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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 10, 2016 at 11:55am

Steady streams of tiny plastic pieces making their way into the ocean give microbial squatters a place to take up residence. Each plastic home comes equipped with a solid surface to live on in an otherwise watery world. These floating synthetic dwellings and their microbial inhabitants have a name: the plastisphere.
Plastic particles, in concentrations averaging 3500 pieces and 290 grams per square kilometer, are widespread in the western Sargasso Sea. Pieces are brittle, apparently due to the weathering of the plasticizers, and many are in a pellet shape about 0.25 to 0.5 centimeters in diameter. The particles are surfaces for the attachment of diatoms and hydroids. Increasing production of plastics, combined with present waste-disposal practices, will undoubtedly lead to increases in the concentration of these particles. Plastics could be a source of some of the polychlorinated biphenyls recently observed in oceanic organisms.
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/175/4027/1240.abstract

Microbes of the plastisphere live in waters from Australia to Europe. They differ by location, are as varied as the plastic they live on and can be a tasty food option for other creatures. What impact — good or bad — the microbe-covered plastic has on the oceans is still in question. Early hints suggest that there may be climate effects and unexpected movement of harmful microbes or other creatures to new destinations. Each study sparks new ideas and new theories.
More recent estimates put the amount of plastic floating in the world’s oceans at more than 5.25 trillion pieces, weighing more than 268,000 metric tons (SN: 1/24/15, p. 4). That translates to as much as 100,000 pieces per square kilometer in some areas of the ocean.
These microplastics are no bigger than 5 millimeters across and come from many sources. Some are broken bits of larger plastic pieces. Others, such as synthetic fibers from clothing and plastic beads from toothpastes and face washes, escape cleaning filters at wastewater treatment plants and end up in the ocean.
- Science News

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 10, 2016 at 11:06am

Cyanobacteria use micro-optics to sense light direction

Biologists say they have solved the riddle of how a tiny bacterium senses light and moves towards it: the entire organism acts like an eyeball.
In a single-celled pond slime, they observed how incoming rays are bent by the bug's spherical surface and focused in a spot on the far side of the cell.
By shuffling along in the opposite direction to that bright spot, the microbe then moves towards the light.
Other scientists were surprised and impressed by this "elegant" discovery.
Despite being just three micrometres (0.003mm) in diameter, the bacteria in the study use the same physical principles as the eye of a camera or a human.
This makes them "probably the world's smallest and oldest example" of such a lens, the researchers write in the journal eLife.
Cyanobacteria, including the Synechocystis species used in the study, are an ancient and abundant lifeform. They live in water and get their energy from photosynthesis - which explains their enthusiasm for bright light.
http://elifesciences.org/content/5/e12620

http://elifesciences.org/content/5/e14169?utm_source=content_alert&...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 10, 2016 at 6:54am

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The Sun could produce a superflare, study says
It appears that our Sun could be capable of producing a “superflare”, which is a mysterious phenomenon that was discovered by the Kepler space mission four years ago, according to researchers from the Aarhus University. They describe the possibility as “frightening”, since more modest Sun storms, with less power than a superflare, have affected the Earth in previous years.

Solar strikes often reach the Earth, when energetic particles are thrown away from the Sun into Space. When these eruptions interfere with our planet, they generate auroras. However, a different type of eruption called “superflares” that remain a mystery for the scientific community, could cause severe consequences to Earth.

It remained unclear whether the Sun could produce a superflare under the same mechanism it uses to produce a solar flare. An international team led by Christoffer Karoff, from Aarhus University in Denmark, suggests that possibilities are weak, but it is still not impossible.
The Sun has been described as a “dangerous neighbor”. A report published by the team in the journal Nature Communications mentions how a solar eruption of hot plasma reached the Earth in September 1859, creating an aurora and breaking down some radio communications.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 9, 2016 at 7:23am

Eating fortified rice increases the risk of hookworm infections, if you don't practice good hygiene and don't provide clean sanitary conditions for children, a study in Cambodian schoolchildren shows, suggesting that the rice’s added nutrients inadvertently help parasites grow.

The study’s authors warn that the overall health benefits of fortified rice should be weighed against possible health risks.

The researchers analysed faecal samples from about 2,000 children at 16 primary schools that participate in a UN World Food Programme initiative that provides daily meals to schoolchildren. The schools were randomly split into four groups: children in one group ate plain, ‘placebo’ rice, while the other groups received three different types of rice fortified with micronutrients including iron, zinc, folate and different vitamins.
“There is absolutely an important role to play for fortified rice, but it should be tailor-made to the local situation.”

Frank Wieringa, French Research Institute for Development

After three and seven months, the researchers measured levels of intestinal parasite infections. “Micronutrient-fortified rice significantly increased risk of new hookworm infection,” the team writes in a paper published in PLOS One last month (6 January).

The paper rightly emphasises the need for improved hygiene and sanitation “for nutritional intervention to be effective and produce desirable nutritional and health benefits."
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.01...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 9, 2016 at 7:06am

A multi-disciplinary group of researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine (UM SOM) have for the first time determined the genetic makeup of various strains of E. coli, which every year kills hundreds of thousands of people around the world.
The researchers analyzed the genetic differences between the strains and mapped them onto disease outcome. Then, they divided the strains into categories, based on genetic content and clinical outcome.
The paper, which appears in a recent issue of Nature Microbiology, analyzed the DNA of Enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC), which are the strains of the bacteria that cause diarrhea.

The scientists, led by David Rasko, PhD, Associate Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at the Institute for Genome Sciences (IGS) at UM SOM and Michael Donnenberg, MD, Professor of Medicine at UM SOM, identified certain strains that are typically much more lethal than others. The results will help researchers focus efforts to identify, treat and potentially control these more dangerous versions. This could lead to a better understanding of exactly how the bacteria causes damage, and eventually, more effective treatments that could significantly lower the death rate for diarrheal diseases, which are a leading cause of child mortality around the world. It is also is a leading cause of malnutrition in children under five years old.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 6, 2016 at 11:26am

An interesting observation about common people's grasp of the words "Antibiotic Resistance".
Researchers found that most people, if they had heard of antibiotic resistance at all, thought that it was their body which becomes resistant to antibiotics, rather than the bacteria that cause drug-resistant infections. This misconception often makes people feel like antibiotic resistance is someone else's problem!

The misconception could help to explain why many people who are prescribed antibiotics fail to complete the course, believing that this will prevent their bodies from becoming resistant!!

So experts are recommending that  “doctors, the media and other communicators talk about ‘drug-resistant infections’ or ‘antibiotic-resistant germs’, rather than ‘antibiotic resistance’. This makes it easier to understand that it is bacteria that acquire resistance, not people's bodies".

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 6, 2016 at 11:20am

Mothers who are obese during pregnancy have almost twice the odds of having a child with autism as women who weigh less, a U.S. study suggests.
When women are both obese and have diabetes, the autism risk for their child is at least quadrupled, researchers reported online January 29 in Pediatrics.

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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 4, 2016 at 7:06am

Model of Sun's magnetic field:

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2016 at 8:41am

Ocean acidification and warming could affect the culturing of pearls
Pearl aquaculture is big business, particularly in Asia and Australia. But much of it takes place in oceans, which are susceptible to the increasing amounts of carbon dioxide human activity releases into the atmosphere. CO2 from the air gets absorbed by the oceans, which become more acidic as a result. Research has found that pearl oysters produce weaker shells under these conditions, and this could hurt their chances of survival. But in addition to acidity, rising water temperature could also play a role in oyster health.
- Environmental Science & Technology

http://phys.org/news/2016-01-ocean-acidification-affect-culturing-p...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2016 at 8:36am

Occupational exposure to textile dust increases the risk of rheumatoid arthritis: results from a Malaysian population-based case–control study
Lung exposures including cigarette smoking and silica exposure are associated with the risk of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Now scientists say association between textile dust exposure and the risk of RA in the Malaysian population is real whose correctness has been established with a focus on women who rarely smoke.
Results of the study: Occupational exposure to textile dust was significantly associated with an increased risk of developing RA in the Malaysian female population (OR 2.8, 95% CI 1.6 to 5.2). The association between occupational exposure to textile dust and risk of RA was uniformly observed for the ACPA-positive RA (OR 2.5, 95% CI 1.3 to 4.8) and ACPA-negative RA (OR 3.5, 95% CI 1.7 to 7.0) subsets, respectively. We observed a significant interaction between exposure to occupational textile dust and HLA-DRB1 SE alleles regarding the risk of ACPA-positive RA (OR for double exposed: 39.1, 95% CI 5.1 to 297.5; AP: 0.8, 95% CI 0.5 to 1.2).

Conclusions of the study: This is the first study demonstrating that textile dust exposure is associated with an increased risk for RA. In addition, a gene–environment interaction between HLA-DRB1 SE and textile dust exposure provides a high risk for ACPA-positive RA.
http://ard.bmj.com/content/early/2015/11/08/annrheumdis-2015-208278...

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