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Tuesday, February 4, 2014

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Americans' Mental Health is Latest Victim of Changing Climate (Op-Ed)

She writes regularly for the National Science Foundation, Climate Nexus, Microbe Magazine, and the Washington Post health section, and she is an adjunct professor of journalism at the University of Maryland, College Park. Cimons contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. For months after Hurricane Sandy sent nearly six feet of water surging into her home in Long Beach, N.Y. — an oceanfront city along Long Island' s south shore — retired art teacher Marcia Bard Isman woke up many mornings feeling anxious and nauseated. What Isman is experiencing is one of the little-recognized consequences of climate change, the mental anguish experienced by survivors in the aftermath of extreme and sometimes violent weather and other natural disasters.

Philip Seymour Hoffman: Why Heroin Is So Deadly

A heroin overdose seems to be what ended actor Philip Seymour Hoffman's life yesterday (Feb. 2), just like the lives of many before him. Although news reports say the police are still investigating the circumstances surrounding Hoffman's death, the likely involvement of heroin brings up the question of why the substance so deadly. So when you're taking heroin, you're not 100 percent sure what you're getting," said Dr. Scott Krakower, a psychiatrist at Zucker Hillside Hospital in Glen Oaks, N.Y., who specializes in drug addiction counseling. Another reason heroin takes many victims is that it can be injected, Krakower said.

Black Death Likely Altered European Genes

The Black Death of the 14th century may be written into the DNA of survivors' descendants, new research finds. The study reveals that Roma people (sometimes known as gypsies, although this is considered a derogatory term) and white Europeans share alterations to their genetic code that occurred after the Roma settled in Europe from northwest India 1,000 years ago. "We show that there are some immune receptors that are clearly influenced by evolution in Europe and not in northwest India," said study leader Mihai Netea, a researcher in experimental internal medicine at Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Center in the Netherlands. "India did not have the medieval plague, as Europe had," Netea told Live Science.

Mosquito Sperm Have 'Sense of Smell'

Mosquitoes use scent-detecting molecules known as odorant receptors in their antennae. They found odorant receptors on the whiplike tails of the mosquitos' sperm. "We know these molecules are very powerful tools for responding to chemical signals from the environment, but this work shows these molecules can also be co-opted to respond to chemicals inside the organism," said study author Laurence Zwiebel, a molecular biologist at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. In other words, molecules used in one part of the body can be co-opted or diverted for a role elsewhere in the body.

Added Sugar May Boost Risk of Heart Disease, Death

Many Americans consume too much added sugar, a habit that not only increases the risk of obesity, but may also increase the risk of dying from heart disease, a new study suggests. The World Health Organization recommends limiting calories from added sugar to less than 10 percent of your daily total. What's more, people who consumed between 17 and 21 percent of their daily calories from added sugar were nearly 40 percent more likely to die from cardiovascular disease over a 14-year period than those who consumed about 8 percent of their daily calories from added sugar, the study found. People who drank seven or more sugar-sweetened beverages (such as soda) per week — a common source of added sugar — were about 30 percent more likely to die from cardiovascular disease during the study than those who drank one or fewer sugar-sweetened beverages per week.

The Most Religious US State Is ...

Once again, Mississippi reigns as the most religious U.S. state, with 61 percent of its residents classified as "very religious," according to the results of a Gallup survey released Monday (Feb. 3).

Strange Saturn Vortex Swirls in Amazing NASA Photo

An amazing new photo of Saturn's north pole puts the planet's odd hexagon-shaped jet stream and dazzling rings on display. NASA's Cassini spacecraft exploring Saturn and its moons snapped the photo — which NASA released today (Feb. 3) — as the probe flew 1.6 million miles (2.5 million kilometers) above the ringed planet. Cassini took its newest view of Saturn's polar vortex on Nov. 23, 2013, though the image itself was just released today. The hexagonal vortex is about 20,000 miles (30,000 km) across and is a jet stream made up of 200 mph winds (322 km/h) surrounding a huge storm, NASA officials have said.

Heat Wave Deaths May Triple by the 2050s

They found that by the 2050s, the number of heat-related deaths in England and Wales could surge by 3.5 times its current number, to around 2,000 deaths yearly in these regions, according to the study published today (Feb. 3) in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. Exposure to hot weather can bring about hyperthermia, a condition in which a person's body absorbs more heat than it dissipates, resulting in dangerously high body temperatures that require medical attention. Every year, about 650 Americans die from hyperthermia — a death toll greater than that of tornadoes, hurricanes, floods and earthquakes combined, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The elderly and people with underlying medical conditions are at higher risk of dying from hyperthermia.

Godspeed the John Glenn: Navy Christens Ship for 1st American to Orbit Earth

John Glenn's first impression upon seeing the U.S. Navy ship that will sail bearing his name was that it looked "like somebody forgot to finish it." "I thought it looked like kids playing with a LEGO set and they forgot to finish the whole thing up," the retired Marine, NASA astronaut and U.S. senator said Saturday (Feb. 1) at the christening ceremony for the USNS John Glenn. "This MLP will serve as our platform in the ocean: a large, stable platform that can stage and facilitate the delivery of vehicles and equipment, personnel and supplies between the sea base and the restricted access locations ashore," Lt. General John Toolan, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force's commanding general, said at the naming ceremony, which was held at General Dynamics' NASSCO (National Steel and Shipbuilding Company) shipyard in San Diego, Calif. "For the United States of America, I christen this ship the 'USNS John Glenn.' May God bless this ship and all who sail in her," Lyn Glenn said just before breaking a bottle of champagne against the ship's hull.

'Fossilized Rivers' Reveal Clues About Disappearing Glaciers

An amazing landscape left behind by melting ice sheets offers clues to the future of Greenland's shrinking glaciers, a new study suggests. Canada was once buried beneath miles of ice, similar to the way Greenland is today. Called the Laurentide Ice Sheet, this massive ice cap covered all of Canada and parts of the northern United States 15,000 years ago. When the Laurentide Ice Sheet started melting, the retreating ice left behind a record of its demise, such as the eskers, still visible on the Arctic tundra.

Strange, Hypervelocity Stars Get Ejected from Milky Way

A new class of fast-moving stars are on their way out of the Milky Way, scientists say. Unlike most other known hypervelocity stars, the 20 sunsize stars are not exiting after interacting with the black hole in the heart of the galaxy, a massive body whose gravitational influence usually provides the kick needed to escape, the new study found. "These new hypervelocity stars are very different from the ones that have been discovered previously," the study's lead author Lauren Palladino, of Vanderbilt University, said in a statement. Palladino discovered 20 potential hypervelocity stars while using a massive stellar census, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, to map the path of sunlike stars in the Milky Way.

Woman's IVF Prevented Fatal Brain Disorder in Her Children

A woman whose genes put her at high risk for a rare brain disorder was able to avoid passing on the condition to her children through a special in-vitro fertilization (IVF) procedure, according to a new report of the case. The woman, a 27-year-old in the United States, had undergone genetic testing that showed she had inherited a gene that put her at risk for Gerstmann-Sträussler-Scheinker (GSS) syndrome, a rare and fatal brain disorder seen in only a few families in the world. To have children, the woman and her husband used IVF, an assisted-reproduction technique in which eggs from the mother are fertilized in a laboratory. But before implanting the embryos in the uterus, doctors took an extra step and screened the embryos for the GSS genetic mutation.

Tiny Numbers Can Predict Sizes of Objects in the Universe

Just a few numbers could be used to predict the sizes of objects large and small in the universe, researchers say. The paper, published Jan. 27 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows that a handful of fundamental constants, such as the speed of light or the charge of an electron, could predict everything from the tallest potential mountain on a planet, to a neutron star's size, to how humans walk. "What we wanted to do is bring together the physical argument that shows that numbers that are usually used in the context of laboratory experiments, or things in the small, can inform even the largest things in our universe," said study co-author Adam Burrows, a physicist at Princeton University. Everything in the universe obeys the fundamental laws of nature, and a few physical constants crop up in many of the laws.

The North Star Polaris Is Getting Brighter

The North Star has remained an eternal reassurance for northern travelers over the centuries. But recent and historical research reveals that the ever-constant star is actually changing. "It was unexpected to find," Scott Engle of Villanova University in Pennsylvania told SPACE.com. Engle investigated the fluctuations of the star over the course of several years, combing through historical records and even turning the gaze of the famed Hubble Space Telescope onto the star.

Pompeii-like Eruption Fossilized Dinos in Death Poses

A mass grave in a Chinese lakebed contains the extremely well-preserved fossils of dinosaurs, mammals and early birds, but the cause of the animals' death has long puzzled scientists. "What we're talking about in this case is literal charring, like somebody got put in the grill," said George Harlow, a mineralogist at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, one of the researchers of the study detailed today (Feb. 4) in the journal Nature Communications. In other words, Harlow told Live Science, "They got fried." [See Images of the 'Animal Pompeii' in China] An ancient ecosystem known as the Jehol Biota existed in northern China about 120 million to 130 million years ago, consisting of dinosaurs, mammals, early birds, fish, lizards and other creatures.

Dramatic Sun Storm, Partial Solar Eclipse Spied by NASA Spacecraft (Video)

A NASA satellite has captured stunning views of a partial solar eclipse and a stormy eruption on the sun as seen from space, two amazing events that occurred on the same day last week.. The space agency's sun-watching Solar Dynamics Observatory saw the dual phenomena on Jan. 30, as this video of the solar flare and partial solar eclipse shows. During the solar eclipse, called a lunar transit, the moon took two and a half hours to cross —the longest transit ever recorded by the satellite. The crisp silhouette of the moon creeps in front of the sun starting at 8:31 a.m. EST (1331 GMT), creating a partial solar eclipse from SDO's viewpoint.

Mars Rover Curiosity Poised at Edge of Red Planet Dune (Photo)

A new photo from NASA's Curiosity rover shows the car-sized robot at the lip of a small Martian sand dune, debating whether or not to drive over the obstacle on its way to a huge Red Planet mountain. In the Mars views from Curiosity, a 3-foot-high (1 meter) dune separates the rover from a valley that may provide a relatively smooth route to the foothills of Mount Sharp, the rover's ultimate science destination. Curiosity's handlers are studying the new photo — a mosaic composed of images snapped on Jan. 30 — as they map out the 1-ton rover's next steps. The Curiosity team is seeking out more forgiving terrain for the rover, whose six wheels have accumulated an increasing amount of wear and tear over the last few months.

Ultrathin, Flexible Sensor Could Improve Health-Monitoring Tech

An ultrathin, flexible pressure sensor that has touch sensitivity almost like humans' could pave the way for artificial skin. Pressure sensors are used in all kinds of applications, including touch screens, wearable technology and even in aircraft and cars. Unlike current pressure sensors, which rely on semiconductor material, "this approach is low-cost and doesn't require lithography or expensive equipment, and it does not need a clean room," said study co-author Wenlong Cheng, a nanomaterials researcher at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. The new sensor, described today (Feb. 4) in the journal Nature Communications, could one day be used as artificial skin for heart-rate monitors or other body sensors.

FDA Launches 1st Campaign Against Youth Smoking

The Food and Drug Administration is launching its first national campaign to prevent and reduce smoking among young people, the agency announced today. "The Real Cost" campaign, which includes posters and TV ads, is targeted to kids ages 12 to 17, and aims to reduce the number of teens who become regular smokers, according to the FDA. "We know that early intervention is critical, with almost nine out of every 10 regular adult smokers picking up their first cigarette by age 18," FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret A. Hamburg said in a statement. Cigarette smoking is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States, accounting for more than 440,000 deaths each year.

Cold-Weather Benefit: Shivering May Count As Exercise

Shivering triggers a response in muscles similar to that of exercise, new research suggests. If this same response could be activated by a drug, then scientists could one day develop medicines that could amp up energy expenditure, without requiring people to break a sweat — or a shiver, said study co-author Dr. Francesco Celi, an endocrinologist at Virginia Commonwealth University. A hormone called irisin seemed critical in the process, but exactly how it was linked to energy expenditure wasn't clear. To find out, Celi asked seven healthy study participants to ride a bike as hard as they could, and measured their maximum oxygen uptake, or VO2 max. This allowed the researchers to calculate the participants' maximum energy expenditure.

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Monday, February 3, 2014

FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

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Super Bowl Safety: TV Tip-Overs Can Be Deadly, Group Warns

Ahead of the Super Bowl — often the most-watched television event of the year — the group Safe Kids Worldwide has declared Saturday (Feb. 1) National TV Safety Day to educate families about properly securing their big screens, with mounts and anchors to prevent accidents. Top-heavy flat panel TVs, too, can be pulled down by a climbing child if the set is not mounted to a wall. In a 2012 survey, Safe Kids Worldwide found that just one in four parents had mounted their flat panel TVs to the wall. As part of the campaign, Safe Kids Worldwide and Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) are urging parents and caregivers to recycle their old TVs, and the make sure the ones they keep are appropriately secured to keep kids safe.

Supplements May Have Negative Impact on Endurance Training

Certain vitamin supplements may blunt the muscle's natural response to endurance training, a new study from Norway suggests. In the study, 54 healthy participants were randomly assigned to take vitamin C and E supplements, or a placebo, during an endurance training program that consisted of running three to four times a week. After 11 weeks, the muscles of the people in the placebo group had produced more mitochondria — "powerhouses" of the cells — a natural response to training. The findings suggest "vitamin C and E supplements blunted the endurance training-induced increase of mitochondrial proteins, which are needed to improve muscular endurance," study researcher Dr. Gøran Paulsen, of the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences, said in a statement.

Do Older People Have More Body Odor?

Question: Do older people have more body odor? The body odor of people between the ages of 26 and 75 was analyzed. So, what causes body odor (aka B.O.)? Sweating helps maintain your body temperature, hydrates your skin and balances your body fluids.

3 Tips for Keeping Teens Healthy

I surely hope so, and that's why I took comfort in the results of a European Heart Journal study published this month. The study was done on adolescent boys, but I can only imagine that regular exercise in these years is good for the girls too.

Did Alien Life Evolve Just After the Big Bang?

Earthlings may be extreme latecomers to a universe full of life, with alien microbes possibly teeming on exoplanets beginning just 15 million years after the Big Bang, new research suggests. Also known as Goldilocks zones, these regions are considered to be just the right distance away from stars for liquid water, a pre-requisite for life as we know it, to exist. But even exoplanets that orbit far beyond the habitable zone may have been able to support life in the distant past, warmed by the relic radiation left over from the Big Bang that created the universe 13.8 billion years ago, says Harvard astrophysicist Abraham Loeb. Just after the Big Bang, the cosmos was a much hotter place.

NASA Moon Probe Broadcasts Space Weather Symphony Live Online

A NASA probe orbiting the moon is broadcasting live cosmic tunes from a computer near you. NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has a new internet radio station for people who want to check out space weather through music. The craft carries with it a Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation, or CRaTER. The main instrument at the lowest level of activity is a piano.

Help Hubble Telescope Scientists Study Amazing New Galaxy Photos (Video)

A newly released Hubble Space Telescope mosaic image shows the nearby spiral galaxy M83 in rich detail and scientists want your help to understand exactly what they are seeing in the cosmic view. Bold magentas and blues indicate the galaxy blazes with star formation, and the galactic panorama depicts stellar birth and death on a vast scale of 50,000 light-years, encompassing thousands of star clusters, and hundreds of thousands of stars, as well as supernova remnants, the last vestiges of dead stars. A new project called "STAR DATE: M83" asks amateur astronomers to use the new M83 image to estimate ages for approximately 3,000 star clusters. Later, stellar winds from the youngest, most massive stars blow the gas away, revealing bright blue star clusters, and giving a perforated appearance to the spiral arms.

Your Heart Health: 5 Numbers to Know

Researchers at The Ohio State University surveyed more than 2,000 adults from across the United States and asked them questions about BMI, for example, whether a person with a BMI of 24 is underweight or obese, or is normal weight. BMI is a number calculated from a person's weight and height, and provides a reliable indicator of body fatness and the risk for heart problems for most people. So, in addition to BMI, people should know four other numbers to get a good picture of their health: their blood pressure, cholesterol levels, blood sugar levels and the circumference of their waist, the researchers said. "There really are five numbers everyone should know when it comes to heart health," said Dr. Martha Gulati, director of preventive cardiology and women's cardiovascular health at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.

Teen Boy Is Youngest to Have Rare Fatal Brain Disorder

For three years, a teen boy in North Carolina developed progressively worsening movement, speech and memory problems, but doctors remained unable to determine the cause of his deteriorating condition. It was only after his death at age 16 that they found the answer: The boy had an extremely rare brain disorder called sporadic fatal insomnia, which is caused by prions, or abnormally folded proteins. Although prion diseases are rare in teenagers, the researchers wanted to publish the case to raise awareness about the condition among doctors who treat children, said Dr. Ermias Belay, of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, who investigated the boy's case.

Home Births Linked to Higher Rate of Newborn Deaths

The rate of death for newborns born in home births is more than four times that of newborns born in hospitals, according to new research. The research, which will be presented on Friday (Feb. 7) at the Society for Maternal Fetal Medicine annual meeting in New Orleans, also found especially high rates of neonatal death among first-time mothers who gave birth at home. "If you deliver in the hospital with a mid-wife, you can prevent 75 percent of all neonatal death," said study co-author Dr. Amos Grunebaum, an obstetrician at Weill Cornell Physicians in New York City. Home births have been on the rise in recent years, and the safety of the practice has been fiercely debated, with studies coming to different conclusions.

Great Lakes Water Levels Are in Unusual Decline

The Great Lakes share a surprising connection with Wisconsin's small lakes and aquifers — their water levels all rise and fall on a 13-year cycle, according to a new study. "The last two decades have been kind of exceptional," said Carl Watras, a climate scientist with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Water levels have been declining since 1998, Watras told Live Science. The research was published Jan. 21 in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Shrinking Greenland Glacier Smashes Speed Record

In summer 2012, Greenland's Jakobshavn Isbrae Glacier raced more than 150 feet (46 meters) per day, faster than any glacier on Earth. In 2000, Jakobshavn flowed at roughly 6 miles (9.4 km) per year. "We've been watching it for over a decade now, so it was quite a surprise when it popped up in 2012 with these unusually high speeds," said Ian Joughin, lead study author and a glaciologist at the University of Washington's Polar Science Center in Seattle. Jakobshavn Isbrae slows a bit in winter but is still flowing roughly three times faster overall than in the 1990s, Joughin said.

New Cholesterol Guidelines: How to Make Sense of Them

The new guidelines about who should take cholesterol-lowering statin drugs have spurred ongoing debate and confusion among both physicians and patients since their release in November. More than 70 million American adults have high blood cholesterol, which doubles their risk for heart disease, and less than half of people in this group take statins. But the changes to the guidelines would add more people to the group of those who are recommended to get a statin prescription. "Some people who were otherwise considered not at-risk might be considered at-risk now," said Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum, a cardiologist and the director of Women's Heart Health at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York.

Arctic's 'Layer Cake' Atmosphere Blamed for Rapid Warming

The Arctic is leading a race with few winners, warming twice as fast as the rest of the Earth. Loss of snow and ice, which reflect the sun's energy, is usually blamed for the Arctic temperature spike. "In the Arctic, as the climate warms, most of the additional heat remains trapped in a shallow layer of the atmosphere close to the ground, not deeper than 1 or 2 kilometers [0.6 to 1.2 miles]," said Felix Pithan, a climate scientist at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Germany and lead author of the new study. The Arctic atmosphere looks like a layer cake compared with the tropics.

Five Tips to Ward Off Cholesterol Confusion (Op-Ed)

Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum is an attending cardiologist and the director of Women's Heart Health of Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City and has been featured on The Early Show, The Doctors, Good Morning America, 20/20 and other programs. She recently released her book "Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum's Heart Book: Every Woman's Guide to a Heart Healthy Life," (Avery, 2014) and is the host of Focus on Health, a weekly magazine news show spotlighting health topics, seen on WLNY-TV. Steinbaum contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. The controversy surrounding November 2013's release of cholesterol guidelines from the American Heart Association (AHA)-American College of Cardiology (ACC) continues, and the confusion amongst physicians and patients is widespread.

Off-Road Wheelchair Helps People with Disabilities Get Off-Road and On With Their Lives (Op-Ed)

Amos Winter is the an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), and a participant in ASME's Engineering for Global Development Committee. The reality is much different for the 20 million to 40 million people in the developing world who require the use of a wheelchair. In such conditions, a conventional wheelchair provides only limited mobility and for people with disabilities, their ability to support themselves is restricted. The idea behind the Leveraged Freedom Chair (LFC) that my colleagues and I developed was conceived — and the technology evolved — through field trials in East Africa, Vietnam, Guatemala and India.

4,600-Year-Old Step Pyramid Uncovered in Egypt

TORONTO — Archaeologists working near the ancient settlement of Edfu, in southern Egypt, have uncovered a step pyramid that dates back about 4,600 years, predating the Great Pyramid of Giza by at least a few decades. Over time, the step pyramid's stone blocks were pillaged, and the monument was exposed to weathering, so today, it's only about 16 feet (5 m) tall. Scattered throughout central and southern Egypt, the provincial pyramids are located near major settlements, have no internal chambers and were not intended for burial. Six of the seven pyramids have almost identical dimensions, including the newly uncovered one at Edfu, which is about 60 x 61 feet (18.4 x 18.6 m).

Light Pollution Threatens Skywatching Around the World

But I always looked forward to the times when my family visited my Uncle Ron's house in Mahopac, N.Y. The night sky in Mahopac — which is 50 miles (80 kilometers) due north of midtown Manhattan — was incredibly dark and starry; I now live just to the west of Mahopac, and while I can still see the Milky Way on most clear nights, the nights now are a far cry from what they were a half century ago. Now, it's closer to a charcoal gray, and when I look south toward New York City, I see a bright, whitish glow reaching nearly halfway up into the sky. On the best nights, I can just about make out Eta Ursae Minoris, the dimmest of the four stars that make up the bowl of the Little Dipper.

Flow Battery Breakthrough May Boost Green Energy Storage (Video)

Joss Fong is a video producer and science journalist living in New York. She contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. A new battery designed by researchers at Harvard University may open the door to large-scale storage of solar and wind power. Because solar and wind power are intermittent energy sources, storage solutions are needed to improve their reliability.

When Wildlife TV Programs Hurt the Wildlife (Op-Ed)

Marc Bekoff, emeritus professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder, is one of the world's pioneering cognitive ethologists, a Guggenheim Fellow, and co-founder with Jane Goodall of Ethologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. This Op-Ed is adapted from two that appeared in Bekoff's column Animal Emotions in Psychology Today. He contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. I like to believe that animal abuse in film and television is a thing of the past, but it isn't.

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