph provided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows the bird flu virus strain H5N1 (in gold). (Photo: AP)

In December, the U.S. government asked scientists working on a man-made version of the avian flu virus to withhold certain details of their studies out of concern terrorists might use the information to manufacture and spread the dangerous virus, causing a worldwide pandemic.

At the time of the request by the U.S. National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, details of the studies into the H5N1 avian influenza virus were under review for publication in the journals Science and Nature.

The journal Science reported last week that the researchers agreed to a 60-day moratorium on some of the more sensitive aspects of their studies involving H5N1 in order “to provide time” for international discussions.

Yesterday, members of the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity offered an explanation for the action they took regarding the controversial H5N1 studies.

“We are in the midst of a revolutionary period in the life sciences. Technological capabilities have dramatically expanded, we have a much improved understanding of the complex biology of selected microorganisms, and we have a much improved ability to manipulate microbial genomes. With this has come unprecedented potential for better control of infectious diseases and significant societal benefit. However, there is also a growing risk that the same science will be deliberately misused and that the consequences could be catastrophic.”

>>> Read more…

NASA’s IBEX looks at space beyond our solar system

Studies of matter from outside of our Solar System reveal an alien environment which contains material riding on the interstellar wind throughout our galaxy that doesn’t look like the same things our own Solar System is made of.

NASA says the new data – from by the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) -  provides scientists with insight into not only the origins of our Solar System and the physical powers that went into forming it, but also the history of other stars all over the Milky Way galaxy.

“We’ve directly measured four separate types of atoms from interstellar space and the composition just doesn’t match up with what we see in the Solar System,” says Eric Christian, a mission scientist for the IBEX program at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight center in Maryland. “IBEX’s observations shed a whole new light on the mysterious zone where the Solar System ends and interstellar space begins.”

David McComas, the IBEX principal investigator at the Southwest Research Institute in Texas, believes the findings suggest two possibilities.

“Either the Solar System evolved in a separate, more oxygen-rich part of the galaxy than where we currently reside, or a great deal of critical, life-giving oxygen lies trapped in interstellar dust grains or ices, unable to move freely throughout space.”

>>> Read more…

Developing more effective antibiotics

(Photo: US Food and Drug Administration)

Bacterial resistance to antibiotics has become a growing concern within the medical community.  As Doctors continue to prescribe stronger and a wider range of these drugs to their patients, the germs the drugs are supposed to fight are getting wise to their nemesis and are changing in ways to survive making the antibiotics less effective.

One reason for this growing resistance to antibiotics, according to a new study published recently in the journal Nature, is that drug resistant proteins are taking the “good” antibiotics, or inhibitors, out of the cells, allowing them to evolve and mutate as if the drugs weren’t given in the first place.

In their research for the study, scientists at Brandeis University focused on one of these drug transporting proteins called EmrE and how it removes the antibiotic from the infected cells.

“You have a disease and an antibiotic goes into the cells to try to kill it but the protein EmrE takes the antibiotic and transports it out,” says Dorothee Kern, a professor of biochemistry and one of the study’s authors.

Kern adds that a challenge in developing drugs that would stop the protein’s method of transport is that you need to kill specific targets but nothing else.

“The goal would be to find clever ways to stop EmrE from functioning as an exporter while allowing necessary nutrients to remain.”

>>> Read more…

Burmese python killing off mammals in Florida Everglades

Researcher John “J.D.” Willson holds a young Burmese python captured in Everglades National Park. (Photo: Michael Dorcas)

The Burmese python has become a popular pet for some folks. But many who own these constricting snakes find that as the python gets older, it becomes harder to safely manage and maintain.

In order to quickly rid themselves of the potentially-deadly burden of keeping the snake, some release it into the wild.

The pythons have become quite a problem and are considered an invasive species in Florida’s Everglades.  Joining the snakes let go by their owners, are other pythons which were released from Florida pet shops following 1992’s devastating Hurricane Andrew.

A new study reveals the Burmese python has not only become dramatically plentiful in a widening geographic range in the Florida Everglades Park since 2000, but it has also consumed a wide variety of mammals and birds, with mid-sized mammals being most affected.  Reported sightings of mammals such as raccoons, opossums, white-tailed deer and  bobcats have diminished by as much as 99 percent in areas of the park where the pythons and other similar constricting snakes have been known to frequent.

John “J.D.” Willson from Virginia Tech’s College of Natural Resources and Environment led the study.

“Our research adds to the increasing evidence that predators, whether native or exotic, exert major influence on the structure of animal communities,” he says. ” The effects of declining mammal populations on the overall Everglades ecosystem, which extends well beyond the national park boundaries, are likely profound, but are probably complex and difficult to predict.”

The US National Park Service, which oversees Florida Everglades National Park, reports it has captured and removed 1,825 Burmese pythons since 2000.

>>> Read more…

Last week, a massive solar flare on the sun produced one of the strongest radiation storms Earth has experienced since May 2005.

As a result, airlines were forced to reroute some flights that usually cross over the Polar regions. Many parts of the world, which usually can’t see the aurorae produced over the North and South Poles, were treated to a spectacular light show.

Last week’s events could be a sign of things to come as the sun moves toward its solar maximum, the period in which it experiences its greatest amount of activity. The sun goes through an approximately 11-year cycle that takes it from a period of relative calm to a state of agitation.

These three images taken over four years illustrate how the level of solar activity has risen from near minimum to near maximum in the sun's 11-year solar cycle. (Images: SOHO (ESA & NASA))

The solar maximum is expected to peak sometime next year, in 2013.   In 2003, during its last period of intense activity, the sun produced the largest and most powerful solar flare ever observed, up to that point, which was measured by modern methods.

This time, as the sun reaches its period of greatest turmoil, experts at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center will be ready with new tools.

These tools will help them measure solar activity, giving space weather forecasters greatly enhanced forecasting capability.

Right now, forecasters work with only one set of parameters with data that is taken from near real-time information gathered by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO), and the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), among others.

But NASA officials point out that they have no assurance of receiving continuous real-time data stream from these observatories.

Chief space weather forecasters Yihua Zheng and Antti Pulkkinen help implement ensemble forecasting, which will improve NASA’s ability to predict the path and impact of severe solar storms. (Photo: NASA/Chris Gunn)

Forecasting by the Space Weather Laboratory could be further hindered by imperfections in the data they do receive. Those imperfections tend to grow over time, all of which can lead to forecasts that may not necessarily agree with the progression of actual conditions.

Utilizing “ensemble forecasting,” a computer technique meteorologists use to predict weather on Earth, NASA’s space weather forecasters will be able to concurrently create up to 100 computerized forecasts instead of analyzing that one set of solar weather conditions as they do now.

These multiple computerized solar weather forecasts, made by calculating a number of possible conditions, allow forecasters to quickly and accurately provide alerts of space weather storms that could, for example, be potentially harmful to astronauts and NASA spacecraft.

Since the new computer systems have already been installed at the Space Weather Lab, NASA hopes its space weather scientists will be able to generate more specialized forecasts.

This state-of-the-art space weather forecasting capability, according to NASA, is expected to be completed within three years.