Good morning all,
I'm so glad it's not morning here...I'm about to go to bed. I would like to point out just one article before I get there though. The article is the one about Baskin Robbins offer of 31 cent Ice Cream on the 30th of April. This is in honor of our nation's Fire Fighters. I wanted to bring it to your attention so that if there is a Baskin Robbins nearby you, you could get in on the icecream, AND support a good cause. :)
Anyway, here are the top articles for today. I hope you enjoy them! I'll see you tomorrow. :)
Today's Top 5:
1. China Rescues 167 Children from Slavery (Yahoo News)
2. Scientists Identify 14 New Species in Brazil (Times Online UK)
3. Tiny Chess Set Built Between Heartbeats (Times Online UK)
4. City to Try Using Mushrooms to Clean up Dioxin-laden Site. (San Fransisco Chronicles)
5. 31 Cent Ice Cream to Honor Nation's Firefighters! (firehouse.com)
Honorable Mentions:
1. Human Protein May Offer Novel Target for Blocking HIV Infection: Successful In Lab (Science Daily)
2. Floyd Inflatable Pig is Recovered (BBC)
3. Microsoft Device Helps Police Pluck Evidence from Cyberscene of Crime (Seattle Times)
4. New Solar Energy System Makes it Possible to Produce Wholesale Electricity at a Cost Competitive with Fossil Fuels (Earth Times) 5.
Today's Top 5:
1. China Rescues 167 Children from Slavery http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080430/wl_nm/china_slavery_dc;_ylt=Aj1IFxyDttsabZU.WK4dwlxn.3QAWed Apr 30, 1:08 AM ET BEIJING (Reuters) -
Chinese police have rescued 167 village children sold to work as slave laborers in a city in the booming southern province of Guangdong, newspapers said on Wednesday. The children, all from the ethnic Yi minority, came from poor families in the Liangshan region of the southwestern province of Sichuan more than 1,000 km (600 miles away).
"In all, 167 child laborers have been rescued so far, 107 boys and 60 girls," the Hong Kong-based Wen Wei Po paper said.
The China Daily said there had been several arrests and printed a picture of one young girl crying after being rescued from a factory in Dongguan, an industrial city in the Pearl River Delta between Hong Kong and the provincial capital, Guangzhou.
China announced a nationwide crackdown on slavery and child labor last year after reports that hundreds of poor farmers, children and mentally disabled people were forced to work in kilns and mines in Shanxi province and neighboring Henan.
(Reporting by Beijing newsroom; Editing by Nick Macfie and Alex Richardson)
2. Scientists Identify 14 New Species in Brazil
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3843133.ece#cid=OTC-RSS&attr=797093
Lewis Smith, Environment Reporter
A picture gallery of some of the new species is located at:
http://www.conservation.org/fmg/pages/galleryplayer.aspx?galleryid=29
A legless lizard and a miniature woodpecker are among 14 species new to science discovered in a remote region of Brazil. The animals were identified during an expedition to the Cerrado, an area of wooded grassland rated among the world’s top 50 homes for wildlife.
Scientists found that the new lizard, from the Bachia genus, was perfectly adapted to its surroundings, being able to slither, snake-like across the sandy soil. The expedition carried out by Conservation International in partnership with researchers from Brazilian universities also found eight previously unknown species of fish, two reptiles, a horned toad and a fat-tailed mouse oppossum.
All were located in and around the 716,000-hectare (1.77 million-acre) Serra Geral do Tocantins Ecological Station. The woodpecker had a striking red head and at about 12cm long is one of the smallest in the world.
Dr Nogueira described the discovery of new species as better than finding buried treasure. He said it was likely that there were more new species in the region but habitat was being destroyed so fast that they could become extinct before being identified. “The area we were looking in is large and it is likely there are other unknown species, especially fish — they are a very diverse group — and reptiles.”
Several species of animal known to be struggling for survival were identified in the area including the hyacinth macaw. Other endangered creatures spotted were marsh deer, the three-banded armadillo, the Brazilian merganser, and the dwarf tinamou. Overall, scientists identified 440 species in 29 days tramping through the region.
“It’s very exciting to find new species,” said Cristiano Nogueira, a biologist with Conservation International who led the expedition. “We gathered valuable data on the richness, abundance, and distribution of wildlife in one of the most extensive, complex, and unknown regions of the Cerrado.
“Protected areas such as the Ecological Station are home to some of the last remaining healthy ecosystems in a region increasingly threatened by urban growth and mechanized agriculture.” Researchers taking part in the project are convinced the 14 new species have never been described.
3. Tiny Chess Set Built Between Heartbeats
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/games_and_puzzles/chess/article3842965.ece April 30, 2008
TYUMEN A microscopic chess set no bigger than a match head could be the smallest board game in the world. The board is 3.5 mm by 2.5 mm and the gold and silver pieces are 0.15 mm and 0.3 mm high.
The set is one of the most remarkable works of the Russian micro-miniaturist Vladimir Aniskin, who has spent a decade perfecting his craft. He uses powerful microscopes and equipment that he designed himself and says that he must work between his heartbeats to create the tiny pieces.
“While working I hold my creation in my fingers,” he said. “Even one’s heartbeat disturbs such minute work, so particularly delicate work has to be done between heartbeats.”
The chess took six months to complete and he has about another 40 works to his name. His first was a grain of rice inscribed with 2,027 letters. “The rice grain took three months, camels in an eye of a needle took two months and camels in a horse hair also took two months,” he said. “Even with these simpler jobs it is still time-consuming.”
Mr Aniskin, 30, works at the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Science in Tyumen, specialising in developing microphobes for aerodynamic investigations.
4. City to Try Using Mushrooms to Clean up Dioxin-laden Site.Alternative is to bury soil, locally or 200 miles away
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/04/30/BA8C10CKCU.DTL
Annie Correal, New York Times
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
(04-30) 04:00 PDT Fort Bragg California -- On a warm April evening, 90 people crowded into the cafeteria of Redwood Elementary School to meet with representatives of the state Department of Toxic Substances Control.
The substance at issue was dioxin, which contaminates the site of a former lumber mill. And the method of cleanup being proposed was a novel one: mushrooms.
Mushrooms have been used to clean up oil spills, in a process called bioremediation, but they have not been used to treat dioxin.
"I am going to make a heretical suggestion," said Debra Scott, who works at a health food collective and has lived in the area for more than two decades, to whoops and cheers. "We could be the pilot study."
Fort Bragg is in Mendocino County, a stretch of coast famous for grand seascapes, organic wineries and trailblazing politics: The county was the first in the nation to legalize medical marijuana and to ban genetically modified crops and animals.
Fort Bragg changingFort Bragg, population 7,000, never fit in here. Home to the country's second-largest redwood mill for more than a century, it was a working man's town where the only wine tasting was at a row of smoky taverns. But change has come since the mill closed in 2002.
The town already has a Fair Trade coffee company and a raw food cooking school. The City Council is considering a ban on plastic grocery bags. And with the push for mushrooms, the town seems to have officially exchanged its grit for green.
The mill, owned by Georgia-Pacific, took up 420 acres, a space roughly half the size of Central Park in Manhattan, between downtown Fort Bragg and the Pacific Ocean. Among several toxic hot spots discovered here were five plots of soil with high levels of dioxin that Georgia-Pacific says were ash piles from 2001-2, when the mill burned wood from Bay Area landfills to create power and sell it to Pacific Gas & Electric.
Debate remains about how toxic dioxin is to humans, but the Department of Toxic Substances Control says there is no safe level of exposure.
Kimi Klein, a human health toxicologist with the department, said that although the dioxin on the mill site is not the most toxic dioxin out there, there is "very good evidence" that chronic exposure to dioxin causes cancer and "it is our policy to say if any chemical causes cancer there is no safe level."
Town could lose millionsFort Bragg must clean the dioxin-contaminated coastline this year or risk losing a $4.2 million grant from the California Coastal Conservancy for a coastal trail. Its options: haul the soil in a thousand truckloads to a landfill about 200 miles away, or bury it on site in a plastic-lined, 1.3-acre landfill.
Alarmed by the ultimatum, residents called in Paul E. Stamets, author of "Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World."
Typically, contaminated soil is hauled off, buried or burned. Using the mushroom method, Stamets said, it is put in plots, strewn with straw and left alone with mushroom spawn. The spawn release a fine, threadlike web called mycelium that secretes enzymes "like little Pac-Mans that break down molecular bonds," Stamets said. And presto: Toxins fall apart.
In January, Stamets came down from Fungi Perfecti, his mushroom farm in Olympia, Wash. He walked the 3-mile coastline at the site, winding around rocky coves on wind-swept bluffs where grass has grown over an airstrip but barely conceals the ash piles. It was "one of the most beautiful places in the world, hands down," he said.
Quick to caution against easy remedies - "I am not a panacea for all their problems" - he says he has hope for cleaning up dioxin and other hazardous substances on the site. "The less recalcitrant toxins could be broken down within 10 years."
At least two dioxin-degrading species of mushroom indigenous to the Northern California coast could work, he said: turkey tail and oyster mushrooms. Turkey tails have ruffled edges and are made into medicinal tea. Oyster mushrooms have domed tops and are frequently found in Asian food.
Mushroom fans see growthLocal mushroom enthusiasts envision the site as a global center for the study of bioremediation that could even export fungi to other polluted communities.
"Eventually, it could be covered in mushrooms," said Antonio Wuttke, who lives in neighboring Mendocino and describes his occupation as environmental landscape designer, over a cup of organic Sumatra at the Headlands Coffee House.
The proposal is not without critics, however.
"There still needs to be further testing on whether it works on dioxin," Edgardo R. Gillera, a hazardous substances scientist for the state Department of Toxic Substances Control, said. "There has only been a handful of tests, in labs and field studies on a much smaller scale. I need to see more studies on a larger scale to consider it a viable option."
On April 14, at a packed City Council meeting, an environmental consultant hired by the city voiced skepticism, citing a study finding that mushrooms reduced dioxins by only 50 percent. Jonathan Shepard, a soccer coach, stood up and asked: "Why 'only'? I think we should rephrase that. I think we should give thanks and praise to a merciful God that provided a mushroom that eats the worst possible toxin that man can create."
Jim Tarbell, an author and something of a sociologist of the Mendocino Coast, says the enthusiasm for bioremediation shows a change in the culture at large.
"We are trying to move from the extraction economy to the restoration economy," Tarbell said. "I think that's a choice that a broad cross-section of the country is going to have to look at."
At the meeting, Georgia-Pacific promised to finance a pilot project. Roger J. Hilarides, who manages cleanups for the company, offered the city at least one 10-cubic-yard bin of dioxin-laced soil and a five-year lease on the site's greenhouse and drying sheds for mushroom testing. And the City Council said it would approve the landfill but only if it came with bioremediation experiments.
So, sometime this year, Stamets is scheduled to begin testing a dump truck's load of dioxin-laced dirt in Fort Bragg.
"One bin. Ten cubic yards. That's a beginning," said Dave Turner, a council member. "I have hope - I wouldn't bet my house on it - but I have a hope we can bioremediate this."
5. 31 Cent Ice Cream to Honor Nation's Firefighters:Baskin-Robbins Stores Make Donation to Nationall Fallen Firefighters Foundation http://cms.firehouse.com/content/article/article.jsp?sectionId=46&id=59306
Posted: 04-29-2008
Updated: 04-29-2008 12:38:05
PMFirehouse.Com
NewsBaskin-Robbins
Firefighters across the nation will be visiting with citizens and residents at many of the Baskin-Robbins throughout country on April 30. Career and volunteer firefighters and paramedics and civilian members will participate in conjunction with the 31 Cent Scoop Night at Baskin-Robbins to help to honor America's firefighters. Participating Baskin-Robbins stores will reduce prices of small ice cream scoops to 31 cents on Wednesday, April 30, from 5 p.m. until 10 p.m.
This promotion will result in a donation of $100,000 by Baskin-Robbins to the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation. The National Fallen Firefighters Foundation remembers America's fallen heroes and assists their families. The NFFF organization provides firefighters with training to prevent deaths in the line of duty and offers the public information to prevent fires in our communities.
Baskin-Robbins has also selected 31 members of the fire service to honor as America's Firefighting Heroes. They were nominated for going above and beyond the call of duty. "These firefighters have helped save lives and guarantee the safety of our neighborhoods," according to the Baskin-Robbins Web site.
Honorable Mentions:
1. Human Protein May Offer Novel Target for Blocking HIV Infection: Successful In Lab
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080428175345.htmScienceDaily (Apr. 29, 2008)
A research group supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has uncovered a new route for attacking the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that may offer a way to circumvent problems with drug resistance. In findings published April 28 in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers report that they have blocked HIV infection in the test tube by inactivating a human protein expressed in key immune cells.
Most of the drugs now used to fight HIV, which is the retrovirus that causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), target the virus's own proteins. However, because HIV has a high rate of genetic mutation, those viral targets change quickly and lead to the emergence of drug-resistant viral strains. Doctors have tried to outmaneuver the rapidly mutating virus by prescribing multi-drug regimens or switching drugs. But such strategies can increase the risk of toxic side effects, be difficult for patients to follow and are not always successful. Recently, interest has grown in attacking HIV on a new front by developing drugs that target proteins of human cells, which are far less prone to mutations than are viral proteins.
In the new study, Pamela Schwartzberg, M.D., Ph.D., a senior investigator at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of NIH; Andrew J. Henderson, Ph.D., of Boston University; and their colleagues found that when they interfered with a human protein called interleukin-2-inducible T cell kinase (ITK) they inhibited HIV infection of key human immune cells, called T cells. ITK is a signaling protein that activates T cells as part of the body's healthy immune response.
"This new insight represents an important contribution to HIV research," said NHGRI Scientific Director Eric D. Green, M.D., Ph.D. "Finding a cellular target that can be inhibited so as to block HIV validates a novel concept and is an exciting model for deriving potential new HIV therapies."
When HIV enters the body, it infects T cells and takes over the activities of these white blood cells so that the virus can replicate. Eventually, HIV infection compromises the entire immune system and causes AIDS. The new work shows that without active ITK protein, HIV cannot effectively take advantage of many signaling pathways within T cells, which in turn slows or blocks the spread of the virus.
"We were pleased and excited to realize the outcome of our approach," Dr. Schwartzberg said. "Suppression of the ITK protein caused many of the pathways that HIV uses to be less active, thereby inhibiting or slowing HIV replication."
In their laboratory experiments, the researchers used a chemical inhibitor and a type of genetic inhibitor, called RNA interference, to inactivate ITK in human T cells. Then, the T cells were exposed to HIV, and the researchers studied the effects of ITK inactivation upon various stages of HIV's infection and replication cycle. Suppression of ITK reduced HIV's ability to enter T cells and have its genetic material transcribed into new virus particles. However, ITK suppression did not interfere significantly with T cells' normal ability to survive, and mice deficient in ITK were able to ward off other types of viral infection, although antiviral responses were delayed.
"ITK turns out to be a great target to examine," said Dr. Schwartzberg, noting that researchers had been concerned that blocking other human proteins involved in HIV replication might kill or otherwise impair the normal functions of T cells.
According to Dr. Schwartzberg, ITK already is being investigated as a therapeutic target for asthma and other diseases that affect immune response. In people with asthma, ITK is required to activate T cells, triggering lung inflammation and production of excess mucus.
"There are several companies who have published research about ITK inhibitors as part of their target program," Schwartzberg said. "We hope that others will extend our findings and that ITK inhibitors will be pursued as HIV therapies."
NHGRI researchers received support for this work from the NIH Intramural AIDS Targeted Antiviral Program. Chemical compounds used in the research were synthesized at the NIH Chemical Genomics Center, which was established through the NIH Roadmap for Medical Research and is administered by NHGRI. The Boston University group originally participated in the research while at Pennsylvania State University, where they received support from Penn State Tobacco Formula Funds, and where Dr. Henderson received support from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).
2. Floyd Inflatable Pig is Recovered
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7374994.stm
Page last updated at 12:31 GMT,
Wednesday, 30 April 2008 13:31 UK
A giant inflatable pig which floated away during a Roger Waters concert at the weekend has been recovered in tatters in California.
The pig, which measured the width of two buses, was found by two families on their driveways in La Quinta.
They will split the $10,000 (£5,090) reward offered by the Coachella music festival, from where the pig was lost.
The inflatable pig bore the image of a ticked ballot box for US presidential hopeful Barack Obama on its underbelly.
Prototype pig
The animal's flanks carried the slogans "fear builds walls" and "don't be led to the slaughter", with a cartoon of Uncle Sam holding two meat cleavers.
Former Pink Floyd star Waters said "that's my pig" as it drifted away during Sunday's gig.
The inflatable appeared at the Coachella festival in California Coachella spokeswoman Marcee Rondan said: "It wasn't really supposed to happen that way."
The pig was tethered to the ground with ropes and floated away as Waters was playing one of the versions of Pink Floyd song Pigs.
Pink Floyd had used inflatable pigs during their concerts in the past, and the lost animal was the same prototype as all the others, according to Ms Rondan.
The two families who found what was left of the inflatable have also decided to share four life tickets to the Coachella festival that were offered as part of the reward.
3. Microsoft Device Helps Police Pluck Evidence from Cyberscene of Crime
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/microsoft/2004379751_msftlaw29.html
April 30, 2008
By Benjamin J. Romano
Seattle Times technology reporter
Looking for answers on Microsoft's COFEE device Microsoft has developed a small plug-in device that investigators can use to quickly extract forensic data from computers that may have been used in crimes.
The COFEE, which stands for Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor, is a USB "thumb drive" that was quietly distributed to a handful of law-enforcement agencies last June. Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith described its use to the 350 law-enforcement experts attending a company conference Monday.
The device contains 150 commands that can dramatically cut the time it takes to gather digital evidence, which is becoming more important in real-world crime, as well as cybercrime. It can decrypt passwords and analyze a computer's Internet activity, as well as data stored in the computer.
It also eliminates the need to seize a computer itself, which typically involves disconnecting from a network, turning off the power and potentially losing data. Instead, the investigator can scan for evidence on site.
More than 2,000 officers in 15 countries, including Poland, the Philippines, Germany, New Zealand and the United States, are using the device, which Microsoft provides free.
"These are things that we invest substantial resources in, but not from the perspective of selling to make money," Smith said in an interview. "We're doing this to help ensure that the Internet stays safe."
Law-enforcement officials from agencies in 35 countries are in Redmond this week to talk about how technology can help fight crime. Microsoft held a similar event in 2006. Discussions there led to the creation of COFEE.
Smith compared the Internet of today to London and other Industrial Revolution cities in the early 1800s. As people flocked from small communities where everyone knew each other, an anonymity emerged in the cities and a rise in crime followed.
The social aspects of Web 2.0 are like "new digital cities," Smith said. Publishers, interested in creating huge audiences to sell advertising, let people participate anonymously.
That's allowing "criminals to infiltrate the community, become part of the conversation and persuade people to part with personal information," Smith said.
Children are particularly at risk to anonymous predators or those with false identities. "Criminals seek to win a child's confidence in cyberspace and meet in real space," Smith cautioned.
Expertise and technology like COFEE are needed to investigate cybercrime, and, increasingly, real-world crimes.
"So many of our crimes today, just as our lives, involve the Internet and other digital evidence," said Lisa Johnson, who heads the Special Assault Unit in the King County Prosecuting Attorney's Office.
A suspect's online activities can corroborate a crime or dispel an alibi, she said.
The 35 individual law-enforcement agencies in King County, for example, don't have the resources to investigate the explosion of digital evidence they seize, said Johnson, who attended the conference.
"They might even choose not to seize it because they don't know what to do with it," she said. "... We've kind of equated it to asking specific law-enforcement agencies to do their own DNA analysis. You can't possibly do that."
Johnson said the prosecutor's office, the Washington Attorney General's Office and Microsoft are working on a proposal to the Legislature to fund computer forensic crime labs.
Microsoft also got credit for other public-private partnerships around law enforcement.
Jean-Michel Louboutin, Interpol's executive director of police services, said only 10 of 50 African countries have dedicated cybercrime investigative units.
"The digital divide is no exaggeration," he told the conference. "Even in countries with dedicated cybercrime units, expertise is often too scarce."
He credited Microsoft for helping Interpol develop training materials and international databases used to prevent child abuse.
Smith acknowledged Microsoft's efforts are not purely altruistic. It benefits from selling collaboration software and other technology to law-enforcement agencies, just like everybody else, he said.
4. New Solar Energy System Makes it Possible to Produce Wholesale Electricity at a Cost Competitive with Fossil Fuels http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/new-solar-energy-system-makes,370859.shtml
Posted : Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:49:35 GMT
Author: DC-SUNRGI
Category : Press Release
WASHINGTON - (Business Wire)
A new patents pending solar energy system will soon make it possible to produce electricity at a wholesale cost of 5 cents per kWh (kilowatt hour). This price is competitive with the wholesale cost of producing electricity using fossil fuels and a fraction of the current cost of solar energy.
XCPV (Xtreme Concentrated Photovoltaics), a system that concentrates the equivalent of more than 1,600 times the sun’s energy onto the world’s most efficient solar cells, was announced today by SUNRGI, a solar energy system designer and developer, at the National Energy Marketers Association’s 11th Annual Global Energy Forum in Washington, DC. The technology will enable power companies, businesses, and residents to produce electricity from solar energy at a lower cost than ever before.
“Solar Power at 5 cents per kWh would be a world-changing breakthrough,” said Craig Goodman, president, National Energy Marketers Association. “It would make solar generation of electricity as affordable as generation from coal, natural gas or other non-renewable sources, without requiring a subsidy.”
“In a little more than a year we were able to develop and successfully test XCPV,” said Robert S. (Bob) Block, co-founder and SUNRGI principal. “We expect the SUNRGI system to become available for both on- and off-grid power applications, worldwide, in twelve to fifteen months.”
What differentiates SUNRGI’s XCPV system from any other solar energy system includes: a proprietary, integrated low profile technology for concentrating sunlight; a proprietary technology and methodology for cooling solar cells; a low cost, modular system optimized for mass-production; less land area or “roof top” requirements than typical solar energy systems; a technology roadmap for continuous improvement; low-cost field installation; and, a custom-designed system for easy operation and maintenance.
ABOUT SUNRGI
SUNRGI, with offices in Reno, Silicon Valley and Los Angeles, is in the business of designing and developing solar energy systems. It was formed by five experienced, entrepreneurial, inventive individuals with the goal of creating a renewable energy source that would be available at fossil fuel prices. Its work has led to the development of an entirely new solar energy category: Xtreme Concentrated Photovoltaics or XCPV. Visit http://www.sunrgi.com.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
2008: April 29th Good News (Having a Dog Helps Children Resist Allergies, Tropical Reforestation Aided by Bats, more...)
Good Morning all,
So today I found an article that my husband will be thrilled about. It's about dogs, which are his favorite pet. A study done in Germany shows that having a dog as a pet when children are small helps children to not develop allergies. It seems that dogs are man's best friend from beginning to end. :)
I would also like to point out two other interesting articles. First is an article about a house made of straw, which is up for an Eco-House of the year award, in Great Brittain. Second, is an article about a rare cloud rat, which, prior to its rediscovery was last seen over 100 years ago in the philippines.
I hope you enjoy today's posts. I've really got to get some sleep, but I'll see you tomorrow! :)
Today's Top 5:
1. Having A Dog Can Keep Kids from Developing Allergies (City News California)
2. Playgroups and Day Care 'Can Cut Risk of Childhood Cancer' (The Scotsman)
3. Tiny Shrew a Big Hope for Dwindling Owls (Irish Independent)
4. Kamasutra Inspires Car Design! (The Times of India)
5. Dancer Swaps New York for House of Straw (IC Wales)
Honorable Mentions:
1. Idaho Lab Develops a Quicker Way to Catch a Thief (Yahoo News)
2. Tropical Reforestation Aided by Bats (Science Daily)
3. Biologists Rediscover Rare Cloud Rat in Philippines (Yahoo News)
4. Washable Diapers are Better for the Environment, Says Dutch Study (Earth Times)
5. Japan, Russia See Hope in Island Dispute (St Petersburg Times)
Today's Top 5:
1. Having A Dog Can Keep Kids from Developing Allergies
http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_22153.aspx
Tuesday April 29, 2008
By Ben Hirschler, Reuters
Having a dog in the house reduces the risk that young children will develop allergies, German researchers said on Tuesday.
The finding, based on a six-year study of 9,000 children, lends weight to the theory that growing up with a pet trains the immune system to be less sensitive to potential triggers for allergies like asthma, eczema and hay fever.
Just why this should be is unclear but scientists believe youngsters may get beneficial early exposure to germs carried into the house on the animal's fur, which helps their immune systems develop.
"Our results show clearly that the presence of a dog in the home during subjects' infancy is associated with a significantly low level of sensitization to pollens and inhaled allergens," said Joachim Heinrich of the National Research Centre for Environmental Health in Munich.
The same protective effect was not seen in children who had frequent contact with dogs but did not have one at home.
Previous studies have suggested that exposure to pets may have a protective effect against allergies but many of these studies were based on retrospective questioning of subjects about their exposure.
Heinrich's study, by contrast, was designed before the data was collected. Experts consider such prospective studies make for more reliable results.
Parents answered detailed questionnaires about possible allergic symptoms in their children, from birth to the age of 6, and blood samples were also taken from a third of the group to test for antibodies to common allergens.
The group's findings were published in the European Respiratory Journal.
2. Playgroups and Day Care 'Can Cut Risk of Childhood Cancer'
http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/latestnews/Playgroups-and-day-care-39can.4028960.jp
Date: 29 April 2008
By Jane Kirby
ATTENDING day care or playgroups can lower a child's risk of developing leukaemia by around 30 per cent, research suggested yesterday.
A review of studies found that children who interact with other youngsters early in life are at lower risk of the most common form of childhood leukaemia.
One theory is that children who are exposed to common infections, including those pickeADVERTISEMENTd up from being around other youngsters, gain protection from leukaemia.
Some experts believe that if the immune system is not challenged early in life, it may mount an "inappropriate response" to infections encountered later in childhood, leading to the development of leukaemia.
Dr Patricia Buffler, professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, said that the review revealed evidence of a link between social contact and a reduced risk of the disease.
Dr Buffler said the theory was that there are two events in childhood development which can trigger childhood leukaemia, the first taking place in the womb and the second after birth.
She added: "We don't completely understand the mechanisms, but immunological data is emerging which suggests a strong association."
Dr Buffler reviewed 14 published studies involving 6,108 children with leukaemia and 13,704 without the disease.
Parents were asked if their child attended day care or playgroup and any other interaction with children that they had.
She explained: "We had 14 studies that we considered eligible.
"Twelve of them were protective, while two of them showed no effect. No study found social contact increased the risk of childhood leukaemia."
The overall risk reduction was put at around 30 per cent for all types of social interaction with other youngsters.
Combined results for studies of day-care attendance specifically before the age of one or two showed a similarly reduced risk.
Dr Buffler added: "When you take the overall evidence, it seems to be consistent.
"No studies are showing an increased risk. This is consistent with what we've seen for some other childhood conditions that seem to be modulated in this way, like asthma."
She said that studies such as hers may offer a "window of opportunity" to prevent childhood leukaemia as "it might provide foundation for a vaccine that might offer some protection".
Parents should also be encouraged not to isolate their children, she said.
When Dr Buffler's team excluded five studies where the selection of children as controls was not thought to be ideal, youngsters exposed to social contact were found to be almost 40 per cent less likely to develop leukaemia than their counterparts.
Leukaemia accounts for one third of all childhood cancers, with approximately 400 new cases occurring each year in the UK, according to the charity Cancerbackup.
The most common form is acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, which accounts for about 75 per cent of cases.
ALL can affect children at any age, but is more common in children aged one to four. It is also more likely to affect boys than girls.
3. Tiny Shrew a Big Hope for Dwindling Owls
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/tiny-shrew-a-big-hope-for-dwindling-owls-1361803.html
By Ed Carty
Tuesday April 29 2008
THE discovery of a tiny new mammal in Ireland may be the key to reviving dwindling populations of the elusive barn owl, environment experts said yesterday.
BirdWatch Ireland revealed students have made the first record of the greater white-toothed shrew, a mouse-like animal about the size of an adult's thumb and a favourite food of the rare bird of prey.
However, there are also concerns the fast-breeding little creatures could have a seriously damaging effect on the island's eco-system.
John Lusby, of BirdWatch Ireland, said it was a very significant discovery.
"The greater white-toothed shrew is an important prey item for barn owls in parts of Europe,'' he said.
The shrew was discovered by a research team from Queen's University Belfast and University College Cork.
They found unfamiliar remains in regurgitated food, known as pellets, of barn owls and kestrels in Tipperary and Limerick.
Seven greater white-toothed shrews were later trapped at four locations in Tipperary in March.
Ireland has suffered from a scarcity of small mammals for birds to prey on, which experts believe is partly to blame for the dwindling numbers of owls.
Prof Ian Montgomery of Queen's University said there was evidence the shrews were brought in accidentally from continental Europe.
- Ed Carty
4. Kamasutra Inspires Car Design!
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Cities/Kamasutra_inspires_car_design/articleshow/2992760.cms
29 Apr 2008, 0020 hrs IST,
Vasundhara Vyas,TNN
AHMEDABAD: A Kamasutra posture on wheels? Yes, it looks like Vatsyayan re-invented, with the ancient Indian treatise on love-making inspiring a student of the National Institute of Design (NID) to design a car.
The idea has given him the rare opportunity of an internship with the world's leading automobile design house, Pininfarina of Italy. If 'Kamas' is Ramesh Gound's creation of passion, it is Ahmedabad's signature landmark — the Sidi Saiyed ki Jali — that has spurred another NID student, Neerav Panchal, to design 'Ratna' which he calls the "jewel of Indian roads". A third student, Shailendra Petwal, was inspired by 'Navras' to create his design.
Panchal and Petwal too join Gound at Pininfarina. They were winners of a competition on the theme 'Luxury Car For India' held by designers associated with auto giants like Ferrari, Ford, GM, Jaguar and Fiat.
"We were asked to define Indian contemporary luxury and how it is rooted in India. When I thought of what the world associates with India, it is Kamasutra that came to my mind. After studying Kamasutra, I realised its essence and my theme emerged — two objects coming together and moving in one direction with a force of passion," said Gound.
He added, "My design is built on this essence, where the exteriors of the body curve and become part of the interiors of the car. It's a two-seater car that has seats like a bike but with a back-rest".
Panchal has always been attracted by the Sidi Saiyed ki Jali, the intricate stone carving at an Ahmedabad mosque which has been adopted as the city's symbol by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation. So, when he designed his car, its influence was evident.
"My inspiration was Indian architecture, where the roof of the car resembles a dome and the back door has a print of the carvings of the jaili. I call it Ratna, which can be a jewel on the Indian roads," says Panchal.
"My design is inspired by the shape and the layers of the conch and depicts the Shant Ras from the Navrasas.
The design has loose curves and spirals. The seat next to the driver can rotate and has a 180 degree incline, to give a feel like you are in your drawing room," says Petwal.
"The designs are contemporary but rooted in Indian culture. It's a big recognition for the students, which comes right after a good show at the Fiat design competition," says Pradyumna Vyas, head of academics at NID, who initiated the automobile designing course at the institute.
5. Dancer Swaps New York for House of Straw
http://icwales.icnetwork.co.uk/news/wales-news/2008/04/29/dancer-swaps-new-york-for-house-of-straw-91466-20832877/
Apr 29 2008
by Steffan Rhys, Western Mail
ITS walls are made of straw bales, it is powered by wind and sunlight, it was 12 years in the making, and it was largely built by unskilled women volunteers from all over the world.
Perched atop the mouth of the River Teifi, at a spot once used as a lookout point by the monks of the now ruined St Dogmaels Abbey, the UKs only load-bearing two-storey straw bale house was even visited by Amazonian tribes people and Aboriginal chiefs during its lengthy construction.
And, having finally been completed this year, it is now one of three buildings vying for the title of Eco-Home of the Year, to be awarded at Channel Fours Grand Designs Live show next week.
Owner Rachel Shiamh gave up an off-Broadway dancing career in New York and a Manhattan lifestyle to return to Wales and oversee the project, living in a shed in woodland for seven years before building finally started in 2003.
The result, Penwhilwr Welsh for watch tower has no mains electricity or water supplies, uses biomass heating fuelled by coppiced wood from the surrounding woodland, has a rainwater harvesting system and all waste is composted on site.
Its uniqueness led to it becoming a virtual pilgrimage site for people from across the globe who arrived in the remote corner of West Wales in their hundreds to help build it. They still make it a destination now for its courses, retreats and conferences on the ways of authentic living, natural building, yoga, healing, music and meditation.
I came back home to visit my parents and I found the land. I wasnt really looking for it but when it came up I had such a strong sense that I needed to live in nature, said Ms Shiamh, 42.
Then it changed the course of my life. It took five years to build because it was a self-build project and a way of building which encompassed education and working with the community.
It had a natural ebb and flow to it which was also reliant on my own energy levels.
I realised that if I wanted the home I envisioned I would have to project manage it myself.
After two years of communications with Pembrokeshire Planning Authority who have given me a lot of support I received planning permission to build a sustainable house.
Meanwhile I lived without mains in a shed, carrying water from a local spring, using candlelight, a gas stove and reaping the benefits of a compost loo.
My way of life completely changed as I lived here. I dropped my dance career to be in nature and allow the simple daily tasks of living here unfold.
Ms Shiamh cultivated a garden with some herbs and flowers already growing on her land, made flower essences and sun-infused oils from flowers and herbs and set up a space to silversmith and create jewellery inspired by her surroundings and meditations.
Whats interesting is that the site was once connected to the abbey, Ive always had a sense it was going to be bigger than me and it is starting to unfold that way, she said.
The homes original designs were drawn up by Lindsay Halton an architect whose new book The Secret of Home explores a homes physical aspects as deeper reflections of its owners spiritual life and path after a chance meeting resulting from his daughter being in Ms Shiamhs dance class.
Its construction during which straw bales were stitched together with bailing twine and cut into shape with saws before being painstakingly covered with clay and lime by hand and topped with a timber roof was then supervised by Amazon Nails, a company run by women which specialises in straw bale builds. The technique began more than 100 years ago, shortly after the introduction of the baling machine in America. There are still straw bale houses standing today that have stood the test of time and the elements.
You spend hours making a mix, all with hands and feet, then you spend the rest of the day spreading it on your walls with your hands, said Ms Shiamh.
Then, at the end of the day you stand back to look at it and it seems like youve done nothing at all.
It’s a grand week for home design on television
Fifteen homes from across the UK will compete for the title of Grand Designs Home of the Year 2008.
As part of its heavily promoted Grand Designs Live Week, Channel Four will screen six spin-off episodes of its flagship property programme over consecutive days, with viewers voting for what they believe is Britain’s best home in a number of categories before an overall winner is chosen.
Rachel Shiamh’s straw bale house will feature in the Eco-Build category. The television programme will run from Sunday to May 9 with a live exhibition being held over nine days, from Saturday to May 11, at London’s ExCel centre.
The event will feature more than 450 exhibitors, building workshops, including straw bale building, design tutorials and energy-efficiency hints.
Honorable Mentions:
1. Idaho Lab Develops a Quicker Way to Catch a Thief
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080429/ap_on_sc/antibody_profiling;_ylt=AteedgUmI6HFAk7i3elDC.Ks0NUE
By TODD DVORAK, Associated Press Writer
Mon Apr 28, 9:13 PM ET
IDAHO FALLS, Idaho - Federal researchers say they've developed a human identification test that's faster and possibly cheaper than DNA testing. It would be a handy new weapon in the arsenal for detectives, forensic experts and the military, though no one expects it to replace DNA analysis — and its promoters say it is not intended to.
ADVERTISEMENT The new method analyzes antibodies. Each person has a unique antibody bar code that can be gleaned from blood, saliva or other bodily fluids. Antibodies are proteins used by the body to fend off viruses or perform routine physiological housekeeping.
"DNA is a physical code that describes you ... and in many ways so are your antibodies," said Dr. Vicki Thompson, a chemical engineer at the Idaho National Laboratory who's been working with other researchers to perfect the test for the past 10 years.
The scientists say an antibody profile can yield results faster and more cheaply and be performed in the field with minimal training. National lab administrators have licensed the technology exclusively to Identity Sciences LLC in Alpharetta, Ga.
The Georgia startup plans to begin rolling out test kits and training to law enforcement, the military and forensic and medical labs around the globe by fall of 2009. Ken Haas, vice president of marketing, says the test is not intended to supplant DNA testing, the recognized gold standard in human identification.
But Haas says the value of antibody profiling is as a screening tool to help make sense of a crime scene, sort out the blood trails or spatter from multiple victims or more quickly identify body parts on a battlefield or at the scene of a disaster like the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
It may also reduce the number of DNA tests required in an investigation, potentially saving time and money and easing the growing backlog, he said. Results from tests on blood serum or dried blood can be ready in two hours, a fraction of the time it takes to run similar tests for DNA matches.
However, a major drawback for now is the lack of a national antibody database. That's one of the reasons antibody testing is not likely to be used at the outset of an investigation to link suspects to crimes or establish probable cause to justify issuing an arrest warrant.
Company officials say beta testing by forensic scientists at simulated crime scenes at seven locations across the country has produced positive results and reinforced the notion that an eager market awaits. The company declined to say where the testing occurred, citing nondisclosure agreements with participants.
The company has not yet put a price tag on the field kits. But executives say their product will be significantly cheaper than DNA analysis, which can run anywhere from $500 to $3,000 per sample because it requires sophisticated equipment and lab time.
"We don't see this yet as a product to take to court," said Gene Venesky, vice president of Identity Sciences. "But we do see this as a way to get the case moving forward toward a final, legal resolution."
Still, some forensics experts say that kind of scrutiny may be unavoidable, especially if the test takes on a bigger crime-fighting role.
"There is a lot of potential here," said Lawrence Kobilinsky, a DNA expert and chairman of the Department of Forensic Science at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. "Any time you can develop a quick and easy screen for something ... that is a good thing."
But Kobilinsky and others caution that it takes time for any new forensic test to gain acceptance where it matters most — state and federal courthouses. If the new tests begin appearing in police reports, defense attorneys can be expected to challenge their validity.
"If these tests are going to get to the courtroom, which I think is inevitable, they are not going to be admissible as evidence until they can be proven reliable, accurate" and trustworthy, Kobilinsky said. "My bet is that a crime scene unit is going to be very careful about using this if it's not going to be of any benefit in litigation."
2. Tropical Reforestation Aided by Bats
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080428124235.htm
ScienceDaily (Apr. 28, 2008)
German scientists are engaging bats to kick-start natural reforestation in the tropics by installing artificial bat roosts in deforested areas. This novel method for tropical restoration is presented in a new study published online in the science journal Conservation Biology this week. Detlev Kelm from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Berlin (IZW) and Kerstin Wiesner and Otto von Helversen from the University of Erlangen–Nuremberg report that the deployment of artificial bat roosts significantly increases seed dispersal of a wide range of tropical forest plants into their surroundings, providing a simple and cheap method to speed up natural forest regeneration.
Tropical forests are of global ecological importance. They are a key contributor to the global carbon balance and are host to a major part of the world’s biodiversity. Between 2000 and 2005, worldwide net losses of tropical forest cover averaged 0.18 % annually and regionally even exceeded 1.5 % annually in some Latin American countries. Forest is usually replaced by agriculture. Often soils become rapidly infertile and land is abandoned. Because deforested areas rarely offer much food or protection for seed dispersers such as birds or small mammals, natural forest regeneration is hampered by a lack of natural seed inputs. The alternative, replanting tropical forests, is too expensive and rarely a feasible option, and, in general, knowledge on how best to rapidly restore natural vegetation is lacking.
“We believe that bats could help in reforestation. They are able to cover large distances during their nightly foraging flights and are willing to enter deforested areas”, says Detlev Kelm from the IZW. Many bats eat fruits or nectar, and thus are key species for seed dispersal and flower pollination. Kelm and colleagues showed that the principal barrier to reforestation - the lack of seed inputs - could be overcome by the deployment of artificial day roosts for bats in deforested areas. These roosts were designed to approximate characteristics of large, hollow tree trunks, the main type of natural bat roost. “Within a few days to weeks the first bats will move in. So far we have found ten bat species using the roosts, and several of these are common and important seed dispersers”, Kelm reports. “We measured the effect of the roosts on seed dispersal and found seeds of more than 60 plant species being transported by the bats”. Of these plants, most were pioneer species, which represent the initial stages of natural forest succession.
This cost and labour efficient method can thus support and speed up natural forest regeneration. Artificial roosts are simply built boxes, which require little maintenance and can be used by bats for many years. “We hope that this cheap and easy to use method will be applied in many parts of the tropics in the near future, and that bats will be “employed” as efficient agents of reforestation”, says Kelm. They may provide an effective contribution to the amelioration of deforestation and climate change.
Detlev H. Kelm, Kerstin R. Wiesner, Otto Von Helversen. Effects of Artificial Roosts for Frugivorous Bats on Seed Dispersal in a Neotropical Forest Pasture Mosaic. Conservation Biology. Published article online: 25-Apr-2008.
Adapted from materials provided by Forschungsverbund Berlin e.V..
3. Biologists Rediscover Rare Cloud Rat in Philippines http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080427/sc_afp/philippineswildlife;_ylt=Av2.GEa7.C8rxl2kJ2Z0EYkbr7sFSun Apr 27, 7:15 PM ET
MANILA (AFP) - A rare rat species last seen over a century ago in the mountainous northern Philippines has been rediscovered by a team of American and Filipino biologists, a report said Sunday.
ADVERTISEMENT Lawrence Heaney, team leader and curator at the Chicago-based Field Museum of Natural History, said the rare dwarf cloud rat was last seen by British scientists some 112 years ago.
He said the rat was dead when the team found it in a canopy of a large tree whose branches were covered by thick moss, orchids and ferns at a national park in Mount Pulag in northern Luzon, the Philippine Daily Inquirer said.
The animal was described as small "with reddish brown fur, a black mask around its large dark eyes, small round ears, a broad and blunt snout and a long tail covered with dark hair," the report said.
"It is the animal whose existence had baffled biologists for so many years," Heaney said.
The animal has been preserved and is being prepared for shipment to Chicago for further studies.
The discovery proved a theory that the rare species lived only in high canopies with mature mossy forests in areas with an elevation of between 2,200- 2,700 metres (7,200-8,850 feet) above sea level. Mount Pulag is Luzon's highest peak at 2,922 metres above sea level.
"The cloud rats are one of the most spectacular cases of adaptive radiation by mammals anywhere in the world," Heaney said.
A British researcher, John Whitehead, first saw the rat in 1896 in another mountain region in the north, but little was known about the species.
"Since then the species became a mystery," Heaney said.
4. Washable Diapers are Better for the Environment, Says Dutch Study
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/202049,washable-diapers-are-better-for-the-environment-says-dutch-study.html
Posted : Tue, 29 Apr 2008 10:19:05
GMT Author : DPA
Category : Environment
Amsterdam - Washable diapers contribute to a better environment, a Dutch foundation for the protection of the environment said Tuesday. Spokesman Hans van Dijk of the non-gouvernmental organisation Milieu Centraal in Utrecht said new research demonstrated washable diapers were substantially better single-use for for the environment.
"Contrary to all previous studies that looked primarily at the damage to the environment - starting from the moment a customer buys one type of diaper or another - our study also looked at the production process, including transportation," he said.
"Although multi-useable diapers need to be washed, which also puts a strain on the environment, we found that washable diapers are up to seven times better for the environment than single-use diapers."
Children use an average 5,000 diapers until they are potty- trained, which is on average at the age of 3,2 years, Milieu Centraal says.
"Washable diapers also have an extra advantage," says Van Dijk. "Children are potty-trained at a substantially younger age."
5. Japan, Russia See Hope in Island Dispute
http://www.sptimes.ru/index.php?action_id=2&story_id=25835
By Anna Smolchenko, Staff Writer
Issue #1369 (33), Tuesday, April 29, 2008
NOVO-OGARYOVO, Moscow Region — Japanese Prime Minister Jasuo Fukuda and President Vladimir Putin agreed on Saturday to expedite talks to resolve a decades-old territorial dispute by issuing “fresh directives” to their respective governments, Japan’s Foreign Ministry said.
Fukuda is the first Japanese prime minister to visit Putin’s official residence outside Moscow, a venue seen by some as more prestigious than the Kremlin and a gesture that the Foreign Ministry said Fukuda appreciated.
Following the talks, the two governments agreed to jointly explore oil and gas in Siberia in a five-year, $96 million project.
Making his first visit to Russia since his election last fall, Fukuda sought to establish a good rapport with Putin and his successor, Dmitry Medvedev, and to secure their support for the upcoming Group of Eight summit on Hokkaido in July.
Moscow’s refusal to return a chain of islands seized during the last days of World War II has prevented the two countries from reaching a peace treaty. The islands are known as the Southern Kurils in Russia and the Northern Territories in Japan.
“We are continuing our dialog on a peace treaty and creating the necessary conditions to advance in this direction,” Putin told Fukuda at the start of the talks Saturday.
Putin did not elaborate in front of reporters, but he added that “a lot of unresolved problems” remained between the two countries despite an improvement in ties in recent years.
Fukuda, who nodded frequently as Putin spoke, thanked the president for his personal role in promoting ties and said he wanted to deepen cooperation in the Pacific region.
It was unclear to what extent the dispute over the islands was discussed.
Putin’s spokesman Alexei Gromov told reporters that the territorial issue was not discussed in detail. But Japanese officials appeared to have interpreted the talks in a more positive way.
“With respect to the territorial issue, I believe we will be able to secure a positive direction,” Fukuda said after separate talks with President-elect Dmitry Medvedev at his official residence outside Moscow, Main Dorf Castle, Reuters reported.
Kazuo Kodama, a Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman, told reporters late Saturday that Fukuda and Putin had agreed to “issue fresh directives” to their governments to expedite talks on the islands to elevate bilateral ties to a new dimension. Kodama did not elaborate, and it was unclear whether the agreement between the outgoing Russian leader and the Japanese prime minister, whose support at home is faltering, would bear any fruit.
Japan has said it wants back all four islands — Kunashir, Iturup, Shikotan and Habomai — but Moscow is not ready to give them up. Tokyo maintains that a peace treaty should be in place for ties to be taken to a new level.
But some Russian observers believe no peace treaty is needed because economic ties are booming anyway.
“In the great scheme of things, Russia doesn’t need the peace treaty,” said Valery Vinogradov, the point man on Japan within the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, the big business lobby group. “It wouldn’t change anything in the current state of affairs,” he said.
In the most recent example of increased cooperation, the governments agreed Saturday to cooperate on oil and gas exploration in eastern Siberia in the first project of its kind, said Kodama, the Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman.
Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corp. and Russia’s Irkutsk Oil will jointly explore oil and gas deposits 1,000 kilometers north of Irkutsk and 150 kilometers from the East Siberia-Pacific Ocean oil pipeline, which is under construction, the Japanese company said in a statement. The two companies have set up a joint venture in which the Russians have a 51 percent stake. They will jointly invest 10 billion yen ($96 million) in the project, which will initially span five years, Kodama said.
Trade between the two countries grew about 65 percent to $20.1 billion last year, and Japanese total investment totaled $3.1 billion as of late 2007, according to Kremlin figures.
In March, state-owned nuclear energy company Atomenergoprom and Toshiba agreed to build power plants and produce atomic-reactor fuel.
Several Japanese carmakers, including Toyota, Suzuki and Nissan, have built or are building plants here. Oil deliveries from Sakhalin to Japan totaled 6.8 million tons last year, and deliveries of liquefied natural gas to Japan will start no later than 2009, the Kremlin said.
Kodama said the conclusion of the peace treaty was needed, and its absence was a reason why an agreement to develop the Far East and Siberia had not gotten very far.
The Japanese government appeared to interpret the choice of the Novo-Ogaryovo residence for the meeting as a positive sign. “It’s indeed the first time that the Japanese prime minister was invited to the official residence of a Russian president, “ Kodama said. “The prime minister appreciated such a gesture.”
Putin and Fukuda were initially scheduled to meet at the Kremlin.
Putin has held numerous meetings at Novo-Ogaryovo, and he presided over a Security Council meeting here immediately before his talks with Fukuda on Saturday.
In other issues, Russia and Japan agreed to “drastically” expand youth exchanges to 500 people a year and cooperate on climate change after the Kyoto Protocol ends in 2012. Fukuda also “requested to exercise Russia’s influence over North Korea on all issues, including the issue of abduction” of Japanese citizens, Kodama said.
Fukuda’s meeting and a subsequent lunch with Putin lasted for two hours, and the talks with Medvedev went for about an hour. Before his meetings with the Russian leaders, Fukuda visited a Japanese festival at a Moscow school where the students showed off their knowledge of Japanese and sang songs for him, Kodama said.
So today I found an article that my husband will be thrilled about. It's about dogs, which are his favorite pet. A study done in Germany shows that having a dog as a pet when children are small helps children to not develop allergies. It seems that dogs are man's best friend from beginning to end. :)
I would also like to point out two other interesting articles. First is an article about a house made of straw, which is up for an Eco-House of the year award, in Great Brittain. Second, is an article about a rare cloud rat, which, prior to its rediscovery was last seen over 100 years ago in the philippines.
I hope you enjoy today's posts. I've really got to get some sleep, but I'll see you tomorrow! :)
Today's Top 5:
1. Having A Dog Can Keep Kids from Developing Allergies (City News California)
2. Playgroups and Day Care 'Can Cut Risk of Childhood Cancer' (The Scotsman)
3. Tiny Shrew a Big Hope for Dwindling Owls (Irish Independent)
4. Kamasutra Inspires Car Design! (The Times of India)
5. Dancer Swaps New York for House of Straw (IC Wales)
Honorable Mentions:
1. Idaho Lab Develops a Quicker Way to Catch a Thief (Yahoo News)
2. Tropical Reforestation Aided by Bats (Science Daily)
3. Biologists Rediscover Rare Cloud Rat in Philippines (Yahoo News)
4. Washable Diapers are Better for the Environment, Says Dutch Study (Earth Times)
5. Japan, Russia See Hope in Island Dispute (St Petersburg Times)
Today's Top 5:
1. Having A Dog Can Keep Kids from Developing Allergies
http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_22153.aspx
Tuesday April 29, 2008
By Ben Hirschler, Reuters
Having a dog in the house reduces the risk that young children will develop allergies, German researchers said on Tuesday.
The finding, based on a six-year study of 9,000 children, lends weight to the theory that growing up with a pet trains the immune system to be less sensitive to potential triggers for allergies like asthma, eczema and hay fever.
Just why this should be is unclear but scientists believe youngsters may get beneficial early exposure to germs carried into the house on the animal's fur, which helps their immune systems develop.
"Our results show clearly that the presence of a dog in the home during subjects' infancy is associated with a significantly low level of sensitization to pollens and inhaled allergens," said Joachim Heinrich of the National Research Centre for Environmental Health in Munich.
The same protective effect was not seen in children who had frequent contact with dogs but did not have one at home.
Previous studies have suggested that exposure to pets may have a protective effect against allergies but many of these studies were based on retrospective questioning of subjects about their exposure.
Heinrich's study, by contrast, was designed before the data was collected. Experts consider such prospective studies make for more reliable results.
Parents answered detailed questionnaires about possible allergic symptoms in their children, from birth to the age of 6, and blood samples were also taken from a third of the group to test for antibodies to common allergens.
The group's findings were published in the European Respiratory Journal.
2. Playgroups and Day Care 'Can Cut Risk of Childhood Cancer'
http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/latestnews/Playgroups-and-day-care-39can.4028960.jp
Date: 29 April 2008
By Jane Kirby
ATTENDING day care or playgroups can lower a child's risk of developing leukaemia by around 30 per cent, research suggested yesterday.
A review of studies found that children who interact with other youngsters early in life are at lower risk of the most common form of childhood leukaemia.
One theory is that children who are exposed to common infections, including those pickeADVERTISEMENTd up from being around other youngsters, gain protection from leukaemia.
Some experts believe that if the immune system is not challenged early in life, it may mount an "inappropriate response" to infections encountered later in childhood, leading to the development of leukaemia.
Dr Patricia Buffler, professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, said that the review revealed evidence of a link between social contact and a reduced risk of the disease.
Dr Buffler said the theory was that there are two events in childhood development which can trigger childhood leukaemia, the first taking place in the womb and the second after birth.
She added: "We don't completely understand the mechanisms, but immunological data is emerging which suggests a strong association."
Dr Buffler reviewed 14 published studies involving 6,108 children with leukaemia and 13,704 without the disease.
Parents were asked if their child attended day care or playgroup and any other interaction with children that they had.
She explained: "We had 14 studies that we considered eligible.
"Twelve of them were protective, while two of them showed no effect. No study found social contact increased the risk of childhood leukaemia."
The overall risk reduction was put at around 30 per cent for all types of social interaction with other youngsters.
Combined results for studies of day-care attendance specifically before the age of one or two showed a similarly reduced risk.
Dr Buffler added: "When you take the overall evidence, it seems to be consistent.
"No studies are showing an increased risk. This is consistent with what we've seen for some other childhood conditions that seem to be modulated in this way, like asthma."
She said that studies such as hers may offer a "window of opportunity" to prevent childhood leukaemia as "it might provide foundation for a vaccine that might offer some protection".
Parents should also be encouraged not to isolate their children, she said.
When Dr Buffler's team excluded five studies where the selection of children as controls was not thought to be ideal, youngsters exposed to social contact were found to be almost 40 per cent less likely to develop leukaemia than their counterparts.
Leukaemia accounts for one third of all childhood cancers, with approximately 400 new cases occurring each year in the UK, according to the charity Cancerbackup.
The most common form is acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, which accounts for about 75 per cent of cases.
ALL can affect children at any age, but is more common in children aged one to four. It is also more likely to affect boys than girls.
3. Tiny Shrew a Big Hope for Dwindling Owls
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/tiny-shrew-a-big-hope-for-dwindling-owls-1361803.html
By Ed Carty
Tuesday April 29 2008
THE discovery of a tiny new mammal in Ireland may be the key to reviving dwindling populations of the elusive barn owl, environment experts said yesterday.
BirdWatch Ireland revealed students have made the first record of the greater white-toothed shrew, a mouse-like animal about the size of an adult's thumb and a favourite food of the rare bird of prey.
However, there are also concerns the fast-breeding little creatures could have a seriously damaging effect on the island's eco-system.
John Lusby, of BirdWatch Ireland, said it was a very significant discovery.
"The greater white-toothed shrew is an important prey item for barn owls in parts of Europe,'' he said.
The shrew was discovered by a research team from Queen's University Belfast and University College Cork.
They found unfamiliar remains in regurgitated food, known as pellets, of barn owls and kestrels in Tipperary and Limerick.
Seven greater white-toothed shrews were later trapped at four locations in Tipperary in March.
Ireland has suffered from a scarcity of small mammals for birds to prey on, which experts believe is partly to blame for the dwindling numbers of owls.
Prof Ian Montgomery of Queen's University said there was evidence the shrews were brought in accidentally from continental Europe.
- Ed Carty
4. Kamasutra Inspires Car Design!
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Cities/Kamasutra_inspires_car_design/articleshow/2992760.cms
29 Apr 2008, 0020 hrs IST,
Vasundhara Vyas,TNN
AHMEDABAD: A Kamasutra posture on wheels? Yes, it looks like Vatsyayan re-invented, with the ancient Indian treatise on love-making inspiring a student of the National Institute of Design (NID) to design a car.
The idea has given him the rare opportunity of an internship with the world's leading automobile design house, Pininfarina of Italy. If 'Kamas' is Ramesh Gound's creation of passion, it is Ahmedabad's signature landmark — the Sidi Saiyed ki Jali — that has spurred another NID student, Neerav Panchal, to design 'Ratna' which he calls the "jewel of Indian roads". A third student, Shailendra Petwal, was inspired by 'Navras' to create his design.
Panchal and Petwal too join Gound at Pininfarina. They were winners of a competition on the theme 'Luxury Car For India' held by designers associated with auto giants like Ferrari, Ford, GM, Jaguar and Fiat.
"We were asked to define Indian contemporary luxury and how it is rooted in India. When I thought of what the world associates with India, it is Kamasutra that came to my mind. After studying Kamasutra, I realised its essence and my theme emerged — two objects coming together and moving in one direction with a force of passion," said Gound.
He added, "My design is built on this essence, where the exteriors of the body curve and become part of the interiors of the car. It's a two-seater car that has seats like a bike but with a back-rest".
Panchal has always been attracted by the Sidi Saiyed ki Jali, the intricate stone carving at an Ahmedabad mosque which has been adopted as the city's symbol by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation. So, when he designed his car, its influence was evident.
"My inspiration was Indian architecture, where the roof of the car resembles a dome and the back door has a print of the carvings of the jaili. I call it Ratna, which can be a jewel on the Indian roads," says Panchal.
"My design is inspired by the shape and the layers of the conch and depicts the Shant Ras from the Navrasas.
The design has loose curves and spirals. The seat next to the driver can rotate and has a 180 degree incline, to give a feel like you are in your drawing room," says Petwal.
"The designs are contemporary but rooted in Indian culture. It's a big recognition for the students, which comes right after a good show at the Fiat design competition," says Pradyumna Vyas, head of academics at NID, who initiated the automobile designing course at the institute.
5. Dancer Swaps New York for House of Straw
http://icwales.icnetwork.co.uk/news/wales-news/2008/04/29/dancer-swaps-new-york-for-house-of-straw-91466-20832877/
Apr 29 2008
by Steffan Rhys, Western Mail
ITS walls are made of straw bales, it is powered by wind and sunlight, it was 12 years in the making, and it was largely built by unskilled women volunteers from all over the world.
Perched atop the mouth of the River Teifi, at a spot once used as a lookout point by the monks of the now ruined St Dogmaels Abbey, the UKs only load-bearing two-storey straw bale house was even visited by Amazonian tribes people and Aboriginal chiefs during its lengthy construction.
And, having finally been completed this year, it is now one of three buildings vying for the title of Eco-Home of the Year, to be awarded at Channel Fours Grand Designs Live show next week.
Owner Rachel Shiamh gave up an off-Broadway dancing career in New York and a Manhattan lifestyle to return to Wales and oversee the project, living in a shed in woodland for seven years before building finally started in 2003.
The result, Penwhilwr Welsh for watch tower has no mains electricity or water supplies, uses biomass heating fuelled by coppiced wood from the surrounding woodland, has a rainwater harvesting system and all waste is composted on site.
Its uniqueness led to it becoming a virtual pilgrimage site for people from across the globe who arrived in the remote corner of West Wales in their hundreds to help build it. They still make it a destination now for its courses, retreats and conferences on the ways of authentic living, natural building, yoga, healing, music and meditation.
I came back home to visit my parents and I found the land. I wasnt really looking for it but when it came up I had such a strong sense that I needed to live in nature, said Ms Shiamh, 42.
Then it changed the course of my life. It took five years to build because it was a self-build project and a way of building which encompassed education and working with the community.
It had a natural ebb and flow to it which was also reliant on my own energy levels.
I realised that if I wanted the home I envisioned I would have to project manage it myself.
After two years of communications with Pembrokeshire Planning Authority who have given me a lot of support I received planning permission to build a sustainable house.
Meanwhile I lived without mains in a shed, carrying water from a local spring, using candlelight, a gas stove and reaping the benefits of a compost loo.
My way of life completely changed as I lived here. I dropped my dance career to be in nature and allow the simple daily tasks of living here unfold.
Ms Shiamh cultivated a garden with some herbs and flowers already growing on her land, made flower essences and sun-infused oils from flowers and herbs and set up a space to silversmith and create jewellery inspired by her surroundings and meditations.
Whats interesting is that the site was once connected to the abbey, Ive always had a sense it was going to be bigger than me and it is starting to unfold that way, she said.
The homes original designs were drawn up by Lindsay Halton an architect whose new book The Secret of Home explores a homes physical aspects as deeper reflections of its owners spiritual life and path after a chance meeting resulting from his daughter being in Ms Shiamhs dance class.
Its construction during which straw bales were stitched together with bailing twine and cut into shape with saws before being painstakingly covered with clay and lime by hand and topped with a timber roof was then supervised by Amazon Nails, a company run by women which specialises in straw bale builds. The technique began more than 100 years ago, shortly after the introduction of the baling machine in America. There are still straw bale houses standing today that have stood the test of time and the elements.
You spend hours making a mix, all with hands and feet, then you spend the rest of the day spreading it on your walls with your hands, said Ms Shiamh.
Then, at the end of the day you stand back to look at it and it seems like youve done nothing at all.
It’s a grand week for home design on television
Fifteen homes from across the UK will compete for the title of Grand Designs Home of the Year 2008.
As part of its heavily promoted Grand Designs Live Week, Channel Four will screen six spin-off episodes of its flagship property programme over consecutive days, with viewers voting for what they believe is Britain’s best home in a number of categories before an overall winner is chosen.
Rachel Shiamh’s straw bale house will feature in the Eco-Build category. The television programme will run from Sunday to May 9 with a live exhibition being held over nine days, from Saturday to May 11, at London’s ExCel centre.
The event will feature more than 450 exhibitors, building workshops, including straw bale building, design tutorials and energy-efficiency hints.
Honorable Mentions:
1. Idaho Lab Develops a Quicker Way to Catch a Thief
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080429/ap_on_sc/antibody_profiling;_ylt=AteedgUmI6HFAk7i3elDC.Ks0NUE
By TODD DVORAK, Associated Press Writer
Mon Apr 28, 9:13 PM ET
IDAHO FALLS, Idaho - Federal researchers say they've developed a human identification test that's faster and possibly cheaper than DNA testing. It would be a handy new weapon in the arsenal for detectives, forensic experts and the military, though no one expects it to replace DNA analysis — and its promoters say it is not intended to.
ADVERTISEMENT The new method analyzes antibodies. Each person has a unique antibody bar code that can be gleaned from blood, saliva or other bodily fluids. Antibodies are proteins used by the body to fend off viruses or perform routine physiological housekeeping.
"DNA is a physical code that describes you ... and in many ways so are your antibodies," said Dr. Vicki Thompson, a chemical engineer at the Idaho National Laboratory who's been working with other researchers to perfect the test for the past 10 years.
The scientists say an antibody profile can yield results faster and more cheaply and be performed in the field with minimal training. National lab administrators have licensed the technology exclusively to Identity Sciences LLC in Alpharetta, Ga.
The Georgia startup plans to begin rolling out test kits and training to law enforcement, the military and forensic and medical labs around the globe by fall of 2009. Ken Haas, vice president of marketing, says the test is not intended to supplant DNA testing, the recognized gold standard in human identification.
But Haas says the value of antibody profiling is as a screening tool to help make sense of a crime scene, sort out the blood trails or spatter from multiple victims or more quickly identify body parts on a battlefield or at the scene of a disaster like the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
It may also reduce the number of DNA tests required in an investigation, potentially saving time and money and easing the growing backlog, he said. Results from tests on blood serum or dried blood can be ready in two hours, a fraction of the time it takes to run similar tests for DNA matches.
However, a major drawback for now is the lack of a national antibody database. That's one of the reasons antibody testing is not likely to be used at the outset of an investigation to link suspects to crimes or establish probable cause to justify issuing an arrest warrant.
Company officials say beta testing by forensic scientists at simulated crime scenes at seven locations across the country has produced positive results and reinforced the notion that an eager market awaits. The company declined to say where the testing occurred, citing nondisclosure agreements with participants.
The company has not yet put a price tag on the field kits. But executives say their product will be significantly cheaper than DNA analysis, which can run anywhere from $500 to $3,000 per sample because it requires sophisticated equipment and lab time.
"We don't see this yet as a product to take to court," said Gene Venesky, vice president of Identity Sciences. "But we do see this as a way to get the case moving forward toward a final, legal resolution."
Still, some forensics experts say that kind of scrutiny may be unavoidable, especially if the test takes on a bigger crime-fighting role.
"There is a lot of potential here," said Lawrence Kobilinsky, a DNA expert and chairman of the Department of Forensic Science at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. "Any time you can develop a quick and easy screen for something ... that is a good thing."
But Kobilinsky and others caution that it takes time for any new forensic test to gain acceptance where it matters most — state and federal courthouses. If the new tests begin appearing in police reports, defense attorneys can be expected to challenge their validity.
"If these tests are going to get to the courtroom, which I think is inevitable, they are not going to be admissible as evidence until they can be proven reliable, accurate" and trustworthy, Kobilinsky said. "My bet is that a crime scene unit is going to be very careful about using this if it's not going to be of any benefit in litigation."
2. Tropical Reforestation Aided by Bats
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080428124235.htm
ScienceDaily (Apr. 28, 2008)
German scientists are engaging bats to kick-start natural reforestation in the tropics by installing artificial bat roosts in deforested areas. This novel method for tropical restoration is presented in a new study published online in the science journal Conservation Biology this week. Detlev Kelm from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Berlin (IZW) and Kerstin Wiesner and Otto von Helversen from the University of Erlangen–Nuremberg report that the deployment of artificial bat roosts significantly increases seed dispersal of a wide range of tropical forest plants into their surroundings, providing a simple and cheap method to speed up natural forest regeneration.
Tropical forests are of global ecological importance. They are a key contributor to the global carbon balance and are host to a major part of the world’s biodiversity. Between 2000 and 2005, worldwide net losses of tropical forest cover averaged 0.18 % annually and regionally even exceeded 1.5 % annually in some Latin American countries. Forest is usually replaced by agriculture. Often soils become rapidly infertile and land is abandoned. Because deforested areas rarely offer much food or protection for seed dispersers such as birds or small mammals, natural forest regeneration is hampered by a lack of natural seed inputs. The alternative, replanting tropical forests, is too expensive and rarely a feasible option, and, in general, knowledge on how best to rapidly restore natural vegetation is lacking.
“We believe that bats could help in reforestation. They are able to cover large distances during their nightly foraging flights and are willing to enter deforested areas”, says Detlev Kelm from the IZW. Many bats eat fruits or nectar, and thus are key species for seed dispersal and flower pollination. Kelm and colleagues showed that the principal barrier to reforestation - the lack of seed inputs - could be overcome by the deployment of artificial day roosts for bats in deforested areas. These roosts were designed to approximate characteristics of large, hollow tree trunks, the main type of natural bat roost. “Within a few days to weeks the first bats will move in. So far we have found ten bat species using the roosts, and several of these are common and important seed dispersers”, Kelm reports. “We measured the effect of the roosts on seed dispersal and found seeds of more than 60 plant species being transported by the bats”. Of these plants, most were pioneer species, which represent the initial stages of natural forest succession.
This cost and labour efficient method can thus support and speed up natural forest regeneration. Artificial roosts are simply built boxes, which require little maintenance and can be used by bats for many years. “We hope that this cheap and easy to use method will be applied in many parts of the tropics in the near future, and that bats will be “employed” as efficient agents of reforestation”, says Kelm. They may provide an effective contribution to the amelioration of deforestation and climate change.
Detlev H. Kelm, Kerstin R. Wiesner, Otto Von Helversen. Effects of Artificial Roosts for Frugivorous Bats on Seed Dispersal in a Neotropical Forest Pasture Mosaic. Conservation Biology. Published article online: 25-Apr-2008.
Adapted from materials provided by Forschungsverbund Berlin e.V..
3. Biologists Rediscover Rare Cloud Rat in Philippines http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080427/sc_afp/philippineswildlife;_ylt=Av2.GEa7.C8rxl2kJ2Z0EYkbr7sFSun Apr 27, 7:15 PM ET
MANILA (AFP) - A rare rat species last seen over a century ago in the mountainous northern Philippines has been rediscovered by a team of American and Filipino biologists, a report said Sunday.
ADVERTISEMENT Lawrence Heaney, team leader and curator at the Chicago-based Field Museum of Natural History, said the rare dwarf cloud rat was last seen by British scientists some 112 years ago.
He said the rat was dead when the team found it in a canopy of a large tree whose branches were covered by thick moss, orchids and ferns at a national park in Mount Pulag in northern Luzon, the Philippine Daily Inquirer said.
The animal was described as small "with reddish brown fur, a black mask around its large dark eyes, small round ears, a broad and blunt snout and a long tail covered with dark hair," the report said.
"It is the animal whose existence had baffled biologists for so many years," Heaney said.
The animal has been preserved and is being prepared for shipment to Chicago for further studies.
The discovery proved a theory that the rare species lived only in high canopies with mature mossy forests in areas with an elevation of between 2,200- 2,700 metres (7,200-8,850 feet) above sea level. Mount Pulag is Luzon's highest peak at 2,922 metres above sea level.
"The cloud rats are one of the most spectacular cases of adaptive radiation by mammals anywhere in the world," Heaney said.
A British researcher, John Whitehead, first saw the rat in 1896 in another mountain region in the north, but little was known about the species.
"Since then the species became a mystery," Heaney said.
4. Washable Diapers are Better for the Environment, Says Dutch Study
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/202049,washable-diapers-are-better-for-the-environment-says-dutch-study.html
Posted : Tue, 29 Apr 2008 10:19:05
GMT Author : DPA
Category : Environment
Amsterdam - Washable diapers contribute to a better environment, a Dutch foundation for the protection of the environment said Tuesday. Spokesman Hans van Dijk of the non-gouvernmental organisation Milieu Centraal in Utrecht said new research demonstrated washable diapers were substantially better single-use for for the environment.
"Contrary to all previous studies that looked primarily at the damage to the environment - starting from the moment a customer buys one type of diaper or another - our study also looked at the production process, including transportation," he said.
"Although multi-useable diapers need to be washed, which also puts a strain on the environment, we found that washable diapers are up to seven times better for the environment than single-use diapers."
Children use an average 5,000 diapers until they are potty- trained, which is on average at the age of 3,2 years, Milieu Centraal says.
"Washable diapers also have an extra advantage," says Van Dijk. "Children are potty-trained at a substantially younger age."
5. Japan, Russia See Hope in Island Dispute
http://www.sptimes.ru/index.php?action_id=2&story_id=25835
By Anna Smolchenko, Staff Writer
Issue #1369 (33), Tuesday, April 29, 2008
NOVO-OGARYOVO, Moscow Region — Japanese Prime Minister Jasuo Fukuda and President Vladimir Putin agreed on Saturday to expedite talks to resolve a decades-old territorial dispute by issuing “fresh directives” to their respective governments, Japan’s Foreign Ministry said.
Fukuda is the first Japanese prime minister to visit Putin’s official residence outside Moscow, a venue seen by some as more prestigious than the Kremlin and a gesture that the Foreign Ministry said Fukuda appreciated.
Following the talks, the two governments agreed to jointly explore oil and gas in Siberia in a five-year, $96 million project.
Making his first visit to Russia since his election last fall, Fukuda sought to establish a good rapport with Putin and his successor, Dmitry Medvedev, and to secure their support for the upcoming Group of Eight summit on Hokkaido in July.
Moscow’s refusal to return a chain of islands seized during the last days of World War II has prevented the two countries from reaching a peace treaty. The islands are known as the Southern Kurils in Russia and the Northern Territories in Japan.
“We are continuing our dialog on a peace treaty and creating the necessary conditions to advance in this direction,” Putin told Fukuda at the start of the talks Saturday.
Putin did not elaborate in front of reporters, but he added that “a lot of unresolved problems” remained between the two countries despite an improvement in ties in recent years.
Fukuda, who nodded frequently as Putin spoke, thanked the president for his personal role in promoting ties and said he wanted to deepen cooperation in the Pacific region.
It was unclear to what extent the dispute over the islands was discussed.
Putin’s spokesman Alexei Gromov told reporters that the territorial issue was not discussed in detail. But Japanese officials appeared to have interpreted the talks in a more positive way.
“With respect to the territorial issue, I believe we will be able to secure a positive direction,” Fukuda said after separate talks with President-elect Dmitry Medvedev at his official residence outside Moscow, Main Dorf Castle, Reuters reported.
Kazuo Kodama, a Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman, told reporters late Saturday that Fukuda and Putin had agreed to “issue fresh directives” to their governments to expedite talks on the islands to elevate bilateral ties to a new dimension. Kodama did not elaborate, and it was unclear whether the agreement between the outgoing Russian leader and the Japanese prime minister, whose support at home is faltering, would bear any fruit.
Japan has said it wants back all four islands — Kunashir, Iturup, Shikotan and Habomai — but Moscow is not ready to give them up. Tokyo maintains that a peace treaty should be in place for ties to be taken to a new level.
But some Russian observers believe no peace treaty is needed because economic ties are booming anyway.
“In the great scheme of things, Russia doesn’t need the peace treaty,” said Valery Vinogradov, the point man on Japan within the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, the big business lobby group. “It wouldn’t change anything in the current state of affairs,” he said.
In the most recent example of increased cooperation, the governments agreed Saturday to cooperate on oil and gas exploration in eastern Siberia in the first project of its kind, said Kodama, the Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman.
Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corp. and Russia’s Irkutsk Oil will jointly explore oil and gas deposits 1,000 kilometers north of Irkutsk and 150 kilometers from the East Siberia-Pacific Ocean oil pipeline, which is under construction, the Japanese company said in a statement. The two companies have set up a joint venture in which the Russians have a 51 percent stake. They will jointly invest 10 billion yen ($96 million) in the project, which will initially span five years, Kodama said.
Trade between the two countries grew about 65 percent to $20.1 billion last year, and Japanese total investment totaled $3.1 billion as of late 2007, according to Kremlin figures.
In March, state-owned nuclear energy company Atomenergoprom and Toshiba agreed to build power plants and produce atomic-reactor fuel.
Several Japanese carmakers, including Toyota, Suzuki and Nissan, have built or are building plants here. Oil deliveries from Sakhalin to Japan totaled 6.8 million tons last year, and deliveries of liquefied natural gas to Japan will start no later than 2009, the Kremlin said.
Kodama said the conclusion of the peace treaty was needed, and its absence was a reason why an agreement to develop the Far East and Siberia had not gotten very far.
The Japanese government appeared to interpret the choice of the Novo-Ogaryovo residence for the meeting as a positive sign. “It’s indeed the first time that the Japanese prime minister was invited to the official residence of a Russian president, “ Kodama said. “The prime minister appreciated such a gesture.”
Putin and Fukuda were initially scheduled to meet at the Kremlin.
Putin has held numerous meetings at Novo-Ogaryovo, and he presided over a Security Council meeting here immediately before his talks with Fukuda on Saturday.
In other issues, Russia and Japan agreed to “drastically” expand youth exchanges to 500 people a year and cooperate on climate change after the Kyoto Protocol ends in 2012. Fukuda also “requested to exercise Russia’s influence over North Korea on all issues, including the issue of abduction” of Japanese citizens, Kodama said.
Fukuda’s meeting and a subsequent lunch with Putin lasted for two hours, and the talks with Medvedev went for about an hour. Before his meetings with the Russian leaders, Fukuda visited a Japanese festival at a Moscow school where the students showed off their knowledge of Japanese and sang songs for him, Kodama said.
Monday, April 28, 2008
2008: April 28th Good News (Retired Carpenter Offers Hot Soup to Homeless, Gene Therapy Aid's Youth's Sight, more...)
Good Morning All,
Well, there were a lot of articles today. :) That always makes my day. One article, which came out yesterday was so good that, I stuck it in Today's Top 5. That rarely happens, because I usually feel that the top 5 should be the most current news available. But this particular piece was about a teenager who was the third person in the world to recieve a special kind of eye surgery to restore his sight. That article was so cool it almost made it to number one. However, in the end I decided that the most heartwarming story was the Seattle story about a retired carpenter feeding the homeless.
I hope that you enjoy today's good news. :) Please feel free to comment below, share your thoughts, and or pass the news along. I love it when I hear from someone that they got an article sent to them by a friend from here. Have a great day everyone, and I'll see you tomorrow!
Today's Top 5:
1. Retired Carpenter Offers Hot Soup, Warm Smile to Homeless on Seattle's Capitol Hill (Seattle Times)
2. Gene Therapy 'Aids Youth's Sight' (BBC UK)
3. Philippines Helps Poor with Cheap Rice (Las Vegas Sun)
4. Irish Charity Helps Build Schools for Aids Orphans (Irish Independent)
5. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon Leads Battle to Feed World's Poor (France 24)
Honorable Mentions:
1. Surefire Gas Cost-cutter: Drive Slower (San Fransisco Chronicles)
2. Young Vegas Rockers Out to Change the World (Las Vegas Sun)
3. Alaska Reaches Organ and Tissue Donation Milestone (Red Orbit)
4. Technological Breakthrough in Fight to Cut Greenhouse Gases (Science Daily)
Today's Top 5:
1. Retired Carpenter Offers Hot Soup, Warm Smile to Homeless on Seattle's Capitol Hill
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004377860_homeless28m.html
Monday, April 28, 2008 -
Page updated at 12:00 AM
By Elizabeth Rhodes
Seattle Times staff reporter
Bill Pond parks his pickup twice a week on Broadway Avenue East near a boarded-up Jack in the Box. There, he offers chicken soup, egg-salad sandwiches and juice to the homeless. The retired carpenter pays for it out of his own pocket, collecting and recycling aluminum cans to help offset some of the cost.
Bill Pond's friendly manner is appreciated by the homeless he encounters on Capitol Hill. "There aren't many people that nonjudgmental, who show that much kindness," says Eli Kington, left.Lining up Sunday for steaming bowls of free chicken soup, Bill Pond's customers sensed this stranger with the flowing beard was more interested in feeding them than stigmatizing them as homeless.
It showed as Pond, a retired carpenter, ladled the hot liquid from a kettle on the tailgate of his green truck parked on Capitol Hill's Broadway Avenue East.
"You're broke?" he repeated to a man who sheepishly confessed he had no money to pay. "Then have some more soup."
Squatting nearby, Eli Kington flashed an appreciative smile as he ate.
" 'If it wasn't for him, people would be hungry,' said Kington, 21, who says he's been on the street since he was about 13. "There aren't many people that nonjudgmental, who show that much kindness."
Indeed, in a county with an estimated 2,600 homeless people, Bill Pond stands out. While there are more than 40 programs to feed the homeless, Pond's is one of the few to be run — and paid for — by an individual rather than a church or social-service agency.
It's also one of the few on Capitol Hill, an area popular with street youth.
"There's always that little niche that needs to be filled," says Fe Arreola, head of emergency food programs for the Seattle Human Services Department. "I think it's wonderful he's doing that."
Ironically, Bill Pond's soup service began about 18 months ago when he rejected an overture from a street person.
Eating a hamburger at Dick's Drive-In on Broadway, Pond was approached for spare change.
He responded with a counter offer. How about a burger instead?
"I decided I'd feed him because I didn't want to give him money; I didn't know what he would do with it," he recalls.
The man gratefully accepted, gobbled down the burger, then another, and Pond's one-man feeding program began.
Only store-bought burgers were out as too expensive. Instead, Pond mulled over issues of quantity and cost and chose homemade soup.
So he made a big pot and returned to Capitol Hill. In an hour it was gone. Then Pond got really serious, buying a 16-quart pot and getting a food-handler's license, just in case anyone asked, and began buying chickens, rice and vegetables for his soup in bulk.
He expanded his menu to add egg-salad sandwiches, small juice drinks and individual bags of chips.
Always, Pond dug deep into his pocket to pay. Soon the initial dozen customers turned into the 50 to 60 who now await him.
He's at the same location, 100 Broadway East in front of a defunct Jack in the Box restaurant, every Wednesday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 6 p.m.
It costs Pond about $35 per night, which he partially funds by collecting and recycling aluminum cans.
Many who feed the homeless do so out of religious obligation, but Pond says that's not him. His motivation, he says, is straightforward:
"I'm just really happy inside doing this. It just makes me feel really good. It's my way of giving back. I've never been homeless, but I've been down so I know how these people feel."
Pond's son, Will, helps his dad distribute the food and says he's not surprised by his father's generosity.
"He's always been a real giving guy," the younger Pond says. "He's just generous with everything he has."
Lately Pond senior has been passing out used clothing collected by Pond junior.
Still, the father has his limits. Early on, he located his mobile kitchen in downtown Seattle, only to quickly pull up stakes when customers responded with rudeness.
That doesn't happen on Capitol Hill, he says. The crowd, mostly younger men, "are really friendly, really appreciative. It just breaks your heart."
Nearby shopkeepers have been cordial, too, he says; some have even contributed soup ingredients.
Pond doesn't ask his customers why they're homeless, nor does he try to verify they are. He suspects about 70 percent are living on the street, but it's a respect thing, he says, not to pry.
Pond has never solicited financial donations from the homeless or the public. But concerned that "it's getting really expensive," he says he's open to donations of soup and sandwich ingredients. He can be contacted at 206-244-8521.
Or just look for the guy parked beside a boarded-up Jack in the Box dishing up soup and getting grateful smiles in return.
"Someone willing to give free grub to people in need is a good thing; I think he's a good guy," said Shade Allen yesterday, filling his stomach with warm soup as rain began to fall.
2. Gene Therapy 'Aids Youth's Sight'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7369740.stm
Page last updated at 21:24 GMT
Sunday, 27 April 2008 22:24 UK
By Pallab Ghosh
BBC science correspondent
A 18-year-old whose sight was failing has had his vision improved in a pioneering operation carried out by doctors at Moorfields Eye Hospital.
The London researchers used gene therapy to regenerate the dying cells in Steven Howarth's right eye.
As a result he can now confidently walk alone in darkened rooms and streets for the first time.
Steven, from Bolton, is the third person to have the operation - doctors expect better results in future cases.
Before the procedure, he could hardly see at all at night and in time he would have lost his sight completely.
Confidence
His condition - Lebers congenital amaurosis - was due to a faulty gene that meant that the light-detecting cells at the back of his eye were damaged and slowly degenerating further.
RETINAL GENE THERAPY -STEP BY STEP The operation involves injecting fluid with missing gene within a modified virus into the eye. A fine needle (cannula) is passed through the front of the eye and across the vitreous gel. The cannula is pushed through the retina, light sensitive tissue that lines the back of the eye. The fluid is injected beneath the retina, causing it to detach from the underlying pigment layer. Cells in the pigment layer absorb the fluid and the retina returns to its normal position. The virus infects cells of pigment layer, supplying the gene required for normal sight.BACKNEXT1 of 6But, in a delicate operation, surgeons at Moorfields injected working copies of the gene into the back of Steven's eye.
After a few months, doctors detected some improvements.
But Steven did not notice these changes until he confidently strode through a dimly-lit maze designed to test his vision.
Until then he had kept walking into walls - and it would take him nearly a minute to walk a few feet.
His doctors were shocked at the improvement.
Professor Robin Ali, of the Institute for Ophthalmology, who led the trial, said: "To get this indication after only three patients is hugely exciting.
"I find it difficult to remember being as excited as I am today about our science and what it might achieve."
'Cracks in the pavement'
The operation gave Steven the confidence to try out his improved night-time vision on the streets near his home in Bolton.
Before he had only been able to see the bright lights of passing cars, street lamps and brightly-lit buildings but, to his amazement, he found he could see beyond the bright lights. For the first time he could see the cracks on the pavement, the edge of the curb and markings on the street.
He recently began walking home late at night from the railway station.
James Bainbridge, the consultant surgeon who carried out the operation, said: "It's hugely rewarding and exciting to see that this new treatment can have this impact on a person's quality of life."
'To not have to worry about losing my sight is great'Steven also says that it has really helped his confidence.
He is now able to socialise more late at night with his friends. And, as an aspiring musician, he says he can see the frets on his guitar better - and can move around more on a darkened stage.
There may well be further improvements. But without the operation it was likely that Steven would have lost his sight altogether.
The prospect made him depressed. Now he says he can get on with his life.
"When I used to think about it, it would get me really down and depressed. But now I don't have to think about it. It's a big burden lifted."
Child sight hope
The gene therapy has not improved the vision of the other two patients who have received it so far - but it may well stop their vision from declining further.
Robert Johnson was the first person to undergo the operation, as reported by BBC News in May 2007.
He welcomed the results so far: "For the team, I am thrilled that their hard work has come off.
This is only the beginning
James BainbridgeSurgeon
"For me - I am simply pleased that I left what I entered with - a level of sight that gives me my freedom. What more could I ask for?"
Professor Ali said that the team now hoped to treat children: "The next stage is to increase the dose of the gene which we anticipate will improve the outcome - and it's also to treat younger patients, who have better residual vision and in whom we expect to see a much greater benefit."
Although the genetic condition that is being treated is rare, the researchers believe that their technique could be used to treat a wide variety of sight disorders, possibly even age-related sight loss.
Mr Bainbridge added: "This is only the beginning.
"What we've demonstrated so far is proof of principle that gene therapy can be used to treat a particular gene disorder."
The research, which has been funded by the Department of Health, has been published online in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Health Minister Dawn Primarolo said: "This is absolutely brilliant.
"It's been done here in the UK with the expertise of the NHS and the science and research of the Department of Health all coming together to offer such hope for gene therapy for the correction of sight - but also for gene therapy generally."
David Head, of the British Retinitis Pigmentosa Society, thanked Professor Ali and his team for their "outstanding" work.
He said: "Of course, we must temper our excitement and enthusiasm with an acknowledgement that these are very early days, and the trial is working on one flawed gene."
3. Philippines Helps Poor with Cheap Rice
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/apr/28/philippines-helps-poor-with-cheap-rice/
The Associated PressMon, Apr 28, 2008 (3:12 a.m.)
The government said it would introduce access cards for Manila's poorest residents to buy subsidized rice as food prices rise dramatically, officials said Monday.
The rice cards are intended to benefit about a third of the poorest families in the capital, according to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's administration. The government said it will separately distribute cash cards to help families in the poorest 20 of the country's 81 provinces with quick money transfers.
The measures came as Arroyo's administration moved to cushion the impact of skyrocketing fuel and food prices. The Philippines has been paying record prices on international markets to make up for a 10 percent domestic shortfall of rice.
The criteria for Manilans to obtain the card is a monthly salary of $120 or less for a family of five. The card allows holders to buy subsidized rice from specialized stores for the poor, called in Tagalog "Our Store." The limit is 31 pounds per week.
Cardholders will pay 42 cents per 2.2 pounds of the subsidized rice, compared with 83 cents for commercially available rice, Social Welfare Secretary Esperanza Cabral said.
It was not clear exactly when the cards will go into effect.
"The objective is to really help the poor," said Social Welfare Undersecretary Celia Yanco. "If they have to compete with those with money they'll really have a hard life."
A separate cash-transfer card, which will be given to 300,000 poorest families in provinces, will include $12 a month plus $7 for every child who logs at least 85 percent class attendance, Cabral said.
Rice topped $1,000 per ton on the international market this month _ triple the price from January _ and the government said it has so far contracted about half of 2.1 million tons of rice it plans to import this year.
The National Food Authority, the state-run grain importer, plans to hold a fifth tender this year on May 5 for more than 500,000 tons of rice.
Thailand, the world's largest exporter, said Friday it will not restrict exports despite talk of a shortage. Some Asian countries, including India and Vietnam, recently suspended rice exports to guarantee their own supplies.
Arroyo has declared war on rice hoarders, who have been blamed for creating artificial shortages, and promised to improve distribution and invest $1 billion to boost production.
About 40 percent of Filipinos live on less than $2 a day, and about 13 percent _ or 11 million _ survive on less than $1 a day.
Meanwhile, Malaysia's government plans to subsidize locally grown rice to prevent consumers from being hit by record high prices, a Cabinet minister said Monday.
"The government wants to assure the lower income group that local rice will remain affordable to them," Shahrir Samad, the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs minister, told reporters.
Malaysia grows about 65 to 70 percent of the rice its people consume, while the rest is imported, mainly from Thailand. With the price of Thai rice nearly tripling in the last 18 months, the government expects consumers to switch to local rice, whose price _ so far steady _ is expected to rise.
On Sunday, Vietnam's prime minister warned rice speculators they face severe punishment after rocketing prices led to panic buying over the weekend.
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung insisted supplies in Vietnam _ the world's second-largest rice exporter after Thailand _ would be enough for domestic consumption, according to state media reports.
But he warned that any organizations and individuals speculating in the commodity would be "severely punished."
Crowds of people flocked to rice markets Sunday in Ho Chi Minh City, the country's largest, to stock up on the grain.
The rice cards are intended to benefit about a third of the poorest families in the capital, according to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's administration. The government said it will separately distribute cash cards to help families in the poorest 20 of the country's 81 provinces with quick money transfers.
The measures came as Arroyo's administration moved to cushion the impact of skyrocketing fuel and food prices. The Philippines has been paying record prices on international markets to make up for a 10 percent domestic shortfall of rice.
The criteria for Manilans to obtain the card is a monthly salary of $120 or less for a family of five. The card allows holders to buy subsidized rice from specialized stores for the poor, called in Tagalog "Our Store." The limit is 31 pounds per week.
Cardholders will pay 42 cents per 2.2 pounds of the subsidized rice, compared with 83 cents for commercially available rice, Social Welfare Secretary Esperanza Cabral said.
It was not clear exactly when the cards will go into effect.
"The objective is to really help the poor," said Social Welfare Undersecretary Celia Yanco. "If they have to compete with those with money they'll really have a hard life."
A separate cash-transfer card, which will be given to 300,000 poorest families in provinces, will include $12 a month plus $7 for every child who logs at least 85 percent class attendance, Cabral said.
Rice topped $1,000 per ton on the international market this month — triple the price from January — and the government said it has so far contracted about half of 2.1 million tons of rice it plans to import this year.
The National Food Authority, the state-run grain importer, plans to hold a fifth tender this year on May 5 for more than 500,000 tons of rice.
Thailand, the world's largest exporter, said Friday it will not restrict exports despite talk of a shortage. Some Asian countries, including India and Vietnam, recently suspended rice exports to guarantee their own supplies.
Arroyo has declared war on rice hoarders, who have been blamed for creating artificial shortages, and promised to improve distribution and invest $1 billion to boost production.
About 40 percent of Filipinos live on less than $2 a day, and about 13 percent — or 11 million — survive on less than $1 a day.
Meanwhile, Malaysia's government plans to subsidize locally grown rice to prevent consumers from being hit by record high prices, a Cabinet minister said Monday.
"The government wants to assure the lower income group that local rice will remain affordable to them," Shahrir Samad, the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs minister, told reporters.
Malaysia grows about 65 to 70 percent of the rice its people consume, while the rest is imported, mainly from Thailand. With the price of Thai rice nearly tripling in the last 18 months, the government expects consumers to switch to local rice, whose price — so far steady — is expected to rise.
On Sunday, Vietnam's prime minister warned rice speculators they face severe punishment after rocketing prices led to panic buying over the weekend.
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung insisted supplies in Vietnam — the world's second-largest rice exporter after Thailand — would be enough for domestic consumption, according to state media reports.
But he warned that any organizations and individuals speculating in the commodity would be "severely punished."
Crowds of people flocked to rice markets Sunday in Ho Chi Minh City, the country's largest, to stock up on the grain.
4. Irish Charity Helps Build Schools for Aids Orphans
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/irish-charity-helps-build-schools-for-aids-orphans-1360969.html
By Senan Hogan
Monday April 28 2008
An Irish charity has helped construct school buildings for children orphaned by Aids in Zambia.
A group of volunteers from Co Kildare-based organisation, Touch Ireland, spent the past three weeks working on the project outside Lusaka, the capital of the African country.
Parents of some of the school's pupils, who live in a nearby mud hut village, have already died of Aids.
Head teacher at the St Patrick's School in Mapepe, Alice Hanjuwa said: "About one-quarter of the pupils have lost either a mother or father to Aids while six have lost both parents."
Ms Hanjuwa added: "However, they are good students and want to learn. If this school wasn't here they would have to walk for miles to the next school or not go to school at all."
Up to 15 construction workers and volunteers from Leitrim, Roscommon, Kildare and Dublin helped fundraise and build the school buildings.
Eileen McGowan from Boyle, Co Roscommon said her local Touch Ireland group raised thousands of euro from a variety of fundraising initiatives.
She said: "Two children even handed over some of their Confirmation money.''
Funding was also raised for the Guardian Angels Community School in nearby Chilanga to purchase a water pump.
Touch Ireland is currently involved in projects constructing schools and orphanages in five countries including Zambia, Cameroon, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka.
5. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon Leads Battle to Feed World's Poor
http://www.france24.com/en/20080428-ban-ki-moon-will-fight-feed-poor-un-food-crisis
Monday 28 April 2008
The UN will meet in Bern on Monday to discuss plans to combat rising food prices worldwide, as the Food and Agriculture Organisation warns that 37 poor countries are facing an emergency.
Special Report
General Ban Ki-moon was set Monday to lead a concerted effort by 27 key UN agencies to tackle the growing crisis caused by a worldwide sharp rise in basic foodstuff prices. The UN was scheduled at a two-day conference in the Swiss capital Bern to reveal a battle plan of emergency measures, while exploring other longer-term measures to solve the world's food crisis. This will involve adjudicating between advocates of protectionism and those who favour opening up markets, as well as between supporters of biofuels and opponents thereof.
Rising populations, strong demand from developing countries, increased cultivation of crops for biofuels and increasing floods and droughts have sent food prices soaring across the globe.
"The world food crisis and the solutions that the United Nations can provide will be at the centre of discussions," said the UN. The talks hosted by Ban will take place behind closed doors at the Universal Postal Union headquarters in Bern, lasting all day Monday and Tuesday morning.
Results of the deliberations are expected Tuesday when Ban Ki-moon gives a press conference flanked by Josette Sheeran, Executive Director of the UN's World Food Programme, World Bank President Robert Zoellick, Jacques Diouf, head of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), and Lennart Bage, President of the International Fund for Agriculture Development.
The FAO has warned that sharp rises in cereal prices have left 37 poor countries in an emergency situation sparking food riots. Ban Ki-moon called in Vienna on Friday for immediate concerted action to resolve the global food crisis. "In the short term, we must address all the humanitarian crises which have been impacting poorest of poor pople in the world," he said.
The World Food Programme had made an urgent appeal for additional 755 million dollars (485 million euros) to fill the gap. But in the medium to longer term, "the international community and its leaders in particular should sit down together on an urgent basis and address how we can first of all improve the economic system, the distribution systems, as well as how we can promote new production of agricultural products".
"The steeply rising price of food has developed into a real global crisis," Ban told journalists in Vienna. "The United Nations is very much concerned, as all other members of the international community are. We must take immediate action in a concerted way throughout the international community."
Ban estimated that around 100 million of the world's poorest who previously did not require help now can not afford to buy food. The World Trade Organisation, whose Director-General Pascal Lamy will also attend the Bern talks, says the food crisis reinforces the need to open up world markets.
"Agricultural subsidies by rich countries have destroyed the agriculture of poor countries," a spokesman told AFP. "A more open system will be less subject to distortion."
The UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) is also seeking a rapid conclusion to current world negotiations in the framework of the Doha Round.
The head of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), Juan Somavia, has warned against the danger of seeking only temporary solutions to the latest crisis, saying this would only mean a return to the original problem in a world in which globalisation would not benefit the world at large. Dominique Strauss-Kahn,head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), has criticised protectionism and the use of foodstuffs to make biofuels, and called for a reform of world coordination of agricultural policy.
Honorable Mentions:
1. Surefire Gas Cost-cutter: Drive Slower
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/04/28/MN9H10BFRS.DTL&tsp=1
Michael Cabanatuan, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, April 28, 2008
While gas prices at or near $4 a gallon have persuaded some Bay Area motorists to take public transit, join carpools or curse the oil companies, the high cost of fuel has moved few drivers to practice a proven gas-saver - driving slower.
A Chronicle reporter circumnavigated the bay last week - with the cruise control set at 59 mph - and found little company in the slow lane.
In 111 miles of freeway driving during noncommute hours, he passed just 118 slower-moving vehicles. And on some stretches of freeway - most notably Interstate 80 between the MacArthur Maze in Oakland and Vallejo - almost nobody was driving slower than 60 mph.
"When I'm (driving 55) consciously, I look around and see that it's just me," said Jawahar Swaminathan, 31, who drives regularly on Interstate 80 between his home in Richmond and his job in San Francisco. "Even the truck drivers are pulling around me to pass."
Still, scientists and fuel efficiency experts say that for most cars, driving slower pays.
"It can make a big difference," said Patricia Monahan, deputy director of clean vehicles for the Union of Concerned Scientists. "If you like to really accelerate fast, if you have a lead foot, that can have a really big impact on fuel economy."
Most cars get the best mileage between 45 and 55 mph, Monahan said. As speeds creep higher, fuel efficiency drops. For every mile per hour over 60 mph, she said, fuel economy drops by an average of around 1 percent.
"Going 65 is really lowering your fuel efficiency," she said. "And it gets worse at 75."
How much you stand to save depends on a lot of factors. With gas at $4 a gallon, a driver with a long commute - 400 miles a week - and a gas-guzzling vehicle getting only 20 mpg would save $18.74 a week by slowing down dramatically from 75 to 55 mph, extrapolating from the government's most recent figures on the subject. Even a more moderate deceleration - from 70 to 60 mph - would save that driver $11.74 a week.
In contrast, a commuter who started with a smaller carbon footprint - driving 100 miles a week in a car getting 30 mpg - would stand to save only a few dollars a week by slowing down.
The estimates are rough at best. The U.S. Department of Transportation last studied the effect of speed on fuel efficiency in 1997, and its results were based on a fleet of nine vehicles manufactured between 1988 and 1997 - hardly what's on the road today. "Unfortunately this analysis has not been done over, to my knowledge, in the last 10 years," said Monahan's colleague at the Union of Concerned Scientists, senior engineer Jim Kliesch.
Still, the results are striking. Slowing from 70 to 60 mph improved average fuel efficiency by 17.2 percent. A big slowdown - from 75 to 55 mph - improved fuel efficiency by a whopping 30.6 percent.
The need to conserve gasoline is why, in 1974, in the wake of the Arab oil embargo and ensuing fuel shortage, President Richard Nixon ordered the speed limit nationally to be lowered to 55 mph. The limit was lifted to 65 mph in some areas in the late 1980s, and the 55 mph national speed limit was entirely discarded in 1995. And except in backed-up traffic, few motorists have driven that slowly since.
The Chronicle's drive around the bay last week found that even $4 a gallon gas prices haven't persuaded many Bay Area drivers to ease off the gas pedal and save a few bucks.
Driving a Chronicle-issued Chevy Malibu, this reporter hopped on southbound Highway 101 in downtown San Francisco, settled into the slow lane going 59 mph and started counting the cars he passed - which took a while.
Even in the 50 mph zone through downtown, nobody was driving slower than 60. It took a couple miles of driving to tally the first slow-moving fuel saver.
The drive around the bay went south on 101 to San Jose, north on Interstate 880 to the MacArthur Maze in Oakland, north and east on Interstate 80 to Vallejo, across Highway 37 to Novato and south on Highway 101 back to San Francisco. The drive was made in noncommute hours, and traffic was mostly free-flowing. Only freeway driving was counted.
Drivers traveling slower than 60 mph were scarce all around the bay. But they were hardest to find on I-80 from Emeryville to Vallejo, where the Malibu passed just four vehicles.
Slower on 101Slower drivers were most common across the bay on Highway 101. From Novato to the north end of the Golden Gate Bridge, 49 drivers were traveling slower than 60 mph. Between San Francisco and San Jose on 101, 38 drivers were passed.
On I-880 from San Jose to Emeryville, 27 drivers were moving slower than 60 mph.
Even at 59 mph, it seemed like the Chronicle car was standing still - especially on wide freeways such as I-880 where cars whizzed by in all lanes. Nobody honked, shook their fists or raised any fingers, but several drivers zipped right up to the rear bumper before suddenly swerving to pass. It wasn't clear whether those moves were the result of inattention or attempts at intimidation.
It's a behavior that fuel-conscious drivers have to get used to, say Bay Area residents who have pulled into the slow lane to save gas costs.
"It's scary, and it can be unsafe if you don't know how to drive defensively," said Swaminathan, who's been driving 55 since moving a year ago to the Bay Area from New Jersey, where gas is much cheaper. "A lot of people try to look into the car. I think they expect to see a grandma driving."
Linda Winter-Meiberg, 67, of Tiburon drives to Sacramento once a week to visit her mother. A few weeks ago, she decided to slow down from 72 mph, which is probably an average speed on that stretch of I-80, to 59 mph.
The move has cut her weekly gas bill from $40 to $35 - even as gas prices have risen.
"I try to be courteous by driving in the slowest lane," she said, "but I still get plenty of dirty looks and a lot of people honking at me. I kidded my husband, saying I was going to put up a sign in the rear window saying, 'Drive slower, save gas.' "
But some drivers don't want to ease up on the gas. They say it's unsafe, that their time is more valuable - or that it takes the fun out of driving.
"I won't do it," said George Steffner, 63, a retired engineer who lives in Moraga and tries to conserve by combining short trips. "I didn't do it when it was the law. To tell you the truth, I like going at higher speeds. I feel safer. And I have other ways of saving fuel."
2. Young Vegas Rockers Out to Change the World
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/apr/28/young-vegas-rockers-out-change-world/
By Joe Brown
Mon, Apr 28, 2008 (2 a.m.)
Fans watch as bassist Adam Knaff -- known professionally as Bomb - tunes up at the Extreme Thing festival in Desert Breeze Park. He's the brother of lead singer Brandon Knaff, who taught him to play after a "random guy" Brandon was starting a band with didn't work out.Sun ArchivesVenue options for local bands limited (1-07-2005) Beyond the SunSongs by Think Teenage girls cluster at the lip of the outdoor stage as if they have been attracted by some invisible signal, or have texted one another: CUTE BAND ALERT! More girls show up, then more.
Setting up onstage is a local rock band, five guys who glance at their audience with studied nonchalance.
“We’re called Think,” says the lead singer, just before they plug in and play.
After just a song or two, teenage guys are heading toward the stage, too. And they’re all listening.
If you are looking for the next big thing to come out of Las Vegas, the next Killers or Panic at the Disco, these kids may have found it.
Think is a young Las Vegas band that has just about everything it takes to go the distance — looks, charisma, an original sound, ambition, work ethic, musical genes and connections.
Lead singer Brandon Knaff brings to mind Roger Daltry, Bob Dylan and Jeff Buckley all at once. And the other guys are just as camera-ready. MTV-watchers will eat them up.
They have original songs, an energetic, melodic funk-pop sound, top-line instruments and a rehearsal room that would be the envy of any rock star.
They know someone: The Vegas-based production team of dancer/choreographer Cris Judd and songwriter Darren Sher recorded and produced Think’s self-released first CD, “Odyssey,” which will be available on iTunes soon.
And it doesn’t hurt that the music industry is suddenly paying attention to the Las Vegas music scene because of the commercial success of The Killers and Panic at the Disco.
Play that funky music
With their charisma and stage presence alone, the guys in Think have a big head start on many local bands. And they can really play. Guitarist Phillip Seaton, 19, has Johnny Marr’s knack for versatility, handling melody, rhythm and eloquent solos that evoke his heroes Jimmy Page, Slash and Brian May, without once sounding imitative. Bomb, 16, takes a Paul McCartney-style approach to the bass, playing it as a melodic lead instrument, breaking out a finger-popping style on the band’s frequently funky songs. Keyboard player Sam Riddle, 20, is a solid musician, and the energy surges when he joins Knaff at the front line. Drummer Billy Carmody, 21, is an inventive player who can hit hard — it’s not an exaggeration to say he conjures John Bonham. And singer Knaff, 19, with his halo of curls and effortless grace, sounds as good as he looks.
Think big, think different
“Since we started the band, we want to change the world with what we’re doing,” says Seaton. “Like the John Lennons, like the Jimi Hendrixes. We want to make a dent in this music industry and bring it out of all the (crud) that people are listening to. We want to go from this (rehearsal) room to playing worldwide.”
The others chime in with all the strugglingly articulate earnestness and bravado of young mean who really mean it.
“The song ‘Day to Day,’ we all wrote that against drugs,” Knaff says. “Against the common teenager drug-alcohol-party kind of thing.
“Our songs also talk about common things that all humans go through,” he adds. “Relationships, having fun, apologies, the city ...”
“Sex,” adds Bomb, who always seems ready to supply the punch line.
(This story has been shortened. For the full length article, please visit the URL provided above.)
3. Alaska Reaches Organ and Tissue Donation Milestone
http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1360267/alaska_reaches_organ_and_tissue_donation_milestone/index.html?source=r_health
Posted on: Sunday, 27 April 2008, 15:00 CDT
By Carly Horton, Alaska
Journal of Commerce, Anchorage
Apr. 27--Gov. Sarah Palin announced April 11 that more than half of Alaska's roughly 670,000 residents have registered as organ and tissue donors.
Bruce Zalneraitis, CEO of Life Alaska Donor Services, said Alaska is the second state to make the distinction; Utah was the first.
"But Alaska is tremendous," Zalneraitis said. "We've reached the 50 percent point sooner than any other state that has a registry."
That's no easy feat for a state with 1 person per square mile (the U.S. average is about 80) where traditional means of communication are often not available. Case in point: Less than 70 percent of Alaska households have Internet access, according to statistics provided by the Census Bureau, and most people who are organ donors in other states register online, Zalneraitis said.
Alaska has bypassed the hurdle many other states face by setting up a donor registry through the state Department of Motor Vehicles. Zalneraitis said 98 percent of organ donors register through the DMV.
"Alaska was a state that had progressive legislation in this area," Zalneraitis said. "From many years of research, we know most people want to be donors. But most people aren't doing anything -- we don't think about death and dying on a daily basis. The registry makes it simple and effective.
"When you get your license or renew it, it's done -- all the information is already in the computer. You don't have to go online, fill out forms and mail anything in. That's the biggest thing about the registry: It makes it easy for people to look up (their information), to renew it. Once you're in, you can make all those choices."
Once they've registered, Alaskans can rest assured their wishes will be carried out after their death. According to Zalneraitis, Alaska has first-person consent, meaning organ donor registration "is a legal binding agreement. It cannot be revoked by other people; it survives your death."
First-person consent also removes the burden from family members of deciding what to do with your body, Zalneraitis said.
Nearly 100,000 people in the U.S. are awaiting organ donation. Of those, roughly 75 percent need kidneys. Heart, liver, pancreas, lung and small intestine transplants are also becoming increasingly common. Approximately 18 people per day die waiting for organs.
Zalneraitis said anyone can become an organ donor, but an intensive screening process prior to surgery is performed "so we know the organ is safe and will function properly when it goes to the recipient."
He said the number of people who can donate is actually relatively small. Most viable organs come from young, healthy people involved in fatal accidents. Because potential organ donors must be at least 18 years of age to register without parental consent, Life Alaska Donor Services travels to middle schools and high schools throughout the state encouraging young people to register as organ donors.
"It's always important to let your wishes be known to your family members, regardless of age," Zalneraitis said.
In Alaska and across the U.S., there is an urgent need for organ donation from racial minorities. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, some diseases of the kidney, heart, lung, pancreas and liver are found more frequently in racial and ethnic minority populations than in the general population.
African Americans, Asians and Pacific Islanders and Hispanics are three times more likely than Caucasians to suffer from end-stage kidney disease, often as the result of high blood pressure and other conditions that can damage the kidneys. Native Americans are four times more likely than Caucasians to suffer from diabetes.
In addition, similar blood type is essential in matching donors to recipients. Because certain blood types are more common in ethnic minority populations, increasing the number of minority donors can increase the frequency of minority transplants.
Native Alaskans and American Indians comprise over 15 percent of the state's total population, and Zalneraitis said there is a concerted effort by his organization to encourage this segment of the population to sign up for organ donation.
Among racial minorities there are often cultural issues and misunderstandings that prevent them from becoming organ donors, he said.
"There's often a fear of or bad experiences with medicine in general, so it does follow they would be reluctant to donate," he said. "We've learned over the years to dispel myths and address cultural concerns ? (and) been able to increase consent in minorities over the years."
Ancient fears plague virtually all segments of the population, he said.
"Ancient fears have to do with wondering what happens to us after we die. ?My loved one is dead, but will it cause more suffering if his kidney's taken out?' It's not rational, not logical, but the fear itself is totally real," he said. "We have to learn to address those fears in a sympathetic way."
On the Web: www.lifealaska.org, www.organdonor.gov
Carly Horton can be reached at carly.horton@alaskajournal.com.
4. Technological Breakthrough in Fight to Cut Greenhouse Gases
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080424103217.htmScienceDaily (Apr. 27, 2008)
Scientists at Newcastle University have pioneered breakthrough technology in the fight to cut greenhouse gases. The Newcastle University team, led by Michael North, Professor of Organic Chemistry, has developed a highly energy-efficient method of converting waste carbon dioxide (CO2) into chemical compounds known as cyclic carbonates.
The team estimates that the technology has the potential to use up to 48 million tonnes of waste CO2 per year, reducing the UK's emissions by about four per cent.
Cyclic carbonates are widely used in the manufacture of products including solvents, paint-strippers, biodegradable packaging, as well as having applications in the chemical industry. Cyclic carbonates also have potential for use in the manufacture of a new class of efficient anti-knocking agents in petrol. Anti-knocking agents make petrol burn better, increasing fuel efficiency and reducing CO2 emissions.
The conversion technique relies upon the use of a catalyst to force a chemical reaction between CO2 and an epoxide, converting waste CO2 into this cyclic carbonate, a chemical for which there is significant commercial demand.
The reaction between CO2 and epoxides is well known, but one which, until now, required a lot of energy, needing high temperatures and high pressures to work successfully. The current process also requires the use of ultra-pure CO2 , which is costly to produce.
The Newcastle team has succeeded in developing an exceptionally active catalyst, derived from aluminium, which can drive the reaction necessary to turn waste carbon dioxide into cyclic carbonates at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, vastly reducing the energy input required.
Professor North said: 'One of the main scientific challenges facing the human race in the 21st century is controlling global warming that results from increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
'One solution to this problem, currently being given serious consideration, is carbon capture and storage, which involves concentrating and compressing CO2 and then storing it,' he said. 'However, long-term storage remains to be demonstrated'.
To date, alternative solutions for converting CO2 emissions into a useful product has required a process so energy intensive that they generate more CO2 than they consume.
Professor North compares the process developed by his team to that of a catalytic converter fitted to a car. 'If our catalyst could be employed at the source of high-concentration CO2 production, for example in the exhaust stream of a fossil-fuel power station, we could take out the carbon dioxide, turn it into a commercially-valuable product and at the same time eliminate the need to store waste CO2', he said.
Professor North believes that, once it is fully developed, the technology has the potential to utilise a significant amount of the UK's CO2 emissions every year.
'To satisfy the current market for cyclic carbonates, we estimate that our technology could use up to 18 million tonnes of waste CO2 per year, and a further 30 million tonnes if it is used as an anti-knocking agent.
'Using 48 million tonnes of waste CO2 would account for about four per cent* of the UK's CO2 emissions, which is a pretty good contribution from one technology,' commented Professor North. The technique has been proven to work successfully in the lab. Professor North and his team are currently carrying out further lab-based work to optimise the efficiency of the technology, following which they plan to scale-up to a pilot plant.
* Based on 2004 figures from the UN.
The paper 'Synthesis of cyclic carbonates from atmospheric pressure carbon dioxide using exceptionally active aluminium(salen) complexes as catalysts' s been published in the European Journal of Inorganic Chemistry.
The project was funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.
Adapted from materials provided by Newcastle University.
Well, there were a lot of articles today. :) That always makes my day. One article, which came out yesterday was so good that, I stuck it in Today's Top 5. That rarely happens, because I usually feel that the top 5 should be the most current news available. But this particular piece was about a teenager who was the third person in the world to recieve a special kind of eye surgery to restore his sight. That article was so cool it almost made it to number one. However, in the end I decided that the most heartwarming story was the Seattle story about a retired carpenter feeding the homeless.
I hope that you enjoy today's good news. :) Please feel free to comment below, share your thoughts, and or pass the news along. I love it when I hear from someone that they got an article sent to them by a friend from here. Have a great day everyone, and I'll see you tomorrow!
Today's Top 5:
1. Retired Carpenter Offers Hot Soup, Warm Smile to Homeless on Seattle's Capitol Hill (Seattle Times)
2. Gene Therapy 'Aids Youth's Sight' (BBC UK)
3. Philippines Helps Poor with Cheap Rice (Las Vegas Sun)
4. Irish Charity Helps Build Schools for Aids Orphans (Irish Independent)
5. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon Leads Battle to Feed World's Poor (France 24)
Honorable Mentions:
1. Surefire Gas Cost-cutter: Drive Slower (San Fransisco Chronicles)
2. Young Vegas Rockers Out to Change the World (Las Vegas Sun)
3. Alaska Reaches Organ and Tissue Donation Milestone (Red Orbit)
4. Technological Breakthrough in Fight to Cut Greenhouse Gases (Science Daily)
Today's Top 5:
1. Retired Carpenter Offers Hot Soup, Warm Smile to Homeless on Seattle's Capitol Hill
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004377860_homeless28m.html
Monday, April 28, 2008 -
Page updated at 12:00 AM
By Elizabeth Rhodes
Seattle Times staff reporter
Bill Pond parks his pickup twice a week on Broadway Avenue East near a boarded-up Jack in the Box. There, he offers chicken soup, egg-salad sandwiches and juice to the homeless. The retired carpenter pays for it out of his own pocket, collecting and recycling aluminum cans to help offset some of the cost.
Bill Pond's friendly manner is appreciated by the homeless he encounters on Capitol Hill. "There aren't many people that nonjudgmental, who show that much kindness," says Eli Kington, left.Lining up Sunday for steaming bowls of free chicken soup, Bill Pond's customers sensed this stranger with the flowing beard was more interested in feeding them than stigmatizing them as homeless.
It showed as Pond, a retired carpenter, ladled the hot liquid from a kettle on the tailgate of his green truck parked on Capitol Hill's Broadway Avenue East.
"You're broke?" he repeated to a man who sheepishly confessed he had no money to pay. "Then have some more soup."
Squatting nearby, Eli Kington flashed an appreciative smile as he ate.
" 'If it wasn't for him, people would be hungry,' said Kington, 21, who says he's been on the street since he was about 13. "There aren't many people that nonjudgmental, who show that much kindness."
Indeed, in a county with an estimated 2,600 homeless people, Bill Pond stands out. While there are more than 40 programs to feed the homeless, Pond's is one of the few to be run — and paid for — by an individual rather than a church or social-service agency.
It's also one of the few on Capitol Hill, an area popular with street youth.
"There's always that little niche that needs to be filled," says Fe Arreola, head of emergency food programs for the Seattle Human Services Department. "I think it's wonderful he's doing that."
Ironically, Bill Pond's soup service began about 18 months ago when he rejected an overture from a street person.
Eating a hamburger at Dick's Drive-In on Broadway, Pond was approached for spare change.
He responded with a counter offer. How about a burger instead?
"I decided I'd feed him because I didn't want to give him money; I didn't know what he would do with it," he recalls.
The man gratefully accepted, gobbled down the burger, then another, and Pond's one-man feeding program began.
Only store-bought burgers were out as too expensive. Instead, Pond mulled over issues of quantity and cost and chose homemade soup.
So he made a big pot and returned to Capitol Hill. In an hour it was gone. Then Pond got really serious, buying a 16-quart pot and getting a food-handler's license, just in case anyone asked, and began buying chickens, rice and vegetables for his soup in bulk.
He expanded his menu to add egg-salad sandwiches, small juice drinks and individual bags of chips.
Always, Pond dug deep into his pocket to pay. Soon the initial dozen customers turned into the 50 to 60 who now await him.
He's at the same location, 100 Broadway East in front of a defunct Jack in the Box restaurant, every Wednesday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 6 p.m.
It costs Pond about $35 per night, which he partially funds by collecting and recycling aluminum cans.
Many who feed the homeless do so out of religious obligation, but Pond says that's not him. His motivation, he says, is straightforward:
"I'm just really happy inside doing this. It just makes me feel really good. It's my way of giving back. I've never been homeless, but I've been down so I know how these people feel."
Pond's son, Will, helps his dad distribute the food and says he's not surprised by his father's generosity.
"He's always been a real giving guy," the younger Pond says. "He's just generous with everything he has."
Lately Pond senior has been passing out used clothing collected by Pond junior.
Still, the father has his limits. Early on, he located his mobile kitchen in downtown Seattle, only to quickly pull up stakes when customers responded with rudeness.
That doesn't happen on Capitol Hill, he says. The crowd, mostly younger men, "are really friendly, really appreciative. It just breaks your heart."
Nearby shopkeepers have been cordial, too, he says; some have even contributed soup ingredients.
Pond doesn't ask his customers why they're homeless, nor does he try to verify they are. He suspects about 70 percent are living on the street, but it's a respect thing, he says, not to pry.
Pond has never solicited financial donations from the homeless or the public. But concerned that "it's getting really expensive," he says he's open to donations of soup and sandwich ingredients. He can be contacted at 206-244-8521.
Or just look for the guy parked beside a boarded-up Jack in the Box dishing up soup and getting grateful smiles in return.
"Someone willing to give free grub to people in need is a good thing; I think he's a good guy," said Shade Allen yesterday, filling his stomach with warm soup as rain began to fall.
2. Gene Therapy 'Aids Youth's Sight'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7369740.stm
Page last updated at 21:24 GMT
Sunday, 27 April 2008 22:24 UK
By Pallab Ghosh
BBC science correspondent
A 18-year-old whose sight was failing has had his vision improved in a pioneering operation carried out by doctors at Moorfields Eye Hospital.
The London researchers used gene therapy to regenerate the dying cells in Steven Howarth's right eye.
As a result he can now confidently walk alone in darkened rooms and streets for the first time.
Steven, from Bolton, is the third person to have the operation - doctors expect better results in future cases.
Before the procedure, he could hardly see at all at night and in time he would have lost his sight completely.
Confidence
His condition - Lebers congenital amaurosis - was due to a faulty gene that meant that the light-detecting cells at the back of his eye were damaged and slowly degenerating further.
RETINAL GENE THERAPY -STEP BY STEP The operation involves injecting fluid with missing gene within a modified virus into the eye. A fine needle (cannula) is passed through the front of the eye and across the vitreous gel. The cannula is pushed through the retina, light sensitive tissue that lines the back of the eye. The fluid is injected beneath the retina, causing it to detach from the underlying pigment layer. Cells in the pigment layer absorb the fluid and the retina returns to its normal position. The virus infects cells of pigment layer, supplying the gene required for normal sight.BACKNEXT1 of 6But, in a delicate operation, surgeons at Moorfields injected working copies of the gene into the back of Steven's eye.
After a few months, doctors detected some improvements.
But Steven did not notice these changes until he confidently strode through a dimly-lit maze designed to test his vision.
Until then he had kept walking into walls - and it would take him nearly a minute to walk a few feet.
His doctors were shocked at the improvement.
Professor Robin Ali, of the Institute for Ophthalmology, who led the trial, said: "To get this indication after only three patients is hugely exciting.
"I find it difficult to remember being as excited as I am today about our science and what it might achieve."
'Cracks in the pavement'
The operation gave Steven the confidence to try out his improved night-time vision on the streets near his home in Bolton.
Before he had only been able to see the bright lights of passing cars, street lamps and brightly-lit buildings but, to his amazement, he found he could see beyond the bright lights. For the first time he could see the cracks on the pavement, the edge of the curb and markings on the street.
He recently began walking home late at night from the railway station.
James Bainbridge, the consultant surgeon who carried out the operation, said: "It's hugely rewarding and exciting to see that this new treatment can have this impact on a person's quality of life."
'To not have to worry about losing my sight is great'Steven also says that it has really helped his confidence.
He is now able to socialise more late at night with his friends. And, as an aspiring musician, he says he can see the frets on his guitar better - and can move around more on a darkened stage.
There may well be further improvements. But without the operation it was likely that Steven would have lost his sight altogether.
The prospect made him depressed. Now he says he can get on with his life.
"When I used to think about it, it would get me really down and depressed. But now I don't have to think about it. It's a big burden lifted."
Child sight hope
The gene therapy has not improved the vision of the other two patients who have received it so far - but it may well stop their vision from declining further.
Robert Johnson was the first person to undergo the operation, as reported by BBC News in May 2007.
He welcomed the results so far: "For the team, I am thrilled that their hard work has come off.
This is only the beginning
James BainbridgeSurgeon
"For me - I am simply pleased that I left what I entered with - a level of sight that gives me my freedom. What more could I ask for?"
Professor Ali said that the team now hoped to treat children: "The next stage is to increase the dose of the gene which we anticipate will improve the outcome - and it's also to treat younger patients, who have better residual vision and in whom we expect to see a much greater benefit."
Although the genetic condition that is being treated is rare, the researchers believe that their technique could be used to treat a wide variety of sight disorders, possibly even age-related sight loss.
Mr Bainbridge added: "This is only the beginning.
"What we've demonstrated so far is proof of principle that gene therapy can be used to treat a particular gene disorder."
The research, which has been funded by the Department of Health, has been published online in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Health Minister Dawn Primarolo said: "This is absolutely brilliant.
"It's been done here in the UK with the expertise of the NHS and the science and research of the Department of Health all coming together to offer such hope for gene therapy for the correction of sight - but also for gene therapy generally."
David Head, of the British Retinitis Pigmentosa Society, thanked Professor Ali and his team for their "outstanding" work.
He said: "Of course, we must temper our excitement and enthusiasm with an acknowledgement that these are very early days, and the trial is working on one flawed gene."
3. Philippines Helps Poor with Cheap Rice
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/apr/28/philippines-helps-poor-with-cheap-rice/
The Associated PressMon, Apr 28, 2008 (3:12 a.m.)
The government said it would introduce access cards for Manila's poorest residents to buy subsidized rice as food prices rise dramatically, officials said Monday.
The rice cards are intended to benefit about a third of the poorest families in the capital, according to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's administration. The government said it will separately distribute cash cards to help families in the poorest 20 of the country's 81 provinces with quick money transfers.
The measures came as Arroyo's administration moved to cushion the impact of skyrocketing fuel and food prices. The Philippines has been paying record prices on international markets to make up for a 10 percent domestic shortfall of rice.
The criteria for Manilans to obtain the card is a monthly salary of $120 or less for a family of five. The card allows holders to buy subsidized rice from specialized stores for the poor, called in Tagalog "Our Store." The limit is 31 pounds per week.
Cardholders will pay 42 cents per 2.2 pounds of the subsidized rice, compared with 83 cents for commercially available rice, Social Welfare Secretary Esperanza Cabral said.
It was not clear exactly when the cards will go into effect.
"The objective is to really help the poor," said Social Welfare Undersecretary Celia Yanco. "If they have to compete with those with money they'll really have a hard life."
A separate cash-transfer card, which will be given to 300,000 poorest families in provinces, will include $12 a month plus $7 for every child who logs at least 85 percent class attendance, Cabral said.
Rice topped $1,000 per ton on the international market this month _ triple the price from January _ and the government said it has so far contracted about half of 2.1 million tons of rice it plans to import this year.
The National Food Authority, the state-run grain importer, plans to hold a fifth tender this year on May 5 for more than 500,000 tons of rice.
Thailand, the world's largest exporter, said Friday it will not restrict exports despite talk of a shortage. Some Asian countries, including India and Vietnam, recently suspended rice exports to guarantee their own supplies.
Arroyo has declared war on rice hoarders, who have been blamed for creating artificial shortages, and promised to improve distribution and invest $1 billion to boost production.
About 40 percent of Filipinos live on less than $2 a day, and about 13 percent _ or 11 million _ survive on less than $1 a day.
Meanwhile, Malaysia's government plans to subsidize locally grown rice to prevent consumers from being hit by record high prices, a Cabinet minister said Monday.
"The government wants to assure the lower income group that local rice will remain affordable to them," Shahrir Samad, the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs minister, told reporters.
Malaysia grows about 65 to 70 percent of the rice its people consume, while the rest is imported, mainly from Thailand. With the price of Thai rice nearly tripling in the last 18 months, the government expects consumers to switch to local rice, whose price _ so far steady _ is expected to rise.
On Sunday, Vietnam's prime minister warned rice speculators they face severe punishment after rocketing prices led to panic buying over the weekend.
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung insisted supplies in Vietnam _ the world's second-largest rice exporter after Thailand _ would be enough for domestic consumption, according to state media reports.
But he warned that any organizations and individuals speculating in the commodity would be "severely punished."
Crowds of people flocked to rice markets Sunday in Ho Chi Minh City, the country's largest, to stock up on the grain.
The rice cards are intended to benefit about a third of the poorest families in the capital, according to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's administration. The government said it will separately distribute cash cards to help families in the poorest 20 of the country's 81 provinces with quick money transfers.
The measures came as Arroyo's administration moved to cushion the impact of skyrocketing fuel and food prices. The Philippines has been paying record prices on international markets to make up for a 10 percent domestic shortfall of rice.
The criteria for Manilans to obtain the card is a monthly salary of $120 or less for a family of five. The card allows holders to buy subsidized rice from specialized stores for the poor, called in Tagalog "Our Store." The limit is 31 pounds per week.
Cardholders will pay 42 cents per 2.2 pounds of the subsidized rice, compared with 83 cents for commercially available rice, Social Welfare Secretary Esperanza Cabral said.
It was not clear exactly when the cards will go into effect.
"The objective is to really help the poor," said Social Welfare Undersecretary Celia Yanco. "If they have to compete with those with money they'll really have a hard life."
A separate cash-transfer card, which will be given to 300,000 poorest families in provinces, will include $12 a month plus $7 for every child who logs at least 85 percent class attendance, Cabral said.
Rice topped $1,000 per ton on the international market this month — triple the price from January — and the government said it has so far contracted about half of 2.1 million tons of rice it plans to import this year.
The National Food Authority, the state-run grain importer, plans to hold a fifth tender this year on May 5 for more than 500,000 tons of rice.
Thailand, the world's largest exporter, said Friday it will not restrict exports despite talk of a shortage. Some Asian countries, including India and Vietnam, recently suspended rice exports to guarantee their own supplies.
Arroyo has declared war on rice hoarders, who have been blamed for creating artificial shortages, and promised to improve distribution and invest $1 billion to boost production.
About 40 percent of Filipinos live on less than $2 a day, and about 13 percent — or 11 million — survive on less than $1 a day.
Meanwhile, Malaysia's government plans to subsidize locally grown rice to prevent consumers from being hit by record high prices, a Cabinet minister said Monday.
"The government wants to assure the lower income group that local rice will remain affordable to them," Shahrir Samad, the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs minister, told reporters.
Malaysia grows about 65 to 70 percent of the rice its people consume, while the rest is imported, mainly from Thailand. With the price of Thai rice nearly tripling in the last 18 months, the government expects consumers to switch to local rice, whose price — so far steady — is expected to rise.
On Sunday, Vietnam's prime minister warned rice speculators they face severe punishment after rocketing prices led to panic buying over the weekend.
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung insisted supplies in Vietnam — the world's second-largest rice exporter after Thailand — would be enough for domestic consumption, according to state media reports.
But he warned that any organizations and individuals speculating in the commodity would be "severely punished."
Crowds of people flocked to rice markets Sunday in Ho Chi Minh City, the country's largest, to stock up on the grain.
4. Irish Charity Helps Build Schools for Aids Orphans
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/irish-charity-helps-build-schools-for-aids-orphans-1360969.html
By Senan Hogan
Monday April 28 2008
An Irish charity has helped construct school buildings for children orphaned by Aids in Zambia.
A group of volunteers from Co Kildare-based organisation, Touch Ireland, spent the past three weeks working on the project outside Lusaka, the capital of the African country.
Parents of some of the school's pupils, who live in a nearby mud hut village, have already died of Aids.
Head teacher at the St Patrick's School in Mapepe, Alice Hanjuwa said: "About one-quarter of the pupils have lost either a mother or father to Aids while six have lost both parents."
Ms Hanjuwa added: "However, they are good students and want to learn. If this school wasn't here they would have to walk for miles to the next school or not go to school at all."
Up to 15 construction workers and volunteers from Leitrim, Roscommon, Kildare and Dublin helped fundraise and build the school buildings.
Eileen McGowan from Boyle, Co Roscommon said her local Touch Ireland group raised thousands of euro from a variety of fundraising initiatives.
She said: "Two children even handed over some of their Confirmation money.''
Funding was also raised for the Guardian Angels Community School in nearby Chilanga to purchase a water pump.
Touch Ireland is currently involved in projects constructing schools and orphanages in five countries including Zambia, Cameroon, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka.
5. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon Leads Battle to Feed World's Poor
http://www.france24.com/en/20080428-ban-ki-moon-will-fight-feed-poor-un-food-crisis
Monday 28 April 2008
The UN will meet in Bern on Monday to discuss plans to combat rising food prices worldwide, as the Food and Agriculture Organisation warns that 37 poor countries are facing an emergency.
Special Report
General Ban Ki-moon was set Monday to lead a concerted effort by 27 key UN agencies to tackle the growing crisis caused by a worldwide sharp rise in basic foodstuff prices. The UN was scheduled at a two-day conference in the Swiss capital Bern to reveal a battle plan of emergency measures, while exploring other longer-term measures to solve the world's food crisis. This will involve adjudicating between advocates of protectionism and those who favour opening up markets, as well as between supporters of biofuels and opponents thereof.
Rising populations, strong demand from developing countries, increased cultivation of crops for biofuels and increasing floods and droughts have sent food prices soaring across the globe.
"The world food crisis and the solutions that the United Nations can provide will be at the centre of discussions," said the UN. The talks hosted by Ban will take place behind closed doors at the Universal Postal Union headquarters in Bern, lasting all day Monday and Tuesday morning.
Results of the deliberations are expected Tuesday when Ban Ki-moon gives a press conference flanked by Josette Sheeran, Executive Director of the UN's World Food Programme, World Bank President Robert Zoellick, Jacques Diouf, head of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), and Lennart Bage, President of the International Fund for Agriculture Development.
The FAO has warned that sharp rises in cereal prices have left 37 poor countries in an emergency situation sparking food riots. Ban Ki-moon called in Vienna on Friday for immediate concerted action to resolve the global food crisis. "In the short term, we must address all the humanitarian crises which have been impacting poorest of poor pople in the world," he said.
The World Food Programme had made an urgent appeal for additional 755 million dollars (485 million euros) to fill the gap. But in the medium to longer term, "the international community and its leaders in particular should sit down together on an urgent basis and address how we can first of all improve the economic system, the distribution systems, as well as how we can promote new production of agricultural products".
"The steeply rising price of food has developed into a real global crisis," Ban told journalists in Vienna. "The United Nations is very much concerned, as all other members of the international community are. We must take immediate action in a concerted way throughout the international community."
Ban estimated that around 100 million of the world's poorest who previously did not require help now can not afford to buy food. The World Trade Organisation, whose Director-General Pascal Lamy will also attend the Bern talks, says the food crisis reinforces the need to open up world markets.
"Agricultural subsidies by rich countries have destroyed the agriculture of poor countries," a spokesman told AFP. "A more open system will be less subject to distortion."
The UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) is also seeking a rapid conclusion to current world negotiations in the framework of the Doha Round.
The head of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), Juan Somavia, has warned against the danger of seeking only temporary solutions to the latest crisis, saying this would only mean a return to the original problem in a world in which globalisation would not benefit the world at large. Dominique Strauss-Kahn,head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), has criticised protectionism and the use of foodstuffs to make biofuels, and called for a reform of world coordination of agricultural policy.
Honorable Mentions:
1. Surefire Gas Cost-cutter: Drive Slower
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/04/28/MN9H10BFRS.DTL&tsp=1
Michael Cabanatuan, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, April 28, 2008
While gas prices at or near $4 a gallon have persuaded some Bay Area motorists to take public transit, join carpools or curse the oil companies, the high cost of fuel has moved few drivers to practice a proven gas-saver - driving slower.
A Chronicle reporter circumnavigated the bay last week - with the cruise control set at 59 mph - and found little company in the slow lane.
In 111 miles of freeway driving during noncommute hours, he passed just 118 slower-moving vehicles. And on some stretches of freeway - most notably Interstate 80 between the MacArthur Maze in Oakland and Vallejo - almost nobody was driving slower than 60 mph.
"When I'm (driving 55) consciously, I look around and see that it's just me," said Jawahar Swaminathan, 31, who drives regularly on Interstate 80 between his home in Richmond and his job in San Francisco. "Even the truck drivers are pulling around me to pass."
Still, scientists and fuel efficiency experts say that for most cars, driving slower pays.
"It can make a big difference," said Patricia Monahan, deputy director of clean vehicles for the Union of Concerned Scientists. "If you like to really accelerate fast, if you have a lead foot, that can have a really big impact on fuel economy."
Most cars get the best mileage between 45 and 55 mph, Monahan said. As speeds creep higher, fuel efficiency drops. For every mile per hour over 60 mph, she said, fuel economy drops by an average of around 1 percent.
"Going 65 is really lowering your fuel efficiency," she said. "And it gets worse at 75."
How much you stand to save depends on a lot of factors. With gas at $4 a gallon, a driver with a long commute - 400 miles a week - and a gas-guzzling vehicle getting only 20 mpg would save $18.74 a week by slowing down dramatically from 75 to 55 mph, extrapolating from the government's most recent figures on the subject. Even a more moderate deceleration - from 70 to 60 mph - would save that driver $11.74 a week.
In contrast, a commuter who started with a smaller carbon footprint - driving 100 miles a week in a car getting 30 mpg - would stand to save only a few dollars a week by slowing down.
The estimates are rough at best. The U.S. Department of Transportation last studied the effect of speed on fuel efficiency in 1997, and its results were based on a fleet of nine vehicles manufactured between 1988 and 1997 - hardly what's on the road today. "Unfortunately this analysis has not been done over, to my knowledge, in the last 10 years," said Monahan's colleague at the Union of Concerned Scientists, senior engineer Jim Kliesch.
Still, the results are striking. Slowing from 70 to 60 mph improved average fuel efficiency by 17.2 percent. A big slowdown - from 75 to 55 mph - improved fuel efficiency by a whopping 30.6 percent.
The need to conserve gasoline is why, in 1974, in the wake of the Arab oil embargo and ensuing fuel shortage, President Richard Nixon ordered the speed limit nationally to be lowered to 55 mph. The limit was lifted to 65 mph in some areas in the late 1980s, and the 55 mph national speed limit was entirely discarded in 1995. And except in backed-up traffic, few motorists have driven that slowly since.
The Chronicle's drive around the bay last week found that even $4 a gallon gas prices haven't persuaded many Bay Area drivers to ease off the gas pedal and save a few bucks.
Driving a Chronicle-issued Chevy Malibu, this reporter hopped on southbound Highway 101 in downtown San Francisco, settled into the slow lane going 59 mph and started counting the cars he passed - which took a while.
Even in the 50 mph zone through downtown, nobody was driving slower than 60. It took a couple miles of driving to tally the first slow-moving fuel saver.
The drive around the bay went south on 101 to San Jose, north on Interstate 880 to the MacArthur Maze in Oakland, north and east on Interstate 80 to Vallejo, across Highway 37 to Novato and south on Highway 101 back to San Francisco. The drive was made in noncommute hours, and traffic was mostly free-flowing. Only freeway driving was counted.
Drivers traveling slower than 60 mph were scarce all around the bay. But they were hardest to find on I-80 from Emeryville to Vallejo, where the Malibu passed just four vehicles.
Slower on 101Slower drivers were most common across the bay on Highway 101. From Novato to the north end of the Golden Gate Bridge, 49 drivers were traveling slower than 60 mph. Between San Francisco and San Jose on 101, 38 drivers were passed.
On I-880 from San Jose to Emeryville, 27 drivers were moving slower than 60 mph.
Even at 59 mph, it seemed like the Chronicle car was standing still - especially on wide freeways such as I-880 where cars whizzed by in all lanes. Nobody honked, shook their fists or raised any fingers, but several drivers zipped right up to the rear bumper before suddenly swerving to pass. It wasn't clear whether those moves were the result of inattention or attempts at intimidation.
It's a behavior that fuel-conscious drivers have to get used to, say Bay Area residents who have pulled into the slow lane to save gas costs.
"It's scary, and it can be unsafe if you don't know how to drive defensively," said Swaminathan, who's been driving 55 since moving a year ago to the Bay Area from New Jersey, where gas is much cheaper. "A lot of people try to look into the car. I think they expect to see a grandma driving."
Linda Winter-Meiberg, 67, of Tiburon drives to Sacramento once a week to visit her mother. A few weeks ago, she decided to slow down from 72 mph, which is probably an average speed on that stretch of I-80, to 59 mph.
The move has cut her weekly gas bill from $40 to $35 - even as gas prices have risen.
"I try to be courteous by driving in the slowest lane," she said, "but I still get plenty of dirty looks and a lot of people honking at me. I kidded my husband, saying I was going to put up a sign in the rear window saying, 'Drive slower, save gas.' "
But some drivers don't want to ease up on the gas. They say it's unsafe, that their time is more valuable - or that it takes the fun out of driving.
"I won't do it," said George Steffner, 63, a retired engineer who lives in Moraga and tries to conserve by combining short trips. "I didn't do it when it was the law. To tell you the truth, I like going at higher speeds. I feel safer. And I have other ways of saving fuel."
2. Young Vegas Rockers Out to Change the World
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/apr/28/young-vegas-rockers-out-change-world/
By Joe Brown
Mon, Apr 28, 2008 (2 a.m.)
Fans watch as bassist Adam Knaff -- known professionally as Bomb - tunes up at the Extreme Thing festival in Desert Breeze Park. He's the brother of lead singer Brandon Knaff, who taught him to play after a "random guy" Brandon was starting a band with didn't work out.Sun ArchivesVenue options for local bands limited (1-07-2005) Beyond the SunSongs by Think Teenage girls cluster at the lip of the outdoor stage as if they have been attracted by some invisible signal, or have texted one another: CUTE BAND ALERT! More girls show up, then more.
Setting up onstage is a local rock band, five guys who glance at their audience with studied nonchalance.
“We’re called Think,” says the lead singer, just before they plug in and play.
After just a song or two, teenage guys are heading toward the stage, too. And they’re all listening.
If you are looking for the next big thing to come out of Las Vegas, the next Killers or Panic at the Disco, these kids may have found it.
Think is a young Las Vegas band that has just about everything it takes to go the distance — looks, charisma, an original sound, ambition, work ethic, musical genes and connections.
Lead singer Brandon Knaff brings to mind Roger Daltry, Bob Dylan and Jeff Buckley all at once. And the other guys are just as camera-ready. MTV-watchers will eat them up.
They have original songs, an energetic, melodic funk-pop sound, top-line instruments and a rehearsal room that would be the envy of any rock star.
They know someone: The Vegas-based production team of dancer/choreographer Cris Judd and songwriter Darren Sher recorded and produced Think’s self-released first CD, “Odyssey,” which will be available on iTunes soon.
And it doesn’t hurt that the music industry is suddenly paying attention to the Las Vegas music scene because of the commercial success of The Killers and Panic at the Disco.
Play that funky music
With their charisma and stage presence alone, the guys in Think have a big head start on many local bands. And they can really play. Guitarist Phillip Seaton, 19, has Johnny Marr’s knack for versatility, handling melody, rhythm and eloquent solos that evoke his heroes Jimmy Page, Slash and Brian May, without once sounding imitative. Bomb, 16, takes a Paul McCartney-style approach to the bass, playing it as a melodic lead instrument, breaking out a finger-popping style on the band’s frequently funky songs. Keyboard player Sam Riddle, 20, is a solid musician, and the energy surges when he joins Knaff at the front line. Drummer Billy Carmody, 21, is an inventive player who can hit hard — it’s not an exaggeration to say he conjures John Bonham. And singer Knaff, 19, with his halo of curls and effortless grace, sounds as good as he looks.
Think big, think different
“Since we started the band, we want to change the world with what we’re doing,” says Seaton. “Like the John Lennons, like the Jimi Hendrixes. We want to make a dent in this music industry and bring it out of all the (crud) that people are listening to. We want to go from this (rehearsal) room to playing worldwide.”
The others chime in with all the strugglingly articulate earnestness and bravado of young mean who really mean it.
“The song ‘Day to Day,’ we all wrote that against drugs,” Knaff says. “Against the common teenager drug-alcohol-party kind of thing.
“Our songs also talk about common things that all humans go through,” he adds. “Relationships, having fun, apologies, the city ...”
“Sex,” adds Bomb, who always seems ready to supply the punch line.
(This story has been shortened. For the full length article, please visit the URL provided above.)
3. Alaska Reaches Organ and Tissue Donation Milestone
http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1360267/alaska_reaches_organ_and_tissue_donation_milestone/index.html?source=r_health
Posted on: Sunday, 27 April 2008, 15:00 CDT
By Carly Horton, Alaska
Journal of Commerce, Anchorage
Apr. 27--Gov. Sarah Palin announced April 11 that more than half of Alaska's roughly 670,000 residents have registered as organ and tissue donors.
Bruce Zalneraitis, CEO of Life Alaska Donor Services, said Alaska is the second state to make the distinction; Utah was the first.
"But Alaska is tremendous," Zalneraitis said. "We've reached the 50 percent point sooner than any other state that has a registry."
That's no easy feat for a state with 1 person per square mile (the U.S. average is about 80) where traditional means of communication are often not available. Case in point: Less than 70 percent of Alaska households have Internet access, according to statistics provided by the Census Bureau, and most people who are organ donors in other states register online, Zalneraitis said.
Alaska has bypassed the hurdle many other states face by setting up a donor registry through the state Department of Motor Vehicles. Zalneraitis said 98 percent of organ donors register through the DMV.
"Alaska was a state that had progressive legislation in this area," Zalneraitis said. "From many years of research, we know most people want to be donors. But most people aren't doing anything -- we don't think about death and dying on a daily basis. The registry makes it simple and effective.
"When you get your license or renew it, it's done -- all the information is already in the computer. You don't have to go online, fill out forms and mail anything in. That's the biggest thing about the registry: It makes it easy for people to look up (their information), to renew it. Once you're in, you can make all those choices."
Once they've registered, Alaskans can rest assured their wishes will be carried out after their death. According to Zalneraitis, Alaska has first-person consent, meaning organ donor registration "is a legal binding agreement. It cannot be revoked by other people; it survives your death."
First-person consent also removes the burden from family members of deciding what to do with your body, Zalneraitis said.
Nearly 100,000 people in the U.S. are awaiting organ donation. Of those, roughly 75 percent need kidneys. Heart, liver, pancreas, lung and small intestine transplants are also becoming increasingly common. Approximately 18 people per day die waiting for organs.
Zalneraitis said anyone can become an organ donor, but an intensive screening process prior to surgery is performed "so we know the organ is safe and will function properly when it goes to the recipient."
He said the number of people who can donate is actually relatively small. Most viable organs come from young, healthy people involved in fatal accidents. Because potential organ donors must be at least 18 years of age to register without parental consent, Life Alaska Donor Services travels to middle schools and high schools throughout the state encouraging young people to register as organ donors.
"It's always important to let your wishes be known to your family members, regardless of age," Zalneraitis said.
In Alaska and across the U.S., there is an urgent need for organ donation from racial minorities. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, some diseases of the kidney, heart, lung, pancreas and liver are found more frequently in racial and ethnic minority populations than in the general population.
African Americans, Asians and Pacific Islanders and Hispanics are three times more likely than Caucasians to suffer from end-stage kidney disease, often as the result of high blood pressure and other conditions that can damage the kidneys. Native Americans are four times more likely than Caucasians to suffer from diabetes.
In addition, similar blood type is essential in matching donors to recipients. Because certain blood types are more common in ethnic minority populations, increasing the number of minority donors can increase the frequency of minority transplants.
Native Alaskans and American Indians comprise over 15 percent of the state's total population, and Zalneraitis said there is a concerted effort by his organization to encourage this segment of the population to sign up for organ donation.
Among racial minorities there are often cultural issues and misunderstandings that prevent them from becoming organ donors, he said.
"There's often a fear of or bad experiences with medicine in general, so it does follow they would be reluctant to donate," he said. "We've learned over the years to dispel myths and address cultural concerns ? (and) been able to increase consent in minorities over the years."
Ancient fears plague virtually all segments of the population, he said.
"Ancient fears have to do with wondering what happens to us after we die. ?My loved one is dead, but will it cause more suffering if his kidney's taken out?' It's not rational, not logical, but the fear itself is totally real," he said. "We have to learn to address those fears in a sympathetic way."
On the Web: www.lifealaska.org, www.organdonor.gov
Carly Horton can be reached at carly.horton@alaskajournal.com.
4. Technological Breakthrough in Fight to Cut Greenhouse Gases
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080424103217.htmScienceDaily (Apr. 27, 2008)
Scientists at Newcastle University have pioneered breakthrough technology in the fight to cut greenhouse gases. The Newcastle University team, led by Michael North, Professor of Organic Chemistry, has developed a highly energy-efficient method of converting waste carbon dioxide (CO2) into chemical compounds known as cyclic carbonates.
The team estimates that the technology has the potential to use up to 48 million tonnes of waste CO2 per year, reducing the UK's emissions by about four per cent.
Cyclic carbonates are widely used in the manufacture of products including solvents, paint-strippers, biodegradable packaging, as well as having applications in the chemical industry. Cyclic carbonates also have potential for use in the manufacture of a new class of efficient anti-knocking agents in petrol. Anti-knocking agents make petrol burn better, increasing fuel efficiency and reducing CO2 emissions.
The conversion technique relies upon the use of a catalyst to force a chemical reaction between CO2 and an epoxide, converting waste CO2 into this cyclic carbonate, a chemical for which there is significant commercial demand.
The reaction between CO2 and epoxides is well known, but one which, until now, required a lot of energy, needing high temperatures and high pressures to work successfully. The current process also requires the use of ultra-pure CO2 , which is costly to produce.
The Newcastle team has succeeded in developing an exceptionally active catalyst, derived from aluminium, which can drive the reaction necessary to turn waste carbon dioxide into cyclic carbonates at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, vastly reducing the energy input required.
Professor North said: 'One of the main scientific challenges facing the human race in the 21st century is controlling global warming that results from increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
'One solution to this problem, currently being given serious consideration, is carbon capture and storage, which involves concentrating and compressing CO2 and then storing it,' he said. 'However, long-term storage remains to be demonstrated'.
To date, alternative solutions for converting CO2 emissions into a useful product has required a process so energy intensive that they generate more CO2 than they consume.
Professor North compares the process developed by his team to that of a catalytic converter fitted to a car. 'If our catalyst could be employed at the source of high-concentration CO2 production, for example in the exhaust stream of a fossil-fuel power station, we could take out the carbon dioxide, turn it into a commercially-valuable product and at the same time eliminate the need to store waste CO2', he said.
Professor North believes that, once it is fully developed, the technology has the potential to utilise a significant amount of the UK's CO2 emissions every year.
'To satisfy the current market for cyclic carbonates, we estimate that our technology could use up to 18 million tonnes of waste CO2 per year, and a further 30 million tonnes if it is used as an anti-knocking agent.
'Using 48 million tonnes of waste CO2 would account for about four per cent* of the UK's CO2 emissions, which is a pretty good contribution from one technology,' commented Professor North. The technique has been proven to work successfully in the lab. Professor North and his team are currently carrying out further lab-based work to optimise the efficiency of the technology, following which they plan to scale-up to a pilot plant.
* Based on 2004 figures from the UN.
The paper 'Synthesis of cyclic carbonates from atmospheric pressure carbon dioxide using exceptionally active aluminium(salen) complexes as catalysts' s been published in the European Journal of Inorganic Chemistry.
The project was funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.
Adapted from materials provided by Newcastle University.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
