Science

Russian scientists prepare for Mars mission: Sitting in a tin can, not far from central Moscow

by
  • 105-day experiment to simulate rocket ride
  • Six volunteers will ‘blast off’ on Tuesday


A member of the research team in one of the modules where the experiment will take place Photograph: Pavel Zelensky/AFP/Getty Images

In a car park not so far away … It is a big brother experiment like no other, an experiment which will boldly go where few have gone – or probably wanted to go – before.

Six apparently fearless volunteers are to take part in a unique test by being locked up in what amounts to a series of small steel tins off a parking lot in Moscow for 105 days as scientists simulate a space rocket ride to Mars.

On Tuesday the team will step into a chain of cramped metal capsules, connected by cables and corrugated metal pipes, in a hangar at the back of the Institute of Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP) in the Russian capital, swing close the hatch and “blast off”.

The idea is for the 550 cubic-metre “ground exploration complex” (GEC) to recreate as closely as possible the atmosphere of a spacecraft racing through the solar system, bombarded by cosmic radiation. Any return flight to Mars – at least 34 million miles from our planet – would take between 18 months and three years, including landing and exploration.

The volunteers – four Russians, a French airline pilot and a German army engineer – will be kept under constant camera surveillance to record the physical and psychological impact of their time in the isolation chamber.

Read moreRussian scientists prepare for Mars mission: Sitting in a tin can, not far from central Moscow

Scientists film HIV spreading for first time

by

– Coconut Oil Against HIV & Aids (Natural News):
Scientists in the Philippines researched the effects of coconut oil and lauric acid on patients with the HIV virus that causes Aids.The results were amazing. Most of the Aids patients showed a dramatic drop in the HIV virus count, in some cases to “undetectable” levels.

Scientists have made a breakthrough in understanding how HIV spreads through the human body after filming the process for the first time ever.

Researchers found that the virus is transferred from infected cells to healthy ones in a previously unknown way.

It is hoped that the discovery will help researchers create a vaccine to combat the virus, which has led to the deaths of more than 25 million people.

The study was made possible after experts created a molecular clone of infectious HIV and inserted a protein into its genetic code which glows green when exposed to blue light.

This allowed scientists to see the cells on digital video, and capture the way HIV-infected T-cells interact with uninfected ones.

They noted that when an infected cell came into contact with a healthy one, a bridge was created between them, called a virological synapse.

Researchers were then able to observe the fluorescent green viral particles moving towards the synapse and into the healthy cell.

Read moreScientists film HIV spreading for first time

Pentagon exploring robot killers that can fire on their own

by

“We are sleepwalking into a brave new world where robots decide who, where and when to kill,” said Noel Sharkey, an expert on robotics and artificial intelligence at the University of Sheffield, England.

WASHINGTON — The unmanned bombers that frequently cause unintended civilian casualties in Pakistan are a step toward an even more lethal generation of robotic hunters-killers that operate with limited, if any, human control.

The Defense Department is financing studies of autonomous, or self-governing, armed robots that could find and destroy targets on their own. On-board computer programs, not flesh-and-blood people, would decide whether to fire their weapons.

“The trend is clear: Warfare will continue and autonomous robots will ultimately be deployed in its conduct,” Ronald Arkin, a robotics expert at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, wrote in a study commissioned by the Army.

“The pressure of an increasing battlefield tempo is forcing autonomy further and further toward the point of robots making that final, lethal decision,” he predicted. “The time available to make the decision to shoot or not to shoot is becoming too short for remote humans to make intelligent informed decisions.”

Read morePentagon exploring robot killers that can fire on their own

Alaska volcano Mount Redoubt erupts 3 times

by

Alaska’s Mount Redoubt volcano has begun erupting over night, sending smoke billowing some 50,000 feet above sea level.


Alaska’s Mount Redoubt volcano has begun erupting over night, sending smoke billowing some 50,000 feet above sea level. Photo: EPA

Geologists at the Alaska Volcano Observatory said the volcano, which is roughly 100 miles from southwest of Anchorage, erupted three times late on Sunday and early on Monday.

“This is a fairly large eruption, close to the larger cities in Alaska,” said John Power, a geophysicist.

More information: Q & A: Will Mount Redoubt erupt again? (MSNBC)

He said no cities have yet reported any ash fall from the volcano, but he added that it is still early.

Geologists said seismic activity around the volcano has been intense in recent days, and they expect that the volcano would blow soon.

Read moreAlaska volcano Mount Redoubt erupts 3 times

CDC Takes Closer Look at Gardasil and Paralysis

by

Related article: Gardasil Vaccine Ingredients – Roach Killer, Aluminum, and Polysorbate 80

I know that those foreign proteins in the vaccine are also very, very destructive to the brain, the immune system and the entire body. In the wireless age you can forget about the protection of the brain through the blood-brain barrier, because just using a mobile phone or maybe even a cordless phone (DECT) opens the blood-brain barrier and all those toxins will destroy the brain. (The numbers of brain tumors will go through the roof in the next few years.)

The first moment your child shows signs of illness after a vaccination, besides from visiting a doctor, go immediately to an excellent classical homeopath. Homeopathy can literally save your child from autism, ALS, MS and any mental/physical development problems.

For vaccination damage in general:

Learn how to detoxify the body from aluminum, mercury and other toxins.

To detoxify the body of aluminum you may use Vitamin C (Acerola!) and Zinc (Zincorotat!).

Do not use homeopathy to detoxify the body from mercury, which is common in other vaccines. Use organic(!) Chlorella, AFA-algae, Spirulina, coriander, bear’s garlic (Allium ursinum), onions, garlic etc. instead.

Also use herbs to detoxify the body and to strengthen, especially the kidneys and the liver. A tea mixture should be prepared individually. Her is an example for a tea mixture: Herba Artemisiae cc., Herba Solidaginis cc., Herba Hederae terr. cc., Radix Bardanae cc., Radix Taraxaci cc., Radix Cichorii cc. in equal parts.

Go to a acupuncturist learn the important points for your child and massage (acupressure) them every day. If your child is old enough to understand that acupuncture treatments are meant to help, then you can do acupuncture as long as your child allows it. In young children just inserting the acupuncture needle and immediately withdrawing it is equal to 20-30 minutes of retaining the needle in adults. (A great master does not need needles anymore.)

Learn to focus on health for your child and do it the moment you wake up and before you go to bed for several minutes every day.

Watch the video with Dr. Bruce Lipton to improve your acceptance:
– Bruce Lipton – The New Biology – Where Mind and Matter Meet (!)
– Dr. Bruce Lipton Ph.D. – Changing Our Cells by Thought
This will change your life.

Dr. Bruce Lipton is a former medical school professor and research scientist.

(((Find and consult an excellent therapist that is worth its salt. Do not treat your child by yourself, if you are not a doctor or an alternative medicine practitioner, that knows what he/she is doing.)))


Phil Tetlock and Barbara Mellers were in a race against time to save their 15-year-old daughter, Jenny. As I reported last summer, Jenny developed a degenerative muscle disease nearly two years ago, soon after being vaccinated against the cervical-cancer-causing HPV. She became nearly completely paralyzed, though her mind was perfectly intact and she could still enjoy her pet parakeet, Hannah Montana, and Twilight.

I’ve been E-mailing Phil regularly over the past year, and up until our last E-mail, one week ago, he had been holding out hope that they would be able to find a cure for his daughter—or to at least determine if the human papillomavirus vaccine called Gardasil had caused his daughter’s illness, most likely a juvenile form of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (aka Lou Gehrig’s disease). Sadly, the clock ran out last Sunday, and Jenny passed away.

Related articles:
 – Concerns over safety of cervical cancer vaccine after 1,300 girls experience adverse side-effects
– Spain withdraws cervical cancer shot (Gardasil) after illnesses
– Gardasil Vaccine: Almost 8000 adverse reactions, reports CDC
– Two More Girls Die After Receiving Gardasil Cervical Cancer Vaccination
– Girl Paralysed 30 Minutes After Cervarix Vaccination
– Vaccines Found to Cause Diabetes in Children
– Vaccine Nation – Director’s Cut
– Vaccines and Medical Experiments on Children, Minorities, Woman and Inmates (1845 – 2007)
– ANOTHER AUTISM CASE WINS IN VACCINE COURT By Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Through their efforts to publicize Jenny’s case on their blog, Jenny’s parents have connected with two other sets of parents whose daughters developed what appears to be ALS after being injected with Gardasil. One was 22-year-old Whitney Baird, who died last August, just 13 months after receiving Gardasil. Another is Alicia Olund, a 12-year-old who began having trouble walking after getting her third shot last September. She now uses leg braces and a walker at home as her muscles continue to deteriorate. After ruling out other conditions, her specialists at the University of California-San Francisco Medical Center—who also treated Jenny—suspect that Alicia may have the same condition. “They don’t know what she has,” her mother, Barbara, tells me through tears, “but it’s destroying her nerves and muscles, and none of the treatments they’ve given her are working. Before the vaccine, she was a perfectly healthy child, going for her brown belt in karate.” (They’re awaiting the results of the ALS test.)

Read moreCDC Takes Closer Look at Gardasil and Paralysis

IVF babies in health alert: Test-tube children 30 per cent more likely to have defects, warns watchdog

by


Couples are being warned an IVF pregnancy increases the risk of birth defects by up to 30 per cent

Couples having IVF treatment are to be warned for the first time that their children have a higher risk of genetic flaws and health problems.

Official guidance will make clear that test-tube babies could be up to 30 per cent more likely to suffer from certain birth defects.

The alert has been ordered by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, the Government’s watchdog on fertility issues.

It means that the one in six British couples estimated to be infertile will have to balance their desire for a child against concerns that IVF methods could lead to life-threatening defects or long-term disabilities.

Read moreIVF babies in health alert: Test-tube children 30 per cent more likely to have defects, warns watchdog

Pictures of ‘liquid water’ increase possibility of life on Mars

by


Droplets on a leg of the Mars Phoenix Lander which scientists believe are made of water (NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona/Max Planck Institute)

Pictures beamed back from Mars appear to provide the first photographic evidence of water existing in its liquid state on the planet.

Shots of Nasa’s Mars Phoenix Lander’s leg struts appear to show droplets of water forming and then vanishing as if they have dripped on to the ground.

The find, if confirmed, has important implications for the chances of there being life forms, however small or primitive, on Mars.

Related article: Phoenix Lander sees snow falling on Mars

Professor Nilton Renno, of the University of Michigan, is convinced the photographs show water droplets forming. It had previously been thought that Mars was so cold and the atmospheric pressure so low that water would exist only as ice or vapour.

Professor Renno led analysis that suggested the water droplets may have been prevented from freezing because they had absorbed salty chemicals which act as anti-freeze.

Tests carried out by the Mars Phoenix Lander uncovered the presence of perchlorate salts, probably including magnesium and calcium perchlorate hydrates, which freeze at minus 68C and minus 77C.

Read morePictures of ‘liquid water’ increase possibility of life on Mars

Military Laser Hits Battlefield Strength

by

Huge news for real-life ray guns: Electric lasers have hit battlefield strength for the first time — paving the way for energy weapons to go to war.

In recent test-blasts, Pentagon-researchers at Northrop Grumman managed to get its 105 kilowatts of power out of their laser — past the “100kW threshold [that] has been viewed traditionally as a proof of principle for ‘weapons grade’ power levels for high-energy lasers,” Northrop’s vice president of directed energy systems, Dan Wildt, said in a statement.

That much power won’t get you a Star Wars-style blaster. But it should be more than enough to zap the mortars and rockets that insurgents have used to pound American bases in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The battlefield-strength breakthrough is just one part in a larger military push to finally make laser weapons a reality, after decades of unfulfilled promises. The Army recently gave Boeing a $36 million contract to build a laser-equipped truck. Raytheon is set to start test-firing a mortar-zapper of its own. Darpa is funding a 150 kilowatt laser project that is meant to be fitted onto “tactical aircraft.”

Read moreMilitary Laser Hits Battlefield Strength

A Silenced Drug Study Creates An Uproar

by

The study would come to be called “cursed,” but it started out just as Study 15.

It was a long-term trial of the antipsychotic drug Seroquel. The common wisdom in psychiatric circles was that newer drugs were far better than older drugs, but Study 15’s results suggested otherwise.

As a result, newly unearthed documents show, Study 15 suffered the same fate as many industry-sponsored trials that yield data drugmakers don’t like: It got buried. It took eight years before a taxpayer-funded study rediscovered what Study 15 had found — and raised serious concerns about an entire new class of expensive drugs.

Study 15 was silenced in 1997, the same year Seroquel was approved by the Food and Drug Administration to treat schizophrenia. The drug went on to be prescribed to hundreds of thousands of patients around the world and has earned billions for London-based AstraZeneca International — including nearly $12 billion in the past three years.

The results of Study 15 were never published or shared with doctors, even as less rigorous studies that came up with positive results for Seroquel were published and used in marketing campaigns aimed at physicians and in television ads aimed at consumers. The results of Study 15 were provided only to the Food and Drug Administration — and the agency has strenuously maintained that it does not have the authority to place such studies in the public domain.

Read moreA Silenced Drug Study Creates An Uproar

Star Wars scientists use laser gun to kill mosquitoes in fight against malaria

by

Scientists who worked the Star Wars anti-missile programme in the United States are building a ray-gun than can kill mosquitoes in a bid to tackle the scourge of malaria.


Insect-killing lasers could fight the spread of malaria Photo: AFP

Experts behind the 1980s missile shield idea have helped to develop a laser that locks onto and kills airborne insects.

It is thought the device, dubbed the ‘Weapon of Mosquito Destruction’ (WMD), could be used against mosquitoes, which kill almost one million people around the world every year by spreading malaria.

The research in Seattle, reported in the Wall Street Journal, has been funded by Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates through his charitable foundation.

The WMD laser works by detecting the audio frequency created by the beating of mosquito wings. A computer triggers the laser beam which burns the wings off the mosquito and kills it.

Among those working on the research project are astrophysicists Dr Lowell Wood and Dr Jordin Kare who both worked on the original Star Wars plan to shield America from nuclear attack.

Dr Kare said: “We like to think back then we made some contribution to the ending of the cold war. Now we’re just trying to make a dent in a war that’s actually gone on a lot longer and claimed a lot more lives.”

Read moreStar Wars scientists use laser gun to kill mosquitoes in fight against malaria

Lasers to create mini sun in hunt for clean energy

by

However, the NIF experiment is not without controversy. The Californian facility’s primary purpose is to allow munitions to be tested without a radioactive fallout, which would contravene the nuclear test ban treaty.

Critics fear the US military is using the NIF complex to develop a new generation of advanced nuclear weapons, although a spokesman for the facility denied this.

Physicists hope to develop the first form of nuclear fusion technology by firing laser beams at a pellet of hydrogen

SCIENTISTS are to use the world’s most powerful laser system to replicate the fiery core of the sun in experiments that may ultimately offer humanity a clean source of energy.

After more than 50 years of experimentation, physicists are hoping to develop the first form of nuclear fusion technology that produces more energy than it consumes.

Within the next fortnight, researchers at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) in California will fire 192 separate laser beams capable of generating 500 trillion watts – 1,000 times the power of the US national grid – for a fraction of a second.

The energy pulse will be concentrated on a tiny pellet of hydrogen in an attempt to mimic the reactions that take place inside the sun.

The scientists hope to refine the process over the next year until they trigger a nuclear reaction capable of producing large amounts of energy.

Read moreLasers to create mini sun in hunt for clean energy

Nobody listens to the real climate change experts

by

The minds of world leaders are firmly shut to anything but the fantasies of the scaremongers.


Cold comfort: If the present trend continues, the world will be 1.1C cooler in 2100 Photo: Getty

Considering how the fear of global warming is inspiring the world’s politicians to put forward the most costly and economically damaging package of measures ever imposed on mankind, it is obviously important that we can trust the basis on which all this is being proposed. Last week two international conferences addressed this issue and the contrast between them could not have been starker.

Read moreNobody listens to the real climate change experts

A New Low in Drug Research: 21 Fabricated Studies

by

We’ve followed plenty of controversies around drug trials, from ghostwriting to keeping quiet about unflattering results. But the latest news is particularly eye-popping: A prominent Massachusetts anesthesiologist allegedly fabricated 21 medical studies involving major drugs. Yikes.

Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., has asked several anesthesiology journals to retract the studies, which appeared between 1996 and 2008, the WSJ reports. The hospital says its former chief of acute pain, Scott S. Reuben, faked data used in the studies.

Some of the studies reported favorable results from use of Pfizer’s Bextra and Merck’s Vioxx, both painkillers that have since been pulled from the market. Others offered good news about Pfizer’s pain drugs Lyrica and Celebrex and Wyeth’s antidepressant Effexor XR. Doctors said Reuben’s work was particularly influential in pain treatment and that they were shocked by the news.

“We are left with a large hole in our understanding of this field,” Steven Shafer, editor-in-chief of Anesthesia and Analgesia, told Anesthesiology News, which first reported on the retractions. “There are substantial tendrils from this body of work that reach throughout the discipline of postoperative pain management.”

Pfizer had funded some of Reuben’s research and had also paid him to speak on behalf of its medicines. “It is very disappointing to learn about Dr. Scott Reuben’s alleged actions,” Pfizer said in a statement to WSJ. “When we decided to support Dr. Reuben’s research, he worked for a credible academic medical center and appeared to be a reputable investigator.”

Read moreA New Low in Drug Research: 21 Fabricated Studies

Scientists develop battery that can be charged in just 10 seconds

by

Thing of the past? The new mobile phone batteries will be recharged in just 10 seconds

A revolutionary mobile phone battery that recharges in 10 seconds instead of several hours has been created by scientists.

The new device charges 100 times as fast as a conventional battery and could also be used in phones, laptops, iPods and digital cameras within just two or three years, they say.

The same technology could even allow an electric car to be charged up in the same time that it takes to fill a conventional car with petrol – removing one of the biggest obstacles to green, clean motoring.

The quick-charge battery is the brainchild of engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The MIT team say their invention uses materials already available to battery manufacturers and would be simple to mass produce.


The new battery could also work with rechargeable cars

The invention is based on conventional lithium ion rechargeable batteries found in most cameras, phones and portable computers.

Read moreScientists develop battery that can be charged in just 10 seconds

Czech leader joins meeting of climate change deniers

by
  • US convention aimed at escalating confrontation
  • Klaus to attack ‘arrogant, unscrupulous ideology’


Climate change is said to be threatening the future of species such as the polar bear. Photograph: Mathieu Belanger/Reuters

It is billed as the largest ever gathering of climate change deniers, a convention that kicked off last night with a title suggesting global warming is a thing of the past, and a guest list that includes a hurricane forecaster, a retired astronaut and a sitting European president.

Entitled Global Warming: Was It Ever Really a Crisis? and featuring some of the most prominent naysayers in the climate change debate, this week’s conference in New York sets out to escalate its confrontation with the scientific establishment, the vast majority of whose members subscribe to the view that humans are the principal cause of climate change.

More information:
 – Climate ‘denial’ is now a mental disorder (Telegraph)
– Japan’s boffins: Global warming isn’t man-made (The Register)
– Al Gore sued by over 30.000 Scientists for fraud (YouTube)
– World is getting colder: It’s the sun, not CO2, that’s to blame (Washington Times)
– Global warning: We are actually heading towards a new Ice Age, claim scientists (Daily Mail)
– Scientists find greenhouse gas hysteria to be myth (World Net Daily)
– 2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved (Telegraph)
– Army: Sun, Not Man, Is Causing Climate Change (Wired)
– World might be heading towards Ice Age (Economic Times)

Conference organisers were celebrating something of a coup in securing as a keynote speaker the Czech president, Václav Klaus, at a time when his country holds the rotating presidency of the EU. Klaus, a Eurosceptic, believes that efforts to protect the world from the impact of climate change are an assault on freedom.

In his remarks last night, Klaus accused European governments of being “alarmist” on the subject of climate change and in thrall to radical environmentalists.

“They probably do not want to reveal their true plans and ambitions to stop economic development and return mankind several centuries back,” he said.

Read moreCzech leader joins meeting of climate change deniers

Baxter: Product contaminated with live H5N1 avian flu virus

by

The company that released contaminated flu virus material from a plant in Austria confirmed Friday that the experimental product contained live H5N1 avian flu viruses.

And an official of the World Health Organization’s European operation said the body is closely monitoring the investigation into the events that took place at Baxter International’s research facility in Orth-Donau, Austria.

“At this juncture we are confident in saying that public health and occupational risk is minimal at present,” medical officer Roberta Andraghetti said from Copenhagen, Denmark.

“But what remains unanswered are the circumstances surrounding the incident in the Baxter facility in Orth-Donau.”

The contaminated product, a mix of H3N2 seasonal flu viruses and unlabelled H5N1 viruses, was supplied to an Austrian research company. The Austrian firm, Avir Green Hills Biotechnology, then sent portions of it to sub-contractors in the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Germany.

The contamination incident, which is being investigated by the four European countries, came to light when the subcontractor in the Czech Republic inoculated ferrets with the product and they died. Ferrets shouldn’t die from exposure to human H3N2 flu viruses.

Public health authorities concerned about what has been described as a “serious error” on Baxter’s part have assumed the death of the ferrets meant the H5N1 virus in the product was live. But the company, Baxter International Inc., has been parsimonious about the amount of information it has released about the event.

On Friday, the company’s director of global bioscience communications confirmed what scientists have suspected.

“It was live,” Christopher Bona said in an email.

The contaminated product, which Baxter calls “experimental virus material,” was made at the Orth-Donau research facility. Baxter makes its flu vaccine — including a human H5N1 vaccine for which a licence is expected shortly — at a facility in the Czech Republic.

Read moreBaxter: Product contaminated with live H5N1 avian flu virus

Oldest human footprints found in Kenya

by

The oldest human footprints – left more than 1.5 million years ago – have been discovered in northern Kenya.


A fossil footprint left by a human ancestor about 1.5 million years ago in Kenya has been discovered Photo: REUTERS

Two sets of prints left by Homo ergaster, an early ancestor of modern humans. were found in separate rock layers near Ileret.

Laser scanning revealed that feet have stayed much the same over 1.5 million years and the creature walked the same way as people do today.

Read moreOldest human footprints found in Kenya

Japan’s boffins: Global warming isn’t man-made

by

Climate science is ‘ancient astrology’, claims report

Japanese scientists have made a dramatic break with the UN and Western-backed hypothesis of climate change in a new report from its Energy Commission.

Three of the five researchers disagree with the UN’s IPCC view that recent warming is primarily the consequence of man-made industrial emissions of greenhouse gases. Remarkably, the subtle and nuanced language typical in such reports has been set aside.

One of the five contributors compares computer climate modelling to ancient astrology. Others castigate the paucity of the US ground temperature data set used to support the hypothesis, and declare that the unambiguous warming trend from the mid-part of the 20th Century has ceased.

The report by Japan Society of Energy and Resources (JSER) is astonishing rebuke to international pressure, and a vote of confidence in Japan’s native marine and astronomical research. Publicly-funded science in the West uniformly backs the hypothesis that industrial influence is primarily responsible for climate change, although fissures have appeared recently. Only one of the five top Japanese scientists commissioned here concurs with the man-made global warming hypothesis.

JSER is the academic society representing scientists from the energy and resource fields, and acts as a government advisory panel. The report appeared last month but has received curiously little attention. So The Register commissioned a translation of the document – the first to appear in the West in any form. Below you’ll find some of the key findings – but first, a summary.

Read moreJapan’s boffins: Global warming isn’t man-made

How to save new brain cells that are created every day of your life

by

Fresh neurons arise in the adult brain every day. New research suggests that the cells ultimately help with learning complex tasks—and the more they are challenged, the more they flourish

Recent work, albeit mostly in rats, indicates that learning enhances the survival of new neurons in the adult brain. And the more engaging and challenging the problem, the greater the number of neurons that stick around. These neurons are then presumably available to aid in situations that tax the mind. It seems, then, that a mental workout can buff up the brain, much as physical exercise builds up the body.

The findings may be particularly interesting to intellectual couch potatoes whose brains could benefit from a few cerebral sit-ups. More important, though, the results lend some support to the notion that people who are in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease or who have other forms of dementia might slow their cognitive decline by keeping their minds actively engaged.

It’s a New Neuron!

In the 1990s scientists rocked the field of neurobiology with the startling news that the mature mammalian brain is capable of sprouting new neurons. Biologists had long believed that this talent for neurogenesis was reserved for young, developing minds and was lost with age. But in the early part of the decade Elizabeth Gould, then at the Rockefeller University, demonstrated that new cells arise in the adult brain—particularly in a region called the hippocampus, which is involved in learning and memory. Similar reports soon followed in species from mice to marmosets, and by 1998 neuroscientists in the U.S. and Sweden had shown that neurogenesis also occurs in humans [see “New Nerve Cells for the Adult Brain,” by Gerd Kempermann and Fred H. Gage; Scientific American, May 1999].

In rodents, studies of neurogenesis generally involve injecting the animals with a drug called BrdU (bromodeoxyuridine), which marks newly formed cells, making them stand out when viewed under a microscope. Those studies indicate that in rats, between 5,000 and 10,000 new neurons arise in the hippocampus every day. (Although the human hippocampus also welcomes new neurons, we do not know how many.)

Read moreHow to save new brain cells that are created every day of your life

Toxic cabin air found in new plane study

by

“Scientists, former pilots and aviation pressure groups have accused the industry of knowing about the problem for decades and doing little to tackle it. But reports linking exposure to contaminated air with long-term harm to health have led to an increase in passengers and crew seeking redress, according to lawyers in the United States.”

Samples taken secretly from the planes of popular airlines have raised fresh concerns over passengers inhaling contaminated air.


Hundreds of incidents of contaminated air have been reported by British pilots Photo: GETTY

Fresh concerns about whether passengers could be inhaling contaminated air on aircraft have resurfaced, after undercover investigators claimed to have found high levels of a dangerous toxin on board several planes.

As part of an investigation by a German television network, ARD, and Schweizer Fernsehen (Swiss television), 31 swab samples were taken secretly last month from the aircraft cabins of popular airlines.

These were analysed in laboratories at the University of British Columbia, under the supervision of Prof Christian van Netten, a leading toxicologist.

Twenty-eight were found to contain high levels of tricresyl phosphate (TCP), an organophosphate contained in modern jet oil as an antiwear additive, which can lead to drowsiness, headaches, respiratory problems or neurological illnesses.

Scientists refer to the condition as Aerotoxic Syndrome. Dr Mackenzie Ross, a clinical neuropsychologist at University College London, says the illness may be affecting up to 200,000 passengers each year.

Read moreToxic cabin air found in new plane study

Flu may not have killed most in 1918 pandemic

by


An emergency hospital at Camp Funston, Kansas, for soldiers sickened by the 1918 flu.
REUTERS/National Museum of Health and Medicine/Armed Forces Institute of Pathology/Handout

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Strep infections and not the flu virus itself may have killed most people during the 1918 influenza pandemic, which suggests some of the most dire predictions about a new pandemic may be exaggerated, U.S. researchers said on Thursday.

The findings suggest that amassing antibiotics to fight bacterial infections may be at least as important as stockpiling antiviral drugs to battle flu, they said.

Keith Klugman of Emory University in Atlanta and colleagues looked at what information is available about the 1918 flu pandemic, which killed anywhere between 50 million and 100 million people globally in the space of about 18 months.

Some research has shown that on average it took a week to 11 days for people to die — which fits in more with the known pattern of a bacterial infection than a viral infection, Klugman’s group wrote in a letter to the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases.

Read moreFlu may not have killed most in 1918 pandemic

Vitamin D is ray of sunshine for multiple sclerosis patients

by

An MRI scan of the brain of a multiple sclerosis sufferer

Multiple sclerosis could be prevented through daily vitamin D supplements, scientists told The Times last night.

The first causal link has been established between the “sunshine vitamin” and a gene that increases the risk of MS, raising the possibility that the debilitating auto-immune disease could be eradicated.

George Ebers, Professor of Clinical Neurology at the University of Oxford, claimed that there was hard evidence directly relating both genes and the environment to the origins of MS.

His work suggests that vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy and childhood may increase the risk of a child developing the disease.

He has also established the possibility that genetic vulnerability to MS, apparently initiated by lack of vitamin D, may be passed through families.

These risks might plausibly be reduced by giving vitamin D supplements to pregnant woman and young children.

“I think it offers the potential for treatment which might prevent MS in the future,” Professor Ebers said.

“Our research has married two key pieces of the puzzle. The interaction of vitamin D with the gene is very specific and it seems most unlikely to be a coincidence of any kind.”

Warnings over sun exposure could now also be called into question – sunlight allows the body to produce the vitamin.

Read moreVitamin D is ray of sunshine for multiple sclerosis patients

Scientists: 40,000 planets could be home to aliens

by

And Jesus probably has to show up on all of them. Being God’s only begotten son must be a very busy job. No wonder he can’t make it back anytime soon.

From the perspective of an advanced civilization human beings on planet earth look more like a deadly plague, than like the crowning achievement of creation.

Up to 40,000 planets could support alien life forms, scientists at the University of Edinburgh believe.


40,000 planets could be home to aliens Photo: GETTY

Researchers have calculated that up to 37,964 worlds in our galaxy are hospitable enough to be home to creatures at least as intelligent as ourselves.

Related article:
UFOs: database of police sightings of records 310 incidents in six years (Telegraph)

Astrophysicist Duncan Forgan created a computer programme that collated all the data on the 330 or so planets known to man and worked out what proportion would have conditions suitable for life.

The estimate, which took into account factors such as temperature and availability of water and minerals, was then extrapolated across the Milky Way.

Mr Forgan believes that the life forms would not be amoeba wriggling on the end of a microscope but species at least as advanced as humans.

Read moreScientists: 40,000 planets could be home to aliens

World is getting colder: It’s the sun, not CO2, that’s to blame

by

David J. Bellamy is a professor at three British universities and an officer in several conservation organizations. Mark Duchamp, a retired businessman, has investigated global- warming theory and written more than 100 articles.

After the wet and cold centuries of the Little Ice Age (around 1550-1850 A.D.), the world’s climate recuperated some warmth, but did not replicate the balmy period known as the Middle Age Warm Period (around 800-1300 A.D.), when the margins of Greenland were green and England had vineyards.

Climate began to cool again after World War II, for about 30 years. This is undisputed. The cooling occurred at a time when emissions of C02 were rising sharply from the reconstruction effort and from unprecedented development. It is important to realize that.

Related article: BBC abandons ‘impartiality’ on warming (Telegraph):
Again and again the BBC has been eager to promote every new scare raised by the advocates of man-made global warming. As late as August 28 this year it was still predicting that Arctic ice might soon disappear, just as this winter’ s refreezing was about to take ice-cover back to a point it was at 30 years ago.

By 1978 it had started to warm again, to everybody’s relief. But two decades later, after the temperature peaked in 1998 under the influence of El Nino, climate stopped warming for eight years; and in 2007 entered a cooling phase marked by lower solar radiation and a reversal of the cycles of warm ocean temperature in the Atlantic and the Pacific. And here again, it is important to note that this new cooling period is occurring concurrently with an acceleration in CO2 emissions, caused by the emergence of two industrial giants: China and India.

To anyone analyzing this data with common sense, it is obvious that factors other than CO2 emissions are ruling the climate. And the same applies to other periods of the planet’s history. Al Gore, in his famous movie “The Inconvenient Truth,” had simply omitted to say that for the past 420,000 years that he cited as an example, rises in CO2 levels in the atmosphere always followed increases in global temperature by at least 800 years. It means that CO2 can’t possibly be the cause of the warming cycles.

So, if it’s not CO2, what is it that makes the world’s temperature periodically rise and fall? The obvious answer is the sun, and sea currents in a subsidiary manner.

Read moreWorld is getting colder: It’s the sun, not CO2, that’s to blame