March 18, 2008, 8:23 PM CT

Arctic sea ice still at risk despite cold winter

Using the latest satellite observations, NASA scientists and others report that the Arctic is still on thin ice when it comes to the condition of sea ice cover in the region. A colder-than-average winter in some regions of the Arctic this year has yielded an increase in the area of new sea ice, while the older sea ice that lasts for several years has continued to decline.

On March 18 the researchers said they think that the increased area of sea ice this winter is due to recent weather conditions, while the decline in perennial ice reflects the longer-term warming climate trend and is a result of increased melting during summer and greater movement of the older ice out of the Arctic.

Perennial sea ice is the long-lived, year-round layer of ice that remains even when the surrounding short-lived seasonal sea ice melts away in summer to its minimum extent. It is this perennial sea ice, left over from the summer melt period, that has been rapidly declining from year to year, and that has gained the attention and research focus of scientists. As per NASA-processed microwave data, whereaccording toennial ice used to cover 50-60 percent of the Arctic, this year it covers less than 30 percent. Very old ice that remains in the Arctic for at least six years comprised over 20 percent of the Arctic area in the mid to late 1980s, but this winter it decreased to just six percent......... Posted by: Tyler      Read more         Source

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 01:54:13 GMT

Guizotia abyssinica

Fifth in a series celebrating UBC Research Week, again organized by Connor Fitzpatrick:

Scott Black, a Dept. of Botany M.Sc. student supervised by Dr. Gary Bradfield, and Hannes Dempewolf, a Ph.D. student co-supervised by Dr. Quentin Cronk and Dr. Loren Rieseberg, are researching the crop species noug, Guizotia abyssinica. Scott provided the photograph and Hannes adapted the write-up from this brochure on noug (PDF) that he co-authored (published by the Global Facilitation Unit for Underutilized Species).

What is noug?

Noug is an oil-seed crop, indigenous to Ethiopia and holds significant promise for improving rural livelihoods in Sub-Saharan Africa. The species is used in intercropping systems, grows on poor but also extremely wet soils, and contributes to soil conservation. While not fully domesticated, and suffering from low yields and susceptibility to insect herbivores, it contributes up to 50% of the Ethiopian oil-seed crop. Noug belongs to the Compositae family and is closely related to sunflower. It differs from domesticated sunflower mainly due to its high level of branching, numerous flower heads and small seeds. The oil content of noug seed varies from 30 to 50%. The fatty acid composition is typical for seed oils of the Compositae family with linoleic acid being the dominant component.

Ethiopia is well known as centre of diversity for several crops, including teff, enset and Ethiopian mustard. As a result, it has been suggested as Africa''s independent origin of domestication. Noug diversity is greatest in Ethiopia and Eritrea and local farmers are able to distinguish many different land-races. The process of noug domestication is incomplete, probably due to frequent interbreeding with its co-occurring wild relatives. Apart from Africa (Ethiopia, Sudan, Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Tanzania, Malawi, Zimbabwe), noug is also cultivated in parts of South Asia (India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan) where it was introduced several thousand years ago, and the West Indies.

The Rieseberg lab at UBC''s Department of Botany is at the centre of an international collaborative research effort that has been launched in order to understand and manage the genetic diversity of noug for its improvement. The challenge of the project (2007-2010) is to show how modern molecular breeding efforts can be adapted and implemented for neglected and underutilized species, such as noug, through research on their diversity. This approach is especially powerful when conducted in the context of genomic information and tools that have already been developed for related major crops, in this case sunflower and lettuce.

This requires:

• collection, characterization and conservation of ecologically and genetically diverse germplasm
• initiation or re-orientation of existing breeding and crop deployment programs to capitalize on this diversity
• transfer of knowledge and technology to breeders and farmers in Ethiopia

With funds from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), scientists from UBC''s Department of Botany in collaboration with researchers from Addis Ababa University, the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research and Bioversity International have initiated this project last year and have already completed several components, such as the collection and characterization of several noug cultivars in Ethiopia. Currently, scientists are working in the laboratory to assess the genetic diversity and population structure of noug and its wild relatives. Posted by: Daniel Mosquin      Read more     Source

March 11, 2008, 10:54 PM CT

Climate change and transportation

While every mode of transportation in the U.S. will be affected as the climate changes, potentially the greatest impact on transportation systems will be flooding of roads, railways, transit systems, and airport runways in coastal areas because of rising sea levels and surges brought on by more intense storms, says a new report from the National Research Council. Though the impacts of climate change will vary by region, it is certain they will be widespread and costly in human and economic terms, and will require significant changes in the planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of transportation systems.

The U.S. transportation system was designed and built for local weather and climate conditions, predicated on historical temperature and precipitation data. The report finds that climate predictions used by transportation planners and engineers may no longer be reliable, however, in the face of new weather and climate extremes. Infrastructure pushed beyond the range for which it was designed can become stressed and fail, as seen with loss of the U.S. 90 Bridge in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

"The time has come for transportation professionals to acknowledge and confront the challenges posed by climate change, and to incorporate the most current scientific knowledge into the planning of transportation systems," said Henry Schwartz Jr., past president and chairman of Svedrup/Jacobs Civil Inc., and chair of the committee that wrote the report. "It is now possible to project climate changes for large subcontinental regions, such as the Eastern United States, a scale better suited for considering regional and local transportation infrastructure." ......... Posted by: Tyler      Read more         Source

March 11, 2008, 5:35 AM CT

China's Carbon Dioxide Emissions

The growth in China's carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions is far outpacing prior estimates, making the goal of stabilizing atmospheric greenhouse gases much more difficult, as per a new analysis by economists at the University of California, Berkeley, and UC San Diego.

Prior estimates, including those used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, say the region that includes China will see a 2.5 to 5 percent annual increase in CO2 emissions, the largest contributor to atmospheric greenhouse gases, between 2004 and 2010. The new UC analysis puts that annual growth rate for China to at least 11 percent for the same time period.

The study is scheduled for print publication in the recent issue of the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, but is now online.

The researchers' most conservative forecast predicts that by 2010, there will be an increase of 600 million metric tons of carbon emissions in China over the country's levels in 2000. This growth from China alone would dramatically overshadow the 116 million metric tons of carbon emissions reductions pledged by all the developed countries in the Kyoto Protocol. (The protocol was never ratified in the United States, which was the largest single emitter of carbon dioxide until 2006, when China took over that distinction, as per numerous reports.)......... Posted by: Tyler      Read more         Source

March 11, 2008, 5:00 AM CT

US stands to lose a generation of young researchers

Five consecutive years of flat funding the budget of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is deterring promising young scientists and threatening the future of Americans health, a group of seven preeminent academic research institutions warned today. In a new report released here, the group of concerned institutions (six research universities and a major teaching hospital) described the toll that cumulative stagnant NIH funding is taking on the American medical research enterprise. And the leading institutions warned that if NIH does not get consistent and robust support in the future, the nation will lose a generation of young researchers to other careers and other countries and, with them, a generation of promising research that could cure disease for millions for whom no cure currently exists.

The report, A Broken Pipeline" Flat Funding of the NIH Puts a Generation of Science at Risk, was co-authored by Brown University, Duke University, Harvard University, The Ohio State University, Partners Healthcare, the University of California Los Angeles, and Vanderbilt University.

It profiles 12 junior scientists from institutions across the country who, despite their exceptional qualifications and noteworthy research, attest to the funding difficulties that they and their professional peers are experiencing. These scientists are devising new ways to manipulate stem cells to repair the heart, revealing critical pathways involved in cancer and brain diseases, and using new technologies to diagnose and treat kidney disease......... Posted by: Kevin      Read more         Source

March 9, 2008, 4:45 PM CT

GLAST Spacecraft Arrives in Florida

NASA's Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope, or GLAST, arrived Tuesday at the Astrotech payload processing facility near the Kennedy Space Center to begin final preparations for launch. Liftoff of GLAST aboard a Delta II rocket is currently targeted for 11:45 a.m. EDT on May 16.

GLAST is a collaborative mission with the U.S. Department of Energy, international partners from France, Gera number of, Italy, Japan and Sweden, and numerous academic institutions from the U.S. and abroad. The spacecraft will explore the most extreme environments in the universe, and answer questions about supermassive black hole systems, pulsars and the origin of cosmic rays. It also will study the mystery of powerful explosions known as gamma-ray bursts.

The milestones to be accomplished over the next two months include attaching the Ku-band communications antenna and the two sets of solar arrays, a complete checkout of GLAST's scientific instruments, installing the spacecraft's battery, and loading aboard the observatory's propellant. These activities will be performed by General Dynamics, builder of the spacecraft for NASA. GLAST currently is scheduled to be transported to Pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on May 1.

The rocket that will launch GLAST is a Delta II 7920-H, manufactured and prepared for launch by United Launch Alliance. It is a heavier-lift model of the standard Delta II that uses larger solid rocket boosters. The first stage is scheduled to be erected on Pad 17-B the week of March 17......... Posted by: Brooke      Read more         Source

March 9, 2008, 4:43 PM CT

Canadian astronomers on hunt for meteor

Astronomers from The University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, have captured rare video of a meteor falling to Earth.

The Physics and Astronomy Department at Western has a network of all-sky cameras in Southern Ontario that scan the sky monitoring for meteors. Associate Professor Peter Brown, who specializes in the study of meteors and meteorites, says that Wednesday evening (March 5) at 10:59 p.m. EST these cameras captured video of a large fireball and the department has also received many calls and emails from people who actually saw the light.

Brown along with Wayne Edwards, a post doctorate student, hope to enlist the help of local residents in recovering one or more possible meteorites that may have crashed in the Parry Sound area.

Most meteoroids burn up by the time they hit an altitude of 60 or 70 kilometres from Earth, says Edwards. We tracked this one to an altitude of about 24 kilometres so we are pretty sure there are at least one, and possibly a number of meteorites, that made it to the ground.

Edwards says the lab can narrow the ground location where the meteorite would have fallen, to about 12 square kilometres and have created a map that may assist in locating the meteorite. The rock, or rocks, would probably weigh a kilogram or slightly more......... Posted by: Brooke      Read more         Source

March 9, 2008, 4:25 PM CT

Controversial shoulder surgery effective long-term

Young, athletic, first-time shoulder dislocation patients benefit from arthroscopic surgery long term, as per a research studyreleased recently at the 2008 American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine Specialty Day at The Moscone Center. The study observed that for highly active patients, surgery, rather than conservative methods, yielded excellent results.

In young, active patients, there were statistics as high as 92 percent that they would dislocate their shoulder again when conservative approaches like rest and immobilization in a sling were used, says Robert A. Arciero, MD, of the Keller Army Hospital in West Point, NY. If we had an operation with a 90 percent failure rate, we would abandon the procedure. My thought was, why should we embrace a therapy with such a high failure rate".

Beginning in 1993, Dr. Arciero began performing arthroscopic surgery on young military cadets who suffered their first shoulder dislocation. The short-term results were excellent. The unknown, however, was how these patients would fare over the years.

We decided to examine these patients long-term results, says Major Brett Owens, MD, of Williams Beaumont Army Medical Center in El Paso, Texas. We observed that these patients maintained their health and active lifestyle. Surgery for this group of patients was durable and provided excellent shoulder function and a high activity level even after 10 years......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

March 9, 2008, 1:10 PM CT

Drosophila drug screen for fragile X syndrome

Researchers using a new drug screening method in Drosophila (fruit flies), have identified several drugs and small molecules that reverse the features of fragile X syndrome -- a frequent form of mental retardation and one of the leading known causes of autism. The discovery sets the stage for developing new therapys for fragile X syndrome.

The results of the research by lead scientist Stephen Warren, PhD, chair of the Department of Human Genetics at Emory University School of Medicine, are published online in the journal Nature Chemical Biology.

Dr. Warren led an international group of researchers that discovered the FMR1 gene responsible for fragile X syndrome in 1991. Fragile X syndrome is caused by the functional loss of the fragile X mental retardation protein (FMRP). Currently there is no effective drug treatment for fragile X syndrome, and previously no assays had been developed to screen drug candidates for the disorder.

During the past 17 years, intense efforts from a number of laboratories have uncovered the fundamental basis for fragile X syndrome. Researchers believe FMRP affects learning and memory through regulation of protein synthesis at synapses in the brain. One leading view, proposed by Dr. Warren and his colleagues, suggests that over stimulation of neurons by the neurotransmitter glutamate is partly responsible for the brain dysfunction resulting from the loss of FMRP......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

March 5, 2008, 8:04 PM CT

Quest For Fusion Energy

Physicists at MIT and the University of Rochester have devised a new way to take "snapshots" of the high-energy, high-temperature reactions seen as key to achieving the long-held dream of controlled nuclear fusion.

The work, which is published in the Feb. 28 issue of Science, could one day help researchers harness nuclear fusion as an energy source. It could also shed light on basic questions about the physics of stars.

Nuclear fusion--the process by which atomic particles clump together to form a heavier nucleus--releases an enormous amount of energy (roughly one million times that of a chemical reaction). When nuclear fusion occurs in an uncontrolled chain reaction, it can result in a thermonuclear blast--such as the one generated by hydrogen bombs.

Achieving controlled nuclear fusion, which could be a safe and reliable source of nearly limitless energy, is one of the "holy grails" of high-energy-density physics, as per Richard Petrasso, senior research scientist at MIT's Plasma Science and Fusion Center and an author of the Science paper.

For decades, researchers at MIT and elsewhere have been working toward that goal by setting off miniature implosions that recreate the high temperatures and densities found in stars.

One way physicists create the implosions is by bombarding tiny pellets of hydrogen fuel with lasers. Inside the pellet, the compressed gas reaches about 100 million degrees, or about seven times hotter than the center of the sun. Under certain conditions, the gas's density can reach 1,000 grams per cubic centimeter (50 times the density of gold)......... Posted by: Kevin      Read more         Source