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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 9:18am

Source diversity among journals cited in Science Times
A content analysis of The New York Times’ Science Times section from 1998 to 2012 found evidence of increased source diversity in use of scientific journals as news sources. Science Times increased the frequency at which it cited journals, the number of different journals that it cited, and the number of disciplines represented by cited journals. The results suggest that online availability of a wide array of scientific journals has changed sourcing behaviors.

http://pus.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/07/24/0963662514542908.ab...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 9:15am

Six Reasons Not to Worry about the Higgs Boson Destroying the Universe
https://storify.com/AstroKatie/six-reasons-not-to-worry-about-the-h...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 9:02am

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 8:48am

Here is another warning:
Artificial sweeteners can trigger diabetes
Artificial sweeteners may disrupt the body's ability to regulate blood sugar, causing metabolic changes that can be a precursor to diabetes, researchers are reporting. That is "the very same condition that we often aim to prevent" by consuming sweeteners instead of sugar, said Dr Eran Elinav, an immunologist at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, at a news conference to discuss the findings. The scientists performed a multitude of experiments, mostly on mice, to back up their assertion that the sweeteners alter the microbiome, the population of bacteria that is in the digestive system.

The different mix of microbes, the researchers contend, changes the metabolism of glucose, causing levels to rise higher after eating and to decline more slowly than they otherwise would. The findings by Dr Elinav and his collaborators in Israel, including Eran Segal, a professor of computer science and applied mathematics at Weizmann, are being published Wednesday by the journal Nature.

Cathryn R Nagler, a professor of pathology at the University of Chicago who was not involved with the research but did write an accompanying commentary in Nature, called the results "very compelling." She noted that many conditions, including obesity and diabetes, had been linked to changes in the microbiome. "What the study suggests," she said, "is we should step back and reassess our extensive use of artificial sweeteners."
Previous studies on the health effects of artificial sweeteners have come to conflicting and confusing findings. Some found that they were associated with weight loss; others found the exact opposite, that people who drank diet soda actually weighed more. Some found a correlation between artificial sweeteners and diabetes, but those findings were not entirely convincing: Those who switch to the products may already be overweight and prone to the disease.

While acknowledging that it is too early for broad or definitive conclusions, Dr Elinav said he had already changed his own behaviour.

"I've consumed very large amounts of coffee, and extensively used sweeteners, thinking like many other people that they are at least not harmful to me and perhaps even beneficial," he said. "Given the surprising results that we got in our study, I made a personal preference to stop using them."

In the initial set of experiments, the scientists added saccharin (the sweetener in the pink packets of Sweet'N Low), sucralose (the yellow packets of Splenda) or aspartame (the blue packets of Equal) to the drinking water of 10-week-old mice. Other mice drank plain water or water supplemented with glucose or with ordinary table sugar. After a week, there was little change in the mice who drank water or sugar water, but the group getting artificial sweeteners developed marked intolerance to glucose. Glucose intolerance, in which the body is less able to cope with large amounts of sugar, can lead to more serious illnesses like metabolic syndrome and Type 2 diabetes.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 8:16am

Computer simulations point to formamide as prebiotic intermediate in ‘Miller’ mixtures

New Steps Shown Toward Creation of Life by Electric Charge
Simulating a famous experiment to produce life's building blocks by jolting molecules with electricity, scientists may have found a strange new intermediate state .

Localized electrical fields on the surface of minerals may have had a bigger part in prebiotic chemistry than has been appreciated.

Short-range, localized electric fields on the surface of minerals may have played a part in directing the chemistry that led to the molecules of life, according to this new study. The work does provide ‘new insights into the idea that electrical discharges, for example lightning, could have played a role in the formation of prebiotic molecules on early Earth’.

However, ‘One criticism is that the authors chose to use a somewhat reduced or hydrogen-rich mixture in their study, whereas the atmosphere on early Earth is thought to have been carbon dioxide rich, which could entail very different chemistry in the presence of an electric field. Similar studies on a more realistic prebiotic mixture could yield interesting predictions for future experiments.
http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/2014/09/modelling-points-formamid...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 8:13am

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 8:06am

We will have to think about this:

Radio-collar infection kills tigress in MP

The first tigress in India to be translocated to the wild after being hand-bred was on 19th sept., 2014, found dead of an infection caused by its radio collar at the Panna Tiger Reserve in Madhya Pradesh. T4 had earlier being showcased as the biggest success story of a big-cat breeding experiment.  Can't we be careful?

The radio-collar caused infection around her neck. Rigor mortis set in around the maggot-infested wounds. This is the second incident of collar-related infection. In the first case, we had prior information and timely action was taken to remove the collar. This time, the wound was spotted only during autopsy.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 7:10am

Spoof Nobel prizes that honor the humor in science were handed out at Harvard University on 18th sept. 2014, celebrating the physics of stepping on a banana skin and the neuroscience behind spotting Jesus in toast.

The 24th edition of the annual Ig Nobel Prizes were handed out to winners from across the world by genuine, if baffled, Nobel laureates in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The awards showcase "achievements that first make people laugh, and then make them think," said the organizers. The ceremony at Harvard's Sanders Theatre was attended by hundreds and broadcast live online.

The winners are serious scientists whose work is generally considered only unintentionally funny.
Japanese researchers won the physics prize for measuring the amount of friction between a shoe and a banana skin, and between a banana skin and the floor when a person steps on the discarded fruit peel.

Scientists in China and Canada won a neuroscience prize for trying to understand what happens in the brains of people who see the face of Jesus in a piece of toast.

The authors come from Beijing Jiaotong University's School of Computer and Information Technology, Xidian University, the Institute of Automation Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, and the University of Toronto.

Australia, Britain and the United States shared the psychology prize for collecting evidence that people who habitually stay up late are, on average, more self-admiring, manipulative and psychopathic than early risers.

The public health prize was shared by the Czech Republic, India, Japan and the United States for investigating whether it is mentally hazardous to own a cat.

The Czech Republic also joined Germany and Zambia in winning the biology prize for documenting that when dogs defecate and urinate, they prefer to align their body axis with Earth's north-south geomagnetic field lines.

Italy took the art prize for measuring the relative pain people suffer while looking at an ugly rather than a pretty painting.

The Italian government's National Institute of Statistics walked away with the economics prize for increasing the official size of its national economy by including revenue from prostitution, illegal drug sales, smuggling, and other unlawful financial transactions between willing participants, organizers said.

India and the United States shared the medicine prize for treating "uncontrollable" nosebleeds with strips of cured pork.

Germany and Norway won the Arctic science award for testing how reindeer react to seeing humans who are disguised as polar bears.

And Spanish researchers took home the nutrition prize for a study titled "Characterization of Lactic Acid Bacteria Isolated from Infant Faeces as Potential Probiotic Starter Cultures for Fermented Sausages."

The prize-winners, who travel to collect the awards at their own expense, were given 60 seconds for an acceptance speech, a time limit enforced by an eight-year-old girl.

The ceremony also included the premiere of a mini-opera called "What's Eating You," about people who stop eating food in favor of nourishing themselves exclusively with pills.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 6:45am

QOTD: “I think we risk becoming the best informed society that has ever died of ignorance.” -Reuben Blades

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on September 20, 2014 at 6:10am

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