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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 20, 2014 at 6:16am

Asian Elephants Console Each Other When in Distress
Using trunks and vocalizations, elephants reassure one another when distressed
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/asian-elephants-console-e...

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

Prions Are Key to Preserving Long Term Memories
The famed protein chain reaction that made mad cow disease a terror may be involved in helping to ensure that our recollections don't fade
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/prions-are-key-to-preserv...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 19, 2014 at 9:43am

A Happy Life May Not Be a Meaningful Life
Feeling happy was strongly correlated with seeing life as easy, pleasant, and free from difficult or troubling events. Happiness was also correlated with being in good health and generally feeling well most of the time. However, none of these things were correlated with a greater sense of meaning. Feeling good most of the time might help us feel happier, but it doesn’t necessarily bring a sense of purpose to our lives.
Money, contrary to popular sayings, can indeed buy happiness. Having enough money to buy what one needs in life, as well as what one desires, were also positively correlated with greater levels of happiness. However, people don’t see their lives as more meaningful when they have lot sof money.
Perhaps instead of saying that “money doesn’t buy happiness,” we ought to say instead that “money doesn’t buy meaning.”
More broadly, the findings in the study suggest that pure happiness is about getting what we want in life—whether through people, money, or life circumstances. Meaningfulness, in contrast, seems to have more to do with giving, effort, and sacrifice. It is clear that a highly meaningful life may not always include a great deal of day-to-day happiness. And, the study suggests, obsession with happiness may be intimately related to a feeling of emptiness, or a life that lacks meaning.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-happy-life-may-not-be-a...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 19, 2014 at 9:03am

Why Einstein changed his view on the universe.
Albert Einstein accepted the modern cosmological view that the universe is expanding long after his contemporaries Until 1931, physicist Albert Einstein believed that the universe was static.. An urban legend attributes this change of perspective to when American astronomer Edwin Hubble showed Einstein his observations of redshift in the light emitted by far away nebulae -- today known as galaxies. But the reality is more complex. The change in Einstein's viewpoint, in fact, resulted from a tortuous thought process. Now, in an article published in EPJ H, Harry Nussbaumer from the Institute of Astronomy at ETH Zurich, Switzerland, explains how Einstein changed his mind following many encounters with some of the most influential astrophysicists of his generation. In 1917 Einstein applied his theory of general relativity in the universe, and suggested a model of a homogenous, static, spatially curved universe. However, this interpretation has one major problem: If gravitation was the only active force, his universe would collapse -- an issue Einstein addressed by introducing the cosmological constant.

He then fiercely resisted the view that the universe was expanding, despite his contemporaries' suggestions that this was the case. For example, in 1922, Russian physicist Alexander Friedman showed that Einstein's equations were viable for dynamical worlds. And, in 1927, Georges Lemaître, a Belgian astrophysicist from the Catholic University of Louvain, concluded that the universe was expanding by combining general relativity with astronomical observations. Yet, Einstein still refused to abandon his static universe.

However, in an April 1931 report to the Prussian Academy of Sciences, Einstein finally adopted a model of an expanding universe. In 1932 he teamed up with the Dutch theoretical physicist and astronomer, Willem de Sitter, to propose an eternally expanding universe which became the cosmological model generally accepted until the middle of the 1990s. To Einstein's relief these two models no longer needed the cosmological constant. - Agencies

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 19, 2014 at 8:59am

What Good are Footprints?
http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1113073715/what-good-are-footp...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 19, 2014 at 8:54am

Theory On Origin Of Animals Challenged
Study Suggests High Oxygen Levels Not Required For Complex Life
In sharp contrast to the longstanding belief among scientists that advanced life on Earth was only able to evolve once atmospheric oxygen levels rose to near-modern levels, new research has discovered a small sea sponge which they claim proves that a high concentration is not needed in order for complex creatures to live and grow.
According to the authors of the new study, which appears in Monday’s edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), complex life first evolved when atmospheric levels of oxygen began to increase approximately 630 to 635 million years ago.

However, a sea sponge (a species known as Halichondria panicea )that was fished out of Kerteminde Fjord in Denmark is challenging that theory, as the creature demonstrates that animals are able to grow and thrive with extremely limited oxygen supplies. In fact, they can stay alive when the atmosphere contains just 0.5 percent of the oxygen content of typical modern levels.

“Our studies suggest that the origin of animals was not prevented by low oxygen levels,” and Daniel Mills of the Nordic Center for Earth Evolution at the University of Southern Denmark, who co-wrote the PNAS paper alongside Lewis M. Ward from the Caltech Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences.

“There must have been other ecological and evolutionary mechanisms at play,” Mills said. “Maybe life remained microbial for so long because it took a while to develop the biological machinery required to construct an animal. Perhaps the ancient Earth lacked animals because complex, many-celled bodies are simply hard to evolve.”

http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1113073323/oxygen-high-concent...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 19, 2014 at 8:45am

Outsmarting Nature During Disasters
http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1113073691/outsmarting-nature-...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 18, 2014 at 9:55am

Ganga teeming with deadly superbugs: Study
The Ganga is teeming with multi-drug resistant superbugs, including the deadly NDM-1 virus, and their levels peak during the annual pilgrimage season, says a new study.

Experts from UK's Newcastle University and the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, sampled water and sediments at seven sites along the upper Ganga and found that in May-June , when millions of pilgrims travel to Rishikesh and Haridwar , levels of resistance genes that lead to "superbugs" were about 60 times higher than other times of the year.

The NDM-1 was first identified in New Delhi and coded by the resistant gene blaNDM-1 . Until recently, strains that carry blaNDM-1 were only found in clinical settings or hospitals but in 2008, blaNDM-1 positive strains were found in surface waters in Delhi. Since then, blaNDM-1 has been found elsewhere in the world, including new variants.

By comparing water quality of the upper Ganga in February and again in June, the team showed that levels of blaNDM-1 were 20 times higher per capita during the pilgrimage season than at other times.

Monitoring levels of other contaminants in the water, the study found overloading of waste treatment facilities was likely to blame and that in many cases, untreated sewage was going straight into the river where the pilgrims bathe.

"The bugs and their genes are carried in people's guts," said professor David Graham , an environmental engineer based at Newcastle University who has spent more than 10 years studying the environmental transmission of antibiotic resistance around the world. "If untreated wastes get into the water supply, resistance potential in the wastes can pass to the next person and spiraling increases in resistance can occur."

"This isn't a local problem - it's a global one. We studied pilgrimage areas because we suspected such locations would provide new information about resistance transmission via the environment . And it has - temporary visitors from outside the region overload local waste handling systems, which seasonally reduces water quality at the normally pristine sites," Graham said.

The team says it is important to protect people visiting and living at these sites while also making sure nothing interferes with important religious practices. They argue that preventing the spread of resistance genes that promote life-threatening bacteria could be achieved by improving waste management at key pilgrimage sites.

"What humans have done by excess use of antibiotics is accelerate the rate of evolution , creating a world of resistant strains that never existed before. Through the overuse of antibiotics, contamination of drinking water and other factors, we have exponentially speeded-up the rate at which superbugs might develop. For example, when a new drug is developed , natural bacteria can rapidly adapt and become resistant ; therefore very few new drugs are in the pipeline because it simply isn't cost-effective to make them," Graham said.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/south-asia/Study-Ganges-te...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 18, 2014 at 9:24am

Recently I came across a news paper report that says racism arises in science research: 

According to a Penn State anthropologist, both medical and scientific researchers need to be careful that the growth of genomics does not bring about another resurgence of scientific racism. "What we are facing is a time when genomic knowledge widens and gene engineering will be possible and widespread," said Nina Jablonski, Distinguished Professor of Anthropology. "We must constantly monitor how this information on human gene diversity is used and interpreted. Any belief system that seeks to separate people on the basis of genetic endowment or different physical or intellectual features is simply inadmissible in human society."
people who believe that they can use genetic traits to describe races and to develop race-specific interventions for each group. One particularly disturbing approach, although currently suggested as beneficial, is application of genetics to create special approaches to education. The idea that certain individuals and groups learn differently due to their genetic makeup, and so need specialized educational programs could be the first step in a slippery slope to recreating a new brand of "separate but equal."
Similar approaches in medicine that are based not on personal genetics but on racial generalizations can be just as incorrect and troubling, especially because human genetic admixture is so prevalent.
Scientific racism's long history mandates caution.

Yes, be cautious but this is using science in a bad way. Science is not at fault. This is like saying a knife is 'bad' because it was used in murder! It is the murderer at fault but not the knife!

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 18, 2014 at 9:16am

One factor that makes glioblastoma cancers so difficult to treat is that malignant cells from the tumors spread throughout the brain by following nerve fibers and blood vessels to invade new locations. Now, researchers have learned to hijack this migratory mechanism, turning it against the cancer by using a film of nanofibers thinner than human hair to lure tumor cells away. Instead of invading new areas, the migrating cells latch onto the specially-designed nanofibers and follow them to a location -- potentially outside the brain -- where they can be captured and killed. Using this technique, researchers can partially move tumors from inoperable locations to more accessible ones. Though it won't eliminate the cancer, the new technique reduced the size of brain tumors in animal models, suggesting that this form of brain cancer might one day be treated more like a chronic disease.

Details of the technique were reported February 16 in the journal Nature Materials.

The Atlanta-based researchers decided to take a more engineering approach

Researchers hijack cancer migration mechanism to 'move' brain tumors
http://esciencenews.com/articles/2014/02/17/researchers.hijack.canc...

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